Well, I tried Savage Worlds.

I kind of like the system, but as a player who didn't look at the book very much, I had barely any idea what was going on.

Pathfinder Homebrew Arcanist Exploit

 Well, I came up with a couple of minimally-creative arcanist exploits.

Arcane Discovery: The arcanist gains any arcane discovery, using his arcanist level as his effective wizard level.

Magus Arcana: The arcanist gains any magus arcana, using his arcanist level as his effective magus level and points from his arcane reservoir instead of his arcane pool.
Edit: Not likely this, as that would defeat the purpose of the Blade Adept archetype.

Spellstrike (Su): The arcanist gains Spellstrike, as per the magus class feature.

Spell Combat (Su): The arcanist gains Spell Combat, as per the magus class feature.

Saw Age of Ultron.

Finally saw the movie. Was excellent.

Pathfinder Class Archetype: Grudgemaster (Dwarf, Slayer)

Requires either Hatred or Ancient Enmity racial traits.

Favored Enemy (Ex): At all levels when a Grudgemaster gains Studied Target, he gains Favored Enemy, as per the ranger class feature, against any individuals who have wronged a member of his community, their family members, and any creature of the subtypes affected by either the Hatred or Ancient Enmity racial trait. This bonus increases against all targets of it whenever he gains a Studied Target increase but he does not select any new subtypes. The bonus against an individual who has wronged the community and his family members is lost upon the grudge being settled.

A Grudgemaster's Studied Target bonus decreases by 1 against any creature of the Humanoid type that he does not have Favored Enemy against. Dwarves with the Xenophobic racial trait do not have any penalty to the effectiveness against non-dwarf Humanoids who they do not have Favored Enemy against.

If a Grudgemaster chooses to end Studied Target while he still knows the location of the target and the target has not been defeated, lethally or otherwise, he cannot declare a new Studied Target until the next day.

This ability modifies Studied Target.

Yes, I was thinking of Warhammer Fantasy when I came up with this.

Thoughts on Paladins and Antipaladins

I don't like how in 3.0-derived games, paladins can only be lawful good. There should certainly be exemplars of all nine aligments in PF, but there are only exemplars of LG and CE.

The standard response to that among PF players seems to be something along the lines of "just play a warpriest." I find this to be idiotic and I have a feeling that a lot of those players don't understand how the two classes work either mechanically or thematically.

The warpriest is a priest first and a warrior second. He is certainly a better front-line fighter than a the cleric, but he still can't fight as well as paladins, rangers, fighters, barbarians, or a few other classes due to having the 3/4 BAB progression when not using the capstone ability. A paladin is a warrior first and foremost. He serves whatever religion he follows as a secondary concern, primarily focusing on vanquishing the forces of evil.

A paladin's abilities focus on defeating the forces of evil. He uses divine power because that will allow him to defeat the forces of evil more effectively than a non-magical fighter would.

A warpriest's abilities focus on harnessing divine power, primarily through his weapons and armor. He has no specific enemy that he focuses on.

Thematically, a warpriest serves his deity first. A paladin focuses primarily on being a paragon of lawful good, often while also serving a deity.

I understand why the APG only added one variant class for paladin, the antipaladin, but I wish Paizo had added a few others in later books (UC would have been a great book for that). Certainly, they could at least add a few in a Player Companion the same way that they added variant heritages for aasimars, tieflings, and dhampirs.

I definitely would like to see paragons of the Benevolence, Freedom, Order, Balance, Disorder, Domination, and Malevolence in addition to paragons of Justice and Destruction. A LE paladin-type, especially, would be a good class to have, perfect for evil overlord-type characters.

Summer 2015 Dark Heresy campaign, session 1

I decided to run a Dark Heresy campaign (second edition) over the summer (alternating weeks with the fourth edition of Legend of the Five Rings). Having avoided my usual player group (I don't feel like I need to air my grievances about why I have decided to no longer either GM or play with a terrible group of players, suffice to say that the only reason why I stayed with them so long was that no other table had open seats), it went a lot better than the last few times that I tried to GM. Thank you, Roll20!

I was only able to gather two players this time, but they managed to have a good player dynamic. One was an Adeptus Mechanicus Sage, while the other was an Adeptus Arbites Warrior.

