As others have pointed out, Druids are able to use metal weapons without penalty. The biggest problem with Druid MC for an Eldritch Trickster is that cantrips are the workhorses for the Magical Trickster feat, and Druid is the only spellcasting class without a Cantrip Expansion feat.
As others have pointed out, Druids are able to use metal weapons without penalty. The biggest problem with Druid MC for an Eldritch Trickster is that cantrips are the workhorses for the Magical Trickster feat, and Druid is the only spellcasting class without a Cantrip Expansion feat.
There are Familiar options.
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I do know that there are other ways to get cantrips. ;)
• Gisher's Guide to Acquiring Common Cantrips
It's just weird that Druids don't get Cantrip Expansion.
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This is a friendly reminder that the wording of the Anathema is suggestive of the fact that you need to commit MULTIPLE offenses, and not just ONE, in order to break it and suffer consequences.
Nearly any Druid can almost certainly get away with wearing and using metal armor and shields for quite a long time as long as they break any other rules.
If you perform enough acts that are anathema to nature, you lose your magical abilities that come from the druid class, including your primal spellcasting and the benefits of your order.
The important part is "enough acts" which is very specifically something that can only ever trigger if you make repeat offenses against the Anathema and means that no singular offense can cause you to lose the benefits of your Class/Order/Casting. Since you're dealing with PFS which has to operate on RAW the GM will almost never have enough justification to take these away from you during a game unless you're breaking more than JUST the metal prohibition, full stop.
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Since you're dealing with PFS which has to operate on RAW the GM will almost never have enough justification to take these away from you during a game unless you're breaking more than JUST the metal prohibition, full stop.
Nonsense. If a druid sat down at my PFS table trying to rules lawyer that his druid could wear plate mail because that is only 1 act of anathema I'd tell him no.
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Nonsense? Read the RAW, that's how it is phrased and is how it functions, period. I don't understand the position you're coming from here, the way it's worded is not at all ambiguous and no single act can or should ever result in having powers revoked... especially at a PFS game in situations where no errata or special PFS guidance has specifically been issued to address it and especially when the "call" is to take agency and literally an entire character away from a player.
This isn't negotiable or up to interpretations at all, that's how it works... "enough acts" is by every reasonable definition MORE than one act. Sure it's not in line with previous editions functionality but the Anathema is far more permissive in this edition and hasn't seen any changes or clarification yet, ergo: Druids can break at LEAST one of their prescribed codes without suffering consequences.
Clerics and Champions DO have a far less permissive version of Anathema and get the boot as soon as they violate it but ... Barbarians and Druids, not so much, you get a bare minimum of one free pass, go ahead and compare the rules again if you don't believe me, they could have easily used the same wording in all instances of Anathema but they choose not to which I believe must have been intentional given that the only thing rewriting it out would have done otherwise is to increase the wordcount on the relevant pages where they're printed (something they try to avoid whenever they can help it).
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Nonsense? Read the RAW, that's how it is phrased and is how it functions, period.
The issue you run into is that there is NO duration for a "use" of metal armor or shields that is a single instance of transgression. Therefor, the DM can say that every day, hour, min or even round is it's own act against the Anathema: as such, you have no basis for claiming a DM in PFS couldn't trigger the Anathema as there is no definition as to what constitutes a single act and exactly how many is required to trigger it.
This is JUST from the actual pathfinder rules though: there may be something specific from PFS about this that I don't know of that covers this more comprehensively. I don't play PFS after all.
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Since you're dealing with PFS which has to operate on RAW the GM will almost never have enough justification to take these away from you during a game unless you're breaking more than JUST the metal prohibition, full stop.Nonsense. If a druid sat down at my PFS table trying to rules lawyer that his druid could wear plate mail because that is only 1 act of anathema I'd tell him no.
If I had someone come to my table and ask nicely for their Druid character to use metal armor or shields (probably because they have better stats), I would probably let them. Because it is an outdated restriction that doesn't need to be in the game any more and Druid characters shouldn't be mechanically punished for a lack of equivalent non-metal armor and shields.
If I had someone try to rules-lawyer that the Druid Anathema as ambiguous because it doesn't specify how many times you can commit Anathema before losing class features ... Count each attack made against you where you apply either your shield or armor bonus when calculating your AC. Because that is when you are 'using' your armor or shield. And for quantity: 5 seems like enough to cause problems and trigger penalties.
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By that logic... When is ENOUGH murdering of the innocent in cold blood to trigger a anathema violation by a champion with the tenet of good ? 5? 10?
