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@Deriven: I definitely disagree with all your points. Casters deal lower damage because of lower proficiency and lower Dexterity. The higher you go and the lower the part of your damage dice in your total damage (thanks to Elemental runes and Weapon Specialization) so the d4s are less and less of an issue. If the Eidolon is swallowed you just shrug as it's not really a problem. And if you lose your Eidolon to some nasty status you still keep the Summoner and as such more than half of your efficiency.
Sort of weird that we went from action economy to complaining about ranged eidolon damage and "summoners don't summon enough" but it feels like at this point Deriven and Temperans will never miss an opportunity for that.
The Summoner is definitely part of the subject as it's a post CRB class and in my opinion the class with the best action economy in the game (once you grab Tandem Move as before it is clunky everytime it needs to move). So it's the best counterexample to OP's point.
But I don't think there's much to say besides: The Summoner has 4 actions instead of 3.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
IMO Summoners are excellent and very unique classes. Extremely versatile, having a good amount of HP and fun. Yet the class isn't perfect and nor should it be. Summoner and it's eidolon are basically an eternally "quickened" char due Act Together that can also be even more quickened (using haste) and can do whatever he want with such action. So you have a healing potion in your hand and want to drink it and use 3-actions with your eidolon you can! Also Eidolons have their own stats, share your skills and have a normal martial proficiency, something that none companion will had.
But It had it's own risks. Having 2 tokens sharing same HP means you have a double risk and you have to take this into consideration during every encounter. It's a complicated class that need that player worry about positioning, spells, eidolon abilities and so on. There will be situations cleary disadvantageous to summoners at same time there are many others that only summoners can do (already tried to sent eidolon ahead to scout? Having 100 ft range means you can usually sent your Eidolon to next room first (specially if you have Stealth) to investigate for creatures and hazards and unmanifest in case of being detected or trigger a hazard with Share Senses you and your eidolon can even try to RK and inform and prepare the entire party to enter into next room.
IMO Summoners are an example of how a class could be very unique in PF2 and how could you have too many benefits and opportunities at cost of greater risks. It's not a class for everyone but is a fantastic class.
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@Deriven: I definitely disagree with all your points. Casters deal lower damage because of lower proficiency and lower Dexterity. The higher you go and the lower the part of your damage dice in your total damage (thanks to Elemental runes and Weapon Specialization) so the d4s are less and less of an issue. If the Eidolon is swallowed you just shrug as it's not really a problem. And if you lose your Eidolon to some nasty status you still keep the Summoner and as such more than half of your efficiency.
I've already played a caster with a weapon. Any caster can obtain energy runes. So that is not an advantage to the eidolon. The base weapon die is more important to damage than the energy runes. That is why a d10 or 12 weapon with striking runes does far more damage than a d6 or d8 weapon with energy runes and especially a d4 weapon.
Swallowed Hole does a ton of damage.
Getting smacked while affected by status penalties to AC and saves also does a ton of damage.
So I'm not even sure what you're disagreeing with as this is just the math of the game. You get hit by a frightened aura or some wounding aura, your losing hit points through your eidolon. And it's not something you'll shrug off at all. CR+2 and 3 creatures rip things apart and if you don't have a melee keeping them at bay, your eidolon won't be too happy if targeted.
The summoner isn't half your efficiency. The summoner is a weak caster with limited spell slots. He loses his action economy advantage without his his eidolon.
We'll see how it goes. I'm playing this combination right now. I will measure its abilities against the other party members in terms of damage and capability at level 11 plus.
I will test it first to see if I confirm it's a problem or the class proves to be more effective than I expected.
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So I'm not even sure what you're disagreeing with as this is just the math of the game.
That your math is wrong. For example:
Swallowed Hole does a ton of damage.
Froghemoth melee damage: 3d12+14
Froghemoth swallow whole damage: 3d6+9Purple Worm melee damage: 3d10+15
Purple Wormswallow whole damage: 3d6+9
I think one can handle 19.5 automatic damage per round at level 13ish.
The summoner is a weak caster
14 levels with maxed out spell DC is "weak"?
I won't bring a graph for every point I disagree with you. Overall, the "math of the game" is not on your side (or you are going way too much on the hyperbole and as such I can't answer your points).
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So I'm not even sure what you're disagreeing with as this is just the math of the game.That your math is wrong. For example:
Swallowed Hole does a ton of damage.Froghemoth melee damage: 3d12+14
Froghemoth swallow whole damage: 3d6+9
Purple Worm melee damage: 3d10+15
Purple Wormswallow whole damage: 3d6+9I think one can handle 19.5 automatic damage per round at level 13ish.
I find that when a creature swallows the monk in my party whole, the damage per turn does not matter much because the monk ruptures his way out in one turn.
