My reaction after my first read through


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Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I did my initial read through last week and I'm trying to decide if I want to participate more in the play test or even make the switch over.

One of my first concerns is the tendency to use the word "simple" as better than "complex". Moreover, the attempt to frame 1e as too complex. Too simple is just as bad as too complex. With that said trying to frame the new action system as better because its simpler is just wrong. The difference in complexity is negligible and this is pretty much a lateral change. I would have to say my reaction to the action system or the degrees of success change is "meh".

Next let's look at Ancestries/Races. My main criticism for Races in D&D3e to PF1e would be that your race is mechanically significant at 1st level and almost totally unimportant by 10th. If any variant of the d20 system did races right it would be Arcana Unearthed/Evolved, if you wanted to keep your race as a significant mechanical aspect of your character in that system you definitely could. Looking at Ancestries in PF2e, I like the automatic racial feats idea but overall, I think this area needs a lot of work. The mechanical contribution of the race at first level is far too little and the feats are not interesting. Not a single one has a requirement over level 5. Also not a fan of the way Half-Elf and Half-Orc were done.

Next let's look at classes, feats, and archetypes since they're so intertwined it's hard to separate. First, the single best feature of D&D3e was its multiclass system. Multiclass fighters worked because everybody got BAB and everybody got feats. Multiclass rogues worked because everybody got skill points. If I had a criticism of the multiclass system in D&D3e was that the designers punted when making it work for the spell casting system. Instead of designing it so Wizard 20, Wizard 10/Fighter 10, Wizard 10/Cleric 10, and Wizard 7/Cleric 7/Fighter 6 worked because every class could improve spell casting in some manner, they instead siloed spellcasting inside its class. They papered over it a little with Prestige Classes but it still needed work. With PF1e in addition to not fixing spellcaster multiclassing, it worked very hard to discourage multiclassing at all by making sticking to one class much better than multiclassing. In this regard, PF2e is really bad. Far too many feats are siloed inside their classes, and the multiclass system is hugely incomplete and too costly. Moreover, going back to simplicity/complexity, feats having lots of prerequisites is not a bad thing, you removed those for no reason. This part just needs to be reworked.

Next I want to talk about adventuring stages. In d20 your character goes through roughly 3 stages. Fledgling adventurer, adventurer, and high level. In the fledgling stage, you probably haven't created the character you want to play yet and it's mechanically uninteresting. This area of the game would be boring but tension is added because death is always around the corner. In the adventuring stage, you've probably created the core of your character, you're survivable, and you get to do cool stuff. At high level, you've made your character and fully fleshed out the character but the game falls apart in book-keeping. In D&D3e-PF1e this stages are roughly 1-4, 5-10, 11+ in character level. My main concern reading through PF2e is that the added HP at first level removes the tension and makes the fledgling stage far too boring. Moreover the defrontloading of characters means you'll be in the fledgling stage far too long. Suggestion, drop Ancestry HP, put back a lot more of the racial abilities and ratchet up the mechanical aspect of Backgrounds to accelerate characters out of the fledgling state as fast as possible.

Finally I want to talk about staleness. The d20 system is nearing its 20th birthday. In that time I've played a lot of characters. In my current game, with my last death; my GM gave me the option: get raised or make a character only from the core rulebook. I chose the former option. The latter option was so detestable, I might've considered dropping the game than taking it if it was my only option. I've played the Core Rulebook. The fact that that the new Core rules only contain Goblin as a newish race and Alchemist as a newish class is a major problem for me. I get the need for basic archetypes for new players but veterans also need a reason to switch and right now; I'm not inspired. PF1e core was 575 pages, 2e is 428, that means you've got over 150 pages to fill with more stuff. 1e's problem wasn't that it was too complex, its problem was it was too sprawling. Having more options in the core book would go a long way to get me to consider to switch over.


while i'm pretty neutral overall to how half-elves and -orcs are handled (really, you're basically just trading in your human racial feat to have access to elf stuff, which flavor-mechanics aside was basically what the difference was in 1e as well--though i DO want those flavor-mechanics back!), I'm quite excited by... i think it was mark seifter's post on the ancestry article about them considering opening up half-races and even more exotic ones (such as aasimar, dhampir, tieflings, the various elementals, etc) as half-ancestries available more broadly than just human, which i really hope they do--the sheer number of unique character origins (a half-elf-orc, or an aasimar elf, or an oread dwarf, etc) that could create alone is an amazing prospect... if ancestry feats get spiced up a bit, and a bit more frontloaded for interests' sakes (as currently they all feel a little bland and samey aside from name).


Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
AndIMustMask wrote:
while i'm pretty neutral overall to how half-elves and -orcs are handled (really, you're basically just trading in your human racial feat to have access to elf stuff, which flavor-mechanics aside was basically what the difference was in 1e as well--though i DO want those flavor-mechanics back!), I'm quite excited by... i think it was mark seifter's post on the ancestry article about them considering opening up half-races and even more exotic ones (such as aasimar, dhampir, tieflings, the various elementals, etc) as half-ancestries available more broadly than just human, which i really hope they do--the sheer number of unique character origins (a half-elf-orc, or an aasimar elf, or an oread dwarf, etc) that could create alone is an amazing prospect... if ancestry feats get spiced up a bit, and a bit more frontloaded for interests' sakes (as currently they all feel a little bland and samey aside from name).

That would be cool. The half-races thing is probably the least obstacle from me trying to convince my group to do some actual sessions. Actual multiclassing, de-siloing feats, and better fledgling adventurer rules are far more important for me.


i understand, i'm having trouble with my group (currently still in the chargen/decision phase) for a similar reason--it's a bit of a hard sell that nobody can get quickdraw other than ranger, or that rogues don't really support TWF aside from the universal "everyone can hold two weapons without penalty" now, or that ranged paladins (especially for erastil, who one of my players abroad generally defaults to) basically cannot work and nobody gets smite evil, and everyone needing to spend a class feat for fighter dedication if they want access to general combat feats by weapon from 1e back.

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