[Dreamscarred Press] New playtest: the Rajah, an akashic initiator!

[thecrimsondawn]

DSP errata'd Profane and Sacred damage to no longer deal +50% damage to good/evil targets, what's in the document is the normal there now.

Aww man, that is one change I dont like. :/ I was not even aware they did that. Guess I wont be using Silver Crane and Black Seraph as much now :p

[Talinor]

Aww man, that is one change I dont like. :/ I was not even aware they did that. Guess I wont be using Silver Crane and Black Seraph as much now :p

If you go through all of the errata'd stuff, you'll see that they've re-written every ability that uses profane/sacred damage to deal additional damage and/or effects to the original targets that those types did additional damage to. There's not really a loss on the stuff that uses them, and they still bypass DR.

[thecrimsondawn]

If you go through all of the errata'd stuff, you'll see that they've re-written every ability that uses profane/sacred damage to deal additional damage and/or effects to the original targets that those types did additional damage to. There's not really a loss on the stuff that uses them, and they still bypass DR.

Im going to need to do that. Where can I find the full change log btw?

[Castilonium]

Im going to need to do that. Where can I find the full change log btw?

http://dreamscarred.com/download/DRP271X_PoWErrata.pdf Here ya go

[thecrimsondawn]

http://dreamscarred.com/download/DRP271X_PoWErrata.pdf Here ya go

You're a god and a saint, thanks! :)

[Air0r]

You're a god and a saint, thanks! :)

what are his domains?

[Galacktic]

So, are there any thoughts to the future of a prestige class that advances veilweaving and maneuvers? I'm playing a Rajah in a Kingmaker game and the thought came up in the group!


E: Another thought, how do prestige classes work with the Rajah anyway? What would advance assuming they got a veilweaving or initiating one?

[digiman619]

You're a god and a saint, thanks! :)

what are his domains?

Well clearly at least Knowledge and Good.

[thecrimsondawn]

About to give 'The Duelist' a run for its money next game. We have a house full of were-creatures running an operation outside our CR range, and my scouts that infiltrated report that they plan to attack the town that I am building. Clearly a Rajah could never have this. The odds seem to be about 15 to 1, but I am using the Batal archetype, with 'sword of the Moon Queen' to make me very hard to hit. Just in case I fail my save, I also have 'The Primordial' shaped to give myself additional saving throws on any effect.

I dont think the DM expected our small group to try to raid the place that is clearly a bad idea, but when you have YOUR town under risk of invasion, as well as the lives of hundreds of people to worry about, its not like I have a choice, right :p.
Gotta strike first and fast.

[AGrinningCat]

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Or at least everyone in the US.

I think you accidentally dropped The Protector's bookmark when you edited it. Also, while I can understand removing the typeless AC bonus to allies, taking away the Rajah's own AC bonus seems a bit much.

Fixed the bookmark issue! To repeat what I said for everyone else: The Protector was changed as 'number fixing veils' ended up being very unpopular -- While it was popular for players who wanted to boost numbers, reportedly GMs would just boost attack by the same amount to compensate (Same with Warlord). Thus it was changed into something more impactful to make players feel better about using it.

Do you think it'd be possible to get a generic "+1 bind" feat for the rajah? I'm not quite sure I like the slot limitations of the existing binding feats when it comes to the rajah and its title veils.

The Mighty veil does not remove the AoOs from bull rushes; I believe it'd become more helpful if it did.

For clarification: Stance of the Sunlight Shield's emergency shield sharing damage with the initiator is meant to be for the life of the shield, yes? I'd think it would make sense if the essence would be separated by the start of the initiator's next turn, but I can understand the desire to prevent double shield spamming.

In addition, I don't think the current wording of the stance allows the shield to float above the ground. Given the comment about being a pseudo-Floating Disk, I'd assume it would...

Regality specifically excludes increases in maneuver essence capacity... At the moment, by RAW, the other capacity increasing class features for other akasha classes do not have this stipulation. Do you have plans to errata other capacity increasing class features when this is released? Or is this an intentional aspect of balance, where the rajah has full maneuver progression and the default essence capacity and other classes have the slower maneuver progression and greater essence capacity?

