[Dreamscarred Press] Path of War: Expanded! (Discussion Thread IV)

[Vhaidara]

You can describe almost any discipline like that. I mean, Flux is basically burning/freezing people alive. Eternal Guardian at least lets them run away.

Also, I'm not actually suggesting a hard change. What I was thinking was an optional swap built into the class, like Black Seraph for the Fiendbound Marauder. I really think you guys should make use of that optional trade more. I like the fluidity that it gives the classes.

[ErrantX]

You can describe almost any discipline like that. I mean, Flux is basically burning/freezing people alive. Eternal Guardian at least lets them run away.

Also, I'm not actually suggesting a hard change. What I was thinking was an optional swap built into the class, like Black Seraph for the Fiendbound Marauder. I really think you guys should make use of that optional trade more. I like the fluidity that it gives the classes.

Personally, I don't like those optional swaps. It makes it look rickshaw, like we can't make up our minds. Having set choices may be restrictive, but we've given ways to circumvent these without a lot of undue issue and and the disciplines they come preloaded with are set to help the class achieve its role. I think we'll have to agree to disagree there. Traits and traditions, and the design team is tossing around a feat as well.

-X

[Wavestone]

Delurking here..

Regarding the revised Mystic - it looks more straightforward to me, at a quick read through.

A couple of clarifications are needed on the Elemental Glyph feature, I think:

• Is there a range to which allies you can affect with the glyph? If so, what happens when allies go past the range?
• Can the glyph effects be dispelled or suppressed with antimagic?
• Are the glyph effects dependent on the Mystic being alive and conscious, and what happens if he is not?
• Fire and Metal have bonuses expressed as (Initiatior level)/4 at 3rd level. Rounding is always down, so these come out to +0..

-Wavestone

[PsyBomb]

You can describe almost any discipline like that. I mean, Flux is basically burning/freezing people alive. Eternal Guardian at least lets them run away.

Also, I'm not actually suggesting a hard change. What I was thinking was an optional swap built into the class, like Black Seraph for the Fiendbound Marauder. I really think you guys should make use of that optional trade more. I like the fluidity that it gives the classes.

Going to send my two coppers into this part of the debates

I do not believe that Knight-Chandler needs any discipline swaps. If you look at it, the features delineate sharply into their intended roles.

The class features are in the support vein, though not so much leader. Between crafting, sharing Boosts (which is WAY better than it looks if you select your maneuvers right), and the Candle you are perfectly positioned to magnify your allies' abilities, particularly non-initiators.

The maneuvers emphasize striking power and battlefield movement. Flux, Wind/Tempest, and Current have tons of ranged options to let you be away from the thick of things, while Mirror, Moon, and Hourglass (plus some Current, let's admit) let you zip around the battlefield.

The net result of this is bringing up the candle's effects, then placing yourself wherever you need to be for the 15-ft aura to help them and unleashing destruction upon your foes. I personally wouldn't go for any swaps in this case.

[tekevil]

With regards to discipline swapping I have a question.

Are you guys planning to remove how discipline swapping replaces skills?

It's honestly kind of annoying when I want to use a non-magical archery style like Piercing Gale, but replacing Solar Wind removes Perception as a class skill. Solar Wind being the only SU discipline on the Warlord annoyed me.

Or I don't want to use a savage discipline like Primal Fury, but its removal also significantly harms my chances of hunting for game successful.

I think that the current ruling hurts more than it helps.

[PsyBomb]

With regards to discipline swapping I have a question.

Are you guys planning to remove how discipline swapping replaces skills?

It's honestly kind of annoying when I want to use a non-magical archery style like Piercing Gale, but replacing Solar Wind removes Perception as a class skill. Solar Wind being the only SU discipline on the Warlord annoyed me.

Or I don't want to use a savage discipline like Primal Fury, but its removal also significantly harms my chances of hunting for game successful.

I think that the current ruling hurts more than it helps.

In the Solar Wind case, it's been said a few times that those two free-swap between each other without any trait or tradition required. You won't lose Perception.

[squiggit]

the one that always bugs me is when you swap a discipline and lose the skill even though you have another discipline with the same skill.

[ErrantX]

the one that always bugs me is when you swap a discipline and lose the skill even though you have another discipline with the same skill.

