Dreamscarred Press Introduces Lords of the Wild- The Playtest!

[Elricaltovilla]

Barring certain exceptions which will (hopefully) be hammered out through this playtest, Chimera Soul maneuvers are not supposed to give you extra limbs with which to make additional natural attacks. Specifically:

When using stances or maneuvers that grant you natural attacks, if you already possess an equivalent natural attack of that type from another source you do not gain additional natural attacks of that type. For example, if you enter Swift Panther Stance while already possessing two claw attacks, you would not gain additional claw attacks from the stance. In such cases, you use the most beneficial version of the natural attack, whether that comes from the maneuver or another source.

And

If you already possess one or more of these natural attacks, you cannot select them a second time to gain additional natural attacks of the same type.

If the wording on those needs to be made more clear to better convey the intent, I'll work on that.

[Elricaltovilla]

Bit of an aside, but I'll be doing a livestream interview this Tuesday (March 8th) at 8 PM EST on the Twitch Channel ExplodingDice. It'll be about 2 hours long and you can come by to say hi or send tweets to @Askren during the show to ask questions. Hope to see you all there!

[upho]

Barring certain exceptions which will (hopefully) be hammered out through this playtest, Chimera Soul maneuvers are not supposed to give you extra limbs with which to make additional natural attacks. Specifically: /snip/

If the wording on those needs to be made more clear to better convey the intent, I'll work on that.

The text you quoted say absolutely nothing about limbs and imposes a completely new and unique limitation based on attack types, which is the main reason why it currently reads like an exception to the general rules for natural attacks. I believe these passages are partially to blame for Ylva's absurd number of attacks, and maybe also for creating some of the balance concerns people have expressed about the Chimera Soul stances.

Since your reply may be an indication that you have missed a few potentially very important details regarding natural attacks, I'll try to explain exactly why the mentioned Chimera Soul texts you quoted are problematic:

The general rules for natural attacks typically limit the number a PC can gain and use during a turn by basically saying (my summary of the relevant RAW):

In order to select an option that grants you a natural attack, you must have the associated limb(s), which cannot already be associated with any other natural attack(s) you possess. Whenever you make the granted natural attack, you cannot use the associated limb to deliver any other attack of any kind during the same turn.*

This is different from, and a lot more limiting than Chimera Soul's "When using stances or maneuvers that grant you natural attacks, if you already possess an equivalent natural attack of that type from another source you do not gain additional natural attacks of that type."

Since Chimera Soul repeatedly makes it really clear that the discipline options specifically cannot grant an attack type you already have, which is both a unique limitation and one that would be (for all practical purposes) redundant if the discipline followed the more limiting general rules, it reads like an exception and thus replaces the general rules. And since the texts also fail to mention anything about limbs at all, the resulting effect is, for example, that Chimeric Body Stance may grant you slam attacks even if you already have two claw attacks and only one pair of arms, which is normally impossible.

In addition, the Chimera Soul text imposes different (although less severe) limitations on natural attacks than the general rules do, and these limitations may have weird effects which are inconsistent with those of the general rules and, when combined with the above, disregards all logic and common sense. For example, if my werewolf PC has four arms and two claw attacks and I gain the Strongclaw Shift or Aspect of the Beast feat, I can use my two free arms to make the granted two claw attacks (which does make a lot of sense, IMO). In contrast, none of the Chimera Soul stances or maneuvers will grant me so much as a single claw attack, even should I somehow possess enough free arms to make an entire army of mariliths green with envy, while an option from the discipline may grant me two slams even if I already have four claw attacks.

In summary, the relevant Chimera Soul text currently reads like an exception to the general rules, having effects that make little sense, are inconsistent with those of the general rules and may disrupt balance, especially in the case of the following natural attack types:

• Claws - as mentioned above, these can not be selected if the initiator can already make one or more claw attacks, regardless of any free limbs she may have from other sources, but can be selected even if all of her arms already have natural attack(s) of other types associated with them
• Slams - as claws above
• Tail slap - can be selected regardless of whether the initiator has a tail from another source, but not if she can already make one or more tail slaps, regardless of any additional free tails she may have from other sources
• Tentacle - can not be selected if the initiator already possesses one or more tentacle attacks

*There are of course several exceptions to this general rule in both Paizo and DSP material. Judging from Paizo's FAQ, forum threads, and the most widely accessible/used related PC options, I think two of the exceptions that most commonly impact games are: a) both a bite and a gore attack can be gained and made in the same round by a creature that only have one head, and b) a creature of a PC race typically cannot make claw attacks using its legs/feet, even though a few creatures in the bestiaries make claw attacks with their feet and an eidolon explicitly may add claws to one pair of legs. In the case of DSP material, for example the metamorphosis line of powers may grant you up to three natural attacks of the same type, without requiring any free associated limbs.

