Is Remove Curse the only way to permanently cure a curse affecting a PC? Is there some handy way to view all the spells/focus spells/alchemical items/whatever that could remove a curse?
In the module, Prisoners of the Blight, fifth in Ironfang Invasion adventure path, the party would need to both remove a curse and treat disease to cure Darkblight. With only primal and arcane casters in the party, they could not prepare Remove Curse.
I searched Archives of Nethys for the word "curse." I could not read through all 800 results, most of which were curses or cursed items rather than cures. The alternatives I found were Claim Curse, a 3rd-level divine or occult spell to temporarily move a curse; some feats in the Curse Maelstrom archetype, and the 13th-level Panacea potion.
Fortunately, the druid was not purely a primal caster. She had taken Cleric Multiclass Archetype and could cast divine spells up to 3rd level. Remove Curse is 4th level, but that did let her use a scroll or wand of Remove Curse or a greater Staff of Providence. Their friend Amelia Rivercast ran 70 miles to deliver a wand of Remove Curse to the party before they entered the Darkblight Region.
Going down the Mercy feat line with either Champion or Blessed One you can take Affliction Mercy which can attempt to counteract curses.
Not sure of anything else off the top of my head. Probably a Cleric feat to turn a Font slot into a Remove Curse but not sure.
My search had not found Guntermench's suggestions, but Affliction Mercy champion feat 12 and Channeled Succor cleric feat 8 do as he said.
Can't you dispel them or break enchantment if low enough level?
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Can't you dispel them or break enchantment if low enough level?
The curse trait is quite explicit. "Effects with this trait can only be removed by effects that specifically target curses."
Also I don't think Break Enchantment exists in 2e...
I searched Archives of Nethys for the word "curse." I could not read through all 800 results, most of which were curses or cursed items rather than cures. The alternatives I found were Claim Curse, a 3rd-level divine or occult spell to temporarily move a curse; some feats in the Curse Maelstrom archetype, and the 13th-level Panacea potion.
This is exactly the problem I'm running into. I know that saying "effects that target curses" is for future-proofing, but maybe there should be a "Curse-lifting" tag or something so we can actually find the dang stuff?
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I tried a more advanced search on Archives of Nethys. Filtering the search on the word "curse" to give only spells that lack the trait "Curse" gave only 20 results. Among them only Claim Curse and Remove Curse acted against curses. The other true hits were spells like Hag's Fruit which creates cursed fruit but is not a curse itself and Ray of Enfeeblement, which said, "Patron Theme curse." Most were false positives, because the search engine viewed "cure" and "course" as possible variant spells of "curse." Thus, Magnificent Mansion showed up on the list because "The mansion is stocked with enough food to serve a nine-course banquet to 150 people."
A similar search on the word "curse," restricted to items but without the "cursed" trait had 45 results. Some were items such as Staff of Nature's Vengeance, which can cast Bestial Cuse and Staff of Providence (Greater), which can cast Remove Curse. Others helped defend against curses; for example, Cursebreak Bulwark is a tower shield that gives a +2 circumstance bonus against curses. But the good hits were Panacea item 13, Celestial Peach (Rejuvenation) item 17, Panacea Fruit item 19, and Sun Orchid Elixir item 20, And a Bottomless Purse, some items that cured things, some items that follow courses, and the curve of Golden-Cased Bullet were false positives due to variant spelling.
Feats had 63 results, which dropped to 55 when I excluded Oracle and Witch. Eight were from Curse Maelstrom archetype. Cat Sith Fey Ascension lets the charater make a DC 13 flat check to avoid a curse. Aasimar's Mercy ancestry feat 13 grants an innate ability to cast Remove Curse. Witch Warden human ancestry feat 1 gives a +1 circumstance bonus to saving throws against curses. Reclaimant Plea feat 12 from Knight Reclaimant archetype grants the ability to cast Remove Curse, and Vigilant Benediction feat 12 from Knight Vigilant archetype can do the same. And you already knew about a champion's Affliction Mercy and a cleric's Channeled Succor.
I had mentioned that I needed to provide my party with a Wand of Remove curse in Prisoners of the Blight, because the darkblight is both a disease and a curse, so both need to removed to cure it. However, I also threw in a creature with a curse ability, because I thought they could handle it with Remove Curse. I was wrong, but they handled the curse another way.
Queen Arlantia rules over the Blighted Region from deep in her underground lair. On the surface the party encountered Arlantia's minion the ancient fungal black dragon Naphexi, called the Duchess of Rot. I decided that Arlantia would have two more local governors like Naphexi, a vilderavn herald named the Duke of Ravens and a Marrmora. And I added them and the Duke's son, a regular vilderavn, to the end-of-module combat with Queen Arlantia, to increase the challenge since the party was oversized and overleveled.
