DEEP DIVE into the remastered Oracle, Pathfinder's cursed caster! (Rules Lawyer)

[@TheRulesLawyerRPG]

On "confirmation" that Paizo intends the oracle to have 4 slots per rank: It is still secondhand information at the time of this video. Also, when it came to the Dying/Wounded rules confusion regarding Player Core 1 last fall, I think Paizo might have changed its mind last-minute. Regardless, if they say it's 4 slots/rank I will disagree =) (This is a class that effectively has 3 Focus Points and ends up with 7)

[@DrCaesarMD]

I don't particularly want them to be a 4-slot class, but without that buff, I don't see really... much reason at all to play them with how much mysteries have been gutted. Some cursebound abilities are nice, but few are great enough to be worth the lack of mystery benefits, so it leaves me wondering... Why would I not just play Divine Sorcerer?

[@geraldstacy3658]

I agree with DrCeasearMD. Oracle is basically Sorcerer with tricks that punish you for using them and no basic bonus to damage/healing. It needs the 4 slots to be relevant until lv 10 when the actually 'good' tricks start to come out.

[@cheezeofages]

On the Death/Dying thing I totally believe them when they said they intended to go the gentler route but there was a miscommunication. As far as the spell slots go I honestly believe 4 slots is intended because accidentally copy pasting the old spell paragraphs and not changing them is a far more likely whoopsie than accidentally copy pasting the sorcerer chart and partially editing it.

[@cheezeofages]

And we know there's copy pasting from the old book to the new to save time because Paizo folk literally said they were doing that for sections that didn't need rewriting. Whoever was putting together the oracle section together literally would have had the old one open and be copying sections then editing them as needed. So I don't think they'd have randomly by accident grabbed a 4 slot chart. Old outdated paragraphs from the old class though? VERY much more likely.

[@geraldstacy3658]

@cheezeofages Yeah, they seem to go far too liberal on the "copy/paste when things don't need any editing" part.

[@elmokaartinen3854]

I really like how Paizo handled the battle oracle thematics. Their curse makes the oracle more angry as the spirits possess them to battle, and now with their new focus spell the players get to become tilted every time they look at their characters sheet.

[@RoofTopRenegade]

I'm pretty disheartened. The premaster oracle was really special to me, and i really loved running them. I know they have mechanically received buffs, and are better casters now with extra slots and effectively a second focus pool for even more spell like effects per day, but i don't think anyone who liked the old oracles wanted to lose the function of the curse for this. When i say functions of the curses, i don't mean the bonuses and penalties, i mean the very specific playstyle they made. I think the oracles weren't popular or understood because people who played other classes thought you were supposed to be trying to find ways to mitigate or avoid the penalties of your curse, but that is not my experience. Every kind of oracle i've played worked way better when you just embrace as much curse as you can, and lean into it, take as much penalty and bonus as you can! and now there are no bonuses, and the penalties for half the curse are so uninteresting (the other half are still pretty cool) and easily avoidable... why do they even have curses anymore? what niche does the class fill? it used to be "weirdo casters who would risk themselves in fairly unique way to do a few cool and unique things a day". In the remaster, they are just another caster. it really just seems like their niche now might be casting the most spell/spell like feats per day, and thats boring as hell, no one who did play oracle wanted that. we want to blow ourselves up to maybe be useful for a few minutes. thats not sarcasm! thats the power fantasy we wanted!

[@heyfell4301]

I agree 100% I guess what they were trying to go for was the "raw force of divine power," not as versatile as something like a Cleric and without any of the martial prowess to boot, just pure catalysts for the divine to channel miracles. But not only was this only half of the Oracle's original identity, I also don't think it really fulfilled that niche, especially when stuff like a Divine Sorcerer already exists and can do that arguably better. Oracle was an incredibly clunky class that definitely needed a buff, but not only did that buff come in the form of turning it into a completely different class that shares nearly nothing with the former's identity, it's also a less interesting class with less flavor to boot. Oracles are now just a slightly stronger Divine Sorcerer who has some cool abilities that they have to use somewhat sparingly not to hurt themselves. They're to Sorcerer's and Clerics what old Witches used to be to Wizards, and that's a shame when in the se book the Alchemist was so fantastically remastered into an infinitely superior version of itself that are still undeniably still the Alchemist in identity.

[@al8188]

27:20 knowledge of shapes at level 4? Busted, I didn't get knowledge of shapes until after I got knowledge of colors and I was 5.

[@LightningRaven42]

Weapon Trance is definitely a meme. I wonder what was going on when people designed this feat. Anyone can see that this is neither flavorful nor mechanically interesting.

