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2) Completely divorce yourself from OGL compatibility so you can clean up some of the broken and sometimes nonsensical rules.
Just one point here.
OGL doesn't refer to any particular ruleset. If you mean the d20 3.5 SRD (or "D&D 3.5e" if you prefer) please say that ("OGL 3.5" as used by Paizo, while not entirely accurate, at least is more obvious which ruleset it means, so that's okay too - plus it's as much as they can really do without breaking trademark laws.)
Games with no connection to d20 have also been released under the OGL, so by reading this I'd possibly assume you mean you don't want the game released under the Open Game License ;)
Certain other companies within the industry are to blame here for shoving "OGL" on their rulebook covers in an attempt to label them as compatible with the d20 SRD, thus subverting the name from it's intended use.
And sorry, this is just a particular nitpick of mine, I don't like to see "OGL" keeps getting subverted to mean just d20 games.
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@ memorax - You need not worry about PAIZO. Its a quality company with quality decisions. THIS is what made them successful.
I never said otherwise about Paizo implementing quality decisions. Or that its a quality company. They are still a business and not a non-profit rpg company last time I checked. To think otherwise is to be delibretly naive in the extreme. Notice i did not say greedy I said they want to have a profitable company. Its not like James or anyone else at the company are losing sleep because they produce both a quality and proiftable product.
The rest... well... the rest is just fear. Fear is what drives poor decisions made by other companies (wotc) who trash the game in favor of money. I guess all I'm trying to say is that PAIZO is growing a diversified portfolio. Soon Pathfinder Online will be raking in the micro-purchase money.
Really fear is what you think motivates Wotc and other companies to implement change. Fear. LOL. Conpsiracy theory much. They dont do it because of fear. They like Paizo do it because they want to sell a profitable product. How exactly do you think Paizo pays bills, and slaries. With goodwill. Sorry but goodwill last time I checked is not a valid currency at most banks. Now do I agree they may have gone too far with the changes in 4E. To a certain extent yes. Yet they may have to if eventuially the current version stps being profitable.
My suggestion is to quit assuming the same FEAR that drives other companies has to be the fear that drives PAIZO.
If you can link to some sort of memo where other rpg companies make major changes motivated by fear to their rpgs please post it. Otherwise its just so much tin foil hat conspiracy theory.
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I don't think people are seriously arguing that Paizo should never change the system even in the presence of falling sales. Most are just worried that about Paizo potentially jumping the gun and alienating existing/potential customers. Just read these threads. People arguing for change are all over the map on what they hate or don't hate, or what the major problems of the system are. Any radical change to address one criticism is likely to tick off someone else. Pathfinder owes a bit of its current popularity after all from 4E refugees who weren't happy with the changes or the need to go ahead and rebuy all new books. DnD Next might force rule vamps sooner than I might want, if it is successful. But lets keep supporting the existing system while the game is doing well.
Good points all around. I would like to see more optional source material along the lines of unearthed arcana or something similar. Would I like a new edition. Possibly and not anytime soon. It may have to happen though if the current one stops being profitable. At the same time Im not sure they can make any major fixes short of a new edition or optional rules in sourcebooks. Im trying to be objective about the matter. I may nto always succeed.
Paizo's stated business model also relies on adventure paths, not the rule system. Under that model, they should continue to do well until they run out of AP's or until most of the most interesting AP ideas are taken.
I thin that eventually the sales on APs may reach a saturation point. How many APs does one truly need. After awhile one imo does become less reliant on APS. That being said though from the looks of it and imo they are doing well. Myself nto a fan of them though.
stuff
While those may be awesome mechanics (don't know, haven't playtested DnD next), it strikes me that Pathfinder whole sale copying another game to that extent might be a bad idea. Let Pathfinder and DnD Next due there own thing...I suspect the market is large enough for both games to exist.
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Not a fan of all of it, but there's some good stuff. I expect you'll get reamed for actually daring to suggest real solutions instead of a bandaid, though. People here don't really want anything more than minor tweaks, for the most part. And they tend to try to shout down anyone who suggests that something more radical might actually be an improvement.
