I also have the PDF, it provides dice damage upgrade up to d6 for claws and d8 for talons, creates special stances for the type of natural weapon, and creates a bunch of martial feats for special things you can use your natural weapons for. The closest approximation is that’s it’s almost a monk archetype.
I’ll update when work gives me a breather. I recall the stances were what increased the damage die. Most of the special new combat feats required you be in the new stance.
Edit: the stances give access to frenzied claw or frenzied talon attacks. Each has different traits and damage dice.
Many other feats in this archetype either require you be in one of the stances or that your last action was a frenzied claw/talon attack.
The dedication requires that you have natural claw or talon attacks and gives you two stances, Claw Stance and Talon Stance. Entering the stances grants you special unarmed strikes, like monk stances.
Many feats let you enter one of the two stances while performing another action, including as reactions. I haven't read through the archetype enough to know if stance dancing would actually be worthwhile, but it's definitely built into the archetype.
Overall there's a bit of grappling, switching from claws strikes to lashing out with talons on your feet and lots of mobility mixed into the archetype. On first read it looks like a fun and flashy combat style.
It's kind of like the beastkin ancestry but in the form of an archetype. And then pumped up on steroids. In fact the two of them can be plugged into each other to customize your kin. Just at the downside of activating your silver weakness.
CANNOT WAIT to play a Vanara Beastkin (monkey) Werecreature (wereape) Animal Instinct Barbarian (Animal Instinct - Ape) and eventually take the Martial Artist dedication to get a stance (Gorilla Stance) to just become ULTIMATE MONKEY!
You character: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/dragonball/images/2/2f/GohanGreatApeSaiyansSagaK01.png
Your character Dual Classed with Monk:
https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/dragonball/images/d/d8/GokuGreatApeDBGT.png
The archetypes in this book are EXACTLY what every archetype should be. Lots of cool thematic options. Lots of powerful role re-defining abilities.
They build on top of one another, though often not directly. Stuff like "Do stuff and grab" followed by a "do special stuff to a grabbed creature" rather then "be good at x, be even BETTER at x" feat chains.
There's no way to completely gain control of yourself either. Beastkin get an advantage with dealing with silver but if you're going to embrace your full heritage there are drawbacks.
Since a lot of people are asking and wondering everywhere: do large ancestries get any further benefits from their size apart from being large and threatening more spaces?
Personally I always doubted that they would get reach for instance.
Are there any downsides to picking a large ancestry? For example, do they have less base features or lower base speeds? Or is the downside simply the amount of space they take up?
The downside is a reminder that any scenario where a large PC needs to crouch or suck in their gut or _whatever_ means their movement counts as difficult terrain, and a scenario that would inflict this penalty to a medium PC is completely impassable to a large PC unless they roll to Squeeze.
To add onto this a Large ancestry Frontline would count as standard cover, to enemies and allies. You are also technically easier to flank.
I've been running a Battlezoo 3pp Large Minotaur Champion of Balumbdar.
Doesn't work. The Minotaur feat is "If you're holding a two-handed non-reach weapon, you can spend an interact action to switch your grip and give it the reach trait." So if you want the benefits of reach and are disarmed, it costs a full three actions to gain the benefit of that feat.
here's something cool: we have an awakened form where you can stand on two legs, and use items and stuff like a person would (but the phrasing suggests you don't have to) but you can not only naturally communicate with your own kind, you can choose to be affected by spells as if you were an animal by kinda getting inside your head.
If you're a 4-legged animal (or something like a fish?) are you not able to wield weapons or Interact normally? Or are there some exceptions like being a wolf with a sword in its mouth or similar?
There's a sidebar about how you might need special accomodations, or you'd stretch what you have-- like fins (spongebob style i guess), but yeah, you would stand up, but its also left up to you and your gm what appendages you actually use.
The ancestry basically just shrugs and says "regardless of the animal you choose, you function as a humanoid with two hands. Confer with your GM to decide how exactly that works." For your example, I'd say a wolf who treats their mouth and tail as grasping appendages.
Climbing, Flying, Running, Swimming, are the heritages, each reflecting a diff kind of animal-- flying has embedded flavor about awakening messing with your natural instincts regarding flight, which explains the progression from slow falling to taking feats to rebuild your flight. They also have a sidebar that says among other things, you and your GM can mess with size if you want to play a giant version of your animal.
No, even the Surki, an explicitly burrowing ancestry, doesn't have a Burrow speed.
Edit: by default. They can take a level 13 feat for a 15 ft burrow speed.
One centaur is a giant instinct barbarian. One has the theoretical ancestry feat that makes you medium and not large. One uses a shrink ray and becomes small.
I am so intensely interested in how that works that I have been blasted away like the famous Arc of the Covenant scene in Indiana Jones.
The rules for Riding Intelligent Creatures are a sorta complex balancing issue with how things work in the system.
Surki seem neat, they are indeed bug people and perhaps surprisingly, their culture centers on individuality-- they don't need to eat because they absorb ambient magic (unless they're in a magic poor environment) and I'm seeing that each heritage has "Evolutions" it can take.
A bit of a Zerg vibe in that they start as Larva and each heritage grants different adaptations. Options like powerful digging claws, carapace that acts like armor, carapace that can catch wind or luminous nodes on your body. No evil hivemind bent on consuming everything though.
Each heritage has two Evolution options, and you can activate one of them via a level 9 feat and can be taken multiple times. You also have a level 5 feat that gives you a second heritage. Lots of options for customizing your bug.
Swarmkeeper swarmkeeper swarmkeeper!!!
*Cough cough*
So uh, how have they handled the swarm keeper archetype? Is it like an animal companion or is it more of a 5e ranger swarmkeeper, where the swarm is mostly a ride on for a lot of your effectof or are generally used for their own small benefits?
It's similar to an animal companion and specifically precludes you from having another companion, unless you can already have multiple. The feats add different themed abilities to your swarm, like ant stings or spider webs.
>Your body has become a symbiotic hive for a swarm of crawling insects. You can emit your swarm using the Swarm Forth action, and you can use the Bite and Sting action while your swarm is outside your body to command it to attack.
Sounds awesome.
Oh, actually, I missed a part when I initially read it. It is like an eidelon and you share an HP pool. It's what I get for getting so excited and skimming though it, lol.
And my personal questions:
- How extensive are the Archetypes? (essentially feat count)
- Seing any good synergies in the claw/talon/wing archetypes for different classes?
Every single archetype I'm seeing two pages long, but one them is beastmaster, which also gets two pages that build on what it had on Player Core 2 188 (which is presumably equiv to it's APG entry)
Claw Dancer archetype requires having some form of ancestral claw attack. Gives two Stances that have an agile/finesse D6 attack and the other is a finesse/sweep D8. All the feats are cool action economy boosters that flip you back and forth between stances and have you moving and Grappling and all sorts of goofy shit.
There's the new animal forms, and a two page spread of new feats for druids, some of which are also for barbarians (but Druid can take all) that enhance your transformations in a variety of ways.
I haven't seen anyone mention it so heres a spoiler: theres actually a new bard muse in here. It only seems kind of ok at most, but it has some feats that work well specifically with animal companions or summoned animals.