Please stop perpetuating this. We've already said that's not the case. It was an oversight in book 1 that we are going to errata.

If you trade out say Thrashing Dragon and have Broken Blade still, you retain Acrobatics. Same with all disciplines. The skill stays if there is another discipline on board that still uses it.

-X

[PsyBomb]

Please stop perpetuating this. We've already said that's not the case. It was an oversight in book 1 that we are going to errata.

If you trade out say Thrashing Dragon and have Broken Blade still, you retain Acrobatics. Same with all disciplines. The skill stays if there is another discipline on board that still uses it.

-X

I actually managed to miss that as well, thank you for the clarification

[Lord_Gareth]

What time is it?

SURVEY TIME

We're starting work on PrCs for Path of War: Expanded. One thing I'd wanted to do personally was update two I'd made that had very positive reception: the Knights of the Fractured Prism and the Dukes of Last Light (yes, the tables are broken. No, I'm not going to fix them). However, both classes feature an unusual form of progression; instead of continuing to learn maneuvers from traditional disciplines, each gains seven maneuvers not available to those outside of the prestige class.

For homebrew that's fine, no guilt whatsoever there. But what would the thoughts be on such a mechanic being published in Path of War? Should they continue to gain psuedo-stances instead of a stance progression? Should I abandon the idea and make something new?

[Taveena]

My first thought when reading this is- Compare the two Warlock PrCs, Enlightened Spirit and Eldritch Theurge. Enlightened Spirit gives you locked-in invocations as you level. Eldritch Theurge gives you invocations as though you were continuing Warlock, plus a few more.
The thing is that the former SHOULD be equal to continuing in Warlock, but it almost never is viewed as such.
In this specific case it might be because it doesn't actually unlock higher level Invocations, but if this class continues to progress IL that's not a huge problem.
While I don't see an inherent problem with this design method, it's... very unlikely I'll actually use either of the PrCs if they're published that way? It's subjective, but that's all I can give.
I already feel uncomfortably cramped by the Dragon Fury or the Battle Templar's discipline restrictions. and this is even worse.

I mean - okay, I was messing around with a Prodigious TWF Brutal Slayer build, right? And I was going to go into Dragon Fury.

Problem was I wanted to focus on Black Seraph, and that meant for 5 levels I just couldn't take any Black Seraph maneuvers. And that was already awkward.

EDIT: Now, it's worth noting, I do like the look of the classes (from my brief skim) but even then, with how they work you're FORCED to build around this concept, rather than the PrC being suitable to a wide variety of builds.

[MilleniaAntares]

I would say it's fine to skip a maneuver/stance if you get a class-specific version for that particular level, but getting rid of all of them may be a bit restrictive. You'd have to essentially compete with all the stances afterwards, which may mean you'd have to design a stance that is just that good, even if it's restrictive in some manner.

Edit: On a separate topic, one possibility for dealing with switching disciplines on archetypes and trying to combine archetypes that switch out different disciplines would be to make the disciplines be explicit class features, separate from maneuvers known. Though, it would probably make formatting the class's first level a pain...

[PsyBomb]

Alright, I like the concept of the PrCs I see there. The biggest thing about them is that what they do is UTTERLY UNIQUE, which is the big point. A Prestige Class does not need to be broad, but it has to have something that makes it worth going out of the way to get them, and the unique-maneuver idea is one good way to do it. I won't comment on the classes themselves, other than to say I love the flavor of each and they seem worthwhile at my admittedly rushed first glance.

Flip side, if possible, I'd like to so something like ToB's master of Nine, for someone who just really wants to omni-school it with maneuvers from all over the place.

[Kymme]

Normally, I'd be against swapping out old maneuver progression to get seven locked-in ones.

But both of these classes are absolutely awesome, so I'll overlook it.

[Forrestfire]

As a longtime fan of both of those classes, I'd love to see either of them in Path of War. However, I am not a fan of the way some of the current Path of War PrCs lock you out of your previous disciplines, so I'm very much not a fan of the idea of them losing access to other maneuvers in exchange for the thematic ones. I'd rather they be extra, myself (or at least have a slow progression of other maneuvers on top of it).