My suggestion is that Chimera Soul is changed to conform to the general rules for natural attacks. Meaning the relevant texts quoted from Chimera Soul are replaced with a reminder that the initiator must have the associated limb(s) able to deliver the attack when applicable, as per the normal rules for natural attacks. I would add an exception for tentacle attacks (and I think probably also tail slap or sting attacks), saying these include the limbs required to make the attacks but can not be selected by an initiator that already has the attack type. It might also be a good idea to mention that only one head is required to make both a bite and a gore attack.

And on a related note, the Deathsting Shift feat should probably include a note that you don't need to have a tail in order to gain the sting attack.

....

Fixing the above issues will tone down the potency of the Chimera Soul stances a bit, especially in higher levels by limiting the number of stacking attacks that can be gained from the most flexible options such as Chimeric Body Stance. But unfortunately it won't really address what I believe is a far more serious issue with the natural attack related options in the playtest so far - namely that most of them can be selected at a very early level. For example, a bloodrager 2/alchemist 2/warlord 2 could have the following:

• 1 bite granted by race
• 2 claws granted by the abyssal or draconic bloodline 1st level power
• 2 claws granted by the Strongclaw Shift feat and the vestigial arms from Alchemical Discovery and the Extra Discovery feat
• 1 sting granted by the Deathsting Shift feat
• 1 gore granted by the Furyhorn Stance
• 2 hooves granted by the Furyhorn Stance
• Power Attack

So a full attack would include 7 primary attacks at bab +5 and 2 secondary attacks at bab +0, all benefitting from bloodrage and the +4/+2 damage bonus from Power Attack. At level 6.

Besides the potential for creating utterly broken builds from very early levels, I think the the natural attack options so far has a too damage oriented focus, something which has already been done to the death (literally) by martial builds, and especially natural attackers. AFAICT, the only attack options which might have the potential to allow a natural attacker to be somewhat viable in a combat role other than striker are the werewolf's grabbing bite and the reach-pimped Deathsting Shift (if the clarification on the reach goes the way I hope, see my previous post). I'd really love to see some options with the potential to render the damage output of a natural attack controller/debuffer more or less irrelevant, without also making such a build any less effective in combat than a damage focused one.

[Elricaltovilla]

The problem Upho, is that you're seeing the text of Chimera Soul as an exception to the base rules about natural attacks, when in actuality it is an addition to the existing rules to natural attacks. There is no text in Chimera Soul that says that the natural attacks gained from Chimera Soul stances are not meant to follow the existing rules for natural attacks because there is no reason to indicate that they do not because they are not an exception, therefore you are drawing your assumptions based on nonexistent information.

Thank you for clearing up the issue you were having, and allow me to make it very clear: Chimera Soul maneuvers follow the normal rules for natural attacks, in addition to the rules laid out in the discipline itself.

[upho]

The problem Upho, is that you're seeing the text of Chimera Soul as an exception to the base rules about natural attacks, when in actuality it is an addition to the existing rules to natural attacks. There is no text in Chimera Soul that says that the natural attacks gained from Chimera Soul stances are not meant to follow the existing rules for natural attacks because there is no reason to indicate that they do not because they are not an exception, therefore you are drawing your assumptions based on nonexistent information.

From a semantic POV, I believe your logic is flawless. And this is exactly how I would've treated this rule if it had been written by Paizo. So I admit I may have been over-analyzing this simply because it's you and DSP, and I'm sort of primed to being able to follow (and usually agree with) the reasoning and logic behind the stuff you write and DSP rules texts in general.

Anyhow, my point was that if you also consider the mechanical effects of the Chimera Soul text and compare them to those of the general rules, I think there is indeed a very good reason to assume they are an exception. As I wrote in my previous post:

Since Chimera Soul repeatedly makes it really clear that the discipline options specifically cannot grant an attack type you already have, which is both a unique limitation and one that would be (for all practical purposes) redundant if the discipline followed the more limiting general rules, it reads like an exception and thus replaces the general rules.

