Learning Takes a Lifetime

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills? I think I've rolled more diplomacy checks than swim and climb checks combined. Probably more intimidate checks and deception checks too.

I think that's a pretty decent thing to consider when consolidating skills. A lot of the ones that are gone are skills we just didn't use that much. By contrast, we have had an entire new skill added for how we interact with magical writing, because we are going to be interacting with magical writing a lot.

I don't really feel like I need every specific thing broken into its own skill, I just want to know which skill I roll to do a thing and not have to squint to figure it out.

Another thing to note is that while Swim and Climb are rolled rarely, the consolidation into Athletics means more things will get folded into that skill, that don't just involve swimming and climbing. With that, that puts it on the same tier as Social skills, and I'm ok with that being the standard by which we hold our skills to.

Captain Morgan wrote:

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills? I think I've rolled more diplomacy checks than swim and climb checks combined. Probably more intimidate checks and deception checks too.

I think that's a pretty decent thing to consider when consolidating skills. A lot of the ones that are gone are skills we just didn't use that much. By contrast, we have had an entire new skill added for how we interact with magical writing, because we are going to be interacting with magical writing a lot.

I don't really feel like I need every specific thing broken into its own skill, I just want to know which skill I roll to do a thing and not have to squint to figure it out.

Another thing to note is that while Swim and Climb are rolled rarely, the consolidation into Athletics means more things will get folded into that skill, that don't just involve swimming and climbing. With that, that puts it on the same tier as Social skills, and I'm ok with that being the standard by which we hold our skills to.

I wonder if Athletics will be used for things like kicking down the door now. I never really liked how hard that usually was at higher levels compared to chopping your way through with a sword.

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills?

How about skills under thievery? How many open locks/disable traps vs sleight of hand?

Secondly, this makes social skills worth 2-3 times as much as physical skills. One skill pick either gets you a single social skill whiole it gets you several current skills rolled into one.

Captain Morgan wrote:

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills?

How about skills under thievery? How many open locks/disable traps vs sleight of hand?

Secondly, this makes social skills worth 2-3 times as much as physical skills. One skill pick either gets you a single social skill whiole it gets you several current skills rolled into one.

Definitely a lot more disable device device rolls vs sleight of hand, which is part of why I'm not that worried about losing sleight of hand. When I read thievery, I think "Disable Device with some perks rolled into it if I need to plant something on someone."

And yeah, I mean, that's kind of what I was saying. The social skills feel worth 2-3 times as much as physical skills now. Heck, if you look at the way skill ranks are alloted in PF1, it's much more than 2-3 times. In PF1, if I was trying to make a physical badass, I would usually max acrobatics because it helped me do daring maneuvers and I might max intimidate if I had ranks enough to do it. But I'd usually only put 1 rank in Climb and Swim so I'd get the class skill bonus, and then never touch them again. They just didn't stay relevant long enough to justify more. Largely because they are the sorts of skills the story needs to specifically cater to use at all, not something you can usually initiate independently.

Meanwhile, I can always choose to roll diplomacy, intimidate, or deception. Consequently each of those skills winds up defining my character a lot more than climb or swim ever did.

Resonance, like attunement, does not represent internal magical energy, it is merely how much magic you can take/attune with/resonate with, due to Charisma, as far as I can see.

"What's the resonance level of that Staff of Wizardry? I need a count."

"It's over 20,000! Even Master Ezren doesn't have a resonance count that high!"

:D

This creates serious issues. Making Paladins (known for their Diplomacy) also master liars has a few thematic issues, as does making all good liars also superbly charming.

That's in addition to the problems Mark Seifter mentioned with adding Intimidate in (Trolls are suddenly immensely charming and brilliant liars if all three are one skill, for example).

I tend to agree with you in theory, but at the same time, from this blog post, it seems as if certain functions of different skills are locked behind proficiency levels and/or skill feats. So couldn't the concept of what they've apparently done with Thievery be done with a "Social" skill?

IE, if picking pockets or disabling traps is a function of Thievery that is either available only with a skill feat or a higher level of proficiency, so too could things like Intimidate or Diplomacy. So in your example, the troll might be able to use its Social skill for some powerful Intimidation, but not for diplomacy (at least not nearly as well).

They show examples of one part of athletics making sense while another part doesn't [much like your paladin and diplomacy/intimidate]. Nothing more or less. An aquatic elf that has NEVER climbed a single thing in his life gets better at it if he wants to swim better which makes as much sense as a paladin getting better at intimidation by raising his diplomacy.

As much sense as a desert mountian climber being a great/expert swimmer even though they've never seen a swimmable body of water.

See, those examples are fine, adding animals who lack the limbs necessary to do X makes it really and sincerely weird, though.

It's somehow hard to imagine a dwarf that's good at climbing but not at swimming? Or a locksmith that doesn't pick pockets? Or a street performer/circus magician that has sleight of hand but no lockpicking?

It's not hard to imagine, no. It's hard to imagine how the Dwarf being good at swimming or the street performer being good at picking locks damages their character concept somehow in the way being automatically good at Diplomacy damages a lot of Intimidate characters (ala the Troll example) or Intimidate damages Diplomacy concepts (the utterly harmless seeming but likable character), or Deception damages either (the high Diplomacy Paladin or the hulking Intimidate Barbarian who can't lie).