I fondly remember when I ambushed my 8-member 15th-level party with five 14th-level blighted froghemoths, a Moderate-Threat encounter. The blighted froghemoth's swallow-whole damage was 3d6+10 bludgeoning. The froghemoths managed to swallow three party members. The monk ruptured his way out, the swallowed ranger was pulled out by the rogue/sorcerer looking down the froghemoth's throat to cast Friendfetch, and the champion just nonchalantly said, "Don't worry about me. I will cut my way out before the damage bothers me." She did.
The summoner is a weak caster14 levels with maxed out spell DC is "weak"?
Perhaps Deriven Firelion means that a wave caster has fewer spells.
I won't bring a graph for every point I disagree with you. Overall, the "math of the game" is not on your side (or you are going way too much on the hyperbole and as such I can't answer your points).
Some people have the view that any class that is not the best of all classes at a particular strategy is weak in that strategy. That viewpoint is sensible in a competitive game such as Magic: The Gathering in which a small advantage can determine the winner, but in a roelplaying game such as Pathfinder any strategy that wins against level-appropriate challenges is good enough.
The math says that the summoner is not a supreme spellcaster. However, the math says that the summoner is good enough.
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Some people have the view that any class that is not the best of all classes at a particular strategy is weak in that strategy. That viewpoint is sensible in a competitive game such as Magic: The Gathering in which a small advantage can determine the winner, but in a roelplaying game such as Pathfinder any strategy that wins against...
I myself often find this completely black and white, all or nothing thinking to grossly misrepresent a lot of aspects of this game. It's incredibly misleading.
"Don't ever play Witch, it's the worst class in the game, completely useless and ineffectual, literally just dead weight, like you might as well just show up with all 0's in your stats for all the good your character will be worth. literal unplayable garbage."
People straight up have this attitude about a lot of stuff in this game, or even strategies. "If you're a Magus and you're not spellstriking you might as well delete your character sheet. It's literally unfathomable of having a turn in which you're not doing OpTiMaL dAmAgE"
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Gunslinger in my game does very well. Reload is definitely felt as a tax, but she's pretty consistent about making attacks that seriously hurt. I feel like risky reload and alchemical shot and the like should only misfire on a crit fail though; a dice roll on whether your action is an action compressor or an extra action tax isn't a super great design on a class thats pretty heavily balanced around reload weapons. I'm not sure though is this is because reload is bad, or that reload zero weapons are just really, really good
I agree that Alchemical Shot has too many drawbacks with the misfire on merely a miss.
Risky Reload though is only ever action neutral or positive, it can't actually result in taxing an action. Loading and a firing a gun is two actions. Risky Reload loads and fires a gun in one, and you spend an extra on a miss... which puts you into the same action cost and situation as missing a normal shot (2 actions spent, gun is unloaded and not jammed). Which is why the feat is so strong - it just flat gives you a permanent extra half action (averages, lol) each round of combat.
If risky reload misses, it misfires, which means you have to spend an action to clear the weapon before you can reload it; so yes, it actually can tax you an action when it fails
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If risky reload misses, it misfires, which means you have to spend an action to clear the weapon before you can reload it; so yes, it actually can tax you an action when it fails
Risky reload compresses two actions into one. If you miss, you pay back the compressed action. In this sense, it never goes negative on action economy and is always worth using (and is actually required that you use it to have any hope of matching other, better classes).
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I myself often find this completely black and white, all or nothing thinking to grossly misrepresent a lot of aspects of this game. It's incredibly misleading.
"Don't ever play Witch, it's the worst class in the game, completely useless and ineffectual, literally just dead weight, like you might as well just show up with all 0's in your stats for all the good your character will be worth. literal unplayable garbage."
People straight up have this attitude about a lot of stuff in this game, or even strategies. "If you're a Magus and you're not spellstriking you might as well delete your character sheet. It's literally unfathomable of having a turn in which you're not doing OpTiMaL dAmAgE"
In a game with tight math where every +1 matters and that wants to emphasize strategy and tactics, then yes, starting from a deficit by picking a bad class or playing poorly is putting a burden on the rest of the party to pick up your slack. Will a well played/built witch outdo a really really badly played bard? Maybe, but if the bard is played equally well, it's not even a contest.
It's simple enough to see if you compare what a party of fighter, rogue, bow magus, bard can do vs a party of something like gymnast swashbuckler, investigator, gunslinger, occult witch.
If risky reload misses, it misfires, which means you have to spend an action to clear the weapon before you can reload it; so yes, it actually can tax you an action when it failsRisky reload compresses two actions into one. If you miss, you pay back the compressed action. In this sense, it never goes negative on action economy and is always worth using (and is actually required that you use it to have any hope of matching other, better classes).
The most problematic part of Risk Reload is that it harms other Strike activities with that gun. But if you just spam RR it always will be better than Strike and Reload.
