As we move into the actual play test, these threads will all be locked, and most of us will forget about the specific questions raised here, unless they ring out as major issues in the actual playtest.
Here are things I hope people look at very closely and find to be either more balanced than I expect, or ways to positively revise:
MC and Archetype feats: These seem to give a bunch of good to OK stuff bundled together in one feat. The more stuff bundled together, the better the feat becomes for some characters, while the worse it becomes for others. For example, if Fighter MC gives Athletics as a signature skill, the Pirate Archetype (as a stand alone feat) is pretty much dead in the water and becomes a very hefty feat tax for anyone that already has the weapon proficiencies and/or athletics, if later pirate stuff is of interest to them. These Feats already seem pretty complicated to balance against the host of feats that will grant only one of the 3 to 5 things each of these feats grant, and I am sure they will be coming under a lot of scrutiny, but I am curious as to whether they could offer flexible options or if that turns them into uber-mega feats.
The Strength Monk: I am not fond of what has happened to the monk and it has wildly decreased my desire to play it, so I hope folks that are excited about the new monk are willing to post their experiences in the new thread. I want to hear all the reasons why it is awesome to have the monk this way so that I am eventually convinced that it is going to work out.
The Paladin: I fundamentally think that PF2 is making a mistake by having Paladin as one of its core classes and not as an archetype. All the other classes are broad and give players many different ways to build a character narratively and mechanically and can be interpreted into many different kinds of characters. The Paladin, on the other hand, is starting to feel like a legacy "must-have" level of specificity in design that has been entirely moved to archetypes for every other possible narratively derived character. I hope I see 15 different paladins that all feel completely different mechanically, narratively and make their players happy.
Attributes: I am still opposed to the level of focus that RPGs in general are moving towards in making the 6 Attributes the core focus of what defines a character. The tighter the math gets, the less likely that a character could exist with even a 16 in their primary stat, with maybe 1 or 2 builds per class that deviate from needing to maximize their one stat. PF2 looks to be in better shape that 4e in this regard because every class doesn't base their attack rolls and damage bonus off of their primary stat, but the new attribute system really pushes gunning for that 16-18 in your primary stat (it is almost difficult not to build towards it). I really hope there do not become obvious Attribute spreads for every class that only fluctuate by 2 points here or there. I hope players keep an eye on this.
I see you problems with the Archetypes but I think, even if the 'tax' for the entry feat is different weighty for different characters, the options those open up are immense so I'm rather optimistic
The (Str) Monk: from my pov the new monk seems very intersting. The difference between a str and a dex monk seems also be roughly about the same - you have to be more careful in your defense but are more efficient in the offense. The new modularity is interesting and I guess fitting for the world (not every monastry is mystical oriented). I think it is a bit sad that the new monk makes the brawler obsolete (well maybe brawler can in anothr way still be a thing)
Paladin: Since there will be later on (probably, I hope so) a Paladin Archetype that can be stacked on everything I would not worry about that part. I am a bit dissappointed that Paladin seems to be the only one left with a harsh alignment restriction but it still seems like therere are enough options to build them
Attributes: The first one I actually share your worry...but I never thought about how my characters were supposed to be and therefore it won'T influence me any more in future then now
I appreciate your feed back. I post these issues because I hope they are things that people keep in mind as they play test, not because I think I have the magic solution to each issue.
I hope you post your positive feedback about playing the monk, since you seem excited by the class.
I think you mistake my issue with the Paladin however. I am disappointed that space is being dedicated to the paladin as a core class, because there are better and more flexible classes that could occupy that space, and I don't see the paladin's special feats and abilities justifying more than an archetype's worth of space, while the vast majority of its feats are probably going to be shared by either the cleric or the fighter.
The alignment issue is a part of this issue, because it makes a lot more sense to me for their to be alignment specific archetypes that build up in interesting ways around basic classes, than to have basic classes that are so specifically defined.
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Oh, my poor innocent summers boy.
There'll always be theorycrafting. It will get more intense when we know all the rules.