... And speaking of those PrCs, can we get some standardization errata on the PoW 1 PrCs to make them (1) less all over the place and (2) nicer to use in the super-specialized PrCs' cases? Seriously:

• Awakened Blade: Any previously known disciplines.
• Battle Templar: Golden Lion and two previously known disciplines.
• Bladecaster: Any previously known disciplines.
• Dragon Fury: Broken Blade, Primal Fury, and Thrashing Dragon.
• Mage Hunter: Scarlet Throne, Steel Serpent, Solar Wind, and Veiled Moon.
• Umbral Blade: Black Seraph, Steel Serpent, Thrashing Dragon, and Veiled Moon

Half of them allow characters with specific disciplines they want to use to progress them, and half do not. I am of the mind that the PrCs ought to allow an initiator to continue their progression of the class they started with, but since that doesn't work (as you can enter with the Martial Training feats, unlike with casting PrCs and +1 level of existing etc), I propose that PrCs add zero to two thematic disciplines to the initiator, and allow them to learn from any previously known discipline as well. Otherwise you get things like Mystics not being able to use any non-gish PrC if they want to use Elemental Flux past a certain level, and Harbingers being completely left out with their disciplines.

PrCing is almost always a poor choice in Pathfinder anyway because of the way the system builds things on the idea of single-class stuff rather than the mixing and matching of 3.5. It'd be great if these PrCs got thrown a bit of a bone, here.

[Nyaa]

Does Anima Burn work on boosts?
Can I make iterative attacks with Enter the Vortex blasts?
Is 30ft maximum range, or range increment?
How does Cascade of Elemental Wrath interact with Elemental Attunement's damage type conversion?
Is darkness glyph concealment countered by true seeing?

Flickering Defense (Riven Hourglass 3) - "You must initiate this encounter".
Sands of Time Hurricane (Riven Hourglass 7) - "If an opponent opponent is hit".
Improved Blade Meditation [Combat] - it's not a skill, it's a class feature. Also, is the name here to stay? IIRC "blade" is from when the class was called "blade mystic".

[Manly Man]

Kinda tired, so I may sound rather incoherent or otherwise silly at some point here, just figured I should warn you.

I really like the two prestige classes, but the way the extra maneuvers are implemented strikes (no pun intended) me as... odd. If you want to keep them restrictive, so as to persuade them to stay in the class to the end, you could try making a unique (and rather short, in comparison to the others) discipline for that class only; there is no tradition or trait or anything that grants you access to that particular discipline except for taking levels in the prestige class that grants it. The initiator progresses their maneuvers known/readied/stances known as normal, and can switch their maneuvers at even levels as well, but the new discipline comes with a catch: you cannot know a maneuver of a level higher than that of your class level, i.e. a 1st-level Knight of the Fractured Prism wouldn't be able to learn 2nd or 3rd-level maneuvers of the special discipline, as well as the normal restriction of having an appropriate initiator level to use maneuvers of whatever level. The prestige class counts as full initiator levels for such purposes.

Yes, it does mean that more disciplines will need to be made, but they don't have to be so extensive as the other ones so far. You could also probably get away with having less stances available in them.

[Swaoeaeieu]

Sorry to repost this. but next session is this afternoon and i would like to know...

In the Piercing Thunder discipline, does the piercing strike hit multiple enemies? the wording confuses me. Flavor text talks about striking against a foe. But crunch metions an attack roll against foes within reach. 1 attack roll agains all within reach? or a typo?

And i just remembered another question: if i throw my shield with the throwing shell manouver. does it only bounce back on a hit, or do i get it back even when i miss? I lost my shield last session, but wondered if it was justified...

thanks in advance

[Kaidinah]

I really like the focus on specific combat styles in these prestige classes. Having a focus on a particular combat style is what would draw me to a prestige class in the first place.

I am a not a fan of prestige classes granting lots of maneuvers without allowing any of the normal maneuvers. There are a lot of fun maneuvers among the disciplines already available, so I'd rather that you get some unique maneuvers and some normal maneuvers.

[Tempestfury]

Sorry, some Life Stuff happened today and I lost track of time.

But I did write something else: the next part of Aisiling's story.

Very nice... much better view of the Paladin's there, especially as he admitted he was wrong.

Okay everyone!