They were dispatched to a planet to investigate rumors of the planetary governor committing acts of heresy. When they arrived, they took a break to investigate an archaeological dig conducted by the Mechanicum. They discovered some Necrons and wisely chose to leave it alone. They decided to then go and meet with the planetary governor's councilors to try to ingratiate themselves and get into his private vaults to see what was in there.

Eventually, the planetary governor allowed them to enter his vaults. When they entered, the vault was sealed behind them with a lascutter and the planetary governor informed them that he knew that they were Inquisitorial agents and that they would starve to death in his endless vaults.

They fought their way through a powerful beastman mutant (with the head and hooves of a bull) who occupied a labyrinthine section of the vault (because I'm not always a very creative GM) and other threats such as Khorne cultists, eventually finding another exit, after which their Inquisitor bombarded the planetary governor's palace from orbit and landed some Sisters of Battle to secure the capital city.

In the closing of the session, after all of the stuff was done that needed doing and all of the archaeotech was removed from the planet (including a few Titans, Baneblades, Shadowswords, and other superheavies), the player characters boarded their Inquisitorial transport just in time to see the last few refugees leave the planet before a two-stage cyclonic torpedo was fired to destroy it, taking out all of the deactive Necrons below the surface. That's one way to ensure that each session is a self-contained adventure even if the characters remain the same.

Weapon thoughts for Pathfinder: Crossbows and Firearms

Crossbows and early firearms in Pathfinder have one key thing about them that is absolutely unrealistic but I am willing to overlook for the sake of game balance: they reload absurdly fast compared to their real counterparts.

Reloading a two-handed firearm, a heavy crossbow, or a repeating crossbow is a full-round action. That means that another shot is ready to fire in six seconds. Unless you're absurdly strong, you're not going to be able to pull a heavy crossbow's string back with its windlass within six seconds and you are not going to have time to carry out all of the required steps for loading a matchlock firearm such as those that the firearms in Pathfinder presumably are given the general technology level of the setting. Even flintlock firearms, which take less time to load, could only be fired at four shots per minute by the best-drilled soldiers in the setting. Light crossbows, hand crossbows, and one-handed firearms have a similarly absurd rate of fire, but I can't easily discuss it because only full-round actions have a specific time duration (as a single round is six second).

As I said, I am willing to overlook this for the sake of game balance, but some things really seem to have been done wrong.

Crossbow range increments are definitely too long. Ten feet longer than a comparable bow (heavy crossbow/longbow, light crossbow/shortbow) is ridiculous. Even if, at what for a firearm would be called "muzzle velocity," a projectile from a bow and a crossbow were the same, the crossbow's bolt/quarrel/whatever you call it would slow down much faster than the arrow because of the fact that it is a much smaller projectile. This, combined with the slow rate of fire, meant that the only reason why it was more widespread in military use in the late medieval/Renaissance era than the longbow was because it took years and years of practice to build up the strength required to use a military-strength bow and that practice was very rare outside of England.

The crossbow in PF is generally (with the exception of one fighter archetype and one gunslinger archetype) used by characters who don't focus on ranged weapon combat. It's a weapon for characters who do not have proficiency with either shortbows or longbows and who are clearly in a lot of trouble if they have to use any ranged weapon at all. This includes nearly all nine-level spellcasting classes (the cleric may have a bow as his religion's favored weapon, in which case, he should take it) and a very small number of others (though the alchemist has a much better ranged attack as a class feature). Because of its status as an emergency backup weapon, I see no problem in cutting its range increment to something that makes more sense.

I also don't like that early firearms bypass armor and roll against touch AC. When you consider that in the era when firearms and full suits of plate armor coexisted, one way that armorsmiths demonstrated the quality of their product was to shoot it at close range (buyers looked for a dent that became known as the "bullet proof," leading to the phrase "bulletproof"), this really doesn't make sense. In my opinion, it would be better to increase the damage of all firearms across the board and to eliminate that rule for early firearms, though for advanced firearms (when not making a scatter shot), it still makes sense.

Pathfinder Archetype: Conversion of Musketeer (Cavalier archetype) to work with Samurai

One of the problems that I have with the alternate classes is that there aren't enough conversions of archetypes from the base class to the alternate. While I don't mind this so much for ninja/rogue and some of the paladin archetypes don't have a thematic reason to be converted to antipaladin, I'd like to see more conversions of cavalier archetypes to work with samurai.

