Pathfinder General /pfg/
Friendly reminder to tell us what 3pp your game allows if you need character building help.
Blood, sweat, and tiers: do you ban or enforce any tiers at your table?
Unified /pfg/ link repository: pastebin.com
Psionics Augmented: Psychic Warriors playtest: docs.google.com
Bloodforge: Infusions playtest: docs.google.com
Legendary Vigilantes playtest: docs.google.com
DSP's Forrest started a patreon for her own 3pp company: patreon.com
Old thread:
POLL
Does anyone actually play levels 15-20?
repost from last thread
I'm working on a homebrew setting and in it I have all the giants as being explicitly descendants of Titans, much like PF.
The Titans, though, are a bit different and I have them as all more explicitly derived from IRL myth. Olympians are Greco-Roman flavored Titans, Eldthursar (Fire Giant daddies) and Hrimthursar (Frost Giant papas) are Norse, etc.
One thing I'm wondering about, and I figured I'd ask you /pfg/ - what are Cloud and Storm Giants? Like in PF and in DnD 3.5. I suppose. Do you see Storm Giants as Greek or Norse flavored, in terms of their creative origins? Ditto for Cloud. I've always been a bit unsure and can see either going either way.
What do you mean by tiers?
Kinu is cute! CUTE!
Only if the campaign doesn't wrap up/die by that time. It's rare, but it happens.
For the purpose of the poll, yes, we'll play 15-20 if we get the chance.
Are you offering a game where we start at 15?
Please tell me you are!
in case you aren't being facetious.
>enforce tiers
What exactly does that mean?
>user, you're not allowed to play this class, it's low tier
>user, your character is too good, it needs to go back to its tier
While technically it's pretty much exactly what you described, the spirit of enforcing tiers isn't to stop everyone from having fun. Rather, it's an agreement the group has before the game starts to make sure that everyone is playing classes with similar power-levels, so that everyone at least has the same chance at being useful and having fun.
Update on vigilante stuff:
Inquisitive Detective is now a 3rd level archetype instead of 1st.
Also
If Forrest wants to hit me up, I'd be game working with her on something.
Only tiers 2-4 are allowed at my table.
If you want a t1 class, I'll tell you to fuck off.
If you want a t5 or t6 class, I'll try to either work out a homebrew buff to the class with you or convince you to use a fluff-equivalent alternative.
>Inquisitive Detective is now a 3rd level archetype instead of 1st.
Aw shieeeeet son. Shame it's probably getting pushed out to another book, like the dragon stuff.
>If Forrest wants to hit me up
giggity
What threats and inner city adventures might a party encounter in a pseudo-french, specifically Marseille inspired, setting?
It's been shunted over to Intrigue Archetypes along with Trickshot Sniper and Talented Tactician. TT works really well with it though, so it's not a bad combo.
>Blood, sweat, and tiers: do you ban or enforce any tiers at your table?
No. When I'm running a game, if someone wants to play a shitty class I'll let them. Of course, before the campaign I'll tell them why the class they want to play has issues, what those issues are and I'll help them look for a slightly better class to play as that still fits their goals.
But if they're dead-set on playing a low tier class while other players are playing high-tier classes, I'll tell them they're character will feel a bit behind.
I'm not heartless though. I'll try and give them bonuses or such to make up for it, though usually no bonuses are enough to close the gap between a tier 5 and a tier 1.
WINE WARS
A group of druids has recently released the local lord's flock of ortolan, and his is most grievously upset because he has a large banquet coming up in only three days and now he has nothing to serve! The PC's are hired to go beat these druids into the ground for the trespass, as well as hopefully try to recover his escaped foul (which fortunately were blinded and forcefed so they aren't likely to have flown far very far from the druid's abode).
How is a mid-level (5 to 12) wizard supposed to flourish in a Path of War game set all over the Outer Planes, with outsiders as 99% of NPCs?
Outsiders have many resistances, immunities, and mobility options that shut down wizard options. Summons also run into damage reduction problems. Enchantments go up against spell resistance, Will saves, Knowledge (arcana), Sense Motive, and Spellcraft.