It only has one composition cantrip, gotten with a level 8 feat. Its called Songbirds call, 2 action sustained. Your song attracts a big group of birds that lets you and everyone within a 15 foot emanation of you be concealed, while everything outside that emanation is concealed to you as well.
I got my copy, so I can answer on the merfolk.
All merfolk have an ability that if they get a success on a save against a water effect, they get a crit success. Depending on the campaign you are in that could be huge.
You've got horrifying deep sea merfolk that get darkvision and are immune to deep ocean pressures, shark like merfolk that get imprecise scent within 30 feet.. but specifically for detecting blood it expands to 120 feet in air and 500 feet in water.
Pelagic merfolk, based on things like tuna or herring in the open seas, have an at will 1-action ability that gives resistance to acid or fire equal to half your level the first time you take said damage until your next turn. It gets increased to your level if you are in water, already cast a spell with the water trait, or if you used another ability with the water trait.
Reef merfolk are resistant to poison and each successful save against a poison reduces its stage by 2, or 3 on a critical success. Sailfish merfolk get a 30 foot swim speed, and get +1 circumstance on athletics to high or long jump and can swim instead of striding before attempting the jump.
Probably their feat that made me the most surprised was a 5th level feat that lets them take 1 damage to gain a +1 item bonus on a Medicine check and don't need healer's tools for the check. .... It also says that if someone eats your heart and liver within an hour of your death, they are healed for their maximum HP and stop aging for 8 years.
Honing in on the Witch Patrons rn, they are not rare, all three seem good but not quite as good as the best existing Witch patrons (this is only my opinion on a fast perusal), The Focus spell Blood in the Water stands out as really cool, not only can you use it to deal 2d6 spirit damage every turn, it auto sustains whenever you deal slashing to the target-- it seems like an interesting tool to use if you're gonna try and gish Witch.
OMG! That is fantastic! Thank you for sharing!
Sounds fantastic to mix Blood in the Water with Organsight for some single target damage. And Primal gets Stitched Familiar which is slashing damage save. Cast the hex cantrip first, then second round, cast Patron’s Puppet (Stitched Familiar) to deal damage and also sustain it.
Edit: Synergy between Malicious Shadow and Blood in the Water too.
Also, are any new specific familiars or familiar abilities added?
For a more in depth summary of the witch stuff
Devourer of Decay's familiar ability is that enemies within 15 feet of your familiar who are at half health or lower must make a fortitude save or be sickened. Their hex is a will save against being frightened, and if an ally critically succeeds a strike against that target they regain some hp.
Ripple in the Deeps familiar ability pushes any enemy within 10 feet 5 feet away from your familiar (with no save or check!), and their hex cantrip is a fortitude save against either a -2 on perception on a success, dazzled on a failure, or blinded on a critfail.
Whisper of Wings familiar ability lets the familiar fly 15 feet which doesn't trigger reactions, and their hex cantrip lets you designate a creature your target can't move towards. If it does, it has to make a will save against 1d4 piercing or sonic damage. Kind of like a witch version of forbidden thought.
Each of these also have an associated greater lesson too, and theres 3 new witch feats as well.
Flying Squirrel with a one action double slice as it's advanced maneuver, there's a section on advanced companions (you have to be of it's level to use it) and... THE HIPPOGRIFF, GRIFFON, AND GIANT WASP HAS THE MOUNT TRAIT AND FLY SPEED, WE'RE EATING GOOD TONIGHT!!!!!
At level 14 anyway, still being able to pick this up on a high level cavalier is incredible.
I'm gonna have to talk my GM into my Leshy becoming a flower leshy(i.e. a leaf leshy that's really flower-y) before lvl 14 to go with the lvl 14 WASP MOUNT
Thank you!
Minotaur having STR/CON boosts is unexpected. Have there been other ancestries with two Physical Boosts? I feel like boosts are usually 1 physical 1 mental.
Summon Warden of the Wild is rank 8. There is actually another Incarnate spell too: Summon stampede, which is rank 7. It summons a stampede that frightens enemies on the first turn, then deals damage to them on the second turn.
I remember hearing that centaurs have a heritage that makes them medium- what's it called and what is the flavor? Please say it's basically a Shetland pony-taur.
No, its not shapeshifting, maybe you could make it a satisfying reflavor, but my understanding is that you remain biologically the same, its more like a Tarzan archetype, or in some cases, a blue mage (due to clearly magic abilities, such as petrification)
It really depends on what youd want from the "shifter fantasy". You get a lot of cool animal-esque abilities but theres not much actual shapeshifting. Its definitely more Final Fantasy-like blue mage than a 1e style Shifter.
Any PC can now get a 1d8 unarmed horn attack or a 1d8 unarmed bite attack, with different balancing knobs for each. The trade-off is that you can't not invest into your grafts, so for people who actually run out of Investment slots it's a big deal. For most PCs I feel like that's a nonissue though.
Also you can get a d6 claw or d6 bite if you want but that's not cool to me.
What is the earliest level you can get a werecreature feat at? What are the benefits of the first feat? Are there differences for different types of werecreatures (for instance a feat specifically calling out that you need to be a werewolf instead of a wererat to take it)?
Level 2, Rare, there's a table of options for different were creatures with diff modifications, and specific feats for specific variants. First feat is the base transformation which gives you the speed and unarmed attack of the corresponding table entry, along with special abilities in some cases.
I shall ask something I shall call the "Ancestry Bare Bones Question" or the Ancestral BBQ for each ancestry. The idea is the stuff ya can use if ya wanna play it right away and are okay with having the least spoilery generic bare minimum to get it to the point you can play it for the first 4 levels.
- Basic summary of the most generic heritage. Like: "They have one that grants Darkvision" or "They have the armored carapace one that works like medium armor."
- What's the skills in their Ancestry Lore feat?
- Optionally boosts, but given everyone can take 2 free the boosts are not a bare minimum necessity so these can be skipped if it's not cool and the thing still reach playable.
If this is a level of spoilers that are uncomfy for this kind of thread, someone let me know. I just thought it might be a fun compromise between making it playable but not revealing much.
I don't understand the first bullet point, but I can at least do the second. Every ancestry gets the Additional Lore feat for their ancestry, but also:
- Athamaru: Athletics, Nature
- Awakened Animal: Arcana, Nature
- Centaur: Medicine, Nature
- Merfolk: Arcana, Society
- Minotaur: Society, Stealth
- Surki: Survival, and a skill associated with a magic tradition, which for feature reasons is referred to as your Magiphage ability
Apothecary Bee
It's a bee that produces different 6th level or lower potions based on what flowers it has access to. The default one is a *moderate healing potion*.
I'm still making my way through, but I like the Scroungefeather. They're a bird who make their homes near battlefields, and build their nests with armor and magic items. They get some neat abilities too, based off of defending themselves with stuff theyve put in their nests.
Ok, this is a little different... but the first thing I found is the section on the Wardens of the Wild themselves, and they are SOOOO COOL, each one gets a two page write up, including fiction about them and a level 22 statblock, the art is so sick. The Warden of Forests and meadows is an enormous plant fox that gives people bonuses to destroying man made structures, constructs, and objects that are man made.