Meaning I see a big sign on Chimera Soul which says:

"If I adhered to the general rules, the limitations I keep repeating would have no real mechanical impact and therefore there would be no reason for me to utter them in the first place. But since I keep repeating them and you know my creator is not only good-looking but also unusually intelligent, the limitations must in conclusion make a significant mechanical difference, which in turn means I cannot adhere to the general rules."

Thank you for clearing up the issue you were having, and allow me to make it very clear: Chimera Soul maneuvers follow the normal rules for natural attacks, in addition to the rules laid out in the discipline itself.

Got it. Thanks. So what is the purpose/mechanical effect of the additional limitations of Chimera Soul? I'd really appreciate if you (or anyone else who isn't as blind as myself) could give me a simple example or two which could open my eyes.

(The only effects I can think of are either way too minor and applicable to way too few builds to be worth the space the text currently occupies (such as altering the full attacks of a very tiny sub-category of the rare multi-armed builds during maybe a few levels, having them for example include two claws and two slams rather than four claws), or they may only have a meaningful an impact for certain specific builds which are pretty much lost causes and probably not one the intended target groups anyways (such as a natural attack synth or wild shape druid).

Also, some of the more rules-fuzzy attack types Chimera Soul and the Shifting feats offer, such as tail slaps or stings, might need a little clarification on whether they have a limb requirement or come with the required limb.


.....


Regarding the much more serious issue of the early level natural attack insanity, the level 6 build outline in my previous post unfortunately remains completely unaffected by the additional limitations of Chimera Soul.

[Elricaltovilla]

Got it. Thanks. So what is the purpose/mechanical effect of the additional limitations of Chimera Soul? I'd really appreciate if you (or anyone else who isn't as blind as myself) could give me a simple example or two which could open my eyes.

(The only effects I can think of are either way too minor and applicable to way too few builds to be worth the space the text currently occupies (such as altering the full attacks of a very tiny sub-category of the rare multi-armed builds during maybe a few levels, having them for example include two claws and two slams rather than four claws), or they may only have a meaningful an impact for certain specific builds which are pretty much lost causes and probably not one the intended target groups anyways (such as a natural attack synth or wild shape druid).

It serves a couple purposes:
1. It's additional padding to prevent Kali builds from using Chimera Soul to gain additional limbs with which to wield greatswords (or the like). Not that I necessarily have a problem with Kali builds, but that would go entirely against the spirit of the discipline.

2. To make it clear how Chimera Soul stances interact with preexisiting natual attacks. Especially in the case of creatures with natural attacks that have a higher damage die than they would normally. It would be unfair to downgrade someone's 4d6 bite to a 1d8 just because they're in Stance of the Sea King.

3. To prevent using edge cases like psychoactive skin of the proteus or the shifting feats being used to get around the limb limitation

4. To encourage people with already existing natural attacks to diversify their choices and pick up some of the less common natural attack types.

Also, some of the more rules-fuzzy attack types Chimera Soul and the Shifting feats offer, such as tail slaps or stings, might need a little clarification on whether they have a limb requirement or come with the required limb.

This is honestly something I've had a bit of trouble with in terms of wording. I'm reluctant to stick Special sections in a bunch of stances but finding a general wording to add to Chimera Soul and the Shifting Feats has been a little tricky. I'm open to suggestions if you have any.

Regarding the much more serious issue of the early level natural attack insanity, the level 6 build outline in my previous post unfortunately remains completely unaffected by the additional limitations of Chimera Soul.

Quite frankly, while impressive, that's not terribly unusual even in 1st party material:

A Ragebred Skinwalker Bloodrager can have 5 natural attacks at level 1 and with Primalist can get 2 additional attacks at level 4. Works much best on the Draconic Bloodline.

Eidolons can have 2 claws, Rake (counts as 1), Bite, 2 hooves (also counts as 1), and pounce by level 6 for a pittance. They'd have room in their build to throw a pair of arms and greatsword (or lance) proficiency in there as well for another attack.

Honestly, ragebred skinwalkers are cream of the crop for natural attack builds since they can get 3 natural attacks at level 1 for a feat.

An unarchetyped Fighter with the shapechanger subtype can get a similar number of natural attacks just through using their feats and bonus feats on Shifting Feats alone. I know because that's one of the baselines we used for testing the shifting feats.

Natural attack builds tend to ramp up very quickly in low levels and then peter off once they run out of natural attacks to pick up. I also noticed that you used Vestigial Arms in your build (missed that before). Vestigial Arm explicitly states it can't give you extra attacks:

The arm does not give the alchemist any extra attacks or actions per round, though the arm can wield a weapon and make attacks as part of the alchemist’s attack routine (using two-weapon fighting).