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Hmmm... I think Paladin as full class makes sense, they are too unique in their way to make them to just an archetype
As I read that Archetypes and MC is basically the same I was actually delighted, that means that whenever we get a new class we also get another archetype that potentially spices up the other classes and enables even more builds.
I am all about more options, so seeing the paladin as core class AND the potential archetype on the horizon (not just the archetype straightup) is something I appreciate a lot.
And while one of the reaons paladin stayed may be legacy, I sure won't complain...though I would have loved a slightly more flexible divine champion that works with other alignments as well
MC and Archetype feats: These seem to give a bunch of good to OK stuff bundled together in one feat. The more stuff bundled together, the better the feat becomes for some characters, while the worse it becomes for others. For example, if Fighter MC gives Athletics as a signature skill, the Pirate Archetype (as a stand alone feat) is pretty much dead in the water and becomes a very hefty feat tax for anyone that already has the weapon proficiencies and/or athletics, if later pirate stuff is of interest to them. These Feats already seem pretty complicated to balance against the host of feats that will grant only one of the 3 to 5 things each of these feats grant, and I am sure they will be coming under a lot of scrutiny, but I am curious as to whether they could offer flexible options or if that turns them into uber-mega feats.
That reminds me of multiclassing my PF1 ranger to monk back in 2012. He had been a very monk-like ranger, taking high Wisdom, two-weapon fighting combat style, and Fleet. Finally, at 6th level he multiclassed to monk. Then his monk-like ranger features became redundant, so I received GM approval to retrain his ranger combat style to archery and swap out his Fleet feat. From the monk side, I saw that 1st-level Stunning Fist would be fairly useless tacked onto a 6th-level character, so I took the Monk of the Four Winds archetype for Elemental Fist instead.
Pirate Dedication Feat 2
Archetype, Dedication
Prerequisites Dexterity 12, trained in Acrobatics and Sailing Lore
When you Balance aboard a ship, treat a success as a critical success. You also ignore any difficult terrain, uneven ground, or incline caused by the ship's movement. You are trained with the hatchet, scimitar, and spear. In addition, Acrobatics is a signature skill for you.
Special You cannot select another dedication feat until you have gained two other feats from the pirate archetype.
It is signature Acrobatics rather than Athletics. Nevertheless, maybe Paizo will invent other pirate-based archetypes that fit better with the Fighter class. I initially imagined describing an archetype called Ulfen Sea Raider, based on the Ulfen viking motif, but then I realized that it would probably start by giving the Ulfen Sea Raider a bunch of fighting abilities unneeded by a fighter. A fighter would need a Navigator dedication or a Sailor background (which is on the list of backgrounds) to get ready for a life on the sea without redundant abilities. Maybe a fighter is already enough like a pirate that the class does not need an archetype.
Hm, about the only way to have Sailing Lore at level 2 to qualify for Pirate Dedication would be the Sailor background. The prerequisites are more restrictive than they seem at first glance.
It's only trained, I would guess you can put one of your start prphiciencies in sailing lore so it is pretty easy - It may be speculation but I would doubt that one gets no free pickable skill training at level one - and if you want to be a pirate you should have sailing lore either way
"When you Balance aboard a ship, treat a success as a critical success. You also ignore any difficult terrain, uneven ground, or incline caused by the ship's movement" = the real benefit of pirate dedication.
"You are trained with the hatchet, scimitar, and spear. In addition, Acrobatics is a signature skill for you. " = Isn't really supposed to be something big, it's just a side thing to make characters fit the concept more. A character that already has these will probably already suit the archetype more and doesn't need the extra benefit.
"When you Balance aboard a ship, treat a success as a critical success. You also ignore any difficult terrain, uneven ground, or incline caused by the ship's movement" = the real benefit of pirate dedication.
"You are trained with the hatchet, scimitar, and spear. In addition, Acrobatics is a signature skill for you. " = Isn't really supposed to be something big, it's just a side thing to make characters fit the concept more. A character that already has these will probably already suit the archetype more and doesn't need the extra benefit.
But it does make a big difference if you are wizard with none of these abilities. Suddenly it is one feat that gives you 3.