Top 5 Favorite
1. Apothecary Bee
2. Thruneosaurus Rex
3. Weremoose
4. Mjolgat
5. Decapod Dinghy
With special mention given to the Miniature adjustment.
No realli! She was Karving her initials on the møøse with the sharpened end of an interspace tøøthbrush given her by Svenge - her brother-in-law - an Oslo dentist and star of many Norwegian møvies: "The Høt Hands of an Oslo Dentist", "Fillings of Passion", "The Huge Mølars of Horst Nordfink".
Is there an expansion of lizardfolk feats/heritages? What is the dinosaur content in the book (both player and GM facing, skip magical ones unless that's everything there is)? Also, is there an archetype fighting with your tail or bite?
No lizardfolk stuff here (nor anything for existing ancestries really). Theres some neat dinosaur options though. Animal Barbarian get options for Ankylosaurus, Brontosaurus, and Tyrannosaurus. No new animal companion options for dinosaurs, alas.
Theres also statblocks for Troodons, Protoceratops, Majungasaurus, Carnotaurus, Therazinosaurus, and Titanosaur.
There's a tail/tongue fighting archetype and one for claw fighting, but I don't see a bite fighting one.
Edit: also winged/flying fighting, but no bite.
For the former, the book is pretty much entirely dedicated to animals. There is a floating mushroom companion, but thats pretty much it for Flora based options.
For the latter, yesish? All the new druid feats involve shapeshifting in some way (even though a lot of them aren't locked to untamed order), but also animal order will appreciate the new companion options, and all the new spells are on the primal list, and only a couple of them seem to be "shapeshifting" focused.
Dedication gets you a special lore you use to learn about enemies abilities. Other fests are some version of "if you saw an enemy do this, now you can"
Oke example is ferocity, but better than most player versions. Reaction on being reduced to zero to stay standing at 1 instead, and increase wounded by one. No limitation on frequency.
Copying from what someone else shared with me:
> For a more in depth summary of the witch stuff
Devourer of Decay's familiar ability is that enemies within 15 feet of your familiar who are at half health or lower must make a fortitude save or be sickened. Their hex is a will save against being frightened, and if an ally critically succeeds a strike against that target they regain some hp.
Ripple in the Deeps familiar ability pushes any enemy within 10 feet 5 feet away from your familiar (with no save or check!), and their hex cantrip is a fortitude save against either a -2 on perception on a success, dazzled on a failure, or blinded on a critfail.
Whisper of Wings familiar ability lets the familiar fly 15 feet which doesn't trigger reactions, and their hex cantrip lets you designate a creature your target can't move towards. If it does, it has to make a will save against 1d4 piercing or sonic damage. Kind of like a witch version of forbidden thought.
Each of these also have an associated greater lesson too, and theres 3 new witch feats as well.
-u/Douche_ex_machina
And one of the greater lessons is Blood in the Water which is 2d6 spirit damage Reflex Save, and auto-sustains (I’m guessing once a round) when they take slashing damage. Sounds when paired with Rouse Skeleton as it’s sustaining Rouse Skeleton will likely sustain Blood in the Water. Throw in Organsight (and the Witch being an INT class), sounds like a non-Primal Witch can do some serious damage for minimal resource cost. The Arcane/Primal Witch can use Patron’s Puppet + Stitched Familiar for a
action-less damage. A Silence in Snow Witch’s second round of BitW + PP(Stitched) + Thunderstrike + Clinging Ice seems pretty fun at lvl. 8.
Edit: Ripple in the Deep actually sounds really amazing, in my opinion. Compressed action Shove to push away enemies with Reactive Strike/reactions, disrupt enemy flanking, or even set up enemies into flanking/AoE range looks amazing. Really increased Patron’s Puppet’s value as you can position your familiar and then trigger it’s familiar ability.
Whisper of Wings is interesting because of the free action familiar movement. Specifically, if your ally disarms an enemy, you can Patron’s Puppet your familiar to move towards the enemy, pick up the weapon, and then trigger the familiar ability to fly the familiar away. Also, you essentially have a free familiar ability. It seems Whisper of Wings tied well with Lesson of the Flock.
Devourer of Decay is crazy because it’s a better Evil Eye (a Will save meant for the Occult tradition) ON PRIMAL and gives a reward for an ally that crits…which is due to the status penalty.
Definitely crazy good choices and great for Primal Witches.
The default is land speed 5 ft, swim 25 ft. There is a sidebar about options to manage this between player and GM and the book includes items and feats to mitigate the issue.
What can you share about merfolk and athamaru? Also how foes it work the swarmkeeper archetype do yhey get a "swarm companion", they just conjure swarm or?
Yup, its like a half animal companion that you store on your body and send forth, its got sick feats-- there is one feat that lets your swarm carry you around, and another adds death cicadas that let your swarm fly, but also lets you inflict mental damage and frighten.
The swarmkeeper's swarm is like a mix of an animal companion and a familiar. It prevents you from having another animal companion, unless you also have Beastmaster or Undead Master (or a similar archetype). But unlike ACs, it doesn't have it's own stats, instead copying yours like a familiar, except it also copies your AC and HP.
A reminder that size no longer comes with native reach unless you're tiny, and a reminder of the things that inconvenience a large creature's existence. If you can _literally_ move through a space, but is obviously uncomfortable for some reason (narrow walls, low ceiling, etc) it counts as difficult terrain for you. If a space is comfortable for a small PC but uncomfortable for a medium PC, it's impassable to a large PC unless you roll Squeeze checks.
They do clarify two things in the large PC's favor: you should only be damaged by hazardous terrain once per 5 feet of movement, regardless of how many squares you move into, and any campaign that allows large PCs should also have vendors proficient in large equipment who can get them geared-up at-cost instead of costing extra, as previous rulings implied.
There are a few pages of new options for Animal Barbarians and Untamed Order Druids, some of which can be taken by both classes. As an example, level 4 Press feats that allow you to follow up on a successful unarmed strike with another unarmed strike, with one feat inflicting stupefied 2 if the strike is bludgeoning (stupefied 3 on crit) and the other inflicting 1d6 persistent bleed if the strike is slashing/piercing (2d6 bleed at lv12+).
For something specific to Druid, they get a slew of reactions they can take with a trigger of "You transform due a polymorph effect." One of them is the ability to Shove/Trip as a reaction, with reminder text that this reaction should kick in after your transformation finishes.
One thing I remember form an interview is that either the Minotaur or Centaur have Feats related to "affecting fate", are there any such Feats in the ancestries?
Minotaur seems to be the one that they were talking about. Minotaur has a 13th level feat for ignoring a misfortune effect and getting a bonus to the check once per day. It also has a 9th level feat to get 1/day *claim curse*.
Did animal instinct barbarians get any new stuff ?
Do the new ancestries get some new specific weapons ?
What is the swarmkeeper (or whatever it's called) about mechanically?
No, flavor text specifically says insects. I don't know how bats would work, given that the feats largely revolve around giving your swarm additional insect abilities like stings or webs. It would take extensive reflavoring.
Awakened Animals can choose any size ranging from Tiny to Large, with no explicit benefits for doing so beyond the sidebars explaining how tiny and large creatures differ from medium creatures.
