|
Clerical Terrors posted:I've had this discussion twice now and the general rule of thumb we settled on was that only classes and archetypes give you unambiguous access to a tradition's spell list by giving you the "X Spellcasting" ability. Everything else is a bit nebulous but same as innate cantrips don't automatically give you access to a spell list Minor Magic wouldn't either. I'm pretty sure Minor Magic is innate, anyways, since you don't get a spell repertoire nor are they prepared.
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 01:09
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 04:10 |
|
|
Impermanent posted:the whole "this damage type gets hosed over completely in this encounter" stuff is probably one of the grosser old dnd warts pathfinder 2e has inherited. I'm debating just houseruling any and all immunities except for very specific circumstances, or just offering players an "immunity override" feat for any damage type they care about. This was a conversation a couple pages ago but yeah I pretty much agree. I feel like damage immunities in general basically shouldn't exist outside of something very thematic and appropriate to an enemy (fire elemental gets hit with a fire spell), or there are ways around it. Case in point, we encountered some crossbow turrets that had physical damage immunity or an extraordinarily high DR. I know this because I crit the poo poo out of one and did nothing to it. I was still useful as a fighter because they were connected to a power source and succeeding at crafting checks allowed me to power them down. Immunity to precision damage feels like a completely unnecessary and pointed drawback against Rogues in particular, who I don't think are exactly damage kings and queens.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 05:18
|
|
|
Yeah I've got a Rogue in AV right now. Last few fights in a row have been blobs and poo poo with both immune to flanking and immune to precision. Every other fight I hit for like 30ish damage or so then enemy takes like 12 damage and it's a guessing game of what it's immune to. Best case I do 4d6 damage vs the other martial in the party that does...2d12, but my damage is just randomly cut in half. Why I've got that Kineticist backup lined up even though Rogue is pretty fun.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 09:15
|
|
|
Remastered Witch preview: https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6sif5?Witch-Witch-You-re-a-Remastered-Witch Seems neat (not that I have internalized witches very well) with buffs to familiars and hexes. [Edit] Also War of Immortals wrap-up yesterday: https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6sif3?War-of-Immortals-Playtest-Wrapup-Blog
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 18:42
|
|
|
appropriatemetaphor posted:Yeah I've got a Rogue in AV right now. Last few fights in a row have been blobs and poo poo with both immune to flanking and immune to precision. Every other fight I hit for like 30ish damage or so then enemy takes like 12 damage and it's a guessing game of what it's immune to. If you're on Foundry you should ask about the precision immunity module, since the main obstacle for a GM if they're decent is editing enemy stats rather than not wanting to let the players use their abilities. when I had someone ask to play a rogue in AV i just grabbed that
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 19:00
|
|
|
1ed pathfinder let PCs apply precision damage to ghosts if they had a ghost touched weapon. I keep going back and forth on whether I should incorporate that as a houserule for my AV campaign.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 19:07
|
|
|
KPC_Mammon posted:1ed pathfinder let PCs apply precision damage to ghosts if they had a ghost touched weapon. I keep going back and forth on whether I should incorporate that as a houserule for my AV campaign. My personal opinion; I get that precision damage is supposed to be something like managing to stab something vital like a kidney and that's where the logic of stuff without vital organs being immune comes from, but I don't see why a construct couldn't have a fantasy-hydraulic hose or something to stab extra good and precisely, or you stab a slime and manage to scoop out a bit of its mass for precision damage to apply.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 19:32
|
|
|
