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[Kaelik]

This is stupid. Instead of comparing the paladin to the wizard, cleric, or druid--who all "rule the roost," so to speak--why don't we compare the paladin to his peers? As in, the classes that aren't primary spellcasters. Can the paladin take equal-CR opponents?

Um, that's pretty much exactly what we did. And the answer was no. And then someone trotted out the tired old Paizo defense that since no characters can deal with monsters of their CR, it's okay that the Paladin can't.

A brief foray went into how in fact many characters can and how Pathfinder is about making those characters worse, and not the ones we already know can't better.

[Psychic Robot]

My apologies then. My eyes sort of glaze over when I see walls of text.

EDIT: While Jason sucks at writing--God, his prose is stale--here are some useful bits of information.

Of all the changes, smite evil was perhaps the most contentious on the message boards. Everyone seemed to have an idea of how this iconic ability should work. In the end, it was decided that smite evil really should last until your evil foe is vanquished, making this ability useful even if you miss with your first attack. But we did not stop there, the amount of bonus damage dealt (that is, 1 point per paladin level) doubles if the selected foe is an evil outsider, dragon, or undead. Smite attacks also ignore any damage reduction the target might have. Finally, the paladin is protected from harm gaining a deflection bonus to her AC equal to her Charisma modifier against attacks made by the target. Suffice to say, you do not want to be on the receiving end of a paladin's smite evil.

Smiting now sucks quite a bit less. Before, you had a standard action smite. Now, you have a smite that lasts the full encounter (doing +26 damage to the gelugon in question) and which grants you a bonus to AC equal to your Cha mod. Again, not spectacular, but significantly improved over the previous "not a full attack lol."

In addition, her spellcasting progression is a little bit faster now (matching the ranger's), it is based off her Charisma modifier

This reduces the Paladin's MAD somewhat, which is a positive change.

The issue with 95% of high-level monsters in D&D is lazy developers--instead of giving the monsters interesting abilities, the devs decided to slap on a bunch of SLAs. Terrible design.

So how does the gelugon fight the paladin, exactly? This is what I'm interested in. It is completely unrealistic to expect the gelugon to have its buffs on all the time. Full stop and whatnot. You're telling me that the gelugon spends several seconds every minute or so pausing to cast its spells? No. Gelugons, being not-computer-generated-mobs, are similar to other thinking creatures in that they have better things to do than that. They also would forget. (Let's say you have to take a drink of water from a water bottle every minute. How long are you going to keep that up? Not very.)

Now, what about this sneaking business? The gelugon likely has the drop on the paladin no matter what, even though Pathfinder's skill set takes less of a dump on CC skills than 3.5's. The teleporting ensures that he can retreat at a moment's notice, which basically makes him immune to anything that doesn't one-shot him or cast dimensional anchor.

So we will have to assume that the gelugon is going to stay and fight the paladin rather than teleport out, as the topic is moot otherwise. Thus, the gelugon gets the drop on the paladin and does...what? Trap the paladin in a hemispherical ice wall? Buff himself with unholy aura? (No, he probably did that when he teleported away.) Summon more devils? Create illusions? Tell me which of these he is going to do in the first round of combat.

As a final note, all characters in Pathfinder have a CR equal to their level -2, which means that the paladin is actually CR 11, so she'd have to be level 15 before being "equal" to the gelugon.

[virgil]

Holy Word vs. HD=to Caster Level= save or Deafened. Nope, that doesn't matter.

1) There is no save against the effects dumb fuck.

Paizo changed Holy Word and its ilk; Will saves are allowed for each effect to reduce the duration to a round (or 1d4 rounds for blinded) as well as a Will save to change it from death to 3d6+CL damage. The same goes for the banishment part (target has a -4 to keep from being banished).

[Kaelik]

It is completely unrealistic to expect the gelugon to have its buffs on all the time. Full stop and whatnot. You're telling me that the gelugon spends several seconds every minute or so pausing to cast its spells?

1) As was already presented by Frank, Even if he doesn't keep it up all day, which he does, he still has all his buffs (aka, two of them) up.

2) Yes he spend 3 seconds and exactly zero physical effort every minute to keep Unholy Aura. Yes he thinks about flying every 10 minutes or so. Deal.

