What is in your Top 5 "Things to Change" list for Pathfinder?


Homebrew and House Rules

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TheAlicornSage wrote:
You think d20 is designed with narrower range of settings than it actually is, and that has colored your analysis.

This is where you and I disagree. I'm not interested in what a system is designed for. I'm interested in how it works. I'm of the opinion that the system shows its best qualities at a much narrower band of this "spectrum" than was intended by its design and I cannot be swayed from this.

Also, of course it colors my analysis. All critique is gonzo. There isn't any point in pretending that our personal experiences with a work don't have an effect on how we perceive and analyze it.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:
SmiloDan wrote:
I houseruled you roll for hit points for levels 2 to 20 (max at 1st), and if you get less than half, you get half + 1 (4 for d6s, 5 for d8s, 6 for d10s, 7 for d12s).

I give Maximum forever because why not? The worst that happens is players can fight for longer and use more of their healing spells because players are deathly afraid of going into any combat at anything less than maximum. Then when they're in deep, and want to go rest.

Random encounter time.

I'm actually working on a quest where the reward will be getting max hit points and a Constitution increase.

Then I can take the kid gloves off and not worry (too much) about TPKs.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Pathfinder Accessories, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:
I give Maximum forever because why not?

Well, it makes damaging spells less dangerous, unless you apply the same rule to them and just deal maximum damage. Otherwise, it means PCs are tougher to kill, which I often find desirable.


Neurophage wrote:
TheAlicornSage wrote:
You think d20 is designed with narrower range of settings than it actually is, and that has colored your analysis.

This is where you and I disagree. I'm not interested in what a system is designed for. I'm interested in how it works. I'm of the opinion that the system shows its best qualities at a much narrower band of this "spectrum" than was intended by its design and I cannot be swayed from this.

Also, of course it colors my analysis. All critique is gonzo. There isn't any point in pretending that our personal experiences with a work don't have an effect on how we perceive and analyze it.

Then shouldn't the difference between the zone the system was designed for and the zone you want it to be in, be the thing that gets changed? That is a baseline issue, not in the details.

For example, the biggest thing I'd like to see change about pathfinder is to get rid of the focus on balance and meta-combat, and instead focus on being a simulationist toolkit that supports making flexible gm rulings.

RPGs are not mmo computer games, and I hate them being treated like it.


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Balance is important in any good game. That concept did not start with MMOs, and I wish that meme would go away.

In my experience, "simulationist toolkits" are horribly complicated and/or barely functional messes in which the designers offload a great deal of their work onto the GM. The best one is probably GURPS, and I'll wager you're not playing that instead of Pathfinder because there are no groups, because there are no GMs.

And how does the d20 system not support flexible GM rulings?


An MMO can be simulated. The characters rebuild a town for resources and fight marauding monsters daily. Once they muster a town guard, they can go out on adventures.

Back on topic, monsters get more than half each hit dice and fort or structure bonus hit points. So should characters. If characters have to roll hit points, so does every monster and NPC. If characters get max, so should all monsters and NPCs. You can apply this to all spell damage too.

Max everything makes things easier on GMs, but it takes out a lot of the surprise and wonder. It depends on the game world. In limbo, probably everything is rolled and nothing is hand waved.

This should all be in the new core rule book. You could just add a supplement, Personalizing Core. Ultimate Personalizing is just too pretentious.


Athaleon wrote:

Balance is important in any good game. That concept did not start with MMOs, and I wish that meme would go away.

In my experience, "simulationist toolkits" are horribly complicated and/or barely functional messes in which the designers offload a great deal of their work onto the GM. The best one is probably GURPS, and I'll wager you're not playing that instead of Pathfinder because there are no groups, because there are no GMs.

And how does the d20 system not support flexible GM rulings?

Balance is only important to games where how good the results are is important. The great thing about RPGs that separates them from nearly every other game in existance is that it doesn't need to matter how good the results are. Some will play an rpg like a squad based tactics game with story, but that isn't the only way to play an RPG. An RPG can be played where failure is no worse than success, just different.

I've played times where balance was not a consideration. Even had a group of various levels spread from 1-6 and no regular "wealth" division. Those were the best and most enjoyable games I ever played and they were games using 3.0 and 3.5 dnd. In those games, defeating monsters was never the point, never the focus. We faced a varied and wide range of foes of a many different CRs.

In those the games, our emotional investment was in the lives of the characters, not in the triumph over encounters.

Try it this way,
When you play chess, where is your emotional investment, your motivation to keep playing?

When you read a story, where is your emotional investment, your motivation to keep reading?

When I play an rpg, my motivation and investment is more similar to the investment of a book than chess.

Balance only matters for games where your investment in the game is like your investment in chess.

---When you read a book, you become emotionally invested in the characters. You feel happy when the triumph, frustrated when they are foiled, and sad when they die. In reading, you emphasize with the characters and care about their lives.

But chess is different. In chess, the pieces are just pieces. There is no emotional connection with them. You don't care whether pawn #3 lives or dies, cause it is just a pawn, a nobody, a nothing. It's only purpose is to be game piece.

Some games have both a story and a game. Like Halo. In Halo, you suppossedly play Master Chief. But you don't really play him. You watch cutscenes about him, and even emphasize with him, but there exists a division between that story about Master Chief and the actual game of shooting up aliens. You don't use tactics because you think Master Chief would ue them, no, you use tactics you want to use. Why? Because when it comes to the actual gameplay, you are not putting yourelf in the mind of Master Chief, rather, you are testing your own self against the challenges.

A RPG has the option of being different, of truly putting yourself in the mind of the character, of being focused purely on the character's perspective. You can play such that the combat is nothing but a backdrop, a struggle your character faces, and not a mere challenge to the player.

The purpose of a using a system for such play is to introduce uncertainty and tension while respecting the capabilities of the character and the difficulty of the challenge, as well as aiding communication, syncing expectations among the players, and reducing arbtrary gm calls.

[aqua]An example,
When players encounter a trap, the chess way of handling it is to go

"You found a poison dart trap."
"I rolled a 32 for disable device."
"You disarmed the trap, and the party moves on..."

This is chess style because the focus is not on the characters, it is on the mechanics. The players don't see the trap as a trap, they see it as a thing they need to roll dice for.

The book style goes more like this,
"You notice a tripwire going across the hall."
"Hmm, well since we will be headed back through here later, perhaps we should deal with it. I see if I can figure out what the tripwire is hooked up to."
"Ok. Give me a search check."
"I got a 32."
"You see the wire go right into the wall, but as you step back, you notice small holes in the wall above it. Moving the torch just right, you see needles in th holes."
"Rogar, Samson, get the table from the last room, amd hold it in front of these holes. Then I'll cut the wire."

See the difference? In this second example, the trap is not some abstract game obstacle arbitrarily named a trap. Instead, it is seen and dealt with from the character's perspective as an actual trap. Oh, and notice that it wasn't simply reduced to a single disable device check either. In fact, it would even be reasonable to say there is no need for a disable device check in this particular case, since all players are doing is holding a table, stepping over a wire, and cutting said wire.

