Opinions edition

>>IF YOU ARE ASKING A QUESTION, PLEASE SPECIFY WHICH GAME YOU'RE PLAYING<<<

Previous thread: >>96020752

/pfg/ (pathfinder 1e) link repository: https://pastebin.com/RSt0rF0T
/p2g/ (pathfinder 2e) link repository: https://pastebin.com/1zySxwm3
/sfg/ (starfinder) link repository: https://pastebin.com/5yp9s2U3
/s2g/ (starfinder 2e) link repository: https://paizo.com/store/pathfinder/rulebooks/core
/3eg/ (D&D 3.X) link repository: https://pastebin.com/VMRsxB2m
/pacgg/ (pathfinder adventure card game) link repository:
https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lists_of_games_considered_the_best
The T̶r̶o̶v̶e̶ Vault (seed, please!): >implying

>>CHECK THE SHARE THREAD FOR MISSING MATERIALS<<

TQ: What is your least/favourite class? What changes could make it better?

pf1e, but any system will do, even an idea to steal from a video game or movie will do: wizard king got an exotic monster as a pet and guardian, the kingdom has fallen into chaos but the monster is still there. I need recommendations for the monster. Preferably stupid and as high CR as possible, ideally a magical beast, preferably something that looks majestic.

Hi, I'm from /aicg/, I am that guy who uses some simple prompt magic and lots of autism to adapt tabletops I'll never get to try IRL to SillyTavern frontend. Sometimes it's sloppy, but mechanically it works great. Free roam is shit, but adaptations of adventure models work almost flawlessly.
Anyway, I was thinking about adapting Pathfinder 1, 2 or 3.5 next. What's the best choice? I can make a compatibility layer between 3.5 and PF1e.
Pathfinder 1e + Starfinder 1e are the right choice, aren't they? They have the most adventures and supplements.

>2e killed the general again
how do we return to 1e bros

>>96062749
you don't, d&d 3e killed ttrpgs and everything that came from it has to die before things can improve

>>96062720
Redpill me on how to do this
I know how to proxy etc but what model what adventure and how so? 2e btw

>>96062557 (OP)
This game has almost no items that help casters
>but what about scrolls and wands and shit like that!
My spells slots are functionally infinite and I can always cast the needed spells
>Well that's because your gm is extremely lenient
My GM doesn't need to know this.

>>96062816
You can playtest what I've done so far here:
https://arch.b4k.dev/g/thread/105841385#105841467
This is a bit outdated. I've been adapting more books at lightning speed. Since then, I've adapted VtM2e+PHB, 2e's Fighter, Thief, Wizard, Psionics Handbooks, Queen of Spiders and Dark Sun Campaign Setting.
I take a .pdf, send it to Google AI studio and show it how to make good World Info. Then I copy-paste said entries into SillyTavern. I also have to make a chat completion preset for each system. Adventures work great. It's all a bit difficult to set up, but the system is there. You can also have any chatbot act as your game master.

>>96062812
3e era was blessed and we suffer now at the hands of faggot retards who hate casters

>>96062749
>Thread hit bump limit instead of falling off page 10 because of inactivity
>Must be different edition's fault
If people contributed to the conversation a fraction they spend agitating for edition warring we would be having actual fixes to problems instead of retreading old talking points. Maybe even hit four digit posts.
A man can dream.

>>96062557 (OP)
2e

Is it worth taking titan wrestler if I am a secondary grappler and athletics will be no better than expert at best?

>>96062932
paizo will never fix casters because they wont fit nicely into their gay math that ruins 2e

>>96062946
How wonderful it is then that we have plenty of ways (start at expert proficiency, gate attenuators, more slots...) that *allegedly* fix (some of) those problems.
You can help by contributing your own ideas.

>>96062944
If you want to wrestle, invest in it.
If not, don't.

House rule: Assurance lets you roll, but anything below a 10 turns into a 10.
Is it generally useful now?

>>96062826
Stop trying to be an overpowered caster, chud.

>>96062966
literally nothing can fix casters because the spells are fundementally weak as shit
More slots doesnt address the spells being weak
shit like attenuators giving you more weak spells
Save or suck/die arent going to work in any level appropriate combat and ontop of that casters just get nothing interesting
>You can help by contributing your own ideas.
okay, shift all spell saves and effects to be a degree more punishing. this is a 10 point shift, which is why paizo will never fix casters

>>96063033
You get an +2.75 average increase to the check compared to unaltered Assurance, along with that you're still rolling so feats et al work with it.
Pretty good but Paizo would kill you for this.

https://app.demiplane.com/nexus/pathfinder2e/feats/switch-places-playtest

Why did this feat never make it into the game? I really can't see how it would give problems

>>96062966
>You can help by contributing your own ideas.
Enemies cannot critically succeed their two weakest saves, and they automatically reduce the degree of success of their weakest save by one. However, their strongest save cannot critically fail, and the degree of success for rolls with it is automatically increased by one.
For enemies with no high or low saves, either their saves get marked as "weak" "medium" and "strong" even though the bonus is the same, or all of their saves are treated as a medium save(preventing them from critically succeeding it), depending on the enemy.
Incapacitation is applied after this, so a higher level enemy could still critically succeed against an incapacitation effect targeting their two weaker saves.

>>96063154
But attributes and other non-proficiency bonuses still don't apply. So I don't think it's that broken.

>PF1e Entangle
1st level spell, 40' radius. 400'+ range
If you fail you are entangled which fucks your movement, dex rolls and attack rolls. Escaping requires spending your whole move action
Properly fitting a druid. Even a level 1 druid is remarkable when in nature
>Pf2e entangle
2nd level spell
20' burst, 120' range
If you fail you are a bit slower, if you critically fail you are immobilized but this doesnt have any non movement penalty
1 action to make the escape check if you do get immobilized
dogshit caca spell

How do you fix this other than forcing paizo to completely overhaul everything? Thats why theres no reason to throw out suggestions, the changes are a dramatic upheaval of their shitty balance or so much homebrew it doesnt matter.

>>96063375
Casterkek sit.

We haven’t talked about the APs or the setting for 3 generals. Is everything alright?

2e

Is there an easy way to check what spells I have access to if I take Captivator Dedication? The spells page in the archives is so fucking shitty.

>>96063425
Nobody has shared the latest AP and Im not gay enough to give paizo money for it
Based on the summary it reeks of the same soulless structure as other recent APs
>its a festival so run around doing these wacky xD filler quests until something real finally happens
tired of this shit
In Shades of Blood it was so blatant that NOTHING you were doing even mattered and just after enough filler the sky turns black adventure actually starts now

Cant wait to see how they ruin the ruinlords further too in the next AP

>>96063446
Runelords are going to be interesting, they’ve already redeemed all the women and I thought the men were dead?

>>96063468
Xanderghul is coming back, not sure if we know how yet
Which is fine, his death in Return was absurdly contrived. He should have enough wizard bullshit to be fine, he is the first and only runelord of pride and shouldn't have gone down so easily

>>96062557 (OP)
2e
How effective is it to have multiple fear effects?
I want to play a Dragonblood Monk that uses Dragon Stance, but I'm not sure if it's worth investing into Intimidation for Dragon's Roar and Battle Cry when I can just take Majestic Presence at LV13 and just use class DC instead while still keeping the scary dragon flavor. On the plus side, having multiples allows you to reapply them in battle, but how often does it actually come up?

>comparison is the thief of joy
Very apparent here.

>PF2
>foundryVTT module
I'm looking for a module that automatically adds a cover to a token behind other tokens. I reinstalled Foundry, and now I can't remember the name of module, or find the option in the ones I have.

>>96063731
I've forgive Paizo if they redeem or keep Xanderghul around by the end of the AP. I'm tired of nooooticing their biases and being a bit more fair with their writing would go a long way.

>>96062826
>My spells slots are functionally infinite

go on

>>96063375
Magical Difficult Terrain is way more dangerous in PF2E, they have to make balance checks verse your Spell DC and could fall prone-- even if they don't end their turn in your spell. They could crit fail both the balance check and the spell, they can't get up from prone which is brutal
Escape attempts also eat into their MAP since it's an attack, instead of getting a free one
Entangled isn't hard CC compared to Immortalized, which straight up stops any move action ability or spells

3.pf one they get free checks and soft CC at worst, there's a reason it's level 1. While PF2E one could cripple a charge instead of merely slowing it down and pissing off a caster's concentration

2e. how good is eagle knight? should every non-fighter martial be going out of their way to pick it up for tactical reflexes?

>>96062720
PF2E is your best
bethttps://www.scribd.com/document/831723109/Tarondor-s-2025-Guide-to-Pathfinder-Adventure-Paths

>>96062720
>>96065144
I think, if you aren't doing a story-heavy module like Strength of Thousands or Seasons of Ghosts, 1e is better suited for AI-adventures than 2e. The large layer of tactical combat and downtime functionality don't really work with a computer partner, at least compared to the absurdity the computer can create for you with 1e's numerous options.

No opinion on Starfinder1e or SF2e AI.

>>96063152
A lot of spell functionality is tied up into traits, if you don't read the traits and know their interactions with rules they can on the surface level appear weaker than they actually are to newbies. Good examples are magical terrain, minions and illusions

>>96065248
Yeah, outside of the classic Save-or-Suck spells Paizo nerfed into the ground like Sleep, Paralyze, or Baleful Polymorph, I think most spells in 2e are fine. They either have good effects on successful saves like Sickened, Slowed, or Dazzled; or do good enough damage in a wide area. It tends to be a combination of accuracy in certain level ranges and resources that hurt casters than casting a bad spell that screams it is a bad spell from every letter to A-to-Ω. Ontop of how most caster feats merely sidestep these issues over tackling them.

>>96065144
Thanks. I'll look into it. I'll probably do both honestly. Heck, maybe someone is already doing PF2E.
>>96065223
From my humble experience, AI actually works best with predefined quests, scenarios and encounters, that's exactly why I'm looking for systems with lots of scenarios. I've only beaten the Village of Hommlet so far, which has proven that my concept works. AI sucks at inventing things on its own, but it's pretty good at following orders. Especially the simple and straightforward ones from Gygaxian era. It also handles large fights with surprising ease, it's just that they're a slog to read through. As a player you feel way more cowardly and fragile than with a human DM. The DM sees you as your friend, while the AI sees you like just another character since you've prompted it into not sparing you or even killing you outright if you do something stupid.
What I'm trying to say is the worst thing you can tell AI is to take you somewhere. No. You sit down, upload the entire map, cover each room and then bind it together with a navigational entry. Then you have a predefined map, like a custom dungeon from Daggerfall as opposed to those random generated ones.
If I were to do Pathfinder, I'd start with Kingmaker module since I've played the video game. That, however would be a real bitch to playtest. If you think playing with AI is faster than playing with humans, you're dead wrong. Not being on the clock means you'll play for a long time.

>>96063855
Fear only goes to the highest/longest lasting, each stack only lasting a round. Intimidation is one of the best skills to invest in if you're tanking

Battle Cry is good if you don't have an initiative Free Action trigger, also free demoralizes on crits is kino
Dragon Roar's great because it gives bonus damage on ANY fear effect you hit and keeps the fear up. With only 1 minute immunity on targets
Majestic Presence is only once per day verse a creature, it's nice for mooks that need to be AoE'd down

Fear Gem and Dreadhelm is criminally underrated for fearmaxxing

>>96065306
The big range that caster suffer is facing off verse level 7+ monsters when they're level 5 since monsters get their save bump, something GMs should be aware of

>>96065306
I think that taking half damage on even a successful save is something that would be praised.
I think you are right, in that the spells in a different game system that would turn the tide of an entire battle not having the same potency is the actual problem. I don't see people complaining overly much about the capability of the sorcerer blasting shit.

>>96065513
I also believe the 12-14 Level Range is another big dip in caster accuracy, with common foes routinely only having a 45% chance of failing a save. Though this number may be incorrect or skewed by modern monster additions/rebalances.

>>96065555
>I think you are right, in that the spells in a different game system that would turn the tide of an entire battle not having the same potency is the actual problem.
I do tend to not defend the Incap trait or how Paizo design these spells. Like, I look at Sleep and definitely know it really is just here for legacy reasons than them wanting to create a reasonable counterpart. It's not even good for Stealth purposes because it is missing the Subtle trait. So it is a wildly ineffective spell. I just also know that most other spells aren't this compromised.
>I don't see people complaining overly much about the capability of the sorcerer blasting shit.
Nah, there's plenty of people that complain about damage, despite spell damage not only being good but also easy to stack up compared to accuracy. Even with Sorcerers or the EVERY 6 SPELLS shit like with Electric Arc, people complain about not doing a lot of damage. It's frankly ridiculous and skews caster discussion to poor places.

>>96065555
Everyone talks about using spells, but what about facing spells?
PF2E you can actually use spells verses players and it's balanced verse them-- it's fun to fight enemy spell casters

>>96065710
I don't think people care?
I don't think the discourse about 1e's Rocket Tag came from the idea of getting hit with a Save-or-Suck, so much as people complaining that 3/4 players at the table didn't get to do anything cause combat was already over thanks to 1. So even if this problem was genuinely fixed on both ends, no one cares about balance afforded to their defenses. I believe most people would want "Rocket Tag but I fired a missile too!", that's "balance" in their mind.

It's honestly impressive how much 2e can market itself on something most people couldn't care less about, until it bites them on the ass. Either I have been downplaying the number of people with suspicious teeth marks on their rear ends, or this been something of a cope.

>>96064664
Take Cover macro

>>96063033
Assurance is a great skill feat already and makes its way into most of my builds, sometimes more than once.

>>96064664
PF2e Perception is the one that does that:

>https://github.com/reonZ/pf2e-perception

It's not updated for v13 though, so you'll want to be running v12 to use it. The developer is still active so I imagine it'll be updated at some point, but this mod's always been a little experimental (which is why it's unlisted) so I wouldn't count on an update any time in the near future. Works great on v12 though.

>>96065874
>I don't think people care?
GMs care a lot, it allows us to make fun and interesting encounters having confidence that a single spell from a mook won't TPK a party
One of my biggest issues with 5e and 3.pf is that spells sucked ass to fight against and hard to balance encounters around since players likely wouldn't have an answer to it. It's a one-sided system that the GM has to play with kiddie gloves, per the designers: spells are primarily for players

>I believe most people would want "Rocket Tag but I fired a missile too!"

If the monsters used rocket tag tricks you'd scream bloody murder like everyone else. Do you think GMs have fun playing against it?

>>96065993
Mind you, I said this last thread >>96040419
>But that ties into the market share issue. When every person in the game are players and not GMs, you just have nogames that don't buy the product. You see this issue currently with the low attach rates of 5e24 compared to 5e14. The GMs don't want to switch (granted more for moral than mechanical or GM support reasons), so it isn't pushing books.
>Modern games going to thrive by GM support, not just endless glut of player options, and I think this is starting to sink in more and more.

I'm a 2e GM myself, I absolutely adore the content and support the game gives. But I also know it is really tough to sell the idea of "Gee golly, the game rapes me in JUST the right way!". I can see how this just sounds less interesting, especially as 2e doesn't really cater to the simulationism of "both sides are playing with the same rules and numbers". I always felt that people playing that high-level just sort of accept the idea that they could be victim to a Coup de Grace or other bullshit if the GM actually plays fair. And those that are sick of that would just stick in the Goldilocks Zone of 3-12. It just hard for me to rationalize that there is a significant amount of people that take the idea of Balance in a TTRPG seriously, and willing to put their time and money where their mouth is, especially when this general always argue otherwise (TORtanic posting aside...). The most popular game in this space is not balanced and only just have decent GM support--which they didn't even bother to release at the same as the new PHB!

>>96065884
can it do it automatically, or do I need to give tokens lesser cover by hand?
>>96065974
hope they do. I thought "ranged combat" had it, but maybe I was wrong

>>96066099
> I always felt that people playing that high-level just sort of accept the idea that they could be victim to a Coup de Grace or other bullshit if the GM actually plays fair.

I'm running a level 19 game, 2E is very playable mid-high level and the players are excited to hit level 20. Rare in this space

It's pretty tough to kill players since they have so many answers and hero points. The biggest threat is going to be the triple elite encounters with caster mook support where they're out-action econ'd

>>96062557 (OP)
>What is your least favourite class?
Gunslinger. Mainly because it's an entire class built to make the single worst class of weapons in the game, firearms, work. Even ignoring the name (should have been "Gunner" imo) the class is just bad, mainly suffering from how poorly firearms are implemented. It's a plaster over a gaping wound, and it passes me off because just following how guns worked irl (easy to use, a lot of retained energy, ammunition is dirt cheap once production is set up, psychological effects of gunfire on foes, long reloading times, susceptible to wet, early guns need matchcord) would lead to actually useful weapons, and then the class wouldn't be hampered by them.
>What changes could make it better?
I would start by fixing firearms, then rework the entire class so as ro actually function. Also, the Shadowshot enchantments base dc would be buffed to 20 or 25, as it is even with a max enchantment gun it's too low to ever really threaten anything post level 12.