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The base weapon die is more important to damage than the energy runes
I mean, the difference between a d4 and a d6 is literally a single point of damage per die, which becomes less and less important as you gain more static damage modifiers from other sources.
I do think a d4 with no mods and no strong traits is pretty bad for something that's short range and requires feat investment on a martial class, especially considering Summoner's low damage mods, but you're also really overstating how significant the die actually is.
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I myself often find this completely black and white, all or nothing thinking to grossly misrepresent a lot of aspects of this game. It's incredibly misleading.
"Don't ever play Witch, it's the worst class in the game, completely useless and ineffectual, literally just dead weight, like you might as well just show up with all 0's in your stats for all the good your character will be worth. literal unplayable garbage."
People straight up have this attitude about a lot of stuff in this game, or even strategies. "If you're a Magus and you're not spellstriking you might as well delete your character sheet. It's literally unfathomable of having a turn in which you're not doing OpTiMaL dAmAgE"
In a game with tight math where every +1 matters and that wants to emphasize strategy and tactics, then yes, starting from a deficit by picking a bad class or playing poorly is putting a burden on the rest of the party to pick up your slack. Will a well played/built witch outdo a really really badly played bard? Maybe, but if the bard is played equally well, it's not even a contest.
It's simple enough to see if you compare what a party of fighter, rogue, bow magus, bard can do vs a party of something like gymnast swashbuckler, investigator, gunslinger, occult witch.
Yes "every +1 matters" but it isn't "every +1 is needed". Sometimes the people overemphasize the optimization to a point that forget about fun and that forget that many times the things doesn't goes as they want.
I have frustrated many time my players expectations simply because the situations goes far from their expectation. Many highly optimized characters was put in situations where their optimization simply doesn't work and had notice that they are less effective than they think.
Fully focused AC champions that don't know how to work against save focused spellcasters, highly optimized Rogues vs Ooze. An entire party vs an invisible creature where no-one was prepared to deal with it.
Sometimes you have to forget a little the perfect optimization and have greater vision or just focus into the fun.
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I think what Super means is that if an eidolon gets paralyzed or confused or what have you, then the summoner can just take more actions. Yes, they will be losing power without their eidolon, but if a regular martial was paralyzed they would lose everything. Generally that works in reverse too; if the summoner is paralyzed the Eidolon can still take 3 actions. Though if the summoner is confused or controlled that advantage disappears.
It does actually make a difference. I've seen Eidolons get shut down completely and their summoner just shrug and act alone for a few rounds.
But the summoner actions are weak without the eidolon and vice versa.
I still feel the damage hammer hard if the eidolon is getting attacked.
If the eidolon or summoner are neutralized, they completely lose their action economy advantage.
And a fighter without the fighter isn't just weak, it is non-existent.
If the fighter is neutralized, they lose all of their actions.
You're comparing half a character to a full character when it is actually half a character against no character. If someone in your party is going to get Incapacitated, then the eidolon is the best case scenario besides minions. The summoner might be weaker on their own, but can still contribute, where any other class's player might as well go get pizza.
It is basically the flip side to their AoE vulnerability.
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It is basically the flip side to their AoE vulnerability.
And I still question the penalty to Summoner for AoE.
Sure, rolling twice and taking the higher damage is worse than what single character characters get.
But a Druid with an Animal companion, or two PCs caught in an AoE*...? They also roll twice - but each take the damage amount instead of only applying damage once.
* because seriously, do enemies regularly use an AoE ability or spell and only catch one party member with it?
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two PCs is two PCs.
The summoner + eidolon is one PC.
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I myself often find this completely black and white, all or nothing thinking to grossly misrepresent a lot of aspects of this game. It's incredibly misleading.
"Don't ever play Witch, it's the worst class in the game, completely useless and ineffectual, literally just dead weight, like you might as well just show up with all 0's in your stats for all the good your character will be worth. literal unplayable garbage."
People straight up have this attitude about a lot of stuff in this game, or even strategies. "If you're a Magus and you're not spellstriking you might as well delete your character sheet. It's literally unfathomable of having a turn in which you're not doing OpTiMaL dAmAgE"
In a game with tight math where every +1 matters and that wants to emphasize strategy and tactics, then yes, starting from a deficit by picking a bad class or playing poorly is putting a burden on the rest of the party to pick up your slack. Will a well played/built witch outdo a really really badly played bard? Maybe, but if the bard is played equally well, it's not even a contest.
It's simple enough to see if you compare what a party of fighter, rogue, bow magus, bard can do vs a party of something like gymnast swashbuckler, investigator, gunslinger, occult witch.
