In a vacuum if the party doesn’t play around it it’s a mild damage boost, certainly not a necessary one for goddamn fire kineticist, but whatever. Now anyone who had already had flaming rune gets another weakness proc.
If the party actually tries and stacks fire damage on their strikes it’s busted, and one of the many possible ways to break the new weakness rules right open.
Isn't the Kineticist Fire Junction weakness specific to their own impulses? Not a huge party-wide boost.
Except for Ignite the Sun, maybe? But for a level 18 impulse, it doesn't seem huge? 1d6 Fire Damage + 9 or 10 Weakness to Impulse. Nice but not incredible.
Furnace Form also seems the only way to take advantage of this within Kineticist, as far as I can tell.
Sorry, my bad.
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I don't like weaknesses set as high as they are. Makes the fights way too easy against the toughest monsters. As the others have stated, flaming rune will activate the weakness just fine doing more base damage as well.
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I come just to point that Living Bonfire is a trap.
You waste 2 actions and needs to invest into wood or be single fire and take it at level 8 using Elemental Overlap to only get 4 blasts with an extra 1d6 damage, and then it ends (“You conjure a bonfire in an unoccupied 10-foot-square space within 30 feet”; “This blast deals an additional 1d6 fire damage. Each time you do this, the size of the bonfire is reduced by one 5-foot square”).
Also, you can't get the weakness twice because “When you make a wood ranged Elemental Blast, you can have it come from the bonfire instead of you, flinging burning logs” not a fire ranged Elemental Blast.
It also heightens poorly, only 1d6 every 5 levels, starting from 4.
It's better to just do another Blazing wave instead.
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I don't like weaknesses set as high as they are. Makes the fights way too easy against the toughest monsters. As the others have stated, flaming rune will activate the weakness just fine doing more base damage as well.
Weaknesses are fun when they're somewhat limited in how often you can proc them. Like if an enemy is weak to X and you can proc that once per attack? That's cool.
The idea that you could proc that multiple times per attack is going to just melt enemies. We saw that when a poster here ran some Mythic fights to try the system out, someone landed Decree of Execution to give Weakness All 20 to Treerazor, and proceeded to melt him in no time flat.
You get a +3 Holy Thundering Shocking weapon and that's 80 extra damage every hit.
I don't think that kind of outcome is the direction things should be going, especially in more standard play.
My rather permissive Saturday GM surprised me.
When poked about the errata, he was rather instant to shut it down,
something to the effect of ~"no, no way are we playing with weakness like that."
The guy is the greyest greybeard ttrpg player/gm I've ever encountered. Still has at least one of his AD&D books iirc.
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The idea that you could proc that multiple times per attack is going to just melt enemies. We saw that when a poster here ran some Mythic fights to try the system out, someone landed Decree of Execution to give Weakness All 20 to Treerazor, and proceeded to melt him in no time flat.
You get a +3 Holy Thundering Shocking weapon and that's 80 extra damage every hit.
I don't think that kind of outcome is the direction things should be going, especially in more standard play.
It's noteworthy that "decree of divine execution" is an incapacitation and mythic effect that need a critical failure to apply this "weakness all" to any creature above level 18, or for you to spend a mythic point, while treerazer isn't mythic. Not only is mythic in general not exactly "standard play", but it's against a creature that wasn't built to go out against mythic player in the first place, it being outclassed in this scenario is rather normal.
(also I don't think this scenario work in the first place because Treerazer is immune to death effect and the decree have the death trait, but I understand that the point isn't about treerazer in particular)
But truth be told, at that high a level, creatures (especially bosses) have a lot of resistance and immunities, to the point where even if you have as many damage rune as you can on your weapon to maximise "multiple weakness", you very likely end up hitting one or more resistance/immunity with a few of the damaging effect and can't capitalise on them at all as a weakness.
