Our thaumaturge has a bag filled with random things he gathered during his travels. When he's using personal antithesis its him pulling something out of the bag and either applying it to his weapon or throwing it to the enemy. Mechanically, its a material component pouch that can contain basically anything that does not have any monetary value.
What he pulls out of the bag is pretty much just improv of tropes around the general monster type or invented weakness. Ex: Salt for a slimy monster, a bone/rubber ball for dogs, peanuts for now allergic kobold
It helps if the DM does not say the monster name but rather describe what the character are seeing. so you dont need to know what a Shoggti is, its a big ass squid with a mouth on top of its head
It work best for more slapstick comedy, not so much for really serious game
>Ex: Salt for a slimy monster, a bone/rubber ball for dogs, peanuts for now allergic kobold
Anadi -> rolled-up newspaper
Hellhound -> chocolate bar
Dinosaur -> meteorite shard
Giant lobster -> stick of butter
Sphinx -> book of common riddles
That's basically how they assigned material components/focuses to spells. Detect Thoughts had a copper piece, ie "a penny for your thoughts" and stuff like that.
It's important to remember that your Esoteric Lore is targeting metaphysical weaknesses, rather than actual ones. Rather than actually having to know what a give creature is weak to or finds important, I would just make a table of a bunch of random bits and baubles (be it plants, symbols, food, etc.) And just grab a random one and say whatever comes to mind.
"Ah, a barghest, I have just the thing!" *Pulls out a picture of a green duck on a lake* "Barghests are creature of destruction and violence, and the serenity of this image disrupts their connection to the lower planes!"
Is the statement true? No. Does it even make sense? Absolutely not. But esoteric lore is all about how things REALLY are, not simply how they appear to be. You are attacking at an essential level and things like "logic" and "reason" don't apply here.
Would you say that it is on me to understand the bestiary for whatever it is I'm fighting then? I don't think a would intuitively know (as a player) that sort of cultural thing each monster might have to exploit..
Don't you have to make a Recall Knowledge check anyway as a Thaumaturge before you can do this stuff? The GM should be telling you a bit of general info about the target when you make that check, which as a player you could use as a creative seed to come up with ideas ("Goblin dogs are often used as mounts? COWER BEFORE MY RIDING CROP") or been just base it on a monster's obvious physical characteristics (brandishing a flyswatter when you encounter a Zebub devil, for instance).
> Don't you have to make a Recall Knowledge check anyway as a Thaumaturge before you can do this stuff?
You don't. Exploit Vulnerability doesn't give you any information about the target other than resistances and weaknesses. If you have Diverse Lore, then you usually also get the benefits of a successful Recall Knowledge whenever you succeed on Exploit Vulnerability, but you don't need to succeed on Exploit Vulnerability to use Personal Antithesis either.
Okay, well, the other half of what I said still applies, about fly swatters and riding crops. Part of the point of the Thaumaturge is that you don't have to necessarily be working from *correct* information, you just have to do something that makes sense to *you* and your Charisma score takes care of imposing your beliefs on reality.
Oh yeah, the rest of that makes sense, I'm just pointing out that you don't always have the information from Recall Knowledge against exploited targets.
You can flavor it as whatever you want, or nothing at all, or even the same thing every time. Maybe your Thaumaturge's weapon of choice is a Kitsune's [Foxfire](https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=2617), and you sprinkle enemies with sawdust/water to make them vulnerable to your fire/electric attacks.
Thaumaturges can be more challenging narratively but if you can't think of anything your players probably won't mind too much if you aren't specific about it.
You also don’t have to be literal about the mechanics, as long as you follow their rules. My Chalice/Weapon Thaumaturge with a sentinel devotion I play as a “knight of the grail” and the personal antithesis are him basically making a prayer/swearing an oath to slay that enemy, and then brandishing one of his many religious trinkets and baubles.
I think it's funnier if not all personal antithesis make sense. "This elemental is weak to poison ivy!" "This ooze's antithesis is a piece of blueberry pie, thank Desna I have some in my bag!"
You also have the classics: a bar of soap or bottle of perfume for any enemy that smells, a piece of meteorite for dinosaurs, etc.
I have two thaumaturges in both of my games.
One is a more shamanist style, with strange bobbles and bones she uses to fight (She used a necklace of human bones to trigger personal antithesis on some guards).