Thus, the gelugon gets the drop on the paladin and does...what? Trap the paladin in a hemispherical ice wall? Buff himself with unholy aura? (No, he probably did that when he teleported away.) Summon more devils? Create illusions? Tell me which of these he is going to do in the first round of combat.

Well, since Persistent Illusion is a purely mental standard action. I'd start off by creating an image of a Balor, then when he blows his Smite on that (how does the smite even fucking work if the Paladin designates a non-Valid target?) and maybe casts some buff spells, and I keep hiding and laughing. Maybe after he's caught on to the whole, Images of Demons thing I encase him in an Icewall that is not a Hemisphere, so that he has to waste his boots flight. Then I start spamming More Images of Walls and shit, just to drive him batty. Them Images of Angels shooting at the walls to make him think some divine beings are helping him, then some Devils.

Oh yeah, and then I show up an Full attack the crap out of him once he stops attacking images. Then Teleport out and Image spam some more.

Of course, that's being nice, because at some point I'll just break out the Cone of Colds from behind Illusory walls of Ice and Ice Storms on his ass. But only after phase, fuck with Paladin till he casts half his spells, uses all his smites, and doesn't know what's real.

As a final note, all characters in Pathfinder have a CR equal to their level -2, which means that the paladin is actually CR 11, so she'd have to be level 15 before being "equal" to the gelugon.

It's fine to say that, but unless they changed the actual encounter tables, the fact remains that if you have a party of level 13 consisting on one character, you should have 5% EL 14 encounters, and 15% EL 10-13 encounters, and you should have a 50% chance of victory against a CR 13 foe.

Paizo changed Holy Word and its ilk; Will saves are allowed for each effect to reduce the duration to a round (or 1d4 rounds for blinded) as well as a Will save to change it from death to 3d6+CL damage. The same goes for the banishment part (target has a -4 to keep from being banished).

Did I call Piazo nerfs the Cleric or did I call Piazo Nerfs the Cleric.

[MartinHarper]

Yes he spend 3 seconds and exactly zero physical effort every minute to keep Unholy Aura.

How do you know it is zero physical effort?

[Kaelik]

Yes he spend 3 seconds and exactly zero physical effort every minute to keep Unholy Aura.

How do you know it is zero physical effort?

Because it is a purely mental action.

[Absentminded_Wizard]

d20 SRD[/url]]A spell-like ability has no verbal, somatic, or material component, nor does it require a focus or have an XP cost. The user activates it mentally.

No verbal or somatic components = no physical activity.

[Roy]

I love how you rant about stuff that isn't even fucking relevant to the Gaming Den. You're hopeless. How about you try telling Hawk Diesel how bad you think the game will be over there, instead of being a coward about it by posting it here where no one gives a shit and it only serves to enhance your stupid, overweight (not that that term should be unfamiliar to you) ego.

And yes, keep thinking I'm 'trolling' you, please. I'll just laugh in your fat fucking face and call you a [EDITED] for being so passive aggressive with someone's fucking playstyle on a completely different site, and calling them an idiot over what version of Dungeons & Dragons they play (that's just the pinnacle of nerdrage). Leave the Gaming Den, please. You are not funny, and full of Fail.

Because the Paizils are hopeless, so all I'm really concerned with is quarantine duty. Keeping my players, that I actually care about away from terrible systems is just par for the course. You wouldn't let YOUR buddies stumble into things like that without warning them would you? Actually don't answer that, as you're too busy wanking off to straw men, and whining and flailing all over the place because you lost an argument Iron Mongrel. Who is passive aggressive, again?

But enough of your Fail.

Second 10' reach. Meet 5' step. Even slowed people get this. Yes, the Gelugon can make a single melee and then move far enough away that Seelah can't attack except with her bow. But that eliminates your AoO scenario, as well as multiple attacks per round. Also, she could close in on him (even slowed), forcing him to choose between multiple attacks or 1 attack and movement which would provoke and AoO from her, or retreat and moving forward to attack on another round. 10' reach has its advantages, but immunity to melee attacks is not one of them.

Not true. Slow halves your speed. And things that reduce your speed stop you from taking 5 foot steps.

