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Gotta love how often weapon complaints just boil down to 'my pet favorite weapon should do more damage'
Gotta love how often weapon complaints just boil down to 'my pet favorite weapon should do more damage'
Really, the Ranseur should be the king of polearms.
tbf d8 two hander is a bit of a hard sell, especially on an advanced weapon. the deadly mostly makes up for that, but you can access d10 reach without having to buy advanced weapon proficiency.
Ofc Nodachi has brace, and gets the honor of being the highest damage brace weapon in the game, which by extension means it's the best weapon for readied strikes in the game... but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game. So it's kind of... extremely good at a very niche activity in a game where investing in a weapon is a massive budgetary bottleneck. Rough.
Better than the glaive at least, since deadly d12 is actually enough deadly to balance out the trait cost.
but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game.
Bracing a weapon basically reveals your plans to your GM.
If it was a reaction to brace a weapon, it would be way more appealing.
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but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game.Bracing a weapon basically reveals your plans to your GM.
If it was a reaction to brace a weapon, it would be way more appealing.
You make it sound as if a GM didn't already know what the PCs are going to do most of the time. Its not like classes are that diverse.
But still, the nodachi has reach too so I guess someone could strategically choose to make a reactive strike fighter build since RS would benefit from the bonuses of the brace trait. Deadly is also quite nice for a class such as the fighter and their higher proficiencies.
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but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game.Bracing a weapon basically reveals your plans to your GM.
If it was a reaction to brace a weapon, it would be way more appealing.
You make it sound as if a GM didn't already know what the PCs are going to do most of the time. Its not like classes are that diverse.
Or as if the GM is an opponent you need to hide moves from. The NPCs/creatures the GM control don't know your intent even if the GM does. If your GM can't make that distinction you have bigger problems to solve.
but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game.Bracing a weapon basically reveals your plans to your GM.
If it was a reaction to brace a weapon, it would be way more appealing.
You make it sound as if a GM didn't already know what the PCs are going to do most of the time. Its not like classes are that diverse.
But still, the nodachi has reach too so I guess someone could strategically choose to make a reactive strike fighter build since RS would benefit from the bonuses of the brace trait. Deadly is also quite nice for a class such as the fighter and their higher proficiencies.
When you say "I'm readying my weapon by bracing it", what actually prevents an opponent from NOT approaching you?
You're telegraphing your intentions way too obviously.
You want bracing to be effective? Have an advanced feat that allows you to surprise moving/charging opponents in the same way William Wallace did in Braveheart, when the front line literally surprised a charging cavalry by drawing spears one second BEFORE.
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If you need to hide what you are planning to do from the GM in order to make use of your abilities, you are playing with a level of adversary player-GM relationship that is almost certainly outside the range accounted for by Paizo designers. If this works for you, more power to you, but it doesn't seem to be the assumed default.
That said, for me the main problem with the brace trait is that I can't see most people choosing to trade an extra action for 2 precision damage on a MAP attack that may never trigger. There are rare situations where readying an attack is necessary, in which case it's a nice bonus, but these situations are rare enough that this trait has almost no meaningful power behind it.
Deadly often adds ~4.5 damage on a crit, which feels like a much more common (if less controllable) situation that happens with no additional cost to actions or MAP
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If you need to hide what you are planning to do from the GM in order to make use of your abilities, you are playing with a level of adversary player-GM relationship that is almost certainly outside the range accounted for by Paizo designers. If this works for you, more power to you, but it doesn't seem to be the assumed default.
Except when it's so obvious that the enemies can tell. If you see someone holding a 2h gun in the party back line, you can guess they're probably going to shoot it. That's not adversarial: that's playing the enemies to have a basic sense of awareness.
Brace isn't quite that obvious, but taking the ready actions means you're not doing something else and it does give a hint that you're preparing something. Intelligent enemies aren't dumb and they can likely clue in that "approaching the guy who appears to be waiting for someone to approach him" isn't a good idea.
but idk how often I see readied strikes and I don't think I've ever seen the brace trait used in a real game.Bracing a weapon basically reveals your plans to your GM.
If it was a reaction to brace a weapon, it would be way more appealing.
You make it sound as if a GM didn't already know what the PCs are going to do most of the time. Its not like classes are that diverse.