Related story, my friend ran 2 l17 oneshots, in the second he told Mr to change character as he disliked me playing as a ghost (ghostly gunslinger, basically a cryx pistol wraith).
I rolled up a not really optimised Archer Fighter. His gace when i soloed one of the two Hydras in the first encounter was hilarious. Meanwhile the Gunslinger was resorting to her Corrupting Touch because the Musket wasn't doing a damn thing worth bothering with.

>>96066432
Gunslinger is just ranged fighter with subclasses, they also can use crossbows at legendary

>>96066695
Wrong game, everything he was saying refers to 1e.

>>96062644
Anyone?

Reposting my question for pathfinder 1e

Anyone got a personal list of some of the most choice potions to craft with brew potion feat? I've only been playing for a few months and using the artemis-tabletop to search up spells for non-personal potions, but I don't have a lot of experience.

my list so far
-Air Bubble
-Ape walk
-Aura of the unremarkable
-Bless
-bless weapon
-burrow
-Detect magic
-detect secret doors
-detect snares and pits
-Ears of the City
-Expeditious Construction
-Expeditious Excavation
-Fabricate Bullets
-Faerie Fire
-Feather Fall
-Floating Disk
-Fly
-Glibness
-Hanspur's Flotsam Vessel
-Heightened Awareness
-Heroism
-Hide from Undead
-Hide from Animals
-Incendiary Runes
-Infernal Healing
-Invisibility
-Keyhole
-Lesser restoration
-Lighten Object
-Lose The Trail
-Mount
-Obscuring Mist
-Pass without trace
-Protection from ____
-Remove fear
-Sanctuary
-Spider climb
-Vanish

Anything else?

>>96066695
Gunslinger is just ranged fighter with subclasses, they also can use crossbows at legendary
No it isnt. The only thing they share is HP and the +2 which gunslinger only gets for the worst 2 weapon types in the game. Its feats are much worse than a ranged fighter and has worse features in general.
>>96066708
Have we reached the point that you Paizo dick riders will unironically defend the Gunslinger. Absolute derangement.

Curly needs a hobby

>>96067499
Both Shadowshooting and Corrupting Touch are 1e content, Anon. The guy failed to tag the system but he was obviously talking about 1e gunslinger. When the Anon you're quoting said that the post referred to 1e, he was being literal. I understand your need to bitch about 2e but you don't need to convert 1e complaints into 2e complaints just so you can argue about them, I'm sure you'll find something actually 2e-related you can chime in about in a few posts.

>>96067499
>>96067800
Does bring a bit of joy to my heart that 2e's haters ALSO can't read. The game really does have an autism forcefield that causes illiteracy...

Gunslinger in 2e have issues and some are similar complaints to its 1e-self. But being "just a ranged fighter", as incorrect that is for 2e standards, is a WAAAAAAAAY better base to be in than it is in 1e. 1e Gunslinger and its other siblings Samurai and Cavalier (and its deadbeat son Swashbuckler, a class worse than the above 3) genuinely lack features and offers nothing that just building a normal/archetyped Fighter would accomplish. And 1e Fighter is barely passible, a big victim in how 1e's feat bloat and taxes actually ruin the fun of freely customizable classes like it. It's hard to get excited about Bonus Feats when a good portion of them is going to be caught up in Combat Reflexes/Weapon Focus/Weapon Finesse/Power Attack/Piranha Strikes/Precise Shot/Point-Blank Shot, whatever mathfixer feat you need to maintain comparative damage and accuracy with your selected weapon class. And now you just get less of them for features that barely equal out to how impactful those feats are and definitely don't compare to any kind of spellcasting...

And now just throw in how compromised Early Firearms in 1e are -- guns that don't even target Touch AC outside of their first range increment.
Many of which have less than 40ft...
Several of which take a full-round action to reload...

The mediocrity of guns in 2e do not hold a candle to the ABSOLUTE STATE of most early firearms in 1e. Any discussion of their overpoweredness only applies to shitty Modern Firearm rules brought about by the Reign of Winter AP. And both editions can relate to Shitty AP Writers and not reading the game.

>>96067800
To be fair to the anon its not like 1e and 2e gunslinger dont have the exact same fucking problems with 1e at least giving guns some actual fucking benefits like x4 crits and touch ac targeting. There is so much fucking bloat even i assumed they were some fucking run from a lost omens i havent read.
>>96068058
Guns in 2e are basically unusable and takes a whole class to get them to work. 1e guns arent much better but they at least had mechanics that actually helped you critfish. I unironically think guns in 2e should have a trait that makes people off-guard.

>>96068058
A bit more thought on Pathfinder and Firearm Rules.
It is a bit frustrating to think how close they can get to genre-appropriate firearms. 2e saying that firearms have become commonplace enough around Golorion that their simplicity in execution is well known enough that the average peasant can fire one is actually really smart to avoid the proficiency tax issues. And being fairly low power is honest to the actual degree these things were, it took a lot of more innovation beyond stuffing more gunpowder into the barrel for guns to become the lethal monstrosities we know them today. Stuff like rifling barrels, creating sharper and full-metal jacket bullets, improving the matchlock and spring mechanisms to slam bullets harder, so on and so forth. Guns are more than just "bows that you point-and-click with", they have a full developmental history that is very interesting to learn about and realize through mechanical play. Battlefield 1 is still getting numbers to this day for their various firearm portrayals that feel distinctly different compared to the firearms of World War II, which are still pretty 1-to-1 to how we view modern guns like the AR-15, barring some exceptions. And I value Paizo's attempts to create that fantasy.

That said, yeah, they usually stumble in just the wrong ways. 1e guns are so woefully ineffectual that the x4 crit multiplier is unlikely to do much damage compared to hitting them with a pickaxe. Modern Firearms gave no shit to the idea of balance and feasibility. And 2e guns are outclassed by the Longbow in every stat that matters, despite the overall higher power and accessibility. Stuff like Pistol Twirl and Fake Out just don't hold a candle to spam-attacking with a bow, even on non Fighters.
The excessive need to crit-fish to paint the "HEADSHOT!" fantasy weighs them down, especially with how, these guns should struggle to do even that. Your skull is a lot tougher than your sternum, after all.

>>96068204
As stated, the need to crit-fish with these guns in 2e is a big impediment. Even if the 3x and 4x modifiers are comparable to 2e's Deadly and Fatal traits, losing out on Touch AC does bring remove a lot of impact ot them, even if realistically needing to be so up close to use such negates the point of even having a "ranged fighter" in the party. However, I actually do kind of agree with Paizo on their reasoning when I thought about it. Why DOES a gun pierce armor, something that a dragon can't do?

Auto-granting Off-Guard is actually pretty uninteresting and doesn't make much sense. If someone pointed a gun to you, the last thing you will do is make yourself MORE vulnerable, and the punching weight of early firearms SHOULDN'T be able to pierce traditional fantasy armor, especially ones coated in magic. Pistol Twirl is an active attempt at intimidation and distraction, hence why it can grant it. Fake Out is in a similar field, it is why it is an Aid bonus while still tying into the notion of lethality from these little peashooters. But I do agree with the notion that if firearms are going to be commonplace and crit-fishers, they actually should be more available to classes and archetypes outside of Gunslinger and Pistol Phenom.

I do have an issue with Gunslingers even existing as is. I appreciate the culture clash and informing the audience that guns do have a place in these fantasies. But AS A CLASS, it just weird to think about what they offer to a party in terms of mechanics and scenarios. Even with using The Dark Tower as inspiration, Roland himself or his guns doesn't do much compared to the external influences that help him along. And while it would be stupid to bring it back as a point pool, Grit at least have some thematic idea behind Willpower and Mental Fortitude that would go into using such dangerous tools, so I see why people want it to help provide character. But...everyone else is doing that, so...

>>96065710
That's true, and I will give the system credit for that. From the player side, enemy casters are a joke. They go first, get one big spell off that usually does devastate the party, but the next turn they get bullied to death by martials and even the party's casters. It's why they always need to be paired with decent mooks, even a PL+4 enemy caster just kind of gets shit on.

>>96066099
>"Gee golly, the game rapes me in JUST the right way!"
Not to be pedantic but isn't this the exact logic that's made Soulslikes so popular over the past 15 or so years?

>>96065036
Giving up your move and therefore full attack isnt free and you cannot charge on difficult terrain in 1e
>they could critically fail!
Ok but they wont. Because paizo ruinedn DCs

>>96068985
True, I do think that the idea of difficulty and "Hard But Fair" content have become more palatable to everyone over the recent years. And tabletop have inherited some of those people. Lethal games like Black Crusade, Dark Heresy, Traveller, and Vampire do have their place. And it isn't like the d20 fantasy space have their own ideas of brutal combat. But I do think it is a harder sell and there is less overlap than people think. Especially in games with a lot of customization options like Pathfinder, they want to experience that content than figure out how to best use it to not die. Plus, outside of the actual From Software titles, the space doesn't REALLY sell that much, especially in recent years. There's still going to be some standouts like Lies of P or Stellar Blade, but for the most part these games just do "okay" now.

>low will save
>mental immunity

>>96068327
Because the guns historical significance was because it easily punched through armor so you can then make the argument that magical guns can thus punch through magical armor. I think a trait that functions like a reverse volley where if you are close enough, the target just becomes Off-guard to emulate the 1e touch ac targeting could work. You would need to rework a lot of gunslinger but that class needs a whole rework with grit included anyway.

Guns just desperately need some new trait that makes them viable at critfishing. Auto OG when within a certain range at least helps with that.

>>96064820
i just don't keep track of them is all

PF1E

Running a Dark horror/Lovecraft campaign, mixing multiple adventure modules and my own writing.
Just finished Feast of Ravenmoor, gonna have them go through more spoopy bullshit until they hit level 5 so they could be ready for Carrion Hill.

Does anyone have experience running Carrion Hill?
I'm introducing a group of BG3 babies to TTRPGs so none of their characters are optimized and they aren't super knowledgeable.
I'm not sure they even know how to deal with invisibility. How the fuck are they supposed to survive some of these encounters if they accidentally skip a few steps?

Anyone have experience running other lovecraft style PF adventures?
>From Shore to Sea
>No Response from Deepmar
>Doom Comes to Dustspawn

I know the Adventure Path, Strange Aeons, comes with its own custom sound board if you buy it. Anyone tried it?

>>96071104
I enjoyed the syrinscape soundboard for a couple CoC campaigns ive run. Invisible enemies are a bitch but its a learning experience players need to learn.

>>96065036
>>96065248
What kind of schizo shit are you talking about? Difficult terrain has no Balance test.

>>96071392
dude casters are so powerful anything that makes difficult terrain automatically prones all enemies everywhere in the map and illusory object or any other illusion spell warps reality and does anything you want!!!

>2e
What's the most mobile a character can be, and what's the best build for that? I don't care about anything else.

When I say mobile I mean any and every kind of movement, vertical and horizontal, and I don't care whether it's jumping or flying. Stealth would also be a very welcome addition if possible.

>>96064734
There's no way Xanderghul is getting redeemed or even surviving this book
Best you can hope for is he kills Sorshen for good on the way out
However reviving Xin to lead New Thassilon would be based, although extremely unlikely because thats not a sassy girlboss

>>96071603
highest fly speed would be draconic sorcerer preremaster so your dragon wings get to 120 feet
highest land speed is likely contested between centaur monk or barbarian with quickened pre-applied, still caps to like 70-80ish feet per stride? Jumping scales off your land speed
if something grants swim speed it usually grants it equal to landspeed
climb speed on legendary athletics scales to your land speed
since you want some minor stealth options then centaur and interplanar heritage (for flight later on) dex monk with investment in stealth, athletics and acrobatics, if you'd find space to invest into rogue archetype you could grab arcana to trick magic item invisibility for when you need a good minute of no-fail chance stealth (till enemies start having true sight [constant] even on minions)

>>96070861
If we're talking about actual historical significance, Plate Armor didn't become massively popular until after early flintlock guns were developed. The image in the anon you're responding to is an example of this, where those indentations came from bullets impacting the armor. Hell, for smaller caliber rounds even today if you shoot at ANIMALS that have particularly thick hides, those things will ricochet off (look at testimonies of modern hunters talking about what is required to take down a boar).

Anyway, I've always been of the opinion that guns should have always targeted Flat-Footed AC instead of touch. It fits the fantasy of "bullet is going too fast to react to", but it doesn't treat them like some kind of magical cure-all that penetrates everything no matter how thick your armor or hide is (but is still somehow resisted by DR).

What's the point of Stealth for a melee Rogue?

>>96071930
2e forgot to say

>>96071937
>>96071937
Mainly to get your Initiative roll to scale off DEX and some feats related to initiative.

>>96071930
bullshit a reason that your gm will buy so you can roll initiative with stealth instead of perception

Just got back from a work trip, while I was out there I knew I would have nothing to do and I wouldn't want to watch anything on their TV so I took my copy of Book 1 of Return of the Runelords and ran a "session" of it where I had a Pathfinder-focused iteration of ChatGPT as the "player", presenting the AP as written and seeing how it did.

I figured that keeping track of 4 PCs would be too much for it (and me) to keep track of, so in lieu of that I just gave it an overpowered single character to control, and over the course of this week and only during the times I was in my hotel rool it's managed to get through about 75% of Book 1, which I think is pretty impressive. Obviously not from a, like, numbers perspective, the sheer power level disparity makes that part obvious, but the context it's able to retain over long periods of time has seriously improved since a couple years ago and it remembers aspects of what happened before to an impressive degree, and also came up with some creative yet feasible solutions to problems on par with (and in some cases surpassing) what I've gotten from my human players.

All in all, 8/10 experience, wish the way I was using it allowed it to just have a section where I could have uploaded the character sheet so it could more easily refer back to it without having to go all the way back into its memory banks.

>>96071930
Getting the big drop on enemies who do not know you are there.

>>96063425
Sorry. We have to spend the first 100 posts baiting arguments about casters or else the 2e thread falls off the board due to inactivity.

>>96073205
wouldnt be an issue is casters didnt suck :)
2/3s casters in 1e are better than full casters in 2e

>>96068058
>Does bring a bit of joy to my heart that 2e's haters ALSO can't read
Weren't you the one talking about how you need to make "Balance checks" for Entanglement tho?

Even if not, seems like 2efags not only can't read but will outright hallucinate things to make their system seem good.

Totally not a cargo cult tho.

>>96073289
I totally agree with you. It's just that people realized you can bait Fighterfag into defending casters and 2e since that's his whole life and keep the thread bumped for the next 48 hours.

And sadly even on a slow board that's the only way to survive.

>>96073358
>Weren't you the one
nope

>n-nope

>>96073587
Well either way, don't forget that it took you three tries to post a character sheet when asked for one. That was embarrassing and you really shouldn't be throwing stones at the literacy of others.

>>96073711
>Well either way, don't forget that it took you
Also no.

>>96073716
Mmhmm.

You are monitoring this thread like a HAWK by the way : )

One would think you don't have anything better to do or something.

>2e sessions got cancelled this week

Just found out about the Incapitation trait. What the fuark

>>96073879

>>96062557 (OP)
>TQ
>1e
Hunter. I have no idea why this class exist. What exactly is this thing adding that a normal Druid, Ranger, or even Summoner would provide? Even with the Super Animal Companion and spellcasting, I struggle to envision the goal of this thing? Even with making the Primal Hunter features baseline, I'm unsure how you make this concept work, even if it isn't all THAT bad objectively.
>2e
Enough been said about Inventor I would be treading on the graveyard of the beaten horse, so I'll pick my second-least favorite class: Druid. It seems too laden with having to be the "generic character" idea, it doesn't really stand out. Especially after the years of powercreep. And it suffers a lot from 2e's caster feat design crisis, it isn't allowed to do anything cool with them. It feels like a class that lacks mechanics, regardless of what subclass you pick. I would honestly give it the Herbalist Archetype for free and have it be this herbal dude that gives you free weed every day that can be used as standard buffs.

>>96062557 (OP)
>TQ
>Favorite
2e Rogue, Exemplar, and Champion are probably my top 3. Exemplar is probably the worst off of the three.

Exemplar I kinda wish had bonus skill boosts based on root epithet, any actually good low level feats (including shit Mated Birds being pulled down a few tiers), and had the damage bonus separated from weapon ikons so you didn't have to base every rotation on keeping those sparked. I'll also never forgive the loss of in-class focus spells.

Champion is in a good place, but still feels like it needs some of its feats just baked into the features they upgrade (with the archetype not getting those upgrades). The ability to trade out Exalted Reaction would be nice too, but I say that due to my biased love for Justice cause.

>Least
2e Oracle, Gunslinger, and Inventor. I feel like these horses are beaten enough I don't have to explain why.

>>96074209
I'm actually playing a Hunter at the moment in one of the campaigns I'm in and I've actually been enjoying the spontaneous casting aspect, as I'm pretty sure that every other Nature-based caster is prepared. As it stands I basically see it as Ranger+, it's giving me many of the same vibes as that class but with more versatility that's not as hampered by the Terrain and Favored Enemy restrictions.