The only thing that even comes close is the 'desert dweller' example...and that's a problem that's been in the game since PF1. Not something new.

I'm a bit skeptical that you can't imagine such "humanoid fantasy protagonist". Think the Artful Dodger and Fagin, pickpockets that weren't master locksmiths. As to the reverse, take any modern heist film and you have a dedecated safecracker with no 'pickpocketing'.

I have never seen a heist film where the safecracker can't pick pockets. They're definitely better at safecracking, but either them picking pockets never comes up, or they're fine at it.

I also would not find it jarring if the Artful Dodger engaged in a little light burglary. He doesn't, but it would hardly throw me out of the narrative of the book or anything if he did. It is in no way essential to his concept that he can do one and not the other.

For swim, Altair (Assassins Creed) climb/no swim. Abe (oddworld) climb/no swim. Hobbits (The Stoors), the second most numerous, were shorter and stockier and had an affinity for water, boats and swimming. [no mention of also being good at climbing] Peeta Mellark [hunger games] is known for brute strength and over all athletics but sucks at swimming.

I find the Hobbit example dubious (nothing says they can't also climb well), but more importantly, all of these are Climb/Swim examples.

The thing about Climb and Swim is that, in PF1, those are two of the least frequently taken skills (well, at beyond a single rank anyway). Their utility is deeply dubious at anything beyond the lowest levels, and they are thus some of the weakest skills in the game. Combining them is thus pretty much necessary to create a Skill people are actually inclined and willing to take.

Meanwhile, Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate are three of the strongest skills in the game. Taken often and utilized for a wide variety of things. Combining them would make a ridiculously overpowered skill that everyone would almost be forced to take it's so good.

So thematic issues aside, from a game balance perspective combining the social skills is pretty terrible, while combining Climb and Swim is almost necessary.

But let's get back to thematic issues:

Unless you're a desert dweller (and I'll note that even in this case, most deserts in the Inner Sea region have a lot of coast and a seafaring tradition, so learning to swim is very plausible even there), making your expert climber also decent at swimming very rarely damages anything important about how your character interacts with the world. The characters listed are bad at swimming, but in a Pathfinder game, almost nobody is gonna feel that the system is screwing them over or disallowing their concept by making them good at it instead. Being a bad swimmer is not fundamental to who those people are or why you want to play a character like them. This is actually even more true with Disable Device/Picking Pockets.

But forcing your blunt a!$$$@$ Intimidate character to also be good at Diplomacy and Deception, or your naive and wide-eyed Diplomacy character to also be good at Intimidate and Deception? Those fundamentally damage the thematic nature of the characters in question, and for many people will make them deeply dissatisfied with a system that doesn't allow such things.

Or to put it another way: 'Bad at swimming' is not a character trait you roleplay regularly and it is not restrictive to roleplaying to have it be hard/impossible to acquire. 'Bad at lying' or 'bad at making friends' or 'bad at scaring people' all absolutely are character traits that restrict how you can roleplay your character in profound ways that damage suspension of disbelief and disallow major swaths of character concepts.

Indeed, character concepts who are good at all three of those things are far rarer than those that should only be good at one or two. The same cannot be said for the other examples listed.

Deadmanwalking wrote:

This creates serious issues. Making Paladins (known for their Diplomacy) also master liars has a few thematic issues, as does making all good liars also superbly charming.

That's in addition to the problems Mark Seifter mentioned with adding Intimidate in (Trolls are suddenly immensely charming and brilliant liars if all three are one skill, for example).

I tend to agree with you in theory, but at the same time, from this blog post, it seems as if certain functions of different skills are locked behind proficiency levels and/or skill feats. So couldn't the concept of what they've apparently done with Thievery be done with a "Social" skill?

IE, if picking pockets or disabling traps is a function of Thievery that is either available only with a skill feat or a higher level of proficiency, so too could things like Intimidate or Diplomacy. So in your example, the troll might be able to use its Social skill for some powerful Intimidation, but not for diplomacy (at least not nearly as well).

Well, we don't know what Skill Feats or being trained allows for the social skills yet. But they also represent things that anyone can do to some degree or another, even if they do it very badly. 90% or more of society knows nothing of lock picking and would never be able to do it in a reasonable amount of time, but we all can argue, lie, or try to intimidate someone.

In fact, we will probably be forced to do it at some point-- how many times have you been arguing for something with your actual words and the GM told you roll diplomacy? Gating my ability to say words at all with an intended purpose would be bad mechanically, narratively, and realistically. But being able to do stuff like scare people to death or bluff so well the crazy lie sounds like the other person's own idea? Stuff like that works as feats.

I tend to agree with you in theory, but at the same time, from this blog post, it seems as if certain functions of different skills are locked behind proficiency levels and/or skill feats. So couldn't the concept of what they've apparently done with Thievery be done with a "Social" skill?

IE, if picking pockets or disabling traps is a function of Thievery that is either available only with a skill feat or a higher level of proficiency, so too could things like Intimidate or Diplomacy. So in your example, the troll might be able to use its Social skill for some powerful Intimidation, but not for diplomacy (at least not nearly as well).

