I have a semi-hypothetical question. Three feats in particular are at interest: Witch's Armaments, Sympathetic Strike, and Clawdancer Dedication.
I am choosing to read the "Nails" weapon from Witch's Armaments as a Claw weapon for the purpose of this discussion, but I suspect this could come up in other scenarios. In this case, the Nails satisfy the pre-requisite to let me take the Clawdancer dedication. I am then curious about the interaction between being in say, Claw Stance, and then using Sympathetic Strike.
The wording of Sympathetic Strike says I make "an unarmed Strike with one (of) your witch’s armaments." Claw Stance in this case utilizes my Witch's Armament as a pre-requisite. So the argument would be made that Frenzied Claw strikes are an unarmed attack being made with my witch's armament. Therefore, could I be in Claw Stance and make a Sympathetic Strike? Or is the intention that Sympathetic Strike can only use an unmodified version of my Witch's Armaments? Is that base strike the only one that counts for the feat? Or does a stance that utilizes the "claws" (nails) granted by Witch's Armaments still count as "an unarmed Strike with one (of) your witch's armaments?"
Assuming my GM would already treat nails = claws, does it make sense within RAW to allow me to be in Claw Stance and use Sympathetic Strike?
Nails aren't claws, so this whole question is a homebrew issue. Discuss it with your GM
Okay that's fair, I guess I was still just curious about the implications here in the way these things are written.
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Different unarmed attacks are still different unarmed attacks. Just like different weapons are different weapons. Using one unarmed attack is not the same as using a different unarmed attack even if they use the same body part.
So in this case (assuming that the GM allows Eldtritch Nails to count as a claw attack to let you take Clawdancer Dedication) you have two separate unarmed attacks.
Eldritch Nails: 1d6 slashing damage. Traits: agile and unarmed.
Claw Stance: 1d6 slashing damage. Traits: agile, finesse, grapple, unarmed, and versatile piercing.
and Sympathetic Strike would only qualify for use with the Eldritch Nails attack since that is the one gained from Witch's Armaments.
A similar scenario happens if you instead take Barbarian (Animal Instinct, Crab) archetype instead of Clawdancer archetype. You can have both Eldritch Nails and Crab Instinct's Claw and Big Claw attacks, but they are three separate attacks. Sympathetic Strike interacts with Eldritch Nails, not the other two. Edit: And those Crab Claw attacks are most definitely not simply adding traits to the Witch's Nails attack.
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Different unarmed attacks are still different unarmed attacks. Just like different weapons are different weapons. Using one unarmed attack is not the same as using a different unarmed attack even if they use the same body part.
So in this case (assuming that the GM allows Eldtritch Nails to count as a claw attack to let you take Clawdancer Dedication) you have two separate unarmed attacks.
Eldritch Nails: 1d6 slashing damage. Traits: agile and unarmed.
Claw Stance: 1d6 slashing damage. Traits: agile, finesse, grapple, unarmed, and versatile piercing.and Sympathetic Strike would only qualify for use with the Eldritch Nails attack since that is the one gained from Witch's Armaments.
A similar scenario happens if you instead take Barbarian (Animal Instinct, Crab) archetype instead of Clawdancer archetype. You can have both Eldritch Nails and Crab Instinct's Claw and Big Claw attacks, but they are three separate attacks. Sympathetic Strike interacts with Eldritch Nails, not the other two. Edit: And those Crab Claw attacks are most definitely not simply adding traits to the Witch's Nails attack.
Sure, but op said "Assuming my GM would already treat nails = claws", so it doesn't matter that they're technically two different unarmed strikes.
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Sure, but op said "Assuming my GM would already treat nails = claws", so it doesn't matter that they're technically two different unarmed strikes.
I am interpreting OP's meaning to be the difference in unarmed attack name between what Eldritch Nails gives and what Clawdancer Dedication requires.
You gain a nails unarmed attack
Prerequisites: permanent unarmed claw or talon attack
So considering a 'claw' attack to be different than a 'nails' attack means that having Eldritch Nails still doesn't qualify the character to take Clawdancer Dedication.
If the GM instead rules that a 'claw' attack is functionally equivalent to a 'nails' attack, then having Eldritch Nails does qualify the character to take Clawdancer Dedication.
In neither case does Sympathetic Strike work with unarmed attacks other than the three available from Witch's Armaments no matter what they are named.
Finoan, what do you see through that telescope?
Because this is typed I wanted to say I only meant this in a good natured way. I read it after writing the second post I made and thought maybe this could be read in a negative way and wanted to make sure that was not how I meant it.
I was going to comment, saying I would treat them as equivalent for the purposes of qualifying for the dedication.
But I can see someone going the other way.
If you do say the nails qualify though then it needs to be both on hands and feet to make sense as to why the witch can now use either stance.
And if Ive agreed that the witches armament qualifies then the following options seem to follow from that decision.
The player can when outside of either stance use a nail attack as normal or sympathetic strike which is its own action. the properties of sympathetic strike would use the nails agile and slashing traits.
If the player uses claw stance they cannot use sympathetic strike because the stance only allows the PC to make frenzied claw unarmed attacks.
If the clause was not there then I would allow either the nail's normal traits or the improved frenzied claw traits because both use the witches armaments(only because as GM i said close enough on the nails being claws).
If you do say the nails qualify though then it needs to be both on hands and feet to make sense as to why the witch can now use either stance.
It doesn't have to make sense though: A changeling with Hag Claws can 100% use both stances even though they only have hand claws. In fact you wouldn't even need claws on both hands: for instance, an ancestry with claws that could take Golem Grafter and replace one arm with a Golem arm and still qualify with a single claw attack.
If you do say the nails qualify though then it needs to be both on hands and feet to make sense as to why the witch can now use either stance.It doesn't have to make sense though: A changeling with Hag Claws can 100% use both stances even though they only have hand claws. In fact you wouldn't even need claws on both hands: for instance, an ancestry with claws that could take Golem Grafter and replace one arm with a Golem arm and still qualify with a single claw attack.
yeah its a lot of weirdness. I remember this discussion in we all had when it first came out.
But if a player in my game wants to use them they need to make some sense of them. They have whatever creative leeway they need to do that. If they dont want to even make it make sense then I would rather they dont pick up the feature.