Honestly, appart from it making the math more complicated (which is IMO a really fair point), I feel like most of the criticism levied against this change boil down to white room math that aren't problematic in actual play when happenning to miraculously have a weapon that have all the perfect runes stack on it to proc 3+ weakness at once while avoiding all immunity/resistance is extremely unlikely, but awesome in the rare time it does happen (or require the player to extensively research in advance on the monster it's tracking and prepare specifically for that encounter, which is something that I actively want my players to do as a GM).
The worse it can be abused is through giving foes "weakness to all damage", and I think the only way to do that in the whole game is through 2 archetype specific level 18 feats, that both have limitation and don't remove resistance or immunity. And at that point, I feel like if you're level 18 and your team have invested into "multiple instance of damage" synergy to maximise these things... having a big effect is kinda deserved? Or at least not problematic?
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Marked for rebuke gives weakness 10 to all damage for two actions (one for spell shape, one for magic missile). 1/creature per 24 hours and til end of next turn.
It was already stupid OP and nerf-worthy with each damage type being a different proc, but it’s just comical now. Easily 80+ damage added on each strike.
“Somehow, all of the enemies started carrying fire resist consumables that (almost) entirely counter your instances of chip fire damage.”
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“Somehow, the GM started metagaming”
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Well ok for intelligent adversaries like many humanoids and dragons, makes sense they’d know and counter it. If random tribe of goblins #18282, #79657, and #3885 all have fire resist items though, the GM is cheating.
I'd say if you fight random basic goblin tribes at a level where you're able to stack enough instance of damage for this ruling to be problematic, you probably don't need to abuse any loophole to roll them over. This doesn't strikes me as a "low level" kind of issue.
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The rule is I believe, immunity before weakness before resistance.
Meaning you attack for 10, it get increased to 15 because weakness, it get lowered to 5 because resistance.
It's not the most intuitive thing (I would have expected resistance to go before weakness, because resistance feel more "surface" than weakness, and thus that one would need to pierce through it to inflict the weakness), but I think it was done in that order to favor the player, since resistance can be punishing enough to certain type of character as it is. (Players are more unlikely to have weakness/resistance than creatures, and making weakness go before resistance mean that when you deal damage lower than the total resistance but higher than the resistance minus the weakness, some damage go through, while it would deal no damage if the order was reversed)
I wonder how many monsters have multiple weaknesses. And if their defenses and HP total take the official definition of damage instance into account.
A lot of demons, for one. And yes they do tend to have higher HP than monsters without weakness. In the creature building guidelines its suggested that if you add weaknesses you should also add more HP.
But I don't think most of them are designed with the expectation that "weakness fire 10" can proc 3 times every hit. You need a LOT more HP for that and then it'd feel lousy to anyone who isn't able to do the damage type in question because it becomes a "bullet sponge" type enemy.
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I wonder how many monsters have multiple weaknesses. And if their defenses and HP total take the official definition of damage instance into account.
Arboreals and awakened trees come immediately to mind, as do many zombies.
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Or instead trying to finagle the slightly borked RK mechanic, you can just impose a weakness and prep for that.
A surprising number of *items* can do that, so no need to even invest class feats for something like daily Inflammation Flasks.
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The virgin know a weakness vs the chad force a weakness
Knowing your enemy beforehand and RK become much more valuable. I like it.
Or playing as Thaumaturge.
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Or instead trying to finagle the slightly borked RK mechanic, you can just impose a weakness and prep for that.
A surprising number of *items* can do that, so no need to even invest class feats for something like daily Inflammation Flasks.
From the ways I read about imposing a weakness, I feel the most likely for my PFS PCs would be the Witch's Elemental Betrayal.
Inflammation Flask, an Uncommon item from an AP, is restricted in PFS.
The Greater Shining Symbol item, ie the one that imposes a weakness, is level 9, very late in a PFS PC's career.
The Marked for Rebuke feat which gives a temporary weakness to all once a day is lvl 18.
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I feel it's covered by RK.Knowing your enemy beforehand and RK become much more valuable. I like it.Or playing as Thaumaturge.