But still, the nodachi has reach too so I guess someone could strategically choose to make a reactive strike fighter build since RS would benefit from the bonuses of the brace trait. Deadly is also quite nice for a class such as the fighter and their higher proficiencies.
The phrasing is a bit adversarial, but brace does mean you're spending actions now for an attack that might never happen. If you get your readied action and reactive strike off it's pretty powerful, but that's still a lot of work and a gamble and pretty late game (since you need multiple reactions to get both).
Deadly is okay, but it's ultimately kind of a wash, good burst but the lower base damage tends to average out not in favor of the deadly weapon unless really skew accuracy in your favor.
A braced nodachi crit is basically the hardest hitting weapon attack in the game, which is cool, but brace is so hard to work with and as a daily driver it has on real advantages over any of the stock d10 polearms, which feels a bit bad when it's an advanced weapon so even being able to wield it is a chore.
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I enjoyed that book... but it's a little late to tell people in 2023 to read it.
I am a person from 2023! It wasn't too late!
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The fact that this is a game and to some degree it is the GM's job to play into the Player's plans.
The GM also gets to have fun. Players aren't the only people at the table.
It doesn't feel like a living, breathing world when reasonably intelligent creatures just blindly walk up to an obvious trap over and over again. That feels like a video game.
The GM shouldn't just thwart everything players want to do because they can, but players need to accept that if you telegraph what you're going to do super obviously, an enemy with the smarts to understand that might not fall for it.
Brace is a tool you use when you're acting as a wall. You should not try to be a wall in an open field or against an archer. It's kind of weird it's not used for any spear weapons given this is basically what a pike/long spear is for.
If you need to hide what you are planning to do from the GM in order to make use of your abilities, you are playing with a level of adversary player-GM relationship that is almost certainly outside the range accounted for by Paizo designers. If this works for you, more power to you, but it doesn't seem to be the assumed default.Except when it's so obvious that the enemies can tell. If you see someone holding a 2h gun in the party back line, you can guess they're probably going to shoot it. That's not adversarial: that's playing the enemies to have a basic sense of awareness.
Brace isn't quite that obvious, but taking the ready actions means you're not doing something else and it does give a hint that you're preparing something. Intelligent enemies aren't dumb and they can likely clue in that "approaching the guy who appears to be waiting for someone to approach him" isn't a good idea.
This can also work in the players favor if they want to inhibit approach to themselves or an ally if enemies are wary of them bracing for them.
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if the enemy doesn't approach you because you used brace, and they otherwise wanted to be somewhere within your reach (to flank, or to use an aoe, or just to stride once instead of twice to reach their destination), you still accomplished something
Weapon traits being very niche is just a thing. Like how often does Disarm or Razing come up? Sweep and Shove are nominally useful on paper but I've never seen them used to good effect.
Oh, certainly, a sufficiently intelligent enemy can absolutely avoid a telegraphed attack without it being necessarily adversarial GMing (though I'd caution a GM from assuming every sapient combatant is automatically aware enough to recognize the false opening for what it is in the heat of combat). No, I was responding to JiCi's report that bracing reveals your plans to the GM--a take rather distinct from whether some enemies might be able to recognise a ready action.
Weapon traits being very niche is just a thing. Like how often does Disarm or Razing come up? Sweep and Shove are nominally useful on paper but I've never seen them used to good effect.
I mean that's fair but the nodachi also pays a huge amount of trait budget for brace so it's not mutually exclusive to also be a little bit down on that reality. It's an advanced weapon that is generally just worse than its martial counterparts if brace isn't working.
Oh, certainly, a sufficiently intelligent enemy can absolutely avoid a telegraphed attack without it being necessarily adversarial GMing (though I'd caution a GM from assuming every sapient combatant is automatically aware enough to recognize the false opening for what it is in the heat of combat). No, I was responding to JiCi's report that bracing reveals your plans to the GM--a take rather distinct from whether some enemies might be able to recognise a ready action.
Like I said, why can't you brace a weapon as a reaction instead of a 2-action move?
They did this in Braveheart and that sequence became quite iconic in cinema.
Why can't I go "Hold, hold, hold, NOW" when an enemy charges me again?