And you dared to suggest that the Holy OGL might not be the one and only answer to all RPG prayers. Yeah, I suggest an asbestos suit.
But yeah, also what Matt said. OGL and d20 are not the same thing. Although your mistake is less annoying to me than people who seem to think that the OGL us some sort of seal of quality...that without the OGL, good mechanics cannot exist,NAND that anything bearing the OGL us automatically several degrees of quality above anything without it.
The irony is just oozing from this.Thanks for pointing that out. My head hurts now.
...oh god, that just happened...
stuffNot a fan of all of it, but there's some good stuff. I expect you'll get reamed for actually daring to suggest real solutions instead of a bandaid, though. People here don't really want anything more than minor tweaks, for the most part. And they tend to try to shout down anyone who suggests that something more radical might actually be an improvement.
I do think that it's easy to think that a radical change means incompatibility - on both sides of that argument. Thinking about it more, I think it's possible to have both.
For those who would like to see that level of change - it's feasible to rewrite how pretty much every rule works, while retaining stat-level compatibility. As long as combat depends on ACs, HPs, etc, then you can pretty much rewrite the entire combat and skill systems while ensuring the same stat blocks can plug into it - and that allows far more than minor tweaks. You could, for example, switch to brand new mechanics using d100s while not needing to change stat blocks at all.
For those who don't want to see that level of change - exactly the same thing. Change doesn't mean incompatibility: As long as stat blocks are left intact and the numbers mean the same thing, then the mechanics behind it don't matter. It may end up meaning you have to run combat or magic a different way, but if those of us who tend to balk at the idea of "2nd Edition" are mostly concerned with still being able to use our APs, Bestiaries, and such unchanged then mechanical changes really don't have to affect us if they're done responsibly.
If done the way I'm talking about here, it would mean ending up with a brand new corebook that could look nothing at all like the existing system other than it shares stat names and values, while the resolution mechanics could be completely rewritten if and where necessary. It'd also mean that corebook could directly replace the existing one in the product range, rather than triggering a whole new "2nd Edition" line of products.
I'm sure there'd be a few knock-on casualties (the beginner set, for example, and some add-on rules from other books that were more dependent on the core mechanics working the way they do right now), but the main thing for me is not having to start buying a brand new product line from scratch. A brand new corebook, on the other hand, that can simply "plug in" to the rest of my collection is not really that big a deal for me.
Those of us with a programming or engineering background would see it as a "black box" principle - the Corebook has inputs and outputs involving the use of various attributes (AC, HPs, Str, Dex, Int, and so forth) but it's possible to rewire the insides of that box completely without affecting how those inputs and outputs work.
So, looking at it from that perspective - I'm not against radical change per se, I'm more against automatically throwing away everything and writing a new system from scratch when it might be possible to find a way to have our cake and eat it too (Assuming we've been told the truth about said cake, of course!)
The irony is just oozing from this.stuffWhile those may be awesome mechanics (don't know, haven't playtested DnD next), it strikes me that Pathfinder whole sale copying another game to that extent might be a bad idea.
What I mean by that is Pathfinder came out as a result of 3.5 not being supported. 4E was a very different game. There really wasn't another major 3.5 version (that was actively supported) in competition with Pathfinder when it showed up (I know there were some other games created using the SRD, but they either emulated 1E, were created for different types of settings, or lacked the product support and placement of Pathfinder).
If in some hypothetical situation where a Pathfinder 2.0 emulated a lot of DnD Next features, you would have two very similar types of games that would be trying to grab the exact same type of players. That would probably hurt both games. I am sure that the developers are smart enough not to do that.
...oh god, that just happened...The irony is just oozing from this.Thanks for pointing that out. My head hurts now.
Yeah..a poor phrasing...I should be executed for mis-speaking on a public messageboard, because we all know that makes me a horrible person.