Not exactly.
RK if it fails can no longer be used by the same character against the same target (until you get new sources of information about it).
Exploit Vulnerability in turn can be attempted repeatedly until successful or critical success.
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Knowing your enemy beforehand and RK become much more valuable. I like it.Or playing as Thaumaturge.
Thaumaturge creates weaknesses to their strikes, so like Holy, they aren't getting multiple procs off it. Seems like Exploit Vulnerability didn't become any more or less valuable.
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I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.
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I feel it's covered by RK.Knowing your enemy beforehand and RK become much more valuable. I like it.Or playing as Thaumaturge.Not exactly.
RK if it fails can no longer be used by the same character against the same target (until you get new sources of information about it).
Exploit Vulnerability in turn can be attempted repeatedly until successful or critical success.
Excellent point.
I hate that rule in RK.
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Another interesting detail, which not all game masters follow, is that normally, a successful RK roll, just like an EV roll, should theoretically only reveal a single piece of information. Therefore, broad questions like "what are the creature's weaknesses?" shouldn't be valid, just as questions like "what weaknesses, immunities, resistances, saves, actions, activities, and spells does the creature possess?" are already rejected by most game masters simply because they are too broad.
Therefore, a RK would normally only give a single specific piece of information like "what is the creature's greatest weakness?" and even a critical success would only provide additional context related to the question (if there is one) or allow for another question like "what is the creature's second greatest weakness?" or "what is the creature's greatest resistance?". In practice, although a RK allows more freedom to ask questions beyond just IWR as an EV does, it gives less information in the case of a critical hit than an EV, which simply gives the player the target's entire IWR when it hits.
I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.
Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
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I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
It doesn’t cover that at all, it’s quite narrow.
“You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak.”
No weakness/immunity knowledge.
So “this fire wyvern, unlike a dragon, cannot be reasoned with” or “it has a fire breathe weapon” or “its lowest save is X” but you can’t
find out how it reacts to fire and cold damage.
I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
It doesn’t cover that at all, it’s quite narrow.
“You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak.”
No weakness/immunity knowledge.
So “this fire wyvern, unlike a dragon, cannot be reasoned with” or “it has a fire breathe weapon” or “its lowest save is X” but you can’t
find out how it reacts to fire and cold damage.
Whoops! Looks like I misremembered "weakest save" as "weakness". I guess it makes sense to not have it overlap with the Thaumaturge specialty.
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“Somehow, the GM started metagaming”
Aren't the players metagaming when they're purposefully constructing blender combat strategies? If you take the gloves off against the GM, expect the worst; it's supposed to be a game for them too! No good ever comes of initiating an arms race. Any *game* needs to be conducted in good faith and playing combat as sport against the arbitrary arbiter of "Da Rules" smacks of hubris and most likely results in a one sided arms race and hurt feelings at the table.
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“Somehow, the GM started metagaming”Aren't the players metagaming when they're purposefully constructing blender combat strategies? If you take the gloves off against the GM, expect the worst; it's supposed to be a game for them too!
The 'meta' of meta-gaming means a layer above. Metagaming is when the players are out-of-character in how they plan and strategize.
The complication here is that, firstly, all PC building is metagaming, and that's fine.
It's not possible to avoid the fact that players plan out and choose their level up options based on what's available in the pf2 system, and while the player's choice can be informed by the character, that decision making is still flowing from the meta layer down.
But gear and combat synergies are easier to put at the character level.
And if a Witch wakes up from a dream in which her patron taught her a magical lesson to impose weaknesses, it is absolutely in character for the witch to try to exploit her new power.
It would be a great table moment for the groggy party to wake up to the door slam of the cackling witch, returned from her shopping. Without explanation, she dumps a bunch of alch weapon siphons and mutagens onto her allies, then leaves again to consult a local druid to check if they have any appropriate elemental spells to teach her.
