Hey guys, so im playing a GolemArm Magus, which means i'm basically a cyborg with a pair of metal prosthetic arms. And my arms count as part of my body AND targetable weapons (yes I've had an arm Sundered once). Because it isn't stated in the Rules the GM decided it takes 5 minutes to remove an arm and 5 minutes to attach an arm. (I have multiple arms made of different special materials and he doesn't want me switching mid battle). So i cant just drop my weapon whenever i want to since my weapon is my golem arms.
Anyway we have some persistent rivals who keep hitting me with Heat Metal and Chill Metal spells and i cant drop my arm/weapon to negate the damage.
So I want a ring that grants immunity or resistance to those 2 spells specifically since blanket Cold and Fire resistance is too expensive right now. Does anyone know what the market price for such a ring would be?
A ring of counterspells can handle one of those and costs 4K. It has more uses than just those two spells of course; a magic item which could handle both, but only those would be worth about the same IMO.
What level are you guys? What kind of budget do you have to work with?
I had trouble finding your class on AoN. Is this your class? I know names can be different depending on which website you use.
Magus Jistkan Artificer
Resist Energy would be enough to resist the damage from chill/heat metal. The hard part is guessing which energy type to use before battle. In battle, you would have time to figure it out and cast the right version, but doing that means your caster is not attacking the enemy when protecting you.
Since you mention that your rivals use chill/heat metal, those are second level spells, so you and they are probably at least 3rd or 4th level characters. This probably means a single character has a net worth of 6000 gp. Not good if you want magic items.
A ring of lesser energy resistance is 12000 gp and will protect you from 10 damage of what ever energy type it is set to. Again, you have to pick energy type and hope you choose right. If your rivals find out you have such a ring, they could counter by changing which energy type they use.
Can you make your golem arms out of some other material? Perhaps wood? Though that means your arms could be subject to warp wood (also a 2nd level druid spell), thus ruining them. You would need a friendly druid to undo the warping.
Disguise self to not look like a person with metal arms? Hat of disguise.
OmniMage wrote: What level are you guys? What kind of budget do you have to work with?
I had trouble finding your class on AoN. Is this your class? I know names can be different depending on which website you use.
Magus Jistkan Artificer
Resist Energy would be enough to resist the damage from chill/heat metal. The hard part is guessing which energy type to use before battle. In battle, you would have time to figure it out and cast the right version, but doing that means your caster is not attacking the enemy when protecting you.
Since you mention that your rivals use chill/heat metal, those are second level spells, so you and they are probably at least 3rd or 4th level characters. This probably means a single character has a net worth of 6000 gp. Not good if you want magic items.
A ring of lesser energy resistance is 12000 gp and will protect you from 10 damage of what ever energy type it is set to. Again, you have to pick energy type and hope you choose right. If your rivals find out you have such a ring, they could counter by changing which energy type they use.
Can you make your golem arms out of some other material? Perhaps wood? Though that means your arms could be subject to warp wood (also a 2nd level druid spell), thus ruining them. You would need a friendly druid to undo the warping.
Artificer? Isn't that PAthfinder 2E? We are playing 1E. An i did misslabel my class. I am an GolemFIST Magus: https://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/base-classes/magus/archetypes/paizo-magus- archetypes/golemfist-magus-archetype/
No i cant make them out of wood. Technically they count in most ways as heavy maces which count as unarmed attacks. So i have to make them out of things you could make a heavy mace out of. Party level is 4 right now. And i wear leather armor so my arms are the only significant thing they can target. But i figure having an item with negates a specific spell has to be cheaper than a blanket energy resist.
Yes the GOLEMFIST is the same archetype as the JISTKAN ARTIFICER.
The D20PFSRD site doesn't have permission to use licenced content. The name "Jistkan" can't be used, so they changed it to "Golemfist".
It should be possible to craft an arm with wood affected by the IRONWOOD spell, though you're then susceptible to wood-affecting spells.