[@Nastara]

It feels like whoever was doing Battle Oracle ran out of time. Nothing that weapon trance does is worth it.

[@LightningRaven42]

@@Nastara You know the worst thing? Animist had a Focus Spell that would fit like a glove. And it was just a matter of Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V. Easy breezy.

[@amiablereaper]

It's such harsh nerf for what was already one of the worst gish chassis...

[@Nastara]

@@LightningRaven42 You know what yeah. I forgot about that playtest but the animist DID have a very good focus spell.

[@LightningRaven42]

@@Nastara That wasn't even the broken one.

[@mobi2289]

Life oracle is far worse than you think. Old oracle would use d12s instead of d8s when at curse 2 for heal spells, and reduce magical healing to themselves by half their level rounded up, but couldn't be magically healed by outside sources (not from yourself)unless you were down. But old oracle also had greater HP. At level 10 with curse 2, you would only heal 5 less. Now? Less HP, less heals, and at level 10 with curse 2, you heal 20 less from ALL magical sources including your own healing. That is absolutely massive given the overall less HP you have, using d8s instead of d12s, and you basically can never afford to use life link. Overall, life oracle took a massive hit and is easily the worst subclass in the entire game now. Why play that when base cleric can do everything life oracle can do, but with none of the negatives? Life oracle was heavily nerfed, not buffed. EDIT: something else I forgot. The blaze of revelation feat is worse than before. Legacy didn't require you to be at curse 4, or extreme curse for legacy. With how bad the curses are for specific subclasses, it makes it even more risky and dangerous because then you have to spend time getting to that point, and even staying there before hand can be extremely risky.

[@aventuraenlafogata649]

Weapon Trance is atrocious. There are a lot of ways go get the effect permanently with feat. I would have understand if it was a damage buff, gave fast healing as before or if it was somehow spicier. But as it is, just useless.

[@vellusviridi]

I was really hoping that Battle Oracle would keep its bonus to Strikes (and possibly damage). I think that's what their focus spell should be. Making a whole focus spell just give you martial weapon proficiency and absolutely nothing else is so strange. The lost weapon proficiency can be made up with a general feat for those who want it. Regardless it feels bad as it is, though you still make a powerful caster.

[@aventuraenlafogata649]

It's an atrocious spell that seems like a joke. Probably there will be dozens of homebrew fixes

[@jakethe_]

Yeah its really weird. If the spell gave bonus damage it might at least be a little worth it.

[@cheezeofages]

Old Battle Oracle's bonus to strikes from curse was a tiny +1 status bonus that your curse couldn't even get you until 11th level and hit you with Stupefied 2. Which gave all you spells a 35% fail chance. And to be at that stage you need to wait a few levels to not be totally locked out of your cursebound focus spells (which was literally all the focus spells you got from your class). Like... who cares about that bonus to strikes? You could legit get that from countless other sources way earlier. Some of which the old oracle's curse mechanics got in the way of you using.

[@christianlangdon3766]

​@@cheezeofagesi mean you have forgotten if old battle oracle had been transfered over it would actually be good. The old curse was its largest issue. Even than fast healing, and loads of damage buffs made swinging feel at least worth it. Now the current battle oracle you could argue is played wrong as soon as they have a weapon in their hand.

[@vellusviridi]

@@cheezeofages Oh no, my oracle who's not going to be casting any more spells this combat is Stupefied! If only they had a class feature that made them better at making Strikes at the same time! Oh wait they did. Battle Oracle was elegant in that you could be an effective caster, and, as you ran out of slots and focus points, switch to being an effective Striker. Now they have a focus spell that expects them to be Striking without actually making them any better at Striking. They are objectively worse at doing what they did before. They are a slightly better caster, but they were already a pretty good caster anyway.

[@MikeEspinoza-br6lj]

I was waiting for this one! Definitely looking forward to playing an Oracle soon. Also, when will we get an in-depth analysis of Megan???

[@block_the_]

Of Megan, or BY Megan?

[@subrosian2323]

It's pretty disappointing that there are no mystery-exclusive cursebound feats. I understand each mystery still has its own unique focus spells, but it's IMO pretty lame that they removed the unique benefits of the curses and reintroduced them as non-unique class feats. I like the opt-in cursebound mechanic, but the mysteries lost a little bit of what made them so unique. It also kinda feels like this was done in lieu of properly rebalancing the curses against each other.

[@Understandor]

Loss of mystery benefits is definitely a nerf to some of them. Battle is going to be missing those proficiencies, cosmic is going to be missing that DR.

