[PF/DSP] Dreamscarred Press announces ToB-inspired product II: The Rematch

Old thread was out to 50 pages. New thread time.

Link to Dreamscarred Press' discussion thread: Here.

Link to the conversation on Paizo's forum: Here.

I'll be updating this as we go! Links below:

Warder: A defensive martial initiator. Focusing on defensive control of a combat, protection of allies, and having good combat ability to dominate a battle. Archetypes for both normal modifications as well as 'sect' archetypes that provide background and story information with codes of conduct that are specific to the sect for more organization-based warders with group specific disciplines. Current Status: Beta done, pushed to release

Stalker: An offensive martial initiator. A class that focuses on a wide skill set, stealth, and mystic ability. Highly perceptive and capable in combat with a focus in inflicting critical damage through understanding of the opponent. Archetypes in the works, ways to focus the stalker towards differing roles. Current Status: Beta done, push to release

Warlord: A team leading martial initiator. A tactical commander, capable of boosting the abilities of his allies through teamwork feats as well as through performing his gambits and presences. A capable warrior in his own right as well. Archetypes will be angling towards making discipline specialists within this class. Current Status: Beta done, push to release

Currently Working On: Archetypes

-X

New thread already, huh?

I think folks'll be happy to see some of the stuff I've been tinkering with.

Don't you just love that new thread smell?

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Originally Posted by Fax Celestis

You can, sure.



That still doesn't mean it's "as easy" for a non-caster to create things than a caster. There's a greater up-front feat cost, it's limited functionality (arms, armor, and wondrous only), and higher (cross-class!) skill investment. Non-casters are already lagging 3 points behind casters for using a non-class skill, and now they have between 5 and 15 extra points on top of the craft check because they don't meet prereqs. Or they can invest more skill points (that they don't generally have, due to fighter types being shafted on skill points) on UMD (another non-class skill) and spend money (multiplied per diem, mind you) to get around the increased DC for bypassing prerequisites, but this still puts non-casters behind casters due to, again, more up-front cost.

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I'll grant that decreased spell knowledge means Mundanes need more investment to get the same result, but who is Craft (Whatever) not a class skill for?

Incidentally, I don't think anyone was ever complaining about Fighters couldn't make wands. It was more a complaint that by restricting creation of the necessary Magical Gear the game expects you to have to Casters, it reinforced the idea that Mundanes were dependent on Casters to have baseline functionality. The feat gives you a way to ameliorate that if that's the sort of thing you care about. Even if it's more difficult, it's at least possible now.

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Originally Posted by Beowulf DW

Don't you just love that new thread smell?

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Yes sir...

Can ya smell that?

I love the smell of copypasta in the morning.

It smells like... nerdrage.

-X

Alright, so... a thought for you all:

Fighters need a little love and a martial template. So we know they've got two sides to their class in Pathfinder: Bonus Feats, and Weapon/Armor Training. Veritably every archetype under the sun trades away the weapon/armor training stuff, and bravery. Rarely does it effect the bonus feats. I also think we can all agree that fighter archetypes makes fighter actually more fun to play than normal, because it lends new abilities to make your schtick work (firm believe that all fighters must have a schtick, something that they focus on doing). So what if my archetype for fighter, instead of attacking the same old features, instead, went after some bonus feats? Pay out 6 of your bonus feats, and maybe heavy armor and tower shields to basically get Martial Training 1-6 twice.

This gives your fighter maneuvers up to 6th level, some bonus feats, and the track of fighter's abilities that you could in theory trade for one of those flavorful archetypes.

Too strong? Too awesome? You decide.

-X

It is odd if an archetype trades out something as useful as a bonus feat, but it can be done well. Mostly, if you gain a feat or feature you wouldn't be able to take normally.

Unarmed Fighter and Lore Warden do this, in that they grant certain feats regardless of what stats or other feats the Fighter has (Combat Expertise from Lore Warden; Style Feat from Unarmed Fighter).

You can also give him extra feats, but have them be specific like with the Unbreakable archetype.

