With hasted assault for a focus point, you can enter your stance, move and strike.
That's 4 actions. Hasted Assault extra action only starts at the next round.
I personally think Arcane Cascade should only be used if you have to exploit Weaknesses. Otherwise, just ignore it unless you have an action that you don't know how to use.
With hasted assault for a focus point, you can enter your stance, move and strike.That's 4 actions. Hasted Assault extra action only starts at the next round.
I personally think Arcane Cascade should only be used if you have to exploit Weaknesses. Otherwise, just ignore it unless you have an action that you don't know how to use.
I think the exception would be for Twisting Tree magus and Sparkling Targe. Both of which receive much higher benefits from being in arcade cascade and are much more likely to spend that action earlier in combat.
Ask your GM if using exploration activites like detect magic and repeat spell will allow you to use your first action in combat to arcade cascade.
I think the exception would be for Twisting Tree magus and Sparkling Targe. Both of which receive much higher benefits from being in arcade cascade and are much more likely to spend that action earlier in combat.
You're right, they are not all equivalent. But overall, I think it's better to activate it if it's really interesting than to try to activate it at the start of every fight. The action cost is heavy. Your main attack ability is Spellstrike, not Arcane Cascade.
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A player of mine in an one shot like to use it with Jump, had a Staff with the spell on it, was Laughing Shadow using bite attacks, so Jump + Cascade + Strike was pretty common and had like 5 Jumps at that lvl from the staff.
Do Magi not use the Shield cantrip?
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Do Magi not use the Shield cantrip?
It’s the action economy. Shield is one action. Entering arcane cascade is one action. If you also have to move to get into melee, then you don’t have any actions left to attack. Which is fine, if you’re ok not attacking round 1. The alternative is move into melee, Spellstrike, and don’t enter cascade. Or cast a ranged attack spell, enter arcane cascade, and don’t move.
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It is on the list of things that Logan Bonner should be giving some developer insight into shortly. It may be unofficial errata, but it may be better than nothing.
Do Magi not use the Shield cantrip?It’s the action economy. Shield is one action. Entering arcane cascade is one action. If you also have to move to get into melee, then you don’t have any actions left to attack. Which is fine, if you’re ok not attacking round 1.
Yes. And I know very well that it is often a bad idea to run in to melee combat ahead of my sturdier allies. Magus may get 8 HP per level and armor instead of 6 HP and no armor, but they still may prefer to hang back for the first round and hit the enemy at melee range only when it is advantageous and safe.
And there is an entire Hybrid Study centered around using shields - including the Shield cantrip.
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If it gets clarified you can enter arcane cascade the round after you’ve cast a spell, then that’s probably the best option. I’ve used Dimensional Assault a few times to both get an attack off and enter cascade in a single round. Either cast something like shield, arcane cascade, dimensional assault if close enough, or move, dimensional assault to move farther and attack, then enter arcane cascade. It always feels like a little bit of a waste, because that’s generally happening before I’ve had a chance to Spellstrike (or instead of Spellstrike), so dimension assault doesn’t recharge the Spellstrike.
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Also it would probably just be the first encounter since your curse progresses to make you permanently flatfooted.Doesn't it go back to minor when you refocus ?Yes but since multiclass oracle curse doesn't get the moderate curse, it is replaced by just becoming flatfooted, until you refocus, so it's permanent for the fight assuming you cast it at initiative for a second encounter.
So you would probably only want to cast it once for the day to avoid that.
When you refocus, you lose the moderate, which is replaced by flatfooted, so you lose the flatfooted, way I read it.
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There are magical stances they added in the same book without weird requirements. A more appropriate one would be "you are wielding your hybrid style weapon" would make it more reasonable. Oh well. Maybe they'll change it at some point.Even if you can arcane cascade then next turn, if you use any reactions it is debatable if casting a spell was your last action, so you wouldn’t be in arcane cascade.
I suggested they change the requirement to enter the stance to “If you have cast a spell since the beginning of your last turn.”
That or get rid of the requirement entirely, arcane cascade sometimes has issues justifying it being worth an action.
Or just make it a free action to enter (or maybe a free action when you cast a conflux spell, as a choice instead of recharging spell strike). I'm not sure why Magus had to get hit twice with action economy restrictions. One action to enter Arcane Cascade, one action to recharge spell strike.
