Save the Date for a New Pathfinder Class Playtest!

Monday, August 23, 2021

With the end of summer comes a new Pathfinder Playtest!

Immediately after Gen Con, we’ll be releasing a playtest with two new classes for you to build characters with, play at your tables, and share feedback on. The playtest will run from September 20th to October 26th.

A general looks over a scale model of the battlefield, determining the best place to deploy her troops.

We wanted to share the news a bit ahead of time so you can assemble your groups and plan some games. If you’re a member of our organized play community, you can earn credit for a Pathfinder Society character at the same time that you playtest one of the new classes, using the normal Pathfinder Society rules for class playtests

Are you interested in helping test and shape the newest Pathfinder classes, but you need help finding a group or game? The Paizo Events Discord server, where our Gen Con Online events will be taking place, will have a channel for you to look for other gamers to playtest with. You can also check out warhorn.net or our VTT partners (Roll20, Fantasy Grounds, or Astral) for games. If you need a pre-made adventure, try playing a Pathfinder Society scenario or one or more Pathfinder Bounties!

Tune in to our Gen Con 2021 streams for more information on the new classes (and the book they’ll be appearing in), and be the first to play them right after the convention! We hope to see you there!

James Case
Designer

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Tags: Pathfinder Playtest Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Pathfinder Second Edition
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Squiggit has it, mostly. I can make an “Inquisitor” out of a Ranger or Investigator that takes a divine spellcasting Archetype… but they aren’t really landing on that class fantasy until level 6 at the absolute earliest.


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

Agreed with Squiggit and keftiu here. There's a lot more to the overall whole of a Class than it's individual parts. Relegating any Class to an Archetype without really considering the full mechanics, theme, role, and story behind them would be an injustice. Besides, after all is said and done, each Class will also be an Archetype in the end, thanks to Deication Feats. No sense in trimming something down if it has potential for expansion.

EDIT: Building off Squiggit's comment, I get completely why Cavalier and Vigilante were trimmed down to Archetypes. But, the thing I enjoyed the most about the Cavalier in particular was their Order ability, as well as their Teamwork and Tactician abilities to a lesser extent. And I'm fairly confident that none of those things are going to be brought back in 2e, and that's saddening for me.


Ly'ualdre wrote:

Agreed with Squiggit and keftiu here. There's a lot more to the overall whole of a Class than it's individual parts. Relegating any Class to an Archetype without really considering the full mechanics, theme, role, and story behind them would be an injustice. Besides, after all is said and done, each Class will also be an Archetype in the end, thanks to Deication Feats. No sense in trimming something down if it has potential for expansion.

EDIT: Building off Squiggit's comment, I get completely why Cavalier and Vigilante were trimmed down to Archetypes. But, the thing I enjoyed the most about the Cavalier in particular was their Order ability, as well as their Teamwork and Tactician abilities to a lesser extent. And I'm fairly confident that none of those things are going to be brought back in 2e, and that's saddening for me.

The part of Cavalier I want back most is the Challenge mechanic, especially if it gets tweaked a little to be more like the Mark that Defender classes had in 4e.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

That was also part of what I liked about it, given it's ties to the Orders. They sorta translated the heart of it over in the Dualist and Firebrand Braggart; but it isn't the same.


Somebody pointed out, I beleive it was NoNat1s, that the Samurai 2E would be a great 1 vs 1 challenge class. Although, the Ranger kind of fills that niche, but not to the same tunnel vision.

Humbly,
Yawar

Wayfinders

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This is a weird pull maybe and I basically don't expect it, but would people feel about a Necromancer class?

"Now hang on, aren't necromancer wizards and gluttony runelord wizards already a thing?"

They are, but for whatever reason, 'necromancy' in fantasy RPGs (both on the tabletop and in the video game space) seems to be wholly unique from other magic classifications - even games that feature a wizard class often have a standalone necromancer (13th Age, DnD 3.5 with its Dread Necromancer, plenty of JRPGs I'm sure...). And the necromancy school itself is plenty versatile, with all sorts of buffs, debuffs, damage, healing, summoning and utility spells, faring better than most schools do by themselves.
(Besides, one is somewhat light and not as much of a specialization as some would want to, and the other is rare and comes with other baggage that not everyone might be on board with.)

Hell, a whole region of Pathfinder's setting is dedicated to a feud between a high-level wizard and necromancer, and another is on the rise too, and this seems to be the theme for the upcoming year.


RiverMesa wrote:

This is a weird pull maybe and I basically don't expect it, but would people feel about a Necromancer class?

"Now hang on, aren't necromancer wizards and gluttony runelord wizards already a thing?"

