Feats of Skill

Question: for those who feel that Legendary skills are too close to mythic, what are your proposed alternatives, and how do they remain somewhat impressive compared to things like 6th-8th level spells?

1. I'm merely answering your question. I don't think this will happen in PF2.

2. Since PF2 is a new edition, theoretically significant changes could/can be considered.

We're not talking about "un-inventing" nuclear fusion or gunpowder here. Stats, for example increased dramatically for PCs over original incarnations of the game. Skill systems, feats, and other features were added to the game.

Similarly, if something was out of whack, unwieldy, or overly complicated, like say, the action economy those rules can be changed with a new edition.

So the basic premise of "how to make martials relevant against higher level spells" starts with the faulty premise that spells and magic can't be rebalanced downward. Fly becomes a 4th or 5th level spell. Raise Dead becomes 7th level and Resurrection becomes a 10th level spell.

Again - I'm not saying it will happen. I'm saying that it's one possible way of balancing the scales without throwing legendary into Wile E Coyote falling off of cliff territory. (And Wile E at least craters in the ground and has to dust himself off...)

"But Fly has been a 3rd level spell since the earliest versions of the game!", etc. Since the game evolved out of wargaming roots and a lot of those "legacy" spells were designed specifically when the game was "confined" to the dungeon, that doesn't really mean much.

Actual industry example: Mythic rules. Mythic was the option that Paizo explored differently than D&D's Epic Level Handbook because Epic (under 3.5) broke the math of the game (Paizo staff comments/assessment, not mine). In PF1, feats, spells, and magic items were introduced. Some were modified with errata, etc. because they were too good. (See numerous "nerf" threads and countless "Paizo nerfed my favorite X" posts.) Sometimes, to improve something you dial in down/back.

Again (3rd time) - not saying it'll happen. But it would be a possible design choice, so it's a bit of a miscalculation to assume that PF1 spellcaster power levels are cast in stone as the baseline for anything in PF2.

...also, Resonance.

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. By definition everything the protagonists do and say affects narrative (though I suspect you may be using a nonstandard definition of that term).

PS. It did, briefly, occur to me that you meant 'directly', but very few Spells actually do that in PF1 and none of the Skill Feats previewed for PF2 do so I remain puzzled.

The king the party requires add from is ill and they plan to heal him to earn his favour.

High Level Party of just non-magical 1e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to try to cure the king over a few weeks, or they can go on an arduous quest to get a healing macguffin or certain rare herbs or something.

High Level Party with a cleric in it: Casts remove disease.

High Level Party with a wizard in it: Calls an angel, who then casts remove disease.

High Level Party of just non-magical 2e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to cure the king over a few hours.

Tuning Pathfinder down to a game where nobody can do anything extraordinary just means Pathfinder would be competing directly with 5e for the same set of people. That is not a fight Paizo wins. Doubling down on Pathfinder being a place were Cool People Do Cool Things means they can cater to those of us who think 5e's paradigm is dreadfully dull.

I don't think any of us believe that magic users are going to be gimped to close the gap with martials, so we need to boost the martial to be able to compete with high level magic users.

I do, for what has been revealed so far I think casters are being nerfed, the actual playtest documents will reveal how much

Tuning Pathfinder down to a game where nobody can do anything extraordinary just means Pathfinder would be competing directly with 5e for the same set of people. That is not a fight Paizo wins. Doubling down on Pathfinder being a place were Cool People Do Cool Things means they can cater to those of us who think 5e's paradigm is dreadfully dull.

There is quite a lot of room between these legendary feats and ‘nobody do can do anything extraordinary’ just saying. That is sort of a false dichotomy.

Arachnofiend wrote:

Tuning Pathfinder down to a game where nobody can do anything extraordinary just means Pathfinder would be competing directly with 5e for the same set of people. That is not a fight Paizo wins. Doubling down on Pathfinder being a place were Cool People Do Cool Things means they can cater to those of us who think 5e's paradigm is dreadfully dull.

There is quite a lot of room between these legendary feats and ‘nobody do can do anything extraordinary’ just saying. That is sort of a false dichotomy.

And yet, why would Paizo no cater to the people who wants Legendary stuff in their games? looks like it doesn't have much competition

DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

The biggest complaint I hear from my players when we get to high levels is from the martials/skilled characters (fighters/rogue types) saying that they don't feel they are contributing enough to the narrative. They regret their class choice because without spells they are barely able to nudge the needle as far as narrative is concerned.