I really need to get back to writing my teamwork tactics handbook, because people miss a lot of options. A party of gymnast swashbuckler, investigator, gunslinger, and occult witch won't perform as well as a party of fighter, rogue, bow magus, and bard if they use the tactics of a fighter, rogue, bow magus, and bard. Instead, they will achieve victory by using tactics appropriate for a gymnast swashbuckler, investigator, gunslinger, and occult witch. Perhaps the swashbuckler's gymnastics will work great after the witch debuffs the target. Perhaps the investigator will learn about the enemy in advance so they are especially prepared for the encounter. A polymath or enigma bard could investigate in advance, too, but I suspect that gesalt intended a bard that specialized in combat buffing.
Trixleby was agreeing with my comment, so I agree with Trixleby's comment. I had used Magic: The Gathering as an example in my comment, because I used to competitively play in limited tournaments in which the players open up fresh booster packs of Magic cards and build the best deck out of them possible. Some people dismissed that format as luck, but really the talent in it was in being able to play many different strategies. The format does not let a player stick with their favorite strategy; instead, the player has to play the strategy that those random cards favor.
Pathfinder 2nd Edition is great because it lets players play many different different characters that have their won individual strategies. They can play the versatile summoner, the flamboyant swashbuckler, the sneaky rogue, the lie-to-your-face rogue, the bold fighter, the cautious fighter, the honest paladin champion, the goodhearted redeemer champion, the lawbreaking liberator champion, etc. Optimization does not force them to grub for every +1 bonus they can find. Instead, customization lets them play an interesting character that wins in their own way.
Part of that customization is giving different classes different costs for their abilities. Alchemists use bombs and elixirs that cost limited resources and extra actions. Barbarians have trouble concentrating and dodging hits during their rage, Bards have to spend actions to keep singing. Champions have to follow a code and their best abilities depend on their allies being attacked. Clerics also have a code and their spells consume limited spell slots. And so on. And those abilities that cost extra actions are annoying, so we call them action taxes. And we call limited spell slots the 15-minute workday. And we call every code of conduct a roleplaying straitjacket. Costs open up possibilities while still maintaining power balance, but paying the costs is not cheap.
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Yes "every +1 matters" but it isn't "every +1 is needed". Sometimes the people overemphasize the optimization to a point that forget about fun and that forget that many times the things doesn't goes as they want.
I have frustrated many time my players expectations simply because the situations goes far from their expectation. Many highly optimized characters was put in situations where their optimization simply doesn't work and had notice that they are less effective than they think.
Fully focused AC champions that don't know how to work against save focused spellcasters, highly optimized Rogues vs Ooze. An entire party vs an invisible creature where no-one was prepared to deal with it....
.
In the campaign I run, I have two casual players, one optimizer, and two "in the middle" players. The person who struggles the most in most of my scenerios is the optimizer because his magus was built to deal incredibly high damage... in a theoretical blank room scenerio where he can just sit by the enemy and spellstrike them every turn. He focused so gar on this that stuff like putting the enemies in the water or air; requiring a swim or fly action every turn to avoid sinking/falling, difficult terrain that can hamper advancement, putting enemies on top of walls or other fortified positions, forced movement, etc end up disrupting this, and unlike everyone else, who broadened their character out with feats and gear, or tailored their builds to the specific needs of the campaign, he doesn't have a very broad toolkit to deal with these challenges.
I had used Magic: The Gathering as an example in my comment, because I used to competitively play in limited tournaments in which the players open up fresh booster packs of Magic cards and build the best deck out of them possible. Some people dismissed that format as luck, but really the talent in it was in being able to play many different strategies. The format does not let a player stick with their favorite strategy; instead, the player has to play the strategy that those random cards favor.
Are you aware of KeyForge? It has its roots in exactly that booster draft tournament style of Magic. You get your specific deck, and learn to use what you have been given to best effect.
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Then he doesn't really sound like he's optimized at all. That sounds like a casual player who found something fun they wanted to focus on and are realizing that PF2 doesn't always want to let you do stuff like that.
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Funny how people are jumping up and down saying that this white-room optimization for maximum damage isn't actually optimal play when dealing with an actual combat scenario - and yet that is what most of the advice and rules discussion on these forums is about: optimizing a one-combat-round routine against a target dummy.
This entire thread was started because someone doesn't like how certain classes have something else that they need to spend actions on instead of just Strike on the target that they are adjacent to. Which is somewhat funny to me because I have played in games with Barbarians and Fighters that have nothing better to do than Strike for their third action even though the player even already knows that it is definitely not a good use of their action.
Funny how people are jumping up and down saying that this white-room optimization for maximum damage isn't actually optimal play when dealing with an actual combat scenario - and yet that is what most of the advice and rules discussion on these forums is about: optimizing a one-combat-round routine against a target dummy.
This entire thread was started because someone doesn't like how certain classes have something else that they need to spend actions on instead of just Strike on the target that they are adjacent to.
