[Pathfinder] Dreamscarred Press FAQ

[Kiton2]

Q: Do Hand Cannons belong to any weapon group?

context: I wanted to pick up some Solar Wind maneuvers, but even Weapon Group Adaptation appears to be of no help: rather than discipline weapons, it states a very stark, very different "Solar Wind maneuvers may only be performed with a weapon in the bow, crossbow or thrown weapon groups".

[CGNefarious]

Path of War

When mounted and initiating a maneuver that grants movement to the initiator, such as Red Zephyr's Strike, can the mount take that movement?

[Ssalarn]

Q: Do Hand Cannons belong to any weapon group?

context: I wanted to pick up some Solar Wind maneuvers, but even Weapon Group Adaptation appears to be of no help: rather than discipline weapons, it states a very stark, very different "Solar Wind maneuvers may only be performed with a weapon in the bow, crossbow or thrown weapon groups".

Treat them as firearms for the purposes of determining what weapon group they belong to.

[ErrantX]

Q: Do Hand Cannons belong to any weapon group?

context: I wanted to pick up some Solar Wind maneuvers, but even Weapon Group Adaptation appears to be of no help: rather than discipline weapons, it states a very stark, very different "Solar Wind maneuvers may only be performed with a weapon in the bow, crossbow or thrown weapon groups".

Treat them as firearms for the purposes of determining what weapon group they belong to.

Adding to this that Solar Wind's weapon groups include Firearms - there was a omission for some reason in one version of the book. Firearms are on the Solar Wind OK list.

Path of War

When mounted and initiating a maneuver that grants movement to the initiator, such as Red Zephyr's Strike, can the mount take that movement?

If you're a Hussar or Omen Rider for example - yes. This is because of their class features and how they interact with the mount. If you're not - no. You're performing the move, not the mount. Now the mount can move for you, but it doesn't get free movement out of it.

-X

[Tuvarkz]

Psionics (Yes. You're reading right, this not another PoW question)
Soulknife-Emulate Melee Weapon
Question, if you use this Blade Skill to emulate a Nodachi, what are the stats of the Mind Blade (Assuming a Medium Character)
2d6 19-20/x2 +Brace
2d6 18-20/x2 +Brace
1d10 18-20/x2 +Brace
Also, on Mind Blade
A soulknife with powerful build or any similar ability forms an appropriately-sized mind blade dealing the size-appropriate amount of damage.
Does this mean a character with Powerful Build gets to apply the trait and get a weapon one size larger than his own size, or a weapon of his size? I find the wording a bit unclear.

[jamieth]

Path of War

When a warlord uses Brave gambit, does the "Cha to damage" part of the reward applies to the charge attack she makes as part of gambit, to her first attack on next turn, or neither?

And a second question, can a naginata be sheathed for a purpose of Mythral Current's draw ability?

[Elricaltovilla]

Path of War

When a warlord uses Brave gambit, does the "Cha to damage" part of the reward applies to the charge attack she makes as part of gambit, to her first attack on next turn, or neither?

A: From the Brave Gambit itself:

Reward: The warlord's actions embolden his allies and sets his spirit alight with courage; the warlord and his allies gain a morale bonus to damage equal to the warlord's Charisma modifier on the next attack they make or until the warlord's next turn.

Since you don't get the reward of the gambit until after the gambit is successful (i.e. hit with the charge attack) the gambit's bonus would apply on their next attack made before the start of their next turn (probably an AoO or a followup attack from a pseudo-pounce maneuver).

And a second question, can a naginata be sheathed for a purpose of Mythral Current's draw ability?

A: From the Mithral Current document:

A weapon is considered sheathed if it is in a non-threatening position, such as a monk putting their hands at their sides or in their pockets, a spear wielder pointing the tip of their spear into the ground, a soulknife with an unformed mind blade, or even a samurai keeping their katana in its sheath. The terminology of sheathing the weapon is only intended to serve as a shorthand for any number of ways a warrior can present themselves as non-threatening with their weapon.

Sheathing is simply a term for the mechanical representation of putting your weapon in a position from which you no longer threaten squares. This can be done with any weapon as far as Mithral Current is concerned.

[jamieth]

Not arguing, it's just that by the time you roll damage, you already know the gambit have succeeded :-) But thanks for the reply. So, it's "neither" regarding the original question.

And thanks on the clarification re: sheathing. With that and a feat allowing Finessing polearms, my Mythral Current bushi warlord finally coming together...

[Elricaltovilla]

Not arguing, it's just that by the time you roll damage, you already know the gambit have succeeded :-) But thanks for the reply. So, it's "neither" regarding the original question.

And thanks on the clarification re: sheathing. With that and a feat allowing Finessing polearms, my Mythral Current bushi warlord finally coming together...