This is a total maximum of 32 points of damage over 7 rounds (or an average of 20 points) broken down as follows:
- Round 1 = 0
- Round 2 = 1d4
- Round 3 = 2d4
- Round 4 = 2d4
- Round 5 = 2d4
- Round 6 = 1d4
- Round 7 = 0
Are your combats lasting that long?
Otherwise, and because the way you're using the arms and their removal time, is already such a houserule, I would think it reasonable to split the difference 50:50 between cold and fire damage on a minor ring of energy resistance giving you resist 5 against both.
You've also already said that blanket energy resistance would be too expensive.
What level are you?
What are your HP like?
What's your Will save like?
That said, your DM both made up the time it takes to switch arms and decided to target you with the spell on a regular basis. I'm not sure you're going to get much help from a homebrew and houserule forum to fix it. Seems like he just wants this to happen.
Wear long sleeves and gloves so they don't know your arms are metal?
The cat is already out of the bag... the enemies already know who/what is in the party... even if it is not the exact same enemies every time, information is clearly being shared.
Honestly... I don't know if the GM is messing with you, or just trying to add another element of gameplay to your chosen archetype. But if your arms are getting Sundered, and nobody else's weapons have been targeted with Sunder or Heat Metal... then the GM is metagaming against you. If you are cool with and it is fun, neat. But this sounds like the GM is picking on you for having metal arms.
Immersion in water negates the damage of Chill Metal and halves the damage of Heat Metal. Perhaps make a ring the delivers Create Water CL 3 to sheathe your limbs when you fail a Will save? Of course, this has the added effect of turning to ice if you're suffering Chill Metal or boiling hot steam if you're suffering Heat Metal, but maybe you can use this to your advantage (see below).
Another alternative to resisting the spells is to lean into it.
Retrain your PC for Grappling feats. Develop a strategy for quick movement through your spells and clever placement in battle. Heat Metal/Chill metal require Close range and line of sight to you, so you might be within, say, 40' of your foes when they target you.
Voluntarily fail the Will save and make a Charge ending with a Grapple effect on the rival caster. If successful, do nothing but grappling against that opponent for the remainder of the fight. Deliver unto them whatever suffering you feel!
Last but not least, consider Touch spells. A like amount of damage of the opposing element will cancel one round's worth of damage against the Heat/Chill metal spell. So, if you have Chill Touch keyed up and cast that after failing a save against Heat Metal for example, you can affect yourself with a Touch attack to deliver 1d6 +1 Cold damage to try an negate that much heat damage to yourself for as many rounds as you've got charges with one casting of that spell.
Oh, that's actually another way to go. Use your 6th level Magus Arcana to get yourself a Familiar. Options here would include:
1. a Sage familiar: with the right build and the expense of one of your own feats you can make these creatures powerful wand wielders. Get a wand of Resist Energy or some other means of negating these spells and you're covered
2. an Emissary familiar: they cast Guidance on you at will but more importantly, at 3rd level you can use your familiar to reroll one Will save per day
3. a Mascot familiar: this one's a little complicated. At 3rd level and every 3 levels after they can select one of your allies to add to their "team." By 5th level they get Share Spells with anyone on the team and at 7th level a Mascot familiar can deliver the Touch spells of anyone on the team. Both of these powers are considered the original Caster's level -2, but still since you're picking up the familiar at 6th level, by 7th level you could have another ally (say, a Cohort?) casting the necessary spell and the Mascot delivering it
That's just 4 ways to go. Personally I REALLY like the idea of being a grappling master and turning the energy damage back on your enemies, but that's just me!
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Two hats of disguise.
One for you and one for an ally to look like each other. That way even if enemies have been told there's a guy with metal arms or what the party consists of, they'll target the wrong guy and waste a spell and action.
Mark Hoover 330 wrote: Another alternative to resisting the spells is to lean into it.
Retrain your PC for Grappling feats.
...
Voluntarily fail the Will save and make a Charge ending with a Grapple effect on the rival caster.
Just FYI, you can't make a Grapple at the end of a charge. A grapple is a standard action, not a replacement for an attack.
However, if you're willing to dip: the CONSTABLE Cavalier archetype lets you grapple on a charge.