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But it does make a big difference if you are wizard with none of these abilities. Suddenly it is one feat that gives you 3."When you Balance aboard a ship, treat a success as a critical success. You also ignore any difficult terrain, uneven ground, or incline caused by the ship's movement" = the real benefit of pirate dedication.
"You are trained with the hatchet, scimitar, and spear. In addition, Acrobatics is a signature skill for you. " = Isn't really supposed to be something big, it's just a side thing to make characters fit the concept more. A character that already has these will probably already suit the archetype more and doesn't need the extra benefit.
I can see your concern in general, but in this case I think there's not much to worry about.
Being trained in three (more) weapons seems not a big boon, as you usually choose one to use and specialize in, and forget about the others.Having another signature skill is only good if you want to improve it with higher proficiency and, probably, some skill feats. In this case, you can make it a signature skill for you regardless, so getting that from the pirate archtype seems minor to me. I may be wrong.
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I agree that the pirate archetype is difficult to get a sense of because it is so specifically focused and not likely to see much playtesting with the way the playtest adventure is structured. My concern with the general idea of tagging on 3-4 general proficiency levels and one special thing to archetypes, is that it will make a lot of options trap options for most characters. Will a rogue ever consider being a pirate? Do they need to? I could see people thinking that archetype and class synergy should make for a more powerful character, but mostly it looks like that will not be the case. In fact, the closer the archetype is to the character concept you have already been building, the less likely it will be to contribute to your build.
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But it does make a big difference if you are wizard with none of these abilities. Suddenly it is one feat that gives you 3.
Arrgh! I be a pirate wizard. But I've run out of rum and me spell book be gettin all salty.
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I want to play a pirate Alchemist so that I can poison people with Arrrrrsenic.
Maybe if I get my own ship, I can build a REALLY microscopic board on the side (about 6.62607004 × 10E-34 long) so that when my crew mutinies, I can make them walk the Planck.
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I just wish people would establish a single definition for "feat tax" The way some people use it it ends up being feat tax = any feat
@Vidmaster7 agreed, so far i have seen people use "feat-tax" if only there is a feat in a chain of requirements and the definition have been lost.
The term was most often used in context of Power Attack, Combat Expertise and the chain for whirlwind attack where you had to take some weird choices that did not add any other benefit other than opening the option for the chain.
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Yeah forcing you to take a feat that you won't benefit from is my definition as well.
I don't know how power attack gets used as a feat tax. Its if anything to good and everyone takes it to use it because of that.
Now combat expertise is a great example of a feat tax. I almost never used the options it gives
Yeah forcing you to take a feat that you won't benefit from is my definition as well.
I don't know how power attack gets used as a feat tax. Its if anything to good and everyone takes it to use it because of that.
Now combat expertise is a great example of a feat tax. I almost never used the options it gives
I usually see it used in one of two ways. Taking of a feat that you won't benefit from, like you mentioned. Or for a feat (like power attack or selective channel for clerics) that is basically a must-have. But a third way of using it, for basically anything that requires a feat does seem to be getting used a lot lately. And admittedly, the second definition can overlap into the third.
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Attributes: I am still opposed to the level of focus that RPGs in general are moving towards in making the 6 Attributes the core focus of what defines a character. The tighter the math gets, the less likely that a character could exist with even a 16 in their primary stat, with maybe 1 or 2 builds per class that deviate from needing to maximize their one stat. PF2 looks to be in better shape that 4e in this regard because every class doesn't base their attack rolls and damage bonus off of their primary stat, but the new attribute system really pushes gunning for that 16-18 in your primary stat (it is almost difficult not to build towards it). I really hope there do not become obvious Attribute spreads for every class that only fluctuate by 2 points here or there. I hope players keep an eye on this.
I know this won't work in all situations (especially society), but things like this, stat dumping to min-max (which I personally separate from 'optimizing'), and adding a general increase in believability is why, after trying point buy, I went back to what I'd been doing and enjoying for years: rolling for stats. Obviously, others play/run differently, and they are free to do what they like, but I only ever encountered the issues you mention the few times I used point buy.