[@cheezeofages]

Eh. Literally everything else Battle did is 2-3 times better, including being tanky. People are just looking at a shiny "heavy armor proficiency" and ignoring the fact that you can't meet the STR preq for heavy on Oracle until 5th level. And you have caster scaling so for 5 of the 15 levels you can actually wear it you're a proficiency behind. AND if you had used curse that day you were stuck a -2 to AC and ALL SAVES. On a class that has on one Expert save at level 1. So if you dumped DEX to wear Full Plate later you were sitting cursed with medium armor and like AC 15 and likely no bonus to F/R/W. Like pretty much sitting out there defenseless until you got a turn and then ran in there with defenses like this and made a Strike. Like FO' REAL new battle oracle is tankier with light armor and DEX +1 than cursed prior battle oracle. With tons more tools for accuracy and damage. And at a point proficiency in martial weapons isn't even that relevant. You can just pick up Weapon Storm and that doesn't require you be proficient in the weapon. You can just base rank do an AoE of 4 weapon damage plus a die a rank. Which is on par with higher level martial feats and roughly stays useable at the base rank for the rest of the game. With 4 slots per rank you can select it as a signature and you've got like, 12 of them by 12th level.

[@Hen632]

@@cheezeofages literally just retrain the DEX at level 5 to another stat. It’s that simple, stop acting like it isn’t. Also no one that’s bummed by the changes gives a shit that new battle oracle is better than how it used to be. Their issue is that in it becoming better it lost all its unique flavour. Like it’s regen for example, battle oracle being this unstoppable warrior that would keep getting up until they were killed was awesome. I liked the stupefy, even if it was an extremely harsh penalty because it provided a meaningful choice to make and also fit the fantasy perfectly. Was it badly balanced? Absolutely, but it still gave the subclass character. The fact they just threw it all away also means they threw all that character and flavour away too. Battle oracle was realistically a bad subclass before the remastered, but it had soul. Its new rendition is just a husk and you’d realize that if you could look past your whiteboard for 5 seconds

[@christianlangdon3766]

​@@cheezeofages bro your just wrong, battle oracle now is only better with ac without the old curse. And it still dies as soon as say magic missile is targeted to them. Your foregetting that with heavy armor, came medium, etc along with other archtypes you could go into it. Now you are stuck at light armor and need feats to get better. Your way worse at hitting things and doing damage. Old b oracle could have zeal to start of with, better stat spread for going into a gish set, the current one cant really even say the same. Its focus spell is trash, it needs now more feats than ever to even get the same choices that were baslenine. It does less damage, it doesnt have fast healing, its worse in initiative. Worse so it doesnt have interesting choices. As its curse will either get it killed when relavant or not be an issue. The old one while awful starting out mellowed out to be a -1 which only offset the big bonuses that heavy armor gave you eventualy anyway. The current one has all the same problems of old b oracle with less interesting options and even more feat taxes. To say that new battle oracle is in anyway a better gish would imply it exists as a gish. Bro your talking about a wizard with lightly higher hit points at this point.

[@hilarymoonmurphy]

Sigh. The remaster is going to break my level 7 Finesse Melee Ancestor Oracle. Since Organized Play treats the remaster as an eratta, she just breaks mechanically. I'm going to have to rebuild her into something else.

[@tomirasanen2512]

Thank you very much for the informative video. I must say I wasn't feeling ignited to build an Oracle PC before, and that feeling remains with the Remastered Oracle. Oh well, just not my class then but there are *so many* other classes that I'll not complain overmuch.

[@evrypixelcounts]

I think you're the first to cover the revelation spells, thank you!

[@Cyraneth]

The timing on Meddling Futures is really tricky. It has the Cursebound trait, so it increases your cursebound value once the action resolves. It is a free action to use, so that means the action that needs to resolve for the cursebound increase is the free action. However, the benefit you gain from the feat depends on your cursebound value, so you can only gain the higher value if you use the feat while you have cursebound 3 and thus you immediately become cursebound 4 before attempting the action you would gain the bonus to. This makes it... difficult to use for, say, a Lore Oracle, who might then have to cast a spell while stupified 1...

[@TheRulesLawyerRPG]

I think your read is correct, which helps the feat in most cases. But that yes you'll want to cross your fingers as a high level Lore oracle

[@thejazmaster5292]

This is thankfully irrelevant because the curse is unplayably bad

[@TitaniumDragon]

Bones Oracle got a huge buff because of the granted domains, because they now have Vigil, which gives them the amazingly powerful Remember the Lost at level 8. I think it is important to call that out, because it is a very subtle buff, but it makes them one of the strongest oracles now because they get one of the best focus spells in the game, but it isn't in their listed focus spells but rather hidden in their domains. Also, while Battle Oracle lost heavy armor proficiency, they also lost the -1/-2 penalty to AC they had previously, so their AC is as high or often, higher now than it was pre-remaster. And honestly, the bonuses they got to strikes were pretty paltry compared to the severity of the penalties. Cosmos and Flames oracles also both got buffed by gaining access to the Star domain, which gives you access to the excellent Asterism focus spell.