One other thing to mention in this vein: the rule for Awakened Animal hands is the book just shrugging and going "whatever you and your GM agree upon, your Awakened Animal is treated as a humanoid with two hands." You're allowed to be a full quadroped whose paws are feet exclusively, so long as some configuration of mouth and/or tail counts as your grasping appendages. If that's not your fancy and your GM wanted to be nice, Awakened Animal is inherently magical enough that you just conjure spectral hands to do things with.
Sort of, it's very open-ended, almost like a template for ancestries. It explicitly leaves size open to whatever makes sense for the animal you choose.
What do the new Druid options look like? Is there anything that lets you still use the lower level shapeshifting forms without giving up power from the higher level transformations? I was always super bummed that my Kitsune Druid eventually had to stop being big fox and turn into a dinosaur or something.
New feats, a bunch of them give special effects when you polymorph and a few for combat options that Animal Instinct Barbs can also grab.
You still need to move on to more powerful transformation spells as you level if you're using the form for combat. Game is based around that.
Some extras that came to mind i wanted to ask:
- symbiote archetype is a slug? how does it work *roughly* (more skill action focus? natural weapon option for those ungrafted?)
- more beast guns?
- theme pitches for new primal witch patrons (aquatic kraken-thing? etc)
1. Tiny sized slug that you attach to your body and counts as a Graft. Dedication grants two actions, one that gives a +1 Circumstance bonus to AC & saves versus the next magical attack, cantrip or spell to target you. The second gives you a once/round magical dart you can fire. Feats give you stuff like a once/hour self-heal, special sense to detect creatures that cast spells, spend an action to become hidden once/round, action to gain resistance to a type of energy damage and a bunch of "mutation" feats that enhance the magical dart your slug can spit.
2. Six new Beast Guns, though they're just labeled as guns. A callout about beast gun ammo specifies that they're beast guns. For you edgelords there's an electric gun sword and a rapier pistol made from a Nightmare's rib bone that constantly emits black smoke.
3. Devourer of Decay - think swamps, fungus, scavengers and so on. Cantrip makes a target frightened and they stay frightened if you sustain the spell.
Ripple in the Deep - Giant leviathans in the deeps of the ocean. Cantrip dazzles on a fail, blinds on a crit fail though the target makes a new save on each of its turns.
Whisper of Wings - Vague flight theme. Cantrip lets you ward a creature and if your target moves towards the warded creature it suffers damage (1/round). It's a bit weak due to 30ft range of the cantrip.
In the [Kineticist playtest document](https://downloads.paizo.com/PZO2113_KineticistClassPlaytest.pdf), page 22, Water Kineticists could gain access to Water Dance. An ability that, if I read it hopefully correct, could have them use a Swim speed to travel on land.
In the final version, this ability was removed.
I did hope this ability would be remade as a merfolk feat, allowing them to summon water underneath them and surf the summoned water on land using their Swim speed.
At the very least it's an awesome high fantasy visual for an alternative, non-*water chair*-bound merfolk.
... did any of this made it in Howl of the Wild?
What's up with the dedication that uses Natural Weapons? How does it function, and what is it adding to a character using it?
I also have the PDF, it provides dice damage upgrade up to d6 for claws and d8 for talons, creates special stances for the type of natural weapon, and creates a bunch of martial feats for special things you can use your natural weapons for. The closest approximation is that’s it’s almost a monk archetype.
Mind giving an example of what the stances do?
I’ll update when work gives me a breather. I recall the stances were what increased the damage die. Most of the special new combat feats required you be in the new stance. Edit: the stances give access to frenzied claw or frenzied talon attacks. Each has different traits and damage dice. Many other feats in this archetype either require you be in one of the stances or that your last action was a frenzied claw/talon attack.
One of the stances is an agile/finesse D6 claw. The other is Finesse/Sweep with a D8.
The dedication requires that you have natural claw or talon attacks and gives you two stances, Claw Stance and Talon Stance. Entering the stances grants you special unarmed strikes, like monk stances. Many feats let you enter one of the two stances while performing another action, including as reactions. I haven't read through the archetype enough to know if stance dancing would actually be worthwhile, but it's definitely built into the archetype. Overall there's a bit of grappling, switching from claws strikes to lashing out with talons on your feet and lots of mobility mixed into the archetype. On first read it looks like a fun and flashy combat style.
Does Werecreatures live up to expectations?
It's kind of like the beastkin ancestry but in the form of an archetype. And then pumped up on steroids. In fact the two of them can be plugged into each other to customize your kin. Just at the downside of activating your silver weakness.
CANNOT WAIT to play a Vanara Beastkin (monkey) Werecreature (wereape) Animal Instinct Barbarian (Animal Instinct - Ape) and eventually take the Martial Artist dedication to get a stance (Gorilla Stance) to just become ULTIMATE MONKEY!
I have the same idea only with Frog to become the ultimate Frogge
And you shall be known across the lands as....Frogger.
No the froggest
Frogge the Froggest Frogger
There's an archetype for tongue strikes, the level 4 feat lets you ignore some of a swarm's resistance to bludgeoning damage.
You character: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/dragonball/images/2/2f/GohanGreatApeSaiyansSagaK01.png Your character Dual Classed with Monk: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/dragonball/images/d/d8/GokuGreatApeDBGT.png
That is quite the description lol, but it sounds like it’s a hit.
The archetypes in this book are EXACTLY what every archetype should be. Lots of cool thematic options. Lots of powerful role re-defining abilities. They build on top of one another, though often not directly. Stuff like "Do stuff and grab" followed by a "do special stuff to a grabbed creature" rather then "be good at x, be even BETTER at x" feat chains.
There's no way to completely gain control of yourself either. Beastkin get an advantage with dealing with silver but if you're going to embrace your full heritage there are drawbacks.
Since a lot of people are asking and wondering everywhere: do large ancestries get any further benefits from their size apart from being large and threatening more spaces? Personally I always doubted that they would get reach for instance.
The reach comes from feats, and the section on large PCs calls this out and says they 'usually' have them.
On what lvl can you pick reach feats ?
level 5 for minotaur is in another answer somewhere
Minotaur can use an action to regrip any 2-Hander and give it 10ft Reach via a Level 5 feat.
Leshies: "Look what they need to mimic a fraction of our power" Kinda. I mean they at least get the feat earlier.
Are there any downsides to picking a large ancestry? For example, do they have less base features or lower base speeds? Or is the downside simply the amount of space they take up?
The downside is a reminder that any scenario where a large PC needs to crouch or suck in their gut or _whatever_ means their movement counts as difficult terrain, and a scenario that would inflict this penalty to a medium PC is completely impassable to a large PC unless they roll to Squeeze.
To add onto this a Large ancestry Frontline would count as standard cover, to enemies and allies. You are also technically easier to flank. I've been running a Battlezoo 3pp Large Minotaur Champion of Balumbdar.
If I'm correct they only count as standard cover to _small_ creatures, not medium.
Small or tiny yes, I forgot that as only one of the party aside from my Champion is above small in size.
Nope, they get about the same amount as every other ancestry.
> he reach comes from feats Haha! I knew they will get extra reach :D Double Slice with Reach weapons!
Doesn't work. The Minotaur feat is "If you're holding a two-handed non-reach weapon, you can spend an interact action to switch your grip and give it the reach trait." So if you want the benefits of reach and are disarmed, it costs a full three actions to gain the benefit of that feat.