So far, X, your plan seems better suited for a Ranger and trading up his Style Feats for early entry into the maneuver training feats.

Though I do like not trading out the Armor and Weapon mastery stuff. Maybe have him gain certain maneuvers without them directly being from the martial training feats

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Originally Posted by ErrantX

Too strong? Too awesome? You decide.

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Insufficiently strong. I'd rather it trades away bravery and the training because those are less powerful and the fighter can use a boost.(Though if the bonuses are big enough to make the fighter actually be on par after trading the feats away I wouldn't object.)

And personally, I'd rather see the fighter getting an archetype that lets them really specialize in one discipline more than anyone else can manage than one that lets them just pick up a smattering of martial power.

I am worried how this will interact with old tome of battle stuff, as it is a direct upgrade compared to the 3.5 classes.

Stalker, Warden, and Warlord are all straight up better than SS, Warblade, and Crusader. Is this intentional? Are these classes and disciplines supposed to combine with the old stuff?

Also. There's lots of combat prowess, but not much in the way of utility. Nothing close to Shadow Hand's incredible versatility and out of combat use. I'm concerned that these new initiators will be too strong in combat compared to other classes, but not versatile outside of it.

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Originally Posted by ErrantX

Alright, so... a thought for you all:

Fighters need a little love and a martial template. So we know they've got two sides to their class in Pathfinder: Bonus Feats, and Weapon/Armor Training. Veritably every archetype under the sun trades away the weapon/armor training stuff, and bravery. Rarely does it effect the bonus feats. I also think we can all agree that fighter archetypes makes fighter actually more fun to play than normal, because it lends new abilities to make your schtick work (firm believe that all fighters must have a schtick, something that they focus on doing). So what if my archetype for fighter, instead of attacking the same old features, instead, went after some bonus feats? Pay out 6 of your bonus feats, and maybe heavy armor and tower shields to basically get Martial Training 1-6 twice.

This gives your fighter maneuvers up to 6th level, some bonus feats, and the track of fighter's abilities that you could in theory trade for one of those flavorful archetypes.

Too strong? Too awesome? You decide.

-X

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Hmmm...Trading out the bonus feats...Those bonus feats have historically been what the fighter is known for. You would lose some flexibility with regards to your fighting style outside of the maneuvers, but in exchange you would gain maneuvers.

I honestly think that's a decent trade, but I think that it should only get two disciplines to choose from, chosen at 1st level. Combined with other archetypes (namely the one's based on a specific weapon style), this could really make the Fighter the specialist to the Warlord's generalist. I like.

Beowulf Seal of Approval

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Originally Posted by Beowulf DW

Hmmm...Trading out the bonus feats...Those bonus feats have historically been what the fighter is known for. You would lose some flexibility with regards to your fighting style outside of the maneuvers, but in exchange you would gain maneuvers.

I honestly think that's a decent trade, but I think that it should only get two disciplines to choose from, chosen at 1st level. Combined with other archetypes (namely the one's based on a specific weapon style), this could really make the Fighter the specialist to the Warlord's generalist. I like.

Beowulf Seal of Approval

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You just nailed exactly what I was going for.

-X

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Originally Posted by ErrantX

You just nailed exactly what I was going for.

-X

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Well. Good to know we're on the same wavelength, then.:smallbiggrin: I really think that limiting it to two disciplines (choice is completely up to the player, of course) would help to keep in it a bit more balanced relative to the other fighter archetypes, though.

Hmmm, he adds martial lore to class skills and maybe replaces bravery with a bonus to his disciplines' related skills? Would 1/2 class level be too much?

Also maybe restrict weapon training to the associated weapon groups of his disciplines.

He feels a little specialized because he only gets two disciplines but they have the ability to mix and match where other initiators cannot. Can this character then spend feats to pick up an additional discipline on top of the two granted by class features?

Gotta say that while having the worst recovery possible is damning I don't know that it matters unless the readied maneuvers are reduced. If you stack the feat twice it rapidly outpaces even the Stalker and it gets really crazy if you'd be able to pick up a third discipline.