So PF2e is directly addressing this issue, which is definitely not localized to my table (see every thread about caster/martial disparity), and people are mad that martials can do rad things and how dare they include this in the core rulebook instead of relegating it to a later book that can be safely ignored (you know like Mythic was).

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. By definition everything the protagonists do and say affects narrative (though I suspect you may be using a nonstandard definition of that term).

Naturally, every PC does impact the narrative, but the folks Dudemeister is talking about feel that their impact is negligible relative to that of casters at high level. I think that assessment is correct. It's the most common and old complaint about the game, and in my opinion, a major reason why the first couple of books of any AP see a lot more play than the end book.

PS. It did, briefly, occur to me that you meant 'directly', but very few Spells actually do that in PF1 and none of the Skill Feats previewed for PF2 do so I remain puzzled.

Short list of spells that directly change the narrative of the story: Discern Lies, Find the Path, Heal, Resurrection, Teleport, True Seeing. This is just a small sample of the most famous ones. There is nothing any of the martials can do that comes close in terms of story impact.

And, indeed, the Skill Feats reviewed so far don't match that impact either (except possibly Legendary Medic). Still, they feel like something of import a non-caster can do, closing some of the gap. If top-tier spells get a bit of a tweak down at the same time, then we may get somewhere that doesn't feel so grossly unbalanced anymore.

Combat Monster wrote:

at something that wasn't intitally directed at you in particular.

You literally posted "I'd appreciate it if you quit trying to dissuade Paizo from including stuff you don't like when the simple answer is to not use it if you and your table don't want it" in response to one of my posts.

You weren't quoted in it. Why do you think it was in response to you in particular?

Maybe you should have corrected Combat Monster's misconceptions about your position instead of making this post.

how will paizo garner playtest feedback? Forum threads like on the forums here or website surveys with email login or IP address?

how will paizo garner playtest feedback? Forum threads like on the forums here or website surveys with email login or IP address?

Paizo is pretty strict about people only having one login on this site. If they discover the same person has more than one account, they take action.

So, forum threads here are just as secure for the one-person=one alias as email addresses are (you can't create more than one account with an email address).

And IP addresses are useless for identifying posters. Three different people posting from the same coffee shop would show the same IP address. IP addresses are also not locked to a single geographic address.

I can change my home IP address just by rebooting my router. My ISP uses dynamic address assignments, so the IP address I have today could be in use by someone else tomorrow.

It sounds like you're worried about one person having a lot of aliases and voting multiple times. This site already polices that just about as well as anyone can.

Not worried, just thread post feedback seem clumsy as a way of gaining feedback. I'd prefer a website survey system, last page a comments section if someone wanted too.

Like reading this thread for skill feats...what are they going to take away from it? 15 vocal pro this or that and 5 dont like it, strung out through 500 posts...yeah that's a good system to parse through as 2 games designers on the same system might take away different changes that need to be worked on.

I'm confident that Paizo staff will ask for the kind of feedback they find most useful, and will make sure the method they use to collect that feedback works for their needs.

I am pretty sure that the feedback is going to concern more than forum posts on this board. That said, there is a lot to learn from various outlooks that post on this forum and the feedback is sure to be more coherent when the players get an actual look at the rules and see them in play.

Combat Monster wrote:

I don't think any of us believe that magic users are going to be gimped to close the gap with martials, so we need to boost the martial to be able to compete with high level magic users.

I do, for what has been revealed so far I think casters are being nerfed, the actual playtest documents will reveal how much

I'd probably prefer to call it a rebalance or a retooling than strictly a nerf. If Mark's opinions are to be trusted, then the new cantrips are actually *useful*. While that's not an upgrade in peak power, it's definitely a buff to consistency, something casters have always lacked.

On top of that, casters still get the really awesome spells, only less often per adventuring day. As a player, I kind of don't want to breeze through everything, and having to *seriously* ration spell slots will be good for the game. However, casters won't feel useless on the "off turns " because cantrips actually do something.

I believe the way Mark put it was: "Casters can feasibly cast a spell every turn (thos includes cantrips) if that's how they want to play the game." I really like the new paradigm.

BPorter, you're not alone in your views. I was thinking more about the example Legendary skill abilities, and what came to mind is that they felt like great examples of what Mythic rules might look like in PF2, but aren't something I want in the core rules. I strongly believe that there's room in the game for full 20th level high fantasy support without it simply becoming mythic.