>>96074436
Again, I don't think it is a bad class (something something any spellcasting is good spellcasting) and I can see why people might value a bit more focus out of the Ranger package. But given how Slayer is right there for that concern, it doesn't resolve the alignment locking like Oracle does for Cleric, and how going from a 1/2th to 3/4th caster isn't that big a jump imo, I still struggle to see why it is made.

>>96074209
>Hunter. I have no idea why this class exist.
"We need to make Teamwork Feats function" is about all I can see there, really.

I'm impressed that Shifter stole the animal aspect feature and made it even shittier, though

>>96065454
>Fear Gem
What the fuck is this design? Why can't you just activate the talisman on a successful hit?

>>96065951
It's useless for most skills

>>96076410
Sure, although your statement and the one in the post you're quoting aren't mutually exclusive. Unless you're taking "generally useful" to mean, like, equally useful across all skills it could apply to, rather than a feat that's useful in general, in which case we're just arguing semantics.

>>96076454
It's currently useful for highly specific things, while being a trap option for other actions and most other skills. So I'd never call it "generally useful".

It either needs a buff or removal from the pool of being an option for all skills.

>>96076410
Honestly what skills is it actually useful for besides Medicine so you don't crit fail and kill your own ally? (Thanks Paizo)

Stealth maybe? Although if you're in a situation where the Assurance stealth roll is enough to sneak by, I'd rather just have the party Bard make me Silent and Invisible or something.

Uhhhh... possibly Athletics? Although I'd rather take Quick Climb/Cloud Jump for that.

>>96076512
>Athletics
Yes. To not crit fail your climbing check and fall to your death, or to not crit fail your swimming check and drown.

>>96063154
>You get an +2.75 average increase to the check compared to unaltered Assurance
I think it's +2.25 actually. Normally a d20 is 10.5 average, and the new average would be 12.75.

>>96076503
I mean, if you're taking athletics you probably want Assurance. If you're taking medicine you probably want Assurance. If you don't have an in-class way to get ahold of a status bonus to your speed, or to counter invisibility, you probably want Assurance alongside any of the tradition-related skills in order to access wands of Longstrider or See the Unseen. I guess you could say these are highly specific in that you're using Assurance to target specific benchmarks with each of them, but they're also highly general in that these are things that lots and lots of characters want and will use Assurance to get. Looking back at my last several characters, all of them have Assurance in something, whether it's acrobatics to auto-succeed the check to stay in the air as part of the Wind Jump focus spell, or Athletics to gain what essentially amounts to a passive jump distance with the athletics jump feat chain, or a marshal who takes it in Diplomacy to auto-succeed their Inspiring Marshal Stance check..

It's a powerful feat and an extremely common one to show up on a character sheet across all sorts of classes and builds. I can't really think of a way I'd want to buff it. The proposed fix in the post at the start of this reply chain essentially makes it into a must-take for any skill you care about, so I don't think that's it. I can imagine most characters taking Assurance three times (one for each skill they're taking to legendary) if that ever made its way into the rules. I suppose if you wanted to really dictate how you want Assurance to be used you could limit it to a few "intended" skills, but I don't think that's really a balance change so much as an autism soother, and you're essentially putting a bullet in any potential uses that might come up later by doing it (see the aforementioned Marshal stance changes for an example of assurance in diplomacy becoming useful in an instance where it wasn't before, due to a later rules addition).

>>96076567
Those all sound like metagamey ways of using Assurance. Something you'd read about in a strategy guide. Whereas new players would have no idea about it and fall for the trap option. In fact, I've seen a lot of newer players talk about how disappointed they were when trying the feat and needing to ask when it's useful at all. I don't think such highly unintuitive things have a place in the system.
>The proposed fix in the post at the start of this reply chain essentially makes it into a must-take for any skill you care about
Why would you want to give up all the bonuses you're investing in for the skills you care about?

>>96076623
>Those all sound like metagamey ways of using Assurance. Something you'd read about in a strategy guide.
Yes. Do you not know how most shit in PF2e is designed? It doesn't care about making sense or "feeling good" to a new player or explaining itself, it assumes you are a PFS optimizer freak who just knows what's good, and if you're not, tough shit.

>>96076623
Regarding the original post, you're right, I misread it. The actual version is way toned-down from what I thought it was, although it seems weird that it's just a straight buff to Assurance in all the situations where it's *already* good. I don't think that really levels Assurance out, I think that'd make it more of a win for the feats that already enjoy its common use.

Regarding the rest of the content of your post, I don't really know what to say. It seems like you just weren't really aware of most of those examples, and when confronted with them, you disregarded them as "metagamey." Like, on one hand, I don't really know how Assurance could ever be anything *but* metagamey. It's explicitly an out-of-character mechanic that alters your dice rolls. Everything about it is metagamey. That's its whole thing. On the other hand, I don't understand how you think using Assurance in the way it's explicitly intended counts as more metagamey than anything else. Were you, like, shocked to learn that it worked with Wind Jump? Why wouldn't it? I don't know how I could possibly hope to change your opinion on this if you just disregard points you don't like, and I think we've scooted the goal posts past "Assurance isn't generally useful" by a couple of football field lengths already. Now we're on to arguing what counts as metagamey and what doesn't.

If nothing else, it looks like you've at least been exposed to some new build options, which is nice. I don't know that I'd sign onto that Anon's fix for Assurance, and I don't really think I sign onto the idea that Assurance needs a fix in general. It's a broadly useful way to enable a bunch of different stuff across a bunch of different skills on a bunch of different characters. I like it, and I use it a lot.

>>96076525
I guess. But with a climb/swim speed, you don't have to roll except in the harshest conditions that an Assurance roll would Fail anyway.

>>96076740
>It seems like you just weren't really aware of most of those examples
What the hell do you think people point out when newbies "ask when it's useful at all"?

No idea why you're latching onto a literal definition of metagaming. It's extremely commonly used in the context of looking up strategy guides and letting someone else do the optimizing for you. The feat sucks if you don't have prior knowledge about the game, as evidenced by the novices who still need to ask about this feat to this day.

And if you can't understand how "general" and "highly specific" are opposites, there's nothing I can do here. You're also calling the buff "weird" instead of ever answering the very simple question of
>Is it generally useful now?

>>96076818
I think you're just being argumentative now. All of your points have already been addressed, you just sort of slip right past them. Nobody's "latching on" to a literal definition of metagaming. I even gave you two metaphorical hands, one to address the actual definition and the other to address your apparent disapproval of using Assurance in any of the ways I mentioned. You've made a point to ignore that, though, which is a trend with you. And, again, that whole sub-argument about how "metagamey" those examples are is itself is just moving goalposts to begin with, even though I think you're a little confused there.

Also, I don't know about you, but I feel like I'd probably call a feat that shows up on as many character sheets as Assurance does "generally useful." You're dancing around with semantics here, but I don't think there's any denying that Assurance is both super common and easily in the top half of skill feat power levels. It's a good feat for a lot of characters, dude. I understand that you were having trouble thinking of situations where it was useful, but I don't think that means it needs a buff. If you're really trying to pin me down on the idea that Assurance isn't *equally* useful to every skill, then I happily concede that point, as I did several posts up here: >>96076454. That's purely a semantic argument, sure, but you can take the win if you want it. I'll give it to you.

Let me just try to reset here. Assurance is really good. I don't think it needs a buff. If I was buffing skill feats, Assurance would not be at the top of the list. It does exactly what it says it does on the tin, which makes it useful in a variety of ways, to a variety of characters. I think it's a well-designed feat. You might disagree there. I don't think it needs a buff. I think it's harder to disagree there. You can houserule it all you like though, that's totally okay.

So I've got this crazy idea that it might be cool to try converting very old D&D adventures/module to Pathfinder 1e. Would any of y'all ever want to play a Pathfinder character in Blackmoor or Greyhawk?

2e
>want to play a witch
>hate the fact that I have to use a familiar in combat
How could I go about fixing this? The familiar is so integrated into their playstyle now and I hate it.

>>96078034
Which patron and whats your problem with the familiar? There are solutions, but it depends on both of those things. Like managing it is easy as long as you take Independent. If you don't like it being a creature, object familiars are a thing.

>>96078034
Play a different prepared caster.
Witch IS the familiar.

>>96078057
Starless shadow but I'm not too sold on it, I want an occult spell list. I'm going for a cosmic quasi-magical girl witch/investigator and I want the mascot to only be support and not get involved in combat if possible.

>>96078034
Witches+ has a familiarless witch archetype. I have no idea if it is any good.

>>96062557 (OP)
>favourite
For 1e it was alchemist. I loved becoming the craziest weird science freak shit i could. The 2e version isn't even a shadow of what the 1e version used to be. For 2e, i got to say champion but even so its feat list is a fucking mess with zero martial feats that don't involve a fucking shield and the aura barely has any cool options for it until later levels.
>least
For 1e its probably the inquisitor. I could see the vision but it just didn't pop for me when i tried it. For 2e. Remastered Wizard is such a ridiculous fucking mess that really shows where the designers priorities lie. Wizard getting nerfed while even the fighter got a buff just shows how much of a meme the design team at paizo are.

>>96078092
The easiest thing to do would be to flip your character concept and be an Investigator/Witch, assuming you're talking about the actual classes. The familiar doesn't do much as an archetype and can safely just hide away. You can also just take the Pet feat or ask your gm to give it to you for free and skip Witch altogether.

As >>96078063 said, you might want to pick something else if you don't want it in combat at all. Spirit Familiar at 8 is too strong not to take, and at higher levels you definitely want it to be casting spells. At lower levels, you can absolutely get away with it though, so if the campaign stops at 6 or something, do whatever you want. For example, as great as Resentment is, the familiar doesn't really have an ability most of the time unless your allies are also good at inflicting conditions. So it not being on the battlefield doesn't change much until certain levels.

Spinner of Threads is occult and has a nice support ability. You could just keep it next to you and give yourself the buff. If you're willing to go divine, Faith's Flamekeeper's ability gives temp hp to allies and feels like it would fit very well thematically. You might be able to talk your gm into letting your familiar use that ability instead of any of the other occult ones, it's good but not broken.

>>96076889
If nothing else, it looks like you've at least been exposed to some new words in English, which is nice.

How does Pathfinder 2e alchemist fare in Starfinder 2e? I haven't really kept up on the Compability thing between the system but word is that classes don't need any tweaking.

Had an idea for a character inspired by pic related. A guy basically working for a soda company exploring the Galaxy to try and create the perfect soda recipe and his alchemal concotions would be sodas and shit

>>96078630
First. Stop posting while horny. Second. Starfinder 2e has a heavily ranged and energy based meta which was at least the bombers whole niche. In general i would say starfinder classes are stronger and the game assumes that so even a high ceiling alchemist player is going to struggle imo.

>>96078670
Sorry it was the first image I could grab that wasn't in webp form. Regardless, thanks maybe it might better to have alchemist be my free archetype then

>>96076541
The increase is average +2.75 because you're Taking 10 with Assurance.

2e
Titan's Breaker https://2e.aonprd.com/Ikons.aspx?ID=19
How many damage dice are you rolling with Fracture Mountains at L20 with a Major Striking weapon?
4dX+3dX or 4dX+12dX?

>>96079869
The first one. You can add even more die if you get Nothing Personal from the Blackjacket archetype though
https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=7694

>>96079906
I agree, but why is it written Like That?
Also Antagonize should be a skill feat instead of hogged by Swashbuckler.

>>96080041
Fuck off tourist

>>96080244
Post a detailed homebrew of at least one A4 page long that makes the game better and I might consider it.

Every +1 matters

>>96081098
Its funny because when 2e dick riders hear a complaint they don't like they usually throw this mantra out the window first.

>>96081098
>>96081111
>Every +1 matters

And everything in the game is nothing but +1's, that don't stack.

>>96081821
Getting the combos is fun though. Hitting a Tanuki racial circumstance bonus to party attack rolls that stacks with your party courageous anthem/heroisms while the enemy is also off-guard and frightened/clumsy so you hit someone that's supposed to be tough on a 6 and crit on a 16. And with good character building/spell selection, you can hit this in the average encounter instead of just in a whiteroom with prep time for the encounter.

>>96081821
And that is fine, because you generally do not have access to all the '+1's' in the game, or even a large percentage of them.
This isn't 3.5 where the math just goes fucking wonky after a certain point

>>96081098
This guy is like a strawman a 2ehater thought up except he's a real person somehow.

>>96078183
>Wizard getting nerfed
You mean spells.
>fighter got a buff
You mean melee combat.

I'm trying to get all the pdfs for Starfinder, and there is one book that I can't download via my googlefu in any real capacity due to the file being corrupt: Alien Archive (1). Does any of you have the Alien Archive (1)'s pdf for me to download? Thanks, guys.

>>96081906
What do you mean?

>>96082038
NTG but he seems to focus on glazing the shit that people hate about the system and why it's actually genius. But he's not very charismatic so it often comes across as just spotlighting flaws instead of defending 2e.

>>96082069
That's just how youtube works

>>96081922
>You mean spells.
No, it was a direct nerf to Wizard with the Curriculum change. Even if you play it off with just treating it as a raw 4th slot, they created worse focus spells for them and don't provide enough resources to create "thematically fitting" picks. Combined with the middling new feats and other casters getting far more impactful buffs, Wizard was just hung out to dry.
>You mean melee combat.
Fighter did actually got some nerfs with how they changed weapon-focused archetypes, but they did technically buff them with the removal of the Open trait. Sudden Charge is just a must-pick option now. And it is hard to argue it was a more general change when not many combat feats outside of Fighter and Barbarians' had the trait in the first place.

>>96082038
Rules lawyer has a tendency to exaggerate things that are good about the system and downplay concerns people have. I remember around the time of the remaster, he put out a "test" to see if the claims about spellcasters being underpowered was true or not by making two teams of players: Only martials and only casters. The only caster team did better by some margin (I think including PvP) and he used it as evidence that casters were not weak.

>>96082448
To wit, if you did the same thing in PF1e or 3.5, people would accept it.
Hell, in most games, if an entire group of a single pc option succeeded more than others, people would accept that they are just a better chassis. Why not in this situation?
I'm not being facetious here, I'm honestly wondering why if a group of casters, despite their 'weakness', did better in an adventure than a group of martials, why is that discounted out of hand?

>>96082448
Which is a very lawyery way to put it, but also not the claim most people are making. Casters aren't weak, that claim is correct. Do they have a lot of shit that feels bad and mechanically hinders them? Also correct. Worse accuracy at certain levels for "reasons", the shitty implementation of incap trait, less ways to use hero points, etc..

>>96082528
I think he's just mad he can't run an all-casters party or something. You're supposed to have a well balanced group of players, and casters also can have a bunch of scrolls to supplement their fighting styles.

2e. How are Rogue’s Ruffian and Thief subclasses? Do you think the class is better off with the strength or dexterity leaning?

>>96082542
>but also not the claim most people are making
No, people have ROUTINELY say they are weak, and not just for all the reasons you pointed out. This is beyond the one shitposter in this thread, it isn't hard to see people being utterly bearish on them. No one is saying casters are perfect and have no problems, they are saying that there's no point in EVER being a caster --even supportive ones-- or the core design is so fucked there's no helping them without completely fucking over the entire system. And at that point, go back to 1e or D&D5e for a far better game/experience.
The Rules Lawyer video is kind of too poor a study to really make a proper conclusion on either way. You can probably get better data out of a 2hufag game. But there is merit in saying that the vast majority of caster complaints, or at least their blackpilled conclusions, are overdramatized.

>>96082631
Both are good but Thief is just way better, even with the HARSH falloff after a certain point. DEX-to-Damage and their exclusive Debilitations are just incredibly handy to have in the important levels of play. Rogue tends to struggle a bit being a melee class, but both classes provide far better opportunities and power compared to the other subclasses. The stat you want to focus on very much is dependent on which one your party values more, and usually it will be DEX/

>>96082544
>I think he's just mad he can't run an all-casters party or something
But you can, unless there is something I'm missing? I think you need more synergy and intra-party teamwork to succeed, but you can cover all the traditional bases with a caster party. All the complaints I've seen has been about the wizard, and occasionally the druid, but never bards, clerics, sorc.
>>96082631
I'm in a party with a dex thief right now, and they are doing all the classical rogue stuff successfully, and more than holding their own in combat up to level 6 where we are. It's not mindless unga bunga, but she comes out with these miraculous shanks from the top rope that just murder tanky enemies.
The downside is that these murder shanks require timing and prep to pull off; it's not a mindless/braindead class, and I think that outside Fighter and Barb, the lack of braindead play is a feature, not an accident.
>fighter uses Vicious Strike
>it was Super Effective!!

>>96082631
They are both the class's best options. I think thief is easier to work with if you're not putting in any effort and ruffian is easier to be versatile with. I'm currently playing a ruffian and maybe counterintuitively I gave them +3 dex at level 1. I'm swinging a gladius for damage on the regular but higher dex means I can swap to a bow (Which is admittedly expensive to maintain) when needed but I can also do the shit people expect of rogues; sneak and steal/pick locks. Ruffian just largely gets better feats, vicious debilitations and brutal beating which is why I favour it, alongside being able to do athletics stuff with my pumped strength which is insanely powerful in the right group, Trip something, your other melee reactive strike it when they stand up, you opportune backstab when they do it.

