Stupid Pathfinder Gunslinger Question

[DisFanJen]

Hi,

I'm playing in a new game starting soon and decided to play a gunslinger (not worried about max dam, etc, I just like the rp opportunities;) ) and as I wanted to be a 'pseudo melee' fighter I took a Pistolero so I had to always be in the mix.

Now though I'm more interested in RP that doesn't mean I want to be a wimp though so I've been doing my homework and on several forums (including here) there's a mention that at level 13 the Pistolero no longer misfires (with a pistol I believe was the specific text).

Can anyone explain how this happens? I've pouring through the books and the pfsrd and I can't see any deed, feat, or ability that becomes available at level 13 (though my bookFu may be failing).

[Manyasone]

Considering Paizo's prd doesn't mention it and I too remember reading about it, I believe the third printing errata'd it away as "too powerful"

[DisFanJen]

Considering Paizo's prd doesn't mention it and I too remember reading about it, I believe the third printing errata'd it away as "too powerful"

I must admit that would be my first thought too, and thinking on it I can understand why.

I just wanted to be sure I wasn't missing something.

[Knight Magenta]

This is a bit of a pet issue for me.

Guns are balanced around the idea that they bring lots of damage but are unreliable. Leaving aside the question of whether their numbers come out balanced, the problem is that this is a terrible way of balancing. Consider the two possible situations: Either the gun does not misfire and the gunslinger drops tons of damage against touch ac. The other possibility is that the gunslinger loses his turn half way through the full attack and then has to spend most of the next turn fixing his gun. If your battle lasts 3-4 rounds, this is basically the whole fight where you are doing nothing. Even worse, as you grow higher in levels, the chance of misfire each round goes up since you make more attacks...

So the result is, if everything works as designed, is that either the DM is sad because everything dies super fast, or the player is sad because his character does not work. This is why Paizo removed the no-missfire from the pistolero, since misfires are the core of how guns are balanced.

The other problem is that depending on your group's optimization levels, and with the banning of double-barrel pistol abuse, the gunslinger may not even deliver on the fantasy of absurd damage.

My suggestion is to replace pistols with light crossbows, let them be wielded one handed by the pistolero and play a bolt-ace.