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Hey all,
I gained access to the rare Time Traveler Background in PFS, which means that I could build a time traveler character! Since I often build gnomes who take the Gnome Obsession feat, it suddenly occurs to me... Does gnome obsession enhance all three of the background lores offered by the Time Traveler background?
You might have a flighty nature, but when a topic captures your attention, you dive into it headfirst. Pick a Lore skill. You gain the trained proficiency rank in that skill. At 2nd level, you gain expert proficiency in the chosen Lore as well as the Lore granted by your background, if any. At 7th level you gain master proficiency in these Lore skills, and at 15th level you gain legendary proficiency in them.
You come from a different time. Whether by your own doing or a terrible accident, powerful magic has resulted in you coming to this time from the future or from the past, but you are unable to return. You might be from New Thassilon, an entire nation of time travelers.
Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Dexterity or Intelligence, and one is a free ability boost.
You are trained in three Lore skills of your choice that represent your knowledge from your old time. You gain the Bend Time reaction.
Bend Time Free Action (occult, transmutation) Frequency once per day; Trigger Your turn begins; Effect You are quickened this turn. You can use your extra action to Stride.
At first, I thought that I would have to pick just one of the lores from the background, but now I have reread it, I am uncertain of this.
Hmm
By my reading, those two do not interact. You will get three lore skills from Time Traveler that do not automatically increase. You will get a different lore skill from Gnome Obsession that does automatically increase in proficiency as listed.
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By my reading, those two do not interact. You will get three lore skills from Time Traveler that do not automatically increase. You will get a different lore skill from Gnome Obsession that does automatically increase in proficiency as listed.
But Gnome Obsession usually also increases the Lore skill granted by your background. It would be weird to not get those increases because you happen to get multiple Lore skills from your background.
I personally would probably allow it. But since this is a specific question for PFS, I'm not sure my judgment really matters. Doens't PFS have its own subforum for rules stuff? I honestly don't know since I don't play PFS.
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IMO, since the feat refers to "the" Lore gained from your background, it would probably be limited to 1 of your base Lore skills that have the increased proficiency, not all of them, so as not to make certain background choices too powerful in comparison.
PFS would probably be table variation at-best.
By my reading, those two do not interact. You will get three lore skills from Time Traveler that do not automatically increase. You will get a different lore skill from Gnome Obsession that does automatically increase in proficiency as listed.But Gnome Obsession usually also increases the Lore skill granted by your background. It would be weird to not get those increases because you happen to get multiple Lore skills from your background.
I personally would probably allow it. But since this is a specific question for PFS, I'm not sure my judgment really matters. Doens't PFS have its own subforum for rules stuff? I honestly don't know since I don't play PFS.
You're right. I read it too quickly the first time. I don't play PFS either. I would probably have the player pick one of the lores to automatically increase, but it wouldn't be game breaking to allow all three.
For RAW it is a bit ambiguous. On one hand, Gnome Obsession doesn't give a limit on how many Lore skills from your background that it applies to. On the other, it does list Lore skill from your background in the signular, so it was written with the expectation that there would only be one Lore skill affected.
For balance, I don't find the Lore skills to be so powerful that getting extra ones at higher proficiency than expected to be a game-changing effect. I would probably allow Gnome Obsession to work on all of the Lore skills granted from background unless the player deliberately chose Lore skills specifically because of their increased relative power - things like Lore(Piloting) in a game including vehicles or other forms of Lore(all the things extremely relevant to the campaign).
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Seems to me to be an oversight based entirely on the norm that Backgrounds typically only ever offer you training in one of a select number of Lore skills.
WITH THAT ASIDE, there are TWO plural forms of "Lore" with one being "Lores" and the other being "Lore" so by linguistic standards when it says "the Lore granted by your background..." it should increase every Lore that is provided by that Background selection... or it shouldn't... I have no idea if there are any OTHER instances of the word "Lore" being pluralized without them writing out "Lore Skills" so that might be a good way to research based on wording precedent in the CRB, GMG, or other sourcebooks.
If you need 2cp on the RAW that's the closest that I think you can get even if it does mean you Gnome is going to be one hell of a know-it-all. I think that's probably pushing the envelope in terms of the intended power of the Time Traveler Boon you have access to but, shoot, you freakin' earned it so I say go wild. After all, who is going to question the HMM?
I'd say you get to raise all three lore skills from time traveler: it's the bonus you get for not getting a trained background skill. It's something of a grey area though, so the best thing to do is ask this question on the PFS part of the forum as it has it's own houserules and such.
Yeah, this might be a thing for the FAQ/clarifications. I'd stick with choosing one of your background Lores to advance.
I agree with HumbleGamer. Combining the fact that all backgrounds only granted 1 lore when Gnome Obsession was written and the fact that you now have 4 lores at legendary without using anything but a level 1 ancestry feat is just a bit too good.
I would have the player pick one of the three and that one goes up automatically. If they want their lore to otherwise increase, they can take additional lore.
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me, it falls within the tgtbt area ( too good, as well as not replicable by any other mean), and I'd stick with a single lore ( player's choice).
If it was anything other than Lore, I might agree with too good to be true. However with the way Recall works, it's it has good chance of not being any better than a Trained skill without increases. And multiple Lores don't do anything for Earn Income.
If they want their lore to otherwise increase, they can take additional lore.
LOL That's just give them a 5th Lore and not auto-leveling one they already have.
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Contributor
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It is true that multiple lores won't do anything for Earn Income. But because one of the plurals of 'lore' is 'lore' I really do feel that this requires a PFS clarification. Surely I am not going to be the only gnome player to wonder about this.
I've flagged this for a move to the PFS Pathfinder Society forum.
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For PFS, unless a specific ruling is given, expect table variation aka use the worst interpretation possible. So, only one.
And yes, getting the equivalent of 2 skill feats (Additional Lore) for an Ancestry feat might be fine, but 4 for 1 is definitely TGTBT.
TBH, Gnome obsession feels very powerful for the right build. I am extremely happy to discover its existence and I am now tempted to make my Malevolence Investigator a Gnome.
Seeing as "lores" shows up in the game rules, I think it's safe to assume that "lore" is intended to be singular in this instance.
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Seeing as "lores" shows up in the game rules, I think it's safe to assume that "lore" is intended to be singular in this instance.
As that tidbit if from an AP, it could be that particular writers plural of the work instead of a definitive example of the games only usage of it's plurals. If we look at the actual skill it seems to go out of it's way to avoid Lores and writes "multiple subcategories of Lore" instead. In fact, that link is the ONLY instance of the word Lores in the entire game which is more telling to me that it a fluke than anything else.
As that tidbit if from an AP, it could be that particular writers plural of the work instead of a definitive example of the games only usage of it's plurals. If we look at the actual skill it seems to go out of it's way to avoid Lores and writes "multiple subcategories of Lore" instead. In fact, that link is the ONLY instance of the word Lores in the entire game which is more telling to me that it a fluke than anything else.
That makes perfect sense too.