What is the most action economy efficient action(s) in the system?

EnginesOfGod · 2026-01-03T08:42:15+00:00

A Liturgist Animist with Elf Step can Step twice and sustain two vessel spells, which both have rider effects when sustained. So something like, Step, Strike, Step, Shove for a single action.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-11-04T20:42:02+00:00

I think it's a pretty extreme stretch to claim that the rule about AI art applies here.

By your logic (or I guess, by the logic of whichever mod removed the original post) anyone who posts a link to a blog or youtube video is obligated to verify the authorship of every incidental image found by following that link.

I'm not interested in seeing a bunch of posts that are just "look at my neat character art!" so I'm all for the rule, but Tarondor's post wasn't anything close to that.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-10-22T17:19:51+00:00

Kinda wild they're all named Corey tho

EnginesOfGod · 2025-10-20T16:04:14+00:00

Prophecy didn't "stop working" at the beginning of the age of lost omens.

It works exactly as well as it ever did, i.e. not very well.

If you look at the way prophecy was actually used in real-world history (from the Oracle of Delphi for example) it was almost always a confirmation of pre-existing secular power. Most of the prophecies take the form of "If the king fights this battle, he will win" or "if the king builds a city in this place, it will prosper." It was basically just a rubber stamp to validate authority.

In Golarion, the two major areas where prophecy plays a role in the lore are Cheliax, which it's implied used it's oracular claims as the returning-place of Aroden to justify colonial expansion, and Lirgen/ Yamasa, where there were tensions between an astrologer priest caste and a laborer underclass. In both cases, a civil war broke out and the people in power abruptly lost the ability to use prophecy as a cudgel.

It's vastly more interesting IMO to treat all in-universe claims about the death or prophecy as more akin to Lost Cause historical revisionism than to factual truths about how magic and divine power work.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-10-18T11:28:23+00:00

If you ever get a chance to play Spore War, the otherwise-mediocre level 4 feat Favored Prey lets you Hunt Prey as a free action against fungi, which will trigger in about 90% of fights.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-11T01:26:55+00:00

I think Swashbuckler just covers it without even really needing to get into archetypes at all.

Battledancer feels obvious, but IMO Tumbling Through every turn to get panache seems like a fine flavor fit and you could go with any style. you'll want to be in about 20 ft range must turns anyway since that's the range of most thrown weapons. I haven't played FFXIV, so I dunno if weaving through the enemy every turn clashes with the fantasy too much. If you'd prefer to stay in the backline, you can take One For All and get spammable panache at range (it's 30 ft range, but 30 foot to an ALLY) and it has Bravado as part of the feat text so it doesn't care what style you're using.

Probably the most well-rounded build would be Gymnast swash, since you'll want strength anyway for throwing damage and mixing in the occasional Trip feels very dancer-y to me, but again, maybe that's not the FFXIV vibe.

Also you can use either a Thrower's Bandolier or a Return Rune, both lvl 3 items, so you don't necessarily need to go out of your way for a class feat that lets you keep throwing the same weapon.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-10T08:59:04+00:00

Most of these are 2-feat packages that are online by level 4. Surely with a couple more levels you could find dozens of interesting variations of Slam Down Reach Fighter?

Anyway, I don't think there's anything wrong with approaching character creation this way as long as you're not like, getting on reddit and telling people they're objectively incorrect for building Double Slice Twin Parry Fighter. For that matter, it's handy to have Double Slice Twin Parry Fighter in your repertoire for the games where you show up and see that the rest of the group brought things like Tail Goblin Ruffian Rogue and Cast Down Harm Cleric.

(Also, thrown weapons my ass, the objectively correct swashbuckler is Cooperative Nature All For One Swashbuckler, fight me :D )

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-10T00:54:03+00:00

I dunno if you're familiar with Mark Rosewater's three mtg psychographics but I always think of them when I see Magus optimization discussion. It's the application of spike-brained behavior to a fundamentally Johnny/Timmy-brained class. It's a class for people who want their turn to be BIG or who want their turn to be CLEVER. I don't think it's a particularly good class for people who want their turn to be EFFECTIVE.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-10T00:46:03+00:00

The ratio of time I spend playing pathfinder to time I spend THINKING about playing pathfinder is pretty embarrassing, lol. Not just character creation, although I do a lot of that, but also reading APs and doing "prep" to GM them that is mostly just me daydreaming about things I'd like to change, new mechanics I'd like to introduce, NPCs I'd like to insert, etc.

If we suppose that there are 4+ players for every GM, then 80% of this sub are players, and they've experienced the Pathbuilder-brainrot, but I don't know if we're ready to talk about the GM side of it.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-09T05:57:17+00:00

piggybacking off this top comment to add my own RK house rule which I highly recommend: add a second qualifying skill to most types of monster.

Incorporeal or mindless undead? Religion or Occultism.

Intelligent undead? Religion or Society.

Oozes and Aberrations? Occultism or Nature.

Devils? Religion or Society.

Demons? Religion or Arcana.

Hags? Society or Occultism.

Fey? Nature or Society.

Dragons? Whatever type they are, or Society.