Revised versions of Mystic and her archetypes are available here.

I'm keeping the original mystic up for a while as well for comparison, so I'd like your feedback on the revision as the "leaner and meaner" mystic.

-X

Spoiler: Base Mythic

Show

Very nice, I like new Animus and how it can be used to directly augment any maneuver you use, and not just Elemental Flux. Goes a loooong way in separating the discipline with the class. Blade Meditation is basically the full-round recovery method of the old classes, which I like. The Bonus Feats for either combat or item creation are /greatly/ appreciated.

Then of course, we come to the new gylphs... as they simply are applied to allies directly as a move action, the Mythic's status as a buffing class has been /greatly/ solidified. Not to mention the differences in the gylphs is pretty apparent. Wind gives you agility, and works best with Mithral Current. Darkness is of course stealth, and works with Veiled Moon, through I think the level 3 and 8 abilities should be swapped due to how strong they are. Earth of course is all about survival, and with Iron Tortiose would make the Mythic quite the tank. Fire of course is all about that offense, which works with just about everything! Illumintuation is rather fun, as its anti-illusions, with free mindblank to cap it off. Metal... is pretty much a different version of Earth, and finally, water is... adaptability, through freedom of movement is NOT at 19th level ability, but more a 13th.

I do like Mystic Artifice, makes them a proper crafter now. Withstand Spell... is a very powerful ability, but as its limited to only spells and psionic powers, might not see all that much use, depending on the campaign and their enemies. Font of Animus makes Quell Magic exceedingly useful in terms of out-of combat utility, which is always great to see... until I see that it doesn't work out of combat. Come on, your level 15 now! It makes no sense for you to NOT get the ability to use your Animus out of combat! If your a supporter class, then getting some out of combat utility will be very nice. Especially as it something no martial adept really brings, save perhaps the Stalker, and most definently the Vigilinate... but come on, it won't hurt the game that much at this level.

Arcane Wellspring is surprising, and really places the Mystic in a buffing roll, but its odd that their capstone empowers casters only, when all their other abilities are more combat/general focused... so its honestly rather odd to see this capstone. I like it... but its odd. Honestly, the ability to apply 2 glyphs makes much more sense as a capstone.

Spoiler: Aurora Soul

Show

Aurora Soul... really don't see why you need to drop Perception, especially as its pretty much the strongest skill there is. Their Mystic Combat really focused on their unarmed strike, and I admit it is a pretty strong progression for it, even through I'm sad that their pretty much losing their crafting abilities, as I like that about the Mystic. Defensive Aura is basically an in-combat only, but more powerful version of the monk's AC bonus, as you can wear armour and still get it... and the two stack. Still, pretty small archetype overall... turns you into a monk-lite, but still have your buffing and anti-spell abilities.

Spoiler: Gunsmoke Mystic

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Gunsmoke Mystic... well Magical Gunsmith is pretty much the Gunslinger's Gunsmithing ability, and I have no issues with it at all. Magic Bullet Theory is still as useful as always, very strong if you only use one bullet a turn as it means you don't actually need to go out of your way to buy bullets, or get feats in order to be able to reload... through you'll have to be very careful about you entire build if you do so. The Way of the Gun is very strong, and well worth giving up the feats. I love the Ricochet Shot and Piercing Shot abilities... especially the later one, taking into account that firearms have a x4 critical modifier, it is a great way of really ramping up one's damage, or performing a Nova Strike. Then Flowing Movements makes my previous comments about not needing feats to reload even more unnecessary, XD. Gives up your anti-spell abilities, but that makes sense as you should be peppering your enemies with lead before they can use it.,

Spoiler: Knight-Chandler

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And finally, my favourite, Knight-Chandler. Illumination replacing Animus... which is a very fair trade considering how the two class features work now. The buffing effects are equal to that of the glyphs, even if they do require more management to get effective use out of it, they have much stronger tactical use over all. Share the Light is a very cool and fun class feature, letting your allies take counters and boosts if they benifit them, or honestly need it. Very cool with Riven Hourglass and Mithral Current being in your normal list. Eternal Candle is a MUCH better captsone than Arcane Wellspring, ramping up the Knight-Chandler's buffing abilities significantly, as well as their boost-focus by giving you the only dual-boost ability... especially as its not limited per day, unlike the Stalker's Dual Strike.

