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Sympathetic Weakness 8th level.
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Sympathetic Weakness 8th level.
Sympathetic Weakness IMO only further confuses the issue because it references a completely different creatures from the one that was originally targeted with Esoteric Antithesis. A more apt comparison would be if the thaumaturge attacked a different red dragon instead of fire elementals.
I agree with OP that it's not exactly clear the way that it's written, and the example given in Sympathetic Weakness only furthers that uncertainty.
I'm fairly new to 2e, but I can see a balance argument either way.
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Yes, if fighting a pack of werewolves you need to reroll with every single enemy. That can add up to a lot of actions if they're short-lived, and it'd often be better just to pull out the Silversheen than bother using your main shtick.
This is why I prefer the ability effect the weapon rather than build this synergy w/ one target at a time. That'd avoid such quirkiness.
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Being honest this is more one reason to FF and EA should aren't based in RK. They need their own test based in his own concept.
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Furthermore, I believe the reaction Implements (Amulet & Weapon) would suffer greatly if they were to only be usable against a single target at a time.
Having an Attack of Opportunity or a semi-Champion's reaction against only one creature at a time does not feel good at all, to me.
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Furthermore, I believe the reaction Implements (Amulet & Weapon) would suffer greatly if they were to only be usable against a single target at a time.
Having an Attack of Opportunity or a semi-Champion's reaction against only one creature at a time does not feel good at all, to me.
Actually they can be good againts a high-level solo opponent. But those are the ones against whom you are most likely to fail (or even critically fail) your RK.
Actually they can be good againts a high-level solo opponent. But those are the ones against whom you are most likely to fail (or even critically fail) your RK.Furthermore, I believe the reaction Implements (Amulet & Weapon) would suffer greatly if they were to only be usable against a single target at a time.
Having an Attack of Opportunity or a semi-Champion's reaction against only one creature at a time does not feel good at all, to me.
I am aware they can be good against a single-target. My point is that in any fight that isn't a boss fight (which is most of them, probably) they would suffer immensely in utility and thus not be as worth picking up.
But you make a good point, that often boss fights have higher DCs, thus even this use-case is tenuous.
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If you Find Flaws a creature, the Antithesis should work against the exact same type of creature. It would be ridiculous that you have to do it separately when they literally have the same stat block.
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I could have had this happen in my playtest, which got me thinking a bit more about this.
The real culprit here is RK. Because anything you learn about a ghoul from RK, you (and your teammates) will use against all other ghouls. Which makes perfect sense, even though it is not 100% RAW.
But any bonus gained from RK and specific to an individual creature just breaks verisimilitude in a million shards.
It already exists in the game in the shape of the critical success of the Known weaknesses Investigator feat. Where it makes even less sense since that is a true INT-based RK check.
I prefer to divorce RK and Find Flaws. So that Find Flaws gives you an advantage that you force with CHA over an individual enemy.
And we could have standard INT-based RK check usable as a free action when using Find Flaws, so that we can get the knowledge of generic weaknesses and use it as we always do for RK results.
I agree that it can be confusing, distinguishing between what benefit you should get based on the type/statblock of a particular creature [thug] or such vs. what that should mean to all instances of that particular type of opponent.
So it makes sense that knowing you want to use silver to fight werewolves is a good general, useful piece of information for most werewolves in general. However, when fighting two werewolf thugs, one werewolf assassin, and one werewolf sorcerer, and two wolves. You can see where it is more complicated.
If you say, I'll give you a +1 on 'something' to hit the werewolf thug, but decide, because the other one is also a werewolf thug, why not let the bonus apply there. Then someone might say, hay the werewolf assassin is just a werewolf thug, but a level higher, so why can't I get my plus I got for the thug on the assassin. The Sorcerer is likely easier to imagine fighting differently and therefore argue the bonus won't appy there, but they are still a general werewolf.
Maybe someone will point out the DC for the Assassin would probably have been higher, because it was a higher level opponent. So your success against the Thug might have been a failure against the Assassin. So that can make it easier to say, sorry no bonus for a higher level creature found. However, it might be seen harder to justify the reverse. I started targeting the Assassin, and now want it to apply to the Thugs too.
I think that this makes me feel like things that give ou specific bonuses should probably target specific opponents, individually, similar to hunt prey. But I could see a Circumstance bonus being able to be applied when you have in the past succeeded in a similar enough/related creature. So say you had the bonus on Thug 1, you might get a +2 circumstance bonus on attempts to get the bonus on Thug 2 which is another individual, but functionally identical. And after that, any attempt to target the Assassin, or Sorcerer could be granted a +1 circumstance bonus due to similarities. The wolves the GM says the first won't get a bonus, but after the first, the second would get a +2 circumstance bonus.
Otherwise, perhaps with the Thaumaturge option, maybe with a successful check, they might have the option to affect all werewolves as if their weapon were silver. (trigger whatever their silver weakness is on the individual, for any applicable strike they make, without having to re-up there ability per target) This would give them an edge in attacking several similar creatures with similar weaknesses, by not making them check for each one. However, creatures without a specific weakness to exploit, they would be able to get a bonus against each one, but would require extra time.
That sort of mechanic might make it feel more like a Thaumaturge has more of an advantage over those sorts of creatures that come in groups with a common weakness. That might help the class's flavor some.
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I could have had this happen in my playtest, which got me thinking a bit more about this.
The real culprit here is RK. Because anything you learn about a ghoul from RK, you (and your teammates) will use against all other ghouls. Which makes perfect sense, even though it is not 100% RAW.
But any bonus gained from RK and specific to an individual creature just breaks verisimilitude in a million shards.
It already exists in the game in the shape of the critical success of the Known weaknesses Investigator feat. Where it makes even less sense since that is a true INT-based RK check.
I prefer to divorce RK and Find Flaws. So that Find Flaws gives you an advantage that you force with CHA over an individual enemy.
And we could have standard INT-based RK check usable as a free action when using Find Flaws, so that we can get the knowledge of generic weaknesses and use it as we always do for RK results.
Just wanted to add that the part about esoterica allowing the Strikes to trigger an existing weakness should be kept, the better to fit the image of the Thaumaturge as the always prepared character. And yes I would like the Thaumaturge to apply both existing weaknesses and the FF/EA advantage on their target.
Maybe some choice over the type of weakness you want to apply thanks to the results of your RK. And guessing wildly if you really don't know.