[@blueThumbnail]

Can we get an in depth analysis of megan plz?

[@ikaemos]

She's just the manifestation of Ronald's cursebound effect from his Cat Owner mystery. Cursebound 1 and 2 gives you clumsy 1 and 2, cursebound 3 makes you fall prone, cursebound 4 is instant death.

[@kevinbarnard355]

@@ikaemos Death and the Mysterious Cat force eats your corpse when you don't feed it the next day.

[@evrypixelcounts]

I wish "trial by skyfire" was available to tempest oracles as a sort of lightning storm. Might ask my GM about adjudicating it when I inevitably play a tempest oracle.

[@arthare]

with the electricity weakness it would kill you really fast no?

[@lawrl777]

it would mean you have the exact same cursebound feat access as flames, so instead flames is the best at damage (at the cost of hurting themself), cosmos gets a little damage, and tempest gets a little healing

[@Ascarion47]

I've unfortunately not had the chance to play pre-remaster Oracle outside of a one-shot. It was my by far favourite class in PF1 for both it's versatility and flavour, so I was hoping for some nice updates in PC2. Unfortunately, the promise of a "revised" Oracle didn't live up to the hype. I think this new Oracle, while mechanically more powerful, is still just Sorcerer with extra steps. Too bad, back to Psychic.

[@koschkathedeathless]

I miss the benefits being there. I really liked how the oracle worked before and now the drawbacks just... dont feel worth it to me

[@koschkathedeathless]

*being more innate. Now you have to spend feats to even get access to the curse

[@PAGames-Jacob]

OOF. You're right, Battle got the *shaft*. Flames seems INSANE. Continual, un-removable persistent damage is rough stuff! It can be greatly mitigated with a few magic items - notably charms of resistance - or spells, but it keeps pace hard. Some of the non-scaling cursebound feats are massively underwhelming. Trial by Skyfire for example, is doing basically 0 damage at 10th level, the earliest you can take it, and even if you get it to Curse 3 it's merely doing an average of 14/rnd, with a possibility of as low as 4. While you can prepare ahead of time to trivialize that damage with a *Charm of Resistance*, you're still doing precious little to enemies dealing 10 fire damage at the end of your turn, while potentially KILLING a downed ally or having to burn more of your actions to regret your choice of feats. At least the kineticist aura is enemies only. I also agree on Blaze of Revelation. This is mechanically bad.

[@thedruski85]

Can you mitigate the effects of Oracle curses now? You couldn't before the remaster.

[@flamefriends3842]

You can't mitigate the damaging effects of a curse in any way. "Any resistance to the damage is suppressed" and all that

[@kevinbarnard355]

@@thedruski85 Technically no, theoretically yes. You can't stop or reduce the effect in any way. You CAN make it not matter. Numbing Tonic (even the level 1 item) grants temp HP every round at the start of your turn. That will "absorb" the curse, but isn't a "cheat" because you are still losing the benefit of having those temp HP for other reasons.

[@PAGames-Jacob]

@@thedruski85 You're absolutely right!

[@PAGames-Jacob]

@@flamefriends3842 I stand corrected! 👍

[@Micolino9878]

If I recall how other subclasses that grant bonus spells known work, those count against the spells you can learn. So if the Oracle has 2 spell slots and 2 spells known, then their mystery defines one of them, and they can only choose ONE noncantrip spell, which kinda stings. If the spells known is meant to be "2 + 1 defined by your mystery" like other classes are worded, then that would line up with the table we're seeing, and it might be the tradeoff they have in mind for losing Mystery Benefits. Still need clarification though.

[@mannyvalerio6822]

It would've been so easy, too: "For the duration, when you make a Strike with a martial weapon you use your spell attack modifier, and you gain [spell rank] DR. Auto-sustain on a successful Strike." Instant half-capable Battle Oracle.

[@eyeh0]

Divine Access being a free feat is nice but I wish it also remained as a low level feat. That or instead of granted spells, we got to decide, like with divine access or with clerics, which 3 spells we got through a domain and deity at 1st level.

[@lawrl777]

oracles now get 3 free non-divine spells at level 1, they pick which by picking their mystery

[@kevinbarnard355]

They get both. 3 free spells from Mystery at level 1. They also get the benefit of Divine Access at level 11 from any deity domain their mystery has access to.