the_steve posted:My personal opinion; I get that precision damage is supposed to be something like managing to stab something vital like a kidney and that's where the logic of stuff without vital organs being immune comes from, but I don't see why a construct couldn't have a fantasy-hydraulic hose or something to stab extra good and precisely, or you stab a slime and manage to scoop out a bit of its mass for precision damage to apply. Yeah, IME it feels like an immunity that's in place for flavor reasons but has pretty negative gameplay effects for some classes. I'd honestly kind of prefer it if they revamped a lot of creatures to undo precision immunity, or have it be removeable by achieving some other effect first.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 19:54
|
|
|
Arrrthritis posted:Yeah, IME it feels like an immunity that's in place for flavor reasons but has pretty negative gameplay effects for some classes. I remember corporeal undead were also immune to sneak attacks in 3.x D&D. Which is dumb as hell when that list includes vampires and zombies. Edit: Even if a stone golem is carved from solid stone surely it could have hairline cracks or imperfections where it is weaker. KPC_Mammon fucked around with this message at 20:12 on Oct 13, 2023 |
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 20:10
|
|
|
To me precision damage is bonus damage you get for being a know-it-all. A rogue isn't as deep in fighting as a fighter man, but they are wide as the ocean. In a fair honourable stand-up fight hes flat-out not as good as a fighter, and he's not supposed to be. His whole thing is sneaky tricks. Ways to get an edge. He can dismantle a trap instead of bashing it. He can dismantle a man instead of bashing it. Sneaky tricks are inherently unreliable, that's why they are tricks and not standard practice. Why can't a fighter, who has gone all in studying the blade, find the kidneys and get precision damage? It's not standard practice, and presumably what he learned instead is more reliable. That's just flavor. In terms of game design it would matter if the rogue is balanced around always having precisions damage or only sometimes having precision damage. I don't think there is any way to know that?
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 20:37
|
|
|
KPC_Mammon posted:Edit: Even if a stone golem is carved from solid stone surely it could have hairline cracks or imperfections where it is weaker. It's been mentioned in this thread already, but Golems aren't immune to Precision damage by default. They're resistant to Physical damage, which Precision usually is, but it's actually really useful against them as it is generally tied to spikes in damage which are better against Resistance than smaller consistent attacks.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 20:53
|
|
|
KPC_Mammon posted:I remember corporeal undead were also immune to sneak attacks in 3.x D&D. Which is dumb as hell when that list includes vampires and zombies. I dunno, this makes some sense if you consider a "sneak attack" to be closing on an unaware enemy and then doing a surgical strike to their staying-alive bits. The undead, meanwhile, don't have pesky things like "useful internal organs." It's like doing critical damage to Spam.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 21:49
|
|
|
Mirage posted:I dunno, this makes some sense if you consider a "sneak attack" to be closing on an unaware enemy and then doing a surgical strike to their staying-alive bits. The undead, meanwhile, don't have pesky things like "useful internal organs." It's like doing critical damage to Spam. Like pop culture explicitly has Zombies and Vampires as the two things that do absolutely have a 'hit them in this specific spot' though. Destroy the brain/stake em in the heart.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 21:55
|
|
|
Yeah, I can understand why an animated skeleton doesn't have traditional weak points, but lol at the idea that other undead don't.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 22:01
|
|
|
I don't think Pathfinder Vampires are equally inconvienced by having a dagger stuck in their eye as they would be if that strike hit them in the toe instead. It makes sense for things like an ooze which are LITERALLY undifferentiated masses of goo, but even if undead don't need hearts anymore or whatever they're still complex beings with parts with varying degrees of function and importance. Even if you don't want to take the "precision damage is an abstraction of locational damage" approach, it's harder to put a knife through a zombie's knee than through parts of its neck because it still has bones.
|
|
#
?