All thief gives you over ruffian is more flexibility on your 4th stat, you can boost charisma or int if you want to be a face/nerd as you only have 3 stats that matter offensive/defensively, you can't do that as well if you have STR to consider on top of the normal DEX/WIS/CON, It also has bad feats and you get its damage bonus if you just pump strength anyway.

>>96082542
>Casters arent weak except for all these different points.
But thats the rub isnt it. When people say casters are weak what they actually mean is "casters are weak at the gameplay style i wish to play them as" which is perfectly valid. Paizo expect every single caster to play the exact same way as a limited toolbox support unit where half the one time tools are just worse at solving a problem than someone with a skill check who can do it infinitely. The best casters in game are the ones who completely bypass dealing with the monster math and simply resign themselves to being math enhancers for the party.
>>96082544
It was very famously shown by edna that you can run through a hyper autist's campaign with nothing but fighters so i dont think you really want to take this line of discussion anon.

>>96082772
>you get its damage bonus if you just pump strength anyway.

It's actually even better, you get the str bonus to damage on thrown weapons and composite bows which dex-thief wouldn't be giving you.

>>96082736
>But you can, unless there is something I'm missing?
NTA, but I think he was trying to argue that the power of an all-caster party is too statistically insignificant to argue they are better or worse than martials. And that, in a way, is still a damnation of them, that they are doing too much work just to keep up to martials.
But that is intentional to a large degree. Paizo have stated that they design classes and mechanics on a horizontal power level, not a vertical one. They create classes around an idea and shape the mechanics around it, not to fill in niches or an expectation of "More Work = More Power". Anyone that plays fighting games and deal with the "Super fast, super strong, execution-heavy 'glass cannon'" understands why that isn't necessarily as fair a design as you think it is. That's always the rub against Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards. It doesn't work on a player psychology level because EVERYONE is presumably putting in the same amount of effort and work to play the class, so there's no downside to that idea.

>All the complaints I've seen has been about the wizard, and occasionally the druid, but never bards, clerics, sorc.
There is a bit of an odd hat in these discussions where there usually talk about one class or even subclass that is dysfunctional and debase the entire caster design off of them. And that the "good casters" are those that don't engage with such issues, so they don't matter for the discussion. YMMV on how valid a line of thinking this tends to be, cause there are merits about complaining about some casters more than others.

>>96082787
> what they actually mean is "casters are weak at the gameplay style i wish to play them as"
A lot of the time this does mean either
>single-element, single-target blaster because 5eWarlock brainworms are eternal
>gish build on a class that doesn't have enough pieces to self-buff themselves into one.
So again, YMMV on how valid those takes are.

>>96082787
>It was very famously shown by edna that you can run through a hyper autist's campaign with nothing but fighters
I think that is itself a good thing, in that the most basic, take all comers class can do the work admirably enough. What I would like is more 'basic' classes, with others specializing in different avenues.
>think of the all fighter parties in 4e D&D that could handle near about anything

>>96081870
If you have access to so few of them, why restrict it doubly by making them not stack? Does the game fall apart if at level 1 a party manages to land both demoralize and dirty trick on a monster and those work in unison?

>>96082852
>single-element, single-target blaster because 5eWarlock brainworms are eternal
4e had single target casters and pf2e is its bastard child so its got no excuse. Its also a very valid way to want to play a caster so miss me with your gay 5e hangups.
>gish build on a class that doesn't have enough pieces to self-buff themselves into one.
Battle forms are lame and gay. This wouldn't matter so much if the spells didn't absolutely fuck you by taking away the only pro casters have.
>A lot of the time this does mean either
A lot of people's arguments are just lack of being able to spec into gameplay styles. Where are all the functional blaster feats? Why cant i as a wizard shape my fireball to miss a number of allies or reroll 1s and 2s? Why cant i spec in illusion magic and make them so real that even mindless foes are affected by them? Simple feats like this should exist in a game this far into its lifespan but instead the wizard feat list is filled with dogshit.

1e
A wraith's attack is listed as
>Melee incorporeal touch +6 (1d6 negative energy plus 1d6 Con drain)

it also has this as a separate ability listed
>Constitution Drain (Su)
>Creatures hit by a wraith’s touch attack must succeed on a DC 17 Fortitude save or take 1d6 points of Constitution drain. On each successful attack, the wraith gains 5 temporary hit points. The save DC is Charisma-based.

if the target has Death Ward on, and all of the negative energy damage is reduced to 0, does the 'plus 1d6 Con drain' still happen?

would this rule block it too

>A creature with immunities takes no damage from listed sources. Immunities can also apply to afflictions, conditions, spells (based on school, level, or save type), and other effects. A creature that is immune does not suffer from these effects, or any secondary effects that are triggered due to an immune effect

or does the Su wording above mean that the Constitution Drain is an effect separate from the negative energy damage?

>>96082680
>DEX-to-Damage and their exclusive Debilitations are just incredibly handy to have in the important levels of play
>>96082772
>Ruffian just largely gets better feats, vicious debilitations

>>96082680
You can, but it entirely depends on how lenient your DM is. I'm assuming it's a particularly difficult campaign. How are you gonna win all fights by wasting most of your actions just to cast anything?

>>96082787
>It was very famously shown by edna that you can run through a hyper autist's campaign with nothing but fighters so i dont think you really want to take this line of discussion anon.

Who? That seems like an extremely gimmicky game, which would turn boring fast, and that I bet my left nut the DM has to constantly account for to make it not suck for everyone.

>>96083001
Not to defend Dirty Trick, but there are a few design ideas as to why they limit what can and can't stack.
>Limits mental stack, you don't have to remember multiple different bonus/penalty types or do excessive mental math. Most people start falling apart when something goes beyond +/-7
>Incentivizes horizontal progression while balancing out "building tall". It is better to have multiple options for different opponents, but the diminishing returns are around the same for those that focus on one playstyle or role.
>Pushes the "every +1 matters" narrative. They want small-but-impactful choices, not a death-of-a-thousand-cuts ideas.
>Player protection. PCs are more vulnerable to death-of-a-thousand-cuts disasters, and they want to make sure someone with a bunch of debuffs inflicted on them is still an active participant.

Dirty Trick really should be MUCH better than what it is if it gonna be competing against all the other options, but I do agree with Paizo that not everything should stack.
I do think they could have at least kept Morale Bonus/Penalties, though. It is weird how they can't decide if mental effects are status or circumstance...

>>96083036
>4e had single target casters and pf2e is its bastard child so its got no excuse.
We got Kineticist now, so...
Single-target blasting options do exist in PF2e, they just aren't going to have massive support or push people towards only being that. The design just doesn't make much sense when you think on it, either just pick up a bow/gun if you want to do consistent ranged damage or play to the caster's strength: crowd control.
>Battle forms are lame and gay.
Agreed... They really should add more active abilities or just let people spellcast while in them.
> Simple feats like this
I would not call anything what you said "simple feats". These are "I don't want to deal with problems" ideas, similar logic behind the mathfixer feats in 1e. A specialization should still deal with the balancing aspects.

2e

Speaking of Single Target Blaster Casters, is Arcane Shroud worth taking on a Starlit Span?

Seems like the only benefit for it is the free Invis into Off-Guard on Round 2.

>>96083169
>How are you gonna win all fights by wasting most of your actions just to cast anything?
I mean, I think most other classes don't do much on an individual level, at least when talking about using all their actions. Landing 2 Strikes isn't that much valuable compared to landing the average spell, and other options martials have aren't that much more impactful or come at the expense of DPS.
I think people overvalue a 3rd action, when I barely see most people know how to use a Bonus Action in 5e properly. There could be more variable action and 1-action spells added in the game, but most of the 2 action ones usually do the job on multiple foes compared to one dude who spent their whole turn running in, hitting one guy, and then going for a -5 MAP attack.

>Who?
Edna, otherwise known as 2hufag, is THE hyper-autist optimizer around these parts. They DO run those insane combat test scenarios, especially when playtesting new classes. They very much all about trying to find what works and what breaks and I could honestly see Paizo hitting them up for a QA tester job if they even had an OUNCE of charisma to use for their own benefit. But again, HYPER-autist.
t. was a playtester with them for a short time.

>>96083202
It's okay. The nerf it took to the duration was an insane decision that I really can't defend, even beyond my Magus bias. Paizo really can be "NO FUN ALLOWED" at the worst of times. But past that point, it can leverage some new options if you have the action economy to spare. And the other Level 14 options are meh in their own right.

>>96083269
I don't get it. You're saying that pf2e is or isn't balanced for casters?

>>96083344
I believe it is. There are PROBLEMS, big ones for sure. Baseline Wizard is a big one (Runelord really does show how you can improve them).
But I don't think they cripple the game or worth EVERY thread wasting 100+ posts pointlessly arguing they should be able to make super specialized uber-blasters but also can still use the suped-up insta-kill spells on every enemy in the encounter now without incap tags and they shouldn't have spell slots at all and have all their bonuses stack and can win the game after Level 3.

This isn't even about "casterfags should go back to 1e", it is just the insane degree that everyone has SOME issue for a role that ultimately plays fine 70-80% of the time. And that each issue is some grand dealbreaker that make 2e worthless as a game or system, not just "I wish Paizo wasn't so bad at making their own game". Not even the "Monks should have gotten Parry on their fists!!"-fag is petty enough to be like that, he still likes the game.

But yeah, 2-action spells are weighty but not impossible to play around with, especially if everyone is a caster. You gonna end up in a similar wheelhouse, even with the tighter action economy.

sawtooth sabre, advanced weapon, no versatile, no deadly or fatal, no backstabber

bravo paizo

>>96083172
I don't think you need more types of penalties in 2e, nor involve a lot of numbers/crazy stacking. Instead, more things should be circumstance penalties to diversify what we have. And then just allow penalties within the same group to stack up to -4.
>Pushes the "every +1 matters" narrative
I don't feel this when redundancy actively makes many +1s not matter.
>Player protection.
And I can't believe this from Paizo, who are much more concerned with munchkins ruining the economy in PFS games, or someone forcing an enemy to stand in a campfire.
The system was designed with so many anti-fun practices that player protection has to be a distant thought. Why would they think being paralyzed by ghouls at level 1 would be engaging for players?

>>96082736
>>fighter uses Vicious Strike
>>it was Super Effective!!
Bad example. Vicious Swing is fairly unintuitive to use before you get Furious Focus and even then it's marginal unless you have a mount (or some other way of regularly dedicating 3 actions to Striking). Reach fighter with Sudden Charge is a lot more autopilot.

>>96083482
why does game that's so autistic about math not have printed rules for designing weapons with appropriate power?

I think I've finally narrowed it down
it's not that monk is never cool
it's not that monk is only cool in asian settings
it's definitely not that "monk becomes cool when you reflavor everything" (this sucks actually and is dumb)
it's that monk is only cool when there are other kung fu practitioners around and when you get to fight against them and treat it as a rivalry of styles
without this critical aspect monk is just fucking gay ass shit that doesn't deserve to exist
no other class has this issue

>>96083918
this is why we should have had Ninja as a class back...

Really, past that (and Samurai), what other full, Asian-inspired class could there be? Animist kind of works as an onmyouji deal, but does make me wonder what could work? Especially you don't want to just focus on China and Japan.
...roof korean shooter class?

>>96083979
medium?

>>96083344
NTA. IMO it is, but the issue is:
1) Casters still have a slightly quadratic curve where they don't get "fun" until level 5ish and at level 13ish the control and buffing/debuffing starts dominating encounters.
2) This power curve has a low skill floor and requires players to play casters with every tool in their toolbox, when often people want to go for a narrower theme or playstyle and then get told they're wrong, or playing the wrong game. Casters being broken in other editions meant that you could do this without sacrificing too much power, ironically.

>>96083979
>Especially you don't want to just focus on China and Japan.
I do, though.

>>96083986
Animist already consumes most of Medium into it. As stated, it works as the big "spiritual yokai shrine maiden conduit" class. Spiritualist is also subsumed by both it and Summoner.
If bringing back 1e classes could help, Shifter could do something, given the yokai ideas.

>>96084031
>Casters being broken in other editions meant that you could do this without sacrificing too much power, ironically.
It's not really an ironic deal so much as the design ethos of 1e. It was made so that any build idea could exist and be functional. With enough magic items and feats, you can punch through all forms of spell resistance, damage reduction, and anything that would just say "No" to your ideas.
There is value in that idea, but also some in saying "That's kinda dumb".

>I do, though.
It is kind of funny when people start getting uppity about otakudom and treating Japan and China as all of Asia, but don't have any other suggestions for options based on other cultures. Either those that are covered by the well of Asian fantasy that's been available for millennia, or at all.

>>96083979
the rest of asia kind of blows besides using india as either an ancient empire, distant trade empire, or modern malevolent empire
nobody cares about korea or seamonkeys

>>96083482
Advanced weapons are generally not a big power upgrade, unless the trait it really works for your build. For example Swipe and Sweep trait, worth getting Dwarven Battle Axe if you plan on doing skill-attacks. Worth getting through an ancestry feat if you play dwarf or as a fighter's prep'd feats

1d6 agile, finesse and twin weapon is one of a kind but it's a little under budget but it's median for advance weapons and you can get the training through an Archetype-- Red Mantis Assassin. But if it had another damage trait it would be very clearly the best choice

>>96083586
I'm not sure how they weigh the traits power level on this spreadsheet other than opinion

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/10eQXxg9HjXXehuHbhVe59rjO6j_59OEloW9ApQeXg9s/edit?gid=1446668823#gid=1446668823

>>96082542
From a GM's perspective I like incapacitate better than spell resistance in 3.pf1, legendary resistance(also has Magic Resistance) in 5e and the solo rules from 4e
Baseline, incapacitate protects players from mook and mid's CC.
Parties would get absolutely murdered by monsters without the incapacitates trait's existence, making fighting caster mooks a total nightmare

Mathwise, you have better chances of landing a scary CC spell in PF2E on a boss than any other than 3.pf1(if you pay the feat taxes)-- but not using spells that hit spell res is the meta so it's kinda of moot point.
If you want to be cheeky as a caster in PF2E and you have access to a higher level city/vendor you could buy a heightened scroll and make the BBEG's eyes explode

Pre level 5 is there any competition to a Fighter as a blaster caster
Is it even possible

>>96062557 (OP)
2e. Has anyone played a pure fire kineticist? I was thinking of combining thermal nimbus with vicious howl to get a bunch of free damage and just grappling or tripping enemies so they couldn't just fuck off from me.

>>96084432
You probably shouldn't 'compete' with others doing different roles, you're a team after all

A ranged fighter? Sure, you could easily out damage them even with just cantrips and 1-action focus damage spells, let alone using your spell slots for summons and AoE. Throwing weapons aren't good for sustain damage yet and most ranged weapon suck without very certain feats. The only thing they'd have over you is range

As melee-- no. Melee is generally stronger low level with their big damage bonuses and monsters generally lacking reach/Reactive Strikes. If any ranged character out damages a melee in a tank & spank encounter at low levels the melee guy is doing something horribly wrong

Come mid and high level, melee has to invest a lot in defense or they get stomped hard-- even drawing potions is risky. At that point, you get more powerful spells, stack damage feats and get crazy common items like Shadow Signet etc

The secret to low level blaster caster is leaning on your focus spells and targeting the right defenses since the weak save margins are much larger

>>96084390
The trait is fine, the issue is how they assign it. Phantasmal Killer had it perfect until they changed it (admittedly, it is a buff). The only part of the spell with incap was the part that actually incapacitated you. Now look at Calm. Why does the entire spell have Incap when the success effect is just Bane, except you have to cast it in your highest level slot instead of a 1st level slot? And there are many other spells that work the same way where their success effects are usually not worse than Slow, but the entire spell gets punished. You should have the choice to cast Paralyze at 3 for a stun on a success, but giving the rest of the spell incap, or casting it at 6 and letting it affect enemies of your level with the whole spell.

>>96084703
What is the bare minimum you need to change to make casters good to play

2e
Thaumaturge question, if i'm using a flaming weapon and i exploit vulnerability on a creature with a weakness to fire and i did mortal weakness so my weapon trigger it's fire weakness. Does that mean that both mortal weakness and flaming would apply the weakness damage or would only one instance of weakness damage occur?

>>96085556
Just one, it might be better to personal antithesis in that instance.

>>96085317
Just give them better math. Let full casters start at expert casting, master at 7th and legendary at 15th. The reasons are:
>Cantrips feel more reliable and strong in the early game where you have very few slots. Retards will cry about ranged martials being out damaged while completely ignoring the many pros such as having x2 -x4 your range, a much more versatile action economy and the generally better class chassis they have.
>It raises the spell floor making shittier spells more viable to use because you might actually hit now. The only standout spell that may need a nerf is slow. The rest of the meta spells don't interact with monster math that much.
>You miss that gay math bump at like level 5 and 11 where all the monsters have ridiculous saves compared to your DC. Paizo does everything it can to suck off martial identity progression but basically tell casters to fuck themselves for multiple levels with the fundamental math of the game and give no fix.

>>96085576
Is incap not a problem?