Let's go with this one, a conversion of the Musketeer archetype for cavalier:

Tanegashima Expert: Samurai archetype

Loses heavy armor proficiency. Gains proficiency with firearms and can select fighter-only feats that specifically select firearms, such as Weapon Specialization

Gifted Firearm: replaces Mount, functions exactly as the feature of the same name for the Musketeer archetype for cavalier

Swift Powder: replaces Mounted Archer, functions exactly as the feature of the Musketeer

Must choose a specific type of firearm for Weapon Expertise instead of the usual weapons.

Pathfinder homebrew archetype: Game Warden (Ranger) first draft, seeking feedback

Ranger archetype: Game Warden

Loses medium armor and shield proficiency. Gains firearm proficiency.

Favored terrain modification: Protected Terrain. A game warden must select one terrain type as his favored terrain and does not select others. However, the bonus increases at the appropriate levels and is doubled.

Gunsmith: as per gunslinger feature, replaces Hunter’s Bond

Code of conduct: The game warden must swear to some authority to protect his terrain. This could be to the lord to whom the land belongs, to various natural entities, or to something else. The game warden must select three edicts based on the desires of the entity to whom the oath was sworn, one of which must be to fight against poachers. If he has violated any of those edicts, he loses the bonus of his Protected Terrain feature for 24 hours and may face additional consequences depending on what kind of authority the oath was sworn to.

Ranger Combat Style: Two-handed Firearms

Second Level: Rapid Reload, Point-Blank Shot, Focused Shot, Precise Shot

Sixth Level: Prone Shooter, Improved Precise Shot

Tenth Level: Pinpoint Targeting, Shot on the Run

Ranger Combat Style: One-handed Firearms

Second Level: Rapid Reload, Point-Blank Shot, Quick Draw, Precise Shot

Sixth Level: Prone Shooter, False Opening

Tenth Level: Pinpoint Targeting, Shot on the Run

Weapon issues in D&D/PF: Falchion

The falchion is a weapon that can probably be considered the classic weapon of orcs, along with the greataxe. Two-handed weapon, 1d8 slashing damage, and the best critical threat range that I know of even without Keen. Mechanically, this is an excellent weapon. However, its description does not fit that of a real falchion.

A falchion is a one-handed, single-edged, curved sword. Its grip is generally not long enough to be used two-handed. This is my primary objection to calling this weapon a “falchion.” I propose to divide this falchion into two different weapons, one to represent the real falchion and one more like the in-game statistics.

Falchion: 1d6S damage, 18-20/x2 crit, weighs 5lbs, costs 35gp

Kriegsmesser: stat block of old falchion

Orcs and half-orcs gain proficiency in both.

The stat block of the falchion can be used to represent both the falchion and the grossemesser. The most significant difference between the two weapons is how the blade is attached to the grip, something that has no mechanical effect in-game, so unless you’re somebody who thought that the infamous list of polearms was a good idea (including a few examples of separate weapons that differed only in how the head was attached to the shaft: via socket, via tang, or something else) or a HEMA enthusiast, you probably don’t care enough about the differences between the weapons for it to matter to you. If you are, why are you playing D&D or Pathfinder when you have Riddle of Steel and MYFAROG to cover the fine differentiation between weapon types that you are clearly looking for (note: I haven't actually looked at either rulebook, I just know them by reputation). The d20 System’s combat and weapon mechanics are too simple for that to be of any importance and I am very happy about that because if combat takes too long, it gets in the way of the story. The story is, of course, the most important part of an RPG.

Pathfinder Classes 2: Gunslinger

Ultimate Combat adds gunslinger as a class for Pathfinder. This is my favorite martial class, both in its flavor (I am a firearm enthusiast and I am a fan of the Western genre of fiction that this class draws influence from) and its mechanics. I keep hearing about how it is overpowered, but the people who say that are absolutely wrong.

Based on the fighter template: d10HD, full BAB, good saves are Fortitude and Reflex.

Any class can gain proficiency in firearms, but no class can use them as well as the gunslinger. That really is the beginning and end of its features.

The most unique feature of this class is its "grit" resource. Basically, you get a pool of grit points that you spend on your gunslinger deeds and can, unlike  a monk's ki points, replenish during the day by doing things that look impressive.

At every odd level, you can select a deed that you can spend grit points on. Some of these deeds are special attacks, some are defensive things like better dodging or initiative, and some do things like let you shot out locks.

