The NPC Zealot of Asmodeus in the Gamemastery Guide has a reaction ability that gives them True Strike. There's no limit mentioned to how often this can happen. The requirement is that an enemy hit a follower of Asmodeus other than the Zealot, and the Zealot gains the True Strike spell against that person.
So if there's a big group of Asmodeus followers with the Zealot, the Zealot could gain True Strike every round, for maybe 10 rounds or more if the fight lasts that long, right? Is there something I'm missing, or is that example totally fine? The Zealot also has the Channel Smite ability which makes this even more brutal. Their Channel Smite does 4d8+4, 8d8+8 on a crit, True Strike makes this crit pretty likely. The Zealot is a 4th level creature able to do Channel Smite 3/day, then maybe keep getting True Strike round after round.
Doesn't seem too bad, honestly. You just need to kill the Zealot first. You might run into some serious trouble if the opposition is nothing but 4 of them or something. But at that point, you're probably like level 6 or 7 and they'll have trouble hitting you even with True Strike.
Also, their Channel Smite is 3d8+4, not 4d8+4. And they have only two harms prepared. Not sure how you get the impression you'd be facing three rounds of 4d8+4 damage. Their non-smite damage is only 1d8+4 which is rather low for a 4th level creature. And Channel Smite is 2 actions which might not always be an option.
So yeah, it has some strong burst potential but I don't think it's that big of a deal.
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4d8+4 is correct if you assume the Zealot is using Magic Weapon, which they generally should be.
That said, the Zealot is interesting. Their default offense without magic or Swear Vengeance if just awful (Moderate attack for Low damage), and Magic Weapon only improves that slightly (Moderate attack for Moderate damage), but with Swear Vengeance they burst to, effectively, Extreme attack bonus and Channel Smite can be used to burst them to Extreme damage.
Combining the two results in a couple of really terrifying attacks, but it's just two attacks if done that way, and if you focus on the Zealot their accuracy buff never kicks in, making even those decently likely to miss.
For comparison, a normal foe is High attack bonus and High damage, meaning that when not using magic (or only using Magic Weapon) the Zealot is behind in both, and they're probably on par when using either Swear Vengeance alone (Extreme attack, Moderate damage) or Channel Smite alone (Moderate attack, Extreme damage). Only when combining the two are they exceeding expected offense for their level, and they pay for that by a highly restricted target selection, and even then only if the PCs cooperate.
Meanwhile, defensively, their AC is solid (very good if they use Raise Shield) and their HP are okay, but their Saves are abysmal (one Moderate, one Low, one Terrible).
It's an interesting monster design, but probably not an overpowered one when looked at as a whole.
I missed Magic Weapon. My bad.
But that's one turn wasted. Since he casts True Strike as a reaction, the Zealot probably doesn't start Smiting before turn 2 anyway so spending turn 1 to cast Magic Weapon isn't that big of a deal. On the other hand, by the time he can used his first Smite, either he or his friends have a good chance to be dead.
He's also rather slow at 20 ft Speed. If you know his shtick you can just run away after you hit his friend and he uses his Reaction for True Strike. It's unlikely that he can close th distance to you and still have 2 actions left for Smite.
Maybe just a nitpick, but still, worth mentioning:
If a strike does 4d8+4, it doesn't do 8d8+8 on a crit.
It does (4d8+4)x2 on a crit. A subtle difference, but an important one to remember and get used to when starting to play Pathfinder 2.
Cheers
To nitpick your nitpick:
The game is actually fine with either method by RAW. Doubling the result is the base line but rolling twice is an alternative mentioned in the rules and subject to GM discretion.
Sometimes you’ll need to halve or double an amount of damage, such as when the outcome of your Strike is a critical hit, or when you succeed at a basic Reflex save against a spell. When this happens, you roll the damage normally, adding all the normal modifiers, bonuses, and penalties. Then you double or halve the amount as appropriate (rounding down if you halved it). The GM might allow you to roll the dice twice and double the modifiers, bonuses, and penalties instead of doubling the entire result, but this usually works best for single-target attacks or spells at low levels when you have a small number of damage dice to roll. Benefits you gain specifically from a critical hit, like the flaming weapon rune’s persistent fire damage or the extra damage die from the fatal weapon trait, aren’t doubled.