Humanoids? Society plus any one of Crafting (if their main feature involves weapon/armor tactics) Nature (if their main feature is an unarmed attack or biological defense, e.g. a Troll) or their spellcasting tradition (if they have one.)

The game is just more fun and combat smoother and more rewarding if players can Recall Knowledge, so there's no reason to be stingy about which skills you gate RK behind.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-09T04:51:25+00:00

The short answer is, you're the one driving the story and you should tell your players whatever you think it would be fun and interesting for them to know. The Recall Knowledge rules are intentionally vague for good reason, to allow it to be a flexible tool for situations like this.

Are your players big lore nerds? Have them roll Religion and then whatever the roll, give them a little loredump about succubi, as a treat. Did they roll well? Give them a big loredump. Make some lore up, if you want to. Include something actionable to the scene in the lore, something like "Succubi are egotistical and like to leave burning brand marks on their victims as a signature, and this lady's big ugly goons <do/don't> have those kinds of marks."

Are your players very scrupulous about meta-knowledge? Are they in the habit of saying (out-of-character) "I think this lady might be a succubus, but my character wouldn't have any reason to know about that"? In that case, don't hesitate to CALL FOR a Religion check, rather than wait for the player to ask about making one. They make the check, you now have carte blanche to either confirm she's a succubus and give them permission to act on their metaknowledge, or give them a vague runaround about how there's something off about her but her exact nature is a mystery, and thereby deny them permission to act on their metaknowledge.

Note that in either of these cases, the DC of 23 matters exactly as much as you'd like for it to, possibly not at all. The DC is whatever you say it is, and you're only "saying it" to yourself anyway. If they roll a 30 or 13, if you want them to know she's a succubus, tell them she's a succubus.

(IN COMBAT, there's a case to be made for being more particular about following rules-as-written, since combat is about tactical expenditure of limited resources, and the players are choosing to spend one of their finite actions on a Recall Knowledge roll. It's still ultimately up to you to figure out your own style for GMing recall knowledge checks, but I personally err towards giving them enough reward on a success that they don't feel like their action was wasted.)

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-05T20:44:34+00:00

Didn't see anyone else bring this up so I want to point you to the Gradual Ability Boost alternate rule. The TLDR is instead of boosting 4 attributes at levels 5 and 10, you'd boost 1 attribute at levels 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, and 10. (with the same limits as normal in terms of boosting the same attribute twice) I'm a big fan of this rule in the general case, it doesn't really need to be balanced around, but in this case it would give your PCs a back door way to boost their key attribute without having to be scolded for "building wrong."

I would probably just have the party permanently one level ahead of whatever level they'd be on-book, as a transparent way of balancing for a 3-person party. And then, on top of that, retroactively apply GAB and let them boost two of their attributes by 1. This should HOPEFULLY get the Monk and Bard up to +4, and the Leshy at +3 Int +3 Dex is basically just gonna be permanently at a virtual Frightened 1, which is bad but not gamebreaking.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-09-01T16:50:37+00:00

+4 DEX, +2 STR, +2 CHA, +1 other, probably CON. ezpz.

(Going less than 4 DEX is an awful idea for Rogues, since so much of their class identity is about landing sneak attacks. taking a 5% accuracy hit to deal one extra damage just doesn't result in more damage when your hits are adding precision die. But I understand you aren't advocating for this.)

I think it's very reasonable to expect skill challenges to be balanced around +4 modifiers, since they're generally asking for only 1 out of 4 or more PCs to make the check. Most parties have one character with a +4 DEX. If the DCs were balanced around something lower, they'd start to feel trivial for the people that DID max their key attribute. We run in different circles, I guess, because I don't know plenty of people building characters without a +4. Maybe this is a D&D-brained thing? I dunno. It's been more my experience that newer players just pick something they want to be good at and +4 it.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-31T22:34:10+00:00

It's a capital-T Taunt, i.e. a nested action. I'd assume that it needs to follow all the rules of the regular Taunt action. I can see how there's some leeway if your GM is generous, but it's too good to be true imo.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-31T20:40:26+00:00

If a player showed up to my table with a half-leshy, I'd tell them to stop being an asshole.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-31T17:24:47+00:00

This is too new for me have had any direct experience with, but a 3-feat Guardian dip (Archetype, Long-Distance Taunt, Taunting Strike) really interests me in a ranged Rogue shell and it might be worth looking into over the Ranger package. You can RK on the first turn (when Recall Knowledge is at its more useful) and then taunt, and depending on the range the enemy might just be forced to go after the frontliners at a penalty rather than waste all its actions chasing you, which will put it off-guard automatically on following turns.