[/aqua]
Then you have the added complications of perspective. For example, detail oriented people vs drama oriented people.

Drama oriented people care about how cool or awesome something is, and don't care or even notice if something makes sense or not.

A detail oriented person can't enjoy drama if things don't make sense, cause they easily notice when tjings don't make sense and that nonsensicle moment breaks their immersion. Thus some systems aid in keeping things consistent and sensible as well.

Thus, what I want to see in a game, is a design respecting these things, to be supportive of a focus on characters (instead of chess-like gaming), consistency, communicability, tension building, etc.


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That's all well and good, but some of us like the "game" and "role-playing" parts of role-playing games in equal measure. It's not either-or. The metaphor falls apart because it's not books vs. chess. It's both. RPGs are chessbooks, ideally with the chess and book parts working in concert to deliver an experience. And down that road lies tailoring mechanics for the experience the game wants to deliver. And within that mechanical design is the idea that all of the characterpieces in the chessbook we're playing should be able to meaningfully contribute to the "game" part as much as the "role-playing" part. And because I absolutely love talking about Shadowrun, I'll mention that no one who plays that game expects a hacker and a street samurai to be equally capable of taking out a corporate security team, but everyone expects them to contribute equally to the success of the game's most common objective: completing the run.

So then, a game should have a most common objective or common range of objectives, and its rules should ensure that all character types are capable of equally contributing to fulfilling said objective or objectives. Put another way, the different character types should be balanced.


Neurophage wrote:

That's all well and good, but some of us like the "game" and "role-playing" parts of role-playing games in equal measure. It's not either-or. The metaphor falls apart because it's not books vs. chess. It's both. RPGs are chessbooks, ideally with the chess and book parts working in concert to deliver an experience. And down that road lies tailoring mechanics for the experience the game wants to deliver. And within that mechanical design is the idea that all of the characterpieces in the chessbook we're playing should be able to meaningfully contribute to the "game" part as much as the "role-playing" part. And because I absolutely love talking about Shadowrun, I'll mention that no one who plays that game expects a hacker and a street samurai to be equally capable of taking out a corporate security team, but everyone expects them to contribute equally to the success of the game's most common objective: completing the run.

So then, a game should have a most common objective or common range of objectives, and its rules should ensure that all character types are capable of equally contributing to fulfilling said objective or objectives. Put another way, the different character types should be balanced.

Well said.


There are two issues with that.

A) There are two ways to have story and game together. Look at my Halo example above. It involves a distinct separation between the game and the story.

This is fine for some, but mechanics give different results and often assumes things it shouldn't.

Example one, player jobs. Players of this style tend to have job requirements, some of which are obscure to anyone unfamiliar with this style of play. For example, arcane casters being required to identify potions. This severly limits character design and rp opportunities. Further, such players end up being two-faced, the're acting one way out of combat and then acting completely differently anytime a mechanic is involved.

Example two, restrictive assumptions. I played Blood Under Absalom. Minor spoiler following, there is no point in paying attention to the stated goals of the rounds. Most rounds have a goal beyond simply defeating enemies, and indeed, these stated goals are actually quite good for testing a warrior's wisdom and not merely their skills.

The problem comes in though that if a player actually acts wisely, then they basically get punished for it.

No joke, at one point, we are told that we have an objective. The objective itself does not require us to even attack anyone, but there are enemies who will try to prevent us from achieving the objective.

Chess players will never notice anything wrong because once the encounter starts, they are only focused on killing enemies, regardless of the stated objective.

A player like me (particularly as a real warrior having learned real warrior wisdom) knows that fighting the enemies is a distraction from our true goal, and what we need to do is focus on the goal despite the enemies. Thus using control and defensive tactics, with distracting allies is the way to go, to have a character or two drive straight for the objective without trying to kill everything first.

But why do this? Because the character's objective is clear, and the fight is just an obstacle not a goal.

Sadly, those running Blood Under Absalom literally advise punishing any player who doesn't ignore the explicitly stated objective. In fact, the hidden mechanics are set up in such a way that the objective basically has invincible plot armor until a certain number of enemies are killed, oh and on top of that, whoever gets that final kill gets a cutscene of taking the objective, even if another player is already at the objective.

The entire module has a story layer and a mechanics layer, and they have one way compatibility. If you play according to the story, you get punished. If you play according to the mechanics, you get cutscenes for the story.

B) The second problem with your post is that balance works against naturalistic representation of the setting's milieu. Balance requires limitations that are arbitrary and will not make sense from the character's perspective.

You can slide on the scale from story to chess, but you literally can not fully support both, there is no way to have full naturalistic freedoms and complete strategic balance. You must make comprimises.

Dnd was designed for the story side of the spectrum. That was why it has always had balance issues. 3.x was awesome in refining and unifying mechanics, even if it wasn't perfect, but it still leaned heavily towards story. It also expects a gm to build a customized set of rules and rulings specifically for each campaign and party of players.

Also, the idea of all encounters being roughly equal to player's level is not part of the original design, as that is a gamist thing and not naturalistic at all.

Hence all the balance issues and character options that are complained about.

Recognizing that a system's design goals are not perfectly aligned with yours is important, especially in understanding how to alter it to fit your needs/desires.

Claiming a system is bad because it isn't what you want (not saying anyone in this particular thread made such a claim), is not only unfair to the system and it's designers, as the system might actually be quite good for it's intended objective, but it also blinds one to the required understanding to truly adapt the system to one's needs/desires.


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TheAlicornSage wrote:
Dnd was designed for the story side of the spectrum.

I thought D&D came from Chainmail, which came from wargaming?


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TheAlicornSage wrote:

There are two issues with that.

A) There are two ways to have story and game together. Look at my Halo example above. It involves a distinct separation between the game and the story.

The thing to which you're referring is similar to ludonarrative dissonance. Generally applicable to video games, it refers to the dissonance between a game's story and its gameplay. However, the example you cited falls apart because RPGs have multiple conflict resolution systems and players will not necessarily choose the method the GM was anticipating. Combat does not necessarily have to be to the death. Combat to the death can end in one party surrendering or escaping. A breakdown in communication does not necessarily end in the combat. If the mechanics of a game work in concert with the game's themes in support of the kind of story it wants to tell, then this dissonance will be significantly reduced.

Because Exalted may be the one game I love more than Shadowrun, I'll be using that for my examples this time. That game features a subsystem called Intimacies, which are things, people, places and ideas your character cares about. Maybe they like someone, maybe they hate a country, and maybe they have a belief that forms the bedrock of how they live their life. Your character can oppose their Intimacies, if you want. They can kill their beloved brother if it's the only way to stop a plot to destroy a country, but doing so will tear them up inside (represented by accumulating Limit), and the stress and grief might cloud their judgment and force them into decisions or behavior they wouldn't even consider were they in their right mind (represented by filling up your Limit track and entering Limit Break). You, as a player, have to make the choice of whether or not it's worth it both from a mechanical perspective (Exalted Storytellers love springing punishing challenges on characters in the throes of Limit Break) and from a personal perspective (maybe you really like this NPC. Maybe your character's interactions with their brother are important parts of playing your character to you). The mechanics work in concert with the themes to create a compelling and dramatic story.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
This is fine for some, but mechanics give different results and often assumes things it shouldn't.