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Yeah..a poor phrasing...I should be executed for mis-speaking on a public messageboard, because we all know that makes me a horrible person....oh god, that just happened...The irony is just oozing from this.Thanks for pointing that out. My head hurts now.
Oh, we knew you were a horrible person before that...
Yeah..a poor phrasing...I should be executed for mis-speaking on a public messageboard, because we all know that makes me a horrible person....oh god, that just happened...The irony is just oozing from this.Thanks for pointing that out. My head hurts now.
Dont be so melodramatic. I think cutting off your fingers would be a sufficient penalty.
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I thin that eventually the sales on APs may reach a saturation point. How many APs does one truly need. After awhile one imo does become less reliant on APS. That being said though from the looks of it and imo they are doing well. Myself nto a fan of them though.
Yeah, I think this is a case of extrapolating your own preferences to the market (almost impossible to avoid, in my experience - I struggle to understand how anyone can want yet another rulebook :p).
.I dont know how finely calibrated the list is (or whether it captures every avenue of sale), but each month when Paizo lists the 'top selling Paizo products for the month' the AP ranks higher than the rulebook (when a rulebook is released concurrently). Granted the rulebooks probably have a longer 'tail' but then again there are four times the number of AP volumes released as rulebooks. No doubt the CRB has outsold any specific AP volume many times over, but I suspect the "AP-Profit" is greater than the "rulebook-profit" based on bestselling numbers plus a presumption of lower margins for the hardovers.
The rather flimsy evidence appears to suggest (to me at least) that APs are still the key to Paizo's success.
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I actually see the APs having a longer productivity than rule books...There are tons of themes/plotlines/nations/enemies to mine for AP's.
It strikes me that rulebooks don't have quite that variety...eventually you run into a wall where either you are forced to exploit more niche concepts (which one could argue is already happening to some degree with Mythic) or you run out of new ideas and start retreading past books (which some could also claim is happening with the Advanced Class Guide...which seems in some way to cover similar ground to the advanced players guide, at least on info we have so far)
I suspect a lot of people buy APs with little expectation of running through the whole volume, either because there groups have short attention spans, or they primarily buy them for the flavor, monsters, or to mine encounters from. Also not every AP appeals to every group...some of the present volumes will probably never be played by certain groups, so new entries will attract other buyers.
Dont forget maps.
I would kind of like XP to equal CR. A CR 1 critter would be worth 1 XP, and you would only need 15 XP to get to level 2, as opposed to 1000 XP or whatever.
And you could spend XP for other things besides going up in level, like Hero Points or something similar.
I would kind of like XP to equal CR. A CR 1 critter would be worth 1 XP, and you would only need 15 XP to get to level 2, as opposed to 1000 XP or whatever.
And you could spend XP for other things besides going up in level, like Hero Points or something similar.
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Neat! Glad I'm psychic....now I need to go play the lottery!
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I think both rulebooks and APS eventually reach a point where one has too many. I just find rulebooks more useful. Not that APs are bad products. I just find the npc to be very subpar. When I have top rewrite almost every noc in a AP to be a challenge for the average adventuring group imo it defeats the purpose of buying them in the first place. When I'm spending more time redesigning encounters as well. I might as well just do my own from scratch. Still it just a personal preference on my part. Their maps as well are also useful.
14) Let fighting characters purchase feats with time and xp and gold. Just like casters do with magic and crafting magic items.
We playtested this once in 3.5, creating "trainings" using the magic item design rules. These trainings were a slotless "magical item", that could be given to someone by a character who had a new feat called Teacher.
The only downside was that the GP cost was a bit ridiculous when you're trying to imagine what's happening in the game world. However mechanically it seemed to work quite well and was a lot of fun.
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14) Let fighting characters purchase feats with time and xp and gold. Just like casters do with magic and crafting magic items.We playtested this once in 3.5, creating "trainings" using the magic item design rules. These trainings were a slotless "magical item", that could be given to someone by a character who had a new feat called Teacher.