They are, but for whatever reason, 'necromancy' in fantasy RPGs (both on the tabletop and in the video game space) seems to be wholly unique from other magic classifications - even games that feature a wizard class often have a standalone necromancer (13th Age, DnD 3.5 with its Dread Necromancer, plenty of JRPGs I'm sure...). And the necromancy school itself is plenty versatile, with all sorts of buffs, debuffs, damage, healing, summoning and utility spells, faring better than most schools do by themselves.
(Besides, one is somewhat light and not as much of a specialization as some would want to, and the other is rare and comes with other baggage that not everyone might be on board with.)

Hell, a whole region of Pathfinder's setting is dedicated to a feud between a high-level wizard and necromancer, and another is on the rise too, and this seems to be the theme for the upcoming year.

I'm not certain that there would be a big point. Animate dead is already a necromancy spell so that necromancy wizards can have summons alongside their other necromancy spells. I love necromancers but I wouldn't want something to basically invalidate necromancy wizards


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I think if Book of the Dead has some Necromancy options in it (Undead Eidolon that isn't a spirit, more undead to summon, Undead animal companions, etc.) then that's probably where the itch gets scratched.


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Hmm. I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and make some class feature predictions. Could be wildly off-base, but here we go:

Spoiler:
Level 1: Ancestry and background, initial proficiencies

Even levels: Skill feat

3 and every 4th after that: General feat

3 and every odd after that: Skill increase

5 and every 4th after that: Ancestry feat

5 and every 5th after that: Ability boosts


Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

I think there has to be some common necromancery tropes that could be rolled into an archetype that could enhance a necromancy flavored spell caster as well create the sort of WoW deathknight or Diablo universe melee one.


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My personal want is to have another apg book, one that tries to get as many pf1 classes out for 2e as it can. With lessons learned from SoM and APG, the half classes like bloodrager, skald, slayer, brawler, hunter, and shaman could be class archetypes.

Edit - before someone points it out, I know this won't happen, as future books will be themed. It's just me wishlisting.

Grand Lodge

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QuidEst wrote:

Hmm. I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and make some class feature predictions. Could be wildly off-base, but here we go:

** spoiler omitted **

I don't know QuidEst, that's awfully specific.

Do you have some secret inside connections the rest of us only dream about?
If it comes out that way, we're all gonna know you either work there, or...you're a SPY!! *DUN DUN DUUUUUUUUNNNNN!


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber

So the biggest Issue with a Necromancer class imo is that classes are specifically player facing options in 2e, and the mechanics are very much invested and tied to Golarion. This means that a primary chunk of what somebody would want to go to for a Necromancy class( animating undead) would probably be slapped with the evil trait due to the lore of golarion. And I don't see Paizo releasing class that is primarily focused on evil options. I can see an archetype, sub classes, class archetypes, etc.

Another really issue is that any one that wants to play a necromancer probably wants to control a horde of undead.

And if there is a Necromancer class and there isn't a bunch of animating undead stuff, in fact if that isn't the primary focus I feel we will have another group of players complaining about names again.

Now if there are other reasons people want to be a necromancer(white necromancy) it seems more like the reversal of the trope, and woul be a character option but not the main thrust of a class with such a name.


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Dang it, Pixierose, now you've got me missing Book of the Damned all over again.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
Gaulin wrote:

My personal want is to have another apg book, one that tries to get as many pf1 classes out for 2e as it can. With lessons learned from SoM and APG, the half classes like bloodrager, skald, slayer, brawler, hunter, and shaman could be class archetypes.

Edit - before someone points it out, I know this won't happen, as future books will be themed. It's just me wishlisting.

I wouldn't say that's entirely true. I can see an APG2 in the form of a book designed to just give a bunch more mechanical options, in particular Class Archetypes and Ancestriesfor one. Options is a theme unto itself. Most of the books we've seen so far have either leaned heavy into the lore instead of mechanics(making it more or less 80/20), while others have been sorta balanced (50/50 ish). I can see potential for a book that is more mechanical than lore; which is to say most of the lore in such a book would likely be to give a place to the options therein.

pixierose wrote:

So the biggest Issue with a Necromancer class imo is that classes are specifically player facing options in 2e, and the mechanics are very much invested and tied to Golarion. This means that a primary chunk of what somebody would want to go to for a Necromancy class( animating undead) would probably be slapped with the evil trait due to the lore of golarion. And I don't see Paizo releasing class that is primarily focused on evil options. I can see an archetype, sub classes, class archetypes, etc.

Another really issue is that any one that wants to play a necromancer probably wants to control a horde of undead.

And if there is a Necromancer class and there isn't a bunch of animating undead stuff, in fact if that isn't the primary focus I feel we will have another group of players complaining about names again.