Oct 13, 2023 22:02
|
|
|
Facebook Aunt posted:To me precision damage is bonus damage you get for being a know-it-all. A rogue isn't as deep in fighting as a fighter man, but they are wide as the ocean. In a fair honourable stand-up fight hes flat-out not as good as a fighter, and he's not supposed to be. His whole thing is sneaky tricks. Ways to get an edge. He can dismantle a trap instead of bashing it. He can dismantle a man instead of bashing it. I just don't think a class should "lose" one of its core talents in a fight without there being a really good reason for it/some way to overcome it, something like a BBEG with some sort of bullshit plot shield you have to negate. I mean, what other class can just have a core part of their class identity negated somehow? Casters in an anti-magic zone of some sort? But that goes back to "there's a way to deal with that" or otherwise has some inherent limitation.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 00:19
|
|
|
This is where gm/player creativity comes into play. Pickup a shovel and scoop that ooze with some kind of disadvantage relative to your regular gear at full power, but you get your precision dice.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 00:29
|
|
|
the_steve posted:I just don't think a class should "lose" one of its core talents in a fight without there being a really good reason for it/some way to overcome it, something like a BBEG with some sort of bullshit plot shield you have to negate. it happens constantly to all classes that things are negated and they can't impact things. it's a pretty fundamental part of the game that not everyone can do everything and their stuff doesn't always work.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 00:39
|
|
|
guarantee you that the bigger concern for how sneak attack worked in 3.0 was a revision on how backstab worked in 2e, which was even more restrictive. the target had to have an anatomical spine, and you needed to use a dagger-shaped object, because it is a BACK STAB not anything else. the logic of "undead don't have functioning organs" is a backfill from an adjustment on the existing mechanical logic
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 00:41
|
|
|
sugar free jazz posted:it happens constantly to all classes that things are negated and they can't impact things. it's a pretty fundamental part of the game that not everyone can do everything and their stuff doesn't always work. Nah, it's not "constantly" to any class, and it definitely affects some classes a lot more frequently than others.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 01:07
|
|
|
sugar free jazz posted:it happens constantly to all classes that things are negated and they can't impact things. it's a pretty fundamental part of the game that not everyone can do everything and their stuff doesn't always work. No it doesn't, for most classes it is actually pretty rare that the biggest part of your kit is negated
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 01:27
|
|
|
Piell posted:No it doesn't, for most classes it is actually pretty rare that the biggest part of your kit is negated I love rogues, but I don't consider combat the biggest part of their kit, much less precision damage. Their gold star feature is flexibility. A rogue can be trained in almost every skill at level 1. In some versions they were the only class that could reliably detect and disarm traps. It is a utility class. I suppose it matters more for swashbucklers and precision rangers. Those guys live to hit things. If they changed the rules so nothing was immune to precision damage how would they balance that? Probably by reducing the damage die.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 03:25
|
|
|
I don't think they'd need to change anything if sneak attack was made to be just regular damage, rogues/rangers/swashbucklers aren't OP against enemies without precision immunity/resistance
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 04:12
|
|
|
Facebook Aunt posted:I love rogues, but I don't consider combat the biggest part of their kit, much less precision damage. Their gold star feature is flexibility. A rogue can be trained in almost every skill at level 1. In some versions they were the only class that could reliably detect and disarm traps. It is a utility class. That would need no additional balancing because neither precision rangers nor swashbucklers are in any way exceptionally strong classes without that. Hell, swashbucklers are undertuned even when their poo poo works properly.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 13:48
|
|
|
Precision Rangers seem pretty powerful at potential burst damage. But they're kind of there to do damage. Hunt Prey+ Gravity weapon + Hunted Shot with Hunters Edge active on the first hit can be extreme damage if it all connects. But again, that's kind of their hat. When they get a crit it's a dark day for the victim. Nelson Mandingo fucked around with this message at 15:55 on Oct 14, 2023 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 15:50
|
|
|
My swashbuckler thief ranger is gonna do so much work
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 17:02
|
|
|