D&D 4e did this with DMG2 Grandmaster training; basically alternatives to buying magic items, especially useful for campaigns where inherent bonuses are used, e.g. Dark Sun.
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I thin that eventually the sales on APs may reach a saturation point. How many APs does one truly need. After awhile one imo does become less reliant on APS. That being said though from the looks of it and imo they are doing well. Myself nto a fan of them though.Yeah, I think this is a case of extrapolating your own preferences to the market (almost impossible to avoid, in my experience - I struggle to understand how anyone can want yet another rulebook :p).
Heh, yep I have similar thoughts, except I'm happy with more APs, Rulebooks, Splatbooks, and anything else that adds to the whole.
The thing I struggle with is "why would anyone actually want $1000+ of books to be put aside and start over from scratch with a whole new version?" Once you invalidate everything that's been published, the only feeling I have is one that I've wasted far too much money on the previous version because you're now asking me to start collecting the very same material over again, with new stat blocks to fit a new set of rules.
Now, I like the way Call of Cthulhu does it. I've got at least four different editions of the rulebook and I can run pretty much any of the adventures from any edition with any rulebook. There's some republishing of out-of-print material with updates, but mostly its a case of every new release adding a new book to my CoC shelf. At no point have I ever really had to say "that's it for the old edition, time to start a new collection."
Now, D&D is pretty much the opposite. I've got four different versions in the house, three of which have their own edition of the Forgotten Realms setting, because each one threw away the previous one. Three of those collections (2e, some of 3/3.5, and 4e) have been relegated to storage because I simply don't have the room to keep them on the shelves any more - and quite frankly, if I've switched to a newer version, they're just taking up space. Their only value to me now is as collectors items, not as active gaming material - and that annoys me. If I'd only had to put aside the three core books for each edition, and constantly added to my collection of setting books instead of replacing, I'd have been a lot happier. I do keep the BECMI books around simply because of my love of the Mystara setting, I just can't face shoving them all into a big box and forgetting about them.
Now, I said some of my 3/3.5 collection went into storage. The reason not all of it did is because it's pretty much directly usable with Pathfinder, so all of the setting books are still on the shelves (along with a few others like the Magic Item Compendium) I can play 3.5 Forgotten Realms with the Pathfinder rules quite happily. That's why I view every Pathfinder book as a long-term investment rather than a short-term one that'll be shoved into storage in a few years.
So, Pathfinder 2nd Edition, 2.0, Revised Edition, or whatever - as long as my APs and Campaign Setting books work with it (and as I explained a few posts back, I think that can happen even with major rules changes if they're handled well), then I'm happy. If it means drawing a line under my entire Pathfinder collection and starting again, I'm not. The core and GM book, and probably even the "Ultimate" series, I can handle switching somewhere down the line. Maybe even the Player Companions.
I think that actually puts me in the middle of the argument, rather than at one specific end... typical, everyone is going to disagree with me :D
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The thing I struggle with is "why would anyone actually want $1000+ of books to be put aside and start over from scratch with a whole new version?" Once you invalidate everything that's been published, the only feeling I have is one that I've wasted far too much money on the previous version because you're now asking me to start collecting the very same material over again, with new stat blocks to fit a new set of rules.
As something of a completionist, one of the things I like about a game "finishing" is that I know I can have a complete set without stressing about keeping up with press releases. We didnt start playing 3.5 until 4E was just about to come out - part of what attracted me to jumping in at that point was that I knew exactly what I needed to get and wasnt worried about missing some obscure, poorly publicised release or having to keep up with another game system's new releases.
Granted that's not going to be a common perspective, but it is a reason. :p
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As something of a completionist, one of the things I like about a game "finishing" is that I know I can have a complete set without stressing about keeping up with press releases. We didnt start playing 3.5 until 4E was just about to come out - part of what attracted me to jumping in at that point was that I knew exactly what I needed to get and wasnt worried about missing some obscure, poorly publicised release or having to keep up with another game system's new releases.Granted that's not going to be a common perspective, but it is a reason. :p
Yep - and it's certainly a new perspective for me to think about - which proves we probably don't know everyone's reasons for wanting what they want. I'd love to hear more whys and less whats, to be honest. Understanding someone's point of view makes it a lot easier to accept it, and to come up with ideas that could make more people happy. Sometimes better ideas for solutions can formed from looking at all the "whys".