By adding "mythic" style legendary rules into core, I strongly feel like it's getting peanut butter in my chocolate. I might like both separately, but don't necessarily like them combined (which admittedly wasn't the point of the Reeses Peanut But Cup commercials). It's great to have these types of abilities as an add on system for games that want to emulate characters becommming demi-gods and such, but please keep it out of my high fantasy heroism default game.

then remove either casters or martials from the game. CMD is really that bad.

I feel like i should chime in after reader several pages of comments before i went with the prediction that "uh-oh, someone is going to champion their anti-legendary mindset".

Seriously though legendary skills are what does you over? Your 30+ Strenght Barbarian that can cleave deamons and titans alike, Your rogue that can sneak past a beholder, a bard that can sing the gods to tears, and you now feel like the game is getting out of hand because the Acrobat now inherently can do at lvl 15+ what you could do with a 1k gp item? (Abeit it reduced all fall damage die to 1, but after you get 26 HP this is a non-issue really)

Still i dont see the argument why legendary skill-feats would be so immersion breaking after Level 15 that litterally everyone in the party can single-handly wipe out several lower tier devils, Challenge demi-gods to fisticuffs and threaten cities and gods alike.

Even after several suggestions to how you can limit this in your own game i see the comments is still on-going and i just have to ask: What are you actually trying to champion here?

Look up what they mean with "Legendary", and see now that you now actually can be a legend on the par with Hercules, Beowulf, Conan, Carmen Sandiego and Dora the Explorer. And here we are complaining about realism in a game where you basically walk hand-in-hand with gods already from Level 1.

Wow, people, it's still only a game... and we haven't even hit the official playtest stage yet! I would reserve judgement until we can put everything into proper perspective, i.e. when the book is out.

In my opinion these skill feats are exactly what is needed. I like that my high-level fighter might identify fifty different spells and a hundred devious traps, but he can't counter or dismantle them. He might advise a young low-level wizard or a bard on what some nearly undecipherable runes mean and how they're related to ancient Thassilon, but that comes from life experience and his long talks with his friends at a thousand campfires. Skill feats allow the low-level wizard and bard to do things my fighter can't, because he's not actually proficient in Arcana.

So, I really love these skill feats! And regardless of how people feel about Legendary stuff and complain about it breaking their immersion, let's remember that most campaigns (the vast majority, IIRC) never hit those levels! And even if you hate 'em and are running a high-level game, Pathfinder is truly modular in the sense that you can actually ignore certain mechanics and/or replace them with other components. I'm fairly sure that there will be some sort of guidelines for this, in the same sense 5E allows you to ignore the whole feat system.

Combat Monster wrote:

I don't think any of us believe that magic users are going to be gimped to close the gap with martials, so we need to boost the martial to be able to compete with high level magic users.

I do, for what has been revealed so far I think casters are being nerfed, the actual playtest documents will reveal how much

I think casters will be reigned in a bit, but it's been said that 10th level spells including Wish exist. I'm sure the idea is to have casters doing incredible stuff alongside martials.

Combat Monster wrote:

I'm sorry you're still crying yourself to sleep

Very classy. That one sure did sting!

Combat Monster wrote:

at something that wasn't intitally directed at you in particular.

You literally posted "I'd appreciate it if you quit trying to dissuade Paizo from including stuff you don't like when the simple answer is to not use it if you and your table don't want it" in response to one of my posts.

You also posted "Maybe what I should have said is 'Yo, quit trying to take away toys because you don't like them.'" when I never said Paizo had to "take away" anything. I said I wouldn't use it at my table.

So if you feel you were just being conversational, sharing your inclusive attitude, and encouraging playtest feedback and don't think you were out of line, then I hope your Congeniality award is on its way.

I'm also having a really hard time believing that if I or anyone else had told you to "quit trying to dissuade Paizo from including stuff you don't like" that you'd be all "sure, no problem".

I'm sure you'll get over it.

As it is, King of Anything hit it on the head. I saw a number of people who even after being told that Legendary stuff could be easily bypassed wanted to push for it to not be included at all. You were one of a number whose close mindedness irked me.

I don't think I said to shut the hell up. I was more or less saying that people who want to remove options should take a break, because more options don't hurt them.

Honestly, I don't think a loud minority is going to get Paizo to not include stuff in the playtest. I also don't think they'll get Legendary removed for 2nd edition. "It hurts my sensibilities" isn't going to dissuade Paizo from implementing it. You're gonna have to find some major balance issues with it, so good luck. A martial surviving a large fall or a rogue stealing gear isn't anything compared to what casters do.