We all know one is where you draw the line.
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Anthemas are vague and require some amount of sensible gm judgement. If it's an honest mistake or done under extreme circumstances, it might take more occurrences to justify punishment. If it's done blatantly and unnecessarily, it might be harsher. You gotta enforce mechanical vows or they don't mean very much.
Absolutely correct.
If in the middle of a scenario circumstances suddenly required the druid to wear metal armor or mildly desecrate nature then sure, not a biggy.
But when, as suggested above, the player comes in at the very beginning and tries to rules lawyer his way around a class restriction then that is VERY different.
Seen way too many rules lawyers in PFS and SFS to have much sympathy for them.
ESPECIALLY when they're very selectively interpreting the rules. As others have pointed out "if you perform enough acts" can very, very easily mean 1. You deliberately burn down the forest just for the lols and you've lost all your druidic magical abilities at my table. If you reluctantly cut down a couple of trees for a good reason then you're fine.
Edit: to clarify that I'd definitely warn the player first if he was about to commit acts I thought Anathema, especially if they were bad enough to trigger the consequences. No gotcha wuold be involved
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In 3.5/PF1, there was no such thing as anathema. The Druid class specified "A druid who wears prohibited armor or uses a prohibited shield is unable to cast druid spells or use any of her supernatural or spell-like class abilities while doing so and for 24 hours thereafter."
Note that this made no mention of willfully doing it or not.
So, yes, in those editions, it worked.
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Anthemas are vague and require some amount of sensible gm judgement. If it's an honest mistake or done under extreme circumstances, it might take more occurrences to justify punishment. If it's done blatantly and unnecessarily, it might be harsher. You gotta enforce mechanical vows or they don't mean very much.Absolutely correct.
If in the middle of a scenario circumstances suddenly required the druid to wear metal armor or mildly desecrate nature then sure, not a biggy.
The example in my mind is if the party finds a powerful metal shield, but the druid is the only character with Shield Block and a free hand for it. I would probably let the druid use it for the remainder of the session rather than have it be useless for the party.
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Yeah, I'm still not buying it, the RAW here is simple... "Acts" is plural which means more than one, if you only ever break one of the rules you are not committing an offense that would result in loss of abilities.
You may not like the flavor of it but the wording is completely 100% unambiguous, that's the RAW and this is the Rules subforum, not Advice ... so yeah, that's how it works for now and anything short of errata or a FAQ to change how it's phrased is going to fail here. Intentional or not, that's literally how it works. If you view this as a problem with the rules then I say appeal for clarification, clearly, most people here aren't actually reading the rules for what they are but are instead interpreting, misinterpreting in fact, a word that is NEVER used to indicate something singular as being just that.
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By that logic... When is ENOUGH murdering of the innocent in cold blood to trigger a anathema violation by a champion with the tenet of good ? 5? 10?
We all know one is where you draw the line.
Untrue, the Champion Code is FAR more strict, their line in the sand is quite clear and there is no wiggle room, you break Alignment or your Code of Conduct - BAM- instant fall, that's how it's written. That is NOT how the Druid of Barbarian Anathema is phrased though.
So yeah, this isn't the kind of dunk you think it is at all, which leads me to believe you didn't even read my post that explains how and why they're different.
If you stray from your alignment or violate your code of conduct, you lose your focus pool and divine ally until you demonstrate your repentance by conducting an atone ritual, but you keep any other champion abilities that don’t require those class features. If your alignment shifts but is still one allowed by your deity, your GM might let you retrain your cause while still following the same deity.
You see, there is no "enough acts" phrasing here, one and done, exactly like how folks here are assuming that it works for the Druid and Barbarian when those rules are fundamentally different.
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Yeah, I'm still not buying it, the RAW here is simple... "Acts" is plural which means more than one, if you only ever break one of the rules you are not committing an offense that would result in loss of abilities.
You may not like the flavor of it but the wording is completely 100% unambiguous, that's the RAW and this is the Rules subforum, not Advice ... so yeah, that's how it works for now and anything short of errata or a FAQ to change how it's phrased is going to fail here. Intentional or not, that's literally how it works. If you view this as a problem with the rules then I say appeal for clarification, clearly, most people here aren't actually reading the rules for what they are but are instead interpreting, misinterpreting in fact, a word that is NEVER used to indicate something singular as being just that.
Your entire argument hangs on the idea that a plural word is never used for a singular number of items. Which is a pretty weak argument.