I wouldn't expect any big changes when it gets around to Logan answering the question on Ask a Paizo Developer. Despite how big of a change the Witch Dedication clarification seems, that was done without them changing any wording in the book (though now it feels slightly inconsistent with the wording). So I would expect an answer along the lines of yes, you can enter Arcane Cascade on a different round than the spell (insert restrictions here), or no, you can't. And, yes, you can stay in Arcane Cascade more than one round, or no, you can't. Not additional functionality for Starlit Span or a change in the actions it takes.
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Right, what I mean to say is that you'll be flatfooted in encounters past the first one if you decide to cast it a second time. Yes you can fix your flatfooted condition when you refocus.When you refocus, you lose the moderate, which is replaced by flatfooted, so you lose the flatfooted, way I read it.Also it would probably just be the first encounter since your curse progresses to make you permanently flatfooted.Doesn't it go back to minor when you refocus ?Yes but since multiclass oracle curse doesn't get the moderate curse, it is replaced by just becoming flatfooted, until you refocus, so it's permanent for the fight assuming you cast it at initiative for a second encounter.
So you would probably only want to cast it once for the day to avoid that.
Thanks. I always have trouble getting all those right.
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I really like the conflux spells but sometimes I wonder if they should have just slapped flourish on spellstrike and called it a day. No recharge. Would that have made it too powerful? Or something like spellstrikes with cantrips don't need recharging.
Being a 2-action ability, it'd be functionally impossible to use it twice in a round anyway, so Flourish would only have the pretty minimal effect of stopping it being used with another 1-action flourish activity. I think it's pretty clear that they were concerned about the power of giving a free 1-action reduction in spellcasting every round, rightfully so IMO.
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The Exploration Activity says you cast Detect Magic at regular intervals. Not necessarily every round. Also, you're generally taking other actions as well, like moving, during Exploration. So I don't think it's going to turn into everyone expecting to start combat able to enter Arcane Cascade.
Also, you can only enter a stance in Encounter Mode, so it's reasonable to assume you have to have taken the action to qualify for the stance while in Encounter Mode.
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A Magus has simply to accept not being always able to activate arcane cascade on the first round ( as well as not being able to use spellstrike every single round ).
Have to agree with this. The Magus seems very intentionally designed to not be able to lean on its tools super reliably, with the way recharge and cascade work and the general movement issues around spellstrike. You really seem intended to make a lot of decisions on the fly around how to act.
A little unfortunate that the Magus' math doesn't really line up with those expectations, but that's PF2.
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A little unfortunate that the Magus' math doesn't really line up with those expectations, but that's PF2.
That's also what I thought at first. But when moving pieces around I realized that the Magus' reputation of king of alpha strike is legitimate.
I think the biggest issue one can have with the class is that it lacks consistant damage output. You can try to optimize it with Arcane Cascade and Spellstrike, but it just doesn't work outside white room theorycrafting. The class action economy is made in such a way that you think you can do a lot of things but you always end up screwed because of movement or external factors.
But you should focus on the one true thing that the Magus does well: Killing bosses. Against a level +2 enemy with True Strike or a Hero Point, your Shocking Grasped SpellStrike deals on average twice the damage a Fighter does with 3 attacks. Your job is to land this one crazy blow, as it removes a big portion of the boss hit points (as high as 50% of a boss hit points). Then you can go to bed.
Being able to deliver incredible damage output when you really need it is a very strong power. On average, the Fighter will deal more damage, but when you really need it, it's the Magus that saves the day.
I think the biggest issue one can have with the class is that it lacks consistant damage output. You can try to optimize it with Arcane Cascade and Spellstrike, but it just doesn't work outside white room theorycrafting. The class action economy is made in such a way that you think you can do a lot of things but you always end up screwed because of movement or external factors.
Like Witch keeping two or three Hexes sustained for extended amounts of time, or Bard using Harmonize Dirge of Doom and Inspire Courage. Sounds great on paper - doesn't work so well when dice are hitting the table and actions are scarce.
