Would the anadi's change shape ability prevent an anadi monk from making use of stances, Flurry of Blows, and many other monk abilities?
I want to make a "wolf spider" with Wolf Stance. XD
It will depend from how your GM consider relevant the first sentance of Wolf Stance text about hands.
Unarmed attacks in general don't requires free hands or even that you have hands. But initial sentence of Wolf Stance says "You enter the stance of a wolf, low to the ground with your hands held like fanged teeth". So some GMs will consider that this requires to have a free hand other could consider this as a flavor text and allow you to adapt your current spider legs to work with the stance.
In general there's no balance reason to restrict the stance also this text "Your spider legs can't perform actions that require fingers or significant manual dexterity, including any action that would require a check to accomplish" is about manipulate actions it's not valid to attack actions like unarmed Strikes.
As GM I would allow without any restriction. You just adapted your monk training to work with you spider form too.
I think the restriction to hands only and the specifics of needing to "hold your hands like fanged teeth" would probably prevent an Anadi in spider form from using wolf stance, although I don't think it would break things to allow it anyways. However, the Anadi spider form does seem pretty restricted in what they're allowed to do.
Other monk stances are less restrictive about how the attacks are made, and would be allowed. There's enough grey in the description of wolf fang that for me it's unclear, and just personally when things are unclear I default to saying no.
Some stance strikes are explicitly made with legs or hands. Such as dragon tail or wolf jaw. Those stance strikes are more restrictive.
The question becomes really grey if you ask "Do Anadi spider form qualify for both wolf jaw and dragon tail? Or only one." To me, it can't qualify as both hands and feet at the same time (regardless of whether one character has both stances or would bother to fuse them). To me, it definitely doesn't qualify for both, because no other playable creature does. So the question is does the Anadi spider form leg qualify as a hand or a leg?
In fact the shape change entry specifically mentions them as legs that can take limited manipulate actions, not as hands.
So now I'm leaning even further into "No, because they're not hands so you can't make wolf jaw attacks". But you could make dragon tail attacks.
Edit: Humble Gamer, I think I just realized a key point of where I think you analysis fails. Your point number 3 isn't true, or rather it doesn't apply the way you think it does.
While a generic unarmed strike can be made with any part of your body, stance strikes are sometimes more specific. Wolf jaw is one of those stance strikes that is more specific.
Now more generally, I agree that it's probably not a balance problem to go ahead and let the Anadi character make the wolf jaw strike in their spider form, but by the rules I think it's not allowed.
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Are Unarmed Strikes allowed in spider form? If yes, Wolf Stance has very specific requirements. Is this an armored spider? The descriptive, flavorful portions of the text are written from the baseline assumption of a small or medium humanoid monk. There is an established format for listing hard requirements or rules related restrictions. It seems a little peculiar to discriminate against spider people just because here in the real world the book was written for humans by humans. Why are spiders being restricted from dealing piercing damage with unarmed strikes? In the interests of fostering an inclusive, welcoming environment for all gamers this needless anti-spider bias must stop.
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I think this is another case of a missing word. Just like in the Incorporeal trait where it says 'strength-based checks' instead of 'strength-based skill checks', the restriction on Anadi form says 'any action that would require a check to accomplish' instead of 'any skill action that would require a check to accomplish'.
In both cases, I don't think that the devs are intending to group attack rolls in with skill checks - even though technically an attack roll is a check.
Your spider legs are enough of a 'hand' do do some things such as push open a door or knock a cup off the table. Just not to do skill things that require dexterity or manipulation or have a risk of failure.
So an Anadi in Spider Form should still have their 'fist' attack with their legs - and that is sufficient for me to allow using that unarmed attack to qualify to use Wolf Stance.
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The first part of the feat is always descriptive.
If we were to consider it ok for stances we would be obliged to do so for the rest of the feats, eventually breaking the whole game.
Always descriptive? Let's look through the monk feats in the CRB and see if anything looks decidedly more concrete than that.
Deflect Arrows: You gain a +4 circumstance bonus to AC against the triggering attack.
Water Step: You can Stride across liquid and surfaces that don’t support
your weight.
Disrupt Ki: Make an unarmed Strike.