I guess that comes down to something else I want for Pathfinder, be it the current or a successor version:
I want it to be popular, and I want it to stick around a good few years.
The current version does seem to be hitting both of those targets right now.
I'm not really too worried about the future of Pathfinder. I really can't see Paizo releasing a new edition without running it past their customers first, most likely over at least a 12-month period, and I'm happy with whatever is going to sell best for them. If it doesn't suit me, I don't have to buy it. If it doesn't sell, there's no point having it meet my requirements as it isn't going to stick around long enough to be properly supported. As long as the APs are continuing to sell well, I doubt there's any real chance of an update that will invalidate them, especially as it'd just leave Paizo with a stock of incompatible APs to get rid of.
What I'm more concerned with to be honest is continuing to see more and more of Golarion fleshed out.
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Yep - and it's certainly a new perspective for me to think about - which proves we probably don't know everyone's reasons for wanting what they want. I'd love to hear more whys and less whats, to be honest. Understanding someone's point of view makes it a lot easier to accept it, and to come up with ideas that could make more people happy. Sometimes better ideas for solutions can formed from looking at all the "whys.
Why? Because I love new systems. I like breaking them down and comparing them to older systems, and I love to see the way games grow. It is interesting to see what new mechanics the developers came up with that they thought were important enough to include in the core. I also find it interesting to see what things were chosen to be dropped, and what things were cannibalized from existing/past systems.
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Heh, yep I have similar thoughts, except I'm happy with more APs, Rulebooks, Splatbooks, and anything else that adds to the whole.The thing I struggle with is "why would anyone actually want $1000+ of books to be put aside and start over from scratch with a whole new version?" Once you invalidate everything that's been published, the only feeling I have is one that I've wasted far too much money on the previous version because you're now asking me to start collecting the very same material over again, with new stat blocks to fit a new set of rules.
Now, I like the way Call of Cthulhu does it. I've got at least four different editions of the rulebook and I can run pretty much any of the adventures from any edition with any rulebook. There's some republishing of out-of-print material with updates, but mostly its a case of every new release adding a new book to my CoC shelf. At no point have I ever really had to say "that's it for the old edition, time to start a new collection."
Now, D&D is pretty much the opposite. I've got four different versions in the house, three of which have their own edition of the Forgotten Realms setting, because each one threw away the previous one. Three of those collections (2e, some of 3/3.5, and 4e) have been relegated to storage because I simply don't have the room to keep them on the shelves any more - and quite frankly, if I've switched to a newer version, they're just taking up space. Their only value to me now is as...
I would like to see a PF 2.0. that does not invalidate older material. All im saying is that to see some actually changes to the system they may have to possibly invalidate the older material. I rather not spend 100-120$ on another rehash with new cover art. YMMV. As for COC the latest edition is actually something of a departure from previous editions. So the 7E may not be completeyl compitable with older editions.
I get the argument about too many editions which is why Im not getting 5E D&D. Everything I have read and heard doesbn ot interest me. As well as edition fatigue. Im not saying a new edition has to happen. All Im saying that its something we as fans may see something that is not backwards comipitable in the future. Which may put Paizo in a classic catch-22 situation.
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Once again, from what I'm seeing we'd much rather have Pathfinder 1.5 than a Pathfinder 2.0.
I for one would love to have some new rule books where the relevant information is together more often and a few things like bad feat trees and crafting fixed, but that's about it. 3rd party products kind of solved most of my Pathfinder problems.
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Very much agreed and seconded. I would like to see a Varisa sourcebook. As well as some of the older 3.5 material on areas of the world updated as well.
And that there lies the biggest problem with "Pathfinder 2.0."