Also, since Unholy Aura is an at will ability, the fact it only lasts 13 rounds each time doesn't matter, as it's going in the fight with at least most of the duration left. Not to mention teleport.

Or go halfling hurler and spazz out with like a gajillion acid flasks. It has Acid Resistance 10, but you're doing 33 damage per shot these days.

Not in Pathfinder; you specifically can't sneak attack with a grenade-like weapon.

Ok. So they dragged others down to gimp level. But how does that justify a character not being able to handle an equal level creature they should be perfectly built to handle on the grounds of them being immune or resistant to most of their abilities?

Fine, Spell Resistance, Asshat. And Deafened still doesn't really fucking matter.

Proof you have no idea what you are talking about.

uot;]I haven't read enough of your stuff to know for sure, but from what I have read, it seems you prefer your games to have 1- or2- round combats(rocket launcher tag is your term, I believe), would that be a correct assessment? I'm trying to get a better viewpoint to your prefered playstyle/game design theory.

I suppose I'll get a much more intimate view once I've read through the tome pdf.

All wrong. It isn't that he 'prefers' it, it's that he realizes that's how D&D 'is' without him doing anything at all to alter that. And so he recommends you have the ability to actually deal with that, so you can ya know, play the game.

This is stupid. Instead of comparing the paladin to the wizard, cleric, or druid--who all "rule the roost," so to speak--why don't we compare the paladin to his peers? As in, the classes that aren't primary spellcasters. Can the paladin take equal-CR opponents? There are undoubtedly some cases in which he can, but, more often than not, he cannot. (Battle Blessing + SpC is still nifty, though.) And the point of proving this is what? That non-casters are underpowered? That Paizo lied to the gaming public? We all know that. We all know that demons and devils and anything that can fly or teleport laugh at the classes that can't.

If you do that, then they still fail as there are a few of them that are actually still relevant at level 13, and even the ones that are not can do better... not to mention if one were specifically built to take on a certain type of enemy, they could probably actually do that, and it would be the 'everything else' that presents a problem.

As Frank said, she is a level 13 Fearless Cold Resistant Warrior of Good... and still can't kill Gelugons, despite that being her fucking job. Which means we don't care about her.

[hogarth]

Holy Word vs. HD=to Caster Level= save or Deafened. Nope, that doesn't matter.

It's extraplanar. It gets booted out of existence. It has Greater Teleport, not Greater Planeshift. You win instantly if you pass SR.

Note that there has always been a save vs. the banishment part of Holy Word (in 3.5). So it's not quite "win instantly".

[angelfromanotherpin]

I think my favorite method of victory for the ice devil is to spam Wall of Ice until Seelah dies of one of starvation, exhaustion, or old age. Because it's an immortal who doesn't need food or sleep, and she isn't.

[DMReckless]

This is stupid. Instead of comparing the paladin to the wizard, cleric, or druid--who all "rule the roost," so to speak--why don't we compare the paladin to his peers? As in, the classes that aren't primary spellcasters. Can the paladin take equal-CR opponents?

Um, that's pretty much exactly what we did. And the answer was no. And then someone trotted out the tired old Paizo defense that since no characters can deal with monsters of their CR, it's okay that the Paladin can't.

A brief foray went into how in fact many characters can and how Pathfinder is about making those characters worse, and not the ones we already know can't better.

Actually, what "someone" did was ask for information about which classes/builds would challenge the Gelugon. You may have read it as a "defense". Then "someone" challenged your assumptions about what would work and why, while someone else pointed out that some of your builds will no longer work in Pathfinder.

This "someone" never said that it was ok that Paladin fails at its job.

[Roy]

Holy Word vs. HD=to Caster Level= save or Deafened. Nope, that doesn't matter.

It's extraplanar. It gets booted out of existence. It has Greater Teleport, not Greater Planeshift. You win instantly if you pass SR.

Note that there has always been a save vs. the banishment part of Holy Word (in 3.5). So it's not quite "win instantly".

