Throwing 2 perpetual bombs in a turn?

[Gaulin]

I've found a few similar threads on this subject, but far from a consensus, so I wanted to bring it up again. I'm looking at building an alchemist and there are a few situations that are a little squiggly. I would like to find a way to create and throw two perpetual bombs in the same turn.

First off, there is the debate that double brew/alchemical alacrity don't work for perpetual infusions, as they say "When using the Quick Alchemy action, instead of spending one batch of infused reagents to create a single item" and perpetual doesn't spend any infused reagents. So that's a possible way but I wouldn't rely on it if players are split on how it works.

Second is using a familiar. With lab assistant, your familiar should be able to spend a couple actions to create a couple things. Some hangups here - can it use perpetual infusions, can it add additives to said infusions, and how would the action economy work with handing the bombs to the pc? I would thing that even if the familiar could send two actions to make two bombs, the pc would have to spend two actions to grab said bombs. So this one may be a wash as well.

I'm pretty new to building alchemists and don't know all the ins and outs. If there's something else I'm missing I would love to hear it!

[Aw3som3-117]

Gaulin wrote:

I've found a few similar threads on this subject, but far from a consensus, so I wanted to bring it up again. I'm looking at building an alchemist and there are a few situations that are a little squiggly. I would like to find a way to create and throw two perpetual bombs in the same turn.

First off, there is the debate that double brew/alchemical alacrity don't work for perpetual infusions, as they say "When using the Quick Alchemy action, instead of spending one batch of infused reagents to create a single item" and perpetual doesn't spend any infused reagents. So that's a possible way but I wouldn't rely on it if players are split on how it works.

Unfortunately you're right, it may not be the best idea to rely on a correct reading of the rules to be applied in a game, and I would talk to your GM ahead of time if this is for a non-PFS game. I am not saying what I believe to be correct, as that is not the purpose of this thread, and you seem to not want to get into that here.

Gaulin wrote:

Second is using a familiar. With lab assistant, your familiar should be able to spend a couple actions to create a couple things. Some hangups here - can it use perpetual infusions, can it add additives to said infusions, and how would the action economy work with handing the bombs to the pc? I would thing that even if the familiar could send two actions to make two bombs, the pc would have to spend two actions to grab said bombs. So this one may be a wash as well.

I'm pretty new to building alchemists and don't know all the ins and outs. If there's something else I'm missing I would love to hear it!

Unfortunately this is, at least IMO, far less clear than how double batch interacts with perpetual infusions, so I doubt you'll get consensus here. Personally I would say that it can't use anything other than the basic quick alchemy action and things that affect it's "cost and requirement", as those are called out to work as if you were using the action. This would mean being able to use perpetual infusions, but not the free actions with the additive trait, since those are completely separate actions from quick alchemy that you can use on top of the normal quick alchemy action. I wouldn't be surprised if others disagree with this ruling, though. In fact, I'd say there are at least a couple other valid readings of the lab assistant ability.

Finally, regarding your question of action economy I'm going to assume you have the Quick Bomber feat, which says:

Quick Bomber wrote:

You keep your bombs in easy-to-reach pouches from which you draw without thinking. You Interact to draw a bomb, then Strike with it.

The Interact action, for reference:

Interact wrote:

You use your hand or hands to manipulate an object or the terrain. You can grab an unattended or stored object, open a door, or produce some similar effect. You might have to attempt a skill check to determine if your Interact action was successful.

Now, a bomb held by a familiar is certainly not unattended, but I think most GMs would be lenient in it counting as a similarly easy to access item for the purposes of the feat. YMMV

[Gaulin]

Thank you for your points. I agree with everything you've said.

After thinking about it, even though it isn't raw, it would be pretty silly to not allow quick bomber to work by grabbing bombs from a familiar. Taking something out of your pockets is more difficult than taking something someone is holding out for you to grab, I would think. Shame about your familiar not being able to use additives, but it was a bit of a stretch for that to work. It does take away most of the strengths of using perpetual infusions, not adding additives, but that's the trade off I suppose.

[Alchemic_Genius]

I would definitely talk to your DM first about the perpetuals and double brew/alacrity. The interaction between these two effects is very much unclear. I'd err on the side of caution though and be ready to here the DM take the more legalistic interpretation that they don't work together.

As far as the familiar thing, as written, there's no actual rules for handing off items, so thats very much an "ask your dm" thing as well.

Tbh though, the second bomb you throw is practically garanteed to only do splash damage through. Since you dont have much in the way of gear you need to buy (since you make all of your stuff), and still want to chuck 2 bombs, buying some level 1 bombs isn't the worst idea; they quickly become chump change for a not half bad filler action, since I'm assuming you have calculated splash and such

[breithauptclan]

There is the Toolbearer familiar ability as well. That will let you grab tools from the familiar for no action cost.

Personally I would probably include that as part of the Lab Assistant ability so that you could collect the stuff that the familiar created.