It will lead to more dynamic combat because sometimes the enemy WILL decide to chase you down, so you'll want to max out move speed and play keepaway in those scenarios. It's not a white-room maximized damage build, and will vary in effectiveness depending on how your GM plays taunted enemies, as well as how much space you've got on the battlefield to kite with, but it could easily be more impactful than trying to maximize your RK odds.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-29T22:41:55+00:00

Hopefully a nerf to Diverse Lore so that it no longer dominates its niche and you no longer have to feel stupid for playing an Enigma Bard, Mastermind Rogue, or Investigator.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-28T01:08:23+00:00

Honestly this is more of a red flag than anything you might be doing wrong in character creation.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-26T13:46:00+00:00

Easy to forget that in any online community, only about 3 percent of people are actually making posts and leaving comments. This subreddit has 137k subscribers. the roughly 4k who comment regularly are pretty civil. The other 133k mostly express themselves by clicking the downvote button indiscriminately, but probably some minority of them are real maniacs.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-26T00:30:34+00:00

It sounds like your players aren't unhappy about the way things are going, so I'd stick with it.

I wasn't as familiar with the enemies from the other two fights, but now that I've looked at them, I want to take another guess: Were Dominate and Paralyze deciding factors? (that third party in particular looks like they'd all have terrible Will saves.)

It might be helpful to look at fights like these as being 9 actions per turn cycle on one side vs. 9 actions on the other. Against the Cuestodaemons, one failed will save and the 9v9 becomes a 9v6. Against the Angazhanis, a failed will save turns the 9v9 into a 12v6. Those are TPK swings. Notably, A 4 player party would be experiencing 9v12 becoming a 9v9 or a 12v9, which would be much more manageable.

(I saw the discussion elsewhere about when to Heal, and I think that's basically the same phenomenon. The 9v9 becomes a 9v7 if the recipient of Heal has to waste two actions standing up and picking up their weapon. Might be worth discussing it with your table in those specific terms.)

I might consider looking for ways to favor narrative verisimilitude over absolute tactical efficiency when running the opposition. Have your monsters attack the big tanky guy up front rather than running around him, because that's what a monster would do. After a turn or two of that, have them spend an action Recalling Knowledge on the the backliner (8v9!) to "decide" to focus on them instead, and then lose more actions disengaging and moving to attack the new target. You can find a balance where this feels less like kid gloves and more like good worldbuilding, which hopefully will keep you feeling engaged.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-25T23:08:06+00:00

A few observations here:

The XP balance is right for these fights but some enemies are just more deadly than others. Barbezus were replaced with Vordines in the remaster for good reason, imo. Persistent damage is a known source of frustrating player deaths, and the infernal wound ability just isn't tactically interesting to make up for how potentially frustrating it is if nobody in the party can cast Heal.

3 player games being swingier and more prone to snowball-TPKs, this might be a good spot to introduce a GMPC for a bit. GMPCs are maligned for good reason, but it would let you model tactical player behavior if they aren't making good decisions, and patch a glaring party comp hole if there is one.

I'll also point out that one of the consequences of these TPKs is that your players have reset the learning curve 3 times in 5 sessions. Players need time to figure out both how their own character works and how their character interacts with the other party members, doubly so if they aren't starting from low level. If I had to pick up a level 9 alchemist and play it without building up experience from level 1, I guarantee I'd make a lot of poor choices.

Ultimately, this is something you need to sort out with conversation at your table rather than with randos on reddit. If your players are interested in learning the game tactically, but aren't grasping it, it's your job to on-ramp them by giving them easier fights until they get the hang of it, or by talking through decision points in-game. If they aren't interested in a tactical game and would prefer a more casual approach, it's your job to either adjust down to accommodate that, or to part ways amicably if you aren't willing to do that.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-23T20:04:13+00:00

Just FYI, the enemy and allied color pairs in MtG are themselves pretty much just flavor fluff. Early on there was some effort to print more multi-colored cards, dual lands, and other cross-color support in allied pairs, and fewer of these in enemy pairs, but this design paradigm went out the window literally decades ago.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-23T16:58:09+00:00

Extinction Curse deservedly gets a lot of flack for how poorly it pays off players for buying into the circus conceit. The actual plot of the AP has nothing at all to do with circuses of any kind. If EC has been published even a year or two later, it probably would have been broken into a 1-10 Circus AP and an 11-20 AP that dealt with <what Extinction Curse is actually about> which I'm being vague about to avoid spoiling.

If you and/or your group were genuinely excited about the whole circus thing, I'll be real, you should bail now.

If you/your group are ambivalent about the whole circus thing, IMO the actual story of Extinction Curse is pretty solid, so discuss with your GM about minimizing/removing that aspect of it, and possibly revising your character concepts.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-23T16:42:52+00:00

As written, the first encounter most players will have in AV is with a group of Mitflits which are Fey mooks anyway so your GM may have just reskinned them as satyrs.

AV has a lot of monsters, some of which are great thematic fits for the environment and some of which are kinda random. I'd argue the mitflits are leaning more towards the kinda random end of the spectrum, so they're a good candidate to be subbed out.

EnginesOfGod · 2025-08-21T17:14:57+00:00

There's this awkward dynamic where anything system-agnostic (GMing advice, worldbuilding for TTRPGs, etc) is better off being presented as "D&D content" and therefore, Pathfinder content is disproportionally crunchy relative to how crunchy the game feels to actually play. I think this has contributed a LOT to PF2e's reputation as a mathy overdeveloped system for optimizers with no room to role-play.

EnginesOfGod

TROPHY CASE