Why do people say that it's overpowered? GM's are too lazy to learn how to deal with the gunslinger. They have to spend grit points to make attacks against touch AC when they're well within range of an archer or evoker. Encounters don't have to show up right in front of the players, contrary to apparent popular belief. Firearms and ammunition are much more expensive than bows and have a much lower rate of fire. A composite longbow with a decent strength rating will even do more per-shot damage than a musket, let alone per-round damage accounting for the ability to take multiple shots on a full attack instead of having too spend a full-round action reloading (standard action with Rapid Reload, swift action with Beneficial Bandolier, essentially restricting a gunslinger using any early firearms to two shots per round on rare occasions and one per round most of the time at best). Firearms also misfire on a critical failure, which causes additional problems, and bows don't have that.

The entire dislike for the gunslinger is based on the fact that people think that their fantasy settings are based on medieval Europe where firearms didn't exist, even though the technology level and political setup of most settings is much more similar to Renaissance Europe, where firearms most definitely did exist.

If you want to build a gunslinger, the Pistolero archetype is usually the way to go. Faster reload on one-handed firearms makes them better in almost all cases than two-handed firearms. Even with modern firearms, you'll have to dig into the Reign of Winter adventure path to find two-handed firearms that can make all of the character's attacks in a single round (however, if that book is allowed, definitely go for Best Rifle M1981 because ЗА РОДИНУ is a thing to shout while holding it, товарищ can shout it with Nagant revolver, but doesn't seem right). Techslinger is great for certain settings, but outside of those settings, you're not likely to encounter a laser pistol or something.

Character biography 1: Caradwyn

Here's an old character of mine from a campaign that has since ended. Caradwyn, an elven witch, whose powers of plague earned him the non-serious title "Adolf the Witch, Hitler of the Trees" from the GM and whose prehensile hair earned him a more serious title: "The Ebola Gorgon." Several GM's who have heard of this character have banned me from the Neutral Evil alignment because of how I RPed him.

Caradwyn was born 133 years ago, spending the first eighty of those years living with other elves, but when the Rider in the Night returned, his home village was struck by a plague. Caradwyn was the only survivor, while the rest were transformed into the undead. hThough those monstrosities were quickly given the peace that they deserved by a passing ranger patrol. They saw that the one survivor had been corrupted by this evil. As they were not allowed to kill their fellow elf, they branded him so that he would never be allowed into another elven settlement.

He wandered across the lands, always accompanied by the raven Fyndal. Wherever he went, pestilence followed in his wake.

At the start of the campaign, he was in prison awaiting trial for having killed another man's sheep to feed his raven, however a demon lord attacked the settlement and he joined a couple of adventurers in order to escape.

His highlights in the campaign include gaining a lich as a slave for a few days (Command Undead doesn't technically allow for that, but the GM rolled a 1 for the lich's Will save) and using him to singlehandedly annihilate encounters several CR above the APL, exacting revenge on  the elves by afflicting the same group of rangers who branded him with plague (mechanically: Contagion spell) and destroying the entire forest that they were staying in (mechanically, Blight hex cast multiple times over and over), and exacting revenge on the bandits who nearly killed him and the rest of the party by flying over (mechanically: Flight hex) and dropping the body of somebody who died of his plague into their little walled campsite, then casting Putrefy Food and Drink on the food supply and Feast of Ashes on the bandits so that they would feel compelled to eat the body.

The campaign ended when the adventurers were exploring an ancient temple. Something happened that caused the party's magical power to drain (mechanically: three natural 1's rolled consecutively by different players caused the GM to rule that all spellcasters must forget a spell). In his rage at having his magical power drained, the sorcerer to use all that remained of his power to seal the adventurers in the tomb kill them.

Thoughts on Pathfinder Classes part 1: Alchemist

I'll be doing a series of posts on what I think of classes in Pathfinder. I'll focus more on the ones unique to PF rather than the classic ones (fighter, wizard, sorcerer, cleric, druid, rogue, paladin, ranger, monk, bard, barbarian). Those classes have been discussed enough over the years that people generally know how even the ones that are the primary reason why I haven't switched over to 5e. I will also do a few of these on particularly interesting archetypes.

We can start with the alchemist, from the Advanced Player's Guide:

The alchemist's role in the party is an unusual one. Although it has significant combat power if played right, it should not be a primary combatant. Although it has pseudo-spellcasting ability, it cannot function as anything comparable to a wizard, cleric, or druid. Although it gets a decent amount of skill points per level (4+INT, has a lot of abilities dependent on INT, so generally has a good INT score).