If a GM wanted to be a bit more strict about the rules, I could easily see creating an ability similar to Toolbearer that does let you grab items from the familiar for no action cost. That doesn't seem like an out-of-line homebrew ability.

[Gaulin]

I think, for myself, I'll just go with throwing one a turn. Some might think it's silly but I tend to err on the side of caution when it comes to rules, taking the less powerful ruling.

I wonder how a single perpetual thrown bomb stacks up against a cantrip of a similarly leveled PC? There's probably too many factors to really make that comparison (bombs deal damage to an area, depends on what feats you have, have strange item scaling) but it would be fun to dive into maybe. I've seen comparisons to bomber versus martial that was very interesting, but that was taking into account consumable bombs, not the perpetual versions.

[Aw3som3-117]

Gaulin wrote:

I think, for myself, I'll just go with throwing one a turn. Some might think it's silly but I tend to err on the side of caution when it comes to rules, taking the less powerful ruling.

I wonder how a single perpetual thrown bomb stacks up against a cantrip of a similarly leveled PC? There's probably too many factors to really make that comparison (bombs deal damage to an area, depends on what feats you have, have strange item scaling) but it would be fun to dive into maybe. I've seen comparisons to bomber versus martial that was very interesting, but that was taking into account consumable bombs, not the perpetual versions.

For the record, whether it's possible to do two in a turn or not I think it's a better comparison to talk about one per turn when comparing it to a cantrip, since most cantrips are 2 actions and free up one action for moving, casting a one action spell, etc. This is similar to quick alchemy + throw 1 bomb. It's just that you can use that 3rd action to do another attack with an alchemist (at -5 MAP) if your GM allows it. So, it's kind of just another option for that 3rd action. Not that that's not important, as it's a pretty good third action to do. I'm just trying to put things into perspective.

[Gaulin]

For sure, that's basically what I mean. If a pc could only throw one perpetual bomb a turn, how would that stack up to a cantrip.

[Staffan Johansson]

Gaulin wrote:

For sure, that's basically what I mean. If a pc could only throw one perpetual bomb a turn, how would that stack up to a cantrip.

There are a number of variables that make it hard to determine, but on a single target I think they're slightly worse, but not as much worse off as it seems at first glance.. Let's use Telekinetic Projectile as a baseline, and assume Calculated Splash (splash damage = Int bonus) at level 4 and Expanded Splash (splash damage = regular + Int bonus) at level 10.

Level 7:
Telekinetic Projectile – 4d6+stat
Perpetual Lesser Alchemist's Fire – 1d8+stat* +1 perpetual

Level 11:
Telekinetic Projectile – 6d6+stat
Perpetual Moderate Alchemist's Fire – 2d8+stat+2 +2 persistent

Level 17:
Telekinetic Projectile – 9d6+stat
Perpetual Greater Alchemist's Fire – 3d8+stat+3 +3 persistent

The attack bonuses will be roughly equivalent, assuming the alchemist starts with Int 18/Dex 16, the caster starts with 18 in their casting stat, they both increase their stats with every boost (except the alchemist at level 20 because hitting 21 doesn't help), and the caster gets an apex item at level 17. Without Alchemist's Goggles, the caster will be ahead on some levels and they'll be equal on others, and with them the situation will be reversed (Goggles are a bit of an iffy item for alchemists, because their good bombs will have better inherent item bonuses, though it's still neat to have the basic version to avoid cover bonuses to AC).

Against a single target, the caster's damage will be higher on a hit, but this is somewhat compensated for by the alchemist still dealing splash damage on a miss. Against multiple targets, the extra splash damage can add up – unless the opponents are in melee with your buddies and you play it safe, only dealing splash damage to the primary target.

The alchemist has the advantage of inflicting conditions on a hit: minor persistent damage with fire, major persistent damage with acid (at the cost of low direct damage), flat-footed with lightning, and speed penalties with cold. A caster generally needs to crit with a cantrip in order to inflict a condition.

Bombs have a longer potential range than most cantrips: 20 ft range increment versus 30 ft max range. Some cantrips have a longer range, but then that's pretty much their special thing.

I was going to put ease of access to different damage types as an advantage for the alchemist, but on second thought, no. We're comparing their perpetual bombs here, and they only get two of those, and I think it's fairly common for casters to have two different damaging cantrips. On the whole, that's an advantage, but not for their at-will options.

Of course, there's the elephant in the room: Electric Arc. It pretty much blows bombs out of the water, at least damage-wise. It hits two targets, who don't need to be adjacent. It deals half damage on a failed save, which is generally better than splash damage. There are some subtle disadvantages, the main one being that it deals electrical damage which pretty much nothing has a weakness to.

For damage-dealing, I'm thinking a magic weapon is probably at least on par with, and likely better than, perpetual bombs. Perpetual bombs do have the advantage of being great for making debilitating bombs, though.