[@mushuable]

Had no idea what Oracles did, now I do :D

[@eamk887]

I'm super disappointed they nerfed Life so hard. I mean, I get removing the positive effects of the curse, but why not return them as feats, like what happened with other mysteries? I think they could have easily made some type of feat for the d12 buff to Heal, like a feat that made it so that whenever you are cursebound 3, the dice of your Heal would increase to d12.

[@----Jay----]

I am so annoyed that they removed the higher healing dice aspect of Life. It was what made it the new Cleric of Pelor, in my mind. Now it's like a variant angelic sorcerer. Though I am planning on adding angelic Sorcerer dedication into Life Oracle to see how much of a holy healbot it can be.

[@anqied]

d12 heals were literally the defining feature of my life oracle, and now it's gone completely? literally no way to get it back? what the hell does life oracle do now? it's just a worse cleric. is there actually anything that makes life a better healer than any other mystery? ok soothe is pretty great but besides that? we share our free 1st level healing feat with the friggin undead oracle, and if I'm reading this right, any oracle that wants it.

[@christianlangdon3766]

​@@anqied ye i am more battle oracle hate train but i feel life is just so gutted. Why should i play an oracle of life or battle vs like any caster and the reason is there is bloody none.

[@troyyrob]

The damage for Ancestral Touch got slightly buffed. I think there were also changes to the Cosmos mystery spells.

[@lawrl777]

yeah spray of stars is [rank+1]d4 now

[@Greenman1504]

i dunno a lot of the new cursebound effect just seems so.... lame kinda? The old ones just felt more impactful and flavorful, especially the Cosmos one just making you easier to push around and enfeebled just seems... not that major and just boring... in the old one it really sold the idea of you becoming almost weightless way better, flavor-wise and was more penalizing mechanically It's very evident they can have neat aspects about them, like tempest has a variety of compounding effects that i find pretty cool! But Flame Oracle's just taking persistent fire damage feels so... lame I dunno, the cursebound feats are neat, but the actual curse effects feel really watered down for multiple of the curses

[@kevinbarnard355]

Preliking and commenting before I watch. So looking forward to this one.

[@duncbot9000]

Flames oracle gets set on fire? I can already hear the screams of Sienna Fuegonasus!

[@quban234]

With all the small buffs sorcerers got I think it's fine for more casters to go with 4 slots per rank. All player characters grew in power with the remaster.

[@kevinbarnard355]

Cosmos Oracle can still get lighter. They have to chose it though. Any Oracle can with Water Walker and Lighter than Air. It is both nice as it opens up most mysteries to any "path" of benefit, but also sad for flavor reasons because almost none of them are unique to a mystery.

[@Lunasera]

I definitely appreciate the changes they make but I still lament the first edition oracle. I liked the mysteries better but more importantly I really liked the curses. Curses were not bound to your spellcasting instead they were a permanent thing that came with exploring your mystery. As you progressed in level you would kinda adapt to your curse until it turned into a boon. For example: My oracle in 1e had the curse tongues. This curse states that you gain a bonus language but during stressful situations (combat or social pressure) my character would only be able to speak and understand this one language. It was meant to hinder you a bit. At 5th level they would get a second language with the same restrictions. At 10th Level they could understand all languages as if under the spell tongues but still only speak two during stressful situations. At 15th Level finally they can speak and understand all languages but during combar they are still restricted to the original two for speaking. Most curses worked in that way and they scaled, so that you could really play it as your character learning to handle it. I don't like the new curse getting worse or better all the time.

[@Team_Orchid]

Seconding this. This Oracle is slightly better but nowhere close to 1st ed Oracle and its slew of mysteries. With the amount of features and spells those babies gave you each mystery managed to have something over the others, and that's assuming it wasn't just generically powerful. Nature was a mounted terror, Flame made Evocation Oracle a lot less painful in the midgame, Metal was really good with single strike feats, and then there were all the Oracles that killed it in certain environments. The first version of PF2 Oracle was the exact opposite where multiple mysteries were shooting their legs off for okay spells while Cosmic won on all fronts. Killer passive, the curse barely did anything if you made easy build decisions, and to top it all off it actually had a good revelation spell. It was just insulting to see the power gap on Oracle of all classes.

[@kevinbarnard355]

They were almost all completely avoidable curses. You could get around any of them, to the point that none of them hindered you, just your party. Tongues was immediately circumvented if some or all of your party also spoke that language. It's a burden you place on them so that your PC can participate, or you chose to try not to metagame as no one can understand you. Maimed was the same. All you had to do was ride a horse. 100% upside at that point. There were SO many mysteries and SO many curses, that you could easily fit them together to not be a burden. -4 to weapon strikes? Play a blaster mystery. Have a wolf mouth? Be deaf and get silent spell to avoid the spell failure chance. None of that was flavorful, it was just different colored Fruit Loops that all taste the same.