Mark Hoover 330 wrote: Last but not least, consider Touch spells. ... Chill Touch ... 1d6 +1 Cold damage ... CHILL TOUCH doesn't deal cold damage, I assume you meant FROSTBITE.
I think the Familiar stuff might be the best advice =)
Pizza Lord wrote: Two hats of disguise.
One for you and one for an ally to look like each other.
Actually this is probably the best advice
Unfortunately, them being 4th level characters limits them to a budget of 6000 gp each. A hat of disguise is 1800 gp, which would be more than a quarter of their wealth. So I wouldn't recommend it.
They could use magic spells to disguise themselves, like disguise self and alter self, but they are personal spells so you could only trade places with another spell caster. The duration of them is not very long, so it might only work if they had some time to prepare for a confrontation.
I still recommend that a caster friend be ready to cast resist energy for when the golem arm magus gets targeted by heat/chill metal. Unfortunately, its a spell that a magus does not have.
One thing I just thought is to check your GM is playing this correctly and giving you a save vs the spell.
Saving Throw Will negates (object)
Unattended, nonmagical metal gets no saving throw. Magical metal is allowed a saving throw against the spell. An item in a creature's possession uses the creature's saving throw bonus unless its own is higher.
So your arm is both attended and magical, meaning you definitely get a saving throw. This is in fact simply a reiteration of the general rules in objects and saving throws ...
Saving Throws: Nonmagical, unattended items never make saving throws. They are considered to have failed their saving throws, so they are always fully affected by spells and other attacks that allow saving throws to resist or negate. An item attended by a character (being grasped, touched, or worn) makes saving throws as the character (that is, using the character’s saving throw bonus).
Magic items always get saving throws. A magic item’s Fortitude, Ref lex, and Will save bonuses are equal to 2 + half its caster level. An attended magic item either makes saving throws as its owner or uses its own saving throw bonus, whichever is better.
... so if you're not getting a saving throw vs these spells you should be getting one. If you are getting saving throws already then maybe your best bet is to increase your saves - a +1 Cloak of Resistance is a fantastic purchase, and will help you avoid this spell if you don't already have one.
MrCharisma wrote: Mark Hoover 330 wrote: Another alternative to resisting the spells is to lean into it.
Retrain your PC for Grappling feats.
...
Voluntarily fail the Will save and make a Charge ending with a Grapple effect on the rival caster.
Just FYI, you can't make a Grapple at the end of a charge. A grapple is a standard action, not a replacement for an attack.
However, if you're willing to dip: the CONSTABLE Cavalier archetype lets you grapple on a charge.
Mark Hoover 330 wrote: Last but not least, consider Touch spells. ... Chill Touch ... 1d6 +1 Cold damage ... CHILL TOUCH doesn't deal cold damage, I assume you meant FROSTBITE.
I think the Familiar stuff might be the best advice =) I'm beginning to psychologically fear any thread where I see MrCharisma has posted after I've posted.
Thanks again for correcting my obvious blunders. How have I played this game for over TEN YEARS and still make such obvious mistakes? Anyway, I still think making a Move action and then Grappling (not Charge then Grapple unless Cavalier) was an elegant solution. "Oh, you want me to freeze/char from having these arms? How do YOU like it!?"
Sorry =P
We all have our strengths. I remembered those rules, but I'm rubbish with familiars. I think they were good solutions, but I didn't really critique them because I honestly wouldn't know where to start.
But yes I agree with you about grappling. Actually, something like Arcane Accuracy could make you a pretty decent grappler. You'll still want Improved Grapple to avoid the AoO (or cast Long Arm), but you should be able to get pretty decent bonuses. If you can get your attack bonus high enough you can grapple while fighting defensively, which increases your Touch AC - and therefore your CMD - making it harder for the enemy to escape the grapple.
@MrC: what about Enlarge Person instead? +2 Str, -1 Size penalty on all attack rolls, but because of Size Large (assuming the Magus begins at Medium) they get a +1 on all Combat Maneuvers... working out to a net +1 to the attack? So, their arms would deal more base damage and have a higher Str score, they'd get 10' Reach, but their AC would go down. Also Enlarge Person is a Magus 1 spell. Is Longarm better because no -1 to AC?