"Any number of acts is a valid number of acts to trigger anathema."
Note that this sentence also uses the plural form 'acts'. But clearly one (1) is a perfectly valid number for it to refer to.
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Venture-Agent, Online—VTT
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The idea that RAW declares that something you do constantly is only a single violation has no sound basis. If that is how you run it at your table, you're well within your rights as a GM. It is absolutely using a layer of interpretation, though, which is unsurprising since the concept of RAW without interpretation is a myth.
Stating that it IS how it works and that anyone seeing something that you continue to do as not just a single, discrete act against anathema, or that a PFS GM would be forced to use that same reading is simply wrong, though.
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“You may not like the flavor of it but the wording is completely 100% unambiguous”
Please point out the specific amount of Anathema acts required then.
And please also point out the specific amount of time that one can wear plate mail to count as one act of Anathema.
Edit: This discussion has already reached its desired end. I'm pretty sure that "But one guy on the interwebs says the rules are clear that druids can wear plate mail" isn't going to fly at all PFS tables (there are at least 5 GMs on this thread saying no). So, at best, it will work at some unknown subset of tables. Not something to rely on. Because, again taking myself as an example, the FIRST time you try it at my table I'm going to be very reasonable and say "No, you're not wearing plate. Lets not worry about it right now, just drop your AC by 1 for this session and correct things later". The SECOND time your character tries to wear plate mail at my table its going to be "Take off the plate or lose your magical abilities. Your choice"
Venture-Agent, California—Silicon Valley
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The reason using metal armor/shields are anathema is weird. It should be using all metal, as metal is seen as a desecration to nature by Druids, but if that were the case Druids would be unable to use almost any weapon. So one could instead say that wearing of metal armor severs the Druid's connection to nature, as the unnatural material blocks the natural energies from flowing freely through the druid.
Using this as a "baseline" of why armor/shields are anathema, we can determine the following: Druids should never willingly use these items unless it is absolutely necessary to uphold their primary goal, which is to maintain the natural balance. Grabbing a metal shield on the ground to defend yourself from an enemy trying to disrupt the natural order? Sure, that's fine, it was an act for the greater good. Bringing a metal shield with you all the time "just in case"? No, that's just trying to skirt the rules because metal is "better".
That line of though also means your players are ignoring the many non-metal options now available, such as Wovenwood Shields and Dragonhide Armor.
That line of though also means your players are ignoring the many non-metal options now available, such as Wovenwood Shields and Dragonhide Armor.
I was with you up until this part. Both are uncommon, with one being level 12 and one being made be mages from the western Mwangi Expanse: as such, even if the DM is planning on making such things available eventually, that could leave a lot of play without such items where they might have better luck finding a common option.
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I'm content to let folks believe it works however they like, I just wanted to bring this into the conversation because, at the very least, the prohibition itself isn't cut and dry and does absolutely have wiggle room unlike similar restrictions on other classes.
If the designer's intent really wasn't to be permissive here then the rules and wording need to be brought in line with the Champion and Cleric restrictions and I'd gladly welcome an update to the wording to clarify things.
Simulated FAQ button
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Vague rules border on unusable and useless in this subforum, that isn't what this area exists for and they are asking about PFS which only ever has leeway to interpret RAW when it is vague...and the wording of this ability... I still maintain, is not at all vague at all, it says exactly what it says and it means what it says, "enough acts" would never have been included intentionally as part of the rules for this if they really meant "any acts" IMO.
To me choosing to interpret it at all is a mistake of the same type as:
"The dog crossed the street."
1) You read it, it says what it says, meaning that the dog traversed across the street.
2) You interpret it as meaning something other than a typical and literal reading would so to argue that the sentence means that the dog challenged/defied the street.
You also don't need to be insulting, you might not like my RAW takes but I stand by them just as I did when people jumped down my throat for pointing out the named Staffs are Specific Magic Weapons and, in fact, I'd hold to it that having that conversation and appealing for, and then receiving clarification made was worthwhile just like I think it is now.
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I do know that there are other ways to get cantrips. ;)
• Gisher's Guide to Acquiring Common Cantrips
It's just weird that Druids don't get Cantrip Expansion.
To answer your actual question then. Its for the same reason Clerics don't get Effortless Concentration when the other casters do. Paizo seem to have a policy of not creating totally generic features. There are so many specific details and exceptions. I think they think we value complexity, and Paizo believes it adds flavour. Paizo also doesn't want the game to have a simple, one size fits all, solution.