Not if the game is well-designed.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
Example one, player jobs. Players of this style tend to have job requirements, some of which are obscure to anyone unfamiliar with this style of play. For example, arcane casters being required to identify potions. This severly limits character design and rp opportunities. Further, such players end up being two-faced, the're acting one way out of combat and then acting completely differently anytime a mechanic is involved.

Players pick out who's covering what job when they make their characters. This is solved by knowing your playgroup. Also, this has everything to do with player behavior and mentality and much less to do with game design.

TheAlicornSage wrote:

Example two, restrictive assumptions. I played Blood Under Absalom. Minor spoiler following, there is no point in paying attention to the stated goals of the rounds. Most rounds have a goal beyond simply defeating enemies, and indeed, these stated goals are actually quite good for testing a warrior's wisdom and not merely their skills.

The problem comes in though that if a player actually acts wisely, then they basically get punished for it.

No joke, at one point, we are told that we have an objective. The objective itself does not require us to even attack anyone, but there are enemies who will try to prevent us from achieving the objective.

Chess players will never notice anything wrong because once the encounter starts, they are only focused on killing enemies, regardless of the stated objective.

A player like me (particularly as a real warrior having learned real warrior wisdom) knows that fighting the enemies is a distraction from our true goal, and what we need to do is focus on the goal despite the enemies. Thus using control and defensive tactics, with distracting allies is the way to go, to have a character or two drive straight for the objective without trying to kill everything first.

But why do this? Because the character's objective is clear, and the fight is just an obstacle not a goal.

Sadly, those running Blood Under Absalom literally advise punishing any player who doesn't ignore the explicitly stated objective. In fact, the hidden mechanics are set up in such a way that the objective basically has invincible plot armor until a certain number of enemies are killed, oh and on top of that, whoever gets that final kill gets a cutscene of taking the objective, even if another player is already at the objective.

The entire module has a story layer and a mechanics layer, and they have one way compatibility. If you play according to the story, you get punished. If you play according to the mechanics, you get cutscenes for the story.

An incredibly poorly-designed module illustrates nothing other than that some module writers have no idea how to run an RPG. This illustrates nothing about the game and its mechanics. A good GM wouldn't go so far out of their way to railroad their players and all the rules in the world can't protect you from a bad GM.

TheAlicornSage wrote:

B) The second problem with your post is that balance works against naturalistic representation of the setting's milieu. Balance requires limitations that are arbitrary and will not make sense from the character's perspective.

You can slide on the scale from story to chess, but you literally can not fully support both, there is no way to have full naturalistic freedoms and complete strategic balance. You must make comprimises.

Citation needed. This is an assertion, not an argument.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
Dnd was designed for the story side of the spectrum.

D&D was developed out of a ruleset used for tactical wargaming. It was designed to support tactical combat and, in many ways, it was assumed all of the story stuff would happen on the playgroup's end.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
That was why it has always had balance issues. 3.x was awesome in refining and unifying mechanics, even if it wasn't perfect, but it still leaned heavily towards story. It also expects a gm to build a customized set of rules and rulings specifically for each campaign and party of players.

Please indicate to me what the themes of D&D 3.5 are and how the mechanics work in concert with those themes to support telling a particular kind of story.

TheAlicornSage wrote:

Also, the idea of all encounters being roughly equal to player's level is not part of the original design, as that is a gamist thing and not naturalistic at all.

Hence all the balance issues and character options that are complained about.

Let's throw out the GNS theory. All that's going to happen is people arguing semantics about what "simulationist" means.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
Recognizing that a system's design goals are not perfectly aligned with yours is important, especially in understanding how to alter it to fit your needs/desires.

Again, I'm not interested in what the actual design goals were. I don't care about anything as ephemeral as what someone intended when they designed a particular ruleset in a particular way. I care about the actual, factual reality of what the ruleset is and how it functions best and how those functions inform the kinds of stories the system is best at telling.

TheAlicornSage wrote:
Claiming a system is bad because it isn't what you want (not saying anyone in this particular thread made such a claim), is not only unfair to the system and it's designers, as the system might actually be quite good for it's intended objective, but it also blinds one to the required understanding to truly adapt the system to one's needs/desires.

I don't need to justify my "to change" list any more than anyone else needs to justify theirs. We have irreconcilably different opinions on the game, and that's all there is to it. I'm not trying to change anyone's mind about anything. If you are, you should probably stop.


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Yeah, there needs to be a flag for "arguments of One-True-Wayism." That would save a lot of effort.


Kullen wrote:
Yeah, there needs to be a flag for "arguments of One-True-Wayism." That would save a lot of effort.

I'm not claiming One True Way. I'm claiming a different way that most seem incapable of seeing.

Every time I play with someone who tells me I'm wrong, they only prove me correct, yet they strangely don't see it themselves. I'm literally seeing a difference that others don't, and I feel I'm trying to explain color to the blind (how would you explain color to the blind? or even just the colorblind?).

I suck at communication, but I try anyway because I'm not the sort to stick my head in the sand because everything is working against me.

Grognardy Dangerfield wrote:
TheAlicornSage wrote:
Dnd was designed for the story side of the spectrum.

I thought D&D came from Chainmail, which came from wargaming?

You can use the same rules in a multitude of different ways.

Rules of a particular design may be better or worse for a particular way of playing, but since the rules are merely support for the actual game, most any rules can be used.

Lacking rules for what they were doing, they built on what they had available, which was Chainmail.

DnD was not a varient of wargaming gameplay, DnD was an entirely new game which used some wargame rules as foundational support. Major, if subtle, difference.

I'll address a couple points of Neurophage's post in a bit.

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32

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TheAlicornSage wrote:


Every time I play with someone who tells me I'm wrong, they only prove me correct, yet they strangely don't see it themselves. I'm literally seeing a difference that others don't, and I feel I'm trying to explain color to the blind (how would you explain color to the blind? or even just the colorblind?).

It's like different textures you can feel without having to touch them.


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I would streamline Feats into Feat paths/trees. Like Two Weapon Fighting; initially you buy the feat but it includes Improved and Greater automatically when meeting higher requirements. Improved TWF requires Dex 17 and BAB +6, I would start including more skill investments, like maybe 6 ranks of Acrobatics, to compensate for creating a Feat path, and Greater TWF might require 11 Acrobatics and maybe something else that fits thematically like lesser ranks in another skill or a different feat. Overall, you get all 3 feats from a single slot, freeing up one or two for other bonuses. The same can be done for the Critical, Shield, Crafting families etc etc.

I've always had trouble with the logic that you can buy TWF (or something equivalent) and over the course of 20 lvls NEVER get better at it naturally despite all the other improvements you automatically get with little or no choice, but I have to choose to get better at TWF even if I use it nearly every day for 20 years. Feat paths would make your feat selections feel more like optional class abilities that grow with you.