Improved Knockback: When you successfully Shove a creature, increase both the distance you can push the creature and the distance you can move to follow along with the target by 5 feet on a success or 10 feet on a critical success.
Looking at the CRB introduction on how to read statblocks for feats I also don't find anything saying such and such part of a statblock shouldn't be taken seriously.
Now clearly, a lot of feats do start with some introductory text, and some don't seem to contain any mechanical bits at all. But these stance feats tend to say what body part you're using for making strikes, and that does have mechanical meaning. And we don't have a rule saying you should disregard this as meaningless flavor text. So you have to exercise some judgement on whether the text contains actionable mechanics.
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Looking at the CRB introduction on how to read statblocks for feats I also don't find anything saying such and such part of a statblock shouldn't be taken seriously.
Now clearly, a lot of feats do start with some introductory text, and some don't seem to contain any mechanical bits at all. But these stance feats tend to say what body part you're using for making strikes, and that does have mechanical meaning. And we don't have a rule saying you should disregard this as meaningless flavor text. So you have to exercise some judgement on whether the text contains actionable mechanics.
I have taken a liking to treating that introductory sentence as the RAI statement. It definitely shouldn't be discarded, but it also doesn't reference game rules directly.
Not everything has an RAI statement though - as you pointed out. But the ones that do should be treated as such.
Also, Ravingdork didn't quote the entire ability rule text either.
The first line of the ability is "You change into your human or spider shape."
Also the sentences preceeding the one that we have been looking at are also rather important to consider.
However, in your spider shape you can't use weapons, shields, or other held items of any sort, and you are limited in what actions you can take that have the manipulate trait. The only manipulate actions you can take are to Cast a Spell with somatic components, weave silk or webbing, or simple Interact actions such as opening an unlocked door. Your spider legs can't perform actions that require fingers or significant manual dexterity, including any action that would require a check to accomplish.
So it is pretty clear that the restriction is meant for manipulate actions and fine control of objects - not Strike actions.
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Old story time!
In PF1 days, at some point they printed the feat Pummeling Style.
Pummeling Style (Combat, Style)You collect all your power into a single vicious and
debilitating punch.
Prerequisites: Improved Unarmed Strike; base attack
bonus +6, brawler’s flurry † class feature, or flurry of
blows class feature.
Benefit: As a full-round action, you can pool all your
attack potential in one devastating punch. Make a number
of rolls equal to the number of attacks you can make with
a full attack or a flurry of blows (your choice) with the
normal attack bonus for each attack. For each roll that is
a hit, you deal the normal amount of damage, adding it
to any damage the attack has already dealt from previous
rolls (if any). If any of the attack rolls are critical threats,
make one confirmation roll for the entire attack at your
highest base attack bonus. If it succeeds, the entire attack
is a confirmed critical hit.
And in the table summarizing the feats they wrote:
Pool all unarmed strikes into a single powerful blow
And immediately, there were people arguing that you could use this with a sword because the actual mechanics of the feat didn't reference unarmed strikes. Yeah, the prerequisites were unarmed strikes, the flavor text was about punches, and the summary table talked about unarmed strikes. But the blood-dripping RAW benefit of the feat didn't mention unarmed strikes.
Fast-forward to the second printing:
Pummeling Style (Combat, Style)Your unarmed strikes weave together in an effortless
combo, focusing on the spots you’ve weakened with the
last hit.
Prerequisites: Improved Unarmed Strike; base attack
bonus +6, brawler’s flurry † class feature, or flurry of
blows class feature.
Benefit: Whenever you use a full-attack action or
flurry of blows to make multiple attacks against a single
opponent with unarmed strikes, total the damage from
all hits before applying damage reduction. This ability
works only with unarmed strikes, no matter what other
abilities you might possess.
And I think this has been Paizo's general modus operandi. Whenever someone says "yeah, that's all fluff but RAW it only says..." they make it clear they hate the term "fluff" and usually put in some errata to make the mechanics match the flavor text more.
I don't think think "RAI statement" goes quite far enough. A more precise term might be "natural language rules" instead of "keyword heavy rules". Keywords are useful for things that occur a lot and benefit from standardization, but something can be a rule without using a lot of keywords.