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Oh, certainly, a sufficiently intelligent enemy can absolutely avoid a telegraphed attack without it being necessarily adversarial GMing (though I'd caution a GM from assuming every sapient combatant is automatically aware enough to recognize the false opening for what it is in the heat of combat). No, I was responding to JiCi's report that bracing reveals your plans to the GM--a take rather distinct from whether some enemies might be able to recognise a ready action.Like I said, why can't you brace a weapon as a reaction instead of a 2-action move?
They did this in Braveheart and that sequence became quite iconic in cinema.
Why can't I go "Hold, hold, hold, NOW" when an enemy charges me again?
This is quite literally what readying an action is in this circumstance
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Oh, certainly, a sufficiently intelligent enemy can absolutely avoid a telegraphed attack without it being necessarily adversarial GMing (though I'd caution a GM from assuming every sapient combatant is automatically aware enough to recognize the false opening for what it is in the heat of combat). No, I was responding to JiCi's report that bracing reveals your plans to the GM--a take rather distinct from whether some enemies might be able to recognise a ready action.
Fools! You are all fools!
Having a properly formatted character sheet with your spells, feats, skills, class features, and ability modifiers listed out merely reveals your plans to the GM! They will know everything you plan to do with your character! You might as well surrender to them now!
This is quite literally what readying an action is in this circumstanceOh, certainly, a sufficiently intelligent enemy can absolutely avoid a telegraphed attack without it being necessarily adversarial GMing (though I'd caution a GM from assuming every sapient combatant is automatically aware enough to recognize the false opening for what it is in the heat of combat). No, I was responding to JiCi's report that bracing reveals your plans to the GM--a take rather distinct from whether some enemies might be able to recognise a ready action.Like I said, why can't you brace a weapon as a reaction instead of a 2-action move?
They did this in Braveheart and that sequence became quite iconic in cinema.
Why can't I go "Hold, hold, hold, NOW" when an enemy charges me again?
But you are readying to prepare for a charge, not reacting to it.
While drawing a nodachi takes time, when you have it drawn, you should be able to Brace it as a reaction if someone tries to charge you.
This isn't like a RPG where "both sides pick their actions and then the round plays out". In those cases, if an opponent picked to Brace and you picked to charge, you have to commit to it... and probably get skewered.
In Pathfinder or any TTRPG, including D&D, which that problem was there as well as far back as 3E, it's turn by turn per character. Unless you and your GM can hide Bracing, you have to spoil your strategy.
Last time I checked, the one at the receiving end of the Braced weapon doesn't get a Perception check to swerve around it and avoid taking precision damage.
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Let's rephrase this... why can't this weapon trait allow you to strike enemies as a reaction? I feel like the answer to that should be quite obvious to anyone familiar with how dominant Reactive Strike seems to be for 6th level feats for non-Fighters.
And again, I hate to break it to you, but if you feel that readying an action to attack an enemy as they approach can't capture the feel of reading your weapon to strike an enemy as they charge you because you can't hide that you're readying from the GM, you may be playing a different game than the designers intended. If you can't hold your attack for an enemy charge because the GM never lets enemies try to charge through your defences, that's a conversation you might want to have with your GM about what's fun for your character.
Not every enemy will charge you, but the majority of enemies still need to get up to you to do damage, so if they're either dumb or confident enough that they risk ploughing into you anyway, setting up moments where you can brace a weapon with a readied action only takes a good initiative roll and standing at the front or near a choke point.
I kind of feel like at least the bracing trait might allow you to get an action discount specifically for bracing at weapon. One action to brace instead of two. Maybe it negates the MAP penalty, but then we're getting closer to installing Reactive Strike as a weapon trait again.
Also, I know what you meant, but I feel it bears mentioning that a good reason why using a reaction to 'brace' a weapon seems like a bad idea is that once you've used your reaction to brace it, you don't have any reaction leftover to attack with the braced weapon
I think we can all agree that brace isn't a good trait, right?
If it applied to reactions that include strikes I think people would have less problems with it. I know it technically applies to reactions that include strikes already, but I'm talking about reactions that include strikes that don't require the opponent to move and for you to ready an action first as well.
I wouldn't be bothered if the damage was halved for reactions (1 precision damage for each weapon damage die) since reactions are already strong in PF2e and they clearly don't need the damage boost, but I feel the Ready action in PF2e leaves a lot to be desired if you ask me.