Play a buff mage.
Pour everything into buffing your allies and creating things that can't be resisted?
Buff your friends, use divinations, and craft craft craft.
Why not play a cleric or an oracle at that point?
Haste helps initiators less than it does regular martials.
Focus on buffing and battlefield control (especially battlefield control spells that don't deal with SR).
>/pfg/ wanks over how wizards are ultimate tier 1 and unstoppable
>suddenly, wizards are dogshit and just glorified buffbots
Can you cocksuckers make up your mind on whether or not wizards are overpowered?
Name some buffs that are good for initiators, please.
>especially battlefield control spells that don't deal with SR
And these.
Stinking Cloud? Fiends are immune.
Create Pit? Hahaha, flight/teleportation.
>Hey /pfg/ my character is built in a way that isn't working.
>build that class in another way.
All classes are in a way situational. Just because there's a situation where a wizard sucks doesn't mean that it's not overpowered in others.
Not Pathfinder, but I've had a few 3.5 games like that. Honestly the game just falls apart at that point.
Why do wizards suck the moment you throw them into the Outer Planes? Compared to, like, initiators.
Who is this cutie and why is she so angry?
Yeah, you're right. There are no buffs martials would ever want and no battlefield control spells that would be useful against outsiders.
Wizards are the worst class, so why don't you roll up a Warlord and have fun?
>enforce tiers
Trying to bait people who don't know how tiers work?
Because you did an alright job.
Between mist spells, wall spells, celestial summons, enervation, flight and illusions there's almost always an effective option available to you.
Also consider taking spell penetration, dweomer essence and sure spell in order to overcome cpell resistance.
Usually it is theorywanking that blows up the Wizard's capabilities.
In theory they can solve just about any encounter but they don't always have what they need at hand to do so. Not to mention they're really fucked against enemy wizards.
If we're talking level 5-12 wizards, sad part is that good buffs for initiators and BFC that doesn't get eaten by resistance IS pretty rare.
No, only people like you who don't know why DMs try to keep things around a similar local power level.
Because outsiders have a shit ton of arbitrary immunities and resistances to most wizard tactics.
>mist spells
Really hard to use properly, sometimes screws over the party as much.
>wall spells
Outsider resistances, flight, teleportation.
>celestial summons
Celestial template's smite evil doesn't get past DR X/evil.
>enervation
Spell resistance.
>flight and illusions
Only decent things in your list.
>DM's that try to but can't because they don't know how tiers work.
Wizards are also the ones most likely to make knowledge checks so they know what sort of tactics are effective.
Forgot about flight and illusions.
Yeah, in the Outer Planes with an initiator party, those are your best bet. It's not much though, I think.
Wizards are 1000x better against mortal humanoids, right?
Knowing what tactics are effective and having the spells available to use those tactics are different things though.
>Celestial template'
>. A creature with an alignment subtype (chaotic, evil, good, or lawful) can overcome this type of damage reduction with its natural weapons and weapons it wields as if the weapons or natural weapons had an alignment (or alignments) that matched the subtype(s) of the creature.
Initiators can have high Intelligence and Knowledge skills, man.
>implying every DM is ignorant and can't be arsed to sit down and read something on the internet
Oh! Glitterdust. Glitterdust will still work against outsiders... but I guess they can still sling SLAs against you. So it's not as good.
Celestial template doesn't give any subtype.
>waa I can't come up with ways to have use my >spells overcome everything ever.
Won't initiators get screwed over by those resists and immunities just as much?
Not really, since they can always default to good old-fashioned weapon hitting enemy tactics. As is the case for 99.99% of the bestiary.
But if they're fucked by enemy wizards, then that means enemy wizards are in turn fucked by them!
Most don't get knowledge skills as class skills and since they have to spread them out over physical stats they won't be as high as a wizards check.
Most things are super effective against mortal humanoids since the game partially exists to interfere with PC's, which are mortal humanoids.
Fucking TRIP is valuable vs mortal humanoids.
They won't unless the "initiator" is a multi class caster/Initiator using ray attacks or relies entirely on E.Flux.