Mark Hoover 330 wrote: @MrC: what about Enlarge Person instead? +2 Str, -1 Size penalty on all attack rolls, but because of Size Large (assuming the Magus begins at Medium) they get a +1 on all Combat Maneuvers... working out to a net +1 to the attack? So, their arms would deal more base damage and have a higher Str score, they'd get 10' Reach, but their AC would go down. Also Enlarge Person is a Magus 1 spell. Is Longarm better because no -1 to AC? The main drawback of Enlarge Person is the casting time. 1 round means it takes until the beginning of your following turn to cast, which means any enemy attacks force a concentration check. It also means it's not compatible with Spell Combat.
Having said that, Enlarge Person would actually be better for Grappling. The size penalty to attacks is replaced by a size bonus to combat maneuvers rather than being added to the penalty, so you get a net +2 to your CMB (+1 from STR and +1 from the size bonus). It also gives a defensive size bonus for a net +1 to CMD as well (the +STR and -DEX cancel out). So if you have time to cast it that's +2 to your CMB checks and +1 to the DC for enemies to escape the grapple.
If you want to get around the 1-round casting time I recommend buying a couple of potions. It'll only last 1 minute, but potions only take a standard action to drink. Obviously if you have time to pre-buff the longer duration is better, but for emergency enlargement a 50gp potion is a steal, and will last till the end of the encounter.
Just carry two buckets of water to drop your arms into for half damage, a bucket is only a few cp...
However, the spell states "Target: metal equipment..."
Technically your arms are not equipment, they are a body part, and shouldn't be targetable....
*Thelith wrote: Technically your arms are not equipment, they are a body part, and shouldn't be targetable.... I'm not 100% sure about. To be clear I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm actually not sure ...
Golem Arm:
A Jistkan artificer begins play with a golem arm grafted in place of one of his arms. The golem arm is a masterwork weapon that is treated as an unarmed strike ...
A Jistkan artificer can recreate his golem arm from other materials ...
For the purposes of determining the weapon type and weight for special materials, the golem arm is treated as a heavy mace.
Empowered Arm:
At 3rd level, a Jistkan artificer’s golem arm is treated as a magic weapon ...
(There's some reference to weapons in the unique arcana, but they seem less about how to treat the arm and more about changing damage tyoe, so I ommited them.)
That's all the references I could find as to whether it's counted as a weapon that can be sundered or as an unarmed strike.
What do people think?
Although that did make me think of this:
Truedragon wrote: And my arms count as part of my body AND targetable weapons (yes I've had an arm Sundered once). Just make sure you remember that you can attack with your non-golem arm as well ...
Golem Arm: At 1st level, a Jistkan artificer can use his arcane pool to enhance his unarmed strikes as if they were manufactured weapons.
Improved Unarmed Strike: A Jistkan artificer gains Improved Unarmed Strike as a bonus feat.
Also, your Arm's special materials and enhancement bonuses add to it's hardness amd hitpoints ...
One-handed metal-hafted weapon: Hardness-10, Hitpoints-20 (This is where a Heavy Mace would be).
Add +2 <Hardness> for each +1 enhancement bonus of magic items.
Add 10 hp for each +1 enhancement bonus of magic items.
As a level 4 character your arm is automatically a +1 weapon so it should have 12 Hardness and 30HP as a default, and (assuming temporary bonuses increase these stats) should have 14 Hardness and 40HP while enhanced by your Arcane Pool.
Also remember that energy attacks and rsnged weapons deal half damage to objects, and that the "half damage" is calculated before applying Hardness (So if someone does 30 damage to your Golem Arm with a Fire attack you take half that damage - 15 damage - and then subtract the Hardness of your weapon from the damage - 15-12=3 damage).
Enemies sundering your arm should be VERY difficult to do ... unless *Thelith is correct, in which case it can't be sundered by the rules.