Athaleon wrote:
UnArcaneElection wrote:

^Why do you want to get rid of spontaneous casting and point buy?

With point buy, I'll bet dollars to pesos it's "because powergamers".

And many of us call this BS.

the DM/GM can limit power gaming with a simple word, no.


TheAlicornSage wrote:

Balance is only important to games where how good the results are is important. The great thing about RPGs that separates them from nearly every other game in existance is that it doesn't need to matter how good the results are. Some will play an rpg like a squad based tactics game with story, but that isn't the only way to play an RPG. An RPG can be played where failure is no worse than success, just different.

I've played times where balance was not a consideration. Even had a group of various levels spread from 1-6 and no regular "wealth" division. Those were the best and most enjoyable games I ever played and they were games using 3.0 and 3.5 dnd. In those games, defeating monsters was never the point, never the focus. We faced a varied and wide range of foes of a many different CRs.

In those the games, our emotional investment was in the lives of the characters, not in the triumph over encounters.

Balance is important between player characters, and character options. I'm not saying the players shouldn't ever face anything too strong for them to defeat, or too weak to really be worth their time fighting. Aside from anything else, the CR system (and the general ability to make good challenges for the party) starts to break down when there is too wide a variation between player characters of the same level.

And what part of a well-balanced game is incompatible with a system that supports a good narrative? Leave aside that things like story, setting, and character fluff exist outside the system; Brother Carolus, the Priest of Sarenrae, has the same personality, background, and motivations whether he happens to be statted out for Pathfinder or Savage Worlds. The thing is, most player characters (and and most characters in stories in general) will tend to face challenges that are tough but doable, for reasons that shouldn't even need explaining.

Quote:


Try it this way,
When you play chess, where is your emotional investment, your motivation to keep playing?

When you read a story, where is your emotional investment, your motivation to keep reading?

When I play an rpg, my motivation and investment is more similar to the investment of a book than chess.

Balance only matters for games where your investment in the game is like your investment in chess.

---When you read a book, you become emotionally invested in the characters. You feel happy when the triumph, frustrated when they are foiled, and sad when they die. In reading, you emphasize with the characters and care about their lives.

But chess is different. In chess, the pieces are just pieces. There is no emotional connection with them. You don't care whether pawn #3 lives or dies, cause it is just a pawn, a nobody, a nothing. It's only purpose is to be game piece.

Kicking the can back to chess instead of World of Warcraft doesn't change any part of the implication you're making, namely that I play the game to roll dice, read off numbers, kill bad guys and take their stuff, and nothing else.

And books are actually not very similar to RPGs at all, not even story-focused games. Books generally have one author who can (more or less) write what he pleases. There can be a single protagonist in the spotlight with the rest of the characters supporting. It's easy to jump between multiple characters' points of view in completely different locations, or even different points in time. RPG stories, on the other hand, are generated cooperatively. Characters have agency. Players may not be satisfied as "mere" supporting characters while one player gets to hog the spotlight as the de facto protagonist. Jumping between different locales (i.e. splitting the party) is awkward on the tabletop because it means half the group is playing the game, and the other half aren't.

Quote:

An example,

When players encounter a trap, the chess way of handling it is to go

"You found a poison dart trap."
"I rolled a 32 for disable device."
"You disarmed the trap, and the party moves on..."

This is chess style because the focus is not on the characters, it is on the mechanics. The players don't see the trap as a trap, they see it as a thing they need to roll dice for.

The book style goes more like this,
"You notice a tripwire going across the hall."
"Hmm, well since we will be headed back through here later, perhaps we should deal with it. I see if I can figure out what the tripwire is hooked up to."
"Ok. Give me a search check."
"I got a 32."
"You see the wire go right into the wall, but as you step back, you notice small holes in the wall above it. Moving the torch just right, you see needles in th holes."
"Rogar, Samson, get the table from the last room, amd hold it in front of these holes. Then I'll cut the wire."

See the difference? In this second example, the trap is not some abstract game obstacle arbitrarily named a trap. Instead, it is seen and dealt with from the character's perspective as an actual trap. Oh, and notice that it wasn't simply reduced to a single disable device check either. In fact, it would even be reasonable to say there is no need for a disable device check in this particular case, since all players are doing is holding a table, stepping over a wire, and cutting said wire.

The difference boils down to different methods of solving the same problem, with a lot more description given. There's nothing wrong with that, but what part of all this depends on the system? Why couldn't Example 2 be done in Pathfinder, and what stops a group from pulling Example 1 under your ideal system?

Quote:

Then you have the added complications of perspective. For example, detail oriented people vs drama oriented people.

Drama oriented people care about how cool or awesome something is, and don't care or even notice if something makes sense or not.

A detail oriented person can't enjoy drama if things don't make sense, cause they easily notice when tjings don't make sense and that nonsensicle moment breaks their immersion. Thus some systems aid in keeping things consistent and sensible as well.

The 'drama-oriented people' bit seems like ridiculous pigeon-holing. As for the detail-oriented person, what are you proposing to satisfy them? More complete and detailed rulesets cut down on things like GM fiat, and stretching the limits of abstraction, which can happen in "rules-light" systems. But too much detail slows down the game, and can be immersion-breaking in its own right if people get bogged down in rules.

Quote:
Thus, what I want to see in a game, is a design respecting these things, to be supportive of a focus on characters (instead of chess-like gaming), consistency, communicability, tension building, etc.

What do all of those things mean exactly, and why in your view is Pathfinder inadequate for those things? What would you change in order to fix it?


@Neurophage

It is more a question of where the rules lie in your thinking.

When faced with a problem, do you look at it in mechanical terms and judge your options mechanically?

Or do you look at the problem as your character sees it and consider options in terms of what the world milieu allows, reserving rules merely for translating whatever you option consider into dice.

Exalted makes comprimises. You might not care about the things it comprimises, but it does make them. I've not seen much of it, but the biggest thing I have seem is that it leaves consistancy in the hands of the gm and it is way overly abstracted, both reasons why I have not bothered to delve more deeply into it, it utterly fails at the key points I want a system to cover.

Since when do characters that got randomly tossed together just happen to all perfectly fit abstracted jobs? Seriously, what is the point behind jobs anyway? Why have them? The answer is another difference. Those who see this as a game like a boardgame, think in terms of playing a game.

But others see it as a way of interacting with a story in a way that nothing else can. Even a choose your own adventure story has limits, in that you can only do what the author chose ahead of time. But in a situation where you are sitting across from the author, and make your choices "live" so to speak, then your choices are nearly unlimited, you basically get to choose anything that is possible within the realm of the setting milieu, regardless of whether it had been thought of by the author or system designer.

A chess-like game, most games really, are about strategy and succeeding. An RPG has the potential to be about exploration and discovery.

When you are playing for discovery and exploration, then success is no longer the goal, and therefore strategy and a balanced, level playing field are not required.

Also note, when I mention simulationism, I'm talking about a system simulating a world, as opposed to a system abstracting strategy. DnD 3.x is simulationist for example.