Generic +1 bind feat would probably end up being a 'must take'. As such, I'd like to avoid making a feat like this.

The Mighty: Basically intended for people who already make a lot of use out of bullrushing, like Daevics or something similar. Even if it had protection, the mechanically viable option would be to attack instead of bull rushing most of the time. That being said, I might be able to get the protection on it. Let me float this elsewhere and I'll get back to you. I do worry that it has to compete with 'improved bullrush', which it'd be a better feat for that, even if improved bullrush shouldn't be a feat in the first place.

As for the other classes, you lose progression on maneuver regardless of how you try to slice it when trying to get extra capacity, saving stuff like Gestalt. As such, it should be fine as is.

What are the statistics for a palanquin?

Spoiler

Show

Palanquin (CR 4)

XP 1,200
N Large magical beast
Init +5; Senses darkvision 60 ft., low-light vision, scent; Perception +12

DEFENSE

AC 15, touch 10, flat-footed 14 (+1 Dex, +5 natural, –1 size)
hp 47 (5d10+20)
Fort +10, Ref +5, Will +2

OFFENSE

Speed 30 ft.
Melee 2 claws +8 (1d6+4 plus grab), bite +8 (1d6+4)
Space 10 ft.; Reach 5 ft.

STATISTICS

Str 19, Dex 12, Con 18, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10
Base Atk +5; CMB +10 (+14 grapple); CMD 21 (25 vs. trip)
Feats Improved Initiative, Great Fortitude, Skill Focus (Perception)
Skills Perception +12

The palaquin is a distant relative to the gazebo.

Jokes aside, I don't quite understand what you're looking for here.

I, for one, would love a pet archetype. Or a heraldry maybe? Would be a chance to use the akshaic animal companion archetype.

A heraldry would be too strong, but the pet archetype (currently named Senaapati) is slated for Rajah 2.

Sword of the Moon Queen: While wearing medium or heavy armor, the batal does not incur movement speed penalties from her armor. The batal increases her armor bonus to AC equal to the amount of veils she has shaped. (If she does not have an armor bonus to AC, treat her armor bonus as +0.)

This feels a little redundant. Ive never heard of any armor providing an armor bonus of 0. Is this intended to provide armor if you wear none now, or is it a counter to some combo/skill exploit that I am unaware of?

That function is actually two functions -- For example, you could wear no armor, select sword of the moon queen, and gain an AC bonus off of the veils shaped. Only if you have medium/heavy armor do you get the speed reduction.

As per the Batal change, I made a HUGE paragraph about what I disliked about the change before I realized I read how it works now wrong and deleted it, lol... <_<
Now that we can bind to any slot at that level, its kinda cool, and an even trade to what is given up I feel too.
I do have a big question tho about this change! I see it says not one way or another if the Batal can bind these veils to their allies still or if its only themselves, or if we need to take the bind feat just to bind title veils to our allies. Could you elaborate on your intent with this one please? :)


The Fallen title
I would suggest adjusting your note about profane damage to follow suit with the profane damage that DSP already uses, dealing 50% more damage vs good aligned targets.

The Ephemeral
I like the change, but quite honestly, as a player I feel it may be a little strong giving additional teleportation speed with essence points. Perhaps extra essence giving a 2 stealth bonus instead?

As the Batal is the veilweaver, they are the ones doing the shaping/binding. As such, they can bind normally with their veils, even if it's shaped on another.

As the fallen was already answered, let me get to the Ephemeral -- I think it's in a good place right now. Most benefit comes from short ranged teleports, as once you get to higher levels, the 5-25 or so bonus feet won't really matter to the medium/longer range teleports. If others do complain about this, I'll see about changing this.

So, are there any thoughts to the future of a prestige class that advances veilweaving and maneuvers? I'm playing a Rajah in a Kingmaker game and the thought came up in the group!


E: Another thought, how do prestige classes work with the Rajah anyway? What would advance assuming they got a veilweaving or initiating one?

I, personally, have nothing planned (Too much on my plate as is!). As for how the Prestige class would work, veilweaving prestige classes would progress the titles, and initiators would progress the rajah's initiation side.