MrCharisma wrote: One thing I just thought is to check your GM is playing this correctly and giving you a save vs the spell.
*snip*
Good catch. I was recently thinking "Wait a minute. Don't characters get saving throws against spells?". Chill/Heat Metal, in this circumstance, seems to do more damage than a burning hands or acid arrow. And the GM wasn't allowing, or hadn't considered allowing a saving throw. That wasn't right. I was going to recommend a fort save, but a will save would work fine too, I guess.
Well the OP didn't say whether a save was allowed, I was just double-checking. If there's no save then that's bull, but if you've just been unlucky with your saves then it sucks for you but oh well.
I do think Carrauntoohil had a point though - if you're the only PC being targeted with spells this specific to you -or with sunder attacks - then the GM is arbitrarily targeting you. That may not be a BAD thing, if you know you're the main target you can up your defences and make life easier fir your party by being a punching bag, but only if that sounds fun for you.
If you're not having fun with it and the GM's targeting you more than the other PCs it's worth having a conversation with the GM between sessions.
*Thelith wrote: ...
However, the spell states "Target: metal equipment..."
Technically your arms are not equipment, they are a body part, and shouldn't be targetable....
Technically...
What the spell states is:
Heat Metal wrote: Target: metal equipment of one creature per two levels, no two of which can be more than 30 ft. apart, or 25 lbs. of metal/level, all of which must be within a 30-ft. circle So even if it wasn't considered equipment, it would still be metal and would still be targetable. The only difference might be in mass or amount affected.
Targeting a creature's equipment (which I would consider this item to be), would allow it to affect an item of any size or mass (reasonably speaking, obviously). That means you could target a Cloud Giant's Plate armor, regardless of whether it was within the 25 lbs/level. Otherwise, you can target other metal in the area of up to 25 lbs./level (basically 75 lbs at this spell's minimum caster level), such as a metal door, or a metal plate on the floor.
So there's no questioning whether the spell would work on the metal arm or be targetable, whether your GM rules them equipment or not (unless he rules it 'not', and it's over the weight limit, but if you've got a 75+ lb (minimum) arm dangling from your shoulder, that's a whole other situation and probably bad posture).
I read that as unattended metal by weight. If it's attended, it has to be equipment, why would it differentiate metal by weight vs equipment if it wasn't stipulating that it's "equipment on a creature" vs "random unattended metal, up to weight X".
I'm not 100% sure on the grammar there (would we need a semicolon?) but I also don't think this spell is defining "equipment" that specifically here. In general terms "equipment" means anything and everything you carry with you, so they wouldn't have thought to add "plus any prosthetics you might have".
This is a very specific class feature that likely isn't covered by the rules in every scenario, and I think in this case the GM has made the right call by saying the arm counts for a spell like these ones.
As to how they apply those rules, that's what we're scrutinizing.
Considering it's automatic max damage if it's a weapon and as a way to bypass that damage you can just drop it, I don't think it's intended to be used on body parts. I wouldn't allow this against a creature made of metal as you can't target a creature, merely their equipment. Same for a prosthetic.
Why is it max damage? Did I miss something?
Besides that you have a good point. If it wouldn't target metal creatures it also shouldn't target partially-metal creatures.
MrCharisma wrote: Why is it max damage? Did I miss something?
Besides that you have a good point. If it wouldn't target metal creatures it also shouldn't target partially-metal creatures.
A creature takes fire damage if its equipment is heated. It takes full damage if its armor, shield, or weapon is affected. The creature takes minimum damage (1 point or 2 points; see the table) if it’s not wearing or wielding such an item.
I read full damage as max, but maybe it's just clarifying that you roll as normal and take that much, and if it's not one of those three types you only take 1 damage per 1d4.
*Thelith wrote: I read full damage as max, but maybe it's just clarifying that you roll as normal ... Yes, full damage just means the normal spread of damage potential. It would use the term 'maximum' if it meant the highest possible amount.
