ooc Character Balance and Brief

[Arklytte]

15 hours ago, Paxon said:

5: Oh man, hadn't considered War Paint yet. I suspect there are going to be lots of interesting cases. I mean, it really feels like it would make sense in some ways and not in others. Speed increase is the one I might have the hardest time justifying, and I have a feeling this is going to be turning into a crazy-fast tank in a variety of ways 😉 . Here's what I'll do: yes, warpaint can be applied to the tank. Some of the effects won't be relevant (i.e. it doesn't make perception rolls, so yellow is pointless), but most will. However, anything above Large size takes 2 doses of warpaint. Colossal and above would take 4, though I'm not sure that's ever going to be relevant. You can also use warpaint on Duende's bike. 

Since you made those changes to the Driver rules, none of the other questions really needed responses. I appreciate the clarifications though. 🙂

 

I was thinking of using the Green war paint on the Tank, pretty much all the time.  It allows Morale Bonuses to remain for 2 extra rounds.  Aid Another is a Morale bonus.  I think you see where I'm going with this.  If we're in the tank, and someone Aids Another (or uses some other Morale bonus), then that bonus would linger for 2 rounds after being given.  At least, that's how it seems to me.  If you agree, then consider that pretty much a given for what war paint is on the tank.

 

I was thinking of using said paint to repaint La Chancla on the main gun every day...a part of Doc's morning ritual.  😄

 

*************

 

Also, apropos of nothing, I wanted to get your ruling/approval on a couple things.

 

I decided to not go with Mobile Striker, since it would require someone else to take the same talent, and would require constant coordination, in addition to potentially requiring both parties to take the same action, every round.  It was just too much of a headache.  I'll 'settle' for an increase in speed and a miss chance.  😄

 

I instead used that talent, and one other I dropped from Scout to get some Brute (Tank Only) talents.

 

One of the ones I took was Stampede, which lets you Charge (so long as you do a Bull Rush or Overrun, which is going to be pretty much all the time based on the new rules), and draw AOO's on said Charge.  Plus, it makes it so that noone can avoid an Overrun unless the driver chooses to let them.  I know that you added a partial version of this to the new rules, but it only applies to creatures of size Medium or smaller.  With Stampede, Doc can overrun pretty much everyone...or at least try to. 😈

 

I also added Focused Might, which lets you regain MF on a successful Shove.  Seemed like a good idea, since Doc will probably be expending his Martial Focus a lot to keep Moving Target and/or Hammer going. And that way, it also keeps the Crew MF free for someone else to use, since Doc can regain his MF simply by doing his thing.

 

Finally, I took Giant's Physique (and swapped out a feat for Extend Stance), which lets the Tank count as Colossal (technically Colossal+, but after Colossal you just get a bonus to CMB/CMD) for all it's maneuvers (and gives him a general CMB/CMD bonus, which is always nice). That way, when we inevitably run up against a kaiju...because you know you're going to throw one at us :D...he'll still be able to Bull Rush them, should he be batcrap crazy enough to try wish to, unless they're Colossal++, I suppose.  🙂

 

Anyway, reason for rattling all that off is to make sure that it's all kosher with you before I finalize my sheet.  Doc's basically ready, other than approval for those three talents.

 

EDIT: Actually, I forgot one.  He's also got Mobile Focus from Barrage, which lets you regain your MF when you move no more than half your speed in a round.  I took that as normal, since Doc needs a reliable way to regain MF for himself as well (turns out that several of his class features require MF to really work well 😛).  Anyway, would I be able to use that to regain the tank's MF as well?

 

 

 

Edited June 22, 2022 by Arklytte (see edit history)

[Arklytte]

11 hours ago, dalamb said:

You know more than I do about Spheres, Ark, so I'm happy to take your advice.

You do you, my guy. 🙂

 

I'm more than happy to offer advice, but at the end of the day, it's your character.  Make sure the mechanics fit your vision. You can never go wrong that way, even if it's not the most 'efficient' or 'optimized'.  🙂

[Paxon]

10 hours ago, Arklytte said:

Might I suggest Hammer?  This basically lets the tank Bull Rush critters/vehicles into other vehicles/critters/buildings/whatever, and the vehicle/critter being Bull Rushed takes extra damage from the impact, based on their size and how far they would have been pushed, had they not been slammed into another thing.  Basically, it's the old "We pinned him against the wall with the bumper...FLOOR IT!" trope.  🙂

 

That seems like a good replacement. Anyone opposed?

 

9 hours ago, Arklytte said:

I was thinking of using the Green war paint on the Tank, pretty much all the time.  It allows Morale Bonuses to remain for 2 extra rounds.  Aid Another is a Morale bonus.  I think you see where I'm going with this.  If we're in the tank, and someone Aids Another (or uses some other Morale bonus), then that bonus would linger for 2 rounds after being given.  At least, that's how it seems to me.  If you agree, then consider that pretty much a given for what war paint is on the tank.