About to give 'The Duelist' a run for its money next game. We have a house full of were-creatures running an operation outside our CR range, and my scouts that infiltrated report that they plan to attack the town that I am building. Clearly a Rajah could never have this. The odds seem to be about 15 to 1, but I am using the Batal archetype, with 'sword of the Moon Queen' to make me very hard to hit. Just in case I fail my save, I also have 'The Primordial' shaped to give myself additional saving throws on any effect.

I dont think the DM expected our small group to try to raid the place that is clearly a bad idea, but when you have YOUR town under risk of invasion, as well as the lives of hundreds of people to worry about, its not like I have a choice, right :p.
Gotta strike first and fast.

Glad to hear your having fun with the class! I'm always happy to hear about excerpts about the Rajah/Batal!

-----------------

Alright. As we're nearing the end of this playtest, I'd like to get a few more questions answered from those who are playing/will play the class.

1) How do you feel about the current level of the Batal? Do you feel that it's too strong?
2) Is there anything that you feel I might have overlooked, Rajah/Batal or Radiant Dawn? Something to go back and look at?
3) What would you like to see for Rajah 2?

[Draacul]

3) What would you like to see for Rajah 2?

Ironically,archetypes for OTHER classes that steal some of it's shtick.
And/or a few prestige classes.DSP usually makes usable ones.

[Galacktic]

I've not touched the Batal so I can't give a firm answer on that one, but I'd love an animal companion/Eidolon/something based archetype for Rajah 2. In addition to that, more Titles is never a -bad- thing. Maybe something to focus on caster allies, or similar.

Additionally, more options to interact with other facets of Path of War via feats - like a feat to let you lock via Vassalage from Path of War - would be pretty amazing!

Maybe an inverse Rajah? an archetype that gains Cursed Razor and Veiled Moon, and focuses on debuffing enemies rather than empowering allies. Maybe change Titles to fit with that too, forcing negative versions of them upon enemies as a move action with a save or something?

And when he was asking for the stats of the palanquin, I think he was asking what kind of movespeed it has as a mount/etc. Cause I was entirely going to be riding around on one on my Rajah in fights, but I couldn't find out what kind of movement speed it had or how many spaces it took up.

Phone typing all this, so sorry for odd formatting and any spelling errors!

[thecrimsondawn]

While its on my mind, when you start work on Rajah 2, could you consider adding in a Variant Multi-class rule segment somewhere? I feel that the heraldry system is just too much fun to not give other classes a way to pick it up. Would not be too bad to have a way to get around 1 to 3 title veils to shape on others too.

[thecrimsondawn]

Maybe an inverse Rajah? an archetype that gains Cursed Razor and Veiled Moon, and focuses on debuffing enemies rather than empowering allies. Maybe change Titles to fit with that too, forcing negative versions of them upon enemies as a move action with a save or something?

A huge +1 to this. I love this idea and it would make a great archetype. Cursed Razor and Eternal Guardian would be obvious trade outs for such a system, but so would a series of unique veils. It would be a lot of work too :/

[Castilonium]

1) How do you feel about the current level of the Batal? Do you feel that it's too strong?

It's not too strong. Better armor, more HP, and higher CMD can't make up for losing a veil and the ability to use counters on allies. Most parties will benefit more from having a regular Rajah than a Batal because of that. Its Crossroad options aren't out of line. I think the Batal is perfectly fine.

2) Is there anything that you feel I might have overlooked, Rajah/Batal or Radiant Dawn? Something to go back and look at?

Narcissism's Wis 13 prerequisite. Please remove it . I don't see how it makes thematic sense, and wisdom is already the best mental stat. There's a reason why Ordained Defender Warders are so popular. And while you're at it, please ask Ssalarn if you can reprint the Shape Veil feat to remove its Wis 13 prerequisite too.

3) What would you like to see for Rajah 2?

An archetype or prestige class that involves creating solid objects out of Akasha. Some Rajahs should be so majestic that they can create works of art, lavish furniture, fortifications, and even entire glorious palaces from thin air to show off their splendor! Something more grandiose and applicable to combat than Constructed Comforts. Maybe it could be a Heraldry for the Senaapati, if that's an archetype that will create minions out of Akasha.