>>96085576
I also think math is the way to tackle this, but I would lower every monster save by 1-2 points, then further lower their worst save by another 2. Does this mean martial maneuvers also get buffed? Yeah but they were already doing that, and if the game is supposed to be tactical and not just a dpr race, encourage that. It also incentivizes casters to find the lowest weakness and really exploit it once they do. I'd also do something about how the mental tag interacts with mindless creatures because that is a ridiculous trap.

>>96085606
I just gave the basic thing to make casters feel better to play. If you want incap to feel better then just make it scale off character level instead of spell rank like it does for martial abilities (again paizo gargling martial cum at every turn). This protects bosses while allowing you to deal with ads.

>>96085659
Fucking with monster math is basic but kind of annoying and i would rather the fixes be player side. I definitely agree that RK needs to be incentivized a lot more. The Ranger feats that give you bonuses to attack and defence should be standard for RK or do what Mark Seifter wanted to do and have it give you some form of precision damage.

Can Dragon's Demand release already? Getting a tabletop group together that doesn't consist of freaks is borderline impossible

>>96085768
I really like dawnsbury days, it's pre-remaster but really fun and rewards system mastery.

I have one gripe, I took the paladin cause and in the final DLC map I used the champion's reaction to defend an ally while also attacking - Which lead to an unprompted slashing strike against a black pudding which meant spitting which was a death sentence in my 0 bludgeoning group. They prompt you for which weapon you're attacking with so often it gets annoying but not prompting it there ruined me.

>>96085788
Wait is Dawnsbury Days an actual game? I always thought it was Early Access Vaporware

>>96085788
It needs LVL 20 ;( and more feats and items

>>96085794
It's released with an expansion. it currently goes to level 8 with extra non-story encounters added just for fun.It's insanely good for build-testing, you find out where your guy falters super fast.

I think they just announced another expansion but it only goes to level 9.

>>96082631
Ruffian is the only time a rogue subclass wants to change their key stat off dex. They have access to medium armour and can use it for accuracy. That said, if they focus on throwing they might want to key dex anyway.

As for how good they are, they're both great. I think ruffian can be more engaging in a fight due to maneuvers but thief can really go hard on boosting any mental stat they want without losing anything and you can do funny stuff with that.

>>96082631
For me, one of the biggest draws is the medium armor chance - Now, I know this is meaningless when it comes to AC if you dexmaxx and wear leather it's literally the same but going forward..

Mediium armor long-term can take fortification runes and those are fucking sick. Ruffians and avengers have a big advantage in this avenue.

>>96084283
>finesse weapon with two athletics traits rated highest
KEK this is ridiculous

>>96082631
Thief is really good if you want to play a skirmisher playstyle by dashing in and out of enemies ranges. A thief with Mobility and a decent move speed can just harass creatures and make them chase you, which opens them for reactive strike from your teammates. It's less directly helpful to your team compared to what ruffian can do but it is a lot safer for you

>>96084095
>korea or seamonkeys
I would Korea or SEA over rapey street defilers

>>96086342
>Thief is really good if you want to play a skirmisher playstyle by dashing in and out of enemies ranges. A thief with Mobility and a decent move speed can just harass creatures and make them chase you
What enables a thief to do this that a ruffian doesn't have

>keep reading a common complaint about an AP
>read the AP
>it's baffling how it's not an issue at all; in fact, the opposite of what they complained about is true
>check forums now that I've read the whole thing
>first post is about "muh scatsexual representation, muh straight people are evil"
>AP's writer/director agreeing with them
jesus christ
I can trust no one buy myself about books

Can't seem to get into the starfinder trove/vault...anyone got an updated link or similar? Looking for all the SF1e books and APs

>>96083430
One of the petty shitheads who posts about Monk and parry here. Yea, game fun, I just hate "shield is optimal on Monk" with a Fury.

As with many things, it really just feels like it comes to "death by a thousand minor petty grievances", but people generally don't really have the attention to actually cover everything at once, so it's easier to hyperfixate and get mad at one thing at a time unless they're actively keeping a book of grudges to reference. Something only insane people do.

>>96067281
From that list:
-Fly
-Burrow
-Infernal healing
-Heroism
-Protection from X
-Spider Climb
-Invisibility
-Lesser resto

Those 8 are for stockpile (AT LEAST 2x per character). Everything else is 1x per character max. Also personal range spells can't be made into potions, so Glibness and Heightened Awareness are out.

Other goldies:

-Ashen Path (stay inside the obscuring mist and be SUPER invisible)
-Hermean Potential
-Barkskin
-Slipstream

>>96083047
Since the CON drain comes from being successfully hit with the incorporeal touch wraith have. And wraiths being undead. I think the con drain comes attached to the negative damage. So In this particular case I'd personally rule Death Ward blocking both the negative energy and the CON drain.

But RAW: It doesn't

I HATE SHIELD MONKS I HATE SHIELD MONKS I HATE SHIELD MONKS I HATE SHIELD MONKS

You know what grinds my gears about 2e. Having to buy my subclass feats when they should just be part of my features. The barbarian's feat list is so fucking bloated with shit i cant touch while i have to choose between my unique stuff or the more generic but probably better general stuff.

>>96089115
Same

How the fuck did Paizo think this was a good idea?

>>96089010

Since asking that question I spent my evening looking up posts about this and in the end decided to just go ahead and rule the same way.

My reasoning as a DM is that incorporeal undead are just too damn powerful in universe. Having a single target 4th level spell that can block them for ten to twenty minutes isn't breaking anything. A Wraith is intelligent enough to notice its touch isn't being effective, back off and wait out for the magic to dissipate, testing the target every once in a while.

In our game, the specific use case is the party travelling through a wasteland, an ancient battlefield. The adventure we are playing through has wraiths as random encounters. So the scenario is, what does the party do when its out in a wasteland in middle of the night and 4 wraiths come upon it.

If Wraiths are played as their stats suggest - smart enough to ambush, focus dangerous enemies, retreat if threatened, wait out timed spell buffs like Death Ward - than your average party doesn't stand much of a chance.

I ran several quick simulations with an LLM, the scenario of 4 wraiths rising out of the ground around one of the PCs and usually someone in the party dies, or is very close to death on round 1 before anyone even gets to act. Surprise round - the wraiths come out, usually win initiative on first round with their +7, that's already 4 touch AC attacks with +8, than whoever wants to react first catches all the AoOs. most annoying part is that its nearly impossible to actually kill them because they can just retreat so easily by sinking back into the ground and flying off along the surface in a random direction.

Unless the party has a way to spike 50ish damage against an incorporeal target, they can at best chase the wraiths off.

After that testing, I decided, you know what, lets be extra biased vs. incorporeal undead. Death Ward works extra well against them. Even if you have it ready, in most cases all it gets you is a chance to escape.

>>96089115
It'd bother me a lot less if at the very least, using a weapon on monk didn't cost a non-negligible fee to even start (oh boy I love basically going back to PF1e CRB monk who can't even use like 90% of monk tagged weapons!), and unarmored AC options weren't limited to a versatile heritage, one specific rare ancestry, and a stance that is easily fucked over by any number of factors. Which is just kinda more instances of minor irritation building up.

>>96089354
Subclasses in general feel like kind of a shitshow, imo.

I have a question for Warpriests with the Air Blessing "Zephyr’s Gift". It says "You can touch any one ranged weapon and enhance it with the quality of air".

I see multiple guides referencing using this blessing for thrown weapons such as Shuriken. How does that work if its only one touched ranged weapon?

>>96089363
They don't play their own game

>>96089115
Monks are honestly the best tanks in the game

>>96085666
Then they trade the ability to buy or find heightened incap scrolls

Not worth imo

>>96089404
I dont care about the feat to use monk weapons that much, I do care that the monk tag on weapon taxes them so heavily, making it feel pointless to go into since a lot of monk stances are seemingly significantly better.

>>96089801
Monks should be able to use advanced monk weapons baseline with the feat.

>>96089768
if you max dex, sure

>>96089801
It's ridiculous how monks can't use simple short or longswords. I guess all the wuxia guys are just fighters or magus, not actually monks

>>96089801
The monk tag the vast majority of the time is just an arbitrary extra tag on top of the normal weapon budget, is the thing. It doesn't actually cost anything to have it, it's just up to the whims of a designer whether or not a weapon counts as a "monk weapon". The temple sword and longsword are not budgeted meaningfully differently, as just the most obvious, offhand example.

I just don't think needing to buy base access even makes sense as a balance point. This isn't some dealbreaker for the class, I just think it's dumb, just like I think Captain Absalom the Shield-Using Wrestler Robot Monk being the peak of monk optimization is stupid as fuck.

re. monk weaponry, how much damage is Double Slice worth? I'm just comparing something like Double Slice with a temple sword (d8) and hook sword (d6) versus something like just Flurrying to Strike twice with a d8 agile stance (like Tangled Forest Stance) or a d10 non-agile stance (like Dragon stance). I figured google would immediately bring me a redditor who'd done all the math but I think my google fu is failing me right now.

>>96089788
You would just treat it as the character level of someone who would have slots of that level haha.

Some of you guys act like an adjudication that takes like two extra seconds or MAYBE an extra minute to implement on Foundry if you want to go that far is some Herculean task.

>>96089354
I take it on a case-on-case basis. You see something like Alchemist who is free from such barriers but you realize how it makes every build feel homogenous, even when the subclasses asks for a bit of specialization. And something that looks egregious like Champion is likely more to nerf multiclassing (since Champ MC does NOT need more stuff to it...). But on other hands, something like Swash probably just needs its first level feat to actually work and should just have them from the start.

>>96089985
If you google it you can find a pf2e dpr calculator website and plug it in yourself and check.

>>96090560
>since Champ MC does NOT need more stuff to it
It would be so trivial to just not let the multiclass get that stuff, though

>>96090719
Well reminder that Magus and Psychic just straight up have multiple feats that don't do anything clogging up their feat lists post remaster.

Paizo be lazy.

>>96089549
Generally speaking anything that targets "one ranged weapon" also targets "up to 50 pieces of ammunition" which shuriken count as. Look, for instance, at the rules for enhancing ammunition and you'll see that's how it works.

>>96085659
Mindless creatures are extremely vulnerable to stealth and illusions because they cannot seek, RK, disbelieve or use any concentration action outside of their programming/instincts

>>96085576
>>96085659
Most classes don't get legendary in anything but all full casters get legendary. I would not mess with caster math other than being generous with improvised circumstances to saves for elemental environment effects such as smoke, electrifying water etc.
Perhaps item bonuses to spell attacks, but martial ranged is already lagging behind blasters and shadow signet might get way too OP

I think 5-7 is rough for casters because most GMs/APs like to throw +7 monsters at parties at that level, in which the enemies get their +2 save bump if they're 7+
So, as a GM you should be aware of the save bumps if you plan on making boss/elite level enemies. Lowering their AC/Saves to weakened levels isn't a bad idea

>>96089801
>>96089836
You get a ton of advanced weapons and crit spec for the feat line and with the right race you can unlock even more to qualify as monk weapons. Monks can in fact get all the crit specs, which is really good if you're a mook heavy or high level adventure going deep into skill-attacks

Even fighters need a feat for a single advanced weapon to be up to snuff and they only get crit spec for one weapon group.

>>96089913
>grapple and shield

Only if your GM rules about how grapple doesn't occupy a hand, it's plebbit a take on a ruling of grappled targets not occupying a hand
If you're grappling you really don't want a shield, having two free hands is a big deal; since you say want to reposition you need another free-hand to do so

>>96089354
Sub-classes with built in anathemas tend to get feats like that and a lot of barbarian instincts do have anathemas

>>96091711
You know what, fair enough, my mistake, kholo with dragonblooded heritage, scaly hide, and Crunch! would be the true grapple optimizer build, you're right. For a moment I forgot this was PF2e, where your monk's legs stop being able to make attacks if your hands are occupied.

>>96088313
Just found out about monk with shield today. Almost as bad as double shield or some of the retarded weapons like bladed scarf

>>96091779
You can use any part of your body for an unarmed attack, the issue comes from occupied hands

>>96091583
>I think 5-7 is rough for casters because most GMs/APs like to throw +7 monsters at parties at that level, in which the enemies get their +2 save bump if they're 7+
Are you saying that monsters get an extra +2 to saves at level 7 (on top of level?) the same way casters get an extra +2 to save DCs at level 7? I haven't analyzed bestiary data but I'm pretty sure that's not true. The tables in GMG/GMC show pretty smooth scaling for most monster numbers, either +1 or +2 between levels. Saves in particular follow a +1/+1/+2/+1/+2 pattern.

I think the issue with casters at that level range is more that they've spent the last 4-5 level-ups only getting +1 because Paizo's scaling for PCs is weirdly irregular and inconsistent. Casters get +1/level from levels 1-6, whereas martials at least get +2 at level 2ish (from runes) and +3 at level 5. So relative to that smooth monster curve, a level 6 caster is at -2 and level 7 is just catchup.

I half-understand why they did things the way they did, but so much of 2e's scaling and proficiency system bothers me. It's not fundamentally different from a system where, say, martials are given a "base hit stat" of 9, which would mean a 9 or higher on the d20 hits (fighter and gunslinger get 7) and then modifiers are added based on level differential and so on.
(The "level differential modifier" is about 1.5 per level, by the way, although it varies with stat.)

Of course a lot of systems are like this, 5e included (albeit with a MUCH slower curve), but 2e sticks out to me for being particularly uneven about it between classes, especially relative to the deliberation allegedly put into the game. I really have no clue why certain martials randomly get worse AC than others for 2-4 levels of the game aside from them wanting real class features to be at a certain level and backfilling proficiency as needed. Likewise, it seems odd to me that a class like summoner (magus less so due to stat allocation) is, in part, "balanced" by being randomly worse than casters for three 2-level bands (two of which are above level 14). Many campaigns will never see a difference! The relative numeric balance of classes for a oneshot can completely change depending on what level it's set at.

>>96091983
No, not on top of level. When the bump happens depends on if it's the strong or weak save but 6-7 tends to be the range when a bump occurs
I do highly recommend gradual ability score boosts to iron out the math. One of the few variant rules I think should have been default

If you wanted to give casters access to item skill boosts and high proficiency, then you'd have to change save spells to do nothing on successful saves and give martials easy access to self-status bonuses.
My recommend if you don't want to fiddle around with math to make blasters even better is to simply make spell attacks do half damage on a failure since spell casting proficiency is balanced around save DCs and counteracting

>>96091583
Legendary spellcasting scaling is functionally a meme for so much of the game it might as well not even exist for most players, especially the ones slugging it through levels 2-6 where they'll be first dealing with not getting +1 item bonuses, then being behind a whole +2.

I think with the way spells are designed I understand the purpose behind the way the proficiency mismatches and item bonus disparities were set up, kind of, but it pretty much means we will NEVER be free of people discussing it because a lot of people will hit it and go "oh this feels like shit, I don't care how effective it actually is".

>>96092105
Yea, agreed. The decision to change from playtest +1 proficiency jumps to +2 jumps probably really doesn't help matters.

What if cooldowns instead of spell slots

>>96092156
>is functionally a meme
I am currently GM'ing a level 19 nearly 20 campaign, very enjoyable

> especially the ones slugging it through levels 2-6 where they'll be first dealing with not getting +1 item bonuses

At level 3-4 casters are completely mogging ranged martials since they have an extra damage die+rider effects instead of paying action taxes for reloading or dealing with volley

>but it pretty much means we will NEVER be free of people discussing it because a lot of people will hit it and go "oh this feels like shit, I don't care how effective it actually is".

If you play selfishly with status bonuses, then you'd keep up easily with item bonuses on weapons. But this is a team game, it might better to buff the monk instead of trying to win a damage meter

From my experience casters in PF2E at low level are way funner than other F20s as you have access to some really powerful terrain, focus spells, illusion and summon spells that other editions simply don't get and newbies seem to be afraid of.
Magic users at low level are in much better spot than crafting and most rogue type characters who get screwed over by crit fails and action taxes

>>96092196
If only there were spells that recharged after 10 minutes

name some things kitsune would find fundamentally abhorrent. like shit a thaumaturge would use to activate weaknesses. I need ideas and have zero
"uncle ruckus exorcism" comedy is acceptable as this campaign is tremendously unserious, and it is in fact a kitsune exorcism

>>96092105
Proficiency Without Level and even APB might interest you if you want a more gritty and 5e like powercurve. But it sounds like never had to calculate Fractional Base Bonuses

>The relative numeric balance of classes for a oneshot can completely change depending on what level it's set at.

This is true for all F20 games, level change the meta. Classes are better or worse at different levels; some builds come online while others wane as new types of monsters are introduced make other characters fail
PF2E is very gradual compared to say 5E and 3.pf where getting a single feat, level or feature can double your damage output in everything you do

>it seems odd to me that a class like summoner
Summoner is a half-caster technically, only ever gets Master Spellcaster at 17

>1e
Are there any guides for siege weapon builds?
I am interested in the Siege Gunner and the other one but I can't find fucking anything.

What 2 scrolls would you walk into every battle battle holding as a 9th level monk with cleric spell casting.

