Ranger Hunt Prey clarity

[Riggler]

I think I understand that the intent of the Rangers' feats that use the terms and phases "the one you hunt", "your prey", "your hunted prey", are to only apply to targets for which the character has used the Hunt Prey action on.

Is that the consensus?

If so, for clarity, Hunt Prey should call the designated target the "Hunted Prey" (capitalized), and should use that same proper term when that's what is intended throughout the applicable feats.

Switching between inconsistent terminology creates confusion as one must ascertain was the change intentional or not. Further clouding the waters in TTRPGs is discerning flavor text from rule text. One might consider that with the lack of a proper "Hunted Prey", the inconsistency terminology in the feats is flavor text.

I hope they errata that for clarity. Thoughts?

[Dr. Frank Funkelstein]

Yes.
Not my top priority though, i think it is pretty undisputed.

[NorrKnekten]

That is the consensus yes, and im not to sure if capitalization is a good idea, Since they already capitalize the names of mechanical elements when refferencing them.

Player Core: Reading Rules wrote:

The names of specific statistics, skills, feats, actions, and some other mechanical elements in Pathfinder are capitalized. This way, when you see the statement "a Strike targets Armor Class," you know that both Strike and Armor Class are referring to rules.

If a word or a phrase is italicized, it's describing a spell or a magic item. This way, when you see the statement "the door is sealed by lock," you know that the word denotes the lock spell, rather than a physical item.

"Hunted Prey" is not the name of a mechanical element any more than it is for thaumaturges "target of your Exploit Vulnerability,"

The Hunt Prey action also defines the marked target as "The prey","your prey", "your hunted prey","the prey you're hunting" like that one meme with Kronk. its clear that any ranger related activity using these terms do point towards the designated target from Hunt Prey.

[Bluemagetim]

I dont believe in flavor text.

[Ascalaphus]

I don't think it's unclear. When you read the class from the beginning, the "prey" concept is introduced before any of the class features/feats that reference it.

It's very much a case of "what ELSE could they mean with 'prey' and 'hunted prey' other than the creature designated with Hunt Prey?"

[Ravingdork]

"Flavor text" in RPGs is a made-up distinction. If it's in the rulebook, it's part of the rules—full stop. Designers have said as much. The idea of tossing out anything that "sounds too narrative" just because it’s not a stat block? That’s not how these games are written. Ignoring the descriptive parts only leads to bad rules calls and worse arguments. Treat the whole text as rules unless the book says otherwise.

[Riggler]

Thanks, you all. I was confused to start because I was looking at ranger from the archetype perspective and had to really dive in to get the full picture.

As someone whose been playing TTRPGs for nearly four decades, the concept of flavor text not being rule text has been a thing for a helluva lot longer than it hasn't. I didn't realize there was a new standard adopted on PF2. So thanks, again.

[Baarogue]

Riggler wrote:

Thanks, you all. I was confused to start because I was looking at ranger from the archetype perspective and had to really dive in to get the full picture.

As someone whose been playing TTRPGs for nearly four decades, the concept of flavor text not being rule text has been a thing for a helluva lot longer than it hasn't. I didn't realize there was a new standard adopted on PF2. So thanks, again.

There's no new standard. There's a few players pushing the "no text is flavor" thing with no quotes to back it up. What WAS said was a dev took issue with the phrase "fluff text". They perceived it as a disparaging term (which it frequently is - I'm not disputing that) and that got blown up and white knighted until it turned into this new myth

[graystone]

Ravingdork wrote:

"Flavor text" in RPGs is a made-up distinction. If it's in the rulebook, it's part of the rules—full stop. Designers have said as much. The idea of tossing out anything that "sounds too narrative" just because it’s not a stat block? That’s not how these games are written. Ignoring the descriptive parts only leads to bad rules calls and worse arguments. Treat the whole text as rules unless the book says otherwise.

I find it the other way around: if you insist on taking everything in the text as a mechanical rule, it "only leads to bad rules calls and worse arguments".