Most initiators can just fucking IGNORE DR anything for one attack by level 3 if they pick the right maneuver.
>damage reduction X/good
>Most don't get knowledge skills as class skills and since they have to spread them out over physical stats they won't be as high as a wizards check.
If you're in a planar campaign, all you have to do is take this.
d20pfsrd.com
Boom, now all those INTnitiators have great planar knowledge.
Yeah, but enemy wizards have the benefit of the being made by the GM.
I've never made enemy wizards specifically to fuck over the party. That might just be me not making them right, though.
Well actually, that's a lie, I made one specifically to cast Feeblemind on the That Guy of the game.
SeeSeriously, "You ignore all damage reduction" is a 2nd level maneuver for most initiators.
>Garnet Lance
>Bronze Knuckle
>Devastating Rush
>Eldrich Fang
>Temporal Burn
>Word of Retribution(Counter)
>Steel Shattering Fists
All of these are Level 2. All ignore Damage Reduction.
Mist spells aren't that difficult to use effectively at all. Barrow haze plus flight makes you practically immune to anything without blindsense. Fog spells are almost always fantastic at protecting your close range martials from casters or archers, especially if you plan ahead and give them ways to see through the fog as well.
>Outsider resistances, flight, teleportation.
If outsiders have to spend their time flying over and teleporting through walls, they've generally been effective. Not to mention that wall of force are invisible which means getting past them is even harder for outsiders that can't teleport. They may not be effective against everything, but they can still be very useful.
>Celestial template's smite evil doesn't get past DR X/evil.
No, but the two will mostly cancel each other out at around levels 5-12 and you can also summon actual good outsiders that can get past it. Either way a celestial dire tiger pounce/rake/grappling people will be a significant threat in most situations.
Spell resistance is certainly a nuisance to Wizards but they can still be effective in combat, and direct combat was never the reason why wizards are considered so strong. Wizards still have the most options to bypass threats with teleportation, invisibility, isolating an individual and dominating them (regardless of their spell resistance, there are ways to overcome it) and still potentially carry their weight in encounters that have a lot of defenses against them.
It's not like everyone who plays a wizard will be able to use them 100% effectively, or even that a player with a lot of system knowledge won't ever find themselves in situations where their spells aren't much use, but overall, wizards have sufficient ways to deal with most outsiders.
Reduction =/= Immunity. Plus DR caps out at around 25, which is nothing for an Initiator.
I've had GMs throw enemy wizard at us who did nothing but counterspell/dispel the party casters. Annoying motherfuckers were invisible/levitating/etc.
d20pfsrd.com
This is a typical devil you might be likely to randomly encounter in Hell or in neighboring planes.
What will a level 9 wizard do in a random encounter against a trio of erinyes?
The erinyes have decent saving throws, flight, Greater Teleport, SLAs that blindness will not stop, DR 5/good, and permanent True Seeing.
They have a low Will, so maybe the wizard can try to get lucky on spell penetration?
A level 9 initiator enters Stance of the Crane Knight and rips the erinyes apart.
I just buff martials and only martials, and only IF they already know martials are shit.
I like to reward people who likes their concept so much they are willing to go through hell for it.
>Barrow haze
Starting off the fight doing nothing but putting up a defensive spell, I see.
>Fog spells are almost always fantastic at protecting your close range martials from casters or archers
Not if they want to get in and start fighting.
>If outsiders have to spend their time flying over and teleporting through walls, they've generally been effective.
Flight is a move action. Greater Teleport is a standard action for them, and now they're right next to the wizard. Whoops. Looks like that spell slot wasn't too good a use.
>No, but the two will mostly cancel each other out at around levels 5-12 and you can also summon actual good outsiders that can get past it.
The actual celestials you can summon are dogshit.
>celestial dire tiger pounce/rake/grappling people will be a significant threat in most situations.
Not if they get shit all over by DR.
>teleportation
You're gonna need Plane Shift in the planes.
>invisibility
See Invisibility and True Seeing on outsiders everywhere.
>isolating an individual and dominating them
Good luck against an outsider.