I have a problem. My DM keeps doing fucking chance time.

>be playing with new dm, started about 3 months ago
>clearly puts a lot of effort into the campaign and even makes little tabletop bonus mini games
>but he has one fucking game that has seriously gone too far
>he does fucking chance time

For example

>4 weeks ago
>everything is going well
>suddenly he pulls out a box with a bunch of question marks glued to it (like the simpsons)
>yells CHANCE TIME
>tells us to reach inside
>pull out a piece of paper that says swap roll of the DM
>no one else knows how to DM
>he ways it's chance time doesn't matter
>I fumble through a side quest while he's happy as can be

Each week he's been doing it. 3 weeks ago he said we have to google translate everything through Spanish, to Japanese, back to English, and that's how we communicate. Two weeks ago, another player pulled a piece of paper that said that all players have to switch character sheets and the dm will be judging how well we play each other's characters. But then

>last week
>all the players clearly don't enjoy chance time
>but nobody says anything because DM runs the game and it's at his house and we all want to still play
>he acts like the fucking mad hatter
>pulls out the box and we all wince
>has a shit eating grin and says pick one
>I pull it for the team
>play the whole session in the dark
>we sit in the dark while dm says "so what did you guys roll?"

I can't keep doing this. I wish I was fucking joking we had such a good campaign but this mother fucker must have started making hats and the mercury has fried his brain because this chance time shit is actually too much.

>>96092549
Please tell me this is a pasta
Lmfao chance time

>>96092574
It's not. And the worst part is he keeps the box in his sight at all times. One of the other players tried to look inside and he freaked out because if anyone knew what other pieces of paper were in there it would spoil the "fun".

I have a suspicion that every piece of paper says the same thing and he just swaps them out weekly.

>>96092312
>I am currently GM'ing a level 19 nearly 20 campaign
Good for you? That doesn't mean those are levels the vast majority of the people will experience.

>this thing that is commonly argued feels like shit is better than this OTHER thing that is commonly argued as feeling like shit
Cool?

>play selfishly with status bonuses
I don't think "you literally don't get to even utilize an entire bonus type" is equivalent to "you get easier access to a pretty common bonus type anyone can make use of", especially in a team-based game like PF2e. I think things should feel good for a new player, and just do not think a lot of caster shit feels good until you've spent months autistically diving into the details of why every part of it is actually very impactful and what the actually good options even are.

I'm not arguing about DPR, I don't care about DPR because as long as the GM makes encounters without hate in his heart, Caster DPR is fine.

>>96092675
I am curious what F20 you think has the best early level caster experience?

>>96092675
>That doesn't mean those are levels the vast majority of the people will experience.

NTA but to this day I still have no idea why this idea has endured so long into 2e's life cycle. That was a 1e thing. 2e APs go to 20. Half the published content goes to 20. In 1e, a lot of the stuff post- like level 14 or so was generally (and rightly) considered mostly flavor that nobody would ever actually see in play. That's not the case with 2e. Level 20 PCs are not at all uncommon. I feel like people are still recovering from a little bit of whiplash there.

That's not to say I agree with all the points that Anon is making (frankly I've been mostly tuned out of your argument), but that particular point you're making is about seven years out of date.

>>96092738
Stories may go to 20 but if you're doing 1-20 stories then many of these campaigns don't actually get there because the groups themselves rarely last an entire campaign going from beginning to end.

>>96092738
seems to me most recent ones are for 1-10 or like 3-13/14
I've played at two tables that did a 10-20 and in both cases the whole group thought the ~17+ experience was pretty stupid, so neither table wants to go that high again

>>96092738
I'm not really making an argument, just trying to inform and help a new player. I come from a world of wizards dying to rats and casters having a few good spell for their entire career with no real cool feats other than metamagic
There's more viable blaster builds than any other edition of an F20 I know as well; whenever I play online one-shots half parties are casters. Casters have it pretty damn good in pf2e lol

So it's very strange seeing someone say they're bad

>>96092727
Low levels in basically every d20 I have touched have been some variation of "this sucks", and it's either "this sucks (funny)" or "this sucks (let's skip it)". PF1e is both.

>>96092738
People actually playing level 19-20 is undoubtedly vastly more common than in 1e, I'll give you that, but "more common than basically never" is still "most people won't", and even if not there's still 18 levels before that point and I cannot find find "get legendary at level 19 so it's fine" an acceptable balance decision.

>>96092765
I feel like if you push to twenty you should have had a lot of time with the characters, otherwise the number of moving parts might be overwhelming

>>96092810
No one seems to give PF2E much credit for making all classes viable, spells balanced for use on players and playable 1-20. Very rare in this space

Not even '4e, the king of balance' was able to do that, where half of the classes are not viable at their roles(don't get me started on 4EE classes) and they all felt the same but somehow were horribly balanced. I don't know a single soul who got to level 30 in 4e

>>96092805
There's some kind of mismatch where you think I called casters bad, when what I was initially trying to get across is that they are designed in such a way that it doesn't matter how effective they actually are, it's inevitable that their current design is going to hit a % of new (or even existing) players and make them pissed off enough to argue about them.

>>96092912
In fairness, you can likely make any 1e class "viable" with enough work, barring the Chained classes or something super FUBAR'd like Medium. And I have said before, balance is just not something most people think about unless they are caught up in thread arguments here. And it isn't like there are some poorly designed or thought-out classes in 2e like Magus, Psychic, or Inventor. They are really more carried by the raw math than their actual mechanics, hence why the Remaster was particularly harsh to them -- powercreep is merciless.

That said, yeah, it is nice to be able to pick up just about any class or party comp and make it through 1-20 without needing to know the entire book front-to-back.

>>96092923
Ah I see, players will argue over everything and it's a sign of caring more than anything else. Players are biased towards their class and really care about facilitating a certain play style, but the ones who decide ultimately the balance & vibe of the table is truly the GM-- hell they can hand out bonus feats

Classes people don't argue about are likely the worst off, because no one cares about them

>>96092943
Remastered Inventor is pretty fun, really a nerdy barbarian and excels if the GM uses the TV crafting rules. If you forget +item bonus to crafting though your life is going to be bad though
Magus can do some crazy burst numbers-- magus still quite popular for gamblers enjoyers
Psychic need a remaster badly because of how their cantrips work, still have one that went from 1-19 in my current game and still carries

Early level Caster ...le bad

>>96093003
Again, they all work. They aren't as conceptually flawed as the worst 1e classes and archetypes, or D&D4e's...everything. It is the fact that their mechanics are pretty flawed, aren't conductive to the fantasy (nerd barbarian doesn't really scream inventor...), or outdone by another class. They can be standout examples of 2e's flaws more than their uniqueness. At least with something like premaster Alchemist, they were trying to do something new...

Keep in mind Magus is my favorite 2e class, I just also know that it could have a WAY smoother experience with a full scale rework akin to likes of Oracle. And as scuffed Paizo's production ideas are, I can be reasonably excited for their new classes like Commander or Necromancer. I just also know there's a bit of damnation by faint praise when we say "everything works like it should" and even then there's some you can make a good enough argument that...it doesn't/

>Parry, https://2e.aonprd.com/Traits.aspx?ID=667
This weapon can be used defensively to block attacks. While wielding this weapon, if your proficiency with it is trained or better, you can spend a single action to position your weapon defensively, gaining a +1 circumstance bonus to AC until the start of your next turn.

I'm changing parry into a basic action. It will do everything the parry weapon trait does. Now weapons that have the parry trait will give +2 when you parry with them.

>>96093084
understandable, have a nice day

>>96093072
>nerd barbarian
>not cinema

Inventor goes hard on mad scientist vibes, because it's a trope everyone is familiar with
I think it's character theme stronger than say artificer, which you need to read an eberron economic book to get and come off as a disgruntled magic item vendor once you do

>>96092423
Stuff like that is what I love about Thaumaturge. First thing I would do is never call it a kitsune, call it a raccoon dog, tanuki, whatever other mythical thing you can think of. That should get at its pride. Leaning into the trickster aspect, maybe expose it to sincere honesty and truth. Like a dramatic confession about how much you appreciate another party member. Foxes in general hate predator piss, from a quick google search, so a jar of piss might be a funny prop. Predator can also mean a lot of things, from a werewolf, to a serial killer, to a sexual predator. Sprinkle the piss of Jared from Subway at it, or like a dolphin.

How is Commander anyway
Also your thoughts on free archetype?

>>96092424
>Proficiency Without Level and even APB might interest you if you want a more gritty and 5e like powercurve.
You're fundamentally misunderstanding me. I don't want a "gritty" curve with lower numbers, I just want a smoother one.

>This is true for all F20 games
It is, but 1) I'd rather it be minimized in general anyways, and 2) in other games (and in other aspects of 2e) it's often intentional, or due to game elements that are harder to fine-tune, or both. I don't expect it to be removed completely for the same reason I don't expect there to be 0 power creep as new options are introduced or for there to be no kind of class imbalance whatsoever.

>Summoner is a half-caster technically, only ever gets Master Spellcaster at 17
Never said otherwise lol. You're not understanding what I'm saying here too.
Do you think there's something special about the specific level bands of 7-8, 15-16, and 19-20 that merits summoner having subpar casting stats? What is the tradeoff? What is the intent behind the design? Sure, it's a martial-caster hybrid. It has substantially fewer spell slots than a normal caster, and its eidolon lacks a major "gimmick" to boost its offenses like rage or edge (or a more defensive gimmick like champion's reaction).
I could understand (although I might disagree) staggering its proficiency increases so that it's proficiency is always one step worse than a normal caster (although this is hard to do when normal casters are trained). But instead it's got identical numbers for 70% of the game.

>>96093084
What does Twin Parry do? +3 AC?

>>96065338
AI-sama, what kind of rig are you running this on?
I have a single 3090 and 128gb of ddr5 ram.

>>96093293
Playtest commander was very good. I wouldn't expect major changes in Battlecry! but we'll have to wait another couple of weeks to find out. Free archetype is also good. Maybe don't do it if your group is brand new to avoid dumping too much on them at once.

>>96093310
>it's often intentional
Should clarify to say by intentional I mean it's part of a more deliberated and longer-term trend. For example, they've explicitly said (can't remember where anymore) that war priest drops off in its weapon proficiency in the second half of the game because the relative power of its slots is higher (even with its lower proficiency) due to higher-rank spells being disproportionately stronger.

>>96084390
If balance demands the effect cannot be landed on the pcs, then maybe you shouldn't make that effect. Counter play is better than forced miss. Incap isn't itself a problem. But it's slapped on as a bandaid instead of using good design standards.

>>96093293
>How is Commander anyway
Don't know, its not out yet and PDF leaks is more likely coming next week. The playtest was pretty good, at least.
>Also your thoughts on free archetype?
It's fun, never run a campaign without it. But also probably best to stick as an optional rule. Things do get weird when you try to assume everything in the game runs on it, especially with Multiclass picks in the area.

>>96093310
>Do you think there's something special about the specific level bands of 7-8, 15-16, and 19-20 that merits summoner having subpar casting stats?
Note that those level ranges usually do have a bump up in enemy stats about that time. It is why Alchemist always had Expert Bombs at 9, and Warpriest gets Expert Attacks at 7, they know some level ranges are critical increases and that being behind (using both level and key ability score, much to my own annoyance) is the same as staggered proficiency.
It's similar to the different degrees of BAB and/or classes that can make an additional strike at Full BAB in 1e.
>its eidolon lacks a major "gimmick" to boost its offenses like rage or edge
Boost Eidolon. That is the damage ramp up mechanic.

Ive only DMed OSR style games, and a bit of 5e d&d.
I am interested in Pathfinder 2e, but I won't lie the amount of rules Im seeing on the AON website kinda makes me feel intimidated. Is there a dumbass-friendly like, checklist of the primary things to learn to get running?

>>96093358
https://2e.aonprd.com/PlayersGuide.aspx
Scroll down to the Gamemastering section.

You can also pick up the Beginner's Box if you really need a out-of-the-box adventure to get running.

>>96093345
>Note that those level ranges usually do have a bump up in enemy stats about that time.
Elaborate on this, because I haven't seen it. Enemy stats grow pretty smoothly, from what I've read and played.
This is also not actually answering my question, because my question has nothing to do with enemy stats. It's about the difference between normal caster proficiency and summoner proficiency.

Also, what do you think merits martials getting armor proficiency boosts at differing levels? Why does barbarian get expert two levels later than fighter and ranger, and why do ranger and barbarian get master two levels later than fighter?

>Boost Eidolon. That is the damage ramp up mechanic.
It is *a* damage ramp up mechanic but it's worse than other ramp ups and has its opportunity costs. Eidolons also have more deficits than just this compared to a normal martial (e.g. locked to weapons balanced roughly as 1-handed, less feat support, can't use most items). This isn't really germane to my point about proficiency scaling, though.

>>96093031
This but unironically.

No amount of "actually early level caster play feels great!" is going to chnage that sadly.

>>96093491
How do we fix low level caster

>>96093512
I personally just give all my caster players an extra slot per spell level and an extra spell learned per level and I've never had any complaints after that. Someone in the last thread said that was too strong (it's really really not but agree to disagree). This is the same fanbase that cheers the Livewire nerf so I'm used to encountering let's say... conservative opinions about game balance that I 100% disagree with and don't apply in my games.

Still if at least one person decides to use my simple fix, I made the world a better place for at least some poor first time caster player out there.

>>96093293
I'm going to go against the grain and say I've become sort of disillusioned with free archetype as of late.
It has the potential to provide a lot bigger of a power boost than some people would have you believe if your players know what to do with it. An argument I see in favor of it is that there are a lot of shitty archetypes that players would never pick if FA didn't exist, but in my experience FA doesn't actually make people pick those archetypes.
The way it provides power also intrudes on character concepts in a way I personally don't like. Whenever I make a character, I usually decide the concept through the class, then have to go desperately searching for an archetype that fits the concept or at least doesn't intrude too heavily upon it. This isn't so bad in the early levels where I only have a single archetype, but then inevitably I find the archetype I've picked has run out of feats, or if not, out of feats worth taking, and it's back to the mines to dig out a second archetype
My last point against it is that it just makes powergaming too free. I'm not against optimizing your character, I make my characters based on concept first and mechanics second but I still try to get as much power as I possibly can out of the concept, I'm willing to ignore a thematic option if it's just too shitty to justify or take a powerful one that doesn't exactly fit the concept as long as it doesn't exactly contradict, but with free archetype it feels like you no longer have to make any hard decisions when optimizing. All the powerful options are right there and you're just free to take them all at once. I'm sure for a lot of people that's a positive, but it rubs me the wrong way
By now I'm super biased against it because for awhile I was playing in a westmarches server that Ignored the three feats requirement for second archetype and all attribute and access requirements, And I saw how instead of promoting diversity it made things homogenized in the name of power

>>96093293
I would rather play with Free Archetype than not, but it's flawed, because the class archetype and archetype system itself feels insanely flawed.

>>96093547
>Whenever I make a character, I usually decide the concept through the class, then have to go desperately searching for an archetype that fits the concept or at least doesn't intrude too heavily upon it.
Even as someone who likes Free Archetype and would never play without it short of introing new players, I can feel this. Archetypes in general are not option-dense enough to actually cover being on a second track in most cases, nor should they need to be-but I also do not think the trade of Class Feats for them ever actually feels like a good one in a staggering majority of cases.

It's enough to make me wish general feats actually covered the ground Free Archetype is attempting to, and we had more general feats to go with that, but I know that's a different kind of design headache I'm not sure is worth diving into.

>>96093622
You're on to something. General feats suck besides a few so maybe just sprinkle free archetype stuff in there to really make it interesting

>>96093634
It's less "put the archetypes in the general feats" and more "most of these archetypes blow ass, just let people take some of the stuff you'd be getting as general feats", but that requires so much redesigning and rebalancing it's functionally impossible to really envision.

I also fucked up and kinda meant "-and give people MORE general feats over their progression to account for this" rather than solely "add more options to general feats", just because only getting 5 general feats over 20 levels would be lame as fuck if they were more than just minor number bandaids.

>>96093330
3070, 32gb ddr4. Needless to say, I don't run ttrpgs locally. The only reason I was able to pull this off is thanks to Google releasing Gemini, model with near-infinite context.

>>96093547
I prefer open Free Archetype just because I feel like some classes almost need it to function properly. That said, I think the best use of it is a closed set of choices within a campaign fitting a theme. Obviously it works out better or worse for some character concepts, but you at least know that going in and have the choice to build with it in mind or not. And I won't lie, it is kind of fun to try and make a shitty archetype work with a class or concept you normally wouldn't choose.

>>96094347
which classes do you feel need FA? because the only one that comes to mind for me is pretty much just champion who autistically wants to have shield up at all times and still be able to strike x3

>>96092135
>If you wanted to give casters access to item skill boosts and high proficiency, then you'd have to change save spells to do nothing on successful saves and give martials easy access to self-status bonuses.
You are just describing everything that pisses off people playing casters in the game. The majority of spells already feel like they don't actually have a success result worth spending the actions and slot while martials are far more self reliant and can give themselves big modifiers from doing basic shit that will usually succeed.