The issue with this is that it isn't reciprocal. Whichever is stated as the lowest category of the skill will always be possessed by everyone who has the skill at all. So, say Intimidate is the untrained use. You can no longer have Diplomacy characters who aren't scary, and can't have any Skill Feats in intimidating people unless you're also likable. This issue remains whichever usage is considered 'untrained'.

That'd solve this whole issue quite neatly, and not be overly expensive or punitive on such concepts.

Meanwhile, I can always choose to roll diplomacy, intimidate, or deception. Consequently each of those skills winds up defining my character a lot more than climb or swim ever did.

The thing is, this wasn't why the skills where un-combined. It was that having parts of the combined skills that the character shouldn't have that was an issue.

At one point we had it combined one step further, to Influence and Deception, but it just didn't work. Characters needed to be able to be one of diplomatic/intimidating without being the other

It was ALL based on needing characters be one of the skills without the others: hence my asking is it's bad for Influence, what about the other combined skills?

It's hard to imagine how the Dwarf being good at swimming or the street performer being good at picking locks damages their character concept somehow in the way being automatically good at Diplomacy damages a lot of Intimidate characters (ala the Troll example) or Intimidate damages Diplomacy concepts (the utterly harmless seeming but likable character), or Deception damages either (the high Diplomacy Paladin or the hulking Intimidate Barbarian who can't lie).

I have a hard time seeing how either damages things much. An intimidate build is going to take all the nifty feats for THAT aspect of the skill and would only have the basic rolls for other aspects. Hence, they would rarely want to use other forms as they don't have the feat backups.

I have never seen a heist film where the safecracker can't pick pockets.

And I've never seen one that's used the skill. And the reverse is true: I've never seen the pickpocket master step in for the safecracker.

I also would not find it jarring if the Artful Dodger engaged in a little light burglary.

Street orphans that have NEVER seen lock picks and only trained is picking pockets is VERY jarring if they can open locked doors with ease.

Or to put it another way: 'Bad at swimming' is not a character trait you roleplay regularly and it is not restrictive to roleplaying to have it be hard/impossible to acquire.

I recall an AP that was on a boat and I played with a character that didn't have swim and it came up quite a bit as they played up that fact and it came up WAY more often than thier non-existent social skills.

This creates serious issues. Making Paladins (known for their Diplomacy) also master liars has a few thematic issues, as does making all good liars also superbly charming.

That's in addition to the problems Mark Seifter mentioned with adding Intimidate in (Trolls are suddenly immensely charming and brilliant liars if all three are one skill, for example).

I feel compelled to point out that experience with Trolls on Earth (who seem to be quite common in Cyberspace all out of proportion to how often they are seen in person) seems to indicate that they are in fact — if not exactly charming — very proficient at lying and manipulation . . . .

I have a hard time seeing how either damages things much. An intimidate build is going to take all the nifty feats for THAT aspect of the skill and would only have the basic rolls for other aspects. Hence, they would rarely want to use other forms as they don't have the feat backups.

Intimidate doesn't always work. When you need Diplomacy, he'd still be excellent at it, which is rather a problem for at least half of high Intimidate character concepts.

I recall an AP that was on a boat and I played with a character that didn't have swim and it came up quite a bit as they played up that fact and it came up WAY more often than thier non-existent social skills.

Was he really excellent at Climb and did that come up as well? If not, you've just described a character with untrained Athletics in PF2. At least at low levels.

Bardarok wrote:

I threw out this idea on another thread as well but maybe we could have certain lore skills be able to substitute for subsets of other skills...

I'm a bit skeptical at this, because it...

In my previous example I think it would almost always be a mechanicaly less favorable choice to take locksmith lore over theivery but the idea is only of concern for a character that wants the lockpick without the pickpocket. So basically they trade something they actively don't want to have (pickpocket) for something less powerful but more in line with the character (locksmith knowledge). Overall though this is consistant with lore being a weaker skill.

I think that lore has two advantages over the other skills that help make up for it's lower utility. One everyone is trained in a lore skill from their background so one rank is free. And two I expect Lore will be a signature skill for everyone similar to how everyone had profession as a class skill in PF1e.

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills? I think I've rolled more diplomacy checks than swim and climb checks combined. Probably more intimidate checks and deception checks too.

Not sure about the only one, but I pretty much feel the opposite. I have tried to like the Cha-based/social skills for 18-years, luckily I rarely see them used.

[You may never have climbed as a waterborn humanoid, but if you needed to, you'd actually be pretty good at it, just from raw athleticism and body control.

Not really how it works, they are not always translatable, and require different applications. You don't have to be that strong to climb, it's more about balance, leverage, skill (mostly use your legs).

The Acrobatics/Athletics separation can get muddy, to me, as so much Str is required in gymnastics/acrobatics. Basically, most badasses, let's say Bruce Lee, have high Str and Dex, they do not dump one.

GentleGiant wrote:

[You may never have climbed as a waterborn humanoid, but if you needed to, you'd actually be pretty good at it, just from raw athleticism and body control.

Not really how it works, they are not always translatable, and require different applications. You don't have to be that strong to climb, it's more about balance, leverage, skill (mostly use your legs).

The Acrobatics/Athletics separation can get muddy, to me, as so much Str is required in gymnastics/acrobatics. Basically, most badasses, let's say Bruce Lee, have high Str and Dex, they do not dump one.