Is it possible that there's a spell or ability where the author made a mistake and it wasn't caught? Possibly
MrCharisma wrote: Besides that you have a good point. If it wouldn't target metal creatures it also shouldn't target partially-metal creatures. But we do know the spell can target creatures. We know it can target iron golems (granted it has a different effect than normal) and we know it can target others, like a khargra.
Khargra wrote: A khargra takes maximum damage from a heat metal spell (no save). In this case the term 'maximum damage' is also pointed out. Also, the fact that they don't get a save.
The main defense of a metallic creature (not its equipment) against heat metal is probably the weight limit (25 lbs./level). Other than specifically called cases, like the iron golem or a khargra, where the spells seem able to affect it regardless of weight as a special case, the fact is that most creatures made of metal are going to be significantly heavier than a similar creature of flesh and blood.
Using the iron body spell for a reference, we can see that when a creature becomes living iron, their weight increases by a factor of 10. Even taking into account variants in body density or other factors, that's still a sizable mass. A typical human male is between 130 and 220 lbs (using the typical height/weight table). That means they'd be 1,300 to 2,200 lbs. Doing the math shows you'd need a pretty substantial caster level to affect that amount of metal.
Even assuming a metal creature might be somewhat hollow, metal is typically much heavier than flesh and bones, so even a 'light' metal creature of human size is going to be 500 pounds at least. Even that requires a 20th-level caster.
Are there special cases? Of course there are (there's too many body types, shapes, and compositions that could purely be made up for fantasy creatures to say there isn't an exception or two). In this specific case, it's quite clear that the magus' arm is considered equipment, it counts as such in most cases, but even if it wasn't, it could still be targeted as it is metal (and it is almost certainly within weight limit). As for whether you want to allow a saving throw or not is the GM's call, not an inability of the spell to function.
Pizza Lord wrote: *Thelith wrote: I read full damage as max, but maybe it's just clarifying that you roll as normal ... Yes, full damage just means the normal spread of damage potential. It would use the term 'maximum' if it meant the highest possible amount. Oh. Yeah understandable confusion, but it's not max damage. If a creature saves against a fireball it takes half damage, if it fails the save it takes full damage.
Pizza Lord wrote: MrCharisma wrote: Besides that you have a good point. If it wouldn't target metal creatures it also shouldn't target partially-metal creatures. But we do know the spell can target creatures. We know it can target iron golems (granted it has a different effect than normal) and we know it can target others, like a khargra.
Khargra wrote: A khargra takes maximum damage from a heat metal spell (no save). In this case the term 'maximum damage' is also pointed out. Also, the fact that they don't get a save.
That's a convincing quote, but when I looked up Khargra on ARCHIVESOFNETHYS it came back with no results. I found it HERE, but this site has 3rd party material, and weirdly it didn't seem to list a source for this creature (unless I'm going blind in my old age). Is this a Paizo creature?
For the Iron Golem, I checked AONPRD and PFSRD and what I got from both was:
1. An Iron Golem is immune to Heat Metal (Spell Immunity)
2. If an Iron Golem somehow IS targetted successfully by Heat Metal it would heal them and dispel any Slow effects currently hampering the Golem.
So they don't seem like great examples. I'm not trying to rain on your parade here, but the Heat/Chill Metal spells target objects, and for an example to be proof that they can target creatures it should be a bit more specific than that.
MrCharisma wrote: for an example to be proof that they can target creatures it should be a bit more specific than that. Cannon Golem wrote: Immunity to Magic (Ex)
A cannon golem is immune to spells and spell-like abilities that allow spell resistance. Certain spells and effects function differently against it, as noted below.
Any spell with the water descriptor that affects a cannon golem renders its cannon unusable for 1 round (no save).
A heat metal spell causes the golem’s cannon to instantly backfire, dealing 6d6 points of damage to the golem and staggering it for 1 round (no save).
Someone could try and claim that the cannon is equipment, but it seems apparent that it's an integral part of the creature. That and the fact that equipment doesn't usually receive a creature's natural immunities and protections (they receive a saving throw for being attended, but that's not the same thing). A fire giant doesn't confer its natural fire immunity to a piece of paper it's holding.
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