And yes, that apparently goes for extra natural attacks.

[upho]

It serves a couple purposes:
1. It's additional padding to prevent Kali builds from using Chimera Soul to gain additional limbs with which to wield greatswords (or the like). Not that I necessarily have a problem with Kali builds, but that would go entirely against the spirit of the discipline.

But the general rules already prevent this since none of the attacks currently granted by Chimera Soul will ever give you an additional limb. And if an option will end up granting say a tail to go with a sting, that tail can not ever be used to wield a manufactured weapon or even make an additional unarmed strike. Just as for example Aspect of the Beast, Strongclaw Shift or the Helm of the Mammoth Lord will not ever give you additional limbs. And I honestly don't think many players have assumed that any of those options grant you additional arms or heads, while I do believe a player who disregards these rules is bound to also disregard the "additional padding".

But I can totally understand how wrong it would feel if the discipline somehow became a no-brainer for Kali builds.

2. To make it clear how Chimera Soul stances interact with preexisiting natual attacks. Especially in the case of creatures with natural attacks that have a higher damage die than they would normally. It would be unfair to downgrade someone's 4d6 bite to a 1d8 just because they're in Stance of the Sea King.

This would be exactly the same regardless of the additional limitations. (Unless otherwise stated, you are never forced to use a benefit granted by an ability, and thus you're perfectly within your rights to say "No thanks, already got my own!" to things like an inferior bite offered by Stance of the Sea King). But yes, I can see how some people might believe otherwise without a reminder/clarification because of how spells usually work, although I believe there are better solutions for this than the current text (more on this later).

3. To prevent using edge cases like psychoactive skin of the proteus or the shifting feats being used to get around the limb limitation

I don't follow. What options/rules text do you believe could encourage a belief that this would be possible? And more importantly, what advantage could be gained?

(I agree that especially the attacks granted by the metamorphosis line of powers may, at least initially, appear as weird exceptions to the general rules, since you don't need to have any specified free associated limbs from other sources in order to gain the attacks. But I don't see how that would somehow make metamorphosis susceptible to abuse with the Chimera Soul options, or say Aspect of the Beast for that matter. Which AFAIK has been perfectly safe from any such attempts, probably because there's nothing to be gained by misinterpreting the RAW.)

4. To encourage people with already existing natural attacks to diversify their choices and pick up some of the less common natural attack types.

I don't understand how the additional limitations would affect this aim, because a PC can typically never choose to gain the same natural attack type from more than one attack-granting option anyways, with the exception of metamorphosis which doesn't affect this anyways. Instead, I believe the increased attack diversification is bound to happen by itself as long as the less common natural attack types are offered, since those will typically not require a limb already claimed by a more commonly available option such as claws and thus actually result in additional attacks rather than different attacks. (This is of course also why the rare gore and unique hooves makes the ragepiggy such a strong race for natural attack builds, despite often having less than ideal stat bonuses etc.)

I guess the potential downside of following the general rules is that most natural attack builds with access to Chimera Soul will have nearly the same "basic" set of up to 9 attacks (bite, 2 claws/slams, gore, 2 hooves, 2 tentacles, and tail slap or sting), since this is the maximum number of attacks allowed by the typical maximum number of limbs a PC race may gain. Hmmm... This might make the aasimar the superior race for a natural attacker in higher levels, as it remains the only option granting access to 2 wing attacks AFAIK.


So, all of the above boils down to this: by adhering to the general rules, the limited number of limbs available to a PC creates precisely the same mechanical effect as

"When using stances or maneuvers that grant you natural attacks, if you already possess an equivalent natural attack of that type from another source you do not gain additional natural attacks of that type."

At least in all cases where the Chimera Soul options are relevant. Or in other words, if disregarding point #2 above, why do the Chimera Soul options need the additional limitation, when all of the other "gain X natural attack"-options (such as the mentioned Aspect of the Beast, Strongclaw Shift or the Helm of the Mammoth Lord) seem to work just fine without it?

This is honestly something I've had a bit of trouble with in terms of wording. I'm reluctant to stick Special sections in a bunch of stances but finding a general wording to add to Chimera Soul and the Shifting Feats has been a little tricky. I'm open to suggestions if you have any.

Well, how about simply using wording similar to the Fleshwarped Scorpion's Tail? Something like:

Deathsting Shift (Shifting)
Benefit: You grow a tail which you can use to make a Sting attack, dealing 1d4 damage for a medium creature.