Yeah, it actually makes much better sense to just put Acrobatics, Climb and Swim in Athletics, instead of the weird divide. If you consider "picking pockets" and "picking locks" and "disarming traps" to be in the same ballpark (and they're not, spoken as someone who can pick locks but not pockets; and disarming traps has nothing to do with either) then those three obviously are. As are Intimidation, Deception and Diplomacy.

I mean, if you want a real life example of people that could climb but not swim, ask all those poor 17th and 18th century sailors, many of whom were adept at climbing the rigging, almost none of which could actually swim.

Adding +level to everything does not make the game fun and playable. Gating swathes of skills behind proficiency levels and feats does not make the game easy and simple.

Initially I didn't like adding +level to everything, but I after thinking about it in the context of the other rules we learned about, I can see it working great. It can make level progression numerically much more predictable, which can have certain benefits. These benefits include easier monster design and the ability for add more diversity in the classes through focusing the design on their exclusive class features.

I also seriously doubt Paizo decided + level to everything for no reason at all. I assume they did playtest this among many other things and that's the best they came up with. Now its quite possible they made a mistake, but they propably perceived that the benefits outway the costs. Ofcourse they may also have had different priorities than you, hence my comment about gaining sth loosing sth.

Regarding gating uses of skills we will see how this works out in game. Its really difficult to predict if it will become unwieldy on the table without actually giving it a try. Something can read complicated but actually play simple.

Now the above won't be true for everyone. But it's true for at least some people. It's why we had the automatic +half level to everything was removed from 5th edition.

I am actually part of the people that are very against to everyone getting half or whatever part of their level to all their skills. I really disliked this about 4th edition and the only reason I leave myself open to accepting it in PF 2 is the 4 level gating of the skills.

Sometimes I do want to play the "good at everything" character (but only great at a smaller group of things). Paizo could still allow character builds that capture that without forcing it on everyone.

Yes but these builds propably couldn't do it to the degree it will be achievable in PF 2 and even if they did it to a satisfying level they propably belonged to a specific set of classes or they had severe drawbacks in their main function in the game.

While you might need to playtest this system yourself, I already have in another game. There is little to no material difference in how Paizo has structured this rule compared with the other game so I see no reason for the reaction for my group to be different. But we will playtest just to be sure.

I actually wouldn't need to playtest a dnd system that simply adds bonus to skills, I know I am so against it that I won't bother. I just find the idea of tiered skills fascinating. Again "fascinating" or "sounds nice" is a long way from "I actually like it".

graystone wrote:

I recall an AP that was on a boat and I played with a character that didn't have swim and it came up quite a bit as they played up that fact and it came up WAY more often than thier non-existent social skills.

Was he really excellent at Climb and did that come up as well? If not, you've just described a character with untrained Athletics in PF2. At least at low levels.

If it's the campaign I think it is climb was incredibly necessary in the early levels. I can't speak for the character's skill of course, but climb would probably have come up a lot in the first act.

ETA: As far as the idea of being bad at a thing, given what we now know about Signature skills, I think it would be interesting to have an option of taking a Drawback (penalty to a skill, flaw to a stat, possibly other flavorful options) at char gen to get an extra signature skill.

My gut response was that I wasn't in favor of the consolidation of some of these skills, in particular athletics, mostly for monster reasons. A giant deep sea anglerfish SHOULDN'T be able to run after the players on land or climb a tree.

BUT...it seems like an easy solution to this would just to be incorporate rules like this into the subtype. If creatures with the aquatic subtype simply are incapable of locomotion outside the water, than this never has to come up.

The player side of things is trickier. As some have argued, if people don't really invest much into climb or swim anyway, than consolidation really doesn't matter.

It also to me doesn't seem super unrealistic that say, someone untrained might be able to do these things, even if they are from the desert. Water does exist in and around deserts, and it to me doesn't seem implausible that even a member of a nomadic desert tribe hasn't ever had an opportunity to wade into a sea/oasis/river. Especially since many important trade cities and outposts in such environments are situated around permanent water sources. And climbing, hell most of us have had to do some climbing in our life, even if it's not mountaineering.

Captain Morgan wrote:

Am I the only one that feels like charisma based skills are way more character defining than the strength based skills? I think I've rolled more diplomacy checks than swim and climb checks combined. Probably more intimidate checks and deception checks too.

Not sure about the only one, but I pretty much feel the opposite. I have tried to like the Cha-based/social skills for 18-years, luckily I rarely see them used.

But you're rolling Climb and Swim checks out the wazoo? That's interesting.

I know you can have a game where the social skills are irrelevant, but it either requires just not talking to anyone ever, or completely letting role play replace the skill. Functionally allowing a player to leverage their real life charisma in place of their character's score. I tend to give bonuses to such attempts myself as a DM, but I don't let it replace rolling entirely.

Meanwhile, swim checks and climb checks tend to be things that only happen when something has gone horribly wrong, in my experience. Like you've been knocked off of the ship and need to avoid being pulled under and then climb back up. You can create opportunities to roll social skills as a player, but you can't make a body of water manifest on command. And spells like Fly have much less severe consequences than Charm Person, so it is easier for magic to replace strength based skills.