The poorly designed module was poorly designed, but I chose it not because of it flaws, but because it shows well how the difference in thought process between chess-like gaming is opposite story-like exploration.

Do you honestly need a citation for how the real world is very unbalanced? Seriously? Give two people, one strong, the other smart, an equal amount of training time, and the smart guy will nearly always defeat the strong one. Tje more training you give them, the more things lean in favor of intelligence.

Consider also how unbalanced circumstances of birth are. Some folks are born with grave disabilities, few gain anything in return. Consider also how 2/3s of all people do as told, regardless of personal feelings, so long as there is any pretense of authority or expertise? How can the real world be considered balanced?

Therefore, if the real world is so unbalanced, then any attempt to allow a level of freedom on par with, and similar to, the real world means you will have a similar lack of balance.

Most folks are analyzing rules with the idea of how it works for succeeding, it's usefullness in the sense of playing a game. In essense, looking at them only as parts of a game, rather than as tools for an experience.

Notice also the various feats and choices that are situational, not just in a game sense, such as how toughness works for low level one shot games, but also for settings, for example how a setting where only special individuals get magic thus leaving the military soldiers to pure mundane tactics.

Then also look at the scope. You have the natural wprldly scope at levels 1-5, but then you also have superpowered heroes at levels 15-20.

But most importantly, notice how dnd is trying to model a world, things like all the varied enviromental effects, the various skills, etc. All of those details are insanely over complicated for a game, when a game would benefit from more abstraction, but that complexity and detail is important for immersing players in a consistant world of detail.

Or to quote Extra Credits, "...players to see the places as actual places in the world, rather than reference points..."

And let us not forget all the times the books encourage adapting the rules, adjusting and changing them to suit the current needs. The dmg even explicitly says that if a player wants to change a class feature, then the gm should work with them on changing it, even giving examples such as a paladin player wanting to trade away the mount class feature. Such encouragment promotes storytelling, not gameplay.

As I said before, understanding the system goals informs one on best to utilize them to the user's intent regardless of how different the user's desire is from the designer's. Wanting to ignore the design goals when you go fiddling around with the system is no less troublesome than fiddling around with a car engine without knowing it's purpose and how it is intended to be used.

You say we different opinions on the game, but the truth is, we aren't talking about the same game. The fact that both of us are using the same rule set doesn't change the fact that we are playing two vastly diffeent and unrelated games.


TheAlicornSage wrote:
You say we different opinions on the game, but the truth is, we aren't talking about the same game. The fact that both of us are using the same rule set doesn't change the fact that we are playing two vastly diffeent and unrelated games.

This is what I've been saying. If you understand that, then continuing this conversation would be pointless.


Heh. That's kind of a funny resolution, given the amount of text. :)


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TheAlicornSage wrote:
In essence, looking at them only as parts of a game, rather than as tools for an experience.

And yet some people want to actually play a game and allow the story to emerge from that, rather than having a story hour with "tools" that are ignored half the time. One approach is not automatically more "enlightened" than another -- despite your repeated implications that anyone playing the game by the rules is doing so because they are benighted fools who are ignorant of the "true purpose" of the rules.

In other words, lots of people understand your viewpoint perfectly well, but still find that the experience it provides is less enjoyable for them.

Pathfinder should ideally support both approaches, and everything in between.


Sometimes you need to exchange a lot of language with someone to realize you aren't talking about the same things.


Yeah, I wasn't having a go (I've enjoyed the back-and-forth). I just found that last comment amusing. :)

Community & Digital Content Director

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Removed a couple derailing posts and their responses. Let's keep personal jabs and obviously baiting comments out of the thread, thanks!


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Quote:
When you are playing for discovery and exploration, then success is no longer the goal, and therefore strategy and a balanced, level playing field are not required.

The hell it isn't. If I have made an entirely nonmagical character because I didn't want to play a mage, what the rules allow me to do to interact with the world are "fight things" and "roll skill checks." The other guy, who wanted to play a mage, can do both of those things while also walking through walls, disappearing, and flying. He's going to be able to explore places my character can never go on his own power and discover things that will never, ever enter my character's sphere of influence. Without even the pretense of a level playing field two players are playing entirely different games during the same session of play, or more accurately they are both playing a game but only one of them can access and interact with an entire shelf of that game's content.

If some classes are designed primarily to succeed at combat, which a number of them very clearly are, and another set of classes are designed to do anything you set your mind to, the first set of classes should not be included in a game that "isn't about success."

I also take serious issue with the notion that a story isn't "about success" or that the only thing that matters is the ultimate vaguery that you "had an experience."

Watching The Grey was an experience. The characters in The Grey certainly had an experience.

It was an unpleasant, pointless experience for everyone involved that left all the characters eaten by wolves because they did not succeed at anything at any point in their journey and the viewers keenly aware they just wasted two hours of their life, but it was an experience for both the characters and the viewers. "Having an experience" is not in and of itself a worthy cause. The point is to have a GOOD experience, and surprisingly enough people tend to find experiences where they have goals and succeed at them to be good ones.

Quote:

Do you honestly need a citation for how the real world is very unbalanced? Seriously? Give two people, one strong, the other smart, an equal amount of training time, and the smart guy will nearly always defeat the strong one. Tje more training you give them, the more things lean in favor of intelligence.

Consider also how unbalanced circumstances of birth are. Some folks are born with grave disabilities, few gain anything in return. Consider also how 2/3s of all people do as told, regardless of personal feelings, so long as there is any pretense of authority or expertise? How can the real world be considered balanced?

Therefore, if the real world is so unbalanced, then any attempt to allow a level of freedom on par with, and similar to, the real world means you will have a similar lack of balance.

You know what undermines a good experience for me? Four people sitting down to play a game together as equals only for the game world to decide one of them is the main character and everyone else is a sidekick because "life isn't fair."

Life's not fair, but you know what is? Games. Do you know what Pathfinder is? A game. Denying the people who came here to play a game an equal playing field to enforce your arbitrary view of how things should work in a real world is simply making the game experience worse for all but one of your players.

If you want a game where stats, classes, CR, individual player abilities, and the like are all irrelevant, I have to ask, have you heard of freeform? Because then you CAN just chuck all that stuff in a bin and focus 100% on the story. The way you describe the game as you'd like it to be played, I really think you'd be having a much better time if you just put away the dice entirely. They're just getting in the way at that point.


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#1 with a Bullet - Alignment. As in, removing it completely. It does nothing but limit RP, cause arguments, and doesn't even make sense as a concept because of its subjectivity. Rules need to be objective, which is impossible with alignment. Philosophers have struggled for millennia to define 'good' and 'evil', and gotten nowhere.

#2 - Increased flexibility. Archetypes are good for this, but the Rogue Genius Games' 'Talented' line are even better.

#3 - Reining in magic. It can just do too much too easily. Simple 1st and 2nd level spells can wreck plots. Some spells let you completely circumvent the plot. This is one reason I like E6; most of the truly obscene uses of magic aren't available.

#4 - Removing magic-item dependency. Unchained already did a big chunk of this with the inherent bonus rules, though, so that's more or less covered.