It says in the description for Brave Gambit next attack.

[Kudaku]

Path of War: Stalker Arts

I was comparing the Combat Precognition and Murderous Insight stalker arts, and something left me a bit puzzled. Is Combat Precognition intended to work on all attacks made against the stalker for the duration, or the first attack from each foe each round, or the first attack against the stalker each round?

Spoiler: Combat Precognition

Show

Combat Precognition (Su) The stalker designates his combat senses towards his opponents and gains momentary flashes of insight into how to defend himself against them. SpendIng one point of ki as an immediate action forces opponents who attack the stalker to roll their attack rolls twice and take the worse of the two results due to the stalker's precognitive abilities. This art has a duration of 1 + the stalker's Wisdom modifier in rounds.

Spoiler: Murderous Insight

Show

Murderous Insight (Su) The stalker designates his combat senses towards ending the lives of his opponents and gains momentary flashes of insight in how to best accomplish this. By spending one point of ki as a swift action, the stalker makes an attack and rolls twice for that attack and uses the better of the two results due to the stalker's precognitive abilities. This art has a duration of 1 + the stalker's Wisdom modifier in rounds.

[mostholycerebus]

Sheathing is simply a term for the mechanical representation of putting your weapon in a position from which you no longer threaten squares. This can be done with any weapon as far as Mithral Current is concerned.

How is a Zwiehander Sentinels Armament Shield handled, in general and in regard to Mithral Current? When wielding a two-handed weapon, is the Armament Shield 'sheathed' and does not threaten, making it eligible for Mithral Current maneuvers?

[Elricaltovilla]

How is a Zwiehander Sentinels Armament Shield handled, in general and in regard to Mithral Current? When wielding a two-handed weapon, is the Armament Shield 'sheathed' and does not threaten, making it eligible for Mithral Current maneuvers?

A: You don't get armament shield's effects unless you're wielding the two handed weapon in question. If your two handed weapon is sheathed, your armament shield is considered sheathed as well.

[Tuvarkz]

Bloodforge
Does the Powerful Build racial trait have an intended RP (Race Point) cost?

[Bacris]

Q: [Dreamscarred Press General] As of 2015 August 29th, what are the upcoming DSP products and what timeline are we looking at for their full release?

((I ask because it seems there are a whole lot of content being made and I am sure some of it I have not heard of))

Just wanted to pop in that this wasn't missed and I'm working on an answer.

--Jeremy

[Lord_Gareth]

Bloodforge
Does the Powerful Build racial trait have an intended RP (Race Point) cost?

We don't use RP in any way - certainly not in our design.

[Powerdork]

We don't use RP in any way - certainly not in our design.

Is there any hope of getting race-point values for racial traits from Dreamscarred Press content in the future?

[Lord_Gareth]

Is there any hope of getting race-point values for racial traits from Dreamscarred Press content in the future?

DSP does not use race points - ever. It is one of the very few parts of the core product line that we do not condone, and it's not a can of worms we're interested in opening.

[TiaC]

We don't use RP in any way - certainly not in our design.

Without context, this quote seems to mean something else entirely. (Now I feel like a news anchor, taking sound-bites out of context)


Seriously though, could you see yourselves writing some sort of advice on creating new races in a future Bloodforge supplement?

[ErrantX]

Psionics (Yes. You're reading right, this not another PoW question)
Soulknife-Emulate Melee Weapon
Question, if you use this Blade Skill to emulate a Nodachi, what are the stats of the Mind Blade (Assuming a Medium Character)
2d6 19-20/x2 +Brace
2d6 18-20/x2 +Brace
1d10 18-20/x2 +Brace
Also, on Mind Blade
A soulknife with powerful build or any similar ability forms an appropriately-sized mind blade dealing the size-appropriate amount of damage.
Does this mean a character with Powerful Build gets to apply the trait and get a weapon one size larger than his own size, or a weapon of his size? I find the wording a bit unclear.

When using Emulate Melee Weapon it's as if you were using a weapon of that specific kind (specifically a nodachi in this case) that was sized appropriate to you (if you have powerful build, you get the bigger one). So... Nodachi, 1d10 18–20/×2 S or P brace. Mind blade normal stats do not happen at all in anyway if you're using Emulate Melee Weapon.

Path of War: Stalker Arts

I was comparing the Combat Precognition and Murderous Insight stalker arts, and something left me a bit puzzled. Is Combat Precognition intended to work on all attacks made against the stalker for the duration, or the first attack from each foe each round, or the first attack against the stalker each round?