I mean, if you want a real life example of people that could climb but not swim, ask all those poor 17th and 18th century sailors, many of whom were adept at climbing the rigging, almost none of which could actually swim.

Ha, yep, hence why walking the plank was so feared.

Deadmanwalking wrote:

graystone wrote:

I recall an AP that was on a boat and I played with a character that didn't have swim and it came up quite a bit as they played up that fact and it came up WAY more often than thier non-existent social skills.

Was he really excellent at Climb and did that come up as well? If not, you've just described a character with untrained Athletics in PF2. At least at low levels.

If it's the campaign I think it is climb was incredibly necessary in the early levels. I can't speak for the character's skill of course, but climb would probably have come up a lot in the first act.

ETA: As far as the idea of being bad at a thing, given what we now know about Signature skills, I think it would be interesting to have an option of taking a Drawback (penalty to a skill, flaw to a stat, possibly other flavorful options) at char gen to get an extra signature skill.

I think they want to avoid this because suddenly options like these become, not flavorable character options, but required for specific optimized builds. Being able to go to Master and Legendary on an extra skill is a pretty powerful option at high levels potentially.

Now the above won't be true for everyone. But it's true for at least some people. It's why we had the automatic +half level to everything was removed from 5th edition.

Really, I was involved in the playtest, and do not recall a playtest packet that included +1/2 level to anything; can you point at which packet/part of the 5th Ed playtest where +1/2 level was a thing?

I prefer +1/2 level for 3rd Ed/PF1, in place of BAB, saving throw bonuses, spell DCs, etc.

Elfteiroh wrote:

Pan wrote:

GentleGiant wrote:

Pan wrote:

If you were to simply remove the universal level progression to skills, would you have to do anything but adjust higher level DCs?

Yes, you'd have to explain why skills break away from functioning the same as all the other proficiency abilities in the game.

Easy. I prefer skills improving by the choices you make during leveling via proficiency, not just because you leveled. Bumping stats every 5 levels is enough, for me, to show leveling growth outside of choice. The universal progression is just a little too much for my tastes.

The problem would then become that unless you constantly use these bumps in Athletics/Acrobatics, you'll have trouble succeeding when doing combat maneuvers.

Also, the fact they made skills work the same as all other proficiencies is to make it possible to swap these for skills, probably with feats. It'll also make most initiatives rolls bad UNLESS it's the default perception roll, or that skill is maxed and the lvl at or not too far above 1, 5, 10, 15 or 20 (if the bumps are at each 5 lvls).

Not shutting down your idea, BTW, just pointing the possible other tuning you should think of with the info we currently have.

No, see this is helpful, thank you. The more I think about it, stripping the universal level progression out entirely sounds like an easier way to go about this. I dont really see what it adds besides number treadmill. Why not rely entirely on proficiency that players get to choose for everything?

The only problem with stripping out universal level progression from everything is that "everything" goes a long way. It's built into the bestiaries, and the spells, and the hitpoint calculations. If you don't get +Level to hit then enemies shouldn't get +Level to AC, etc.

You either have to choose "treadmill" or "no treadmill." If you choose to play on a treadmill then enemies will "magically scale" to be level appropriate. If you take out the treadmill then level 1 characters could pose a threat to a lvl 20 character.

I know you don't like a lvl 20 character out-skilling a lvl 1 character in all cases, but the result of not adding +Level to everything is that a level 1 character beats a lvl 20 character, who by now is effectively a demigod.

You could take +Level out of untrained, but then what happens when someone is untrained in AC or swordfighting? The wizard is probably untrained, but that doesn't fit the fantasy trope at all: Gandalf is still pretty good with a sword.

I think that you should play the game as presented and see what you think of it then. Paizo has been working on this game for years, I would tend to trust that all this love they're giving it will make it an excellent game.

The issue with "Swim is only relevant for a few levels" is actually another reason why in the other thread I proposed combining it with Fly, rather than Swim with Climb and Fly with Acrobatics. Fly IS relevant at higher levels, while conversely less relevant at lower levels. And swimming is much closer to flying in how the body is used and moves through the nonsolid medium; a number of birds literally "fly" underwater. It would continue to have relevance in zero-gravity planar environments.

That also better represents the vast number of people and animals who can climb but not swim or vice versa. And it doesn't particularly hurt Athletics to lose Swim or hurt Acrobatics to lose Fly when they're both still strong skills that are also between them used for most of the combat maneuvers in PF2.

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Now, maybe my experience is unusual. I'd be happy to hear from people who have had this experience, and interested in what context it came up in, that's why I'm asking the question, but I've never seen it.

The only problem with stripping out universal level progression from everything is that "everything" goes a long way. It's built into the bestiaries, and the spells, and the hitpoint calculations. If you don't get +Level to hit then enemies shouldn't get +Level to AC, etc.

You either have to choose "treadmill" or "no treadmill." If you choose to play on a treadmill then enemies will "magically scale" to be level appropriate. If you take out the treadmill then level 1 characters could pose a threat to a lvl 20 character.

I know you don't like a lvl 20 character out-skilling a lvl 1 character in all cases, but the result of not adding +Level to everything is that a level 1 character beats a lvl 20 character, who by now is effectively a demigod.

You could take +Level out of untrained, but then what happens when someone is untrained in AC or swordfighting? The wizard is probably untrained, but that doesn't fit the fantasy trope at all: Gandalf is still pretty good with a sword.