If a new edition of the rules came out Paizo would be in the position to either start rehashing the popular material from the old edition or continue to push on introducing new stuff.
Either solution isn't good because it means you abandon crowds edition war crowds. I for one would not adopt a new edition because I feel I'm too invested in the current edition of the inner sea and have no interest in purchasing all this material again.
I did it with Forgotten Realms and had my heart broken with 4e and the Spell Plague.
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Yep - and it's certainly a new perspective for me to think about - which proves we probably don't know everyone's reasons for wanting what they want. I'd love to hear more whys and less whats, to be honest. Understanding someone's point of view makes it a lot easier to accept it, and to come up with ideas that could make more people happy. Sometimes better ideas for solutions can formed from looking at all the "whys".
Well there's a lot of whys for me. Most of them are fairly obvious, like enjoying new systems, finding the new editions genuinely better, etc. So I'll touch on one of the emotional reasons for me that's less obvious.
After a while with an edition, it's easy to stop seeing the game world and just see a collection of rules. People seem to worry more about optimized builds or which classes are balanced or what feats are the must-haves.
When a new edition comes out, everything is exciting and new with people trying out random different crazy things just to see what you can do.
It's not really the main reason, but it's the quirkiest one so I thought I'd share it.
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I'd like a core rulebook that isn't quite so enormous. I'm more than happy to have magic items, NPCs, Gamesmastering etc. in a separate GM's guide, because then you don't have to cart around a 500-page hardback in one bulk.
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The version 2.0 I talk of is, as you have eluded, at least a decade down the line. It is then that the game should move forward, putting behind the days of Vancian casting and OGL. Not that PF would exclude the 3PP, but for the game to go on, ties have to be cut.[Emphasis mine]
Quite apart from the ol' Vancian casting guff debate, what point are you making about 3PP's and the ties needing to be cut? This came out of left field and is a real head scratcher for me.
This is referring to the sacred cows that D20 has like Vancian Casting. The 3PP support is because of the OGL and PF would need some sort of continuance of that ideal when the time comes for a break from D20.
The thing that 3rd edition does well, as the design was blocked in from the very beginning, is put several mechanics together and have them work with one another despite those differences. That one is far superior than the other in every way, the old dusty one still hobbles on.
The Warlock should have been broken like most of the stuff in Nine Swords. It wasn't. The class was focused on one particular and worked with the abilities to modify it.
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So if I am gathering correctly, we want to see some system that maintains backwards compatibility, and gets away from the spell slot system?No! The vast majority of PF players like or are Ok with "Spell slot" and would hate the massive edition changes that would come with such a major change. Mind you, pretty much all of us are open to a ‘warlock" type class as a option.
"We" do not want any major changes.
"Spell slot" vs. "Spell known"
To be sure, the spellbook is the thing that I want to keep. What I have a problem with is that the poor Wizard uses slots to try and predict the future as he tries to figure if he wants to cast something twice (using two slots) or have a variety of spells that are one shots. It may have been great once upon a time, when there was the first spells in 1st edition and not much choice, but now... Now, I have seen two Wizards in play, one spends all his cash on scrolls and wands, using scrolls first before his actual spells.
Confusion sets in when he keeps figuring the spell's effects at his caster level instead of the minimum level of the spell to be cast. He also keeps four pages of reference of just what he has available to him, using the squares to mark off used scrolls, charges and spells.
It is a lot of work for something that had, way back in 3.0, a simple fix. "Spell Known."
If instead you know your prepared spells, you choose what to cast at the time of casting, not when in your tower. I don't know why the Sorcerer was created for this, why the spells come a level later, why they had a different scale of castings per day vs. "Spell known" when the mechanic could have been used for every caster from the start, using spell slots as your daily uses, and what spells you know.
That is the change I want. That is the change that should have happened back then.
