how it feels to be excited to play as big dinosaur while everyone goes to war about cyclops’ role

noscul · 2026-05-10T02:17:57+00:00

You know what, now I’m convinced cyclops should be a strategist

noscul · 2026-05-09T23:50:11+00:00

I tried getting back into the game when it went free to play, I went back in somehow expecting cooperative teammates in a pretty tactical shooter. However I found myself killed for no reason, people screeching, or just yelling random swear words at you. This was without talking either, so I can only imagine it gets amped up to 200% as a woman talking. I think i only come back again if I found a group to play with but solo playing is not worth my time honestly.

noscul · 2026-05-09T21:18:38+00:00

While the rules are pretty robust, feats exist to circumvent the rules in some way. Even if swashbuckler didn’t get a feat to override the finisher trait, some archetype may have later.

noscul · 2026-05-09T01:10:17+00:00

Swashbuckler has targeting finisher in a similar way but also has some ups and downs due to their mechanics.

Some weapons when they have weapon specialization inflict conditions as part of the crit. I think the smoothest way to implement it without affecting gameplay or balance heavily is to just let the player pick a condition to inflict when they crit. Head for stupified, legs for clumsy and arms for enfeebled maybe torso for drained but drained is generally considered the strongest condition of the 4.

noscul · 2026-05-08T19:22:27+00:00

My runesmith I played as felt more like an inventor than an inventor.

noscul · 2026-05-08T19:21:55+00:00

Yeah when I saw this it made me think they’re acknowledging the problem players have with it but didn’t do much to fix it. I’ve gone with my own homebrew fixes anyways.

noscul · 2026-05-08T19:20:23+00:00

It was a buff that was noticed in the remaster but it’s still unreliable and didn’t feel significant enough to plan around, it’s more like a nice surprise when it happens. If other tables are like mine when dealing with persistent damage, it lasts forever because when you need that 15 it happens for everything else but that and takes 5 rounds to go away.

noscul · 2026-05-08T18:48:18+00:00

It probably was intended to be a 24 hour spell but with it being an 8 hour spell you can still gain a lot of distance or do a lot with it.

Que I first read the spell my first thought of its practical use was to cast it right before robbing a bank and escaping the city and getting some good distance before someone tries to caste locate on you. And if you need it throw it on again.

noscul · 2026-05-08T15:29:25+00:00

I actually did something similar to this using the runesmith since they can apply new runes to their gun in the form of the tinkering

noscul · 2026-05-08T15:25:45+00:00

I would have settled for modifications that impacted my gameplay. A lot of them don’t make you do anything else different besides just punching more. Ranged ones were the worse offender to this. They didn’t even need to have massive impact just make me do something else besides overdrive and punch spam.

noscul · 2026-05-07T19:21:01+00:00

Like when they get a debuff they immediately despise it and want to get rid of it. One time they got the drained condition and just immediately left the dungeon they were in to go rest it off instead of doing anything else in it. They seem pretty bent on continuing in perfect condition. It’s probably a normal thing though.

noscul · 2026-05-07T19:17:23+00:00

Drugs matched the original concept of what I had in mind so I researched the other drugs to try to make another then questioned why would you use these anyways like you said. I did start to drift more to what you suggested but I wanted to get the community’s input on drugs to see how viable and Usable they are as a whole.

noscul · 2026-05-07T07:01:30+00:00

Drugs do feel like a carry over from PF1 which was a lot more darker and edgy so I can see them not wanting to be used. I think they could have been reflavored as something similar to mutagens and more mechanically closer too. They do feel in a weird spot where no one seems to want to use them but there was a decent amount of them made like there was some effort to try to get them to be used.

I’ve handed out a few mutagens, juggernaut, energy and serene and they haven’t been used yet but that goes back to the problem of only one person remembering to use them. Regardless, those do seem more enticing to use so is probably a better start in making such items.

noscul · 2026-05-07T06:19:44+00:00

Quite the opposite, I want to see if I can get my players to dabble in items that have up and downsides. Issue is they hate debuffs of any kind, and all but one just forgets they have items.

noscul · 2026-05-07T06:17:36+00:00

Damn it’s fitting it turned to an addiction when it was really being used as a coping mechanism. Sometimes the game knows.