The idea is to remove some of the bonus feats that not only could be used to buy more "Martial Training" feats, but also to spend them more efficiently, effectively, and still leave options for people to take certain archetypes. If I want to play a fighter who has Thrashing Dragon and Veiled Moon, well, I would want to take the Two-Weapon Fighter archetype perhaps, and I was thinking that since most archetypes eliminate weapon and armor training and bravery almost universally for other similar features, why not go after the bonus feats instead to allow for fighters to get the best of both worlds.

Taking a step back from the whole "it will make fighter go uber", how uber will they go? Will it make them unbalanced to the point of wizards will lose sleep at night? I'm really interested in knowing. Will it improve them so far as to eclipse the martial disciple classes? I'm okay with fighter having a little wider base but a lower cap than a martial disciple if that's what you're worried about. The fighter and all other classes I do this with will never get the 9th level. They'll cap out at 6th level. That's my plan anyhow.

I wanted to bring it to you all to see how you felt about it before I started to write a ton of material and have you all hate it :P

-X

I doubt Fighter can ever really go Uber in PF without the 3.5 Shock Trooper and/or Fighter ACFs. But besides that,

Well, I like the idea of Fighters synchronizing their Weapon Group with that of the Disciplines. It adds some nice interconnection between the classes and the combat forms, and may help players remember where Weapon Groups came from.

How about something he gains at Level 5 (When Weapon Training kicks in) which makes his Initiator Level equal to his Fighter level -4 (For free). It then trades out his later bonus feats for a Discipline that matches with his Weapon Group, in which he gets full progression.

Maybe make it even more special by making his main Ability Stat for this Fighter Discipline something like CON.

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Originally Posted by georgie_leech

I'll grant that decreased spell knowledge means Mundanes need more investment to get the same result, but who is Craft (Whatever) not a class skill for?

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Spellcraft is the skill used to craft all magical items, not Craft (Whatever), and Master Craftsman doesn't change that in the slightest.

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To create magic items, spellcasters use special feats which allow them to invest time and money in an item's creation. At the end of this process, the spellcaster must make a single skill check (usually Spellcraft, but sometimes another skill) to finish the item. If an item type has multiple possible skills, you choose which skill to make the check with. The DC to create a magic item is 5 + the caster level for the item. Failing this check means that the item does not function and the materials and time are wasted. Failing this check by 5 or more results in a cursed item.

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Originally Posted by Creating Magic Armor

Skill(s) Required: Spellcraft or Craft (armor).

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Originally Posted by Creating Magic Weapons

Skill(s) Required: Spellcraft, Craft (bows) (for magic bows and arrows), or Craft (weapons) (for all other weapons).

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Originally Posted by Creating Wondrous Items

Skill(s) Required: Spellcraft or an applicable Craft or Profession skill check.

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And since Master Craftsman says this...

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Choose one Craft or Profession skill in which you possess at least 5 ranks. You receive a +2 bonus on your chosen Craft or Profession skill. Ranks in your chosen skill count as your caster level for the purposes of qualifying for the Craft Magic Arms and Armor and Craft Wondrous Item feats. You can create magic items using these feats, substituting your ranks in the chosen skill for your total caster level. You must use the chosen skill for the check to create the item. The DC to create the item still increases for any necessary spell requirements (see the magic item creation rules in Magic Items). You cannot use this feat to create any spell-trigger or spell-activation item.

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...not only does it cost you more up-front, but it needlessly restricts you further: either you cross-class Spellcraft, or you put points into an actual Craft skill and can only make melee weapons or ranged weapons or armor or a certain kind of wondrous item.

Question: Can someone explain to me why Archetypes are good class design?

If you have a cool ability, why lock it away in an Archetype? Why not just give the class the choice of several abilities, or make it a maneuver or stance (or whatever that class has - spells, powers, talents, etc)?