>>96092312
>I am currently GM'ing a level 19 nearly 20 campaign, very enjoyable
Ok and?
>At level 3-4 casters are completely mogging ranged martials since they have an extra damage die+rider effects instead of paying action taxes for reloading or dealing with volley
I dont believe you. Only retards use weapons with reload and use a fucking shortbow if your GM is constantly putting you in cramped conditions. This argument is also slimey as fuck. Casters are stuck in the danger zone with fuck all defense while ranged martials have all the pros of having a martial class skeleton while also being able to shoot 2 to 4 times the distance. And lastly, unless your ranged martial is featless im calling bullshit on casters "mogging" them.
>If you play selfishly with status bonuses, then you'd keep up easily with item bonuses on weapons. But this is a team game, it might better to buff the monk instead of trying to win a damage meter
Ok so thank you for admitting that martials can be completely selfish and be rewarded while casters are stuck as cheerleader because why polish a turd?

>>96093512
This.
>>96085576

>>96092423
A Kitsune pelt (a reference to some earlier threads (you probably won't get it)).

>>96089860
>Mountain Stances in your path
>You beat my initiative and I blow up

>>96094540
>Only retards use 3/4 of ranged weapons

Just wait until you find out how 2h range hand econ works lol
Ranged weapons are garbage at low levels and are extremely feat/class dependant. They do get good though at mid level

>>96093547
I suggest not allowing multiclass dedications for FA if you're worried about power gaming, they tend to be the most powerful

Got a few questions regarding a PF2e Kineticist build I'm workshopping. How good is Armor in Earth for Earth Kineticists out of curiosity for those that have used it? Is it more of a hindrance since it needs to be maintained before the 10 minutes are up? Also doing Earth/Plant for tankiness/healing/utility but was thinking of picking up Investigator dedication as a free archetype but wasn't sure if the attack stratagem would work on elemental blasts since I'm not sure they count as strikes.

>>96094981
>Only retards use 3/4 of ranged weapons
I know your trying to say this as some kind of "own" but this statement is completely correct. The only correct choice for a ranged weapon is a short or long bow and you can blame Paizo for that. But lets just break this down. A caster spamming electric arc does roughly 15 points of damage on average if we assume both monsters fail their save (lol). A well built Precision Ranger with a striking shortbow is doing 11.5 on a single shot without any feats and at double the distance. If i actually give the Ranger feats like hunter's aim, gravity weapon or an animal companion, this shoots even higher so no I'm calling you a liar or your ranged martial player was just bad at the game.

>>96093512
Use a summon. Having another body on the field with actions, skill-attacks and flanking is huge

>>96094981
Bows are also 1h+ so i dont know what the fuck you are talking about with hand economy. You can pull out a potion, drink it then fire in one turn.

>>96095036
>it needs to be maintained
It has a duration of 10 minutes, not "Sustained up to 10 minutes"
>Investigator
Yeah, you can maybe flex the INT but blasts don't count as strikes

>>96095077
Shortbow is a noob trap weapon for precision ranger desu

Newbies are so addicted to strike *3 and don't know how to beef up a single large strike

>>96095135
I was giving the scenario anon gave me the benefit of the doubt because they seem to constantly be implying that their battle maps are small. A longbow makes the calculations better in my favour with my building up a single shot scenario.

Just finished reading book 1 of Mythspeaker
Seems like another dogshit AP for the pile
Why even waste time with a hex crawl that tiny?

>>96093124
Ironically the runes mith seems to the whole I make magic items class while the inventor is I make clock work items

>>96095154
Now compare damage for caster that is built for blasting and has a single action damage focus spells, feats and expensing spell slots

PF2e

What are the best spell attack cantips?

Ranged is always better than melee because of the versatility it enables.

For 1e Favorite Class is probably Cleric, least favorite is Vigilante.
Though for designing archetypes Cleric really sucks. You don't have anything you can really take from it.
Also I recently had ideas or maybe cravings of restless inspiration to do a similar thing for Mirrodin
As Always let me know your thoughts and if you want to see more.

>>96095239
The one that targets the weakest save, hits the most targets or does weakness damage; it's good to switch between cantrips just like spells

>>96095341
Right place; right time is a big deal in PF2E. Getting cover bonuses for yourself also makes you very hard to kill from even reach monster and enables stealth

>>96095125
I see. What other dedications synergize well with Kineticists with decent str/int then? Was looking at stuff like Stone Brawler and Witch as possible alternatives for additional utility.

>>96095187
Which APs aren't dogshit?

>>96095239
the mariachi duck cantrip rework

>>96095543
Whatever AP >>96087355 is talking about

>>96095536
Depends how deep you want to go with the elements and what's your idea for the charatcter. Wrestler/Monk is great with Earth if you want control.

Is Starfinder 2e alive or worth looking at?

>>96095543
early 1e APs up until like Giantslayer

>>96095543
literally not a single one of them

>>96095543
Season of Ghosts is very popular

>>96095200
All you have done is be wrong and then abandon your statements for another with zero concrete points to back it up. Tell me the build so we can compare. I'll bet dollars to donuts that the DPS caster build is some white room meme build where they stand in the centre of the room exactly 30 ft away from all monsters who choose not attack them for the entire combat.
>You brought up reload which only subpar DPS classes use and then abandoned the point because even you know it was a retarded hill to die on.
>You brought up hand economy which doesnt affect bows at all.
>You completely ignore martials having a more versatile action, at least double the range and having better, AC, Saves and HP.
>You try to act like feats are some extra thing for martials that shouldn't count then switch position now saying they count for spellcasters.

>>96095584
I think the big thing is that you can use PF2E and SF2E rules between each other, with modern technology rules you could run a lot of different settings. Might replace GURPs and Cyberpunk for me for near future stuff

>>96095584
Not out yet so we don't know the final state of everything. Check back in like a week when spoilers start dropping, the 31st at most for when it actually is out.

>>96095734
So was Abomination Vaults. And yet...

>>96095741
I agreed with you that most ranged weapons are shit compared to what dedicated blasters and bows get, and you talk to me like this

You get easily confused when someone speaks generally and confabulate; you should get your head checked out

>>96095734
popular among nogame book readers

>>96093512
ban players who don't read from playing them

>>96095911
I accept your terms of surrender.

>>96093512
>more focus spell choices so you can avoid situations where you get a focus spell that isn't useful
>put more wands of generally useful level appropriate spells in the loot earlier in the game
>don't drop PL+3-4 enemies on your level 3 party if they aren't explicitly giga optimizers literally asking for their balls to get busted

Good morning.

>>96092502
Reroll.
How dumb would it be to play a trox Siege Gunner and just have a light cannon strapped to his arm.
Would it at least be fun ?

>>96096188
GMs not balancing encounters and not dropping loot is a very common problem. Some are allergic to reading the gm guide

>more focus spell choices so you can avoid situations where you get a focus spell that isn't useful

This is a legit concern focus spells being too exclusive is a double edge sword and they're often the most important spells you have early.
Animist with Circle of Spirits is so good for this reason

>>96096566
I maintain the position that "Cantrips you can focus spell augment" should not have been exclusive to Psychic

>>96096580
That's their big mechanical gimmick, maybe the dedication will open up that possibility in the remastered version

>>96096531
This is a literal, unironic request for help in building a siege weapons character.
https://aonprd.com/EquipmentWeaponsDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Bombard,%20light
https://aonprd.com/FeatDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Master%20Siege%20Engineer
Is there any way to reload a light bombard faster than three move actions, and is there a way to get it earlier than level ten?

>see that people are getting notices for their battlecry pdfs being available
The full leaks can't come soon enough, there's a lot of shit I have to fucking know about, and trawling AMAs is always a pain in the ass
Then new Thaumaturge implement is Shield, and sounds pretty sick. Gets shit like preventing a shield from becoming useless when it hits broken, a free shield raise when exploiting, adding the bonus to saves, and getting a 15 ft "Shield allies" aura. Meanwhile War Mage is a Wizard class archetype that gets armor proficiency as well as a bonded item shield, which means that it will suck, because class archetypes ALWAYS suck.

>>96096752
Most class archetypes are legit with FA, donno if I'd run certain ones without it though

>>96096752
That sounds like a better Raise Symbol

>>96096916
Knowing Thaumaturge, you're investing your full implement scaling to get all that stuff, so you won't be getting that save bonus and ally protection aura until veeeeery late levels. Pretty cool all the same, though.

currently thinking on joining a 2e campaign and i have a character concept in mind, but im torn on actual class between ruffian rogue and either braggart or wit swashbuckler
basically, a shittalking scumbag thug with a criminal past that's starting to get to the "too old for this shit" point in their life, that actually has the skill to back up their claims

>>96097114
Swash is extremely enjoyable and fun to RP

>>96093358
I used to DM 5E; I find PF2E much easier to GM simply because you have resources, tools and players don't have to constantly ask 'mother may I?'-- since there is already a rule for it such as crafting. Ruling based systems are generally way more stressful for the GM who often just hacks over subsystems from other games; especially for online games and high engagement players that might be messaging you every day

I highly recommend reading GM Core after running some one-shots/beginner box

>>96096745
Battlecry has munitions master class archetype for inventor that seems to be about deploying a siege weapon

>>96097177
>Hurt your teammates in addition to yourself when you fail your class gimmick check

>>96096752
>War mage is a wizard class arch with shield block, martial weapon familiarity (not proficiency), marginally better armour scaling with prof in light and medium (11th level instead of 13th level)
>Forces you to pick school of battle magic.
>No arcane thesis or arcane bond, and no Defensive Robes
>Gives shield block and a special feature called War Magic.
>War Magic: free action - 1/round swap any spell memorized for Sure Strike of the same rank. Refocus by studying war plans instead of your spellbook.
someone fucking forgot they nerfed surestrike, or it was done before the nerf and they forgot to double check

>>96097177
This is for 1e, I'm sorry.

>>96097389
This one unironically pisses me off because not only they pulled another "OOPS WE DON'T PLAY OUR OWN GAME" with them forgetting they nerfed Sure Strike, 5e already has a War Mage Wizard subclass they could have stolen. AC bonus, INT to Inititiative, bonus damage on your spells. It's not hard to make!
Also no Arcane Bond is a dealbreaker.

Current word on guardian is
>Passive, always active 1 + 1/2 level resistance vs physical damage (B/P/S)
>starts expert in armor, master armor at 11, legendary at 15
>taunt has no save, just always applies a -1 circumstance penalty to things that don't target you, and also offguards an enemy if they don't target you
>12 HP/level, still Str KAS, has better accuracy (so standard most likely, good!) but delayed Weapon Specialization (bad!)
>Hampering Sweeps nuked into three feat chain that is allegedly stronger once you have the whole thing
>Intercept no longers adds resistance, but has increased effect range (10 ft default, 15 ft vs taunted), no idea if it's still just damage transfer or if you actually benefit from your own AC in order to potentially downgrade crits
Seems in a way better state now?

BONUS
>Guardian Archetype gives Sentinel style armor scaling and the Taunt
>Archetype version of Intercept has a 10 minute cooldown, lol

>>96097797
Damn, it's an actual TANK now but how much build variety is there?

>>96097830
Without having the books myself, dunno. There's allegedly a lot of athletics based stuff, including an ability to elbow drop a prone target and immobilize them (adding your armor's AC item bonus to the DC to escape)

>>96097389
it's looking bleak wizardbros

>>96094981
>Just wait until you find out how 2h range hand econ works lol
Could you teach me how the "balance check" of Entanglement works while you're at it?

>>96097883
Uneven Ground rules

A lot GMs forget to use those rules for stuff like stairs

>>96098012
that's not how that works. Entangling Flora already has a Reflex check associated anyway, so you would be hardpressed to find a GM that would want to double up on it.
It's an okay spell, it does its job (though I prefer Mist for early game battlefield control), you don't need to make up rules for it to be better.

>>96097855
> including an ability to elbow drop a prone target and immobilize them (adding your armor's AC item bonus to the DC to escape)
Unironically the most badass thing Paizo wrote.

Is there even a spell/feat in 2e that makes uneven ground?

>>96062944
a big yes because it also allows to shove and trip. it is a tremendous help in battle

>>96098150
I don't think so. Most things that would cause such either just make Difficult Terrain or force an Acrobatics/Reflex save anyhow. So it is kind of unnecessary.
Makes sense, spells don't usually cause permanent environmental changes for good reason. It would be like a spell that imposes an environmental hazard, not really efficient and more of a hassle to design and play with.

>>96094277
Interesting, what is the pricing of this? I haven't really followed AI models for about 2 years.

>>96098255
It's free. Get your API and connect it to SillyTavern!
https://aistudio.google.com/app/apikey
https://github.com/SillyTavern/SillyTavern-Launcher

>>96094380
NTA but just because I was thinking about it, I'd put alchemist and rogue as two classes that really, really benefit from FA, for completely opposite reasons.

Alchemist is obvious. The best-supported build for alchemist is bomber, and bomber is incredibly, ridiculously feat-starved. They need to spend every single class feat on bomb-related options in order to keep themselves above water, combat-wise. Without FA, almost every alchemist is going to be a bomber, and almost every bomber's build is going to be identical (if you're not familiar with alchemist, just look at their feat list and pick every feat having something to do with bombs. Ta-da, you've made the optimal build). FA allows them to actually express themselves. Ironically, maybe the best archetype for alchemist in FA is the Demolitionist, purely because it has two alchemist bomb feats on its list, which allows alchemist to offload a little bit of their required feats to their FA slots and actually take some of the fun alchemist options.

Rogue has the opposite problem. Rogue is great, and has great feats. And it happens to have some REALLY great feats at particular levels, to the point where every rogue takes them. What rogue doesn't take Gang Up at 6? Then Opportune Backstab at 8? Then their racket-specific debilitation at 10? Rogue is in a way better place than alchemist is, power-wise, but they're still kind of locked in to similar builds regardless. Instead of being shackled by a low power level and the need to catch up, rogues are shackled by a high-powered feat list that's so good that you don't really have room for dedications.

In both cases, FA lets them breathe a little. That's the biggest win of the variant rule for me.

>>96098113
The uneven ground comes from the traits wood and plant, it's implied that the entire area is being filled with those types of conjured objects/entities; not just a pulse of magical energy
If it did not have those traits, I would agree but traits are sneaky

>>96098150
Slaying enemies and making corpses

>>96098404
>it's implied
Imply this *grabs dick*

>>96098404
So I'm someone that birthed one of 2e's oldest skub points: Produce Flame/Ignition not being able to light a campfire. I believe that a spell is designed very WYSIWYG, expecting more is either GM Fiat or out of the question. So I'm not going easily convinced on such points barring big exceptions.

Sure, it does conjure plants and roots that actively impede people within the area. But I'm very certain that all it can do, especially with it already having its own Reflex check built in. A rank 2 spell that
>auto-inflicts off-guard in the area
>forces anyone struck to make a Balance check or fall prone
>Has no sustained and last 1 minute
>Does all that by a separate rule, that combines with the innate Immobilized chance

Just sounds too good to be true. There's no way Paizo, skittish as they are with spellcasters, made such a blatantly powerful early game option the same level you get Mist, but also made it have some secret game mastery skill check. I love 2e, but that's just stupid.
I don't think it is a bad spell, mind you. Just okay. And sure, more people could use the uneven ground rules, some people actively sabotage 2e's potential simulationism. But don't be surprised other people don't see it your way.

>>96098325
>FA lets them breathe a little. That's the biggest win of the variant rule for me.
Not him but I agree. I'd also add Summoner to that, who has Tandem Movement and Eidolon's Opportunity as feats.

>>96097506
>It has some pretty good feats. The dedication adds 10 feet of forced movement to creatures that fail their saves against AOE damage spells. At 4th level the feat Mage's Field Dressing lets you do battle medicine on an ally you affected with a spell using your previous action from 60 feet away. At 8th level the feat Spellshield gives your arcane bond back and you can choose to give up a spell slot (max rank -1 or lower) and when you use arcane bond to cast a spell it gets heightened to the rank of the slot you have up.
A bit more on War Mage's feats, these are actually pretty decent options. Having Arcane Bond back lightens my opinion on it. And Forced Movement on all damaging AOEs is good CC (though hopefully it says it pushes enemies so that it can knock people off cliffs).
Still, not sure why I pick this over Runelord. Really hoping they have some Day 1 errata for the Sure Strike issue.

>>96098517
There's are lot stuff baked into traits that people overlook, often a big reason new players underrate spells

The DC is up to the GM though, they could just use simple easy DC but it's in line with some of the power level of illusions, control and summons low level casters can do

>Produce Flame/Ignition not being able to light a campfire
That doesn't make much sense why you couldn't

>>96098404
>The uneven ground comes from the traits wood and plant
Oh, so you're making shit up. That's cool.

>>96098613
>There's are lot stuff baked into traits that people overlook
There's a big difference between that and straight up hallucinating shit that isn't there. If it isn't directly and unambiguously stated in either the system rules, the traits, or the feat/action/spell's rules text, it doesn't happen. No ifs, ands, or buts.
>That doesn't make much sense why you couldn't
It doesn't say that it ignites terrain, so why would it be able to?