True. And it has a +15 save against it, because Unholy Aura and the -4 cancel each other out. But you also have a DC around... at least 23, and probably higher. Ok, that's not that reliable. But then there are two different things that boost CL by 4, and quite a few that boost it by smaller amounts... if you can get +5, you paralyze it. And that's not hard to do, and that doesn't allow a save.

[DMReckless]

Fine, Spell Resistance, Asshat. And Deafened still doesn't really fucking matter.

Proof you have no idea what you are talking about.

Oh, yeah and the mistakes he made regarding that same spell, the magic item he was talking about, etc. are proof he also has no idea what he is talking about, so I guess we're both ignorant fucks.

All wrong. It isn't that he 'prefers' it, it's that he realizes that's how D&D 'is' without him doing anything at all to alter that. And so he recommends you have the ability to actually deal with that, so you can ya know, play the game.

Interesting.

[Roy]

Those things are not conceptual flaws. They are factual errors. Factual errors is when you get some details wrong. Conceptual flaws is when you get entire sections wrong. Thinking spell resistance is remotely relevant, at all other than as a possible liability is an example of the latter. And it demonstrates a fundamentally and widely inaccurate understanding of the way the game works. Which is also why you're asking these questions in the first place, so why you are reacting in any way other than acknowledgment of a statement of fact I do not know.

[DMReckless]

But then there are two different things that boost CL by 4, and quite a few that boost it by smaller amounts... if you can get +5, you paralyze it. And that's not hard to do, and that doesn't allow a save.

Now this I am completely ignorant about. What 2 things boost your CL by 4 @ 13th level. The only feats I know about with a +4 boost are along the lines of Practiced Spellcaster, which caps at your HD (ie 13).

[DMReckless]

Those things are not conceptual flaws. They are factual errors. Factual errors is when you get some details wrong. Conceptual flaws is when you get entire sections wrong. Thinking spell resistance is remotely relevant, at all other than as a possible liability is an example of the latter. And it demonstrates a fundamentally and widely inaccurate understanding of the way the game works. Which is also why you're asking these questions in the first place, so why you are reacting in any way other than acknowledgment of a statement of fact I do not know.

Here's the thing. Spell Resistance's relevance comes from the fact that the "no save" effects of Holy Word do have a chance of failing (45%- any boosts to your CL) against the Gelugon. Tell me how a few rounds of Deafness or Blindness (or even Paralysis) are relevant against a creature that can teleport away at will as a purely mental action. That is the conceptual flaw in this part of his posts.

The "factual error" I made was not reading down to the Banishment section. Additionally, the banishment effect has two chances of failing, one from SR and one from the Save it allows. This is the "factual error" Frank made in his statement of "Get past the SR and you win automatically."

[DMReckless]

Not true. Slow halves your speed. And things that reduce your speed stop you from taking 5 foot steps.

Not unless it drops you to 5' move rate.

Take 5-Foot Step

You can move 5 feet in any round when you don’t perform any other kind of movement. Taking this 5-foot step never provokes an attack of opportunity. You can’t take more than one 5-foot step in a round, and you can’t take a 5-foot step in the same round when you move any distance.

You can take a 5-foot step before, during, or after your other actions in the round.

You can only take a 5-foot step if your movement isn’t hampered by difficult terrain or darkness. Any creature with a speed of 5 feet or less can’t take a 5-foot step, since moving even 5 feet requires a move action for such a slow creature.

You may not take a 5-foot step using a form of movement for which you do not have a listed speed.

[Roy]

But then there are two different things that boost CL by 4, and quite a few that boost it by smaller amounts... if you can get +5, you paralyze it. And that's not hard to do, and that doesn't allow a save.

Now this I am completely ignorant about. What 2 things boost your CL by 4 @ 13th level. The only feats I know about with a +4 boost are along the lines of Practiced Spellcaster, which caps at your HD (ie 13).

Karma Bead and some Ankh or another (which would require you to burn another spell slot of the same level). Then combined with all the things that can get smaller boosts, and you have many different ways to manage a net +5 and even a +10 is not THAT hard to do. At this level, these sorts of things are expected. And while I recommend you fix them by making Holy Word and similar use Banishment mechanics for the save even for the non Banishment part, that is irrelevant to the fact that by RAW, a level 13 Cleric can annihilate anything with close to a 1:1 ratio of HD to levels by doing exactly this. Outsiders are one such creature type.