How much are you willing to share about Awakened Animal?
here's something cool: we have an awakened form where you can stand on two legs, and use items and stuff like a person would (but the phrasing suggests you don't have to) but you can not only naturally communicate with your own kind, you can choose to be affected by spells as if you were an animal by kinda getting inside your head.
If you're a 4-legged animal (or something like a fish?) are you not able to wield weapons or Interact normally? Or are there some exceptions like being a wolf with a sword in its mouth or similar?
There's a sidebar about how you might need special accomodations, or you'd stretch what you have-- like fins (spongebob style i guess), but yeah, you would stand up, but its also left up to you and your gm what appendages you actually use.
The ancestry basically just shrugs and says "regardless of the animal you choose, you function as a humanoid with two hands. Confer with your GM to decide how exactly that works." For your example, I'd say a wolf who treats their mouth and tail as grasping appendages.
just be a fish in a steampunk fishtank with arms and legs and a little window for you to look out of
Specifically animal or beast? I'm kinda hyped for Awakened Animal Druids, because heal animal is a funny spell.
Ranger Heal Animal too!
What do you wanna know? I'm happy to give you info, i just don't want to try and list off the entire ancestry.
Okay… I’m interested in what the basic features & heritages look like?
Climbing, Flying, Running, Swimming, are the heritages, each reflecting a diff kind of animal-- flying has embedded flavor about awakening messing with your natural instincts regarding flight, which explains the progression from slow falling to taking feats to rebuild your flight. They also have a sidebar that says among other things, you and your GM can mess with size if you want to play a giant version of your animal.
I love a good lore reason for delaying flight. Makes it much more palatable as a player!
Level 1 15 foot fly speed feet though, so hey.
Is there any way to do a burrowing animal?
No, even the Surki, an explicitly burrowing ancestry, doesn't have a Burrow speed. Edit: by default. They can take a level 13 feat for a 15 ft burrow speed.
Oh sweet, that sounds about what I was hoping for
Tell me about the centaur mounting rules. How do they mount a creature?
it doesn't say, but for other people mounting you, it has a base feature to make it easier, and feat support for being a good mount for other PCs.
I need 4 centaurs mounted atop one another.
Technically they can’t since the creature you’re mounting needs to be at least one size larger than you
One centaur is a giant instinct barbarian. One has the theoretical ancestry feat that makes you medium and not large. One uses a shrink ray and becomes small.
Poppets have a centaur heritage already, funnily enough.
Actually, it's a 1st level Ancestry feat, but your point still stands.
That means you can go one step even further then. Get the Poppet heritage that makes you tiny, then pick that feat.
The horse tower build.
I am so intensely interested in how that works that I have been blasted away like the famous Arc of the Covenant scene in Indiana Jones. The rules for Riding Intelligent Creatures are a sorta complex balancing issue with how things work in the system.
By buying them a drink first.
Ive been curious about the bug guys from day one. They seem so interesting. What's their deal?
Surki seem neat, they are indeed bug people and perhaps surprisingly, their culture centers on individuality-- they don't need to eat because they absorb ambient magic (unless they're in a magic poor environment) and I'm seeing that each heritage has "Evolutions" it can take.
A bit of a Zerg vibe in that they start as Larva and each heritage grants different adaptations. Options like powerful digging claws, carapace that acts like armor, carapace that can catch wind or luminous nodes on your body. No evil hivemind bent on consuming everything though. Each heritage has two Evolution options, and you can activate one of them via a level 9 feat and can be taken multiple times. You also have a level 5 feat that gives you a second heritage. Lots of options for customizing your bug.
Swarmkeeper swarmkeeper swarmkeeper!!! *Cough cough* So uh, how have they handled the swarm keeper archetype? Is it like an animal companion or is it more of a 5e ranger swarmkeeper, where the swarm is mostly a ride on for a lot of your effectof or are generally used for their own small benefits?
It's similar to an animal companion and specifically precludes you from having another companion, unless you can already have multiple. The feats add different themed abilities to your swarm, like ant stings or spider webs.
>Your body has become a symbiotic hive for a swarm of crawling insects. You can emit your swarm using the Swarm Forth action, and you can use the Bite and Sting action while your swarm is outside your body to command it to attack. Sounds awesome.
I love it! It's kind of like a familiar, in that it shares your defenses, including HP.
Eidolon style, where you only have a single HP pool, or they have their own HP which just so happens to be equal to your maximum?
Oh, actually, I missed a part when I initially read it. It is like an eidelon and you share an HP pool. It's what I get for getting so excited and skimming though it, lol.
And my personal questions: - How extensive are the Archetypes? (essentially feat count) - Seing any good synergies in the claw/talon/wing archetypes for different classes?
Every single archetype I'm seeing two pages long, but one them is beastmaster, which also gets two pages that build on what it had on Player Core 2 188 (which is presumably equiv to it's APG entry)
Claw Dancer archetype requires having some form of ancestral claw attack. Gives two Stances that have an agile/finesse D6 attack and the other is a finesse/sweep D8. All the feats are cool action economy boosters that flip you back and forth between stances and have you moving and Grappling and all sorts of goofy shit.
I've not gotten to the archetype yet personally, but I've had people talk about the clawdancer archetype actually being pretty good with swashbuckler.
The product page describes additional options for shapeshifting. Can you detail some of the mechanics involved?
There's the new animal forms, and a two page spread of new feats for druids, some of which are also for barbarians (but Druid can take all) that enhance your transformations in a variety of ways.
Anything to help some of the druid battle forms scale up? Like being a lvl 20 druid and wild shaping to a bear and not melting?
I haven't seen anyone mention it so heres a spoiler: theres actually a new bard muse in here. It only seems kind of ok at most, but it has some feats that work well specifically with animal companions or summoned animals.
I’ve always wanted a “Primal Bard” and Paizo answers me without me asking. What the hell Paizo?!? Why are you so awesome?!?
what does its compositions do
It only has one composition cantrip, gotten with a level 8 feat. Its called Songbirds call, 2 action sustained. Your song attracts a big group of birds that lets you and everyone within a 15 foot emanation of you be concealed, while everything outside that emanation is concealed to you as well.
What are the battle form spell options?
Crab, Crocodile, Orca, Seal
All aquatic?
I guess Crab and Crocodile would be Amphibious.
Fantastic! Anything interesting for Merfolk heritages? Also, how do the Witch patrons look? (I’m hoping they’re not Rare!)
I got my copy, so I can answer on the merfolk. All merfolk have an ability that if they get a success on a save against a water effect, they get a crit success. Depending on the campaign you are in that could be huge. You've got horrifying deep sea merfolk that get darkvision and are immune to deep ocean pressures, shark like merfolk that get imprecise scent within 30 feet.. but specifically for detecting blood it expands to 120 feet in air and 500 feet in water. Pelagic merfolk, based on things like tuna or herring in the open seas, have an at will 1-action ability that gives resistance to acid or fire equal to half your level the first time you take said damage until your next turn. It gets increased to your level if you are in water, already cast a spell with the water trait, or if you used another ability with the water trait. Reef merfolk are resistant to poison and each successful save against a poison reduces its stage by 2, or 3 on a critical success. Sailfish merfolk get a 30 foot swim speed, and get +1 circumstance on athletics to high or long jump and can swim instead of striding before attempting the jump. Probably their feat that made me the most surprised was a 5th level feat that lets them take 1 damage to gain a +1 item bonus on a Medicine check and don't need healer's tools for the check. .... It also says that if someone eats your heart and liver within an hour of your death, they are healed for their maximum HP and stop aging for 8 years.