Don't be obtuse. Panache generation's failings isn't based on movement or positioning, it's based on being an extra point of failure that even under ideal conditions puts the swashbuckler behind, let alone "real world" scenarios. Same with reload where the strict action rotation makes it more rigid and prone to disruption than bow fighter while being inferior from the start (on top of the multiple feat taxes). Bow magus is also vulnerable to disruption, but not nearly to the degree of its melee counterpart. At least magus has room to make up for it with an impressive damage profile and high level spell utility which is more than these other classes can say.
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Not being obtuse. That is how characters are ranked and rated here on these forums more often than not - by how much damage they can do with their three actions, to a single enemy, in ideal conditions.
Just look at the other thread going on right now - same thing. Any class that requires an action for setup of their 'cool thing' is considered sub-par at best. And any character built for doing anything besides damage gets the same treatment.
I will say I think we usually miss the mark when we compare the swashbuckler to fighters and barbarians. With the high mobility it seems a lot closer to a monk, with a slight dash of rogue for the extra skill feats.
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Don't respond to baiting posts, the whole point is to provoke a reaction and derail a conversation. If someone is setting out to intentionally misrepresent you, you aren't going to be able to just talk them into engaging honestly.
I will say I think we usually miss the mark when we compare the swashbuckler to fighters and barbarians. With the high mobility it seems a lot closer to a monk, with a slight dash of rogue for the extra skill feats.
It's definitely closer to the rogue, but even in that comparison you're still hitting the same concern about points of failure (while also getting fewer skill increases).
Level scaling is also an issue there, the base Swashbuckler compares a lot more favorably against the rogue at low levels than high.
I will say I think we usually miss the mark when we compare the swashbuckler to fighters and barbarians. With the high mobility it seems a lot closer to a monk, with a slight dash of rogue for the extra skill feats.
I think it depends on what action choices you make.
If you gain panache and keep it - just relying on the lower static precision damage - then yes, they play a bit like a Monk/Rogue hybrid.
If you gain panache and spend it on finishers regularly, I think they are more like a Precision Ranger (but with a skill check needed, but also flexibility in their target), or Thaumaturge (with an action and skill check needed, but without getting any marginal benefit on a failure).
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Just because you consider him an optimizer doesn't mean he's any good at it. That should have been evident the moment he picked melee magus based on swinging into a target dummy without any other considerations. Far from optimization, that's just incompetence. That's the kind of dead weight that needs to be corrected because they picked a mediocre build and are playing it poorly.
I mean, he is very good at doing what optimization threads focus on (which is to say maximum damage output at a target dummy). I don't disagree that it's bad way to actually play the game, but given that there's tons of threads about "zOMG, spending an action to do my spicy thing ruins my dpr!" tells me very much that optimization values damage more than anything else
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I mean, he is very good at doing what optimization threads focus on (which is to say maximum damage output at a target dummy). I don't disagree that it's bad way to actually play the game, but given that there's tons of threads about "zOMG, spending an action to do my spicy thing ruins my dpr!" tells me very much that optimization values damage more than anything else
If your ability to do your thing has a failure point beyond the attack roll, there's a problem. If your ability to do your thing relies on a strict rotation, there's a problem. If you can't fix or mitigate these problems, then you shouldn't play these builds.
I feel like every thread does mention these things when taking about these classes. I know on that last gunslinger thread I tried to be very explicit about that. I feel that every time swashbuckler comes up panache generation taking an action with a fail rate is pointed out as the culprit for not keeping up. Same with melee magus having terrible action economy and needing something, whether it's a mount or haste or whatever else to fix it.
If somebody's reading a thread and only looking at the math and not any of the context, that's on them.
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I find it genuinely hilarious that you have no problem saying "skill issue" while in the same breath, saying his complaints (thinking that his rotation is strict and leaves little wiggle room) are an inherent issue with the mechanics.
Like I agree it's a skill issue, I disagree that the magus's "action rotation" is strict. Specifically the magus, investigator's is downright oppressive, while swash would be better if it had mechanics to automatically gain panache without a d20 check
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So I'm not even sure what you're disagreeing with as this is just the math of the game.That your math is wrong. For example:
Swallowed Hole does a ton of damage.Froghemoth melee damage: 3d12+14
Froghemoth swallow whole damage: 3d6+9
Purple Worm melee damage: 3d10+15
Purple Wormswallow whole damage: 3d6+9I think one can handle 19.5 automatic damage per round at level 13ish.
The summoner is a weak caster14 levels with maxed out spell DC is "weak"?
I won't bring a graph for every point I disagree with you. Overall, the "math of the game" is not on your side (or you are going way too much on the hyperbole and as such I can't answer your points).
Your graph proves nothing. The attacks in PF2 are so variable that there is no graph you could construct that would capture all the possibilities.