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And...how does altering old mechanics relate to 3PP? Or the OGL?The version 2.0 I talk of is, as you have eluded, at least a decade down the line. It is then that the game should move forward, putting behind the days of Vancian casting and OGL. Not that PF would exclude the 3PP, but for the game to go on, ties have to be cut.[Emphasis mine]
Quite apart from the ol' Vancian casting guff debate, what point are you making about 3PP's and the ties needing to be cut? This came out of left field and is a real head scratcher for me.This is referring to the sacred cows that D20 has like Vancian Casting. The 3PP support is because of the OGL and PF would need some sort of continuance of that ideal when the time comes for a break from D20.
The thing that 3rd edition does well, as the design was blocked in from the very beginning, is put several mechanics together and have them work with one another despite those differences. That one is far superior than the other in every way, the old dusty one still hobbles on.
The Warlock should have been broken like most of the stuff in Nine Swords. It wasn't. The class was focused on one particular and worked with the abilities to modify it.
If they are no longer using the OGL to go into the next iteration, it wouldn't be able to be used to produce 3PP for the PF ver2. Paizo would need to have their own permissions for the the 3PP put out, their own OGL, to continue the support from 3PP. That is what I was pointing out in that blurb. I have no doubt that it would be done.
Modernizing the ruleset means breaking away from D20, to introduce a cleaner, more intuitive structure in such a way that is easier for the new player to understand while keeping the veteran player satisfied. It can be done, I believe Paizo can do it. They can succeed where others have failed.
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I don't know why the Sorcerer was created for this, why the spells come a level later, why they had a different scale of castings per day vs. "Spell known" when the mechanic could have been used for every caster from the start,Presumably, because the designers thought it would be nice to have more than one class in the game. Not every class needs to use the exact same mechanics (if they did, there wouldn't be much point to basing any sort of mechanics on classes).
This is one mechanic that should be built on, not just slapped on at the last minute. I think a lot of other things could have been built around the Spells Known instead of just adjusting it to "balance" with the rest.
Much like the various point pools that are used in the newer classes in PF (based in part by the Monk and the Ki pool)
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a word about the HUGE core book...
I believe that a restructured, modernized rule set would make more use of less classes. Not having to have two different spell classes for each niche to include both mechanics for each one would save a lot of room.
Having weapons be base on Medium creatures and not have secondary stats for small creatures would save some headaches as well as be less page intensive. The 3.5 Small Weapons change should be redacted.
Just include the basic spells. I like the idea of a book of spells, but I might be inclined to have them be more specialized, as Companion products for each class.
Leave the Skill enhancements out of the feat trees, pair down the skills and have the enhancement be class abilities instead.
... Overall, a good revision and combining sections that seem spread out here and there along with the cleanup of rules and modernizing of the overall structure should lessen the page count significantly.
a word about the HUGE core book...
I believe that a restructured, modernized rule set would make more use of less classes. Not having to have two different spell classes for each niche to include both mechanics for each one would save a lot of room.
That's one of the things I actually liked in 4e, reducing the core game down to the minimum of base classes. All you really need is "Person that hits things", "Person that zaps things", "Sneaky Git", and "Person that heals things". "Person that shoots things" could probably be in there too. I often feel I'm carrying around a core rulebook that I'm only really using 10% of (yeah, I still want the other 90% but I don't necessarily need it right *now* :) )
I kinda wonder if we'll ever reach the point where Paizo find an acceptable print-on-demand system, and we're able to order our own custom core rulebooks containing the main rules, plus whichever classes and option/spell books we check off from the list of PDFs we've bought :)
Doing a little bit of thread necromancy here, because I just came up with these ideas
i think what would be nice in the next ruleset would be some reduced redundancy.
For example we have a bunch of different spellcasting classes and each has their casting explained separately although they often are almost identical, other than spell list and casting ability (WIS, INT, CHA)
Instead of all that extra text you could just call Wizards, Sorcerers, Clerics etc primary casters
Bards, Maguses, Inquisitors secondary casters
and Rangers, Paladins tertiary/minor casters,
Also give each a designation as to the ability score used for casting and wether they are prepared or spontaneous casters and if they prepare, wether they have spell books (witch familiars being under the spellbook category) or know all spells
Then you would just need to make a single spells known table for primary, secondary and tertiary spontaneous casters each and a single spells per day table for primary, secondary and tertiary, spontaneous and prepared casters each.