Also, you can bet I'm going to be pushing for martials to be flying around chucking boulders at the monsters.

Also, you can bet I'm going to be pushing for martials to be flying around chucking boulders at the monsters.

Myself, I want to chuck monsters at boulders. Say hello to my sharktopus missile! ;)

Combat Monster wrote:

Also, you can bet I'm going to be pushing for martials to be flying around chucking boulders at the monsters.

Myself, I want to chuck monsters at boulders. Say hello to my sharktopus missile! ;)

I want to grab that thing by the tentacles and fling it into orbit.

For those asking about the feedback plan in this thread a short ways back, Paizo has given us a basic plan that heavily includes links to surveys that are written for each phase of the playtest, which will stress test different sections in different time windows (but the surveys will absolutely be still available for 'Phase X' even if we're up to 'Phase Z' at the time you can playtest and answer), in combination with forum postings. The surveys will help give them mathematically crunchable data and comment boxes in the survey as well as forum threads will give them more details and descriptions of the actual events being commented on.

Then they will be telling us about what they found out and what they're changing based on that feedback as they go along (I think they will lean into their Twitch stream, esp on Fridays, for this but likely forums as well).

They've asked that players NOT read the survey before playing the part of the playtest adventure that is being targeted, but that the GMs who are going to run that section DO need to read it so they know what kind of data Paizo is seeking from the GM so they can notate it as they run the session.

My take on it is this. Many people want martials to be cool. I don't think any of us believe that magic users are going to be gimped to close the gap with martials, so we need to boost the martial to be able to compete with high level magic users.

I think that the spellcaster have been gimped to close part of the gap.

I appreciate that the power of specific spells seem to have been reined in (at least from what we have read so far).

Like way less than the direct damage dealt by spells (when non boosted by feats) has been reduced. The problem in PF1 wasn't the direct damage of non boosted spells but the stacking of damage boosting abilities and the effect of SoS/SoD.

I dislike the reduced number of spells slots as I feel it reduce the caster at actually using a very limited number of spells, always those deemed as "the best" instead of preparing some less common spell in the extra slots and using them creatively.

As it is a very complex system with interlocking parts, until we see the Playtest document our opinions about the relative strengths of martial/casters

Beside the legendary feats, the martials have received a good boost with the introduction of rituals. The ability to "cast" some reality altering spell through a ritual is a great tool to reduce the out of combat gap.

One of the balancing methods of 1st ed. AD&D was memorization time for the spells. Spending 10 minutes for level of spell that you are preparing mean that you don't use every last spell as "tomorrow they will all be back". For some caster recovering all their spell did take 2 and a half days. So casters weren't burning every last slot to go nova. I still think it was a good way to balance playing and world creation, but it is not part of the current way to do things, so I suppose it will not return.

Crayon wrote:

DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

The biggest complaint I hear from my players when we get to high levels is from the martials/skilled characters (fighters/rogue types) saying that they don't feel they are contributing enough to the narrative. They regret their class choice because without spells they are barely able to nudge the needle as far as narrative is concerned.

So PF2e is directly addressing this issue, which is definitely not localized to my table (see every thread about caster/martial disparity), and people are mad that martials can do rad things and how dare they include this in the core rulebook instead of relegating it to a later book that can be safely ignored (you know like Mythic was).

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. By definition everything the protagonists do and say affects narrative (though I suspect you may be using a nonstandard definition of that term).

Naturally, every PC does impact the narrative, but the folks Dudemeister is talking about feel that their impact is negligible relative to that of casters at high level. I think that assessment is correct. It's the most common and old complaint about the game, and in my opinion, a major reason why the first couple of books of any AP see a lot more play than the end book.

Crayon wrote:

PS. It did, briefly, occur to me that you meant 'directly', but very few Spells actually do that in PF1 and none of the Skill Feats previewed for PF2 do so I remain puzzled.

Short list of spells that directly change the narrative of the story: Discern Lies, Find the Path, Heal, Resurrection, Teleport, True Seeing. This is just a small sample of the most famous ones. There is nothing any of the martials can do that comes close in terms of story impact.

And, indeed, the Skill Feats reviewed so far don't match that impact either (except possibly Legendary Medic). Still, they feel like something of import a non-caster can do, closing some of the gap. If top-tier spells...