I love how you avoid taking into account a critical fail on a save and that a Frogehometh need not swallow hole. It would instead use its tentacles to Improved Grab everything within 15 feet of an already huge creature much less it's 30 foot tongue attack. Then tear into creatures with its Greater Constrict. I have watched one of these rip into a party and it would rip up a summoner if it got ahold of the eidolon without needing to use Swallow Hole. If it did decide to swallow the eidolon, then move to the summoner and constrict it you are taking double damage and going down very, very fast.
Purple worm swallows hole and then can move right through to swallow the summoner as well if it wished to or whoever else is around. Given the weak damage by the summoner, it would likely focus on other targets first. You completely ignore the purple worm stinging you for poison damage and using swallow hole on melee targets. It's stinger has a 15 foot reach on a gargantuan creature capable of burrowing through stone.
Then it has a thrash attack. Which is exactly the type of creature I'm talking about that hammers a summoner because Thrash individually targets everyone, so if the eidolon is in melee range it is getting hit. If the summoner and eidolon are in range, they are both getting hit for double dip damage.
It is not 14 levels with a weak DC. You get Expert at level 11 and Master at level 17. Whereas as the regular caster gets Expert at level 7, 4 levels before, and Master at a level 13, also 4 levels before. So you are almost always behind the regular casters with far fewer spell slots and versatility as you have to choose your spells very carefully because the 5 you know cannot be changed.
So no, I don't believe the math is on your side at all. I think there are far too many situations the summoner will find himself lacking. It's provable in gameplay.
I've experienced getting wrecked multiple times in play. When they get get wrecked, they don't get back into the right too quickly. With no eidolon, they are weak casters.
If you bring any graph, then do it like I do where you take real data during the game. Not "white room" data that can't possibly take into account every game possibility.
So far I've played two summoners. One from 1st to 5th and another up to 11th. Both times I have experienced the pain of the double dip attacks that wreck the summoner. I've also tracked the weak damage of the summoner.
I've stated to you the math of a d4 with striking runes is weaker than a d8, but you're claiming this isn't the case? It's most obviously the case. Energy runes are applied for both caster classes.
I am not using hyperbole. The creatures you mention I have fought and know how they work. I have also seen two summoners in action. They are on the weaker side of the damage equation. I don't know what martials you're playing with, but a summoner is not matching their damage as the levels rise if they are well built martials using high value weapons. Not even getting close unless it's a nova attack using a spell slot.
The base weapon die is more important to damage than the energy runesI mean, the difference between a d4 and a d6 is literally a single point of damage per die, which becomes less and less important as you gain more static damage modifiers from other sources.
I do think a d4 with no mods and no strong traits is pretty bad for something that's short range and requires feat investment on a martial class, especially considering Summoner's low damage mods, but you're also really overstating how significant the die actually is.
This is not a d6 versus d4 comparison. A summoner's eidolon is a martial attacker doing very weak ranged damage. A bow does d8 with a deadly d10 or a deadly d6 if using a Hornbow which is pretty easy to obtain for a human caster. This weapon has superior range and will be built out similar to a martial weapon.
Any caster can take Archer as a 2nd level Archetype feat obtaining bow proficiency. It's extremely easy to obtain and build out a bow user as a caster. Elf casters can do it with ancestry feats.
So the main advantage on the eidolon is hit chance with the attack, though the range is much shorter than a bow using caster.
I've built so many bow using casters that I specifically compared ranged eidolon damage versus ranged bow using caster third action damage, they are very similar with the ranged eidolon hitting more often. But often due to the range of the bow the caster can engage at a longer range staying farther from the battle to avoid the risk of being close enough for auras, AoE attacks and such when there is sufficient room.
Ranged eidolon is a better option than melee for avoiding the damage hammer, but the damage is moderate and still short range leaving the eidolon subject to effects within the 30 foot range increment which is common for creatures to be able to affect.
A d8 averages 4.5 damage per die and a d4 averages 2.5. So once major striking is reached, you have an 8 disparity with rune damage being equal and the propulsive half damage from strength and master specialization closing the gap to a 2 point disparity in the bow user's favor damage per hit with the eidolon likely hitting more often improving damage per round over time. Once you include critical hits during finite battle periods, the damage can spike in favor of the bow user with deadly d10 and the eidolon ranged attack lacking any damage increases on a critical hit.
Super Bidi may have a "white room" graph using ctricking's tool. I have real play data showing differently. I rely on real play data because white room math rarely matches what occurs in actual play.
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I will say I think we usually miss the mark when we compare the swashbuckler to fighters and barbarians. With the high mobility it seems a lot closer to a monk, with a slight dash of rogue for the extra skill feats.I think it depends on what action choices you make.