As for their discipline list... I honestly agree with Kel in this regard. They should have Eternal Guardian or Golden Lion as a disicpline. They shouldn't lose Mirthal Current for it, as Current works amazingly well with Eternal Candle, and its a bad trade. But their focus is /much/ more on bufffing and supporting than the base Mystic is, so having their disciplines change in order to further reflect this change simply makes sense for me.

All in all... VERY well done, a much stronger, cleaner class.

SURVEY TIME

both classes feature an unusual form of progression; instead of continuing to learn maneuvers from traditional disciplines, each gains seven maneuvers not available to those outside of the prestige class.

For homebrew that's fine, no guilt whatsoever there. But what would the thoughts be on such a mechanic being published in Path of War? Should they continue to gain psuedo-stances instead of a stance progression? Should I abandon the idea and make something new?

Pretty much everyone's covered everything already... I don't think giving up all of your previous disciplines is a good idea, and you should at least get one discipline which they still advance as normal, and I agree with what others have suggested in that we should let the previous PrC's let you at least you one or two of your previous discplines, in order to ensure they aren't ridiciously restrictive in terms of power.

[NineThePuma]

No. You can use any weapon with any discipline, and with regards to mithral current specifically, sheathing is just a catch-all term for putting the weapon in a nonthreatening position. You can make a mithral current bite attack just fine, but it would still cost you actions to "draw" or "sheathe" the bite attack. It's a bit gamist, but it's the only way to really be fair.

Unless you're talking about something different and I'm misunderstanding.

Piercing Thunder currently has a restriction =\

What time is it?

SURVEY TIME

We're starting work on PrCs for Path of War: Expanded. One thing I'd wanted to do personally was update two I'd made that had very positive reception: the Knights of the Fractured Prism and the Dukes of Last Light (yes, the tables are broken. No, I'm not going to fix them). However, both classes feature an unusual form of progression; instead of continuing to learn maneuvers from traditional disciplines, each gains seven maneuvers not available to those outside of the prestige class.

For homebrew that's fine, no guilt whatsoever there. But what would the thoughts be on such a mechanic being published in Path of War? Should they continue to gain psuedo-stances instead of a stance progression? Should I abandon the idea and make something new?

Give their maneuvers the "Class As Stance" treatment; require expending a maneuver to activate, while having a cut down maneuver progression =V

[tekevil]

Question on Withstand spell.

I currrently read it as

Reflex Partial or Reflex half = Will save to negate

Reflex Negates= still use reflex

is this correct or does Withstand Spell essentially make Will your only save vs magic/psionic effects?

[Xerlith]

I absolutely love the new Mystic. Streamlined (in a good way), clear-cut, with a solid spread of abilities and overall much more easy to understand. There is one thing that bothers me a bit though - Withstand Spell.

Most of the abilities in the game you care about saving against are spells. This gives the Mystic both Mettle (a strong ability) and makes Will THE go-to save.

Then again, this ability doesn't work agaisnt Supernatural or Spell-Like abilities, so I'm probably being too cautious.

[Mathias1313]

I was looking forward to the streamlining of the Mystic when I heard about it and I must say... you guys do NOT disappoint. :)

And so here are my thoughts:

Animus: love what you have done with it. Is there any way we could get an upgrade to Increase Potency that allowed us to do half damage to element immune targets?

Elemental Attunement: I think I have mentioned this awhile ago but I thought I would add it again. Is there any chance we could have spend animus when entering a stance to change the damage it does as well? I know currently the Animus only allows us to change the damage of maneuvers. Would be cool if we could spend some Animus to alter a Stance to our Active element as well.

Blade Meditation: Just a quick clarification, this affects anyone who makes a melee attack against me. So range doesn't matter? I just want to make sure it means I can affect people with crazy reach or if I fight another Mystic and they are using Increase Range with a maneuver.