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I think the biggest issue one can have with the class is that it lacks consistant damage output. You can try to optimize it with Arcane Cascade and Spellstrike, but it just doesn't work outside white room theorycrafting. The class action economy is made in such a way that you think you can do a lot of things but you always end up screwed because of movement or external factors.Like Witch keeping two or three Hexes sustained for extended amounts of time, or Bard using Harmonize Dirge of Doom and Inspire Courage. Sounds great on paper - doesn't work so well when dice are hitting the table and actions are scarce.
I think it's worse for the Magus as it looks like it's intended.
I mean, there's a paragraph stating: "As a magus, you have multiple special actions and abilities that can be used in combination with your spells. You can enter your Arcane Cascade stance with either Spellstrike or a normally cast spell, so it could be in your best interest to cast a spell to buff yourself at the beginning of a fight and enter Arcane Cascade, rather than going for an early Spellstrike. You can usually stay in Arcane Cascade for a long time, though if you find out an enemy has a weakness to a certain damage type, such as fire, you might want to refresh your stance with a fire spell to take advantage of the bonus damage. It's often worth it to cast your conflux spells and make a Strike either on a turn where you can't make a Spellstrike, or as the last action on your turn after a Spellstrike. Sometimes, it might be worth it to cast a conflux spell even if you think you'll miss, because it can still recharge your Spellstrike for your next turn."All the suggestion of this paragraph are taking your 3 actions as if there was magically an enemy inside your Reach all the time. Also it's mostly a whole lot of BS:
- Buffing and activating Arcane Cascade is called a lost round. At that stage you already did a subpar fight unless there's a round available for prebuff.
- Going for an early Spellstrike is how you win fights. The whole point of alpha strike classes is alpha strike.
- Switching Arcane Cascade during a fight is really really bad. Arcane Cascade is already very hard to put into your rotation because the bonus is low for the cost (action cost but also need to cast a spell before, so you are stuck without moving).
- Recharging your Spellstrike is not really important. Unless you end up in a crazy situation where you can cast 2 Spellstrikes in a row (highly improbable) you can ignore the recharge mechanism as your second Spellstrike will come way to late, and even later if you follow their bad advice.
- They only speak of Conflux spell to recharge Spellstrike when recharging Spellstrike is just an added bonus. Conflux Spells have to be used like any Focus Spell: When they are strong, because they are quite strong.
In my opinion, if you follow this paragraph of advice, you'll play your Magus very badly. The Magus is a swiss army knife. Trying to use the knife, the tweezers and the scissors at the same time will just get you hurt. You have to adapt to the situation and use the best tool at the best moment.
PS: I really love PF2. Everytime I speak about a class I want to play one as there are so many things every classes can do it's gorgeous.
- Buffing and activating Arcane Cascade is called a lost round.
Interesting. I can see this being true for martial combatants - that failing to attack immediately is lost time. Mostly because they are already going to live for several combat rounds without any defensive buffs.
But for me, defensive buff spell (Barkskin, Shattering Gem, Invisibility, or something like that) and either move or Discern Secrets is fairly typical for my first round. Because I won't be contributing to the fight at all if I am dying.
So yes, maybe with Magus being a hybrid of martial combatant and spellcaster the competition for actions during the first round is a bit higher. The Magus will have to choose which to be a bit more of during that fight: spellcaster or martial.
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- Buffing and activating Arcane Cascade is called a lost round.Interesting. I can see this being true for martial combatants - that failing to attack immediately is lost time. Mostly because they are already going to live for several combat rounds without any defensive buffs.
But for me, defensive buff spell (Barkskin, Shattering Gem, Invisibility, or something like that) and either move or Discern Secrets is fairly typical for my first round. Because I won't be contributing to the fight at all if I am dying.
So yes, maybe with Magus being a hybrid of martial combatant and spellcaster the competition for actions during the first round is a bit higher. The Magus will have to choose which to be a bit more of during that fight: spellcaster or martial.
I'd answer with the classical PF2 answer: it depends.
If you have a quiet first round, when there is some distance between the enemies and you, then casting a buff can be super handy as you don't lose a round while forcing the enemies to come to you.If you have a first round that starts right in the thick of things, then casting a buff is losing a round that could have been used to dispatch the enemies. And you won't find a buff that justifies a lost round before the highest levels (and even at the highest levels, it's debatable).
It also depends if your buff comes from your spellslots or not. If it comes from your spellslots, it is not a strong move and it costs you resources. So it seems like a bad idea.