For example, if you took all of the Pathfinder Monk's Archetypes and distilled them down to a single class with list of abilities which you could swap out at least once per day, you'd have a fairly decent Tier 3 class. But because they're spread across Archetype, and you can't mix and match Archetype abilities, and you can't change your choice of Archetype or the abilities it grants once it's made, it's doomed to Tier 4 forever. The same could probably be done for pretty much every other Tier 4 Pathfinder class.

Corollary suggestion to ErrantX: If you are going to include Archetypes for every class, I would appreciate it if the alternate abilities are based on Skills, Bonus Feats, bonuses, and fluff related, and not the 'meat" of the class. I don't care if an Archetype grants a different +1 bonus to X or other minor variations which help the class fill a slightly different role. But if you think of an ability that is truly interesting or useful, just work it into the base class somehow.

To be fair, archetypes aren't terribly different from alternate class features. Either way, though, it's the paradigm we're working with - PF does archetypes, they're an expectation and an opportunity.

Have you given any thought to maneuvers that create dispelling effects?

Relatedly, it would be interesting to see some ability that lets non-spellcasters perform the counterspell action (maybe using their shield bonus as part of the dispel bonus), especially if there's an upgrade along the lines of the archmage's Mastery of Counterspelling. "Catch and return" also works.

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Originally Posted by Person_Man

If you have a cool ability, why lock it away in an Archetype? Why not just give the class the choice of several abilities, or make it a maneuver or stance (or whatever that class has - spells, powers, talents, etc)?

For example, if you took all of the Pathfinder Monk's Archetypes and distilled them down to a single class with list of abilities which you could swap out at least once per day, you'd have a fairly decent Tier 3 class. But because they're spread across Archetype, and you can't mix and match Archetype abilities, and you can't change your choice of Archetype or the abilities it grants once it's made, it's doomed to Tier 4 forever. The same could probably be done for pretty much every other Tier 4 Pathfinder class.

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You can reduce the effect by wording archetypes carefully. Say "this modifies, but does not replace" whenever possible, so that the modified feature can still be modified again. Or if Class Feature X references Class Feature Y, you could write into New Class Feature Y "if you have Existing Class Feature X, adjust it like this".

From previous thread, slightly updated:

Kyton Tyranny / "Black Hole Defender" - Melee Control Discipline / Warden Archetype

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Originally Posted by upho

Besides more versatility, more tactically interesting options in combat and more utility in general for non-caster classes in 1-3.5/PF, I've always wanted an increased number of viable mundane/martial combat playstyles/roles as well as the option to truly specialize in such a role/style. Currently, I think all the non-caster PF classes are rather forced into taking the primary combat role of single-target striker, because that's the only role the mechanics allow them to remain effective in during all levels. Here, I think PF has a huge gap that can and should be filled by options in PoW.

Now I couldn't help noticing the PoW Warlord and Warden (unintentionally, I guess) borrow more than their names from two actually great 4e concepts/mechanics also initially based on ToB (the Warlord class and the defender role). You could say I'd like to continue in that vein of "coincidental 4e adaptations" and suggest bringing in another effective, flexible and fun martial combat focus which happens to be possible in 4e: control.

A few ideas for a discipline which hopefully explains the concept:

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Kyton Tyranny
A melee discipline focusing on whips, flails, chains and similar(?) "potentially entangling" weapons to limit enemy options, primarily by covering large areas and making maneuvers that control enemy positions, hinders their mobility and disrupts both their defenses and attacks. The discipline's infernal origin does not mean a practitioner of the Kyton Tyranny is well served by hot-headedness or reckless brutality. Instead, it's the calculating tacticians and cool-headed defenders valuing teamwork that tend to master the style.

I think the most fitting related skill is Martial Lore. (Possible? Feels like it should be something to do with tactical knowledge and intelligence rather than physical prowess, IMO.)