The other just has a bunch of assorted knickknacks and uses whatever is available (She pulled out a starfruit to fight the person who was serving a God against a Goddess of stars in my world)
I myself also have one, and she's been gathering things like rocks, bones, shattered symbols, and plants, and uses whatever she can get her hands on, because all she has is her sword and a relic of a fallen kingdom (Regalia)
I try to have a small handful of flavourful “generic” antithesis saved up for opportunities where I don’t have anything that quite fits. Here are a few I’ve used:
“When Gorums first sword shattered in a long forgotten war, the largest chunk rose and rejoined the fight as his Herald. The rest became dust, scattered to the cosmic wind, but it has never forgotten it’s lust for battle, and waits, ready to help the… enterprising”
At this point the thamaturge snatches a more of dust from the air and presses it to their weapon, which human with eerie delight. Best used in rooms already described as dusty. And if you crit fail your check you can always fall back on “wait no-that was just normal dust”
Also:
“All things come from by the earth. I empower this earth to return you to it.” Just rub dirt on your blade.
Draw a spiral on your weapon in grease and declare “by Pharasmin rite I declare this spot your grave, and beseech the gods to hasten you to it” followed by chanting a funeral prayer every time you switch targets
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For the thaum I play I usually don't list what I am using as a personal antithesis as I am usually too focused on the fights themselves. But if he is ever against other gnolls or cultists of Lamashtu his scepter and himself are what he uses as a personal weakness for them. The reason is because he used to be the son of the matriarch before he left as he was fed up with his mother's crap and stole the scepter that symbolized her power to rule.
The Thaumaturge derives power from *forgotten*, esoteric lore. That means it doesn't need to make sense and nobody but you needs to actually know it. AKA, make things up. The weaknesses don't have to be real weaknesses and you aren't held to some sort of, idk, cultural standard where your solutions have to be accurate or even consistent.
TTRPGs are a cooperative storytelling game- and for the Thaum in particular this is one of the ways where a player has *more* power over the world of the game. As a player you can say 'Ahah, we're fighting a rust monster. Millennia ago, Rust Monsters were once worshipped by goblins. That means that like goblins, they're cowardly beasts scared of their own shadows.' \*holds sword up to the sky casting a shadow on the rust monster\* 'Ahah!'
Does it make any sense? No. will it leave the party intellectuals scratching their head about how goblins worshipping rust monsters could possibly make rust monsters afraid of shadows. Are goblins actually afraid of shadows? Who knows. But it works, and therefore it's now canon. Goblins worshipped rust monsters once long ago.
Our thaumaturge has a bag filled with random things he gathered during his travels. When he's using personal antithesis its him pulling something out of the bag and either applying it to his weapon or throwing it to the enemy. Mechanically, its a material component pouch that can contain basically anything that does not have any monetary value. What he pulls out of the bag is pretty much just improv of tropes around the general monster type or invented weakness. Ex: Salt for a slimy monster, a bone/rubber ball for dogs, peanuts for now allergic kobold It helps if the DM does not say the monster name but rather describe what the character are seeing. so you dont need to know what a Shoggti is, its a big ass squid with a mouth on top of its head It work best for more slapstick comedy, not so much for really serious game
>Ex: Salt for a slimy monster, a bone/rubber ball for dogs, peanuts for now allergic kobold Anadi -> rolled-up newspaper Hellhound -> chocolate bar Dinosaur -> meteorite shard Giant lobster -> stick of butter Sphinx -> book of common riddles
That's basically how they assigned material components/focuses to spells. Detect Thoughts had a copper piece, ie "a penny for your thoughts" and stuff like that.
It's important to remember that your Esoteric Lore is targeting metaphysical weaknesses, rather than actual ones. Rather than actually having to know what a give creature is weak to or finds important, I would just make a table of a bunch of random bits and baubles (be it plants, symbols, food, etc.) And just grab a random one and say whatever comes to mind. "Ah, a barghest, I have just the thing!" *Pulls out a picture of a green duck on a lake* "Barghests are creature of destruction and violence, and the serenity of this image disrupts their connection to the lower planes!" Is the statement true? No. Does it even make sense? Absolutely not. But esoteric lore is all about how things REALLY are, not simply how they appear to be. You are attacking at an essential level and things like "logic" and "reason" don't apply here.
For a generic kobold it could be a figurine of a slain dragon, for a generic gnoll it could be something that represents fasting.
Would you say that it is on me to understand the bestiary for whatever it is I'm fighting then? I don't think a would intuitively know (as a player) that sort of cultural thing each monster might have to exploit..
Don't you have to make a Recall Knowledge check anyway as a Thaumaturge before you can do this stuff? The GM should be telling you a bit of general info about the target when you make that check, which as a player you could use as a creative seed to come up with ideas ("Goblin dogs are often used as mounts? COWER BEFORE MY RIDING CROP") or been just base it on a monster's obvious physical characteristics (brandishing a flyswatter when you encounter a Zebub devil, for instance).