If you gain panache and keep it - just relying on the lower static precision damage - then yes, they play a bit like a Monk/Rogue hybrid.
If you gain panache and spend it on finishers regularly, I think they are more like a Precision Ranger (but with a skill check needed, but also flexibility in their target), or Thaumaturge (with an action and skill check needed, but without getting any marginal benefit on a failure).
My problem with Swash isn't about the action need but the bad cost benefit of the entire thing.
You need to pass in an additional test (Tumble Through or Fascinating Performance (Battledancer) or Demoralize (Braggart) or Feint/Create a Diversion (Fencer) or Grapple/Shove/Trip (Gymnast) or Bon Mot (Wit)) thats many times have limited uses (Fascinating Performance, Demoralize or Create a Diversion*) or gives you additional penalties in case of critical failures (Feint, Grapple, Shove, Trip or Bon Mot) or even can trigger some a movement reaction like AoO (Tumble Through) and in order to be allowed to try a Finisher that usually will do just a little more damage than a Rogue's Sneak Attack and that will prevent you to do any additional attack in that turn.
*Create a Diversion isn't really limited instead it gives -4 penalties in your next tries.
My problem with Swash isn't about the action need but the bad cost benefit of the entire thing.
You need to pass in an additional test (Tumble Through or Fascinating Performance (Battledancer) or Demoralize (Braggart) or Feint/Create a Diversion (Fencer) or Grapple/Shove/Trip (Gymnast) or Bon Mot (Wit)) thats many times have limited uses (Fascinating Performance, Demoralize or Create a Diversion*) or gives you additional penalties in case of critical failures (Feint, Grapple, Shove, Trip or Bon Mot) or even can trigger some a movement reaction like AoO (Tumble Through) and
I actually don't have too much of a problem with the action cost. Compared to Ranger's Hunt Prey or Thaumaturge's Exploit Vulnerability, Swashbuckler's skill actions at least have an effect of their own.
in order to be allowed to try a Finisher that usually will do just a little more damage than a Rogue's Sneak Attack and that will prevent you to do any additional attack in that turn.
The restriction on 'actions with the Attack trait' is a strange one. It prevents using Ray of Frost and Produce Flame, but not Electric Arc or Spout. For some reason.
And Escape. So if you are yourself grabbed, you will have to choose whether to use your finisher at full bonus and stay grabbed, or escape first and then use the finisher with MAP.
And to be fair, Rogue will likely also have to do something other than just Strike three times in order to get Sneak Attack damage going. Move into flanking position, feint, hide, Recall Knowledge (Mastermind only), Demoralize if you have Dread Striker...
Unless, for example, your Gymnast Swashbuckler ally already grabbed/tripped the enemy for you...
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And to be fair, Rogue will likely also have to do something other than just Strike three times in order to get Sneak Attack damage going. Move into flanking position, feint, hide, Recall Knowledge (Mastermind only), Demoralize if you have Dread Striker...
The main advantage of Rogues for me in comparison to Swashbucklers are that half of these moves are things that other players can do for you (flanking or flat-foot an opponent in some way or making it Frightened if you have Dread Striker) and many times are easily sustainable (if your target didn't move it still flat-footed to you, if you have gang up you just need that some other player is closer and so on or just use Precise Debilitations to maintain the target into flat-footed condition).
So when you compare this to all the work that Swashbucler has to do every time to get a similar result, his whole problem becomes clearer.
The restriction on 'actions with the Attack trait' is a strange one. It prevents using Ray of Frost and Produce Flame, but not Electric Arc or Spout. For some reason.
It's so strange that makes me think why Impaling Finisher and Dual Finisher have the normal MAP observations in their text if they are simple impossible to happen due the Finisher trait additional attacks restriction.
It's so strange that makes me think why Impaling Finisher and Dual Finisher have the normal MAP observations in their text if they are simple impossible to happen due the Finisher trait additional attacks restriction.
Dual Finisher makes sense. It specifies that both attacks are made at the same current MAP stage.
Impaling Finisher doesn't make any sense. Unless in the future there is some non-Attack action that requires you to be at maximum MAP in order to use...
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You get Expert at level 11 and Master at level 17.
Expert at 9. So 6 levels with lower proficiency (7-8, 15-16 and 19-20) and 14 levels with same DC than a full on caster. You definitely get less spells, but unlike casters you have a perfectly valid at will damaging routine between Electric Arc and Eidolon's attacks.
I've stated to you the math of a d4 with striking runes is weaker than a d8
I've nearly never seen Longbows used (outside of Point Blank Shot Fighters). 30 feet is the range of most fights, it's the range of Electric Arc, Heal, Slow and a lot of extremely common spells. So you will in general be in the 30-foot range with a caster and as such should use a Shortbow. Also, your caster may always have its third action to shoot but that's not my experience. Casters need to move, and some of them have very valid one-action Focus Spells. So the "bow caster" is a bit of a hyperbole. The Eidolon who moves for free anytime you move and who has an extra action all for itself is definitely a more solid supplemental damage dealer than a caster with a bow.
