A while ago, Flying Pincushion released an addition to their Tides of War line covering volley fire teamwork feats. I had uses for it but really the language made the feats difficult to understand and in some ways the rules as written didn't quite work. But they have since released a revision so here is a retrospective for the new product.

Like the mounted combat feats before it, this Tides of War is very short, with about two pages of usable feats but the pictures reduce it to about one and a half.

The first feat, Group Fire, is simple. Declare that you are making the special attack (A full round action) and anyone close to you with the same feat can make a shot as an immediate action at the same target. This gives everyone a plus one to attack and damage for each attacker at the cost of the participant (aside from the initiator) being staggered the next round. Its easy enough to follow and worthwhile for a gang of enemies or even a single cohort since it nets you at least a +2. There's a bit of weirdness where technically with the wording you don't need an ally to get at least a +1 bonus but given that its one shot for a full round action its not that bad since anyone in their right mind will just make multiple attacks. In fact at least it's something to do with the feat when you don't have allies which is nice I guess.

The rest of the feats require Group Fire and interact with it. Some are obvious, like the clustered shot one, and some seem to be there to compensate for situations where you only have one participant for your group fire. This is nice to have if you're an Inquisitor, or at least I assume so. I question whether or not for the purposes of Solo Tactics the participating ally gets to make an attack, gets the bonus and so on. Given the wording the I assume that the Inquisitor would be the 'source' of the ability and thus starts granting actions but not bonuses. I'm not sure how this works when she would have an ability that calls out granting a bonus to someone or even the clustered shot one. I'm guessing this is why Volley Fire and other teamwork feats function by things happening to you or you doing something than granting actions to allies. Bottom line is that I'm not sure if this is overtly useful for an Inquisitor.

For everyone else this is fine. With enough participants you can increase the threat range of weaker enemies, cluster your shots, get other ranged abilities a chance to participate, and hamper flying creatures among other things.

Everything is clear and easy to understand, which is a huge improvement from the product's previous iteration, but I do think that the inherent nature of how group fire works mucks up any ability that assumes that Teamwork feats don't grant actions or directly affects allies. Being initiated by an action as opposed to the feat enhancing an action does this as well. Case point is how Volley Fire works. As far as I can tell, only Solo Tactics gets confusing with it as it only calls out that participants don't receive bonuses but I don't think the rules intend for it to be able to grant immediate actions. Other than that I would take a hard look at any class feature that interacts with teamwork feats just to make sure.

I want to give this 5 out of 5 stars because the feats do grant new things to do and get creative with teamwork feats while being easy enough to implement, but the very premise is on shaky ground because I'm going to have to check for how it interacts with things. Perhaps Solo Tactics is the only outlier and I just have to rank all of this as mostly useless to it, but with the Inquisitor being one of the main classes that actually uses teamwork feats I'd like to not be confused as to how these feats interact with it. I also can't shake the feeling that this is inherent to teamwork feats not granting allies actions or new things to do specifically because of stuff like this. If we ignore those issues then these work fine whether you're dealing with a cohort or have a group of kobolds that you want to be a bit more dangerous. In the end I'll give this a 'high' 4 out of 5 stars. There's a glaring issue but I don't think you'll encounter the issue in most circumstances that you'll use these feats.

An Endzeitgeist.com review of the revised version

The revised version of Flying Pincushion Games' Tides of War-book clocks in at 6 pages, 1 page front cover, 1 page editorial, 1 page SRD, leaving us with 3 pages of content, so let's take a look!

This pdf begins with a brief introduction to the subject matter, before presenting several feats. These are based on Group Fire, a combat/teamwork feat that, as a full-round action, allows you to make a single ranged attack while calling to allies within 15 feet that have this feat. The allies may spend an immediate action to also fire on the target you are attacking, with each participant granting +1 to atk and damage, including the initiator. However, allies that perform this attack are staggered on their next turn. Okay, this is a HUGE step up from the first iteration of the pdf, let's see whether the feats that build on this are now similarly solid!