#5 - Related to 3- Restricting clerics. In my personal opinion, clerics should have much tighter spell lists consisting of spells that ONLY pertain to their god's/belief's domains. A Storm God should not grant healing spells, for example. A Fire God should not grant Create Water. And so on, and so forth. Tangential to this, making arcane healing/nonmagical healing viable.


^Add to your #5: Prune and reorganize all the spell lists into Core Arcane, Core Divine, Core Alchemical, and Core Psychic, upon which various classes then build by adding Arcane Schools/Bloodlines, Domains/Revelations, etc., each of which awards more than just 1 spell per level, and if it awards a spell that is already on your list, you get some kind of specialist benefits with it.


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( 1 ) FEATS: Dole out more feats to alleviate the feat tax.
Each class gains five additional feats at different levels.

Example:
A monk gets:
Level 1: Dodge
Level 2: Ki Stand
Level 3: Extra Ki
Level 6: Mobility
Level 8: Any style feat for which s/he qualifies.

Also, back in 2E, high ability scores granted automatic abilities (like immunity to illusions for high Wisdom). Grant particular feats for high abilities.

Example:
Dexterity:
12 – 13: Run
14 – 15: Nimble Moves
16 – 17: Improved Initiative
18 – 19: Fleet
20 – 21: Quick Draw
22 – 23: Lightning Reflexes
24 – 25: Acrobatic Steps
26 – 27: Agile Maneuvers

Lastly, racial feats are also free at certain levels. Most racial feats provide nice flavor for a particular race, but, honestly, aren't worth taking as a feat. Now, just give them out:

Gnome:

Breadth of Experience if 100+ years old.
FIRST:
+2 CON & +2 CHA (no STR penalty)
20' land move – Spell Resistance 5 + CL – Darkvision 60' – Hatred – Keen Senses – Obsessive – Gnome Magic – Illusion Resistance – Groundling – Weapon Familiarity – Defensive Training – Tradition Focus: Gnome – Size (Tiny) [homebrew] – Effortless Trickery

SECOND:
Explorer – Houndblooded – Arcane Talent – Arcane School Spirit (REQ: Tinker Gnome) – Great Hatred (REQ: Svirfneblin) – Tantrum (REQ: Garden Variety Gnome)

THIRD:
Gift of Tongues – Innovator – Casual Illusionist – Expanded Resistance

FOURTH:
Bond to the Land – Jewelheart Gnome – Olfactory Alchemy – Extra Gnome Magic – Gnome Weapon Focus

FIFTH:
Academician – Burrowmastery (REQ: Svirfneblin) – Vast Hatred (REQ: Great Hatred)

SIXTH:
Knack with Poison – Earthkinship

SEVENTH:
Magical Linguist – Scrutinizing

EIGHTH:
Master Tinker (REQ: Tinker Gnome) – Farwanderer

NINTH:
Warden of Nature (REQ: Garden Gnome)

TENTH:
Pyromaniac

ELEVETH:
Fell Magic

TWELFTH:
Eternal Hope

I realize that doing this to the races unbalances them. My players and I are okay with that; we are tired of the fluff not equaling the crunch.

I can provide a list for all abilities and all core races & classes upon request.

( 2 ) CLERICS: Clerics spontaneously cast their domain spells, not heal/harm spells.

( 3 ) COMBAT: A full-attack action is now a standard action instead of a full-round action.

( 4 ) HIT POINTS: Max at first level. On subsequent levels, if the die roll is less than or equal to your Constitution modifier, roll again (unless that's the maximum).

( 5 ) CASTERS: Spell casters now add one-third of their caster level, rounded down, to the DC of their spells. It doesn't make sense to me that a fifth level, 18 INT wizard's fireball is just as hard to dodge as a 20th level, 18 INT wizard's.

Cooperative casting works like aid another and is free of charge.

Focused spell is free.

Casters may use spell slots for high ability scores to cast lower level spells. For example, a first level, 18 WIS Cleric may use the second level spell slots for high Wisdom to cast first level spells even though she can't cast second level spells yet. Since one can do that once the spell level becomes available and since it is a function of a character's ability and not their class, this seems reasonable to me.

As you may infer from #1, I've done a lot of tweaking to a lot of things. I mean, I could go on and on, but I'm supposed to stop at five (and I know I already cheated that number by using very broad category names).


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@Mykull:
(1) I'd be wary of assigning a fixed sequence of feats, either to classes and races. I'd feel like I'm removing build options, even if they are bonus feats.
What I would do is giving the player a choice (at each given level) between a set of fitting feats, probably a bit broader than the list you already have.

(2) Having to memorize healing spells specifically is a step back IMO. Spontaneous domain spells are nice anyway.

(3) Many people suggest this. While it's clear that it makes martials stronger, I still don't think it's a good change, as it changes tactics completely, in a way that could become silly if you keep the other rules as they are.
I'm thinking, for example, about a zen archer full attacking and moving back: good luck catching him!

(4) More HP aren't bad, but it goes against the concept of retroactivity: gaining CON at higher levels becomes less effective.

(5) This one is good, but saves need to go up faster to compensate.


Megistone wrote:

@Mykull:

stuff

(1) I actually feel like I'm adding build options to classes because now, for example, instead of a monk having to take Dodge as a feat, one gets it automatically. This frees up that feat selection for more build options, because, let's face it, almost all monks have to take Dodge anyway. Similarly, Ki Stand doesn't railroad a monk into a certain build; I've seen many martial arts movies where, regardless of the style used, someone does a kip up. Extra ki gives more options, not less, as the monk can now use their ki more often, for more things. Mobility, see Dodge. And any style feat for which s/he qualifies . . . well, I'm just mystified as to how you see that as removing build options.

As for races, your suggestion of a broader list from which to choose leads to muddled blood; gnomes that act like dwarves. Elves that behave like orcs. Humans that act like lizardfolk, etc, etc, as a player chooses racial feats from other races. This statement of yours is also why I believe you think I'm replacing feats with mandatory ones as opposed to what I said: These are ADDITIONAL feats gained for free.

I want my gnomes more gnomey, elves more elvey, etcetera. And, mainly because of the feat tax situation that requires players to take certain feats to make their CLASS viable, they never take RACE feats. Racial feats look good, but they just aren't good enough to take the place of Quicken Spell or Improved Critical. Now, you get the best of both.

(2) Unless you're a cleric of the healing domain. I get it from a raw number, game mechanic standpoint. However, story-wise, it makes no sense for Raumo, God of Water, Air, Weather and Catastrophe to just spontaneously grant healing spells. I'm glad you like a part of it, anyway.

(3) Web is a medium range spell. So is Grasping Hand. Or, if zen archer has to get me, lead him to cramped quarters so he has to come to me. There are always countermoves. Full attack as a standard action has yet to seriously unbalance our battles so far.

(4) Not really. If I have a 16 CON (+3) and later gain a magic item that takes it up to 20 (+5), I simply add 2 for every level. Sure, I didn't roll 3 or 4 on every die, but I probably did on some, and, as you say, "more HP aren't bad." If the player keeps track of their roll at every level, then those that qualify for a re-roll may be re-rolled.