Let's go over its main class features right now:

BAB: 3/4, like most support classes
Saves: Fortitude and Reflex

Only proficient in simple weapons and bombs. Proficient in light armor but not shields. Though I have no problem with lightly-armored characters being primary combatants (DEX-based AC is great for dealing with touch attacks), the weapons issue is why I would only build a front-line alchemist in a race with racial weapon proficiency (most likely half-orc, because although real falchions are one-handed, in-game falchions are two-handed, as are greataxes and the class is not proficient with shields).

Alchemy:
This is an interesting ability. Parts of it are useless in PFS (I avoid PFS because it removes a lot of fun stuff) because of the ban on item crafting. However, it allows the class to use Craft (Alchemy) to do things other than craft items: identify a potion. Along with that, it allows the alchemist to create "extracts" that function similarly to spells (up to sixth level), but must be prepared in advance with a shorter preparation time than actual spells, though without the discovery allowing for infusions, they can only be used on the alchemist who made them (infusions can be passed out to other party members: the barbarian can get an Enlarge Person infusion for better barbarianing, for example). The alchemist carries around a formula book, functioning exactly like a spellbook for wizards (he can copy extracts from a spellbook, but wizards cannot copy spells from a formula book). Additionally, the alchemist gains the Brew Potion feat for free (again, useless in PFS) even though he wouldn't typically be able to take the feat without multiclassing due to alchemist not being a spellcasting class and the feat requiring a caster level.

Bombs:
This is definitely what I would focus on if I was to play another alchemist. Splash damage weapon of 1d6 damage for every odd level (same progression as rogues' sneak attack damage) in alchemist is pretty powerful, and the alchemist additionally adds his INT modifier to all splash weapons. Some discoveries modify the bomb: although the standard bomb does fire damage, discoveries allow for every other type of energy damage, though some types of bomb do reduced damage (concussive, for example, is 1d4). Next time I'm GMing PF, there will be an NPC who focuses on using Greater Plague Bomb to try to spread disease wherever he goes. That would make a great villain. I can't see nearly as many ways to make a mad scientist hero.

Mutagen:
This ability works similarly to a barbarian's rage, but longer-lasting (ten minutes per level). It boosts a physical ability score with a penalty to a mental ability score, while boosting natural armor. Its effects get increased by discoveries, eventually making him into a front-line monster (much more literally than the usual sense).

The alchemist is definitely a fun class, though not one of my preferred classes so I don't have any plans to play one. It does suffer a bit by doing too many things alright but nothing particularly well, so you need to focus your discoveries on one particular topic if you want to make a mechanically good alchemist. Another thing that you should definitely seek out is archetypes that benefit your chosen area of focus. Grenadier, for example, goes unsurprisingly well with bombs, for example.

I often play in small groups, so gestalt characters are relatively common. The classes that seem like the best fit for matching with alchemist depend on what the alchemist's focus is. A mutagen alchemist should go for full BAB and martial weapon proficiency. Barbarian makes the most sense for that, as rage seems thematically appropriate for the mutagen. A bomb alchemist can go for that (full BAB is always helpful), but one particular rogue archetype, the Underground Chemist, allows you to do sneak attack damage with splash weapons, essentially allowing two damage rolls for the first bomb thrown.

One thing that you should always keep in mind for this class is that it relies on consumable items that it creates. A particularly strict GM may require you to say that you're preparing whatever items you're preparing instead of letting the party assume that in the same hour that the spellcasters prepare their spells, the alchemist brews a mutagen, in addition to time at the beginning of the day to prepare extracts, while further requiring the alchemist to specifically say that he's making more catalyst vials for his bombs.

And so it begins...

This will be a geek blog. I plan on focusing it around RPG's, primarily Pathfinder at first, but other topics will be covered.

One particular setting that I am a big fan of is that of Warhammer 40,000, so you should expect to see references to it. I can't afford expensive pieces of plastic at present, so I don't play it, though.

Other topics may include Star Trek, Babylon 5, Firefly, video games, and books.

I'll try to avoid politics, though I have strong opinions on a lot of things. I may end up covering geeky topics that have a strong connection to politics, but no direct political stuff. When politics are not directly relevant, they have no purpose but to make people angry. Same applies to religion.