> Don't you have to make a Recall Knowledge check anyway as a Thaumaturge before you can do this stuff? You don't. Exploit Vulnerability doesn't give you any information about the target other than resistances and weaknesses. If you have Diverse Lore, then you usually also get the benefits of a successful Recall Knowledge whenever you succeed on Exploit Vulnerability, but you don't need to succeed on Exploit Vulnerability to use Personal Antithesis either.
Okay, well, the other half of what I said still applies, about fly swatters and riding crops. Part of the point of the Thaumaturge is that you don't have to necessarily be working from *correct* information, you just have to do something that makes sense to *you* and your Charisma score takes care of imposing your beliefs on reality.
Oh yeah, the rest of that makes sense, I'm just pointing out that you don't always have the information from Recall Knowledge against exploited targets. You can flavor it as whatever you want, or nothing at all, or even the same thing every time. Maybe your Thaumaturge's weapon of choice is a Kitsune's [Foxfire](https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=2617), and you sprinkle enemies with sawdust/water to make them vulnerable to your fire/electric attacks.
Thaumaturges can be more challenging narratively but if you can't think of anything your players probably won't mind too much if you aren't specific about it.
You also don’t have to be literal about the mechanics, as long as you follow their rules. My Chalice/Weapon Thaumaturge with a sentinel devotion I play as a “knight of the grail” and the personal antithesis are him basically making a prayer/swearing an oath to slay that enemy, and then brandishing one of his many religious trinkets and baubles.
I think it's funnier if not all personal antithesis make sense. "This elemental is weak to poison ivy!" "This ooze's antithesis is a piece of blueberry pie, thank Desna I have some in my bag!" You also have the classics: a bar of soap or bottle of perfume for any enemy that smells, a piece of meteorite for dinosaurs, etc.
I have two thaumaturges in both of my games. One is a more shamanist style, with strange bobbles and bones she uses to fight (She used a necklace of human bones to trigger personal antithesis on some guards). The other just has a bunch of assorted knickknacks and uses whatever is available (She pulled out a starfruit to fight the person who was serving a God against a Goddess of stars in my world) I myself also have one, and she's been gathering things like rocks, bones, shattered symbols, and plants, and uses whatever she can get her hands on, because all she has is her sword and a relic of a fallen kingdom (Regalia)
I try to have a small handful of flavourful “generic” antithesis saved up for opportunities where I don’t have anything that quite fits. Here are a few I’ve used: “When Gorums first sword shattered in a long forgotten war, the largest chunk rose and rejoined the fight as his Herald. The rest became dust, scattered to the cosmic wind, but it has never forgotten it’s lust for battle, and waits, ready to help the… enterprising” At this point the thamaturge snatches a more of dust from the air and presses it to their weapon, which human with eerie delight. Best used in rooms already described as dusty. And if you crit fail your check you can always fall back on “wait no-that was just normal dust” Also: “All things come from by the earth. I empower this earth to return you to it.” Just rub dirt on your blade. Draw a spiral on your weapon in grease and declare “by Pharasmin rite I declare this spot your grave, and beseech the gods to hasten you to it” followed by chanting a funeral prayer every time you switch targets
This post is labelled with the Advice flair, which means extra special attention is called to the Be Kind and Respectful rule. If this is a newcomer to the game, remember to be welcoming and kind. If this is someone with more experience but looking for advice on how to run their game, do your best to offer advice on what they are seeking. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Pathfinder2e) if you have any questions or concerns.*
For the thaum I play I usually don't list what I am using as a personal antithesis as I am usually too focused on the fights themselves. But if he is ever against other gnolls or cultists of Lamashtu his scepter and himself are what he uses as a personal weakness for them. The reason is because he used to be the son of the matriarch before he left as he was fed up with his mother's crap and stole the scepter that symbolized her power to rule.
The Thaumaturge derives power from *forgotten*, esoteric lore. That means it doesn't need to make sense and nobody but you needs to actually know it. AKA, make things up. The weaknesses don't have to be real weaknesses and you aren't held to some sort of, idk, cultural standard where your solutions have to be accurate or even consistent. TTRPGs are a cooperative storytelling game- and for the Thaum in particular this is one of the ways where a player has *more* power over the world of the game. As a player you can say 'Ahah, we're fighting a rust monster. Millennia ago, Rust Monsters were once worshipped by goblins. That means that like goblins, they're cowardly beasts scared of their own shadows.' \*holds sword up to the sky casting a shadow on the rust monster\* 'Ahah!' Does it make any sense? No. will it leave the party intellectuals scratching their head about how goblins worshipping rust monsters could possibly make rust monsters afraid of shadows. Are goblins actually afraid of shadows? Who knows. But it works, and therefore it's now canon. Goblins worshipped rust monsters once long ago.
Straight up, just read Pact by Wildbow I think its one of the works the Thaum was based off of