Rituals. That you get from a skill. With the appropriate lore (and maybe a skill feat) you will be able to cast at least some of those spells.

And the legendary medic feat is better at healing disease and poison than the level8 or less versions of remove disease/remove poison.

I am not even sure Heal (the PF1 spell) will be a existing spell in PF2, under any name. In PF2 there is a spell named Heal, a level 1 spell that cure hit point of damage and harm undead. A far cry from the PF1 version.

Not worried, just thread post feedback seem clumsy as a way of gaining feedback. I'd prefer a website survey system, last page a comments section if someone wanted too.

Like reading this thread for skill feats...what are they going to take away from it? 15 vocal pro this or that and 5 dont like it, strung out through 500 posts...yeah that's a good system to parse through as 2 games designers on the same system might take away different changes that need to be worked on.

Discussing in this site (when we discuss instead of shouting) show what we feel is a problem or a good feature more that a survey with "rate this from 1 to 5".

JoelF847 wrote:

BPorter, you're not alone in your views. I was thinking more about the example Legendary skill abilities, and what came to mind is that they felt like great examples of what Mythic rules might look like in PF2, but aren't something I want in the core rules. I strongly believe that there's room in the game for full 20th level high fantasy support without it simply becoming mythic.

By adding "mythic" style legendary rules into core, I strongly feel like it's getting peanut butter in my chocolate. I might like both separately, but don't necessarily like them combined (which admittedly wasn't the point of the Reeses Peanut But Cup commercials). It's great to have these types of abilities as an add on system for games that want to emulate characters becommming demi-gods and such, but please keep it out of my high fantasy heroism default game.

then remove either casters or martials from the game. CMD is really that bad.

At that point you can remove the game from the game.

So the basic premise of "how to make martials relevant against higher level spells" starts with the faulty premise that spells and magic can't be rebalanced downward. Fly becomes a 4th or 5th level spell. Raise Dead becomes 7th level and Resurrection becomes a 10th level spell.

The solution PF2 seems to be moving towards is to rebalance martials upward, and casters downward, to hopefully meet in the middle, while adding plenty of cool stuff to both so that no one feels they're losing anything (even then, we've already seen protests from wizard players who think the reduction in spells per day is too hard on them).

Rituals. That you get from a skill. With the appropriate lore (and maybe a skill feat) you will be able to cast at least some of those spells.

Good point, I forgot to mention rituals. This is a way to add something to everybody. It's mostly taken from PF1 casters, but they aren't really losing, since those options will be available to them as well. Hopefully this will be done in a way that makes most people happy.

I admit that I initially balked at Cat Fall due to the players at my table as well as myself really enjoying that feeling of “we could really, really, die due to falling off the cliff” Ya we are weird I suppose that high danger and possible tpk is enjoyable to us. But with that being said, I figured we could still have that high level of ulcer making danger and still have fun with the Legendary aspects of the game. So I am excited to get down to the nitty gritty of the play of the game.

I admit that I initially balked at Cat Fall due to the players at my table as well as myself really enjoying that feeling of “we could really, really, die due to falling off the cliff” Ya we are weird I suppose that high danger and possible tpk is enjoyable to us. But with that being said, I figured we could still have that high level of ulcer making danger and still have fun with the Legendary aspects of the game. So I am excited to get down to the nitty gritty of the play of the game.

Well, given how rare Legendary Skills are (at 18th level or less non-Rogues cap out at 2 of them), I think it'll actually be pretty easy to avoid Legendary Acrobatics + Catfall if that's a specific combo you don't enjoy.

MusicAddict wrote:

The answer is that in real life sleight of hand, misdirection and distraction is key. You need someone deft and highly skilled to pull off the physical part, but if you can't keep them distracted well enough it's over immeadiately. But in fact with sleight of hand in real life you are almost always more likely to be caught by an onlooker than your mark.

Shoes are actually remarkably hard iirc, and pants aren't too bad, the deft guy needs to make sure that they won't trip on them when you move the mark . Jackets and button shirts are supposed to be the easiest when it comes to clothing iirc, with gloves being the hardest.

Most of sleight of hand is knowing psychology more than anything, though dexterity is still important. I'm super clumsy myself so I could never pick pocket someone or take off a piece of clothing, I can still take objects from people's hands or put something in their hands without making them notice, and move them across a building before they realize it. Just look into it and things like real life studies on perception, and you realize just how little we actually notice regularly.