(5) Nope. The reason I implemented this rule is because most saves are a joke. Usually by mid-level play, characters' saves are so high that they have to roll below a five to take the full effect. And by high-level play, when spells are supposed to be world-shaking, it is often anything but a one (even on 'poor' saves). Adding (at high-level) +6 to the DC takes it up to a whopping 7 or above; the odds are still ever in the player's favor, but there is actually a risk.


TheAlicornSage wrote:
Kullen wrote:
Yeah, there needs to be a flag for "arguments of One-True-Wayism." That would save a lot of effort.

I'm not claiming One True Way. I'm claiming a different way that most seem incapable of seeing.

No, you're blind!

It's opinions on both sides.

This topic could use some post deletions.


Goth Guru wrote:
TheAlicornSage wrote:
Kullen wrote:
Yeah, there needs to be a flag for "arguments of One-True-Wayism." That would save a lot of effort.

I'm not claiming One True Way. I'm claiming a different way that most seem incapable of seeing.

No, you're blind!

It's opinions on both sides.

This topic could use some post deletions.

Hmm, this is getting off topic. You are right about one thing, this isn't the place. However, it isn't entirely opinion, I just suck at explaining things. I put up my response in a new thread.

http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2udex?My-article-why-Balance-is-incompatible-wi th#1


@Mykull:
I'd like to make it clear that I'm not antagonizing, just trying to be constructive because I do like some of your ideas.

(1) You say a monk gets:
Level 1: Dodge
Level 2: Ki Stand
Level 3: Extra Ki
Level 6: Mobility
Level 8: Any style feat for which s/he qualifies.

What I'm suggesting is this: at levels 1, 2, 3, 6 and 8, the Monk chooses one of these feats she qualifies for: Dodge, Ki Stand, Extra Ki, Mobility, or any style feat. And probably 2-3 more to make sure that not every Monk ends with the exact same bonus feats, and that if I choose a race/class combination that both give the same feat, I don't end with a double.

(2) Thematically, yours is a very good idea. It's just that in-combat healing is already considered weak, and this option would make it even worse because it would be eating spell slots.
I think that would mean forgetting healing spells at all, besides maybe one for emergency, and making every single group rely on wands for patching up after the fight ends.
But yeah, probably things are already at this point, so not a big harm...

(3) Magic trumps everything, so I don't think it's fair to bring it up when talking about balance.
Admittedly, I never tried playing with full attacks as standard actions, so my judgement may be off; but I can say I like the fact that martials, to unleash their potential (and it's a BIG potential), have to consider movement, AoOs and possible retaliation. The fact that you can just move and destroy an enemy seems too simple to me, and it gives little to no chances to the opponent group to respond.
Here's another example: a Barbarian wins initiative, moves next to the opponent group's Wizard and simply murders him with a full attack. The fact that standing there now opens him to full attacks from the enemy martials means little, because they could had moved and full attacked anyway.
And rogues can move around the enemy and full-sneak attack in a single round. While rogues may need some help, I think that would make their job just too easy.
I don't know if I've been clear with what I mean.

(4) Keeping track of past rolls is a bit cumbersome in my opinion. I think there are simpler ways to get the same result.

(5) I like the fact that it gives higher level casters more power even on their lower level spells, but I don't think that balance between saves and DCs is so off. It may be a thing that comes up regularly in your games for some reason.
What about other abilities that require a save, but are not spells (hexes for example)?


Jonathon Wilder wrote:

1. The Magic system, which can be very frustating especially if you want a game to go high level and yet don't want full casters completely overshadowing other players or causing undo stress to the adventures.

I would replace it with the Spheres of Power system.

2. The Combat system, which often leaves melee characters with much more limited options as well just standing still and full attacking. Giving them options other then simply beating an opponent with a stick while hoping a caster doesn't simply cast a spell and get the job done faster. Also, more kinetic and fluid combat where one does not need to stand still just to get the most damage.

I would, once it is finished going through playtesting and is offically released, replace it with Spheres of Combat. Of which I was part of the kickstarter for and am very excited to use.

3. Leadership rules and the feat that everyone thinks is broken, and how apart for spellcasting many see Charisma as a wasted feat. How there isn't a lot of options, apart from perhaps Kingmaker, for more social encounters or even psychological strategy in combat.

Replace existing rules with Ultimate Charisma, as well consideration of certain Legendary Games supplements from their Ultimate line.

4. More versatility and even complexity for Bloodlines, both for Sorcerers and Bloodragers, and in what powers can actually be gained from have a particular ancestry or parentage.

The The Big Book of Bloodlines by Interjection Games.

5. More archetypes, better crafted archetypes, and in general more options for players or class building. With this even, improved versions of already published options that Paizo did not do quite as well as they could.

The Archetype Compendium by Flaming Crab Games, the Everyman Unchained products (counting, in particular, the Unchained Fighter), Legendary Classes (particularly for the Rogue which is comparable with its Unchained version), Childhood Adventures, and more.
---------------------------------

There is more, but for now...

So why not just say that you really want to play a different system - is there any part of pathfinder you DO want to keep?


Megistone wrote:

@Mykull:

I'd like to make it clear that I'm not antagonizing, just trying to be constructive because I do like some of your ideas.

I didn't think you were being antagonizing, I thought you were misunderstanding. But you're not being either, so we're all good.

I'm not trying to convince you, or anyone, that they should adopt my rules. I'm just trying to explain why I've added these to my game.

( 1 ) A monk gets Flurry of Blows at 1st level, Evasion at 2nd, and Fast Movement at 3rd. Should these also be just an option for a monk to choose from? I'm just adding as class features certain feats that either alleviate the feat tax or stylistically fit the class (e.g. Ki Stand) but aren't really worth taking as a feat (imo).

( 2 ) I think about movies and novels. I rarely see in combat healing. And when I do it is usually the bad guy, like Dolph Lungren in Universal Soldier or Bennet in Commando (if one considers his electrocution to be 'defibriliation'). But we seem to more or less agree on this anyway, I'm just explaining another reason why I came up with it.

( 3 ) I started with the TSR's Basic Set and then went to 1E, 2E, etcetera. Back then, one stopped rolling hp at 10th level and just got 1 more at each level after that. Only the fighter got more than +2 hp per level regardless of Constitution (yeah, a wizard with 18 CON would only get 1d4 + 2 hp per level until 10th).

The point is, there used to be a lot fewer hp and I was used to a fighter being able to walk up to anything and do a prodigious amount of damage, if not kill it outright. Martials were on par with casters even at high levels.

Being that old school and nostalgic, I wanted to bring some of that back. So I did.

The barbarian against the wizard example works if the wizard is unprepared. What if the wizard is prepared? And has shield, mage armor, displacement, mirror image, fire shield, protection from evil, stoneskin, wizard's transformation, and bear's endurance cast? All I'm saying is that one can always come up with a scenario in which Class A will trounce Class B, and vice-versa. With casters, it boils down to prep time.