Yeah, Green is fine for the tank. Though the Tank is still slightly separate from The Crew, so that bonus would apply to morale bonuses that affect the creature that is The Tank. It would not affect every member of the The Crew, you'd still have to apply individual green paints to make aid anothers on one another linger. I'm also going to be a bit more strict with Aid Another upon the tank itself than i might be otherwise. For instance, mostly I'm not going to allow Aid Another to the tank's AC, as it's hard to justify and I can quickly see it getting out of hand if every crewmember throws separate +2 bonuses on it. There might be situational exceptions.

 

9 hours ago, Arklytte said:

Anyway, reason for rattling all that off is to make sure that it's all kosher with you before I finalize my sheet.  Doc's basically ready, other than approval for those three talents.

 

EDIT: Actually, I forgot one.  He's also got Mobile Focus from Barrage, which lets you regain your MF when you move no more than half your speed in a round.  I took that as normal, since Doc needs a reliable way to regain MF for himself as well (turns out that several of his class features require MF to really work well 😛).  Anyway, would I be able to use that to regain the tank's MF as well?

Yup, all those are fine (oh crap, what have I done? Everything is about to get run over and smashed!). 

 

And yes, Mobile Focus will allow you as the driver to restore MF to the Tank/Crew when you take that action. There will still be the normal restriction on the Crew of only allowing MF to be restored once per round, but you all can get around that a little bit by the options to expend/restore your own MFs.

[Arklytte]

2 hours ago, Paxon said:

Yeah, Green is fine for the tank. Though the Tank is still slightly separate from The Crew, so that bonus would apply to morale bonuses that affect the creature that is The Tank. It would not affect every member of the The Crew, you'd still have to apply individual green paints to make aid anothers on one another linger. I'm also going to be a bit more strict with Aid Another upon the tank itself than i might be otherwise. For instance, mostly I'm not going to allow Aid Another to the tank's AC, as it's hard to justify and I can quickly see it getting out of hand if every crewmember throws separate +2 bonuses on it. There might be situational exceptions.

That makes sense.  Still, being able to Aid one round and have it stick  around afor a couple more is a good thing.

 

For now, Green is the only War Paint I have that will work.  As we level, I may end up getting others.

 

Aid is a Morale boost.  AFAIK, those stack normally, so even if everyone Aided AC, it'd still only be +2.

2 hours ago, Paxon said:

Yup, all those are fine (oh crap, what have I done? Everything is about to get run over and smashed!). 

 

MWUAHAAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

*rubs hands together, Mr Burns style*

"Smithers...release the tank!!!"

 

😄

2 hours ago, Paxon said:

And yes, Mobile Focus will allow you as the driver to restore MF to the Tank/Crew when you take that action. There will still be the normal restriction on the Crew of only allowing MF to be restored once per round, but you all can get around that a little bit by the options to expend/restore your own MFs.

Cool Beans! 🙂

 

EDIT: As we level (and presuming the Tank will level with us), we should seriously consider Great Focus as a Crew feat.  Having a second MF (and being able to recover 2/rd) would probably be a good thing too.

 

 

Edited June 22, 2022 by Arklytte (see edit history)

[Paxon]

9 minutes ago, Arklytte said:

Aid is a Morale boost.  AFAIK, those stack normally, so even if everyone Aided AC, it'd still only be +2.

I don't think it is a morale bonus, but I could be wrong. Everything I see it looks like just an untyped bonus, so different sources of it stack. A bunch of the warleader stuff is morale though, which a number of you have, so you have that going for you. 

[Djacob91]

Aid Another looks untyped. Also, if you look in the grappling rules, it does mention that if multiple people attempt to grapple the same guy, they all use aid another to give a stacking +2 bonus to the guy doing the actual grappling, which would indicate that it is supposed to stack normally.

[Arklytte]

Well sonofabitch...I've been working under the premise that its a Morale bonus literally since I started playing PF. 😵🤯

 

Damn.  That makes the green paint all but useless, unless someone else can give Morale boosts.  Doc doesn't have anything to create them.

 

That is...frustrating.

 

EDIT: Oh...warleader.  🤦‍♂️ Got it.  In that case, I'll keep the green paint, since it apparently will be useful.  🙂

Edited June 22, 2022 by Arklytte (see edit history)

[bcool999]

Great Focus is useful if we want to regularly use MF abilities, but we can still only regain MF 1/rd according to the Wiki. 
 

Edit: Also the Blue War Paint will make Parker a Fast Tank!

Edited June 23, 2022 by bcool999 (see edit history)

[Arklytte]

I always run it as 'once per MF', so if you have Great Focus, you could recover it twice per round, and if you had a 3rd Focus from some source, 3 times, etc.

 

It's not RAW, of course, but it just makes sense, since GF specifically says "This martial focus is gained and expended independently from the first.", which says pretty clearly, IMO, that you should be able to regain each independently,  even in the same round.  I know they erratta'd it on the wiki, but as written it's pretty clear.

 

Regardless, some abilities only function when you have MF, so even if we play it as errata'd, having a second instance is never a bad thing.  🙂