[@tinear4]

Did I see in your presentation that the Ancestor Oracle no longer gets a second level-1 ancestry feat? If so, this would be sad, because it was the only way I could find in the old rulebook by which I could legitimately create a Tiefling elf with hooves (form of the fiend) and the Hellspawn lineage.

[@commenter1430]

This is true, no longer does ancestor oracle get an extra ancestry feat. Sorry mate

[@bobyhappy2992]

the cat curse : you are followed by a cat familiar that push things around you just to annoy you and taunts you with cute little "meow" "I swear I saw her smirk !! I'M NOT CRAZY !!"

[@TorchesUponStars]

RE: spell repertoire mismatch, the accepted guideline has historically (coming from the 3.5 days) been ‘text beats table’.

[@chrisweber2739]

Roll the bones #4 is just too complex for what it does. Essentially It doesn't change much for the probabilities while being really slow to adjudicate. It is essentially flip a coin with head being "Roll twice and take the highest except if you roll a 1 then take the 1" and tails being "Roll twice and take the lowest except if you roll a 20 then take the 20". The probabilities are the same as if you didn't do anything with extra steps. This might have well be "The next roll cannot benefit from any fortune or suffer any misfortune effect" and that would essentially do the same thing.

[@lawrl777]

same average, but swingier

[@chrisweber2739]

@@lawrl777 I actually played with the math now, unfortunately the swing pulls out in the wash... mostly. It is so insignificant to me that the effort really seems not worth the effect (0.02%-1% increase in chance of success depending on the target number), but maybe that's because I'm into probabilities and statistics. After all my first reaction was "That's a lot of work for no change". That was wrong but it's still very little. If I ever have to handle that then I think I will take the "The next roll cannot benefit from any fortune or suffer any misfortune effect" route just to let the game run smoother.

[@Aidan8et]

Just IMHO, the wording could have been simplified to something like "The creature rolls a DC11 flat check. On S/CS, they have fortune. On a F/CF: they have misfortune." (Abbreviated for text of course)

[@Money4Nuthing]

My proposal for how Battle Oracle should be is to replace Oracular Warning with some kind of polymorph effect that you can use when you roll initiative. Lets call it Warrior's Visage. Warrior's Visage is a free-action cursebound ability that you can use when you roll initiative. For one minute, it gives you martial weapon proficiency equal to your simple weapon proficiency, medium armor proficiency equal to your light armor proficiency, and the shield block reaction. The drawback is you take a -2 status penalty to spell attacks and spell DCs during Warrior's Visage. At that point you'd have to replace Weapon Trance with something else. I'd suggest a focus spell similar to the ranger's Gravity Weapon.

[@kixter490]

Am I misreading this, or does Knowledge of Shapes let you use either Spellshape as long as you only know one of them. The prerequisite is to have “Reach Spell OR Widen Spell”. But using Knowledge of Shapes simply states “You can use Reach Spell or Widen Spell as a free action.” It doesn’t specify you can only use the abilities which you have Feats for. So say you only have Reach Spell and take Knowledge of Shapes, could you not use Knowledge of Shapes to use Widen Spell as a free action? I don’t think that RAI but it seems like it could be RAW unless theres some other rule somewhere else that negates it.

[@TheRulesLawyerRPG]

The RAI is almost certainly that you should have the corresponding Spellshape feat. I think it is still possible to read that as RAW, as the sentence can simply be read as modifying what you already can do. But your reading is also a fair RAW interpretation... that we shouldn't allow probably lol.

[@geraldstacy3658]

@kixter490 It changes the metamagic to a free action, but it doesn't give you the other feat as well.

[@Fruge430]

I just made a character who was a battle Oracle, with the entire crux of the character being they seem scrawny, then suddenly focus on wrestling. If I were to update the character, which thanks to vtt stuff I may have to, the entire character no longer works at all. Armor gone and replaced with nothing. Not feeling the best about that, to say the least.

[@cheezeofages]

Honestly if the curse was in play old battle oracle was incredibly fragile at early levels. Legit at level 1 you could start a fight Cursed and need to go swing at someone to avoid having 15-16 AC and next to no save bonuses. It sucks that it's a bit awkward to go STR builds now but Human can go Medium at first level. Elves technically can two by going ancient elf with champion dedication. Everyone else can grab it at 2nd or 3rd. The second you get the medium armor access though you are way tankier than old battle oracle was and you have more resources from curse not getting in the way of using Might Domain athletics booster, more slots for buffs, etc.