Yes but....how? Like, there is, for example, no physical way to remove someone's T-Shirt, Shirt, Jacket, what have you without your "mark" having to move in very specific ways. Especially button shirts, where you have to unbutton them. The same is true for pants (and doubly true if they're wearing shoes.)

I mean, this is easy to see. Just put on a t-shirt and ask someone else to take it off you, without you helping them in any way. You'll see it's pretty much impossible, let alone taking it off without them noticing.

Like, I can see people taking your hat, your cloak, a belt. But your shirt? Your pants? A breastplate? That's when it goes from "really skilled" to "complete silliness".

i used to fluster a close friend and casual fling of mine by unbuttoning her shirt while we were talking, i could usually get it mostly unbuttoned before she noticed and occasionally have it falling off before she noticed. never could manage pants with out her noticeing but button shorts were easy as long as i could keep her talking and looking in my eyes .

and i have known people who were vastly better at such tricks.

And you might be able to get them unbuttoned and unzipped. But you still aren’t getting them OFF.

*opens mouth*

...

*closes it*

Crayon wrote:

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. By definition everything the protagonists do and say affects narrative (though I suspect you may be using a nonstandard definition of that term).

PS. It did, briefly, occur to me that you meant 'directly', but very few Spells actually do that in PF1 and none of the Skill Feats previewed for PF2 do so I remain puzzled.

The king the party requires add from is ill and they plan to heal him to earn his favour.

High Level Party of just non-magical 1e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to try to cure the king over a few weeks, or they can go on an arduous quest to get a healing macguffin or certain rare herbs or something.

High Level Party with a cleric in it: Casts remove disease.

High Level Party with a wizard in it: Calls an angel, who then casts remove disease.

High Level Party of just non-magical 2e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to cure the king over a few hours.

None of that affects the narrative though. Besides, all four examples are basically identical - solving challenge put in by the DM. It's interesting, however, that to me your example PF1 sounds far more entertaining than the PF2 one as it leads to potential for adventures rather than just casting a spell that's not a spell or rolling a skill check.

Mind, it's trivial to modify the adventure to work just as well with group of casters (or PF2 healers). Simply change the King's illness to a plague infecting the entire capital. Sure they could just go around healing people, but they just contract the disease again. Instead, they need to discover the source of the plague and put a stop to it once and for all.

Milo v3 wrote:

Crayon wrote:

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. By definition everything the protagonists do and say affects narrative (though I suspect you may be using a nonstandard definition of that term).

PS. It did, briefly, occur to me that you meant 'directly', but very few Spells actually do that in PF1 and none of the Skill Feats previewed for PF2 do so I remain puzzled.

The king the party requires add from is ill and they plan to heal him to earn his favour.

High Level Party of just non-magical 1e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to try to cure the king over a few weeks, or they can go on an arduous quest to get a healing macguffin or certain rare herbs or something.

High Level Party with a cleric in it: Casts remove disease.

High Level Party with a wizard in it: Calls an angel, who then casts remove disease.

High Level Party of just non-magical 2e characters: The party can use their Heal skill to cure the king over a few hours.

None of that affects the narrative though. Besides, all four examples are basically identical - solving challenge put in by the DM. It's interesting, however, that to me your example PF1 sounds far more entertaining than the PF2 one as it leads to potential for adventures rather than just casting a spell that's not a spell or rolling a skill check.

Mind, it's trivial to modify the adventure to work just as well with group of casters (or PF2 healers). Simply change the King's illness to a plague infecting the entire capital. Sure they could just go around healing people, but they just contract the disease again. Instead, they need to discover the source of the plague and put a stop to it once and for all.

The situations are not identical. The first case involves a lengthy quest. The last three reduce that to a speed bump at most. That's a huge narrative change. Your suggestion - the disease is now a city-wide plague - is also a huge change in the story.

I think what this example tells us is this: In PF1, because of basic spellcasting capabilities, no stories can be told based on deadly diseases or poisoning, unless they're specifically set to circumvent healing spells (either the disease is written to be specially resistant to healing magic, or it's a major plague). In PF2, provided spellcasting is toned down in power, you will be able to tell such stories, because not everyone will be a Legendary Medic. Maybe the party will need to find such a great healer, or become one, or somehow keep the king alive until a cure is found, etc.

So it's an example of how the removal of story-ending spells would allow for a deeper game world. Hopefully, PF2 will accomplish this.