Elemental Glyph: Dear Lord this is Sooooo much better. I love it. Couple questions/suggestions though.
We have access to all the glyph types correct?
-Air - Everything seems good.
-Darkness - Partial Concealment? Don't think that's a thing in Pathfinder.
-Earth - Love it
-Fire - This one, I don't really like. They just don't seem very FIRE to me. I mean the 3rd and 13th ability would give you like a +2 to hit and damage if you have a +8 stat mod. That just does not seem comparable to the rest of the abilities of the other glyphs. The 8th ability ignores damage reduction, which just doesn't scream FIRE to me and the 19th ability is just... no. Incredibly sub par to any other glyph. I highly recommend a rework of this one Glyph.
-Illumination - Everything seems good.
-Metal - Everything seems good. I would however maybe take the limit off the 3rd lvl ability. If all your adding is 1/4 your modifier, you'll probably only be adding like +2 or 3 tops, which doesn't seem like that much to have it stack with existing armor.
-Water - I like it, I know some people have said the Freedom of movement should be lowered to the 13th level ability... I am unsure about that. I mean the glyph is a move action buff that affects a lot of people with no range on it. I'm 50/50 on if it should be lowered, I can see both points of view.

Mystic Artifice: Very cool
Withstand Spell: Very, very cool
Instant Enlightenment: I like

Quell Magic: Wow, this ability is freaking gold, love it.

Font of Animus: I think this is incredibly good.

Arcane Wellspring: Thematic class ability


Archetypes
Aurora Soul: Everything about this is good.
Gunsmoke Mystic: I really like the Magic Bullet Theory, opens up a lot of really cool ideas and the Flowing Movements ability is something that I have been waiting for awhile.
Knight-Chandler: I will admit I never really looked at this one before because.... it just didn't interest me, but having read it I must say I really like the mechanics of it. Good job.

I think all in all you did an incredibly good job with the rewrite. I would like to however offer up my plead to redo the Fire glyph as of right now I see it as very sub par to the rest. Here are some suggestions, maybe you will like... maybe you will hate:
3rd lvl ability gives the people who have the glyph immunity to the fire damage you do with any maneuver.
One of the lvls add 1/2 initiation modifier as bonus fire damage
19th lvl allows whoever has the Glyph to inflict an extra +1 fire damage per die of any ability that inflicts fire damage. Maybe increase it to 1/4 your initiation modifier per die instead as it is a 19th lvl ability.

Anyway just some ideas. Thanks again for all the great work guys.

[Prime32]

I'm digging the new Mystic. Some comments below.

Spoiler

Show

The presence of "A mystic is not limited to casting glyphs of her current active element" makes me think that it might be better to drop the active element stuff entirely, and just let Elemental Attunement change your damage type at will (perhaps requiring a longer action to use). Alternately you could go back in the direction of Mandala Adept and assign each glyph an energy type which lasts until you use another one (though that would probably warrant the creation of one additional glyph, just so each element can have two of each).

What are your thoughts on giving Anima Burn some splash damage equal to your initiating modifier? (affects enemies only, so you don't hurt yourself with melee attacks) Helps support the idea that your maneuvers are "overflowing with power". Also, I should note that Anima Burn doesn't appear to stack with the Gunsmoke Mystic's Animus-Charged Bullets class feature.

I'd suggest adding "or 5 points of damage reduction" to the text of Increase Potency, for mystics who don't use energy-based disciplines. Yes, in many cases you could just use Elemental Attunement to bypass the DR, but there might be archetypes in future that trade it away.

Can the Increase Range augment have an option for increasing the range of a strike that's already ranged? Pretty please?

---

For Knight-Chandler, rather than 15ft range, you could create a stronger link between crunch and fluff by having the candle's benefits apply to anyone with the area lit by it. Allies start off having to stay close to it, but grow bolder as the fight progresses.

Given that bright/shadowy illumination is also referenced in their abilities, I recommend changing any instances of "the knight-chandler's illumination" to "the knight-chandler's illumination points". Alternatively, if combined with the above suggestion, you could get rid of illumination points and base the bonuses on the radius of the candle's bright illumination. As a bonus, since you're not using points it sounds less like animus, meaning players are less likely to get confused and spend illumination on augments or things like that.

I agree that Golden Lion seems to fit with their general theme. Also I'd be interested in seeing a feat that shapes their candle into a sword they can wield, just for the sake of imagery (maybe it could deal nonlethal damage? I dunno).

[NineThePuma]

Also I'd be interested in seeing a feat that shapes their candle into a sword they can wield, just for the sake of imagery (maybe it could deal nonlethal damage? I dunno).