[@trafalgarla]

If oracles getting 4 slots is intended, I would have preferred that they retain their mystery benefits and be 3 slot casters instead.

[@nicolasvillasecaali7662]

Im really confused on how the new Oracle would work in game, the cursebond effects feel quite quild and its somewhat sad that the revelation spells seems to not have interaction with the cursebond level, that would make them more interesting on their own i feel.

[@JasonSeal]

I don't think the spirits in The Dead Linger spell do hang around until next turn. It states they strike and disappear. I think the flanking ability is to give the caster options about how and who they attack, so both strikes again one foe with them flanking it or against different foes that an ally is attacking

[@geraldstacy3658]

Surging Might should work for any spell granted by your mystery as well. Flames and Tempest will miss out otherwise.

[@yomrblue1481]

Oracle is the only class i will be using the legacy version, maybe with a few changes from the remaster

[@creislaw4821]

Doesn't Bones oracles weakness to void and vitality mean that it always be hurt by effects that have either vitality or void tag? Doesn't that mean that Bones oracle is almost impossible to heal?

[@eyeh0]

Yeah, on top of that, I’m a little confused if it means you can be targeted with all the void and vitality spells now? Don’t those usually exclusively target living or undead?

[@avery9076]

So, as far as I can tell, You'd still get Void Healing if you picked Void that day... You're just also damaged by Void as normal?? It's really vague.

[@Aidan8et]

Not necessarily. Weaknesses are only applied to damage. Harm/Heal spells both have clauses to stipulate the healing aspect on 1/2 actions. The 3A effect is more open to interpretation, I feel...

[@redmagusmorgan]

Do you think Foretell Harm applies to every target hit by an AoE?

[@lawrl777]

it just says "the target", but i think RAI is pretty clearly one target

[@geswut3144]

I'll be honest, I really don't like how they changed the curses

[@thejazmaster5292]

I can't believe they managed to make Ancestors even worse

[@seancannon2193]

Wait... as bad as the flames mystery curse sounds with constant persistent damage... I don't see anything preventing the persistent damage from being stopped by resistance. Am I wrong or if you, for example, took the new dragonblood versatile heritage and took the level 1 draconic resistance feat with fire as what you resist, could you just use cursebound effects and the only "negative" effect left would be that you shed light like a torch (which is sometimes useful anyways)? In the case of draconic resistance it's resistance equal to half your level, which means you would never take any damage from the curse after level 4 (since you get curseboud 3 available at level 11 when you already have resistance 5 fire). I want to be wrong about that.

[@FireSeraph007]

That's easy: the class feature has a line that says you cannot mitigate, reduce or remove the curse's effect. Resistance or immunity does not apply to the persistent fire damage. Weakness does though.

[@nathansmith5738]

there's a sidebar that calls out that you can't mitigate the damage in any way shape or form.

[@irwingbrasil]

As a rules lawyer what do you think about doing shorter videos explaining some rules that as usually misinterpreted or overlooked at tables, also could present different interpretations of some rules that as debated by the community?

[@AdmAmeoba]

Cosmos references the domain nothingness but I can't find any information on that domain or what spells it gives?

[@AloneD.Walker]

Really got to say, I am not excited for the new Oracle. Loved the Life and Sky Oracle. Both feel just empty now... Should I ever be able to play an Oracle I hope my GM allowes for pre Remaster.

[@Greenman1504]

I agree a lot of the new curse effects just feel so watered down

[@----Jay----]

How can the Domain Acumen feat [2] not be in the changes? It creates a Cursebound Revelation spell, which can't be Cursebound in the Remaster..

[@cephalosjr.1835]

Oh, right, you missed this: a Lore Oracle at cursebound 4 can’t cast any spells because you have to speak to cast spells. So at cursebound 4, almost your entire class is turned off. Also, one of the lightning domain spells nonbos hard with the Tempest curse, which sucks.

[@geraldstacy3658]

Watched a class tier video recently where the Oracle went from middle of the road to possible D tier level. I honestly have to agree with that. Battle Oracles in particular got hit with the nerf hammer that they're basically unplayable. They lost weapon and armor prof, attack bonus while cursed and gained vulnerability to all spell damage. Losing between 1/8th to 1/12th of your hit points on top of whatever spell just zapped you will suck. Especially if the bad guys realize it and start blasting you with cantrip every turn just because it's so effective.

[@geraldstacy3658]

Blaze of Revelation = "OH CRAP!" Button. Out of resources? Go all out for a minute, but maybe die afterwards. Very Shonen anime feel.