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I would avoid using these zealot in a dangerous encounter because their attacks are extremely random and as such they can one shot a character at round one and create a real mess right off the bat. But I think they are really nice in low/trivial encounters. They can create a feeling of danger in a fight that isn't hard the same way a scythe-wielding low level enemy was always scary in PF1.
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I would avoid using these zealot in a dangerous encounter because their attacks are extremely random and as such they can one shot a character at round one and create a real mess right off the bat. But I think they are really nice in low/trivial encounters. They can create a feeling of danger in a fight that isn't hard the same way a scythe-wielding low level enemy was always scary in PF1.
I don't know if I'd quite agree. I think they're fine to put in a difficult encounter...vs. 6th level PCs. It's vs. PCs of lower level than that where you get into the issue of their swinginess causing people to fall down immediately, rather than whether the encounter is easy or difficult by the rules.
So I agree with the need to be careful, but I'd say it's more tied to PC level than encounter difficulty per se.
So if there's a big group of Asmodeus followers with the Zealot, the Zealot could gain True Strike every round, for maybe 10 rounds or more if the fight lasts that long, right? Is there something I'm missing, or is that example totally fine?
If it's an encounter with that many enemies, then the players are probably capable of taking out multiple per round, so this isn't as much of an issue.
Some of you are forgetting how the XP budgets restrict encounters. Pathfinder 2 operates under significantly more restrictive encounter creation guidelines than just about any other version of D&D.
Rules like that are the first up against the wall. They are just a guide to get you going. After the first couple of sessions I ignore them completey.
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Rules like that are the first up against the wall. They are just a guide to get you going. After the first couple of sessions I ignore them completey.
Which is 100% fair; as long as any GM who ignores them then never complains about system difficulty/balance from that perspective.
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Some of you are forgetting how the XP budgets restrict encounters.
For the record, I was taking this into account.
I just think that two Zealots vs. a 4th level party (a Moderate Encounter), or similar things, is going to be notably swingier (as in, have more variance in how hurt the PCs get by it) than most equivalent XP encounters. It's not harder, but does strike me as swingier in its results, including the possibility of a PC going down to a single crit (it's not super likely, but that sort of thing is outright impossible in most equivalent encounters not involving a boss by level 4).
It's not that it's a bad monster to use, just a good one to be careful with due to how bursty they damage is.
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Sure, but once you're used to the system that's an expected result of Level+2 enemies. On level enemies usually aren't swingy enough to result in that, but Zealots can be and are thus to be used more carefully than other on-level opponents. That's really all I'm saying.
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2e's encounter guidelines free up my encounter creations, because I can rely on them.
Thanks for the feedback, it seems most people think I'm overrating them a bit.
The encounter is for a group of 4 level 5 PC's, and is going to be 3 Zealots and 4 Cultists.
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Thanks for the feedback, it seems most people think I'm overrating them a bit.
The encounter is for a group of 4 level 5 PC's, and is going to be 3 Zealots and 4 Cultists.
I mean, that is a Severe encounter with some hard hitting foes. It's gonna be rough, but yeah, Zealots probably aren't rougher to use than, say, three Shadows or three Weretigers (to pick some other level 4 monsters).
Which is 100% fair; as long as any GM who ignores them then never complains about system difficulty/balance from that perspective.Rules like that are the first up against the wall. They are just a guide to get you going. After the first couple of sessions I ignore them completey.
I'm not sure I ever have. Relative balance, or useless features I'll complain about. But my main group are so ruthlessly efficient, the GM just has to crank it up a bit from the official guidelines to challenge them.
Another group I'm in is the complete opposite - the barbarian is wielding a rapier as a primary weapon because it suits his concept. It gets into trouble now and then because the GM there runs his monsters super efficiently.
I had overlooked the zealot of Asmodeus before. But, it would be fun to put them in an encounter I'm running.
Party is four (or five) level 8 PCs.
Right now the encounter is one level 9 Champion (tyrant, hellknight) and two (or three) Barbazu (level 5 creature) for a slightly harder than Moderate challenge.
Should I just add three (or four) zealots to make it a Severe encounter? Or bump up their level to 5 or 6 and only add one or two to the encounter?