For instance, if we assume everything is a rule, Elemental Fist requires a Fist attack and Flying Kick requires a kick. Or taking the text in Needle In The God's Eyes that says "With sinews of bronze and thews of iron, you leap to the heavens, piercing the arrogant eyes of the gods" as an actual requirement that you need a god as a target. There is VERY clearly text in the rules that's just for flavor and I find suggestions otherwise to be disingenuous.

On the topic of Hunt Prey, you'll find prey used elsewhere in the rules so it's not quite as clear as seeing prey as a reference to Hunt Prey. For instance, the Slippery Prey and Prey Mutagen aren't referencing Hunt Prey and the Lion Claw talisman says "When you activate the claw, you learn to pounce on your prey in one fluid motion" which isn't a reference to Hunt pray either even though "your prey" appears. So it takes reading the whole item/ability and using context clues to figure it out. Even though it IS pretty easy to figure out, It'd be nice if prey was Prey when referencing Hunt Prey abilities since they do use prey often enough in casual fluff text/names to make it relevent.

[Ascalaphus]

graystone wrote:

On the topic of Hunt Prey, you'll find prey used elsewhere in the rules so it's not quite as clear as seeing prey as a reference to Hunt Prey. For instance, the Slippery Prey and Prey Mutagen aren't referencing Hunt Prey and the Lion Claw talisman says "When you activate the claw, you learn to pounce on your prey in one fluid motion" which isn't a reference to Hunt pray either even though "your prey" appears. So it takes reading the whole item/ability and using context clues to figure it out. Even though it IS pretty easy to figure out, It'd be nice if prey was Prey when referencing Hunt Prey abilities since they do use prey often enough in casual fluff text/names to make it relevent.

I think the problem is not in the book, but in other mediums that reproduce the book out of sequence.

If you read the ranger class and see "prey" come up a lot it's obvious that it's about Hunt Prey.

If you then see "prey" show up much later in an alchemical item that has nothing particular to do with rangers and isn't in the ranger section of the book, it's also clear that that use of prey is not about the ranger class feature.

But if you were to read up about some ranger abilities by stumbling on them via the Archives of Nethys search console for example, it can be much more confusing. You're not getting the context of "where is this located in the book".

[Ascalaphus]

Riggler wrote:

Thanks, you all. I was confused to start because I was looking at ranger from the archetype perspective and had to really dive in to get the full picture.

As someone whose been playing TTRPGs for nearly four decades, the concept of flavor text not being rule text has been a thing for a helluva lot longer than it hasn't. I didn't realize there was a new standard adopted on PF2. So thanks, again.

I view it a bit more subtle than that.

In a game like Magic, flavor text and rules text are really strictly separate. They're separate areas in the layout, using a different font/italics. Flavor text really has no impact on mechanics in Magic.

Pathfinder, like RPGs in general, have more edge cases where you need to do a bit of interpretation on how to use a rule than a game with really really tight rules like Magic. People play Magic tournaments for money; people play RPGs to let their imagination run wild. These games need different things from their rules.

Sometimes people argue that the flavor text in Pathfinder abilities should be treated strictly as flavor text only, and ignored when trying to figure out what a rule does. But when you're wondering about how exactly to interpret a vague rule, the flavor text can be really helpful to see what it's supposed to do.

In one particular case about 10 years ago now, there was a feat where the flavor text talked about doing stuff with unarmed strikes, and the requirements for the feat also talked about unarmed strikes, but the actual effect didn't mention it was limited to unarmed strikes. So there were people arguing that by strict reading you could use the feat with weapons too, and that trying to bring in the flavor text to limit it to unarmed strikes was really bad. But in the next printing of the book the feat was rephrased a bit to apply only to unarmed strikes.

So I think it's good to realize that flavor text isn't quite rules text, but it's also not totally disconnected from it.

[Ed Reppert]

Text is text. And RPGs are not Chess. The rules are whatever the GM says they are. That said, it's nice to know what the rulemakers intended, or at least get a consensus from all the players.