Isn't the check to overcome SR your caster level?
Any level 9 Wizard has a 50% chance to overcome that.
Also why the fuck would a PoW character be fighting Core enemies without their own maneuvers? People don't actually do this do they?
>Any level 9 Wizard has a 50% chance to overcome that.
And then there's the Will save. While it's low, that's still two rolls that need to go your way.
>Also why the fuck would a PoW character be fighting Core enemies without their own maneuvers?
Reading comprehension. You're shit at it.
If these are PoW enemies, then they just counter off a Will save that the Wizard forces on them.
Plus you need to have a measuring stick that's equal for both sides. If I say my dick is 5 inches, it's not very helpful if I'm using a ruler that's doubled in size compared to everyone else's.
I've only ever /strongly/ expressed my distaste at people playing tier 5 things without a strong cause, especially if they're new, and outright say tier 6 characters are the player is joking and will ban them if I'm gming, but other than that I really don't care. IMO People who wouldn't ban tier 6 characters haven't really considered the fact that tier 6 is commoner, or just don't play with people who would consider that as an option. I unfortunately do.
I'm not gonna ban tier 5 ever or even act passive aggressive, I just think people can do better concept wise with a less shit base.
>And then there's the Will save. While it's low, that's still two rolls that need to go your way.
Oh I forgot, Wizards aren't meant to have a chance at failing anything they try to do.
>Reading comprehension. You're shit at it.
He said, assuming I'm talking about the initiator not having maneuvers and not the erinyes.
>Wizards aren't meant to have a chance at failing anything they try to do.
In a fight, the initiator has a ridiculously better chance of BTFOing the 3 erinyes than the wizard ever will.
>A level 9 initiator enters Stance of the Crane Knight and rips the erinyes apart.
> Online game
> Session 0
> Everything look good so far
> 5k gp limit
> A player came in saying that while he's looking through ioun stone/wayfinder options, he totally roll a 1/100,000,000 chance and get cracked ioun stone with +2 STR,DEX,CON. With no proof at all.
> GM gives an okay because "he's not worry about stat"
Is this a red flag? Should I pull out?
PoW isn't equal for both sides, unless both sides have it.
It's an npc class, why would they consider it? Literally no PC class is a tier 6. Even the weakest of tier 5.
Sounds like you're being petty to me.
that's exactly my point.
>no proof at all
>GM just accepts it
Are they friends before the game?
If not, that's a super red flag, GTFO.
So they shouldn't have counters when PC's do?
Allowing them to basically trivialize the encounter?
They can't really do anything through barrow haze and with nothing more than sure spell or dweomer essence and the spell penetration feat a wizard has an 85% chance of penetrating their SR and probably like a 70% chance of affecting each of them with stuff like confusion, suggestion. Then it's just a matter of using summons to finish things if necessary.
Also true seeing has a range, a range that a wizard with greater invisibility can stay out of i he's clever enough.
And if the wizard doesn't have the proper spells, he can just teleport away, they won't know were to follow him. A martial who gets ambushed will be forced to fight and if there's one other outsider with a nasty save or lose instead of another Fury, the odds could be stacked against them. Wizards also have access to better ways to scout out where these things are, see them coming and hide from them.
Wizards aren't designed to bash their stats against something else. It has its weaknesses, but their versatility is almost always worth it overall.
A wizard in the planes should be investing in Spell Pentration and Greater Spell Penetration (+4 on caster level checks). You can push that higher with gear like ioun stones and such. That 50% chance of failure should be around 25% or lower.
Yes, it sucks when enemies have a 1 in 4 chance of ignoring your spell, but it's hardly crippling. Just focus on large AoE's and battlefield control spells - even if your spell fails against one or two you'll still land it on the rest.
sorry, what?
>Online game
Red Flag!
>Session 0
Zero? Red flag!
>5k gp limit
I dunno what level you guys are so that's just a yellow flag.
>A player came in saying that while he's looking through ioun stone/wayfinder options, he totally roll a 1/100,000,000 chance and get cracked ioun stone with +2 STR,DEX,CON. With no proof at all.