I think that you should play the game as presented and see what you think of it then. Paizo has been working on this game for years, I would tend to trust that all this love they're giving it will make it an excellent game.

My issue isnt with Gandalf being good with a sword. Its with every wizard ever being good with a sword. Sure you can pretend your character isnt, or you can even roleplay failing forward, I just have an issue with it being ever present in the system. I want choices to matter, and there to be differences in characters based on choices, not simple level progression. I get that folks can grok universal skill progression because they saw a horse climb a tree once, but its too much of a cognitive dissonance for me to get over.

With that said, its a matter of preference and not mechanics. In this case, the Paizo folks have chosen a path i'm not good with. So I just want to thank folks for the discussion and I don't intend to derail any further.

-cheers

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Have I seen players complain about not being able to be bad at X? Not so much.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

I've absolutely seen this as well, but IME it has a lot less to do with the specific skill list available and more with the degree of mechanical divergence between characters and the number of meaningful choices they get to make in regards to their characters' stats.

A Class based system combined with Skill Feats (and all the other Feats available) seems tailor made to not cause this particular complaint.

For example, from what we've heard if you want to be a better swimmer than all those other people with Athletics you can easily invest in a Skill Feat and be flat-out better. The only issue is if you want to be notably worse, which is not a distinction most players particularly want in regards to something as narrow and non personality-focused as swimming ability, IME.

My issue isnt with Gandalf being good with a sword. Its with every wizard ever being good with a sword. Sure you can pretend your character isnt, or you can even roleplay failing forward, I just have an issue with it being ever present in the system. I want choices to matter, and there to be differences in characters based on choices, not simple level progression.

All wizards are good with swords* in PF1 as well; a 10th level wizard has a higher BAB than most any Earthly warrior NPC**.

*assuming they take a proficiency feat, of course, just as they should in PF2

**won't be higher than 4th or 5th level.

***assuming, like PF1, that locks can't be attempted untrained.

Well, there are people that claim to enjoy role-playing a flaw-- effectively being worse at whatever thing. The problem is those folks only seem to think it can be justified if it makes them marginally better at what they already wanted to be good at. So I think they aren't into the flaw part of that equation so much.

Deadmanwalking wrote:

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Have I seen players complain about not being able to be bad at X? Not so much.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

Signature skills and skill feats will help a lot with this I think.

Deadmanwalking wrote:

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Have I seen players complain about not being able to be bad at X? Not so much.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

Yes, that is a big problem for me in 4th Ed, but that has a lot to do with the AEDU system, every 1st-level character (pre-Essentials) basically has at least 2 cantrips, a power they can use every 5-minutes, and a Vancian spell.

Pan wrote:

My issue isnt with Gandalf being good with a sword. Its with every wizard ever being good with a sword. Sure you can pretend your character isnt, or you can even roleplay failing forward, I just have an issue with it being ever present in the system. I want choices to matter, and there to be differences in characters based on choices, not simple level progression.

All wizards are good with swords* in PF1 as well; a 10th level wizard has a higher BAB than most any Earthly warrior NPC**.

Certain aspects of characters have always been automatic rather than choice. The choices now are even less in the numbers than the feats and unlocks.
You may not choose that +20 to thievery, but you absolutely choose mechanically whether or not that bonus can actually be used to pick locks***.

*assuming they take a proficiency feat, of course, just as they should in PF2

**won't be higher than 4th or 5th level.

***assuming, like PF1, that locks can't be attempted untrained.

Off loading the difference to feats has many pitfalls. It could work or it could make things worse. Guess we will see in August.

I've ran games with players who had characters that were literally quasi-omnipotent gods (in a different system) that still managed to be incompetent in just the ways the player wanted them to be.

So count me in on the doesn't quite understand the "I can't be bad at stuff complaint." Even if my one Paladin had a +30 perception modifier, I would still play her as half-blind and absentminded.

In PF1, everyone has a chance to roll for untrained skills at low levels. At high levels, untrained characters get effectively locked out from attempting checks with those same skills. That transition is particularly unfun for lower skill characters.

I like that PF2 eliminates that slow transition. All levels are now "anyone can try with a low chance to succeed" for those untrained uses of skills. Trained, expert, and master uses of skills remain about the same experience.

I've ran games with players who had characters that were literally quasi-omnipotent gods (in a different system) that still managed to be incompetent in just the ways the player wanted them to be.

So count me in on the doesn't quite understand the "I can't be bad at stuff complaint." Even if my one Paladin had a +30 perception modifier, I would still play her as half-blind and absentminded.

Except when perception checks come up, she isn’t.

PossibleCabbage wrote:

I've ran games with players who had characters that were literally quasi-omnipotent gods (in a different system) that still managed to be incompetent in just the ways the player wanted them to be.

So count me in on the doesn't quite understand the "I can't be bad at stuff complaint." Even if my one Paladin had a +30 perception modifier, I would still play her as half-blind and absentminded.

Except when perception checks come up, she isn’t.

"I'm honestly not really paying attention" and opt not to roll.

PossibleCabbage wrote:

I've ran games with players who had characters that were literally quasi-omnipotent gods (in a different system) that still managed to be incompetent in just the ways the player wanted them to be.