[@mobi2289]

Only issue is that the remastered feat is worse than the original. The original didn't require you to be at curse 4, but did the same thing.

[@tinycrimester]

ahhh hecc. just started playing life oracle and i'm not sure how i feel about these changes.

[@blaydsong]

FYI, I'd have to dig it up, but I'm pretty sure that Paizo already confirmed the number of Spells per day is correct. Somebody on Reddit found it.

[@ryansalmon6507]

Bad luck gamer claimed 4 per his “sources” (quoted as it was not clarified what he meant)

[@TheRulesLawyerRPG]

It is still secondhand information at the time of this video. Also, when it came to the Dying/Wounded rules confusion regarding Player Core 1 last fall, I think Paizo might have changed its mind last-minute. Regardless, if they say it's 4 slots/rank I will disagree =) (At high levels this is a class that effectively has 7 Focus Points)

[@LordTridus]

I'm playing an Oracle in Kingmaker and these changes are super disappointing. Power wise its fine, especially if it does wind up being a 4 slot caster. But the distinctive flavor has been absolutely gutted from the class and sone mysteries are just garbage now. It feels much more generic than it used to, and its sad. The curses are also not at all balanced. Some of them are very harsh while others (Cosmos, and Flame after a few levels) are easy to ignore.

[@cyanic3148]

I don't play Oracle, and mostly am looking at it for an archetype opportunity, but while I seem to like most of the changes, the Battle oracle feels not great, your focus spell is more of a flavor tax because you lost proficiency in higher weapon tiers and armor, even then, your focus spell is not likely to auto-sustain because you're not likely to hit your Strikes anyway, I'd prefer if they gave Battle martial proficiency and medium armor in exchange for gutting its spellcasting, just so it feels right to play as the first impression would suggest could have been an interesting curse if they made it so when you get more cursebound, other detrimental effects happen, but also your spell proficiency lowers, while your weapon proficiency rises

[@amiablereaper]

Battle is legitimately better as a pure caster now. Spending a focus point, pulling out a weapon, moving into melee, just to maybe sometimes get a hit in? Not worth it. That said, the bonus to initiative and temp hp might be worth taking even with a useless focus spell, for party utility

[@cheezeofages]

@@amiablereaper Why would you have the weapon sheathed in this example? You don't need free hands to cast most spells.

[@tinear4]

… also, would a char hide goblin be okay with the flames oracle curse 1? i think yes, and it would be very funny if true.

[@blockyuniverseproductions]

Whelp, combined with the mess the new rules for publishing Homebrew content turned out to be, seems Paizo has managed to make two massive errors in a short time span.

[@imrantinhere]

I don't get why everybody is bemoaning loss of flavor because of a couple of buffs got cut. Wouldn't being able to custom build your oracle, with cursebound abilities that you feel are right for your concept, allow for more flavor?

[@AdamX222]

I'm a little sad about the ancestors mystery. One of the nice flavor things I liked about the haunted curse in 1st edition was that it specifically messed with your items. It would have been nice if the ancestors mystery, which seems to be sort of an analogue with the flavor about spirits hovering around you and trying to control your actions and meddling with your belongings (at least in the legacy version), had incorporated something about having trouble drawing items (maybe having a flat check to avoid dropping an item on the ground when you draw it?). It could have been like the other curses that alternate between giving you a weakness or situational problem and a flat penalty to certain types of checks. As it is, Clumsy of up to 4 is pretty brutal. Having even a -2 to AC and Reflex saves on a class that already has poor AC and Reflex sounds like it could be a death sentence in harder fights if you're not exceptionally careful. Softening the Clumsy part while adding some risk to drawing items during combat could be an interesting trade off that adds that flavor I'm missing.

[@fefeman2856]

No time mystery? I'm sad

[@avery9076]

Time was added in Dark Archive while Oracle is from the Advanced Player's Guide, so it's likely going to be a little while until it gets remastered.

[@fefeman2856]

@@avery9076 Thanks for the info. One of my player is a time oracle so updating his character will be complicated

[@ginger-ham4800]

Is this class meant to be dogshit on purpose or something? Because literslly nothing here sounds good or worth it lmao

[@cheezeofages]

I don't fully agree with the harshness on Meddling Futures other than the skepticism on the 4th option. "You wanna be in a situation where 2 or 3 of these options are desirable" is a weird critique. You're a CHA caster. Literally the only time you can't use 3 of them to a satisfactory effect is when you're in melee range of something with reactions. Though using it multiple times a turn lowers this as you might have to attack with MAP or roll skill twice. or other things. Like 90% of the time even if it's not the one you wanted you can use it.