A single section on how casting attributes work and on how spell books gain spells.
Instead of retreading the stuff each time with every class you would just have one or two pages that lay it down once. That would both save paper and the time of any player or GM with enough system mastery to know how the various spellcasting mechanics work, as they dont have to tread through a long text only to find out which rules that they already know specifically are used for this class.
You could also do the same with pool abilities, like grit and Ki, separate it into replenishable (grit, panache) and non-replenishable (ki, arcane) pools and explain rules for those once. Perhaps even roundsper day abilities, like rage and bardic performance could get a treatment like this.
I think a half-blinded, or vision obscured, or something like that would be a good condition to have. Half-blinded creatures treat its opponents as if they have concealment (20% miss chance).
EDIT:
blurred?
That reminds me, I wouldn't mind % miss chances gone. It's an extra roll+an extra layer of complexity for calculations+an extra layer of defense vs poor martials... Maybe as a /day class ability, bt not something that can be literally always on.
Agreed. I always wince when a player rolls a crit but forgot to roll the miss chance first.
Dazzled is just -1 to hit, -1 to Perception.
Blind is 50% miss chance.
Half-blind could be 20% miss chance. Like if shadows cover your face, or a pie, or you're swimming in murky water.
I may be a bit of an extremist, but I'd lump all the full casters in one class. There'd be one list for all to use, and you'd have to "specialize" to gain access to your appropriate spell list. Similar to what 3.5 Psions do. Except in this case, your "specialty" determines your Magic stat, and bonuses at various levels would emulate bloodlines, domains, or schools, based on your choice. Sure, it'd be longer than the standard classes as written now, but if we're talking about simplifying things, what's simpler than Fighter, Mage, Thief?
This post is only partially tongue-in-cheek. I actually would like to see some simplification and unification of classes. That being said, PF is a fun game, but I've been having fun with some other games for a while.
All classes being built off of a talented line (Rogue Genius Games) type system. The reasons being for personal customization, instead of the typical cookie cuter class build used today.
Oh, and do not forget to power up some classes , we all know of whom you are.
Feats that scale as you level, (TPK Games) just due to the fact that as you level, your abilities in all other areas get better, except feats where they flat line.
Last but not least a point based spell/power system (Dreamscarred Press) that allows versatility on the fly. This allows for so much more freedom when utilizing your mystic spells/powers. You can bring the spells DC up, if you spend the points. You can mimic a meta feat when counterspelling verbatim, if you spend the points. Overall in my view it is a far better system, all things considered.
In truth I really don't want to see a 2.0, but what would be nice is a supplement rule book with fixes for all the rules that have been found to be unclear or lacking. This would include re-made versions of the weaker classes, different rule systems such as scaled feats and/or a point based spell system. That to me would be the next good playtest for Paizo to move forward with.
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First of I think I would like to see the Pathfinder core rulebook split into the Player's Handbook and Dungeon Masters Guide (or whatever Paizo decides to call them)because of the following advantages:
Binding: Splitting up the core rulebook would result in two thinner rulebooks, which should significantly reduce the strain on their respective bindings.
Secrecy: As it is, whenever a player buys the core rulebook, he also gets rules for the DM as well.
Variety: Splitting the rulebook into two different books makes if possible for there to be variant Player's Handbooks. As I was bought back into D & D by Arcana Evolved, a variant Player's Handbook, I think the existence of variant Pathfinders to be a good thing.
Speaking about Arcana Evolved, I suspect that having the next version of Pathfinder being partially based on Arcana Evolved would be a good idea. As all casters in that system are effectively a combination of prepared and spontaneous casters, that would stop the old "spontaneous vs. prepared" argument stone cold.
There are also many feats in that system that would be a great befit to orthodox D & D, such as Modify Spell.