About Exemplar, Scar of the Survivor's Trascendence and out-of-combat

[solfiore]

So, as subject says, this has been a doubt between me and my DM recently. I looked up online right here and on reddit but the discussion diverted not on actually an Exemplar CAN do it or not, but more on the balancing side (which i understand why).

Me and my DM discussed about that and its main points were about:
- wording: the Ikon and the "Shift Immanence" clearly use a wording about encounter mode;
- traits: there are the "Exploration" and "Downtime" traits so, a feature without neither of them, it is an "Encounter" action so should only be used in an encounter.

On the contrary, I thought that there's no apparent reason an Exemplar couldn't shift his spark outside of combat, or better, during ordinary life. It talks about a "Spark that dwells inside the soul of the Exemplar whom can move it at will".

So, outside of per table ruling, what is your opinion on the matter? which view (talked here or that you think about) find more accurate on the matter and the system?
Idk if we are overthinking that and there is an easy answer for all.

[HammerJack]

The idea that actions with Encounter Mode action costs can't be taken outside of encounters is totally baseless and false. That's never been a real debate, which is probably why you don't see much discussion of it.

If it were true characters not tracking time in rounds wouldn't be able to do things like "climb a ladder" or "open a door" or "pick up an object" or "cast a spell like Water Breathing on the party".

You can't do long timescale activities in shorter timescale. The reverse isn't true.

[NorrKnekten]

Specifically, this is the part which hammerjack is talking about.

GM Core pg. 34 2.0 "Running Exploration" wrote:

Actions and Reactions: Though exploration isn't broken into rounds, exploration activities assume the PCs are spending part of their time using actions, such as Seeking or Interacting. If they have specific actions they want to use, they should ask; you can decide whether the actions apply and whether to switch to encounter mode for greater detail. PCs can use any relevant reactions that come up during exploration mode.

Any distinct action that can be used in an encounter mode can also be used outside of encountermode unless specifically forbidden. (See stances)

[Ascalaphus]

Coming back to Scar of the Survivor on this: yes, it's really really easy to heal up between combats with that. But healing up between encounters just isn't that hard in PF2 for many other classes either:

- Animists can get Garden of Healing to heal the whole party 1d4 per spell rank per round for a minute, with a 10m time to refocus and do it again.
- Champions can Lay on Hands for 6HP per spell rank with a 10m refocus.
- Kineticists can use Fresh Produce or Ocean's Balm to heal everyone every 10m as well.
- Anyone can take Medicine and the associated skill feats

There's a couple more, but you catch my drift. Out of combat healing takes a bit of time but even at level 1 it's very available and not really limited in amount, just in how fast it goes. Scar of the Survivor goes really fast but only on yourself.

[solfiore]

Thank you all for your answers and time.

I sent this very thread to my GM. About "Encounter Mode" actions outside of combat, we had a similar "discussion" when one of out players knew that were enemies coming out of tombs and wanted to Ready an action to attack as soon as one came out; GM didn't allow it cause "Ready" is an "Encounter Action" only so he couldn't use it outside of an encounter.

I personally found that particular setting kinda meaningless cause "why cannot i ready to strike if I know clearly there is someone coming out of there?" but simply skipped the discussion for do not waste time in session and ruin the game.

I think GM may have found that particular scenario "busted" so he didn't want it to happen. Could be the same for "Scar of the Survivor" matter. As one of you stated, other people online and I, there are a lot of "free" healing out of combat. GM thought that Scar of the Survivor was too fast (you can practically full yourself in 10 minutes) and resource-less compared to other type of healing. In a scenario with a time limit, I have a clear advantage and, generally speaking, I am a PC who doesn't need healing out of combat; to all of that I thought "Why not?", the Ikon itself its pretty mid in combat and why shouldn't its strengths shine whenever the occasion (time limit between encounters)?

[Claxon]

While Ready can be kind of abused in some situations, readying to hit an enemy who comes through a door when you can hear them walking towards the door is a very typical and straight forward use IMO.

Now, as a GM, I would tell you that were actually moving into encounter mode when you start doing so, but I'm not going to be like "No, you can't do that because we're in exploration mode and because the enemy isn't here yet we can't use encounter mode either". That's bad GMing.

With respect specifically to Scar of the Survivor. There are many ways to get "unlimited" healing in PF2. How quickly they can work and how often you can do it varies. Scar of the Survivor is going to be fairly quick as you will be able to do it every round.

[NorrKnekten]

Pretty much, Just looking at Chiurgeon whose lv11 vials feature do not apply Coagulant if the targets were below half health. Or kineticist whose level 1 wood/water feats has been talked about plenty.

Scar of the survivor isn't really going to help a party skip a 10 minute recovery the same way many of these other healing options do, unless only the exemplar has taken damage, noone is wounded and noone is missing their 10-minute resources.