This doesn't interfere with any other potential tail or tail-dependent attack the PC might already have (which I don't think it should) and also ties the attack to the limb and vice versa. This does allow for having multiple tail attacks, but since this is already possible with Paizo options and the costs are high, I don't think this will be problematic.

Quite frankly, while impressive, that's not terribly unusual even in 1st party material:

Of course. But such builds are even more horribly broken during at least the first levels and should never be used as some kind of "acceptable maximums" IMO. Which is why my wrathblood archetype has a max attack limit even harsher than the Un-Eidolon (it can still become capable of wiping the floor with just about any other natural attack build in later levels, but by then probably none of those will be OP). I thought it best to not use a race that stands out as much in my build outline to illustrate how the new options encourages similar early level brokenness (by for example offering Furyhorn stance to match or even supersede the 1st party ragepiggy build by level 5).

In addition, especially the shifting feats gives the ragepiggy easy access to even more options for early level brokenness, while also extending the insane early level rocket tag effects of such natural attackers further up the levels.

A Ragebred Skinwalker Bloodrager can have 5 natural attacks at level 1 and with Primalist can get 2 additional attacks at level 4. Works much best on the Draconic Bloodline.

Eidolons can have 2 claws, Rake (counts as 1), Bite, 2 hooves (also counts as 1), and pounce by level 6 for a pittance. They'd have room in their build to throw a pair of arms and greatsword (or lance) proficiency in there as well for another attack.

Honestly, ragebred skinwalkers are cream of the crop for natural attack builds since they can get 3 natural attacks at level 1 for a feat.

I would say it's because the ragepiggy can get 3 attacks that don't compete with other attacks for limbs, all of them difficult or impossible for other races to gain. Although with these new options, this advantage is mostly gone and I think the ragepiggy's going to see some serious competition after a few levels and be surpassed by races such as the tiefling and especially the aasimar in higher levels.

An unarchetyped Fighter with the shapechanger subtype can get a similar number of natural attacks just through using their feats and bonus feats on Shifting Feats alone. I know because that's one of the baselines we used for testing the shifting feats.

Yeah, which is a clear sign that something's horribly wrong IMO.

Natural attack builds tend to ramp up very quickly in low levels and then peter off once they run out of natural attacks to pick up.

Yeah, or at least they tend to have a rapidly shrinking number of viable options available in order to keep up with weapon wielders in higher levels. But I think a few of those options can even have them increase in power relative to other martial classes. For example, the martial build with the highest DPR (on paper as well as in game) by a large margin ever seen at my table was a high level ragepiggy abyssal bloodrider primalist with MoMS and fighter dips, mounted on a griffon, using only Paizo stuff (and no Leadership). By level 16 or so, that pair would've easily one-shotted the tarrasque in a straight up fight, something I think only perhaps a handful other 1st party martial builds are be capable of. Although that was before the FCT nerf, so yeah, Horn of the Crioshpinx...

Anyhow, I believe this tendency is another good reason for restricting the "unusual attack"-granting shifting feats and Chimera options (like hooves, tails, tentacles or wings) to higher levels, thus offering natural attackers a boost when they actually might need it rather than giving them even more ways to break the game in earlier levels.

I also noticed that you used Vestigial Arms in your build (missed that before). Vestigial Arm explicitly states it can't give you extra attacks:

And yes, that apparently goes for extra natural attacks.

Ah yes. Sorry, I keep forgetting this is the official ruling now (not how it works in my games or any I've played in, although it's also not possible before high levels).

[Taveena]

How do Rend attacks work with Deadly Agility, incidentally?

[Elricaltovilla]

How do Rend attacks work with Deadly Agility, incidentally?

I think, by RAW, they would still only do Strength damage, but I will check around to see if there isn't a more concrete answer.

[SwordChucks]

I would have said no, but after searching I believe you would deal damage based on dex. Deadly agility says you deal dex instead of str while wielding a weapon to which weapon finesse applies, including natural attacks. It doesn't say that you have to hit with the qualifying weapon only that you wield it and deal damage with an attack. I don't think this is intentional but it's what the rules say. Also wield not being a defined game term as far as I can tell makes this muddy.

Rend is referred to as an attack several times in its description and if you deal damage with it, you are almost certainly wielding a natural attack.

[upho]

How do Rend attacks work with Deadly Agility, incidentally?

