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I don't have the book, but I have flipped through it, Isn't the whole framing premise of the book "here are a bunch of shops at the Grand Bazaar at Absalom, each of them has a specific focus."
The "toy store" shop (where the ball appears) might be the crunchiest part of the book because it has an ancestry in it.
The mobility aid shop is quite crunchy too, including battle canes in addition to options to trick out your wheelchair.
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I'm just saying, if you can't think of a million and one ways to make use of a bouncy ball, you need to get a bouncy ball irl STAT
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After reading Order of the Stick I know of at least on use of a rubber ball that is quite innovative and very deadly.
But ignoring that: Items like this are important to show that playing a RPG should not really just be about "how good is a character at being powerful in combat" and they are just fun to have as a character.
Yeah, crunch is always good, but for true simulationists like me common trinkets like this listed in the game data are an immense help in creating a believable world worth playing inside.
Why more necessary stuff like the price of Golarian toilets and the like are still missing is beyond me, though... (does it exist, BTW?)
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Warning : analyzing the content of a setting book through a game power lens might cause distress.
Sounds like someone who never read the stats for vegemite.
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Warning : analyzing the content of a setting book through a game power lens might cause distress.Sounds like someone who never read the stats for vegemite.
This made me laugh more than it should have.
This is why Australians can continue to live in a country where everything wants to kill them.
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Inconsistent formatting gets to be a massive pain, there really should a consistent design document to keep things from being that different.
Who's to say there isn't? A ball (bear in mind, casual readers, that this ongoing argument is still about a ball) getting "Hands" and "Usage" isn't out of line for items.
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As someone who uses character personalities to determine what they'd buy, I appreciate having more things like this available in the game. It saves me the time of asking the GM about things that aren't on the item list, saves them the time of deciding, and can serve as inspiration for things that wouldn't have come to mind at the time because I'm perusing item lists instead of thinking up new items. Also serves as a good template for homebrewing other items, as do the waffle irons. ;3
...And now I want to make a warrior chef who fights with their reinforced waffle iron. Bludgeoning foes with it... and turning villains' hands into hand waffles. ;3
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It struck me as a trifle odd that the developers went out of their way to get rid of mechanical representations of simple things like pouches, scroll cases, sheaths, vials and similar items that could easily be relegated to flavor, only to then turn around and add a number of items with no obvious mechanical purpose.
The developer quote about why they wrote it in sure clears things up for me pretty well though. :)
Oh, right, that reminds me: It still strikes me as odd that they errata'd belt pouches out, but didn't errata the Pathfinder's Pouch. Strictly speaking, the item is now non-functional unless you have the pre-errata belt pouch's stats on hand for reference, isn't it?
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Inconsistent formatting gets to be a massive pain, there really should a consistent design document to keep things from being that different.Who's to say there isn't? A ball (bear in mind, casual readers, that this ongoing argument is still about a ball) getting "Hands" and "Usage" isn't out of line for items.
Except it is, otherwise what's the hands and usage for an iron pot?
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One of the best things about "Ball" being an item, is that if we ever get the telekineticist back I can play a character whose entire offense is "flinging bouncy balls at their enemies."
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Except it is, otherwise what's the hands and usage for an iron pot?Inconsistent formatting gets to be a massive pain, there really should a consistent design document to keep things from being that different.Who's to say there isn't? A ball (bear in mind, casual readers, that this ongoing argument is still about a ball) getting "Hands" and "Usage" isn't out of line for items.
What do you use to measure the length of a beach accurately? A yardstick? A ruler? The grains of sand? At some point the granularity isn't necessary.
If an iron pot had Usage: held in one hand, Hands 1 would we not be having the conversation? A writer or editor, even with a design doc in front of them, could easily say "This requires a hand to use," to either item. Do you want this document (which, to my knowledge, no one has confirmed or denied the existence of) to state "if a hand ever touches the item, it requires Usage and Hand?" Because sure you could make that argument for the, "I'm pro-that level of granularity" column. I think that it's unnecessarily hampering to regulate that far down.
Similarly, if we're getting granular, does a pot require a hand to use? Should a ball lack those? Has any of these questions actually posed an in-game problem to anyone outside of the hypothetical?
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I mean the hands usage for an iron pot ought to be variable. If you're carrying it to the serving area when it's full you might want to use 2 hands, if you're doing a classic sauté flip then you only need one, if you're just leaving it there on the heat it requires zero hands (the spoon or whatever you stir it with might require a hand though.)
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Except it is, otherwise what's the hands and usage for an iron pot?Inconsistent formatting gets to be a massive pain, there really should a consistent design document to keep things from being that different.Who's to say there isn't? A ball (bear in mind, casual readers, that this ongoing argument is still about a ball) getting "Hands" and "Usage" isn't out of line for items.What do you use to measure the length of a beach accurately? A yardstick? A ruler? The grains of sand? At some point the granularity isn't necessary.