Piell posted:No it doesn't, for most classes it is actually pretty rare that the biggest part of your kit is negated sneak attack is not the biggest part of the rogue kit, rogues are a utility class. they get a skill increase every level and 7+int skills at 1. sneak attack is a completely fine part of the rogue kit but is far from the biggest part. rogues are a great class and aren't meant to be the big damage dealer. sometimes sneak attack doesn't work, rogues have plenty of other things to do, or at least they should. they excel in other parts of the game where fighters etc who outpace them in damage mostly just sit there because their hitting things specialty isn't really gonna work. those areas of the game are where other classes and their specialty are constantly negated.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 17:45
|
|
|
sugar free jazz posted:sneak attack is not the biggest part of the rogue kit, rogues are a utility class. they get a skill increase every level and 7+int skills at 1. sneak attack is a completely fine part of the rogue kit but is far from the biggest part. "It's ok to be bad in combat if you're really good outside of it" is a bad idea. Letting rogues sneak attack anything causes zero problems, so why not? Removing precision-damage immunity isn't going to break anything and is going to make precision damage classes OP, it'll just remove a section of combat where precision damage users are sad, they can still do all their other things. Fighters will still be better at combat than rogues even if precision immunity is gone Edit: Like, the kineticist is built to avoid this exact problem, the fire kineticist specifically. Instead of having to fall back on other actions, the kineticist gets Extract Elements automatically and can pick up Versatile Blast to still be able to perform well against enemies who would normally shut down their main combat actions. Piell fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Oct 14, 2023 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:01
|
|
|
Not getting precision damage doesn't make you bad in combat tho. It makes you normal in combat. Your rapier is still doing the full 1d6+, the same as if it does for every other character.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:26
|
|
|
I haven't played a rogue / swashbuckler / precision ranger — is losing precision damage significantly worse than the enemy just having resistance to the attack? I feel like enemies having different defenses / resistances / immunities is pretty much fine in my experience. It just forces you to change up your playstyle a bit. But characters in PF2e tend to be absurdly versatile, so that's usually not a problem. The only time it seems like it would be an actual issue is if your character has hyper specialized, or if you are playing a campaign where a significant portion of the enemies have a relevant resistance or immunity, in which case yeah, you should chat with your GM and either homebrew something or come up with a different character.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:34
|
|
|
Facebook Aunt posted:Not getting precision damage doesn't make you bad in combat tho. It makes you normal in combat. Your rapier is still doing the full 1d6+, the same as if it does for every other character. Every other other martial-related class has methods to boost their damage, whether that's the fighters accuracy bump, barbarian's rage, flurry ranger's decreased penalty, etc. Precision damage is pretty much the worst of them in terms of reliability because a very large amount of creatures are immune or resistant and literally nothing is weak to precision damage. (Well, poison is worse, but there's only the one alchemist subclass that specializes in poison)
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:37
|
|
|
Piell posted:"It's ok to be bad in combat if you're really good outside of it" is a bad idea. Letting rogues sneak attack anything causes zero problems, so why not? Removing precision-damage immunity isn't going to break anything and is going to make precision damage classes OP, it'll just remove a section of combat where precision damage users are sad, they can still do all their other things. Fighters will still be better at combat than rogues even if precision immunity is gone rogues are not bad in combat. sneak attack situationally does not work and then they can use other tools as well as their normal attacks. kineticists are a different class with a different purpose than rogues. it is cool and good for different classes with different roles getting different chances to shine during play. not everything needs to or should be good at everything all the time. if someone chooses to play a rogue to be a big damage dealer in combat all the time they are choosing the wrong class. pick something else, that thing exists
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:43
|
|
|