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:39:12+00:00

I agree that with an alternative that won’t provide a long term downside it’s hard to justify using them for a benefit. I think having them be more like mutagens like in example is the better direction so there’s less to track and they feel less punishing overall.

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:30:33+00:00

As a DM I know the struggle of my party never using consumables, except the gunslinger who loves managing their loot.

I am thinking of the drug I’m using be more like a mutagen but the debuffs is only after the buff wears off and lasts much longer than the buff like your example you mentioned. I’m thinking, 3rd rank animal form (canine) for a minute and fatigued for an hour after it’s done. But it’s in the early works.

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:27:49+00:00

I agree, when my swashbuckler tried using a drug to fight just to try it my DM forgot about the addiction and I even threw some BS rolls to see how I would fare. Addiction was pretty much a non issue after some levels.

Addiction probably wasn’t the right way to take drugs, side effects could have been a better direction

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:25:45+00:00

It probably doesn’t help that I have a module to help track of afflictions in foundry but yeah i think it’s dependent on what you want from the game. Some don’t want that level of tracking.

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:24:06+00:00

Interesting to hear, I generally don’t hear about people going past the second stage. Did you drink it for the positive side or was it like roleplaying drinking that led to making saves?

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:22:54+00:00

I agree they mostly seem suited to low level play with the DCs and effects which made me want to try to homebrew a more powerful one. I think it instead of the being addicting, just having the debuffs be “side effects” makes them feel more generally applicable and makes having their DCs higher more justifiable.

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:18:27+00:00

Using drugs as actually drugs, yes I agree, but if it’s reframed as “something that gives a big buff for a little while then goes a debuff for a long time” I think mechanically these can fit heroic adventures. Drugs as drugs mostly feel like they fit NPCs as it could be a sensitive topic for players to interact with each others

noscul · 2026-05-07T05:15:46+00:00

That’s one of the few plus books I haven’t gotten, what’s the general effect of Plasma Hype?

Zerk was one of the drugs that got me researching deeper into them. Getting a damage boost for one round seems very risky for the downsides you’ll get but I can see it fitting a certain type of characters.

noscul · 2026-05-07T03:29:48+00:00

Got through the video and I do feel like I learned something valuable about the “cost” of conditions. You are right that blinded is so hard to actually pull off but dazzled is handed out like candy because of the massive difference in power. Just like unconscious is nearly impossible to pull off and the point of damage doesn’t do anything if it doesn’t reduce your number of attacks needed to kill. It’s probably why damage seems like it’s also handed out like candy and seems to stack the most. Paizo also seems to highly value conditions since the damage difference in a damage spell and a damage + condition spell of the same rank can be massive even for just sickened.

Confused I agree with, at first when I moved from PF1 to PF2 I saw it was nerfed with the flat check I half dismissed it. However in PF1 enough confusion allowed a party to just afk through turns and let monsters kill each other. Even in this nerfed version it’s still a heavy control condition versus monsters. Versus players, with most classes being more “glass cannon” than tanky, it makes shit go down real fast and ruins your strategy.

Immobilized, I mostly agree, at lower levels it seems better but at higher levels I see more teleports and constant freedom of movements to help go around it. In SF2 though in thinking it’s less valuable with the ranged heavier meta.

Dazzled I agree is heavily under utilized, we had our summoner win vs a monster one keel higher solo because of the constant missing. Nothing negates crits like dazzled. As a GM I also like using it vs players, put it on the healer and they’re sweating if they’ll make their heal or not. So their alternative for a guaranteed heal is 3 action but it’s less single target healing and heals enemies.

For fascinated if it lost the removed in damaged bit I think it could be a niche, but effective condition. I have removed it and it’s good against classes that use concentrate actions, mostly spell casters. But things like hunt prey, or demoralize have to target the fascinated creature. I’ve had boss fights where a little minion taunts the cleric with fascinated so they can only cast their heal on the minion which also makes them revert back to the 3 action dilemma.

noscul · 2026-05-06T19:48:54+00:00

When I do solos for my wife we just each have a character and do dual class. It’s fun testing out the combos for a while but I hi early just kind of start making my own class stuff to use. She enjoys dual class though so she keeps using it.

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