If an iron pot had Usage: held in one hand, Hands 1 would we not be having the conversation? A writer or editor, even with a design doc in front of them, could easily say "This requires a hand to use," to either item. Do you want this document (which, to my knowledge, no one has confirmed or denied the existence of) to state "if a hand ever touches the item, it requires Usage and Hand?" Because sure you could make that argument for the, "I'm pro-that level of granularity" column. I think that it's unnecessarily hampering to regulate that far down.
Similarly, if we're getting granular, does a pot require a hand to use? Should a ball lack those? Has any of these questions actually posed an in-game problem to anyone outside of the hypothetical?
It's not about whether we want that much granularity or not - we have inconsistent levels of granularity. That's the problem. one way or the other but errata on the newer items seems easier than on all the old items.
I don't really care for the granularity, but hey - there's the ball and other toys bringing it.
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If there was a design doc that literally said, "If an item requires a hand, it most be noted with Usage and Hand," would that solve the problem? Because it just might be exactly that. Writers, at the end of the day, still have to make a call.
Let me say this, there are definitely some things in PF2 that should get errata. Ball having Usage and Hands on it seems to be the most astounding non-issue. The granularity is there for some groups. Is there some OTHER example where this is requiring attention? Like, you're saying "this ball shows a lack of care from Paizo for standardizing" when it appears to (the majority? I can't rightly say) many people to be just fine? I have several groups with several players across the spectrum (both in personality and the literal spectrum), and have yet to have anything like this brought up. While I have only my personal experiences to pull from, I find it hard to believe we can point to the ball as a marker of poor quality control.
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Also, given the posters arguing against the ball, I'm not terribly surprised about their weird feelings.
Seriously if you rile against a ball in a chapter about a toy shop for kids my only question is: who hurt you?
The ball isn't even the most "useless" item in the section. I can see a group making use of a ball, marbles, a kite, a doll for RP reasons, a "game" for meta reasons, but I'm hard pressed to see a context where the colored clay, the bandalore, blocks, or a toy carriage come up.
That said, something like 60% of useful items I'm unlikely to ever see, so this the main difference between "ball" and "a specific magical weapon with a niche unrelated to the campaign I'm in" is that the ball takes up less space in the book.
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Maybe people missed that there are items like "cookware" that just list the basic stats, no lore, no hand requirements, just bulk, lv, and cost.
Then you have items like the ball that has handedness, lore, cost, bulk, etc.
That is what I was talking about not the fact of "not having the item". But the fact of some items having too much.
Yeah, that is a bit of a shame. We could've gotten, like, 5 items with the same narrative impact as the ball with different formatting. Even more toys for copper pieces.
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I'm just disappointed I didn't get stats for the cup-and-ball game or a paddle ball game.
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The thing that annoys me about the ball is that it is overly gamified. It isn't a big deal, but as others have said it having "Hands 1; Usage held in 1 hand" is just a bad rule.
Obviously not a big deal, but why do I have to houserule a ball?
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Obviously not a big deal, but why do I have to houserule a ball?
I don't know, why do you? Honest question.
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The ball isn't even the most "useless" item in the section. I can see a group making use of a ball, marbles, a kite, a doll for RP reasons, a "game" for meta reasons, but I'm hard pressed to see a context where the colored clay, the bandalore, blocks, or a toy carriage come up.
The blocks carriage, and possibly even the Play-Do- I mean Clay, could all be used quite effectively in planning a heist or ambush. I could even see someone with kids borrowing some (probably a toy car instead of carriage) to diagram out their plans.
As for the Bandalore, NGL when I first saw that I had a mental image of a Weapon Improviser using one as their primary weapon.
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Clay, when spread out over a pane of glass, does an excellent job of reducing the noise when you break it.
It can also be used to pick up lots of small objects quickly.
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Obviously not a big deal, but why do I have to houserule a ball?I don't know, why do you? Honest question.
If someone wants to use a ball by kicking it, or use it with two hands I guess? That's how a ball should work. There's no reason the entry should need a Usage section at all, it is needlessly detailed for such a vague and non-crunchy item, especially as it's just plainly incorrect.
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You don't need to houserule that, that's overthinking (how far a ball will go with a kick would fall under houserules, but that doesn't involves the hand situation).
Usage doesn't mean you're not allowed to hold it with 2 hands or kick it, those are restrictions you've invented.
As for it needing a usage section, there's many practical situations for throwing a ball (distractions, setting off traps early, etc), so it makes sense it would have that listed, since you can't keep both your hands on your greatsword and pull the ball out of your backpack and throw it at the same time.