VikingofRock posted:I haven't played a rogue / swashbuckler / precision ranger — is losing precision damage significantly worse than the enemy just having resistance to the attack? I feel like enemies having different defenses / resistances / immunities is pretty much fine in my experience. It just forces you to change up your playstyle a bit. But characters in PF2e tend to be absurdly versatile, so that's usually not a problem. There are basically three issues 1) Resistance/immunity to precision is stacking on top of weapon immunity, so precision classes also have to deal with the regular "x types of weapon don't work well against this enemy" on top of the precision immunity stuff 2) Immunity to precision is vastly more common than immunity to damage types. For B/P/S damage, generally enemies are just resistant. For precision damage, immunity is far more common. 3) Nothing is weak to precision damage. Fire, for example, has a similar level of creatures with immunity as precision damage does. But fire is also the most common elemental weakness, meaning that while there are a number of fights where you're out of luck there are also plenty of fights where you do outstandingly. At best, a precision-based class does the normal amount.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:46
|
|
|
One thing to consider is that precision-based classes aren't reliant on an off-hand, and are also all Dex classes. So they have the inherent flexibility of range built in, as well as a free hand to use them with. A two-hand fighter can't just casually pull out a bow or other ranged weapon, and using items are a challenge for them because it takes another action. Also, y'know, Dex and Ref are linked.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 18:57
|
|
|
Facebook Aunt posted:Not getting precision damage doesn't make you bad in combat tho. It makes you normal in combat. Your rapier is still doing the full 1d6+, the same as if it does for every other character. Rogues without Sneak attack are in fact bad in combat, as are swashbucklers and precision rangers without precision damage. Cyouni posted:One thing to consider is that precision-based classes aren't reliant on an off-hand, and are also all Dex classes. So they have the inherent flexibility of range built in, as well as a free hand to use them with. A two-hand fighter can't just casually pull out a bow or other ranged weapon, and using items are a challenge for them because it takes another action. Precision damage is not the same as one-handing (or being dex-based). Rangers have dual-wielding feats (which to be fair are more aimed at flurry rangers), there are two-handed finesse weapons and ruffian rogues exist. Andrast fucked around with this message at 19:45 on Oct 14, 2023 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 19:35
|
|
|
Cyouni posted:One thing to consider is that precision-based classes aren't reliant on an off-hand, and are also all Dex classes. So they have the inherent flexibility of range built in, as well as a free hand to use them with. A two-hand fighter can't just casually pull out a bow or other ranged weapon, and using items are a challenge for them because it takes another action. A 2 hand fighter absolutely can pull out a bow, at worst you're 2 points of attack bonus behind a rogue and probably less.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 20:06
|
|
|
Rangers, rogues, and swashbucklers already have to meet certain requirements to get their precision damage, and that precision damage brings them roughly up-to-par with other martials. It does not make them more powerful than other martials. Just saying "gently caress you, your class damage mechanic doesn't work, even if you do meet the requirements" for a good chunk of the bestiary is a lovely design paradigm that should die along with a lot of the other garbage ideas that got ported over from D&D. The idea that anyone is trying to defend precision damage like it's some kind of secret OP strat that "deserves" to be shut down sometimes because otherwise they might be "too good" is laughable. Also, nobody cares that "rogues are good out of combat." D&D and its clones are about combat. Pathfinder has done a better job of making out-of-combat more interesting than most editions of D&D and its clones, but the glut of the mechanics of the game are still unquestionably focused on combat.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 20:25
|
|
|
Yeah losing precision damage doesn't "make you normal", having it does
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 20:35
|
|
|
Paizo making a slime-themed adventure (the slithering) and having two of the pregens be a swashbuckler and an investigator was hilariously mean
Andrast fucked around with this message at 20:59 on Oct 14, 2023 |
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 20:42
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 5, 2024 04:10 |
|
|
Every class needs to he able to equally contribute in combat because the entire game is centered around combat. The other stuff is cool but no one has ever picked up a a pathfinder or dnd book so they could become a half orc hostage negotiator. There are other games that build around that if you want to do that. This sounds like some real "I've never played a non dnd based rpg" stuff happening over here. Rogues have utility, and pathfinder does a better job than most dnd games of expressing that by letting them use that in combat with the various skill based actions and feats that make that meaningful inside of the central conflict resolution system of the game. This thing about "a ranger is there to do damage" is also ridiculous if you put it in line with the rogues utility. The whole deal of a ranger is that they're great to have in the outdoors! They get to be survivalist tracker woodsy people with great utility dealing with all that while still getting their normal damage when they want.
|
|
#
?
Oct 14, 2023 20:52
|
|