Spoiler: Combat Precognition

Show

Combat Precognition (Su) The stalker designates his combat senses towards his opponents and gains momentary flashes of insight into how to defend himself against them. SpendIng one point of ki as an immediate action forces opponents who attack the stalker to roll their attack rolls twice and take the worse of the two results due to the stalker's precognitive abilities. This art has a duration of 1 + the stalker's Wisdom modifier in rounds.

Spoiler: Murderous Insight

Show

Murderous Insight (Su) The stalker designates his combat senses towards ending the lives of his opponents and gains momentary flashes of insight in how to best accomplish this. By spending one point of ki as a swift action, the stalker makes an attack and rolls twice for that attack and uses the better of the two results due to the stalker's precognitive abilities. This art has a duration of 1 + the stalker's Wisdom modifier in rounds.

Combat Precognition is meant to be a pretty good defense ability, and it works for each attack as both deterrent and defense. Emphasis mine for pluralization.

Murderous Insight is the first attack of each round.

-X

[stack]

Psionics Question:

Does the torc of power preservation apply to any uses of PP that aren't manifesting, such as the adaptive gunner's charged shot or a zealot's various abilities? A plain reading of the text appears to only apply the benefit to manifesting powers, didn't know if there had been thoughts on expanding it.

[ErrantX]

Psionics Question:

Does the torc of power preservation apply to any uses of PP that aren't manifesting, such as the adaptive gunner's charged shot or a zealot's various abilities? A plain reading of the text appears to only apply the benefit to manifesting powers, didn't know if there had been thoughts on expanding it.

As written, no. I'd suggest you perhaps move this question as a formal request to the fellas doing the Steelforge project as that's a great place to pitch an item that does what you're asking for.

-X

[Ssalarn]

Without context, this quote seems to mean something else entirely. (Now I feel like a news anchor, taking sound-bites out of context)


Seriously though, could you see yourselves writing some sort of advice on creating new races in a future Bloodforge supplement?

The thing about the race point system as presented in the ARG, is that it..... really isn't very accurate, or terribly useful without an experienced mind behind it filling in the holes and recognizing the various issues with it. For example, the gnoll as presented in the ARG has +2 STR, +2 CON, no negative stat modifier, +2 natural armor, and darkvision 60 feet, thunking it in at 6 RP, a solid 4 points behind the gnome. You could add 2 claws, a bite, and an extra point of natural armor to the race and only make it "equal" to the gnome, and still clock in under races like the dwarf. So again, that's a bonus to two physical stats with no negative modifier, +3 natural armor, darkvision 60 feet, and three primary natural attacks for a race that's "balanced" to the core races.

As another example of issues in that system, the drider and the centaur are both "charged" the full RP for being Large size, but receive no compensating weakness modifier for their Undersized Weapons traits, despite that being a fairly substantial hit to the value of their size increase.

There's also the problem that the race builder really only teaches you how to play Legos with existing traits, which is kind of poor design in and of itself. Why recycle existing materials when you can introduce new dynamics, like Bloodforge does? The system presented in the ARG is actually really appropriate to the Lego analogy- it's like an 8 year old's Lego bucket where there's a lot of pieces, but the diagrams for how they all originally fit together are somewhere else, or may not even exist anymore. The fact that you can click 10 of them together into something that looks more or less right doesn't mean it's the same quality or has the same balance of form and functionality as what those pieces were originally intended for.

Race design is one of those things that's really more like creative writing or adventure design- it takes a combination of experience, inspiration, and on-the-spot judgement, and it's not something you can really write an instruction manual for (well, you can, but that doesn't mean the end result is consistent and/or worthwhile).

[Flesh_Engine]

Some questions;
1) Akashic Augmentation feat:
It states that you reduce the cost to augment a power equal to essence invested. Is this the total cost of the augmentation or the cost per augmentation? Ie; the Body Adjustment power's augmentation costs 2pp, is the base cost decreased to 1 per augment or is it 2pp multiplied by the number of augments minus the essence invested?

2) Martial traditions Discipline swapping;
How does this apply to the Psychic Warrior Pathwalker archtype? With the addition of Sleeping Goddess as standard discipline you could just swap that, but can you swap a chosen path discipline? What happens to the trance?

3) Adding to the recent request regarding a release schedule. Is there any information regarding such a thing available? I recall seeing something akin on the old forums though.

4) Where can i find the offical errata for dsp products and, if any is available, when are these applied to the release version?

[ErrantX]

Some questions;
2) Martial traditions Discipline swapping;
How does this apply to the Psychic Warrior Pathwalker archtype? With the addition of Sleeping Goddess as standard discipline you could just swap that, but can you swap a chosen path discipline? What happens to the trance?

4) Where can i find the offical errata for dsp products and, if any is available, when are these applied to the release version?

I can answer two of these.