Why can't I go "Hold, hold, hold, NOW" when an enemy charges me again?
Because enemies act one at a time in initiative.
Short of having GM buy in to have all the enemies acting on the same initiative, it's not possible to have one large group readying actions against another large group to any significant effect. The moment the first enemy comes within range of a spear and suffers multiple readied actions and dying, every enemy after them in initiative is going to adjust their tactics (perhaps by charging in after their fallen comrade where there are no more readied actions left).
I suppose you could get a close approximation to the scene by using troops.
But you are readying to prepare for a charge, not reacting to it.
... What do you think the part where the pikemen plant their feet and adjust their grip and wait for the enemy to charge them is?
Like I kind of get where you're coming from and Brace is not a good trait but this is like... the worst possible example you could pick because you're describing people literally readying and waiting for the enemy to come closer.
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I kind of feel like at least the bracing trait might allow you to get an action discount specifically for bracing at weapon. One action to brace instead of two. Maybe it negates the MAP penalty, but then we're getting closer to installing Reactive Strike as a weapon trait again.]
I really like the idea of the brace trait letting you Ready a Strike with the weapon as a single action. In my opinion, you wouldn’t even need the MAP negation or bonus damage for this to be a fun, versatile trait that unlocks a few extra options.
Considering that there are exactly three weapons with Brace, I don't think it's likely to get another pass from the developers. One of the purposes of highly situational traits, I feel, is it gets players who end up with those weapons to consider alternative combat strategies. If you don't have the weapon that has Brace, you might never think about readying a strike. In that way, the Nodachi is functional, it doesn't really matter that it's not the weapon that someone with access to every weapon would choose.
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But you are readying to prepare for a charge, not reacting to it.
While drawing a nodachi takes time, when you have it drawn, you should be able to Brace it as a reaction if someone tries to charge you.
This isn't like a RPG where "both sides pick their actions and then the round plays out". In those cases, if an opponent picked to Brace and you picked to charge, you have to commit to it... and probably get skewered.
In Pathfinder or any TTRPG, including D&D, which that problem was there as well as far back as 3E, it's turn by turn per character. Unless you and your GM can hide Bracing, you have to spoil your strategy.
Last time I checked, the one at the receiving end of the Braced weapon doesn't get a Perception check to swerve around it and avoid taking precision damage.
Okay first:
A brace weapon is effective at damaging moving opponents. When you Ready to Strike an opponent that moves within your reach, until the start of your next turn Strikes with the brace weapon deal an additional 2 precision damage for each weapon damage die it has.
Second:
You prepare to use an action that will occur outside your turn. Choose a single action or free action you can use, and designate a trigger. Your turn then ends. If the trigger you designated occurs before the start of your next turn, you can use the chosen action as a reaction (provided you still meet the requirements to use it). You can't Ready a free action that already has a trigger.
If you have a multiple attack penalty and your readied action is an attack action, your readied attack takes the multiple attack penalty you had at the time you used Ready. This is one of the few times the multiple attack penalty applies when it's not your turn.
Think about what is happening in combat where you ready a strike, versus a normal reactive strike. When you sacrifice your actions to hit someone when they move towards you, that is literally holding until they get close and then reacting and hitting them which can take the form of the movie cliche where you pull your spear up at the last second to impale someone charging you.
What you are asking for is exactly counter to the thematics of what you want it to be. You are essentially asking for additional triggers on your regular reactive strike which is a twitch reflex where you see an opportunity to strike and take it. This is more akin to attacking one guy and Batman style suddenly punching the dude running up behind you.
And yes, ofc if the enemy can grok you're holding out and waiting for them to make a move so you can catch them and capitalize on it, well... There is a reason a lot of real warfare involved a lot of stalemates
I kind of feel like at least the bracing trait might allow you to get an action discount specifically for bracing at weapon. One action to brace instead of two. Maybe it negates the MAP penalty, but then we're getting closer to installing Reactive Strike as a weapon trait again.]I really like the idea of the brace trait letting you Ready a Strike with the weapon as a single action. In my opinion, you wouldn’t even need the MAP negation or bonus damage for this to be a fun, versatile trait that unlocks a few extra options.
Look, make this an advanced feat, with Tactical Reflexes as a requirement, so you could Brace AND Strike as a Reaction.