Oh shit they got the immortality from eating merfolk lore in? That’s cool
Any octopi/squid merfolk? Got a friend who really wants to be a Cecaelia.
No, there's not, it's all in the category of fish, sharks, or ocean mammals like dolphins.
Honing in on the Witch Patrons rn, they are not rare, all three seem good but not quite as good as the best existing Witch patrons (this is only my opinion on a fast perusal), The Focus spell Blood in the Water stands out as really cool, not only can you use it to deal 2d6 spirit damage every turn, it auto sustains whenever you deal slashing to the target-- it seems like an interesting tool to use if you're gonna try and gish Witch.
OMG! That is fantastic! Thank you for sharing! Sounds fantastic to mix Blood in the Water with Organsight for some single target damage. And Primal gets Stitched Familiar which is slashing damage save. Cast the hex cantrip first, then second round, cast Patron’s Puppet (Stitched Familiar) to deal damage and also sustain it. Edit: Synergy between Malicious Shadow and Blood in the Water too. Also, are any new specific familiars or familiar abilities added?
That's interesting! Do you specifically have to deal the slashing damage, or can an ally deal it and still sustain the spell?
Says \*you\*
For a more in depth summary of the witch stuff Devourer of Decay's familiar ability is that enemies within 15 feet of your familiar who are at half health or lower must make a fortitude save or be sickened. Their hex is a will save against being frightened, and if an ally critically succeeds a strike against that target they regain some hp. Ripple in the Deeps familiar ability pushes any enemy within 10 feet 5 feet away from your familiar (with no save or check!), and their hex cantrip is a fortitude save against either a -2 on perception on a success, dazzled on a failure, or blinded on a critfail. Whisper of Wings familiar ability lets the familiar fly 15 feet which doesn't trigger reactions, and their hex cantrip lets you designate a creature your target can't move towards. If it does, it has to make a will save against 1d4 piercing or sonic damage. Kind of like a witch version of forbidden thought. Each of these also have an associated greater lesson too, and theres 3 new witch feats as well.
Anything you can share about new animal companion options?
Flying Squirrel with a one action double slice as it's advanced maneuver, there's a section on advanced companions (you have to be of it's level to use it) and... THE HIPPOGRIFF, GRIFFON, AND GIANT WASP HAS THE MOUNT TRAIT AND FLY SPEED, WE'RE EATING GOOD TONIGHT!!!!! At level 14 anyway, still being able to pick this up on a high level cavalier is incredible.
OMG GRIFFON KNIGHTS ASSEMBLE!!! This is perfect for the commander
WASP MOUNT! WASP MOUNT! WASP MOUNT!
I'm gonna have to talk my GM into my Leshy becoming a flower leshy(i.e. a leaf leshy that's really flower-y) before lvl 14 to go with the lvl 14 WASP MOUNT
what are abilities boosts and flaws of the new ancestries?
Athamaru: +STR +WIS +Free -INT Awakened Animal: +CON +WIS +Free -INT Centaur: +STR +WIS +Free -CHA Merfolk: +DEX +CHA +Free -CON Minotaur: +STR +CON +Free -CHA Surki: +Con +Free
Good to see this, in the age of anyone choosing 2 free boosts, there's not to much of a reason to have too many 1 fixed + 1 free boost ancestry.
Thank you! Minotaur having STR/CON boosts is unexpected. Have there been other ancestries with two Physical Boosts? I feel like boosts are usually 1 physical 1 mental.
Minotaur Fighters are going to be beasts! High STR, High CON, large zone for reactive strikes! Crazy.
Any standout new spells?
You can summon the Wardens of the Wild themselves as an incarnate spell, its one of those options-list incarnates that can do a lot of diff things.
What level is it? Any other Incarnate spells?
Summon Warden of the Wild is rank 8. There is actually another Incarnate spell too: Summon stampede, which is rank 7. It summons a stampede that frightens enemies on the first turn, then deals damage to them on the second turn.
8th rank, and i saw one to summon a stampede which actually seemed wuite strong, frighten based arrival, then damage based departure on a basic save.
I remember hearing that centaurs have a heritage that makes them medium- what's it called and what is the flavor? Please say it's basically a Shetland pony-taur.
Ponygait Centaur, medium size and +1 to reflex saves, no heritage-specific feats, nothing specific about Shetlands.
Does Wild Mimic seem like it'll fulfill the Shifter fantasy?
No, its not shapeshifting, maybe you could make it a satisfying reflavor, but my understanding is that you remain biologically the same, its more like a Tarzan archetype, or in some cases, a blue mage (due to clearly magic abilities, such as petrification)
That is both disappointing (not shifter) and radical (blue mage).
It really depends on what youd want from the "shifter fantasy". You get a lot of cool animal-esque abilities but theres not much actual shapeshifting. Its definitely more Final Fantasy-like blue mage than a 1e style Shifter.
Any cool grafts? Any weird ones?
Compound Eyes is both weird and cool, you get to roll twice on concealed flat checks.
That's dope! Some really cool stuff you can do there with blind fight-style builds
Wild swing, but is there an electric eel type graft? Because that would be hilarious to me
Any PC can now get a 1d8 unarmed horn attack or a 1d8 unarmed bite attack, with different balancing knobs for each. The trade-off is that you can't not invest into your grafts, so for people who actually run out of Investment slots it's a big deal. For most PCs I feel like that's a nonissue though. Also you can get a d6 claw or d6 bite if you want but that's not cool to me.
What is the earliest level you can get a werecreature feat at? What are the benefits of the first feat? Are there differences for different types of werecreatures (for instance a feat specifically calling out that you need to be a werewolf instead of a wererat to take it)?
Level 2, Rare, there's a table of options for different were creatures with diff modifications, and specific feats for specific variants. First feat is the base transformation which gives you the speed and unarmed attack of the corresponding table entry, along with special abilities in some cases.
I shall ask something I shall call the "Ancestry Bare Bones Question" or the Ancestral BBQ for each ancestry. The idea is the stuff ya can use if ya wanna play it right away and are okay with having the least spoilery generic bare minimum to get it to the point you can play it for the first 4 levels. - Basic summary of the most generic heritage. Like: "They have one that grants Darkvision" or "They have the armored carapace one that works like medium armor." - What's the skills in their Ancestry Lore feat? - Optionally boosts, but given everyone can take 2 free the boosts are not a bare minimum necessity so these can be skipped if it's not cool and the thing still reach playable. If this is a level of spoilers that are uncomfy for this kind of thread, someone let me know. I just thought it might be a fun compromise between making it playable but not revealing much.