[MilleniaAntares]

The Specialist veil's essence section says:

"Thunderbolt - The entitled gains a +1 bonus on attack rolls when using this ammunition if its opponent is wearing metal armor, is wielding a metal weapon, or is made of metal for each point of essence invested into this veil."

Is this benefit intended to not scale with essence invested? The other options (except normal) refer to essence.

[Galacktic]

The Specialist veil's essence section says:

"Thunderbolt - The entitled gains a +1 bonus on attack rolls when using this ammunition if its opponent is wearing metal armor, is wielding a metal weapon, or is made of metal for each point of essence invested into this veil."

Is this benefit intended to not scale with essence invested? The other options (except normal) refer to essence.

It says +1 per essence invested though?

[Draacul]

3) What would you like to see for Rajah 2?

Also,i asked my wife on the matter.
She wants more titles and heraldies.
Why,oh why did i marry such a child?

[thecrimsondawn]

I need to fully agree with Lord_Gareth's post.
If the creator of the Rajah wishes to make an archetype or something that changes the requirement, that is quite easy to do and wont harm anything already out there. A simple sentence for such a class that uses X stat for their veilweaving modifier in place of all class features, and akashic feat prerequisites that require wisdom would suffice. Ive seen a few archetypes for other systems do this already and its not a bad idea for very MAD classes.

[ATalsen]

Radiant Dawn

Disrupt Essence
If it hits, the target must make a Will save (DC 10 + ½ your initiation level + your initiation modifier) or have a single EX or SU ability that requires an action to activate, special sense, or special movement mode of your choice disabled for rounds equal to your initiation modifier.

I cannot find anything in the rules for determining what "Special Movement Mode" is.
I think you mean "Special Movement Types"

MODE would be Walk/Hustle/Run
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemasterin...tion-movement/

Modes of Movement

While moving at the different movement scales, creatures generally walk, hustle, or run.
Walk: ...
Hustle: ...
Run:...

This could lead to very different effects than intended.



While I get what Ex and Su are, it would probably be best to spell out the actual words: Exceptional Ability or Supernatural Ability
Or at least abbreviate them correctly: Su not SU, Ex not EX

[MilleniaAntares]

It says +1 per essence invested though?

Oh! I'm blind, sorry about that...

2) Is there anything that you feel I might have overlooked, Rajah/Batal or Radiant Dawn? Something to go back and look at?

You didn't respond to my Stance of the Sunlight Shield's questions, so I don't know if you may have overlooked them or if you simply do not know how to respond right now. But here they are again, just in case:

For clarification: Stance of the Sunlight Shield's emergency shield sharing damage with the initiator is meant to be for the life of the shield, yes? I'd think it would make sense if the essence would be separated by the start of the initiator's next turn, but I can understand the desire to prevent double shield spamming.

In addition, I don't think the current wording of the stance allows the shield to float above the ground. Given the comment about being a pseudo-Floating Disk, I'd assume it would...

I don't think I have any other concerns for Radiant Dawn, besides the fact that it's so awesome I can't help but take the maneuvers on my rajah rather than anything else. I suppose that's the advantage of not having to stick to extraordinary abilities.

3) What would you like to see for Rajah 2?

For the Crossroads, I wouldn't mind a fourth option kind that acts like "learn one non-rajah veil [with the standard slot restrictions, ala Inaugurate Title] as a title veil, plus an additional veil every X levels", if you think it could be appropriate.

[thecrimsondawn]

Oh! I'm blind, sorry about that...



You didn't respond to my Stance of the Sunlight Shield's questions, so I don't know if you may have overlooked them or if you simply do not know how to respond right now. But here they are again, just in case:



I don't think I have any other concerns for Radiant Dawn, besides the fact that it's so awesome I can't help but take the maneuvers on my rajah rather than anything else. I suppose that's the advantage of not having to stick to extraordinary abilities.