-Arcing Fire: Reduce cover-bonus to AC by half when firing in an arc; requires suficient space, obviously. Solid.

-Call the Firing Line: When you call for a group fire, all participants get your Cha-mod as a morale bonus to attack, but you can do this only a number of times per day equal to your ranks in Profession (soldier). NICE restriction-element here for the powerful bonus!

-Clustering Volley: Add total damage of group shots together before applying DR. Solid.

-Dodge this!: Each participant targets a 5-foot-squares instead, with scaling Ref-saves to negate the attack. Now this one is genius for hitting high AC targets, but damage is calculated only via base damage die. Nice and in line with similar damaging mechanisms.

-Dynamic Duo: When only using Group Fire with two members, both get a free Intimidate-check using the higher result +5. Actually useful for small units, like adventuring groups - kudos!

-Flying Pincushion: Penalize flying creatures with scaling benefits.

-Gauging Shot: Forego any benefits, but grant +2 to atk and damage rolls for your participating fellows.

-Improved Group Fire: Call out for Group Fire as part of a full attack.

-Greater Group Fire: Allies that participate can use their lowest BAB-attack when using Group Fire - if they do, they are not staggered, but may not be part of a Group Fire attack on their next turn.

-Throw Everything: Use group fire with bombs, kinetic blasts, bloodline/domain power-based attacks, etc. and even held spells. This can thankfully not be combined with Clustering Volley.

Conclusion: Editing and formatting are top-notch, I noticed no significant glitches. Layout adheres to Flying Pincushion Games' two-column full-color standard and the pdf needs no bookmarks at this length.

Frank Gori, with help from David S. McCrae and Jeff Harris has thoroughly revised the original, subpar iteration and created a thing of beauty here - for a low price, you can make creatures (and PCs!) actually fear the power of volleys...and the pdf also expands the usefulness of the feats for purposes of the adventuring groups. With completely cleaned up material, this is pretty much the antithesis to the previous offering: Creative, powerful and sensible, this covers its niche perfectly. 5 stars + seal of approval.

Endzeitgeist out.

Note: I was given a free copy of the product and I am a 3PP. I look at other things (such as OGL, and PI designations) and also calculate that into my review. I'm a little harsh in words, but they ain't fightin words.

Tides of War: Volley Fire Teamwork Archery Feats shoots a little left for me as a player. It includes 6 simple feats that build upon Volley Fire or Group Fire. Only one of these is included in this book, that would be Group Fire.

Rant: It’s fine to mention Volley Fire as a prerequisite, but if it's not in your product, I have no idea where it is. It's sure not listed in the OGL section of the book. Which is missing "Tides of War: Volley Fire Teamwork Feats" from it and Ranged Tactics Toolkit (which by the way is where Volley Fire Feat comes from). So in order to use this book you have to locate where Volley Fire comes from.

Unless this book is referring to its own special rules they call Volley Fire...which is found at the very last page of the feat section in a little grey box. This arrangement should be placed in the beginning, and it should indicate that it is using these rules. Or players, such as myself might think it’s the Volley Fire teamwork feat.

Again, if it is not the feat of the same name, and it uses these special rules, the feats that have the prerequisite that list Volley Fire, should be "Volley fire rules", or some such.

PS. on the OGL "Into the Breach: Cavalier" has its authors double listed... Are these feats from ItB: Cavalier - if there was a note about that it is, it should state that it was a part of it? I might pick it up. Again I digress. /end rant.

So what is Volley Fire rules? Volley Fire Rules require that all characters using a teamwork feat that requires volley fire RULES, “must be within 5 ft. of another ally also using or being granted the use of the same teamwork feat.” I still think you need the Volley Fire Feat. I think.

Basically be within 5 feet of your buddy.