So count me in on the doesn't quite understand the "I can't be bad at stuff complaint." Even if my one Paladin had a +30 perception modifier, I would still play her as half-blind and absentminded.

Except when perception checks come up, she isn’t.

Only if she chooses to attempt one.

Off loading the difference to feats has many pitfalls. It could work or it could make things worse. Guess we will see in August.

We shall, avatar twin, we shall :)

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Now, maybe my experience is unusual. I'd be happy to hear from people who have had this experience, and interested in what context it came up in, that's why I'm asking the question, but I've never seen it.

I think that the closest thing would be the guy complaining about the excessive combat competence of his str 10 Oracle.

As none of his character in several kind of games ever did physical activities, the question has never ben discussed.

Well, there are people that claim to enjoy role-playing a flaw-- effectively being worse at whatever thing. The problem is those folks only seem to think it can be justified if it makes them marginally better at what they already wanted to be good at. So I think they aren't into the flaw part of that equation so much.

I concur.

In PF1, everyone has a chance to roll for untrained skills at low levels. At high levels, untrained characters get effectively locked out from attempting checks with those same skills. That transition is particularly unfun for lower skill characters.

I like that PF2 eliminates that slow transition. All levels are now "anyone can try with a low chance to succeed" for those untrained uses of skills. Trained, expert, and master uses of skills remain about the same experience.

^This is it in a nutshell.

Have I seen players complain about not being able to be bad at X? Not so much.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

Much more often in my experiences, is that if there was a skill that was required of the whole group, such as a difficult climb check, or a social interaction, I just voluntarily sat it out, because I had no hope in Hells of succeeding anywhere near the level that others in the party could, and in fact would likely work to the detriment of the group if I attempted it. In practice, this means I didn't participate in anywhere from a good 10 to 60 minutes of the session, because the key scores I was so terrible at were gateway skills for the whole next x minutes of the session.

At least with a minimum baseline skill level at a given skill due to level, I could attempt to do something that allows me to still stay with the group and keep participating in the adventure.

This is not just "bad GM adventure design," either; I've seen skill challenges written into APs regularly that required a minimum of skill to participate in - a secret alcove in the ceiling that required climbing to reach; a skill challenge involving multiple skill rolls where we must convince an NPC to come over to supporting us; a stealth challenge to get into a building unseen so that information could be uncovered. There are always plenty of skills that the oracle, or cleric, or wizard, will suck at; if you need to sneak into that building, then the Rogue and the Slayer are GOING to be going in without divine support, because my Lame Oracle of Life is going to be sitting out here because he can't make a DC 15 Stealth check, thank you very much - or we have to wait till tomorrow so the Wizard can prepare Invisibility twice to get me and him in.

I'm all for giving people moments to shine with their own talents they've invested in, but this particular feature of the system means that at least once in every AP, one or two players are playing a mini-game that they are the sole players for for anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour. It's like the old complaint in 2nd edition Shadowrun where people used to complain because every time a hacking mission was involved, it was basically a solo game for the Decker player for an hour.

I've honestly rarely had people in other game systems that use general skill increases complain about lack of individuality, because there were dozens of other traits that made them different, whether it was how they dispatched enemies, or their motivations, or their character flaws. Most commonly I ever saw it was in a case where a fellow gamer INTENTIONALLY frequently copied another player's PC at the table, because they had this subconscious game of one-upsmanship they seemed to be playing. Player 2 would build a Sorcerer with some cool tricks, Player 1 would build a Wizard heavily optimized for the exact same tasks; 2 built a Cleric, 1 built a BETTER cleric, who was specialized in all the same skills. In the end we all sat down and had a grownup conversation. :)

I have a serious question here, which I'm going to bold for emphasis:

Has anyone here ever actually had a player complain because they couldn't be bad at X if they were good at Y outside of the social skills?

Because I've been playing RPGs for more than 15 years in almost every context possible with what must be hundreds of different people by now
if you include one shots (I ran LARPs for a while in there, and gamed at cons), and dozens of different systems (some of which had more consolidated skill systems than PF2, some more diversified than D&D 3.0 ever dreamed of being) and I have literally never seen this happen. IME this is a pure theorycraft problem rather than something actual players complain about or have issues with.

Now, maybe my experience is unusual. I'd be happy to hear from people who have had this experience, and interested in what context it came up in, that's why I'm asking the question, but I've never seen it.

I don't think the way you have framed the question is fair. But I'll say that I definitely have. Now, I have to say that I've been playing mostly PF for the 10 years now and so, it isn't much of a problem.

But in other systems I've strongly noticed when the opportunity to actually solve a problem was stolen from the group because streamlined systems made them to good at things that were not part of character concept but got grossly lumped in with things which were part of the character concept.

Fuzzypaws wrote:

Have I seen players complain about not being able to be bad at X? Not so much.

Have I seen players complain because everyone felt too homogenous and no one could stand out very much from anyone else? ABSOLUTELY.

Much more often in my experiences, is that if there was a skill that was required of the whole group, such as a difficult climb check, or a social interaction, I just voluntarily sat it out, because I had no hope in Hells of succeeding anywhere near the level that others in the party could, and in fact would likely work to the detriment of the group if I attempted it. In practice, this means I didn't participate in anywhere from a good 10 to 60 minutes of the session, because the key scores I was so terrible at were gateway skills for the whole next x minutes of the session.