Vilderavns and Vilderavn Heralds have a curse ability, "Bloodbird (curse, occult) A creature hit by a vilderavn's melee attack becomes cursed, taking 2d6 persistent bleed damage that's difficult to stanch: the DC to stop the bleeding using Administer First Aid is 35, and healing the creature to full HP doesn't automatically end the bleeding. Removing the curse ends the bleeding."
Two PCs and an NPC were hit by the bloodbird curse. 2d6 persistent bleeding was significant damage each turn, but the party could afford to wait until after the battle to cure it. The party's leshy sorcerer Gold-flame Honeysuckle Vine cast Regnerate on the barbarian NPC as a stopgap measure, since the barbarian had lost 267 hit points from critical hits by the duke and his son.
I was merely slightly worried about the curse, because the party had recovered an artifact called the Dryad's Song. When I ported the Dryad's Song to PF2 rules, I started with a 20th-level True Staff of Providence, allowed primal spellcasters to invest it too, and added more abilities. Thus, the Dryad's Song in Honey's hands [url="could remove the bloodbird curse to stop the bleeding.
Then Honey's player pointed out Remove Curse has a 10-minute casting time. At 2d6 bleed damage per round, that would be an average of 700 damage to the cursed person in the time to cast Remove Curse, she could not cast healing while taking the 10 minutes to case Remove Curse with the Dryand's Song, and with three people cursed one would have to wait an additional minutes for another 700 damage while the Dryad's Song and the Wand of Remove Curse helped the others. The 10 minutes had not mattered before, because the party had removed previous curses during exploration or downtime mode. She suggested that I had made a mistake when I ported the bloodbird ability to PF2. I explained that the Vilderavens and their curse were straignt from PF2 Bestiary 3; I had not ported it. She read the entry and suggested that maybe Administer First Aid could temporarily stop the bleeding long enought to remove the curse.
When combat slowed down (the vilderavns and the marrmora are dead, and the final defeat of Arlantia will be next week's game session), I re-examined the entry myself and discussed it with the player. I decided that I had misread the bloodbird ability and that the bleeding could be stopped by removing the curse or by a successful Administer First Aid, DC 25. And Honey was legendary in Medicine. Persistant bleeding is a little weird compared to other persistent damage, because it requires Administer First Aid to stop rather than Assisted Recovery, though Assisted Recovery mentions that "healing that restores you to your maximum HP [will] end persistent bleed damage." I had falsely assumed that the bloodbird curse had nullified the flat checks for persistent bleed to stop naturally or medically.
Thus, Remove Curse is useless against the vilderavn's bloodbird curse due to taking too long, but Medicine can stop the bleeding instead and the curse becomes meaningless when the bleeding stops. Technically, the persistant bleed damage could stop without Medicine at the end of the character's turn, but for this combat, I retroactively added that the bloodbird curse prevented the end-of-turn natural recovery checks, because that is how I had played it after misunderstanding it.
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Can't you dispel them or break enchantment if low enough level?The curse trait is quite explicit. "Effects with this trait can only be removed by effects that specifically target curses."
Also I don't think Break Enchantment exists in 2e...
I'll note that got added in errata, as I recall, so a lot of players aren't aware of it.
I'll note that got added in errata, as I recall, so a lot of players aren't aware of it.Can't you dispel them or break enchantment if low enough level?The curse trait is quite explicit. "Effects with this trait can only be removed by effects that specifically target curses."
Also I don't think Break Enchantment exists in 2e...
I was aware of it, from reading threads in this Pathfinder forum, and that is partly to blame for me misunderstanding the vilderavn's bloodbird curse. Because the the 2d6 bleed damage was from a curse, it could be removed only by effects that specifically target curses, right? But some curses include means by which they can remove themselves, such as a DC 35 Administer First Aid.
By the way, Break Enchantment is also a method of ending petrification in PF1, so when preparing for a battle against a medusa (Balancing a Seventeenth-Level Medusa) I had looked for Break Enchantment and confirmed its absence from PF2.
A question in the topic: can't one recover from curse naturally, by making saves? Doesn't making saves against the curse count as an effect that specifically targets curses?
Sorry, I need to be more specific, because I wasn't thinking about the bloodbird's curse. I've been thinking of a curse with stages, like the mummy rot of the mummy guardian).
The curse trait says
A curse with stages follows the rules for afflictions.
Is such a curse removed when one makes a successful save while being on Stage 1? That's how afflictions work.
Sorry, I need to be more specific, because I wasn't thinking about the bloodbird's curse. I've been thinking of a curse with stages, like the mummy rot of the mummy guardian).
The curse trait says
A curse with stages follows the rules for afflictions.Is such a curse removed when one makes a successful save while being on Stage 1? That's how afflictions work.
I'd say this sentence in the Mummy Rot description suggests "no."
This disease and any damage from it can’t be healed until this curse is removed.
The disease can't be healed until the curse is removed. That implies the curse and disease are not cured at the same time.