Show Notes
Last time on Impossible Magic, we discovered that the Magus can finally move, the Summoner can finally summon, and Pathfinder's three-action economy is apparently more of a polite recommendation. Now we're back for Part 2, where Paizo hands Ash an infinite supply of disposable corpses, gives Tyler a class built entirely around weaponized graffiti, drops roughly six hundred spells on his to-do list, and introduces magic so impossible that you're legally allowed to cast it exactly once. Welcome back. Somehow, things have gotten worse for the GM. Show Notes We survived Part 1, so naturally it's time to make things significantly more complicated. We start with the Necromancer, Ash's immediate new obsession and perhaps Pathfinder's most enthusiastic endorsement of reusable corpses. Necromancers summon disposable thralls, sacrifice them to power Grave Spells, choose between the martial Reaper and thrall-heavy Puppeteer Fatal Methods, and customize their undead aesthetic through Blood, Bone, Flesh, or Spirit Grim Fascinations. Blood immediately attracts Ash's attention because apparently the correct amount of bleeding is all of it. The class also gets Mastery of Life and Death, allowing it to play surprisingly flexible games with vitality and void damage. Between healing from dead thralls, creating seas of grasping limbs, exploding minions, summoning enormous undead monstrosities, and eventually dropping a living graveyard onto the battlefield, the Necromancer delivers exactly the sort of wholesome family entertainment we expected. Then we meet the Runesmith, Pathfinder's newest experiment in making someone at the table track even more things. Runesmiths etch persistent runes onto equipment, trace temporary runes onto creatures, modify them with diacritic runes, and invoke them for additional effects. The result is a flexible new magic system with tons of room for clever combinations, action compression, buffs, debuffs, and the inevitable player who arrives with a spreadsheet explaining why drawing twelve symbols on the barbarian causes reality to explode. Or, as Tyler puts it, weaponized graffiti. From there, we explore the new Wizard schools, including enchantment-adjacent magic, divination, dimensional manipulation, and what can only reasonably be described as Minecraft Wizard. Automatons also get new options, including more durability and, most importantly, laser eyes. Then we arrive at approximately six hundred new and updated spells, which Tyler receives with the calm enthusiasm of a man watching years disappear from his life. Standouts include Bone Shield, Murder of Crows, Bone Moth's Kiss, Heartbolt, Living Thunderbolt, and the deeply important Fishing Spot, which creates an extraplanar fishing hole because sometimes saving the world can wait until after you catch a Scholar Salmon. Finally, we reach the actual Impossible Spells. These aren't conventional character options so much as campaign-level magical plot devices. They can set enormous areas on fire, erase entire periods of history, leave permanent supernatural consequences, and can generally be cast only once by a character. So despite the book's title, Impossible Magic is apparently possible. Once. We wrap up with strange rituals, spell catalysts, armor and weapon runes, grimoires, spellhearts, staves, magic tattoos, and enough other magical equipment to keep optimizers occupied until Paizo releases another book and starts the process all over again. The final verdict is overwhelmingly positive. The Necromancer is flavorful and mechanically exciting, the Runesmith introduces a genuinely different approach to magic, the spells are unusually creative, and even the archetypes and magic items feel packed with ideas worth playing. Key Takeaways Necromancer is built around disposable thralls that can attack, block space, fuel Grave Spells, and be sacrificed for increasingly ridiculous effects. Reaper supports a more martial Necromancer while Puppeteer leans hard
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For years, martial characters in D&D have had one job: hit things until they stop moving. Wizards rewrite reality, clerics summon divine power, and fighters get to swing a sword. Again. Well, the 2024 D&D Player's Handbook finally gives martial characters something interesting to do with all that stabbing. Weapon Mastery lets you cleave through enemies, knock them down, shove them around, and even deal damage when you miss. Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down the new mechanics, the best combinations, and why your fighter might soon be carrying enough weapons to open a sporting goods store. Because apparently, hitting things wasn't complicated enough. Show Notes The 2024 D&D Player's Handbook introduces Weapon Mastery, giving martial characters new ways to control the battlefield, improve damage, and make combat more interesting. But are these new D&D 5e combat mechanics balanced? Tyler, Randall, and Ash break down all eight Weapon Mastery properties: Cleave, Graze, Nick, Push, Sap, Slow, Topple, and Vex. We explore how each works, which weapons benefit, and the best Weapon Mastery combinations for fighters, barbarians, rogues, paladins, and rangers. We also dig into two-weapon fighting, action economy, battlefield control, and some potentially ridiculous character builds. Do the 2024 D&D weapon rules finally close the martial-caster gap, or have we just given fighters more creative ways to annoy the DM? Key Takeaways Weapon Mastery gives martial classes more tactical choices in D&D 2024 combat.
Last time, we opened a door that had been sealed for thousands of years, murdered a dinosaur, adopted its baby, and turned a crank we probably shouldn't have touched. Now the village is flooding, the ancient machinery is waking up, and our only hope is building weapons from whatever junk we can find. Oh, and Tyler wants to dismantle a horse for spare parts. Welcome back to Numenera, where saving the world requires a little engineering, a lot of questionable judgment, and apparently a working knowledge of French grammar
What happens when a mysterious cowboy rides out of a deadly desert, introduces himself, and immediately falls off his horse? Naturally, you trust his god, open a door that's been locked for thousands of years, and discover your entire village might be living inside a dead monster. Welcome to Numenera, where the birds are terrifying, the technology is incomprehensible, and Tyler can't roll above a five when it matters. At least Ash gets a pet dinosaur. Things are going great.
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So you've survived character creation in Numenera. Congratulations! Now it's time to level up, rummage through ancient garbage, and build a giant murder robot that might eventually decide you're the problem. What could possibly go wrong? In this episode, we're spending XP, scavenging the ruins of forgotten civilizations, and exploring the joys of community development. Because nothing says heroic adventure quite like spending six months building a machine that might explode, or thirty years constructing a castle. Welcome to the Ninth World, where yesterday's trash is tomorrow's technology, and apparently nobody can agree on how to pronounce a two-by-four.