And Spell Resistance is not relevant because there are a long list of ways to bypass it such that you probably will not notice SR at all unless it is your level + 20 or greater. And last I checked, the Gelugon does not have a SR of 33 or better. Even the Pit Fiend falls short of that (and by then, you'd need to encounter SR 40 or more to matter).

Now if you're thinking to yourself that that basically does not happen unless you are fighting an enemy vastly over your own level, you are correct. And that is what SR is irrelevant. You don't have a fail chance. Full stop.

[DMReckless]

Ok, read up on them, thanks.

Beads use standard action to activate, Ankh requires using up another 7th level slot.

If you can pump your CL up to 24, you win ((24-10=14HD)death, no save, SR is irrelevant). So you need +11 to your caster level, somehow, and you need to get it before the Gel puts you down. Anything less than that or banishment means he can get away and come back once the effects have worn off, and you've used up some of your best resources while he still has all of his.

[MartinHarper]

Because it is a purely mental action.

Oh, of course. I was confusing myself over the possibility of certain types of mental effort making someone feel physically tired, as in the example of chess players, but those are still mental, not physical, efforts.

[virgil]

Hmm, they're changing protection from evil/good/law/chaos a bit. Now the protection it grants against summoned creatures and mind control only works when the foe is of the alignment it protects against. Also, its suppressing effect on mind control is now purely preventative, so it won't save a dominated party member after the fact.

[Username17]

Because it is a purely mental action.

Oh, of course. I was confusing myself over the possibility of certain types of mental effort making someone feel physically tired, as in the example of chess players, but those are still mental, not physical, efforts.

Yeah, but Gelugons never need to sleep or eat. So they can play chess forever. Or even push that big pointless wheel from Conan for no reason.

Here's the thing. Spell Resistance's relevance comes from the fact that the "no save" effects of Holy Word do have a chance of failing (45%- any boosts to your CL) against the Gelugon. Tell me how a few rounds of Deafness or Blindness (or even Paralysis) are relevant against a creature that can teleport away at will as a purely mental action. That is the conceptual flaw in this part of his posts.

This is totally true. While Holy Worders can easily jack their caster level up to absurd levels and instakill all enemies up to and including gods, most demon hunters are going to be a lot less than that. Karma beads and Orange Ioun Stones and Candles of Breaking the Game are all limitlessly stackable and absurdly cheap for 13th level characters, so our standard Sacred Exorcist could easily enough have a large enough caster level bonus to breeze through enemies of his level - but that's basically cheating. It is more likely that such a character is just going to have a +3-8 bonus to overcoming SR and rely upon booting the Gelugon out of the universe to "win."

The issue with 95% of high-level monsters in D&D is lazy developers--instead of giving the monsters interesting abilities, the devs decided to slap on a bunch of SLAs. Terrible design.

I disagree with this assessment vehemently. Giving monsters "interesting" and "unique" abilities is what leads the 4e Cyclops to having 6 different versions with 5 different powers that are all completely unrelated except that they are all called "Evil Eye." Fuck that. There should be a master power list somewhere that monsters get powers off of. Frankly, 3rd edition didn't go far enough with this concept. The master powers list should include not only things like cones of cold, but also petrifying gazes and fire breath.

Like aWoD: A monster who shoots fire bolts should use the same mechanics as another monster that shoots firebolts. Because both are defined as the "Fire Starter" power. Not like oWoD where there is a Darkfire Bolt, a Path of Flame Firebolt, and a Daimonian Fire Bolt that are all using arbitrarily different mechanics.

-Username17

[Roy]

Ok, read up on them, thanks.

Beads use standard action to activate, Ankh requires using up another 7th level slot.

If you can pump your CL up to 24, you win ((24-10=14HD)death, no save, SR is irrelevant). So you need +11 to your caster level, somehow, and you need to get it before the Gel puts you down. Anything less than that or banishment means he can get away and come back once the effects have worn off, and you've used up some of your best resources while he still has all of his.