Maneuvers
Yes:

• Repositioning/pushing/pulling, tripping, disarming and/or grappling/pinning/choking (using weapon) strikes/counters, some requiring a certain weapon type or property
• Some strikes/counters imposing other fitting debuff/status effects (for example staggered, entangled, slowed, AC/Reflex penalties) and/or prevents target from using certain limb(s)
• Trading attack damage (sometimes defense) for bonuses to the relevant check(s), improved effects and/or occasionally free extra movement or reach
• Multi-target strikes
• A few high level (Su) strikes designed to counter magic/supernatural abilities, especially those related to sight/movement such as etherealness, invisibility, flight, teleportation etc. (perhaps hit enemy cannot teleport/move outside of initiator's reach, or w/o also bringing initiator along?)
• Many counters triggered by enemy actions that normally wouldn't provoke AoOs and perhaps a few that don't use up immediate/swift action
• Boosts focusing on attack, initiative and mobility/reach, sometimes adding movement related status effects (like slowed, staggered, immobilized) and/or free combat maneuver checks to attacks.

No:

• HP damage boosts
• Extra damage types
• Single-target focus
• Set range limitations (like "adjacent") rather than melee reach

Stances
Focus on defenses (especially CMD), mobility, reach and additional AoO triggers/effects.

I think the concept can also make an interesting and fitting Warden (or a truly unique Warlord) archetype to complement the discipline. Perhaps a kind of "black hole" defender with improved aura and marking, designed to "suck" enemies close and keep them there. I guess this concept won't fit into a standalone archetype, but on the other hand I believe it might contain enough possibilities to also base an entire adept class and quite a few combat feats on it. Personally, I surely wouldn't mind seeing such a class in a second PoW book.

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Predator - Natural Attack Metamorphic Stalker Archetype

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Originally Posted by upho

Another Stalker archetype idea, "Feral Predator", inspired by wild predatorial beasts, focusing on natural attacks, using ki to enhance natural attacks and gain minor metarmorphosis and shapeshifting-esque abilities. A few ideas:

• Replaces the Monastic Weapon Training art with "Feral Combat" which grants the Aspect of the Beast, Improved Unarmed Strike and Feral Combat Training feats (w/o prerequisites).
• Treats natural attacks as 19-20 x3 (?) weapons associated with the Primal Fury discipline and all disciplines normally associated with light blades (and/or unarmed/natural attacks).
• Can spend ki points to grant natural attacks special material/qualities (cold iron, silver, alignment etc), add common special abilities like grab, trip, swim, climb, scent, darkvision etc (eidolon evolutions might serve as a guideline here), gain additional natural attacks/supernatural abilities (gore, pounce, eye rays, breath weapon etc) or use metamorphosis (minor) (Thanks Prime32!)

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Feedback greatly appreciated, especially on the melee control (Kyton Tyranny) idea!

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Originally Posted by Fax Celestis

Spellcraft is the skill used to craft all magical items, not Craft (Whatever), and Master Craftsman doesn't change that in the slightest.

And since Master Craftsman says this...

...not only does it cost you more up-front, but it needlessly restricts you further: either you cross-class Spellcraft, or you put points into an actual Craft skill and can only make melee weapons or ranged weapons or armor or a certain kind of wondrous item.

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It's still an ability that Mundanes have access to if they really care about it. From a World-building perspective, it means ye olde smithe doesn't have to be an arch mage to make relevant weapons and armour. I'm not advocating for it on the grounds that it's the Best Thing EVER! (tm) but just that it tries to fill a niche that went unfilled before.

Again, one of the reasons people complained about the Magic/Not-Magic divide was that the Not-Magic side still needed Magical items to achieve basic competency in the numbers the game's math expects you to have. If that's something you care about, there's now an option to address that, however imperfectly.

Honestly, I'm fine with the individuals with the very forces of creation at their beck and call being able to, you know, create things better than Mundane skill. At least now rewriting reality isn't the only way to make decent equipment.

Absolutely, from a world-building perspective it's a huge leap. Same sort of thing that Eberron did with the Magewright NPC class.

From a player perspective, though, it's a spectacularly poor failure to remedy an imbalanced situation.