I've experienced getting wrecked multiple times in play.
I've experienced getting wrecked only twice. Once because my level 3 Eidolon decided to deal Fire damage to a Troll and the second time because the GM succeeded at 6 attacks in a row. Overall, my Summoner is solid.
Also, all your "double dipping" arguments consider always catastrophic situations. The Thrash ability from the Purple Worm has a small range, so outside a surprise ambush it should have hard time targeting both the Summoner and the Eidolon. Also, you don't get double dipping if you are targeted by the same effect. Constricting both the Summoner and the Eidolon is a single effect, same with auras, Swipe-like attacks and so on.
I've stated to you the math of a d4 with striking runes is weaker than a d8, but you're claiming this isn't the case? It's most obviously the case. Energy runes are applied for both caster classes.
What I've very exactly stated is that the difference in damage dice has a lower impact on your total damage the higher you level.
Also, it's not just a d4. It's a d4 that turns into a d6 at melee range. Your caster with a bow can be entirely disrupted by an AoO enemy that gets near them, and considering how you love reminding me of all the catastrophic events that can lead to double dipping you should also consider all the situations that shut a caster down but not a Summoner because the Eidolon is also a melee martial.From my experience, my Eidolon acts as much at range as in melee. Range is the basic setup for the beginning of the fight, but depending on its evolution it very often goes to melee range (or gets forced to melee range, which is both common and delightful) and then its damage increases both because of the dice (and Strength bonus) and because of flanking.
Super Bidi may have a "white room" graph using ctricking's tool. I have real play data showing differently. I rely on real play data because white room math rarely matches what occurs in actual play.
I have both white room and experience, they complete each other well. The only thing I don't have much is experience with other player's Summoner, as I'm nearly the only one to play one in the parties I play in. But I'd love to see how they fare.
In my opinion, the Summoner is not easy to play if you really want to maximize its versatility. And from all the posted builds on these boards I see how they are adding pain points to the Summoner instead of alleviating them. The Large AoO Eidolon is for example a recipe for disaster considering the crazy attention it raises, I can clearly see how a player may end up considering the Summoner bad because what is advertised as the "best Summoner build out there" gets wrecked up over and over again if the player doesn't know how to reduce its aggro.Also, may I remind you how you passed on Tandem Move in the past. You should try to play a Summoner with it, reducing the cost of movement by half is a pretty decent 4th level feat and will increase your damage output by a good 20%. There's really a Summoner before and after Tandem Move, and if your other players also pass on Tandem Move then I can fully agree with you that they were playing a clunky character.
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About being a weaker caster and don't having a different gamplay you also has the option to complement summoner's spells with a sorcerer dedication + Basic/Expert/Master Sorcerer Spellcasting + Bloodline Breadth based in your tradition to have the same spell DC to allow the summoner to be more caster at cost to have less feat improvements to your Eidolon.
What kind of tax feat the class have that I don't know?
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What kind of tax feat the class have that I don't know?
Tandem Move is definitely a tax feat. And Protective Bond can be considered one. Eidolon's Opportunity can also be considered one, but that's as much of a tax feat as AoO is a tax feat for a lot of martials, so it's pretty standard PF2 design in that case.
Sorry but I always thinked that "tax feat" is a thing essential to any build and that requires a feat. But IMO none of theses feats are really required to play well with a Summoner.
We can say that theses feats pointed by HumbleGamer with exception of shrink can be considered as taxes to allow a summoner to mount a flight Edilon but isn't like there aren't another solutions (especially using spells).
Sorry but I always thinked that "tax feat" is a thing essential to any build and that requires a feat. But IMO none of theses feats are really required to play well with a Summoner.
Are you also answering to me or only to HumbleGamer? Because Tandem Move is definitely a tax feat. Unless you mount your eidolon, which is a rather fringe build, you have to take it to achieve top efficiency. And Protective Bond removes one of the biggest pain point of the class so it also qualifies as a tax feat.
6 feats just to aeasthetic ( an reach ofc ), that doesn't enhance your gameplay in any way.
You mean that being able to ride a gigantic dragon is not an enhancement of gameplay? Because it definitely is to me. The only one I could see as a tax feat is Shrink Eidolon as you don't take it for its effect but because without it you may end up unable to play with your Eidolon.
In my opinion, you consider that being able to ride a gigantic dragon should be baseline of the class and as such taking feats to achieve this is a tax. But I think it's more an issue in expectation than a proper definition of tax feat (even if I can see Airborne Form as a tax feat for a Dragon Summoner as flying is something Dragons do...).