>>96098404
why tf the spell specifies that it creates difficult terrain? Either it specifies every terrain (difficult, uneven) or it doesn't (and you "imply" like an autistic)

>>96098685
> Effects with the wood trait conjure or manipulate wood. >Those that manipulate wood have no effect in an area without wood. Creatures with this trait consist primarily of wood or have a connection to magical wood.

Since it is not manipulating wood that exists, it is conjuring wood. Therefore the area is filled with wood.

>It doesn't say that it ignites terrain, so why would it be able to?

Absolutely, what do you think Repeat a Spell is for during exploring? Might not happen very quickly though for it to matter in a 25 second combat on a one-minute spell. GM might rule for a counteract check if he's cool

>>96098810
>Therefore the area is filled with wood.
...Yes, this creates difficult terrain, as stated in the spell's description. You don't just get to make shit up and add it on to spells.
>UHM actually fireball should do persistent damage, because it sets things on fire! The fire trait says so!
If a spell doesn't say something directly, it doesn't do it. What part of this is hard to understand?
>What do you think Repeat a Spell is for during exploring?
Having something ready at the start, same as literally every other exploration activity, you schizo. It literally says so in the description.
>Typically, this spell is a cantrip that you want to have in effect in the event a combat breaks out
Read the damn rules before pretending that everyone is somehow missing secret interactions.

>>96098778
>Balance check
>Untrained tangled roots, uneven cobblestones

Strange how balance check explicitly gives the example of tangled roots

>>96098404
No, Jason, you don't get to completely rewrite the effects of spells by going on random tangents about what they "should" do based on your misinterpretation of how traits work. Play the damn game as written or we'll find someone who actually wants to play PF2E to replace you.

>>96098848
>If a spell doesn't say something directly, it doesn't do it. What part of this is hard to understand?

That is not how traits work and these are not 5e spells; there are rules attached to those traits. Traits exist so they don't have to reprint the same rules over and over again.
To note balance check explicitly gives the example of tangled roots as something you'd want to make a balance check for

>Read the damn rules before pretending that everyone is somehow missing secret interactions.

You're dishonest as hell, post the whole activity where explicitly gives an example of making complex decisions and you can get creative with it

>>96099039
>That is not how traits work and these are not 5e spells; there are rules attached to those traits. Traits exist so they don't have to reprint the same rules over and over again.
Yes. We've been over this.
>If it isn't directly and unambiguously stated in either the system rules, the traits, or the feat/action/spell's rules text, it doesn't happen.
The traits for Entangling Flora do not mention uneven terrain.
It does not cause uneven terrain.
If you want to play make believe, go ahead and do so. Just don't pretend you're playing PF2E.

if I had a druid cast entangling flora in a sheer stone cliff in order to make handholds for climbing, I'd allow it, personally
WYSIWYG spellcasting is fucking depressing to be a part of and completely severs the game rules from the world

>>96099059
I think that's good, and would probably do the same myself. But ultimately then it's a discussion of house rules to allow for creative use of spells. The conversation was about caster balance in PF2E, and this schizo always randomly brings up uneven terrain and then bullshits about how random unrelated effects actually cause it... somehow.

Looking it up, there is something that creates both difficult terrain and uneven ground.
https://2e.aonprd.com/Equipment.aspx?ID=1938

So there are things that state explicltly when something creates Uneven Ground.

>>96099059
Sure, you can do that. Hell, it is why I'm not super against the anon saying that is how Entangling Flora works. Your game is your game and some spells even do just say the GM has the final say on how it functions, like Sacred Beasts, Grease, or Pave Ground.
But when we are discussing the viability of spells and game mastery as a whole, especially when we are doing yet another "le casters...bad..." shitstorm, you do need to abide closely (not completely, mind you) to WYSIWYG.

>>96099146
It's the failing of the system for not being explicit about whether or not you can do what the flavor of the ability says. Is the character actually creating fire with all the consequences of that, or some weird abstraction that makes no sense in-universe? If it's the latter, then the properties of the fire need to be defined like they are for Continual Flame.

>>96099159
WYSIWYG autism is a forum problem where players want to talk about a subject without needing a ruling, has plagued TTRPGs for ages

The GM Core explicitly goes into depth about this from Ad Hoc bonuses and Penalties, Yes But(exploding barrels), creative counteract checks (melting magical ice with fire spells) and rewarding hero point for creative solutions. Special Considerations is a very important chapter that I believe even players need to read

>>96099146
The schizo who keeps saying casters are bad?

>>96099480
I wouldn't say it's the system failing since it talks about it as well as the creators; they want you to tell a cool story. Part of the purpose of traits is to allow for cleaner rulings on rule of cool type of stuff, although I think some traits are lacking in detail but you don't need them to tell you fire is hot and wood is hard

But yes, I would allow for a balance check on Entangle to move through the terrain just as if you could leap over it or tumble through a creature. You can Disney Tarzan through it

>>96099762
Which fire spells create smoke? Which create enough smoke to provide concealment? And for how long?
They're important questions that could have been answered.

>>96099608
No Patrick, that's just someone you disagree with that you have decided to call names.

Got a fun situation in my Abomination Vaults game right now. My party is at level 9 really close to beating the AP. Just a few days ago I learned the fighter of my group revealed herself to being a pedophile to her ex(the wizard of the group). And when I mean pedophile I dont mean some lolisho type shit I mean liking children.
So now after she left for that and other drama slop reasons since she's a crazy bitch I need to figure out what to do with this character for the next session, any suggestions?
One was to have Folca worship cannon in my game and do something funny with that

>>96100260
>revealed herself
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYt0WbDjJ4E

>>96100260
Finish up quickly and then start a 1 on 1 group with her

>>96100092
You can use fire spells to set things on fire and it's up to the GM to decide how intense of a hazard it is based on the fuel

https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2768

casters can be as Objectively Fine as they want to be
the issue is that they aren't Fun and don't deliver on the player's desired fantasy in the vast majority of cases, and barring very specific outliers that I am absolutely certain are going to be strawmanned as replies to this, are perfectly reasonable fantasies to expect from a fantasy role-playing game

This appears to be a level 16 feat of the new Guerilla archetype, taking two actions:

>Deathblow [Two Actions], Feat 16
>Your carefully prepared and placed shot brings instant death to your target. Attempt a Strike with a blowgun or sling using ammunition that you have poisoned with your simple injury poison. If the Strike is successful and you are hidden from the target, or unnoticed or undetected by them, the target must succeed at a Fortitude save against your class DC or die; this is a death and incapacitation effect. A creature that survives is temporarily immune to the instant death effect of Deathblow for 1 day.

A level 12 guerilla archetype feat:

>Frightful Attrition, Feat 12
>Your diminishment of your foes’ ranks damages their morale. Whenever you reduce a creature to 0 HP with a Strike or spell, all enemies within 30 feet of the downed creature who witnessed the attack must attempt a Will saving throw against your class DC. A creature that didn’t see you directly (such as if you’re invisible or remained hidden after the attack) takes a –2 circumstance penalty to this save. Regardless of the result, each creature is temporarily immune to your Frightful Attrition for 10 minutes.

>Critical Success The creature is unaffected.
>Success The creature is frightened 1.
>Failure The creature is frightened 2.
>Critical Failure The creature is frightened 3 and fleeing for 1 round.

>>96101110
12's kinda too high for a once-per-encounter global frightened effect.
Guerilla does seem like a hidden sneak attack rogue archetype, which is pretty cool. But these feats aren't all that great looking....

>>96101079
Well it's certainly flavorful. I guess once you get Legendary Sneak (or if you set yourself up with concealment) you can just Hide > Deathblow to force a save or die on a different mook each turn. There are less awkward and more effective ways to clear chaff though, and incapacitation makes it worthless against APL+ enemies. It does enable the very specific build goal of being able to silently one-shot the low-level guards at the perimeter of the bandit camp from range, though, so I guess it's good for something.

>>96101110
I'd call it a better, slightly higher-level Terrifying Howl, which is to say pretty good. Unlike Terrifying Howl, this one doesn't require any investment into charisma or intimidation to be effective, nor does it take an action. It also frightens even on a successful save. It does require that you kill somebody though, so you can't just pop it at the beginning of an encounter like you can with Terrifying Howl. It's not a straight upgrade, but if I were a barbarian I'd trade Terrifying Howl for this any day, and if we follow the "standard" archetype formula of giving out class-specific feats at two levels higher than the normal class gets them, then Terrifying Howl would find itself as a level 12 feat--right where Frightful Attrition is. That's not a bad deal at all.

Not super impressed with the blowgun feat but I guess we'll have to see what the rest of the list looks like.

>>96101110
Why do they have to specify that it needs to be a Strike? This shit drives me up the wall. For some reason they want to favor classes that don't need help, like Rogue.

>>96101400
Spells are also valid. So pretty much the only thing that don't get anything out of this is Kineticist.

>>96101410
No, they're punishing you for using meta strikes. Swashbuckler can't use a finisher for this.

>>96101422
When an activity tells you to make a capital-S Strike, you're literally making a Strike. Finishers count. Things would be pretty weird otherwise; like imagine if Reactive Strike didn't deal Sneak Attack damage, for instance. If the feat requires a specific kind of Strike it'll say so, like in the requirements for the Springboard feat, which require that your previous action was not just to succeed at any old Strike, but specifically with a spinning talon Strike.

It's explained kind of weirdly in the subordinate action rules here: https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=2335

It essentially boils down to: capitalized actions contained within other activities like feats are, for all intents and purposes, exactly the same as those actions. You're just making one of those actions as part of using the feat. Like, if you use Slam Down, you are literally making a Strike, and then (if you hit), literally making a Trip. If you successfully trip them, and meet the requirements, something that triggers off of successful Trips (like The Harder They Fall) would trigger off of it.

This means that Frightful Attrition works with basically everything. Vicious Blow, Hunter's Aim, whatever. Anything that contains a capital-S Strike.

>>96101472
>Whenever you reduce a creature to 0 HP with a Strike or spell
You didn't use a Strike if you used Confident Finisher, which is a separate activity that just happens to involve a Strike as a part of it. So the condition isn't met. That's the whole point of the "Subordinate Actions" rule.

>>96101472
>As another example, if you used an action that specified, “If the next action you use is a Strike,” an activity that includes a Strike wouldn't count, because the next thing you are doing is starting an activity, not using the Strike basic action
Yeah, >>96101606 is right. Finishers aren't Strikes. It's a reasonable failsafe for stacking a bunch of strike modifiers, but does kinda suck.
Granted, I wouldn't really know the synergy between Swashbuckler and Guerilla to begin with...


also who got a new thread ready?

>>96101606
Subordinate action rules are so that you don't use Double Slice or something when an action calls for a Strike. All Strikes are still Strikes regardless of whether they are part of another action or not.

>>96101606
>You didn't use a Strike if you used Confident Finisher

Well, you did both. To break it down:

>You used the Confident Finisher activity.
>As part of the activity, you made a Strike.
>The Strike you made as part of the Confident Finisher activity gained a failure effect.

It's still a Strike. It might be clarifying to see this through the lens of damage runes. For example, look at the text for a Flaming Rune.

>"The weapon deals an additional 1d6 fire damage on a successful Strike, plus 1d10 persistent fire damage on a critical hit."

Flaming Runes trigger off of successful Strikes. Does a Flaming Rune not do damage on a finisher? Does it not do damage on a Reactive Strike, or with Combat Grab? Does Flurry of Blows not benefit from a Flaming Rune? In fact, they all benefit from the rune, because all of those activities contain Strikes.

>>96101633
That is a very fair point.
Again, I wouldn't see much synergy with Guerilla and Swashbuckler or other metastrike heavy deals, but I also realize that the idea that metastrikes aren't Strikes would fly in the face of its own synergies with Deathblow. Rambo not being able to terrify a bunch of people by killing one dude because he didn't do it the "right way" would be pretty fucking off.

i got screwed over by "you didn't technically perform a strike" too many times

you can't just flip the rule around whenever it suits you

>>96101730
Did you ever consider that maybe whoever is screwing you is wrong?

>>96101730
You think you can name one, that might actually help figure out these scenarios. Cause honestly, I haven't really ran into these situations except for Magus, since that's really pendantic on strikes, spells, and spellstrikes.

But I can use a clear example of how subordinate actions do inherit things.
Is Lunging Spellstrike a Spellstrike?
https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=2871
Can you Arcane Cascade after a Lunging Spellstrike?

>>96101743
That gets into the 'your most recent action' clause with subordinate actions debate, which has been ongoing since the start of 2e and has never been answered. It's a different question than the 'is a subordinate strike a strike' one.

>>96101743
I want to use the Transcendence of my Barrow's Edge right after my Spellstrike. My last action was a Strike, because it's part of the Spellstrike. So I heal half of all the damage I dealt, including the damage from the spell, correct?

>>96101757
This is technically the same debate. Frightful Attrition is looking for the last action done, which are Strikes or Spells. And we want to figure if a Finisher is a Strike, assuming it kills.
I think we can agree, regardless of RAW, Lunging Spellstrike not being a Spellstrike would be retarded.
>>96101761
Assuming we aren't going to say "your last action was actually the spell going off" cause that makes Spellstrike itself fucky, sure.
god i see why that one anon wants to redo the entire spellstrike mechanic. how do you make such a simple idea so complex, paizo....

>>96101784
>Frightful Attrition is looking for the last action done
It's not. It's a trigger. Those aren't the same thing.

>>96101807
This argument already pendantic enough, just gonna take the L and say sure.
Even still, I think it would be absurd they would make a feat that triggers off of killing someone not trigger off the feat that instantly kills someone because "Deathblows are not Strikes". In the same archetype.

>>96101784
Ok, that's settled. The game is super permissive when it comes to interactions like that then.

>>96101807
Can you take any other actions between the strike and the effect of frightful attrition? If not, then the strike needs to be the last action done.

>>96101826
>Ok, that's settled. The game is super permissive when it comes to interactions like that then.
In most practical situations, the "Barrow's Transcendence off a Spellstrike" would already be such a feat-heavy investment for rather middling-to-moderate sustain, I would feel like an asshole if I said no, even if it was explicit they don't work together. And that's how most subordinate action issues go, I don't think Paizo is trying to be Konami with Yu-Gi-Oh. I don't think they want weird situations like "Missing the Timing" for most things.

Obviously they don't want a bunch of weird stacks to go off but there's not a lot one can reasonably pull off without running variant rules, and that's already requires a little bit of liberalism in your GM.

>>96101826
Are 'when you strike' and 'your last action was a strike' the same thing? No, they aren't.

>>96101839
>feat-heavy
err, action-heavy. Forgot you already get the Transcendence with the Exemplar MC.
Still not really that optimal a combo and Exemplar MC is still stupid (the other way around, Exemplar with Magus MC is more feat-heavy but worse), but I still wouldn't feel like it is something I would say no, not without explicit clarification that Spelltstrikes aren't Strikes.

>>96101845
Again, pedantic. Really not worth splitting hairs over.

>>96101850
It's literally the difference between how Grab and Improved Grab work. Grab is 'last action,' Improved Grab is trigger. Is it a pedantic distinction when one is clearly considered an 'improved' version of the other?

anyone have their Battlecry PDF yet?

>>96101850
>Again, pedantic. Really not worth splitting hairs over.
NTA but it absolutely is lol. "Your last action" abilities are actions (including triggerless free actions), which means you need to fully resolve any current actions before using them. "When" abilities are entirely passive.

>>96101932
I'd actually note that there's a distinction between "free action with a trigger" and entirely passive abilities. Sneak Attack is entirely passive and affects your own Strikes; a free action with a trigger (e.g. a successful Strike) often has a subordinate action (e.g. a Grapple) and can be disrupted. You also usually can't use more than one triggered free action (or reaction) per trigger per reacting creature; e.g. a gunslinger with a Collar of the Shifting Spider would have to choose between using the collar and using his way's initial deed whenever he rolled initiative, whereas you can stack multiple "on critical hit" effects (e.g. Phantasmal Doorknob, critical specialization, and Crushing rune) because they're entirely passive non-actions.

>>96101932
>>96102249
Also NTA if it wasn't obvious, and your main point about subordinate actions and triggers/passives vs "your last action" is still correct.

>>96100459
Maybe I would if she didn't sound like a fake robot every time I talked to her, she's probably too busy grooming people from what I know

>>96100694
That doesn't work for me brother. I've never read or watched a wizard fuck someone up with force lightning so it doesn't exist. Now get back to doing your actual job of buffing me so i crit every round and have fun.

>>96102321
Its 2025 anon. Is it an actual she or a man wearing a dress?

>commander's animal companion is now perma squadmate and gains reactions on tactics
>also mature at 6 instead of 10
>more caster support with trip+cast cantrip/2a slot spell (and gain slowed 1 only on slotted)
>guardian taunt is no save and auto-offguards if ignored
>more feats that punish ignoring taunt like up to 3 extra dice
>only specialization is delayed, otherwise normal attack progression
bros...im starting to get hopeful for the full classes....

>>96101757
>most recent actin
Don't tell me PF2e imported YGO's "missing the timing".

>>96102491
New thread