The following abilities are part of the 1e summoner:
Life Link (Su): Starting at 1st level, a summoner forms a close bond with his eidolon. Whenever the eidolon takes enough damage to send it back to its home plane, the summoner can, as a free action, sacrifice any number of hit points. Each hit point sacrificed in this way prevents 1 point of damage done to the eidolon. This can prevent the eidolon from being sent back to its home plane.
(tether part omitted)
Life Bond (Su): At 14th level, a summoner’s life becomes linked to his eidolon’s. As long as the eidolon has 1 or more hit points, the summoner is protected from harm. Damage in excess of that which would reduce the summoner to fewer than 0 hit points is instead transferred to the eidolon. This damage is transferred 1 point at a time, meaning that as soon as the eidolon is reduced to a number of negative hit points equal to its Constitution score, all excess damage remains with the summoner. Effects that cause death but not damage are unaffected by this ability. This ability does not affect spells like baleful polymorph, flesh to stone, or imprisonment, or other spells that do not cause actual damage.
Which is to say, at level 14 the class basically has a single HP pool already as long as the eidolon is out, since neither will ever go down until both do (there are probably some edge cases where it's tactically better to not use Life Link, but Life Bond isn't optional).
So is this really them doing anything new here? Or is it just making something that functionally happened in 1e explicit?
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The language of life bond is one way. If the summoner is damaged, excess damage is transferred to the eidolon. If the eidolon is damaged and is in danger of dying, the summoner is in no way able to transfer his HP to the eidolon to save it via Life Bond, only via Life Link.
In other words, its the summoners option to save his eidolon, and the eidolon has no choice but to save his master at it's own expense.
PF1e eidolons are minions to be sacrificed, not a friend to save in a mechanics sense.
Dubious Scholar wrote:
Which is to say, at level 14 the class basically has a single HP pool already as long as the eidolon is out, since neither will ever go down until both do (there are probably some edge cases where it's tactically better to not use Life Link, but Life Bond isn't optional).
So is this really them doing anything new here? Or is it just making something that functionally happened in 1e explicit?
This is one of those cases where a lot of rulings were made and then FAQ'd/errata'd away but some original wording never really got changed to better represent the ability.
You can read more here
Functionally though, no; Lifebond was not as limiting nor worked mechanically the same as current 2e shared HP.
Although, it may be the intent from the devs to have simplified Lifelink and Life Bond into one easier-to-comprehend package, which i am not against even if the execution may not have been the best.
-Poison- wrote: You can read more here Darn you! I took a quick look at the link and now I miss the FAQ button on every post all over again... :P
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Undraxis wrote: The language of life bond is one way. If the summoner is damaged, excess damage is transferred to the eidolon. If the eidolon is damaged and is in danger of dying, the summoner is in no way able to transfer his HP to the eidolon to save it via Life Bond, only via Life Link.
In other words, its the summoners option to save his eidolon, and the eidolon has no choice but to save his master at it's own expense.
PF1e eidolons are minions to be sacrificed, not a friend to save in a mechanics sense.
Which is why I prefer the new version of Lifelink.
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I liked the PF1 version of Lifelink so much more since it was a conditional.
I will agree that Life Bond was worded weirdly. But still the mechanics play out much better than the PF2 version where they have the same HP.
The PF2 version just has way too many weird interactions that dont make any thematic sense. While only making game play weird.
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Dubious Scholar wrote:
So is this really them doing anything new here? Or is it just making something that functionally happened in 1e explicit?
I always felt like the thematic ancestry of 2E shared HP was pretty clear, myself - and way less confusing than the 1E implementation.
Its also a pretty good element of helping to keep the class at the effective capability level of "one PC", which the 1E summoner struggled with.
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The way I see it PF1 Summoner was balanced as a PC with a permanent Summonable Companion that was 3/4 its level. They 100% had separare HP, actions, and were never affect by the same effects/conditions unless it targeted them both.
Lifelink and Life Bond did allow a Summoner to share some amount of HP with the Eidolon, on a conditional basis. But the whole thing was set up in such a way that it did not mess with anything but HP. The only weird rules interaction was wether Life Bond works when the Eidolon is dismissed/killed. Which is much simpler to answer than the whole "Share almost everything" they have right now.
Pathfinder Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
I do not like the idea of crit failing and crit saving the same AOE meaning I actually crit failed.
It does NOT feel good imo. They should just take the average damage of AOE as one hit. This would make crit failing and crit succeeding both much more difficult rather than favoring crit failing.
If you split HP, one of the two is still taking all that damage. And they would surely have less HP than 10/level.
Anyway, I fully support Alfa/Polaris' suggestion of making a single roll, with the worse modifier of the two: it's a simpler rule that results in less damage taken, on average.
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Megistone wrote: If you split HP, one of the two is still taking all that damage. Not only that, but if they both crit fail, split hp means they both take double. As it is now, you're only getting that damage once.
I'd much rather "you take a bad hit sometimes" than "you take a bad hit sometimes, but it happens to each individually and takes twice the resources to recover from"
Not sure I understand why people are essentially saying "this mechanic is bad because sometimes I'm unlucky. I want it changed so that it's even worse when I'm unlucky"
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Rysky wrote: Undraxis wrote: The language of life bond is one way. If the summoner is damaged, excess damage is transferred to the eidolon. If the eidolon is damaged and is in danger of dying, the summoner is in no way able to transfer his HP to the eidolon to save it via Life Bond, only via Life Link.
In other words, its the summoners option to save his eidolon, and the eidolon has no choice but to save his master at it's own expense.
PF1e eidolons are minions to be sacrificed, not a friend to save in a mechanics sense.
Which is why I prefer the new version of Lifelink. Both versions deserve representation imho. Both have exemplars in fiction. Personal preference aside, the more options the better.
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I dont see why Eidolon and Summoner can't have 8 HP each. The same as a Rogue.
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Temperans wrote: I dont see why Eidolon and Summoner can't have 8 HP each. The same as a Rogue. Personally, i'd see it better if it was 6+10 rather than 8+8; i think the Summoner should stay the fragile caster she is.
Of course, still being able to contribute when the Eidolon is down.
-Poison- wrote: Temperans wrote: I dont see why Eidolon and Summoner can't have 8 HP each. The same as a Rogue. Personally, i'd see it better if it was 6+10 rather than 8+8; i think the Summoner should stay the fragile caster she is.
Of course, still being able to contribute when the Eidolon is down. I just gave the value the PF1 gave them.
PF1 Summoner was a 3/4 BAB class with 8 HP and light armor proficiency.
The Summoner by itself was mechanically as strong as a Rogue without any class features.
Recent threads in Summoner Class
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