Red Flag!
>GM gives an okay because "he's not worry about stat"
Red Flag!
Save yourself user and GTFO of that campaign.
I'm taking both of those, any elaboration on WINE WARS?
Do you even know what make TRPG different than children make believe game?
Online games are more of a yellow flag with a skull on it. Exercise caution. You can meet some pretty cool dudes online, but at the same time you can catch some major bullshevik.
Rival architects are both constructing elaborate churches (or other theaters or other buildings) right across from one another. The two hate each other with a passion and fights between their workers break out regularly. This is currently all the rage and large crowds will gather and wait for fights to break out and then bet on who will win. Unfortunately this has only caused the fights to get more and more violent - one worker lost three fingers and another was clubbed he head and is critical condition.
The players can intervene in any number of ways.
Perhaps one of the architects approaches the players asking them to "take out" his rival. Or maybe the building is on top of an small dungeon and he needs help clearing it out (plus the players may have to deal with an attack by hirelings from the rival architect). Maybe one of the architects needs some rare magical device (perhaps an enchanted archstone) and he requires the PCs to get it. Or maybe a noble lord, sick of this chaos asks the PCs to try and mediate a peace between the two groups.
Not being petty? You might get something awesome too, but you're already trying to bail on a campaign you basically haven't even played yet.
>They can't really do anything through barrow haze
>Fear SLA
Try again.
If it wanders within 5 feet through the cloud, otherwise it doesn't know where to target. That's more protection than most classes have. It's not like there aren't CR ~10ish encounters that PoW martials wouldn't have low odds of being able to solo. I'm really not sure what you're trying to prove at this point.
Bluntly cheating in a multiplayer game is petty.
Anyone can come out and say "Hey, I made an even better roll in secret too! Totally real dude!". But a responsible adult wouldn't do that. When you're dealing with other human, mutual respect and fairness is a must.
Spells need line of effect, not line of sight.
>It's not like there aren't CR ~10ish encounters that PoW martials wouldn't have low odds of being able to solo.
Oh, they can take those fights alright.
Ever made a destruction zealot?
Why did Pathfinder change claw damage to BLUDGEONING and slashing, when it was piercing and slashing in 3.5?
What, are claws ideal for ripping skeletons apart while a greataxe has to eat the DR?
Oh wait.. I just check his sheet again. He's cheating for sure. His magic item equipment already over 5000gp limit ( +1 Adaptive Longbow 3400gp, +1 Leather Armor 1160gp, Wayfinder 500gp, Cracked Ioun Stone 500gp)
And he has shit tons of mundane gear on top of that.
Guess I'm out.
>SKELLY, YOU ARE HUGE!
>THAT MEANS YOU HAVE HUGE BONES!
>RIP AND TEAR!
You still need to know the square if it's not an AOE spell, which their version of fear isn't.
I've spent quite a bit of time making some warlords whiles using the veiled moon discipline to teleport around and wreak havoc. I appreciate the power that well optimized PoW classes can have in encounters and they can certainly contribute more than wizards in encounters, especially against lots of monsters with lots of resistances. Like wizards though, no one class can be ready for everything at once. 3 greater shadows would be menacing to most initiators who don't have the veiled moon's ghost touch maneuvers.
What is the best cantrip?
>You still need to know the square if it's not an AOE spell, which their version of fear isn't.
Nope, all you need is line of effect.
Ghost Sound
Prestidigitation.
Prestidigitation, so that your kitsune can go around with a fresh, clean, silky, fluffy tail, not a dirty, matted, sweaty, stinky tail!
Using the total concealment rules, "If you have line of effect to a target but not line of sight, he is considered to have total concealment from you. You can't attack an opponent that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies."
A spell isn't an attack so things are a little bit odd by RAW but I'm sure 99% of DMs will keep you from using a spell that you don't have line of sight to without knowing pretty accurately where they are. It's not like you can cast hold person on an invisibile ninja that you know is within range.
Please just leave, Augunas.
Summon several Aerial Ankylosaurus and stay in my Emergency Force Sphere?