It seems to me there is no RAW answer to that, only mentions of it usually being Str based:

The type of attacks that must hit and the additional damage are included in the creature’s description. The additional damage is usually equal to the damage caused by one of the attacks plus 1-1/2 times the creature’s Strength bonus.

So any Rend ability should always detail what the additional damage is (or include a number which makes it obvious in the case of monster statistics). As does for example:

This damage is equal to the damage dealt by one claw attack plus 1-1/2 times the eidolon’s Strength modifier.

For a PC ability, I'd prefer something like:

"The additional damage is equal to the damage caused by one of the [rending natural attack type] attacks plus 1-1/2 times the [rending natural attack type] attack’s ability score damage bonus (normally Strength or Dexterity)."

EDIT: So in the case of the rend abilities in the playtest, no Dex damage. /EDIT

EDIT:Yes, you do deal Dex damage with Rend using Deadly Agility. Thanks SwordChucks! /EDIT

[upho]

Rend is referred to as an attack several times in its description and if you deal damage with it, you are almost certainly wielding a natural attack.

You're right. I'll edit!

[GhorrinRedblade]

I haven't had a chance to dig into this stuff yet, but does any of the new material give some lovin' to the feral heart soulknife? I can't even recall now, can you war-soul a feral heart, the better to use the new discipline offered?

Later on,
Ghorrin Redblade

EDIT: looked it over, and the two archetypes are incompatible, blah. Still, here's hoping the new book can present options for feral hearts.

[Taveena]

Given Ambush Hunter Animal Companions ONLY get Primal Fury, then wouldn't Chimera Soul... just replace that, with no other options?

EDIT: Chimeric Body Stance giving up to eight natural attacks is kind of ridiculous. Gaining a Bite and Gore attack on top of that isn't very hard, at which point Thousand Claws becomes... rather ridiculous.

When using Rampage, can you move 10 feet to attack the same target, or do you need to alternate targets?

[Aditus]

Apologies if this has already been asked and answered, but is the Varsaerk supposed to increase the number of rounds per day that a barbarian can rage?

[Vhaidara]

Hello again everyone, it's been a while. I want to assure you this project is still going, just got a bit sidetracked with RL stuff. However, I come bearing a new present. If you scroll down to the bottom of our document, you'll find a new martial tradition: The Temple of the Formless Spirit, a group of shapeshifting ascetics with a secret goal. Enjoy!

[Shadow-Eater]

Hey, guys! I realize given the visceral nature of werewolves, they are kinda hard to separate from the martial box and there's really no mental attribute other than Wisdom that makes sense for them. In the interest of diversity, however, alongside the claw and bite form options given with the base template, would you consider adding a pair of natural armor or regenerative (or is regeneration too much a World of Darkness thing?) choices for people who might not want to venture into melee but still play in a werewolf game? You've done a great job with Pack choices already, so it seems like there's at least conceptual room for a werewolf whose hybrid form isn't all that offensively impressive.

Pack of the Night Wind granting low-light vision would be a lot better if almost everything (including all werewolves) didn't have either low-light vision or darkvision already. Any chance we might see that moved into the base template (just in case someone is human) and the Pack's benefit being something more universal? Straight Perception? Some kind of group-enhanced scent that allows for easier/more than just pinpointing?

The unshackled rager (unqualified name suggestion: maybe just Unshackled, I get the chains-of-Fenris association and I wouldn't want to drop it [maybe for Lunatic :P] but "rager" is just kinda awkward): Maw of the Wolf should be before Lupine Frenzy because LF references a bite attack that you haven't heard about yet. I really, really, really like the idea of being a werewolf so hard it's your one true bloodline. Lots of great features too.

Silverblade Fighters are surprisingly cool. My only question is if the category drop for mithral is meant to stack; "modification to the rules" leaves me uncertain if it's just expanding the default mithral application or if you can wear plate like light armor now.

Possibly I'm just not reading closely enough, but since both lycanthropes and werewolves have access to wolf form, what are they getting out of Wolf's Rage I as Varsärks? Otherwise I love it.

I like basically all the feats. I should note that throughout this is really clean and well-designed. I'm looking for bad stuff, but there isn't a lot, taken altogether.

Can you stack shifts, to keep for example your fly speed but also activate your combat package?

I honestly don't care what happens to Chimera Soul as long as you guys keep the 8th-level form of the dragon II stance. The dream. Unf.