This is also why spell / formula book characters are so resilient to meta game accusations. If it is in character for them to wander around every town they pass through to check the small time alchemist for local recipes, it is in character for them to have all manner of uncommons. The bugbear about access region access requirements is that recipes obviously still travel outside borders. It only means that if it's 100% to find inside that region, you slowly fade that % the more disconnected your present local is.
This already means hubs like Absalom and Goka would have almost all of them ready to sell, but makes it genuinely hard for a GM to adjudicate when a region-specific formula should/not be available.
If any of my Craft Anything Alchemist PCs have a timeskip after getting that feat, you can bet your butt they've been busy inventing /adding formulas with no need to first encounter the thing in person.
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I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
It doesn’t cover that at all, it’s quite narrow.
“You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak.”
No weakness/immunity knowledge.
So “this fire wyvern, unlike a dragon, cannot be reasoned with” or “it has a fire breathe weapon” or “its lowest save is X” but you can’t
find out how it reacts to fire and cold damage.
I always found that restriction odd.
It doesn't make sense to me that asking about a creature's weaknesses wouldn't be useful in a battle or war, and therefore wouldn't be reasonable to use in Warfare Lore.
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I feel it's covered by RK.Knowing your enemy beforehand and RK become much more valuable. I like it.Or playing as Thaumaturge.Not exactly.
RK if it fails can no longer be used by the same character against the same target (until you get new sources of information about it).
Exploit Vulnerability in turn can be attempted repeatedly until successful or critical success.
Excellent point.
I hate that rule in RK.
I genuinely don’t think RK is worth investing in as long as that rule exists, not beyond just using untrained improv like once a fight on characters who already want INT. I certainly wouldn’t play a mastermind rogue or anything like that.
Thankfully RK is one of the most homebrew buffed things in the game, DMs seem to want it to be good.
I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
It doesn’t cover that at all, it’s quite narrow.
“You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak.”
No weakness/immunity knowledge.
So “this fire wyvern, unlike a dragon, cannot be reasoned with” or “it has a fire breathe weapon” or “its lowest save is X” but you can’t
find out how it reacts to fire and cold damage.I always found that restriction odd.
It doesn't make sense to me that asking about a creature's weaknesses wouldn't be useful in a battle or war, and therefore wouldn't be reasonable to use in Warfare Lore.
I think it makes sense that a guy leading weapon based soldiers studies as part of warfare whether something is easier to grapple, trip, or frighten, but isn’t memorizing usually pointless stuff (from the point of his specialty) like what elemental spells and alchemical bombs work best/worst.
I think it makes sense that a guy leading weapon based soldiers studies as part of warfare whether something is easier to grapple, trip, or frighten, but isn’t memorizing usually pointless stuff (from the point of his specialty) like what elemental spells and alchemical bombs work best/worst.I'm not pointing to the Thaumaturge playing alone. I pointing it as a reliable source of information for the party to find weaknesses. He's more reliable than RK checks in that regard.Ahh, that's right, the weakness information isn't actually RK, and often has a lower DC.
Commander at level 3 will be useful for traditional RK checks, since they get a scaling primary-stat lore that covers creature basics like weaknesses.
It doesn’t cover that at all, it’s quite narrow.
“You can use Warfare Lore to Recall Knowledge about most creatures regardless of type, but typically only to determine whether they can be reasoned with, their most notable offensive abilities, and whether one of their saving throws is particularly weak.”
No weakness/immunity knowledge.
So “this fire wyvern, unlike a dragon, cannot be reasoned with” or “it has a fire breathe weapon” or “its lowest save is X” but you can’t
find out how it reacts to fire and cold damage.I always found that restriction odd.
It doesn't make sense to me that asking about a creature's weaknesses wouldn't be useful in a battle or war, and therefore wouldn't be reasonable to use in Warfare Lore.
Ooh, I didn't consider the relevance of those save modifiers to the combat skill actions. I had only been thinking of it in caster support terms. That's an excellent point!