For the Crossroads, I wouldn't mind a fourth option kind that acts like "learn one non-rajah veil [with the standard slot restrictions, ala Inaugurate Title] as a title veil, plus an additional veil every X levels", if you think it could be appropriate.

Ya know, I like that idea about the crossroads. The veils are precious, so spending a core feature to get more is kinda a cool idea - most of all if you are a Batal. (of course the bonus veils for batal could only apply to himself or something). On the other hand, I find Sword of the Sky Sovereign for Batal could you a very minor buff. Its just not nearly as cool or useful I find as the other 2. Maybe the ability to trade out weapon groups for a special ability like fighter can too? Or what about the idea of changing the bonus to hit and damage off the number of veils you have shaped, just to keep with the theme.
Just tossing ideas out.

[Biapolis]

Salutations. So, I only recently found this, which is a pity, seeing as it seems to be ending [also a good thing in some ways, I suppose], but I do have but one question. How is the Rajah meant to heal out of combat? Outside of just attacking random squares/helpless critters/each other. While I technically have no problem with that sort of thing mechanically, I kinda have a mental image problem with going "hey guys, good job on that fight. Time to heal up. Everyone drop your weapons and start punching each other". Is it really intended that this is the only way to heal while there isn't a fight going on, or am I missing something?

That question not withstanding, I really love the class/concept. Can't wait to throw money at the final release, and see what sort of things are in a second edition.

[Galacktic]

Salutations. So, I only recently found this, which is a pity, seeing as it seems to be ending [also a good thing in some ways, I suppose], but I do have but one question. How is the Rajah meant to heal out of combat? Outside of just attacking random squares/helpless critters/each other. While I technically have no problem with that sort of thing mechanically, I kinda have a mental image problem with going "hey guys, good job on that fight. Time to heal up. Everyone drop your weapons and start punching each other". Is it really intended that this is the only way to heal while there isn't a fight going on, or am I missing something?

That question not withstanding, I really love the class/concept. Can't wait to throw money at the final release, and see what sort of things are in a second edition.

I feel like their out of combat healing is meant to be a weakness. No initiators can heal without a fight going on or things like sparring!

[Biapolis]

I feel like their out of combat healing is meant to be a weakness. No initiators can heal without a fight going on or things like sparring!

Fair, I suppose, but I'd figure out of combat healing could be baked into the Akasha side. I think most [all?] of the titles are based on the martial traditions, except no title for Radiant Dawn. Although I suppose the Demiurge could be seen as the RD veil. And I suppose one could grab Immaculate Touch with Shale Veil or Inaugurate Title if they don't want to invest into UMD/healing sticks

Edit: I was looking closer at the Radiant Dawn style, and realized something odd about how essence interacts with them. So, you invest in the maneuvers and you can't access it until you ready the maneuver. Sure, simple enough. But Rajah can swap out one maneuver readied for another maneuver known. If the maneuver swapped has essence in it, what happens? I can see a few possible answers.
1] essence falls back into your pool, ready to be reassigned.
2] essence is locked into the maneuver, lost until you ready it again.
3] essence is sitting in the maneuver, but it can be moved around as normal.

I imagine 1 is the proper answer, easiest way to work it, but figured I'd check.

[AGrinningCat]

Fair, I suppose, but I'd figure out of combat healing could be baked into the Akasha side. I think most [all?] of the titles are based on the martial traditions, except no title for Radiant Dawn. Although I suppose the Demiurge could be seen as the RD veil. And I suppose one could grab Immaculate Touch with Shale Veil or Inaugurate Title if they don't want to invest into UMD/healing sticks

The Demiurge is the Radiant Dawn veil, correct. It's also the only veil that isn't a title veil that the rajah has access to, and it also has the title-veil naming scheme.

[Ssalarn]

In the instance mentioned earlier about Shape Veil, the Wis 13 prereq was used because Wis is the default veilweaving modifier for non-veilweaving classes, and it was comparable to feats like Eldritch Heritage which has a Cha 13 prereq. I did send in a message asking them to update the Wis 13 to "Wis 13 or veilweaving modifier 13", but like a lot of the later errata, it never made it into the book after being sent in.