As far as rogues are concerned, well, I'm not opposed to them actually being able to pull off some Assassin's Creed stuff.

( 4 ) I've got character sheets that actually do this, but just adding the difference in CON mod is my simple solution.

( 5 ) No one has played a witch in my gaming group, so I haven't had to address this yet. I wouldn't be opposed to including it, though, I suppose.


Less of the archetypes for the sake of archetypes....

Too much overlap into other classes for my liking.

As always be nice to the fighter... :))


1. UMD should be on the wizard class, not the sorcerer class. Wizards get their arcane abilities from years of study of tomes and objects. Sorcerers get their power innately. It makes much more sense that a wizard would be able to easily use a device, than a sorcerer.

2. CRs need to go down because combat is too easy. I believe this was a side-effect of going from 3.5 to Pathfinder, and adding some facets to the classes that made them more powerful in the transition. So, if CRs go down, then combats would have to include more enemies to be challenging again.

3. Paladin should be a prestige class.

That's all I got. Otherwise, I love Pathfinder.

Sovereign Court

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Ryan Kappler wrote:


3. Paladin should be a prestige class.

This.


^And several other analogous philosophy/religion-specific prestige classes should accompany it. Why should only Lawful Good(*) and (until recently) Chaotic Evil(*) get all the Holy Warrior glory?

(*)Of all the weird combinations . . . legacy heritage is REALLY showing here.


UnArcaneElection wrote:

^And several other analogous philosophy/religion-specific prestige classes should accompany it. Why should only Lawful Good(*) and (until recently) Chaotic Evil(*) get all the Holy Warrior glory?

(*)Of all the weird combinations . . . legacy heritage is REALLY showing here.

Update the 3rd Ed Unearthed Arcana alternate paladins to Pathfinder?


I've made holy warriors for each alignment and modified their abilities. I basically took all of the conditions not cured by the paladin's mercies and gave them out to the other alignments. I also changed the smite to fit the alignment (e.g. the LN Sentinel smites chaos instead of evil). Finally, I changed the detect to fit the alignment; the heretofore aforementioned Sentinel detects lies instead of evil.


KahnyaGnorc wrote:
UnArcaneElection wrote:

^And several other analogous philosophy/religion-specific prestige classes should accompany it. Why should only Lawful Good(*) and (until recently) Chaotic Evil(*) get all the Holy Warrior glory?

(*)Of all the weird combinations . . . legacy heritage is REALLY showing here.

Update the 3rd Ed Unearthed Arcana alternate paladins to Pathfinder?
Actually, I'd like an updated version of 2 things that 3rd Ed Unearthed Arcana had, but for some weird reason didn't think to combine:
  • Alternate Paladins
  • Prestige Paladins

Kirthfinder has an updated Prestige Paladin, built for Lawful Good but with explicit text saying that this can be modified for other alignments. Pathfinder itself has a combination along the lines I am looking for, although only for Any Lawful: the Hellknight. It needs tweaking to work well with newer material (as does the Hellknight Signifer, to an even greater extent), but the basic idea is right where we need it to be -- now just need equivalents for other alignments.

Shadow Lodge

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UnArcaneElection wrote:
Actually, I'd like an updated version of 2 things that 3rd Ed Unearthed Arcana had, . . .

Hell, I'd go for the 3.5 Unearth Arcana. Probably the best d20 book ever produced. Spell Points system that worked, the Spontaneous Cleric, the Battle Sorcerer, L. A. Buy off, Gestalt, Fractional BaB and Saves, etc, etc. . .

I honestly can't think of a single thing from that product I disliked or thought I would never use.


I do like me some gestalt. Wish I ever got the cause to use it properly but I've always found myself playing in groups way too big to justify it.

Shadow Lodge

It was extremely fun the few campaigns I was able to participate in that used it. It also went a long way towards putting an end to the RAW vs RP debate, but also helped to make certain concepts playable that still are lacking. Fractional BaB was another amazing innovation I wish had just been made core.


Ryan Kappler wrote:

1. UMD should be on the wizard class, not the sorcerer class. Wizards get their arcane abilities from years of study of tomes and objects. Sorcerers get their power innately. It makes much more sense that a wizard would be able to easily use a device, than a sorcerer.

2. CRs need to go down because combat is too easy. I believe this was a side-effect of going from 3.5 to Pathfinder, and adding some facets to the classes that made them more powerful in the transition. So, if CRs go down, then combats would have to include more enemies to be challenging again.

3. Paladin should be a prestige class.

That's all I got. Otherwise, I love Pathfinder.

1: Unless there is a bloodline. If crafting wands and staffs run in the family, they might be able to guess the command word and spells contained by the craftsmanship.

2: I'm ok with this.

3: I disagree, but it's not a dealbreaker. Healer could be a prestige class for all divine classes.


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1) Eliminate "Stand Still and Fight".
Battles involving melee combat and potential flying creatures are dynamic and moving things, and the system currently does not reflect that at all. My solution has been to make full attack a standard action.

2) Let Prestige Classes go.
Mostly a legacy relic from 3.5, Prestige Classes are a withering branch, while new classes and archetypes allow someone to play the character they want from level one instead of some arbitrary mid level. Keep developing new classes and archetypes so that any concept is achievable.

3) Go Off the Grid.
Grid/Mat and minis as a system expectation encourages one specific style of play, and creates or contributes to many other issues (such as Attacks of Opportunity, long drawn out combats, and flanking being both required and burdensome). It's okay to have as an optional idea, but building the system around grid play has led to more problems than solutions. It's already a game of imagination, let's go with it.

4) Another on the Pile for Automatic Feat Scaling.

5) Embrace the Implications of High Levels.
Past a certain point (often cited as 6th, but certainly by 10th) a character has ceased in any way to be a mundane being. Get rid of the expectation that high level class or skill abilities are limited by realism, and allow characters to live up to their potential. Any class at lv 20 should be capable of performing deeds of myth and legend, not just spell casters.


^I disagree about prestige classes. Some prestige classes should be converted into archetypes/etc., but the reverse is also true in some cases. (Arcane Trickster, Eldritch Knight, etc. are good candidates for conversion into base class options.) Hellknights are a perfect example of a pair of prestige classes with Prestige (as opposed to just a training path), although mechanically the Hellknight prestige classes need to be updated to work well with newer material. Paladin/Antipaladin and Inquisitor(*) are examples of base classes that should be made into prestige classes -- what religion in their right mind is going to trust some random 1st level warrior or priest to be their exemplary Holy Warrior or to work behind the scenes going above church rules? These roles should be reserved for characters that have proven themselves beyond basic training.

(*)However, I like the Inquisitor chassis, so save this for remixing with Warpriest to make the Cleric Reloaded, and then put 9/9 deity-bound divine casting on a new d6, 1/2 BAB Priest class.


UnArcaneElection wrote:

***

However, I like the Inquisitor chassis, so save this for remixing with Warpriest to make the Cleric Reloaded, and then put 9/9 deity-bound divine casting on a new d6, 1/2 BAB Priest class.

Which reminds me, rules should go back and untie Hit Dice size from BaB.

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