At least with a minimum baseline skill level at a given skill due to level, I could attempt to do something that allows me to still stay with the group and keep participating in the adventure.

This is not just "bad GM adventure design," either; I've seen skill challenges written into APs regularly that required a minimum of skill to participate in - a secret alcove in the ceiling that required climbing to reach; a skill challenge involving multiple skill rolls where we must convince an NPC to come over to supporting us; a stealth challenge to get into a building unseen so that information could be uncovered. There are always plenty of skills that the oracle, or cleric, or wizard, will suck at; if you need to sneak into that building, then the Rogue and the Slayer are GOING to be going in without divine support, because my Lame Oracle of Life is going to be sitting out here because he can't make a DC 15 Stealth check, thank you very much - or we have to wait till tomorrow so the Wizard can prepare Invisibility twice to get me and him in.

I'm all for giving people moments to shine with their own talents they've invested in, but this particular feature of the system means that at...

Assisted checks really help with all that. It is always a frustration that the +50 stealth god's investment was ruined because there will always be a -3 stealth party member, since the enemy only has to see one of you. It's also no fun constantly leaving behind a party member because they have no chance on succeeding on the needed checks, nor to be left behind.

There are several house rules I've seen to deal with that, such as averaging the highest and lowest skill check for the party. Edge of the Empire's dice system allows for a really great use for this. Success and failure negate one another, so you only need one success. Any excess success can be given to the other party members. So if the two low stealth members fail by one but the high stealth member succeeds by more than two, the entire party is considered to succeed.

I believe there was mention of such an ability being tied to proficiency level or skill feats.

This is not just "bad GM adventure design," either; I've seen skill challenges written into APs regularly that required a minimum of skill to participate in - a secret alcove in the ceiling that required climbing to reach; a skill challenge involving multiple skill rolls where we must convince an NPC to come over to supporting us; a stealth challenge to get into a building unseen so that information could be uncovered. There are always plenty of skills that the oracle, or cleric, or wizard, will suck at; if you need to sneak into that building, then the Rogue and the Slayer are GOING to be going in without divine support, because my Lame Oracle of Life is going to be sitting out here because he can't make a DC 15 Stealth check, thank you very much - or we have to wait till tomorrow so the Wizard can prepare Invisibility twice to get me and him in.

It could be argued that you have said it isn't bad adventure design, and then turned around and described bad adventure design.

In my personal, but strongly held opinion, no system can anticipate everything and system that try create more problems than they solve. At some point there must be a meeting between the adventure in question and the merits of the GM to balance the need to make the players feel a true sense of challenge while also creating a sense of the characters are stars of the show.

Your lame oracle of life should be able to overcome. But if the system says your lame oracle of life is still quite capable of sneaking by then the system has robbed you of being a *LAME* oracle of life. If there is no reasonable way to solve the problem, then it is something between bad design and poor facilitation by the GM. If it is overextension of resources or some other group choice that put the group in the situation that they can't overcome this challenge with what they have left, then maybe that is just a good system of rewarding success by allowing failure to have consequences.

I don't think the way you have framed the question is fair.

I'm sorry you feel that way. It seemed the proper way to phrase the question I was asking.

But I'll say that I definitely have. Now, I have to say that I've been playing mostly PF for the 10 years now and so, it isn't much of a problem.

PF1 isn't where I'd expect to find the issue even if it occurred, I must admit.

But in other systems I've strongly noticed when the opportunity to actually solve a problem was stolen from the group because streamlined systems made them to good at things that were not part of character concept but got grossly lumped in with things which were part of the character concept.

Could you possibly be more specific and give some actual examples?

See, I'm trying to come up with non-social examples of this that players would find unpleasant and detrimental to their game experience and failing. Which means I'd be really happy if you could provide an example so I know we're on the same page as discussion goes forward, and we can have a productive discussion of how to avoid that issue in PF2.

Could you possibly be more specific and give some actual examples?

See, I'm trying to come up with non-social examples of this that players would find unpleasant and detrimental to their game experience and failing. Which means I'd be really happy if you could provide an example so I know we're on the same page as discussion goes forward, and we can have a productive discussion of how to avoid that issue in PF2.

"Just cuz I can fly a plane, doesn't mean that I can fly a helicopter."

etc. etc.

For my part, I think broad competency in many related fields is a perfectly acceptable fantasy/superhero trope. Even if it does not fit every narrative that people want, I think the collapsed skills is a good game mechanic.

"Just cuz I can fly a plane, doesn't mean that I can fly a helicopter."

"Just because I am a biologist doesn't mean that I can perform first aide well"

The first lacks applicability to Pathfinder, making it not super useful as a discussion point. The second is actually separate skills in PF2 (Nature and Medicine), and in most other systems as well.

For my part, I think broad competency in many related fields is a perfectly acceptable fantasy/superhero trope. Even if it does not fit every narrative that people want, I think the collapsed skills is a good game mechanic.

I tend to agree, but there's some room to fiddle around and make things a little better for people with these issues if people actually have an issue with them in play. It's that second part I'm skeptical of in regards to several of the theorycrafted examples given thus far.

Which is why I'm looking for real issues people have had in this regard in real games.