[EisenKreutzer]

[Removed an unneccesary and juvenile comment]

[MilleniaAntares]

Edit: I was looking closer at the Radiant Dawn style, and realized something odd about how essence interacts with them. So, you invest in the maneuvers and you can't access it until you ready the maneuver. Sure, simple enough. But Rajah can swap out one maneuver readied for another maneuver known. If the maneuver swapped has essence in it, what happens? I can see a few possible answers.
1] essence falls back into your pool, ready to be reassigned.
2] essence is locked into the maneuver, lost until you ready it again.
3] essence is sitting in the maneuver, but it can be moved around as normal.

I imagine 1 is the proper answer, easiest way to work it, but figured I'd check.

I think 1 is the answer, though the rules aren't too clear on whether or not you can invest essence into a non-readied maneuver.

Edit: Just had a nice combat where my rajah did pretty well.

Level 10 party vs a level 13 cleric of some homebrew chaotic neutral goddess, in a campaign rather akin to Soul Eater, where people turn into weapons.

Sun's Gleam was great because the encounter started as a surprise to both sides, the party alchemist tackled this suspicious cleric most everyone else trusted; the vs touch attack was rather useful with high rolls, even despite my charisma-focused rajah having only 12 dexterity.

Stance of the Sunlight Shield was awesome, especially since the cleric ran away to a corner, and thus pumping essence into it allows her to box the woman in. Everyone else unfortunately whiffs against her quite a bit, partly due to terrible positioning, and partly due to the woman getting really good armor and having Protection vs Good up.

Unfortunately I pumped 3 essence into the maneuvers instead of the 2 I should have. I've already edited my file to prevent me from doing that again.

Decree of Torment: really great, but it requires your allies to actually hit. Sadly I forgot about using a brand with my own Sun's Gleam hits.

Shatter Spell didn't work, unfortunately, due to the cleric relying on her domains for buffs (particularly Protection vs Good)... and perhaps a poor roll.

Decree of Purity was a godsend because of how I managed to pump healing into my ally after she was reduced to 1 HP after a Harm that managed to punch through the Sunlight Shield.

However, Decree of Purity (as well as Royal Mandate) both unfortunately failed to help with reviving the priestess when she took cyanide hidden in a fake tooth to kill herself. The way it's worded, only someone who wants to be saved will benefit from the reroll with a bonus; since the priestess was failing her saves deliberately, the +7 was worth squat. I'm not sure if it would be worth the effort to put in a "you can't deliberately fail the save granted by this ability" to prevent such a thing to happen in the future; it's up to you if you want to remove suicide-through-poison from the GM's box of tools if people use the rajah or Radiant Dawn.

Decree of Mercy helped a bit, since a few of her attacks were changed to nonlethal. Sadly not the Harm.

Sunstroke was useless, since the fight was well outside of its niche (one target for the majority of the fight, in a known square).

Demiurge's bind was great. Unfortunately I forgot to declare veils for that day, because I figured we wouldn't be fighting within the village, so the bind saved my life by slapping veils on people through the battle.

Sadly The Benevolent didn't help against the cleric directly because she was somehow chaotic neutral after taking over another priestess's life, beyond being the origin for Sun's Gleam attacks through vassalage.

The Nightmare was helpful when the rogue hit, because I forgot to put up a sunlight shield after it was destroyed by the Harm spell. So she ended up performing a five foot step away from the corner and proceeded to get her butt kicked in through flanking, disarms, and trips.


As an aside, copying and pasting cells from one Google sheet to another is a pain when the cell references don't update.

[thecrimsondawn]

A couple thoughts while playing with Radiant Dawn.

I feel Dismiss would be way more fun as a counter as a response to an attack rather then a strike.

It would be nice to have a second stance option in the level 3 maneuvers

The feat Narcissism feels like you can get it a little too early, most of all compared to the Shape Veil feat. I feel it should have a minimum level of either 3 or 5 instead of 1. With a level 1 requirement, you can get some powers way beyond what anyone else can have at that level (teleportation at lv1, targeting a second foe on a missed attack, and so on just to give a few examples)


I will post more thoughts from playing as they come.