I've been looking at a Val'Dellenov build and having some trouble understanding what it will look like in the future. i.e. how the bloodline talents "Form of the Predator," "Primal Self," and the spell "Bestial Form" interact.

My take on the talents is that "Form" gives you die bumps to physical stats and a scalable speed three natural attack (starting at d6 damage) + turning you into a beast along with all your equipment. Two tiers later "Primal self" requires "Form" and says "you may change into a hybrid, bipedal form of your Form of the Predator animal form" and you gain a +2 to physical stat rolls and a flat d8 speed 4 natural attack. Both discuss giving you +2 to all perception skill rolls. Because of that, I assume "Primal Self" entirely supersedes and replaces "Form." Is that correct?

I ask because "Primal self" has the advantage of allowing you to maintain your equipment, cast, and talk, but what if you can make better use of a die bump bonus to your might than a static bonus? After all, by tier 4 what are the odds a melee character doesn't have a static bonus talent of some type already? Also, the "Form" melee option might still be better since it scales. To even take "Primal self" you have to have 4 bloodline talents, so by definition "Form" will already by a d8 speed three attack, compared to the "Primal Self" speed 4 attack of the same damage. Does "Primal Self" entirely supersede "Form" or does it essentially activate both?

If not, since they are different talents and have some different bonus's, can you activate both? If so, do you wind up able to talk or not? (I would assume if you do use both that you get the worst case on the casting/talking issue). By the rules it seems like you should be able to, but it doesn't seem to be the intent, and since both involve actual shape-changing, it is difficult to envision both being active at once.

To further confuse things there is the "Bestial Form" Spell. It increases all your stat dice to d12 (as well as other nice goodies). Then it says, "If you cast this spell while under the effects of "The Primal Self" Bloodline Talent, you gain a +2 bonus to damage and all Might and Quickness Action Skill Rolls. It doesn't say "instead" so I assume that is in addition to it. So that is a d12 stat die, a +2 from the talent, and a +2 from the spell, correct? Those all stack, right? If you used "Primal Self" than cast "Bestial Form" than used "Form of the predator" would you also stack another (talent) die bump on top of the d12 (spell) change to stat dice? Since that would become d12+2, is that +2 considered a static bonus, or still a die bump bonus for the purpose of stacking with the +2 from the "primal self" talent (or others)?

Additionally, there is the "Hands of our Mother" tier 1 bloodline talent, that fits nicely into the whole scheme, but it just allows you to cast "Claws of the Beast." It isn't essential, but the damage from it scales faster than the damage from "Form" so it can remains useful, but since you can't cast most spells while making use of "Form" it seems like this should have the language that the val'Dellenov specific psionic spells have, which indicate they can be cast while in "Form." Obviously you could just cast it first, but it seems like a bloodline power should work even when invoking another bloodline power, especially when that exception is so common in other spells they can cast.

Just some thoughts/questions that I would love to hear other people's thoughts on.

Thanks,

Toodeep

I'm pretty sure once you have Primal Self, you can choose the effect. You can either use Form of the Predator or Primal Self with the inherent advantages and disadvantages of the one you choose (you can not mix and match between them).

No, you can't use both at once. You choose which one to use.

I agree with your interpretation of combining Bestial Form and Primal Self. I think the extra bonus is to make up for losing use of equipment and speaking (as the special note doesn't say anything about the spell not doing that). You effectively end of up with an improved version of Form of the Predator by combining the two.

I would agree that Hands of our Mother should be usable while using Form of the Predator (though, iirc, it's worse that the base attack from Form unless adapted).

I agree that you probably shouldn't be able to use both talents at once, but considering they offer different bonus types, technically by stacking rules, they seem like they should be useable together, and there is nothing indicating they aren't. I think there should be some clarification in errata.

"Hands of our Mother" does do less base damage, except that with it and "Form" as talents, you already have enough bloodline talents to match the damage of "Forms" natural attacks using "Hands". If you take any other bloodline talents, it easily surpasses "Form" and scales more quickly (a die bump every two bloodline talents, while "Form" bumps every 4)

Also, as a related question, what tradition would the talent "Hand of our Mother" count as? (since it is both a primal and psionic spell) I'm wondering because it doesn't specifically say what tradition most talents are when cast using "you can cast" descriptor. It seems like it would be helpful to spell that out for the purpose of discern residue. My initial inclination would be to call it a latent psionic talent, but that raises 2 questions:

1. Does it then become a "free spell" they know if they become psionically active? If they become psionically active and don't choose it as a spell, is it
2. If they never become psionically active, but enter a Nullifying Arcanum Field that psi-lock's people, can they still use this ability? It's not spelled out as psionic and they aren't psionically active, so it seems tough to say that they can't, but then what is it?

It seems that kind of question probably applies to a bunch of the bloodline powers that allow one to "cast" something using their bloodrank. Bloodrank being similar to how empowered by the gods a Val is raises the idea that it might be almost divine, rather than psionic, but we see indications tying bloodrank to psionic ability (as a divinely gifted ability) as well, so I certainly can't say for sure.

As a default you might describe "bloodline spells" as Deity for purposes of someone Discerning Residue.

Or you could go with the tradition attached to the spell cast. In the case of multiple traditions I'd pick the one that made the most sense. Probably not psionic.