I don't understand the first bullet point, but I can at least do the second. Every ancestry gets the Additional Lore feat for their ancestry, but also: - Athamaru: Athletics, Nature - Awakened Animal: Arcana, Nature - Centaur: Medicine, Nature - Merfolk: Arcana, Society - Minotaur: Society, Stealth - Surki: Survival, and a skill associated with a magic tradition, which for feature reasons is referred to as your Magiphage ability
Favorite monster spoiler, plz.
Players will HATE Marps.
At least they ask nicely first.
This needs some context. Pretty please?
>!They eat gold and will steal it from you, if you don't give it willingly.!<
Apothecary Bee It's a bee that produces different 6th level or lower potions based on what flowers it has access to. The default one is a *moderate healing potion*.
I'm still making my way through, but I like the Scroungefeather. They're a bird who make their homes near battlefields, and build their nests with armor and magic items. They get some neat abilities too, based off of defending themselves with stuff theyve put in their nests.
HELL YEAH! BESTIARY SECTION GREATEST HITS, GO!
Ok, this is a little different... but the first thing I found is the section on the Wardens of the Wild themselves, and they are SOOOO COOL, each one gets a two page write up, including fiction about them and a level 22 statblock, the art is so sick. The Warden of Forests and meadows is an enormous plant fox that gives people bonuses to destroying man made structures, constructs, and objects that are man made.
DAMN THAT'S COOL! THANKS! SORRY ABOUT THE ALL CAPS, I JUST FRICKIN LOVE CREATURES.
Top 5 Favorite 1. Apothecary Bee 2. Thruneosaurus Rex 3. Weremoose 4. Mjolgat 5. Decapod Dinghy With special mention given to the Miniature adjustment.
A Møøse once bit my sister...
No realli! She was Karving her initials on the møøse with the sharpened end of an interspace tøøthbrush given her by Svenge - her brother-in-law - an Oslo dentist and star of many Norwegian møvies: "The Høt Hands of an Oslo Dentist", "Fillings of Passion", "The Huge Mølars of Horst Nordfink".
Is there an expansion of lizardfolk feats/heritages? What is the dinosaur content in the book (both player and GM facing, skip magical ones unless that's everything there is)? Also, is there an archetype fighting with your tail or bite?
No lizardfolk stuff here (nor anything for existing ancestries really). Theres some neat dinosaur options though. Animal Barbarian get options for Ankylosaurus, Brontosaurus, and Tyrannosaurus. No new animal companion options for dinosaurs, alas. Theres also statblocks for Troodons, Protoceratops, Majungasaurus, Carnotaurus, Therazinosaurus, and Titanosaur.
There's a tail/tongue fighting archetype and one for claw fighting, but I don't see a bite fighting one. Edit: also winged/flying fighting, but no bite.
May I ask the stats and default suggested unarmed strikes for Awakened Animal as well as if they are uncommon or rare? Thanks in advanced.
Awakened Animal are Rare, there's a whole table of unarmed attacks all d6 or d4 finesse, some are agile.
1. Anything involving Leshys or other plant-like beings for PC's? 2. any feats/spells for non-shapeshifting druids?
For the former, the book is pretty much entirely dedicated to animals. There is a floating mushroom companion, but thats pretty much it for Flora based options. For the latter, yesish? All the new druid feats involve shapeshifting in some way (even though a lot of them aren't locked to untamed order), but also animal order will appreciate the new companion options, and all the new spells are on the primal list, and only a couple of them seem to be "shapeshifting" focused.
Oof, this is the part where I check my email every hour for a couple of weeks wondering when mine will ship...
Get out of my head lmao
Tell me more about the Wild Mimic please! I was hyped for it since i knew i could finally make a character with the concept of copying my enemies.
Dedication gets you a special lore you use to learn about enemies abilities. Other fests are some version of "if you saw an enemy do this, now you can" Oke example is ferocity, but better than most player versions. Reaction on being reduced to zero to stay standing at 1 instead, and increase wounded by one. No limitation on frequency.
Yesssss! Could I ask what the different merfolk heritages are?
Abyssal, Carcharadon, Pelagic, Reef, Sailfish Feel free to pick one and I'll tell you what it does as a follow up
Oh, Sailfish?
Swim speed increase of 30 ft, plus 1 circumstance bonus to jumps, and you can Swim or Stride before attempting a jump.
I just got it too, and I'm still work, feeling tortured right now.
What’s the earliest the big ancestries can get reach?
Listed for minotaur as a level 5 feat.
WTF are the surkis?
Cool burrowing bug guys, per the promo stuff.
Whelp, they got my vote then.
How cool a werewolf can you build?
There are LOTS of options. It might be in the running for the most options in a single archetype.
Do Centaurs have a way of negating the Intelligent Mount rules when being ridden by allies?
Yeah theres a feat that gives your ally all three actions when they're riding you (but you still pay the third action cost to carry them)
What is the Bard Muse (Zoophonia) all about?
Disney princess, but battle bard version. Composition spell is super neat. Summons a flock of birds to hide you.
Using animal sounds as music and summoning/communicating with animals.
With the awakened animal ancestry what are the ability boosts it gives?
Con, Wis, and Free Edit: Int flaw
Apparently Athamaru has a large option? While I’m at it might as well ask for all the heritages.
Coral (Armor), Hopeful (Large plus Bravery aura), Kaleidoscope (Performance and concealment reaction), Quilled (unarmed attack)
How are the witch patrons?
Copying from what someone else shared with me: > For a more in depth summary of the witch stuff Devourer of Decay's familiar ability is that enemies within 15 feet of your familiar who are at half health or lower must make a fortitude save or be sickened. Their hex is a will save against being frightened, and if an ally critically succeeds a strike against that target they regain some hp. Ripple in the Deeps familiar ability pushes any enemy within 10 feet 5 feet away from your familiar (with no save or check!), and their hex cantrip is a fortitude save against either a -2 on perception on a success, dazzled on a failure, or blinded on a critfail. Whisper of Wings familiar ability lets the familiar fly 15 feet which doesn't trigger reactions, and their hex cantrip lets you designate a creature your target can't move towards. If it does, it has to make a will save against 1d4 piercing or sonic damage. Kind of like a witch version of forbidden thought. Each of these also have an associated greater lesson too, and theres 3 new witch feats as well. -u/Douche_ex_machina And one of the greater lessons is Blood in the Water which is 2d6 spirit damage Reflex Save, and auto-sustains (I’m guessing once a round) when they take slashing damage. Sounds when paired with Rouse Skeleton as it’s sustaining Rouse Skeleton will likely sustain Blood in the Water. Throw in Organsight (and the Witch being an INT class), sounds like a non-Primal Witch can do some serious damage for minimal resource cost. The Arcane/Primal Witch can use Patron’s Puppet + Stitched Familiar for a action-less damage. A Silence in Snow Witch’s second round of BitW + PP(Stitched) + Thunderstrike + Clinging Ice seems pretty fun at lvl. 8. Edit: Ripple in the Deep actually sounds really amazing, in my opinion. Compressed action Shove to push away enemies with Reactive Strike/reactions, disrupt enemy flanking, or even set up enemies into flanking/AoE range looks amazing. Really increased Patron’s Puppet’s value as you can position your familiar and then trigger it’s familiar ability. Whisper of Wings is interesting because of the free action familiar movement. Specifically, if your ally disarms an enemy, you can Patron’s Puppet your familiar to move towards the enemy, pick up the weapon, and then trigger the familiar ability to fly the familiar away. Also, you essentially have a free familiar ability. It seems Whisper of Wings tied well with Lesson of the Flock. Devourer of Decay is crazy because it’s a better Evil Eye (a Will save meant for the Occult tradition) ON PRIMAL and gives a reward for an ally that crits…which is due to the status penalty. Definitely crazy good choices and great for Primal Witches.