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Venture-Agent, California—Silicon Valley
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That line of though also means your players are ignoring the many non-metal options now available, such as Wovenwood Shields and Dragonhide Armor.I was with you up until this part. Both are uncommon, with one being level 12 and one being made be mages from the western Mwangi Expanse: as such, even if the DM is planning on making such things available eventually, that could leave a lot of play without such items where they might have better luck finding a common option.
The shield is sold in a shop in Absalom dude, it's not THAT uncommon. The GM can also easily just say the shield is as common as a Sturdy Shield. As for Dragonhide, it's the only precious material that is "natural" that can be made into "metal" armor, so yea it has a high level requirement, so what? Just wear Hide until you can make or buy some.
All armor has an equivalent of +5 AC, only Heavy armor has +6, and druids aren't proficient in that. Plus we're talking Eldrich Trickster so all they have is Light proficiency and likely have a high dex.
The shield is sold in a shop in Absalom dude, it's not THAT uncommon.
One specific store in the entire inner seas area... Yeah, that sounds PRETTY uncommon. Should my druid playing in the land of linnorm kings expect to have easy access to an item that's on an island off the the other side of the continent or on a different one entirely. Your acting like it's as easy as picking it up anyplace your character happens to be. :P
The GM can also easily just say the shield is as common as a Sturdy Shield.
The DM can say they grow on trees too but that doesn't matter much when we're talking about what the rules actually say: at base, it's uncommon to most players and that means most times they have to 'work' for it so it's not something they'll start with [it's level 4 too] and that works against your point that there would be no reason to try to game the system to wear metal. You actually CAN pick up metal armor most places.
As for Dragonhide, it's the only precious material that is "natural" that can be made into "metal" armor, so yea it has a high level requirement, so what? Just wear Hide until you can make or buy some.
Your point was that there was NO reason to try to find a workaround for wearing metal because of 2 items: the fact that for more than 1/2 the level you can have in total one of the items is unavailable is a salient point on why that might not be true.
To answer your actual question then. Its for the same reason Clerics don't get Effortless Concentration when the other casters do. Paizo seem to have a policy of not creating totally generic features. There are so many specific details and exceptions. I think they think we value complexity, and Paizo believes it adds flavour. Paizo also doesn't want the game to have a simple, one size fits all, solution.I do know that there are other ways to get cantrips. ;)
• Gisher's Guide to Acquiring Common Cantrips
It's just weird that Druids don't get Cantrip Expansion.
I didn't know that about Clerics and Effortless Concentration. Two similar instances does make it seem more likely that these are deliberate design choices rather than just oversights.
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PFS often gets depicted here on this board as the bogeyman for RAW and the final arbiter. So let me share my personal experience (5-star, 4-glyph GM) how I would expect Plate Mail and Druid to be handled.
You will get away on 80% of tables with wearing Plate Mail. The number is an estimate and not for the reason you think. In games there is only a limited amount of time to do character reviews. That is the amount of GMs who likely (at a F2F game) won't even notice you wear plate.
This number will drop if you go to VTT and drop even further in PBP or PBD.
Disclosure - on average the number of mistakes I pick up when looking across character builds at tables is 2:1 in disfavor of players. On the other hand 95% of rules discussion are if you pick up some 'strange' build in favor of the player based on questionable interpretations of rules.
In case of metal armor and druid expect the majority to rule against it. This reflects several strong opinions here. There are exemptions - sometimes it is a GM or even Venture Officer in an area who starts such a trend and you will have local pockets where something is ruled different. Don't be shocked if that ruling will be challenged if you go to a convention with a wider intake.
How would I rule?
Level 1 / unexperienced player: I ask politely to rebuild ahead / even mid scenario if only picked up later - assuming someone just didn't know the rules
Higher level: Depends. A Plate Mail with several feats spend to be able to wear it and possibly runes on it can be difficult to change on the fly.
At the same time the excuse it is a one time use doesn't fly. If you bought it 2 levels ago then you used it repeatedly - even if not at my table or in this specific game.
I dislike to be THAT GM who stands up and invalidates your build. But on rare occasions it has happened. Ideally we get to a solution that works for both the GM and the player.
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No Widen spell for Bard is another strange exception.
Occult as a list is relatively light on area of effect, especially damaging area of effect spells. There are still a couple at most levels that it might be handy to widen. So maybe this was a thematic choose. Bards have other things to do with one action anyway.
I still think this is Paizo just being a little arbitrary and creating some differences.