2) Pathwalker doesn't benefit as much from discipline swaps because not every discipline has trance/maneuver stuff written. This is a thing that may happen in future releases for universal Pathwalkers but not as of yet. Same goes for specific blade skills for War Soul soulknives to a lesser extent. You can trade but buyer beware on that market.

4) Right now you're posting on it - it's not ideal at the moment but it's the best we got atm.

-X

[Ssalarn]

Some questions;
1) Akashic Augmentation feat:
It states that you reduce the cost to augment a power equal to essence invested. Is this the total cost of the augmentation or the cost per augmentation? Ie; the Body Adjustment power's augmentation costs 2pp, is the base cost decreased to 1 per augment or is it 2pp multiplied by the number of augments minus the essence invested?
****
4) Where can i find the offical errata for dsp products and, if any is available, when are these applied to the release version?

For reference, the most recent version of Akashic Augmentation-

Spoiler: Akashic Augmentation

Show

Akashic Augmentation [Akashic] [Psionic]
You can augment a psionic power with your chakra energy rather than mental energy.
Prerequisites: Con 13 or veilweaver level 1, ability to manifest 2nd-level psionic powers.
Benefit: You can invest essence into this feat and choose a particular psionic power that you know. The total power point cost when augmenting that power is reduced by a value equal to the invested essence. This can’t reduce the augmentation cost to less than 1. You can’t invest more essence in this feat than the chosen power’s level, even if the maximum essence capacity of this feat would normally be higher than that value.
You gain 1 point of essence.

Akashic Augmentation applies to the total cost after all augments have been applied, not to each augment as it is applied. So if I wanted to manifest an energy current that dealt 2d6 additional damage and targeted one additional foe, the PP cost would normally be 15 PP. If you have 4 essence invested in Akashic Augmentation, that total cost is reduced to 11 PP.

DSP usually updates errata whenever we do a compilation or release. I typically post errata over to the Guide page for Akashic Mysteries on this forum. The Vizier errata can be found here. All of the akashic errata will be updated in the .pdfs shortly as we get ready to do the compiled .pdf. Once that process is complete, you should get an e-mail for any .pdf you've purchased from the site you purchased it at informing you that the updated version is available.

[Flesh_Engine]

Wow, that was fast!

Thanks for the answers!

[Bacris]

Is there any hope of getting race-point values for racial traits from Dreamscarred Press content in the future?

I've tried this in the past, but the problem is our psionic races from Psionics Unleashed were designed before Race Points were a thing, and lots of the traits came from 3.5 updates to Pathfinder. It's trying to shoehorn things into a model they weren't designed to be in... and a model that is hard to really be objective about what values should be.

Ballpark estimates would be the best option, because, as mentioned upthread, the traits and their point values in the ARG aren't consistent - some things that are quite cheap are REALLY good, while some expensive traits aren't worth the cost... so it becomes very subjective decisions on "how much is this worth when a bonus feat is 2 RP, a +2 bonus to Dexterity is 4 RP, but a +4 bonus to Ride and Stealth skill checks is 6 RP?"

[Bacris]

Q: [Dreamscarred Press General] As of 2015 August 29th, what are the upcoming DSP products and what timeline are we looking at for their full release?

((I ask because it seems there are a whole lot of content being made and I am sure some of it I have not heard of))

So, I can give you a list of upcoming products, but timelines... we don't really keep - both formally and track-record wise. Since nobody working on any of these projects does this full-time, our timelines are subject to the mercy of our jobs and families.

Path of War:
Mystic (in layout)
Zealot (playtest wrapping up)
Combined Path of War Expanded book + print option

Akashic Mysteries:
Supplemental (in layout)
Combined Akashich Mysteries book + print option

Psionics
Augmented - Soulknives (in playtesting)
Augmented - Occult (in design)
Augmented - Focused Disciplines (in playtesting)

Steelforge (in playtesting)

We also have some other projects in the works internally, but those are the ones that are in the wild, so to speak. Andreas might want to supplement anything I may have missed. Internal projects often have a tendency to undergo drastic shifts in scope or timelines, which is why we don't really talk about them until we've announced them.

[MilleniaAntares]

Other

How do I submit content on dreamscarredpress.com? Through the forums?

Can an aberrant aegis enter and leave his armour form, or is it constantly affected by the armour?

I believe the errata that was on the old forums (but did not survive the transition) indicated that they changed it to be a full-round action to take the form.

[Milo v3]

We also have some other projects in the works internally, but those are the ones that are in the wild, so to speak. Andreas might want to supplement anything I may have missed. Internal projects often have a tendency to undergo drastic shifts in scope or timelines, which is why we don't really talk about them until we've announced them.

Does this post mean Tzocatl is now considered in this category despite previously being in playtesting?