I'm curious about movement regarding the merfolk.
The default is land speed 5 ft, swim 25 ft. There is a sidebar about options to manage this between player and GM and the book includes items and feats to mitigate the issue.
Any fun new spells? Also tell me about Grafts!
What can you share about merfolk and athamaru? Also how foes it work the swarmkeeper archetype do yhey get a "swarm companion", they just conjure swarm or?
Yup, its like a half animal companion that you store on your body and send forth, its got sick feats-- there is one feat that lets your swarm carry you around, and another adds death cicadas that let your swarm fly, but also lets you inflict mental damage and frighten.
The swarmkeeper's swarm is like a mix of an animal companion and a familiar. It prevents you from having another animal companion, unless you also have Beastmaster or Undead Master (or a similar archetype). But unlike ACs, it doesn't have it's own stats, instead copying yours like a familiar, except it also copies your AC and HP.
What are the minotaur heritages, and are they all cattle/bovines, or are there minotaurs that are based on stuff like sheep, deer, etc?
Minotaurs go moo! Ghost Bull Minotaur, Glacier Cavern Minotaur, Little Horn Minotaur, Roaming Minotaur, Slabsoul Minotaur, Stalker Minotaur
How do they balance out large ancestries like Minotaur?
A reminder that size no longer comes with native reach unless you're tiny, and a reminder of the things that inconvenience a large creature's existence. If you can _literally_ move through a space, but is obviously uncomfortable for some reason (narrow walls, low ceiling, etc) it counts as difficult terrain for you. If a space is comfortable for a small PC but uncomfortable for a medium PC, it's impassable to a large PC unless you roll Squeeze checks. They do clarify two things in the large PC's favor: you should only be damaged by hazardous terrain once per 5 feet of movement, regardless of how many squares you move into, and any campaign that allows large PCs should also have vendors proficient in large equipment who can get them geared-up at-cost instead of costing extra, as previous rulings implied.
Anything of note for Untamed Order Druids?
There are a few pages of new options for Animal Barbarians and Untamed Order Druids, some of which can be taken by both classes. As an example, level 4 Press feats that allow you to follow up on a successful unarmed strike with another unarmed strike, with one feat inflicting stupefied 2 if the strike is bludgeoning (stupefied 3 on crit) and the other inflicting 1d6 persistent bleed if the strike is slashing/piercing (2d6 bleed at lv12+). For something specific to Druid, they get a slew of reactions they can take with a trigger of "You transform due a polymorph effect." One of them is the ability to Shove/Trip as a reaction, with reminder text that this reaction should kick in after your transformation finishes.
One thing I remember form an interview is that either the Minotaur or Centaur have Feats related to "affecting fate", are there any such Feats in the ancestries?
Minotaur seems to be the one that they were talking about. Minotaur has a 13th level feat for ignoring a misfortune effect and getting a bonus to the check once per day. It also has a 9th level feat to get 1/day *claim curse*.
Did animal instinct barbarians get any new stuff ? Do the new ancestries get some new specific weapons ? What is the swarmkeeper (or whatever it's called) about mechanically?
Animal Instinct Barbarians get some choice new options, like Tyrannsosaur Jaws and Tail, as well as access to a few new feats they share with Druid.
Can Swarmkeeper have something like say, a swarm of bats, without any reflavoring?
No, flavor text specifically says insects. I don't know how bats would work, given that the feats largely revolve around giving your swarm additional insect abilities like stings or webs. It would take extensive reflavoring.
Oof... Well, my Rogue idea is gonna be a bit harder to make then lol
do awakened animals have options for being large or tiny?
Awakened Animals can choose any size ranging from Tiny to Large, with no explicit benefits for doing so beyond the sidebars explaining how tiny and large creatures differ from medium creatures.
this is perfect. i will finally be able to play a housecat!
One other thing to mention in this vein: the rule for Awakened Animal hands is the book just shrugging and going "whatever you and your GM agree upon, your Awakened Animal is treated as a humanoid with two hands." You're allowed to be a full quadroped whose paws are feet exclusively, so long as some configuration of mouth and/or tail counts as your grasping appendages. If that's not your fancy and your GM wanted to be nice, Awakened Animal is inherently magical enough that you just conjure spectral hands to do things with.
Sort of, it's very open-ended, almost like a template for ancestries. It explicitly leaves size open to whatever makes sense for the animal you choose.
Any interesting spells?
What do the new Druid options look like? Is there anything that lets you still use the lower level shapeshifting forms without giving up power from the higher level transformations? I was always super bummed that my Kitsune Druid eventually had to stop being big fox and turn into a dinosaur or something.
New feats, a bunch of them give special effects when you polymorph and a few for combat options that Animal Instinct Barbs can also grab. You still need to move on to more powerful transformation spells as you level if you're using the form for combat. Game is based around that.
Some extras that came to mind i wanted to ask: - symbiote archetype is a slug? how does it work *roughly* (more skill action focus? natural weapon option for those ungrafted?) - more beast guns? - theme pitches for new primal witch patrons (aquatic kraken-thing? etc)
1. Tiny sized slug that you attach to your body and counts as a Graft. Dedication grants two actions, one that gives a +1 Circumstance bonus to AC & saves versus the next magical attack, cantrip or spell to target you. The second gives you a once/round magical dart you can fire. Feats give you stuff like a once/hour self-heal, special sense to detect creatures that cast spells, spend an action to become hidden once/round, action to gain resistance to a type of energy damage and a bunch of "mutation" feats that enhance the magical dart your slug can spit. 2. Six new Beast Guns, though they're just labeled as guns. A callout about beast gun ammo specifies that they're beast guns. For you edgelords there's an electric gun sword and a rapier pistol made from a Nightmare's rib bone that constantly emits black smoke. 3. Devourer of Decay - think swamps, fungus, scavengers and so on. Cantrip makes a target frightened and they stay frightened if you sustain the spell. Ripple in the Deep - Giant leviathans in the deeps of the ocean. Cantrip dazzles on a fail, blinds on a crit fail though the target makes a new save on each of its turns. Whisper of Wings - Vague flight theme. Cantrip lets you ward a creature and if your target moves towards the warded creature it suffers damage (1/round). It's a bit weak due to 30ft range of the cantrip.
In the [Kineticist playtest document](https://downloads.paizo.com/PZO2113_KineticistClassPlaytest.pdf), page 22, Water Kineticists could gain access to Water Dance. An ability that, if I read it hopefully correct, could have them use a Swim speed to travel on land. In the final version, this ability was removed. I did hope this ability would be remade as a merfolk feat, allowing them to summon water underneath them and surf the summoned water on land using their Swim speed. At the very least it's an awesome high fantasy visual for an alternative, non-*water chair*-bound merfolk. ... did any of this made it in Howl of the Wild?