Naturally, every PC does impact the narrative, but the folks Dudemeister is talking about feel that their impact is negligible relative to that of casters at high level. I think that assessment is correct. It's the most common and old complaint about the game, and in my opinion, a major reason why the first couple of books of any AP see a lot more play than the end book.

While I'm sure there are as many reasons for groups abandoning APs as there are groups playing the things, I would think that the fact they're supposed to take 2-3 years to complete is probably a much greater contributor to why many people never finish them.

Short list of spells that directly change the narrative of the story: Discern Lies, Find the Path, Heal, Resurrection, Teleport, True Seeing. This is just a small sample of the most famous ones. There is nothing any of the martials can do that comes close in terms of story impact.

And, indeed, the Skill Feats reviewed so far don't match that impact either (except possibly Legendary Medic). Still, they feel like something of import a non-caster can do, closing some of the gap. If top-tier spells get a bit of a tweak down at the same time, then we may get somewhere that doesn't feel so grossly unbalanced anymore.

I'm not intimately familiar with all the spells listed and am away from by books, but those spells I do know don't really change the game's narrative beyond the obvious point of removing an obstacle (similar to hitting things with a stick). Granted, they resolve different types of obstacles, but then isn't that the point of a class-based system?

Besides, even if the GM does mess up and create a scenario where a given spell basically ruins the adventure, how does the inclusion of Skill Feats (Legendary or not) prevent that? If anything, it would seem to make such scenarios far more likely.

While I'm sure there are as many reasons for groups abandoning APs as there are groups playing the things, I would think that the fact they're supposed to take 2-3 years to complete is probably a much greater contributor to why many people never finish them.

They are? I thought they were supposed to take six months to complete, and my group was just slow.

Release of one book per month seems to suggest they expect people to finish each book in a month (or at least within 4ish session of play).

I'm fine with being wrong on that, it's just the assumption I've always had.

Crayon wrote:

While I'm sure there are as many reasons for groups abandoning APs as there are groups playing the things, I would think that the fact they're supposed to take 2-3 years to complete is probably a much greater contributor to why many people never finish them.

They are? I thought they were supposed to take six months to complete, and my group was just slow.

Release of one book per month seems to suggest they expect people to finish each book in a month (or at least within 4ish session of play).

I'm fine with being wrong on that, it's just the assumption I've always had.

I can only give you mine, we finished Reign of Winter in 3 years. We play about once every 2-3 weeks on average, and play 3-4 hours. And we skipped parts of AP (although did have some sidetracks, so it about evens out).

I can see people finishing in a year if they play every week, for a bit longer hours, six months sounds like fantasy to me (ba-dum-ts).

Crayon wrote:

While I'm sure there are as many reasons for groups abandoning APs as there are groups playing the things, I would think that the fact they're supposed to take 2-3 years to complete is probably a much greater contributor to why many people never finish them.

They are? I thought they were supposed to take six months to complete, and my group was just slow.

Release of one book per month seems to suggest they expect people to finish each book in a month (or at least within 4ish session of play).

I'm fine with being wrong on that, it's just the assumption I've always had.

They've made it pretty clear that their expectation is that people will get all the books before starting. I doubt the release schedule has anything to do with expected playtime, only with what gives them a reasonable amount of time to work on each module while putting out two Paths a year.

Best example of solving the Caster Martial Disparity that I read on these boards was to play a martial in the early levels, then get killed and play a caster in the higher levels

Anything that helps avoiding this is a boon to the game IMO

My own experience (having run CotCT all the way through and the first two chapters of LoF, and played the first three chapters of Mummy's Mask, plus being currently running Reign of Winter and into the fourth book) is that each book takes 5-6 game sessions (of about 4 to 5 hours) for my group. Sometimes slightly longer, but not enough to bring the average below one book per six sessions. However, sometimes things come up and game doesn't happen that week, so the actual time can be a bit loner.

So that's about 8-10 months per AP in my experience (since we play every week).

We could probably do 6 months, but only by ignoring both random encounter tables and most non plot-related opportunities to roleplay things out.

Crayon what is your definition of narrative? Because to me it isn't merely the end result of events but the journey as well. How long and how hard it is to achieve something absolutely is important to narrative. An epidemic that gets cured by the various faiths pooling resources in a few days is a much different story than thousands dying while a small band of adventurers traverse the mountains looking for the rare Meiklar Orchid held in the halls of the mountain giant Bromar. Yeah end result "The disease got cured" but the narrative is vastly different.