... you just gave me the best idea ever that handily defeats the current brick wall I was hammering my head into.

Thank you.

[master4sword]

Okay everyone!

Revised versions of Mystic and her archetypes are available here.

I'm keeping the original mystic up for a while as well for comparison, so I'd like your feedback on the revision as the "leaner and meaner" mystic.

-X

Liking what I'm seeing so far, and loving the new glyphs.

1. Darkness Glyph's 19th-level ability seems underwhelming (being able to see in magical darkness) when earlier levels are giving us 20-50% concealment and the ability to see invisibility. Perhaps blindsense or blindsight instead would be better for a 19th-level ability?

2. Possible exploit to become basically immune to hp damage: be a 19th-level Mystic with Diehard using Earth Glyph on yourself (you count as your own ally) - you can't be killed by hp loss ever since you remain functional at/below 0. Just keep renewing the glyph every few rounds. Probably not a problem, what with being 19th-level at that point, but thought I should bring it up.

3. Also, as written, stabilizing to 0 with Earth Glyph 19th-level effect - does this keep you conscious and staggered as if you were at 0 normally, or is it intended to be "act as if negative but not negative"?

4. Fire Glyph's attack bonus, is it minimum 1? By RAW, it does nothing at 3rd when you get it since you round down. Metal's natural armor bonus is in the same boat.

5. If Fire Glyph's damage bonus is going to come online at 13th, it should probably be 1/2 level or something, rather than 1/4th level - a +5 bonus to damage at 20 is underwhelming. Heck, when you hit 13 and get the bonus, the +3 hit you've been getting since 3rd is more valuable than the +3 damage. (If you switch the hit bonus to 13th and the damage bonus to 3rd, it's probably fine.)

6. I assume Fire Glyph 19's "energy damage" is fire? It doesn't actually specify, so by RAW it is some untyped energy.

7. Metal seems to overlap with the other glyphs somewhat; it's got Earth's DR and energy resistance (11 and 6 levels later than Earth, though it's DR/-- instead of DR/Adamantine), as well as Fire's DR-piercing (5 levels later, though it also bypasses hardness). Just kinda underwhelmed when it's highest-level abilities are granted by other glyphs earlier, though at least it provides options since you can't have multiple glyphs active on one person at a time so it's not a total loss.

8. Water 13's a double-edged sword, but that's SR for you.

9. Freedom of Movement at 19 seems late, but maybe that's just me. Kinda interesting that if you fall into a lake, the water glyph doesn't do anything to help you until 19.

10. Capstone is useless if you don't have casters around. Kinda wish there was another option for empowering allies here in case the party is caster-free.

11. And since I'm seeing people mention it, I'll throw in my two cents - Withstand Spell is fine, assuming I read it right and it only works on "Fort/Ref half" and not "Fort/Ref negates". It only works against spells that have reduced effects, not binary "it works or it doesn't" spells or non-spell/power threats. I don't see it being too powerful, in my opinion.


I'll read though archetypes later. Liking the new Mystic, it feels much more fine-tuned now!

[Prime32]

8. Water 13's a double-edged sword, but that's SR for you.

A simple way to bypass this might be that the Spell Resistance doesn't apply against spells cast by creatures who are under the effects of a Water glyph.

[deuxhero]

Some of the prcs in PoW1 already get non-standard stances as class features, so it isn't entirely weird.

[Kaidinah]

Okay everyone!

Revised versions of Mystic and her archetypes are available here.

I'm keeping the original mystic up for a while as well for comparison, so I'd like your feedback on the revision as the "leaner and meaner" mystic.

-X

I like this leaner and meaner Mystic. These new glyphs feel pretty cool and I like the options they open up. It really engages in martial buffing in a way not seen before in PoW.

The 3rd level Glyph for fire though, needs text to say "minimum 1", otherwise it has no affect until 4th level. Same with Metal's 3rd level ability.

At the same time, this new Mystic has been easier to sell to my friends. The new Glyph system is the main reason, but they love modifying maneuvers with the new uses for animus too!

Edit: gunsmoke mystic loses perception as a class skill, but still has Solar Wind. Is Solar Wind not an intended discipline?