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Originally Posted by Fax Celestis

...not only does it cost you more up-front, but it needlessly restricts you further: either you cross-class Spellcraft, or you put points into an actual Craft skill and can only make melee weapons or ranged weapons or armor or a certain kind of wondrous item.

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Thank you for spelling it out, FC. This is what I meant with "near-certain trap feat" and there being no mundane crafting option even remotely close to what caster have. Again, in the future I wouldn't mind seeing mundane class features or similar which brings crafting up to or above the level of casters, but I really don't think it should be high on a list of "measures to balance PF".

More importantly, crafting doesn't seem to fit with the PoW theme anyway, so is this really the proper place to discuss this further?

I'm actually going to advocate for craft related archetypes. Assuming there are actual items being presented in PoW, it'd be a good way to showcase said items. Maybe bypass Master Craftsman altogether with a PoW specific feat specifying initiator level or something. Bonding a beloved weapon, making more of a martial script type item, who knows?

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Originally Posted by ErrantX

Alright, so... a thought for you all:

Fighters need a little love and a martial template. So we know they've got two sides to their class in Pathfinder: Bonus Feats, and Weapon/Armor Training. Veritably every archetype under the sun trades away the weapon/armor training stuff, and bravery. Rarely does it effect the bonus feats. I also think we can all agree that fighter archetypes makes fighter actually more fun to play than normal, because it lends new abilities to make your schtick work (firm believe that all fighters must have a schtick, something that they focus on doing). So what if my archetype for fighter, instead of attacking the same old features, instead, went after some bonus feats? Pay out 6 of your bonus feats, and maybe heavy armor and tower shields to basically get Martial Training 1-6 twice.

This gives your fighter maneuvers up to 6th level, some bonus feats, and the track of fighter's abilities that you could in theory trade for one of those flavorful archetypes.

Too strong? Too awesome? You decide.

-X

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While that is a good idea, it's also something than can be done without an archetype at all. Just make Martial Training a combat feat (as it should be) and every Fighter can do that.
I'd much rather see the Fighter as a one-discipline initiator.

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Originally Posted by Metahuman1

Ironfist: I was saying I disagree with it not being Path of War related, since I got the vibe that a decent chunk of the design goal of Path of War as to give Melee/Mundanes Nice Things.

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As far as I know, Path of War is about combat and martial arts, not "giving melee nive things". I don't think it's related at all.

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Originally Posted by IronFist

As far as I know, Path of War is about combat and martial arts, not "giving melee nive things". I don't think it's related at all.

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Even then, isn't "personal weapon of master So-and-so/weapon crafted by elite master So-and-So of Such-and-Such style/system/technique" a staple of Martial arts/Wuxia myth and legend? A fairly major Genera feature?


And what about this for the fighter Archatype:

Give them the ability to ALWAYS know all maneuvers of one style, chosen when they take the archetype, of an initiator equal to there fighter level.

For example, a fighter with this archatype chooses Thrashing Dragon. At third level, he knows all the first and second level maneuvers of that school, and is treated as a Stalker of 3rd level for the purpose of highest level known.

At 5th, he's treated as a 5th level Stalker for highest level known, and knows all the 1st, 2nd and 3rd level maneuvers.

How many feats you make them trade in to get this should also determine how many of these can be readied, and if it's a separate pool form one's they might gain with Martial Training (Which would be what I'd advise cause hey, hurting versatility on a fighter is just a bad design move.).


Maybe let them change the school and as a consequence, all there known maneuvers form the archatype, say, every 5 levels? That way if they make a choice and for some reason it isn't working with the game style there GM is running/the tactics the rest of the party are favoring, they aren't just so out of luck.

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Originally Posted by IronFist

As far as I know, Path of War is about combat and martial arts, not "giving melee nive things". I don't think it's related at all.

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I'm gonna have to say that I don't agree. Paizo may be comfortable with telling melee characters, "You don't get to participate in this fight," but as a rule we aren't. Maneuvers give a lot of things that melee's been missing, it's true, but there are some universal problems that they just can't/don't solve, and frankly I'm sure I'm not the only one who's tired of being punished because he didn't want to play a spellcaster. There are a lot of very classical enemies that resonate with powerful fantasy themes - that melee isn't allowed to fight. Evil priests, insane wizards, demons, devils, the undead - the list goes on and on and on of Things What You Cannot Slay.