In the section on how to read statblocks I linked to earlier the describe it as "Regardless of the game mechanic they convey, rules elements are always presented in the form of a stat block, a summary of the rules necessary to bring the monster, character, item, or other rules element to life during play." The first sentence tends to be a bit flowery because they want to bring an idea to life, but that doesn't mean that makes it zero-rules.
They could have written this:
You enter the stance of a wolf, low to the ground with your hands held like fanged teeth. You can make wolf jaw unarmed attacks with your hands. These deal 1d8 piercing damage; are in the brawling group; and have the agile, backstabber, finesse, nonlethal, and unarmed traits.
That would have been more explicit but it also feels like it's saying the same thing twice, because the introductory text already said the wolf jaws were your hands. If you were to ignore the opening line as being rules-free, you'd probably have to conclude that wolf stance uses your teeth?
Paizo's writing style doesn't really like saying the same thing twice in a row, and they don't feel that there's this harsh boundary between descriptive text and rules. They could have kept the PF1 format with an introduction, Benefits tag and actual rules, but they didn't feel the need to keep that hard separation.
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I'm not entirely sure which side of this you are on - allowing a spider shaped Anadi to use Wolf Stance or not.
But even with the proposed alternative wording of Wolf Stance, an Anadi in spider shape has something on their body that counts as 'hands' enough for casting spells, and using a limited set of manipulate actions.
Smacking things doesn't seem like something that requires fingers or takes a great deal of manual dexterity.
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Mainly I don't like the "it's fluff, ignore it" way of reading those parts of feats.
Whether anadi spiderlegs are handsey enough is a bit of a judgement call it seems.
Looking at the whole text:
You change into your human or spider shape. Each shape has a specific, persistent appearance. In your human shape, you can't use unarmed attacks granted by your ancestry. You aren't flat-footed when climbing in your spider shape. However, in your spider shape you can't use weapons, shields, or other held items of any sort, and you are limited in what actions you can take that have the manipulate trait. The only manipulate actions you can take are to Cast a Spell with somatic components, weave silk or webbing, or simple Interact actions such as opening an unlocked door. Your spider legs can't perform actions that require fingers or significant manual dexterity, including any action that would require a check to accomplish. The GM might determine other manipulate actions are appropriate for your spider legs.
So the middle bolded item would seem to be in the context of manipulate actions, since it's flanked by a sentence about manipulate actions on both ends. Under that interpretation, wolf stance looks okay.
On the other hand, wolf stance sounds like it needs fingers: "your hands held like fanged teeth". You can't really do that without fingers, although it's not a manipulate action. Notice that Striking with a sword also clearly involves your hands, isn't a manipulate action, and anadi can't do it in spider form.
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It's very much in the GM/table variation zone. I'd say No, you basically have eight legs in that shape, not hands with fingers. If a spider's paws(?) had something that could shape into a jawlike thing I'd be more willing to go along with it, but I don't think that's the case. Dragon Stance would be fine though because you definitely have enough legs.
(I don't think it was necessary to design the form to be so limited, just like I find most of the tail feats so limited that they're dead on arrival. But that's a separate question.)
Notice that Striking with a sword also clearly involves your hands, isn't a manipulate action, and anadi can't do it in spider form.
I would assume that wielding a weapon would involve fingers though - not just hands. And it is covered explicitly with the 'you can't use weapons, shields, or other held items' line.
On the other hand, wolf stance sounds like it needs fingers: "your hands held like fanged teeth". You can't really do that without fingers, although it's not a manipulate action.
And on the other hand, nothing in Wolf Stance mentions fingers. You have four spider legs extra while still having four to stand on. That is plenty for approximating fanged teeth.
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The Change Shape ability wouldn't prevent you from using the forms, it would allow you to use the forms. All the monk stances assume you have a humanoid body, which Anadi only have when in their humanoid form. If they're in their default spider form, they just wouldn't be able to move and act in the same way for it to make sense.
Anadi also already have a built in unarmed attack, just use that if you want to stay in spider form.
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I made a "Wolf Spider" as an Anadi Animal Instinct (Wolf) Barbarian XD