But I agree that Chimeric Body opens up too many attacks. But I love the mix-and-match! Would there be a problem in just having it grant, say, one primary (2d6) and two secondary (1d8) attacks and letting you choose the types (tentacle/tentacle/tentacle or bite/hoof/hoof for instance) rather than opening up all those two-weapon packages? You get three good weapons and two good abilities, which is a pretty fair haul for a 6th-level stance, IMHO. Pathfinder has kind of a persistent problem with number of attacks scaling and I don't know that there's a safe, sane, and fun way around it.

I think Thousand Claws is okay. Natural attacks + manufactured weapon routine is worse and that's something you can do already. You're giving up that routine for purity of concept and a complimentary damage boost.

I would suggest considering Style feats for Chimera Soul that give you scaling enchantment on your weapons. Maybe just the basic +1-+5, and then keen in there somewhere, which is okay since natural attacks all share a 20 x2 crit unless a maneuver I wasn't looking at changes that.

[Vhaidara]

The unshackled rager (unqualified name suggestion: maybe just Unshackled, I get the chains-of-Fenris association and I wouldn't want to drop it [maybe for Lunatic :P] but "rager" is just kinda awkward): Maw of the Wolf should be before Lupine Frenzy because LF references a bite attack that you haven't heard about yet. I really, really, really like the idea of being a werewolf so hard it's your one true bloodline. Lots of great features too.

I'm going to be honest, I've gone back and forth on this one, and it came down to capitalization of all things. Archetype names aren't capitalized, and to me, "unshackled" doesn't look nearly as good as "Unshackled" as a name when I was writing the descriptions. Good call on the ordering though

Silverblade Fighters are surprisingly cool. My only question is if the category drop for mithral is meant to stack; "modification to the rules" leaves me uncertain if it's just expanding the default mithral application or if you can wear plate like light armor now.

The intent on this is to make it fully 1 category lighter. Normally, mithral is lighter for just about everything except proficiency. Silverblades, while they lose their heavy armor proficiency, can get that armor back if they are able to shell out for the mithral heavy armor.

I like basically all the feats. I should note that throughout this is really clean and well-designed. I'm looking for bad stuff, but there isn't a lot, taken altogether.

Can you stack shifts, to keep for example your fly speed but also activate your combat package?

Yes. When you shift, you can activate as many of your shifts as you want, taking the lowest duration.

[Shadow-Eater]

Yes. When you shift, you can activate as many of your shifts as you want, taking the lowest duration.

Apologies, I meant "can you activate a 1-hour shift and then half an hour later activate a 2-round shift without cancelling the first shift." Or put a third way, can you expend extra uses to "layer" shift packages so you have both long-duration and short-duration options running simultaneously.

[Vhaidara]

Apologies, I meant "can you activate a 1-hour shift and then half an hour later activate a 2-round shift without cancelling the first shift." Or put a third way, can you expend extra uses to "layer" shift packages so you have both long-duration and short-duration options running simultaneously.

Ah. Kind of. You only ever have 1 shift duration. So if you had a 1 hour shift running, had 20 minutes left on it, and made a combat shift that lasted 2 rounds, your hour long shift would still be in effect, but it's duration would drop to 2 rounds.

[SwordChucks]

I now have three werewolf PCs in my game, so thanks for that

I was trying to come up with natural attack options for a wereboar. I figured a choice between a gore with bullrush/knockback effects, a gore with dirty trick effects, and likely two bite attacks. I can't think of anything to make the bite attacks better though. Any ideas?

[Vhaidara]

I now have three werewolf PCs in my game, so thanks for that

I was trying to come up with natural attack options for a wereboar. I figured a choice between a gore with bullrush/knockback effects, a gore with dirty trick effects, and likely two bite attacks. I can't think of anything to make the bite attacks better though. Any ideas?

Actually, funny story about that. At the beginning of development when I wrote the template, there was a small disconnect where I thought this was going to be lycanthropes as a whole instead of focusing in on werewolves. When we modified it to focus in on the wolf aspect, the gore option became a bite attack named Mighty Jaws.

So my advice would be to cross out the bite on Mighty Jaws and write in Gore.

For those curious about the other weapons of the beast
Inescapable Claws was originally for Werebear. Yeah, I know, bears are bite focused, but to me the iconic imagery for a werebear always seems to be more focused on those massive tree trunk arms. Followed, of course, by an adorable, spine-crushing hug.

Vicious Bite, obviously, plays to existing PF wolves and their trip tomfoolery. Which is currently killing my party in a PbP game.