Karma Bead lasts 10 minutes. And if you're going around frying things with Holy Word, then 1: You are Scry and Dying your opponents, so 10 minutes covers more than 1 fight. 2: The other three guys will happily throw in 5k of their 88k or so so you can have more than one Karma Bead, and therefore the party can nuke more things with that approach. Because it's totally worth it to have 2-3 of the things, for less than 20% of the parties' WBL to be able to annihilate whole overarching types of enemies (aka, anything with meaningful special abilities, as those are the ones that get at or close to 1:1 ratios of HD:levels).

As for the whole getting tired thing... Outsiders don't need to sleep, and they don't need to eat or drink so clearly they don't get tired, and they never run out of power. Outsiders are literally tireless, implacable physical embodiments of (Law/Chaos) and/or (Good/Evil). So keeping that ability on is really not a big deal at all, and even if it were the combat only starts when the Gelugon does something the Paladin is aware of, so he seriously does see it coming.

Now I'd personally deal with the Gelugon via save lowering effect + Win spell, or just cower lock it for the lulz.

And yes, they nerfed beatsticks. This should not surprise anyone at this point.

[Parthenon]

Wait, you say that Gelugons and other such evil outsiders can be easily taken down with Holy Word. This can be aided by losing a 7th level slot or using a magic item to help your CL or a variety of methods such as Ioun stones.

Then, you say that

if you're going around frying things with Holy Word, then ... You are Scry and Dying your opponents

So, what about parties that decide not to Scry and Die. Whether they are saying that the ground will stop Scrying or they have a gentleman's agreement not to, saying that Holy Word is a reasonable spell to use against such enemies then saying that its use is only limited to prepared ambushes makes you look like you either aren't sure what you are talking about or are just lying.

If they aren't Scrying, then the Gelugon hears the party coming, prepares an ambush and then attacks. Unless the party only goes around in 10 minute blocks of time the Cleric won't have an improved CL. So, the first round or two is spent buffing up the CL then one or two rounds is spent trying to banish it. In a place with a dimensional anchor they can't even be banished.

Yes its a lot better than trying to hit it with your lance or smite, but still not that great.

---

And I'd completely disagree with Beads of Karma costing 5,000gp. While if you take a Strand of Prayer Beads and remove the healing and smiting beads then it is completely free for some reason, most DMs would look at the text and see that removing a bead of karma removes 20,000gp from the price so they'd cost it as 20,000gp.

The power of a special bead is lost if it is removed from the strand. Reduce the price of a strand of prayer beads that is missing one or more beads by the following amounts: ... bead of karma –20,000 gp

I really don't know how you got 5,000gp- I'd love to know, but I don't get it. True, Candles of Invocation are insanely cheap at 700gp per day but saying that Beads of Karma (20,000gp) or Ioun stones (30,000gp) are absurdly cheap is pretty much lying when it is 5/11ths of your wealth. Since a lot of parties will only have one encounter per 10 minutes having two BoK is prohibitively expensive unless everyone puts in 5,000gp.

Oh, wait, is that it? Beads of Karma are 5,000gp because the whole party is supposed to pay to keep the Cleric super awesome?

[Username17]

Oh, wait, is that it? Beads of Karma are 5,000gp because the whole party is supposed to pay to keep the Cleric super awesome?

Actually, yes they should. Shilling out 5k for your share of a Karma bead and 9k for a Pearl of Power 3 costs less than the +4 bonus on your armor that gives you. And if you do that twice (once for your shield), you're getting +5 armor and shield out of the deal. And with the incredible cost attached to weapons, this is even more true with regards to castings of Greater Magic Weapon. The fact is that purchasing caster levels and spell slots for the Cleric is a better deal than actually purchasing equipment to use directly. And the Cleric can use the additional caster levels and spell slots to blow enemies up directly on top of that.

But now we're really off topic. Fighters suck and warrior equipment costs too fucking much. This is all universal truth, but it's not particularly interesting or newsworthy. The point is merely that a 13th level Cleric can banish a Gelugon by any of a number of means with a fairly decent chance of success. Which means that they qualify as a 13th level character who could beat a Gelugon (whether or not they actually do). The minutiae are kind of pointless for this discussion. The fact is merely that the Paladin's inability to best a Gelugon is problematic and not universal.

-Username17