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See to me a must-have feat is not the same thing. It just confuses the issue too. When someone calls power attack a feat tax I'm like What? I took power attack so I could take power attack.
The using it for literally all feats thing irritates me. Its not always a Feat tax sometimes it just a feat FFS. You would think people wanted to get all what would normally be a feat automatically and then have absolutely no options feat wise.
See to me a must-have feat is not the same thing. It just confuses the issue too. When someone calls power attack a feat tax I'm like What? I took power attack so I could take power attack.
An example of power attack as a feat tax might be if for my character concept I really want cleave. Right now, not in two more levels. Sure, power attack is better, and almost certainly something I'd want to take eventually anyways, but right this second it is in my way to the land of cleaving.
Even really good choices become annoying if I'm forced to make that choice. Sort of like if a boss you dislike tells you to do something you were about to do anyways.
If you were going to pick up power attack anyways...
Just got to get everything now screw investment and working towards something.
Also I know it was just an example but who would rather have cleave over power attack?
The other thing is. Do you want a selection or not? Do you want to have a few feats to choose from and occasionally have to choose one or just no choices at all? If you have to make a hard choice that means they designed it well. If their is nothing but no duh options that's bad design.
Now if your a wizard and you have to take power attack to get some weird spell buff thing. then power attack is a feat tax. However really that wouldn't be power attacks fault it would be the dumb caster feat that requires power attack.
But it does make a big difference if you are wizard with none of these abilities. Suddenly it is one feat that gives you 3."When you Balance aboard a ship, treat a success as a critical success. You also ignore any difficult terrain, uneven ground, or incline caused by the ship's movement" = the real benefit of pirate dedication.
"You are trained with the hatchet, scimitar, and spear. In addition, Acrobatics is a signature skill for you. " = Isn't really supposed to be something big, it's just a side thing to make characters fit the concept more. A character that already has these will probably already suit the archetype more and doesn't need the extra benefit.
This is a problem with a number of things, I think; I have a similar issue with the Backgrounds. As an example the Acolyte background gives you Lore(Your God), which is basically useless for a Cleric who will already have Religion trained and can make knowledge checks on her chosen deity anyways. Classes who have nothing to do with religion get a greater benefit from it than classes intrinsically tied to religion.
I think the idea is that lore(religion) would be broad knowledge and lore(your god) will be specialisation. A cleric with acolyte background might not bother with broad knowledge(religion)
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Mark uses feat tax when talking about power attack all the time, and other feats that essential just bump numbers up in ways that they probably should have bumped up automatically. Personally it doesn't bother me when people use feat tax to mean: A feat which does little to give a character more of a distinct identity (either because they aren't using it, or never not using it).
a singular definition for a word is a good thing otherwise it creates confusion.
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As far as builds I want to test:
I see a lot of folks locked in thinking about character concepts as a collection of character levels instead of what their characters can do, and I think it will be impossible to feel satisfied with the New system if you are using class levels as a metric of comparison for old characters, so I wanted to toss out some character ideas I will try to make in PF2 with the intention of revisiting this list after playtesting some and seeing what options would be necessary to complete the concept.
I have loved playing the holy champion of Shelyn. I did this in PF1 by multi-classing bard and paladin. My favorite build involved being a CHA primary stat build with a 14 in STR and DEX. (it was pretty MAD). The character used Dazzling display to debuff enemies for rounds and could smite evil when an enemy really posed a challenge, getting massive bonuses to attack and AC, as well as buff allies by delivering light-hearted but delightfully witty quips (perform comedy).
Multi-classing Bard and Paladin will eventually be a possibility I am certain of, but I think it will be fun to test this character out as a cleric, paladin and bard and see how each of them feels.
I have loved playing the ranger who is rather charismatic and flexible in his combat style, but defends the hearth and becomes loved by those who really get to know him. Charismatic rangers have never had amazing synergy and typically get pushed into mastering one specific combat style. I will try this character out first as a ranger, and then as a fighter and see which one feels the least "sub-optimal."