Savage Claws, meanwhile, played to the more savage werewolf imagery, the kind that rips through people leaving nothing but a pile of dismembered body parts. Hence rending people in twain, natural weapon pounce, and a rake attack.

[SwordChucks]

Actually, funny story about that. At the beginning of development when I wrote the template, there was a small disconnect where I thought this was going to be lycanthropes as a whole instead of focusing in on werewolves. When we modified it to focus in on the wolf aspect, the gore option became a bite attack named Mighty Jaws.

So my advice would be to cross out the bite on Mighty Jaws and write in Gore.

Neat, that should save me some time. When I gave my players the option of taking a "level" of werewolf and I showed them the benefits, their only question was "What's the downside?". When they found out there was basically none, I ended up with 3 new werewolves. They're already a gnoll, giant half-orc, and an anthro-wolf so I figured they just got a bit hairier when they shifted. The other PC is playing a Stalker so he will be using Chimera Soul maneuvers.

Overall everyone at my table has gotten some use out of this book.

[Anlashok]

An anthropomorphic wolf werewolf seems kind of redundant.

[Vhaidara]

An anthropomorphic wolf werewolf seems kind of redundant.

I mean, I'm in a PbP game with a kitsune werefox right now. Sometimes people want to beast-mode while they beast-mode, so we add some beast-mode to their beast-mode.

[SwordChucks]

An anthropomorphic wolf werewolf seems kind of redundant.

I don't disagree but it's weird game I run. The group decided that character gets an fur afro when she wolfs-out.

Also, I'd like to point out Bearington Bearman. Redundant? Very. Funny? Undoubtedly.

[Adam1949]

A quick question in regards to the Varsärk Prestige Class. Would it be too much to allow skinwalkers to take this option in-place of being a true Lycanthrope or Werewolf? The race is directly linked to the legends and mythos of the lycanthrope and is very similar to the Shifter of 3.5 Eberron fame; in addition, nothing of the prestige class actually has anything directly linked to being an actual werewolf, since the Beast Shape abilities happen regardless of if they are a werebear, werecrocodile, etc.

[Abithrios]

An anthropomorphic wolf werewolf seems kind of redundant.

Especially considering that "anthropo-" and "were-" both basically mean human. The former comes from Greek, while the latter is Germanic in its roots. See also "weregild" or "Man price" the value of a life that a murderer would owe the victim's family.

[digiman619]

Especially considering that "anthropo-" and "were-" both basically mean human. The former comes from Greek, while the latter is Germanic in its roots. See also "weregild" or "Man price" the value of a life that a murderer would owe the victim's family.

Now that line from The Dresden Files makes sense... Thanks!

[ATalsen]

… allow me to make it very clear: Chimera Soul maneuvers follow the normal rules for natural attacks, in addition to the rules laid out in the discipline itself.

Maybe this has been resolved in a draft that is not online, but looking at the current version of the Chimera Soul Discipline, I'd not seeing a revision that says 'use the normal natural attack rules too'.

My understanding from the posts above is that the natural attack rules are *supposed* to say that you need the limb first before you can 'have' the associated natural attack. I can't really find that, so if that is the case, I'd appreciate anyone point it out to me on the PFSRD!

There is no text in Chimera Soul that says that the natural attacks gained from Chimera Soul stances are not meant to follow the existing rules for natural attacks because there is no reason to indicate that they do not because they are not an exception, therefore you are drawing your assumptions based on nonexistent information.

Assuming that the base rules do require you to have a limb before you can have the attack, I'd say that this part of the current discipline is what would be considering overruling that (even if overruling was not your intension as the author):

"If your form does not currently have this natural attack, you temporarily gain it for use with the maneuver, dealing damage as normal for a natural attack of that type appropriately sized for you."

To me this reads as granting the attack, and if a limb is required to have that attack, then the limb is granted too. If no limb is granted (and thus no natural attack is granted in the case of a missing required limb), then some additional info would be needed to really spell that out.

More Like:
"If your form does not currently have this natural attack, but you have a limb capable of using that attack, you temporarily gain it for use with the maneuver, dealing damage as normal for a natural attack of that type appropriately sized for you. If you do not have an appropriate limb available, you do not gain the natural attack."


This however doesn’t really seem to mesh with the manuvers granting things like sting and tentacles – PCs for the most part aren’t going to have tails and tentacles, so if they can’t gain the attack without the limb, then they can’t get these attacks. Unless they are somehow an exception that was not clarified as an exception?


Or has this all been resolved some other way, and the assumption is that the attacks DO grant limbs when limbs would be needed?