Let’s start with the heart of Volley Fire Feats. It’s Group Fire. By calling commands as a free action to your buddies, you all decided to shoot on the same initiative. This is a full-round action to use the feat. But you net yourself a +1 to damage and +1 for every 3 archers after the second. I think you get a +2 at 5 archers…

Group Fire is a full-round action, not “part of a full round action”. If you have other attacks, toss them out the door, because you can only get 1 shot. But I guess it adds a little balance if your buddies hope in on the shot.

Improved Group Fire: This isn’t where the fix is, but the next logical step up. It address those with multiple ranged attacks. You can the benefit of Group Fire when using a full attack action, even though you are not using group shot (which you shouldn’t). This is a nice step up. Good thought when writing this one, and even identifying that Group Fire only nets you the 1 shot. Clears up any GM/Player feat stacking arguments. Well done.

Since it’s on the same page let us talk about Pincushion. The wording is short and I hate it. “Causes flyers to make….” Flyers. Clearly this means creatures that are flying. Can flyers refer to flying vehicles? Your guess is as good as mine. The phrase; “Flyers just take damage unless….” The language of this feat erks my inflated sense of self of my own knowledge of literature. I think it’s just simple and lazy. Again, I think I know more then I actually do, so take it for what it is.

The feat causes the “flyer” to suffer a cumulative penalty of a -1 to its Fly (skill) check, that it must make once it is it successfully. To what DC I am unsure of, I assume the creatures fly speed check? If the creature fails this check it falls. How far the “flyer” fall? How long does it fall? Does it get a chance to recover? Are the penalties cumulative for the round, combat, life time? As you notice, there is some ambiguous questions that arise from this feet. I’m going to state that this feat falls flat. Love the idea, but the execution needs a review board.

Let us jump to the Arcing Fire feat. This feat is suppose too reduce the target’s AC and Reflex bonus received from cover by half. Again the verbiage of this feat bothers me and feels like there should be a period placed somewhere. Minus the language, it’s a fine feat.

Call the Firing Line: You use a standard action to call commands and grant half your CHA mod to their attack roll.

“The number of attacks that can be modified in this manner are limited to your Profession (soldier) skill modifier…” What? My total skill bonus right? My ability score modifier+ skill ranks + what have you? Not sure how I feel on this one. I’ll let the language slide on this one. I get what the designers are doing. We’ll tag this as okay.

Clustering Volley: Here it mentions the Volley Fire Feat…. See beginning of review…. I cringe when I read this feat. “…..Total the damage in the round before applying damage reduction……” from all shots in the round or just on this initiative? So person A B C and D all shoot. But if E and F decided to shoot later in the turn, does that count towards this feat? I think the language again is the problem. I know what the feat does, because it states, those benefiting from this feat all act on the same initiative (see Special Note of the feat). Feat is okay.

Dodge This: is a little confusing. I like idea behind the feat, but I’m not sure I care for execution. I can’t attempt to go into this. “Special Note: Action is performed on the caller’s initiative.” What caller?

Gauging Shot: Person A fires the first shot. If they hit, everyone else who shoots gets a bonus. This is a fine and simple feat. I like the flavor text in this one.

Conclusion: Two column layout that spaces after each paragraph. I hate this layout. Creative Commons classic public domain stock art fits the bill of this PDF, and I like it. Pretty green page art.

I want to like this PDF, I really do. It’s just average. It is a 2.5 round to a 3. The price is good at just under a dolla. I get the initial ideas behind it, but I think mechanic language got to me. The publisher in me calls for an overhaul of this PDF. But I am look at the weird things like the OGL and credits page, etc.

My thoughts are my own and may be overlooked by those that are not me, but the PDF does have movements of “Cool idea”, but need to be polished. A good GM can make out the wording and can clean up the questionable questions, and this would be a fine group of feats for NPCs on the field of battle. Give it to a bandit group.

Not really useful to PCs, unless you have at least 2 PCs who are focused on ranged attacks.