No, we're not going to address all of melee's problems, because frankly at the end of the day our job is not to fix the system; our job is to give gentle, affordable options to help melee concepts of any class feel heroic. And there's nothing wrong with that.

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Originally Posted by IronFist

While that is a good idea, it's also something than can be done without an archetype at all. Just make Martial Training a combat feat (as it should be) and every Fighter can do that.

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If you look again carefully, you'll notice that the archetype as suggested by ErrantX would net two Martial Trainings per bonus feat slot traded.

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Originally Posted by Lord_Gareth

I'm gonna have to say that I don't agree. Paizo may be comfortable with telling melee characters, "You don't get to participate in this fight," but as a rule we aren't. Maneuvers give a lot of things that melee's been missing, it's true, but there are some universal problems that they just can't/don't solve, and frankly I'm sure I'm not the only one who's tired of being punished because he didn't want to play a spellcaster. There are a lot of very classical enemies that resonate with powerful fantasy themes - that melee isn't allowed to fight. Evil priests, insane wizards, demons, devils, the undead - the list goes on and on and on of Things What You Cannot Slay.

No, we're not going to address all of melee's problems, because frankly at the end of the day our job is not to fix the system; our job is to give gentle, affordable options to help melee concepts of any class feel heroic. And there's nothing wrong with that.

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I tend to agree with you, hence why I suggested the archatype that started the conversation. And if the feat that was pitched "well, it's sorta already been fixed." falls short, maybe it's still a good idea to make the archatype, both for the reasons you listed and because there is precedent in the genera/real world lore were playing off of with this subsystem at it's core, as I mentioned above.

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Originally Posted by Lord_Gareth

I'm gonna have to say that I don't agree. Paizo may be comfortable with telling melee characters, "You don't get to participate in this fight," but as a rule we aren't. Maneuvers give a lot of things that melee's been missing, it's true, but there are some universal problems that they just can't/don't solve, and frankly I'm sure I'm not the only one who's tired of being punished because he didn't want to play a spellcaster. There are a lot of very classical enemies that resonate with powerful fantasy themes - that melee isn't allowed to fight. Evil priests, insane wizards, demons, devils, the undead - the list goes on and on and on of Things What You Cannot Slay.

No, we're not going to address all of melee's problems, because frankly at the end of the day our job is not to fix the system; our job is to give gentle, affordable options to help melee concepts of any class feel heroic. And there's nothing wrong with that.

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I'm not saying there is anything wrong with that. I'm saying PoW is advertised as an OGL ToB and that crafting magical items has nothing to do with it. I'd much rather you spend time and energy making PoW-related stuff than trying to fix something I don't think is broken. In fact, that's the vibe I get from the Pathfinder fanbase as well.
Basically, what I meant is that I thought PoW was an OGL ToB. If it is not, if it is indeed a "book where we fix melee because everyone was doing it wrong before us", please let me know and I'll drop out of this thread forever.

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Originally Posted by Sith_Happens

If you look again carefully, you'll notice that the archetype as suggested by ErrantX would net two Martial Trainings per bonus feat slot traded.

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Ah, that is a lot better.
Still would prefer the "one discipline" Fighter, though.

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Originally Posted by Metahuman1

Even then, isn't "personal weapon of master So-and-so/weapon crafted by elite master So-and-So of Such-and-Such style/system/technique" a staple of Martial arts/Wuxia myth and legend? A fairly major Genera feature?

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That is perfectly covered by Master Craftsman. It has been said before, Master Craftsman works perfectly for worldbuilding purposes - now badass blacksmith can make the badass weapon. It's only a problem if you want to play the badass blacksmith and be as good at fighting as someone who did not spend half their like making weapons.
Or you could play a Soulknife.