At that point you can remove the game from the game.

There are good games with very little magic or magic only in the hands of NPCs, but those aren't D&D derivates. Very far off from Pathfinder intended target.

However, there are other games in this family which have done a much better job of addressing or resolving the Caster/Martial disparity (basically everything after 3.5 except Pathfinder). I imagine folks 'round these parts are so fond the C/MD because Pathfinder was the last bastion of god-wizards marshalling their weak and pathetic martials since this isn't to be found in contemporary d20 games.

Crayon what is your definition of narrative? Because to me it isn't merely the end result of events but the journey as well. How long and how hard it is to achieve something absolutely is important to narrative. An epidemic that gets cured by the various faiths pooling resources in a few days is a much different story than thousands dying while a small band of adventurers traverse the mountains looking for the rare Meiklar Orchid held in the halls of the mountain giant Bromar. Yeah end result "The disease got cured" but the narrative is vastly different.

I suppose that depends on your perspective. In the "quest - based narrative viewpoint" the narrative is binary: succeed or fail. In the journey - based mindset, every choice adds to the story.

The hardest part about all this is that it's largely up to the GM. If the GM emphasizes things then they matter. If the GM only focuses on whether the BBEG dies, then that's going to be the focus. If the GM shows your characters' long-term impact on the setting based on your choices, then that is what matters. Unfortunately for those of us who want every choice to matter, that means the GM has to make every choice matter, which is harder on the GM.

I find that if the GM wants to put that much effort into the narrative, it can be hard to keep up with the mechanics and also the narrative. Roleplaying systems with less mechanical complexity free up the GM (players too) to concentrate more on the narrative impact of individual choices.

Rob Godfrey wrote:

JoelF847 wrote:

BPorter, you're not alone in your views. I was thinking more about the example Legendary skill abilities, and what came to mind is that they felt like great examples of what Mythic rules might look like in PF2, but aren't something I want in the core rules. I strongly believe that there's room in the game for full 20th level high fantasy support without it simply becoming mythic.

By adding "mythic" style legendary rules into core, I strongly feel like it's getting peanut butter in my chocolate. I might like both separately, but don't necessarily like them combined (which admittedly wasn't the point of the Reeses Peanut But Cup commercials). It's great to have these types of abilities as an add on system for games that want to emulate characters becommming demi-gods and such, but please keep it out of my high fantasy heroism default game.

then remove either casters or martials from the game. CMD is really that bad.

At that point you can remove the game from the game.

There are good games with very little magic or magic only in the hands of NPCs, but those aren't D&D derivates. Very far off from Pathfinder intended target.

and to keep competitive martials need to be mythic (in fact it works fairly well as a fudge in PF1 as well, give martials a mythic level or 2 and they matter again), otherwise it has been wall to wall hybrid and pure casters in my experience.

I skipped a bunch of pages due to the flame wars emanating from them, so...

The legendary feats look amazingly overpowered, but you only get a limited number of them (3-6 I believe), so it's not like you're pulling these legendary stunts with everything you do all day long.
If they applied to every single thing your PC ever did, I'd be totally against them. but occasionally being able to do something amazingly overpowered is pretty damned cool.
So, as long as the accessability limit remains, I'm fine with them.

not seeing over powered, most can be done by a low level caster

not seeing over powered, most can be done by a low level caster

We actually don't know that. They could in PF1, but we don't know how something like Feather Fall works in PF2.

I suspect you're partially right, but only partially...and that's just a suspicion. We don't really know anything.

“Falling from orbit” is something I’m seeing a lot as a demonstration of the absurdity of Legenday skills, but really it’s hyperbole.

You only need to survive 1500 ft. That’s the falling distance required to hit terminal velocity.

1500 ft.

The real world record for surviving a fall is over 33000 ft; the woman in question was badly injured, it’s true, but she didn’t have the benefit of Legendary acrobatics. Or, so far as I am aware, even Trained. Or class levels; she was basically a Commoner.

Also her plane exploded. Which probably hurt.

Real life is far weirder than we give it credit for. But sometimes it’s harsher too. In real life, most people, if they got into a fight with a bear, would likely die. No one seems to think of bears as an existential threat at 15 though.

Pathfinder characters are legendary heroic characters; I’m fine with what I’ve heard of legendary skills.

Nicholas Alkemade fell for 18,000 feet and all damage he received was a sprained leg.