Now if there are other reasons people want to be a necromancer(white necromancy) it seems more like the reversal of the trope, and woul be a character option but not the main thrust of a class with such a name.

I will agree that making a Class that is strictly Evil in Alignment is unlikely at best. We moved away from Alignment restrictions for a reason. That said, 2e has done a good job at indicating that Necromancy is more than just undead and death. It also encompasses healing. So, I could see a Neceromancer Class not being inherently Evil in the same sense that a Cleric isn't. You'd have the options to either be a "White Necromancer" or "Black Necromancer".

However, I don't see Necromancer being a full Class. An Archetype at best, that can be applied to any Caster Class in order to avoid bloat to the system. The "hordes of undead" fantasy is defiently touchy. But, if even in 1e, there wasn't really a way to do this in the way that I think most people want. The Gravewalker Witch did a decent job of this, allowing you to control 1 HD of Undead per Caster level. So, theoretically, they could control 20 1 HD Undead at 20th Lvl. Something similar to this could work, adding some variation with future Feats within the Archetype tree.


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I typed, and then deleted, several replies along the lines of "saying such and such could just be an archetype is unhelpful", since we all know that and have multiple examples of that happening. As I also deemed that comment from me to be unhelpful, I deleted.

Reason being is that an opinion like "Dread Necromancer should be an archetype instead of a full class", with an explanation of why, is so much more interesting. As PixieRose said, the magic traditions and lore are very specific now, and a undead summoning necromancer violates much of it. So an archetype that can be as is intended to be class agnostic, that works no matter what tradition you use, is actually pretty interesting to me. The Gravelands Druid, the crypt keeper cleric, the Lesser Death Witch; if all of these can be explored with a single archetype and ideally comes with some flavor as to why all of these classes might dabble in undead summoning or death manipulation, that would be worth a lot more to me than a specific separate class.


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Aristophanes wrote:
QuidEst wrote:

Hmm. I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and make some class feature predictions. Could be wildly off-base, but here we go:

** spoiler omitted **

I don't know QuidEst, that's awfully specific.

Do you have some secret inside connections the rest of us only dream about?
If it comes out that way, we're all gonna know you either work there, or...you're a SPY!! *DUN DUN DUUUUUUUUNNNNN!

The thing to do is make really specific predictions, so that if it turns out you're right, everybody is really impressed.


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I think the best way to do a Necromancer is to give the Summoner an Eidolon that's an undead something, and then mix that with the Wizard archetype.

PF2 is just never going to give you the "horde master" where you're controlling a bunch of independent bodies, no matter how much some people want it- since the people who don't want it are negatively impacted by it being possible.


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PossibleCabbage wrote:
PF2 is just never going to give you the "horde master" where you're controlling a bunch of independent bodies, no matter how much some people want it- since the people who don't want it are negatively impacted by it being possible.

Not everyone that wants to summon things want a "horde" though: myself, I likes summoning for the 'swiss army knife' utility. So I don't know a language? summon a creature that can understand it. need a scout? Got a creature for that. Need some spells cast you don't have? Well there are some here that can fit the bill. For me, that was the appeal of summoning. I'm not sure undead offers enough variety for that though.


I think the transmogrification line is supposed to provide that, or at least it COULD be made to do so. Perhaps a focus spell that allows your eidolon to temporarily gain an evolution feat equal to the spell level or lower? Seems like it would give you a lot of variety without breaking the system as we have it.

Honestly that's how I would have done the "evolution surge" spell. Wouldn't have worked in the playtest, but it seems like it could now.


graystone wrote:
PossibleCabbage wrote:
PF2 is just never going to give you the "horde master" where you're controlling a bunch of independent bodies, no matter how much some people want it- since the people who don't want it are negatively impacted by it being possible.
Not everyone that wants to summon things want a "horde" though: myself, I likes summoning for the 'swiss army knife' utility. So I don't know a language? summon a creature that can understand it. need a scout? Got a creature for that. Need some spells cast you don't have? Well there are some here that can fit the bill. For me, that was the appeal of summoning. I'm not sure undead offers enough variety for that though.

Exactly this. This is what made summoning exciting.

*****************
As to you point @AnimatedPaper , I agree that Evolution Surge ideally would had granted you 1 evolution, 2 for the heightened version. And that the transmogrification line would had helped some of the "get the right evolution for the job".


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Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
keftiu wrote:
I’ve yet to really understand how the “emotions, connections, and storytelling” part of Occult fits into the “alien horrors, cosmic revelations, and oozes” part of Occult.

Occult to me is where the imagination meets the subconcious mind. The alien horros, cosmic revelations are the subconscious mind, tentacles and eldritch horrors are shaped by our fear of the unknown/alien. Basically its the subconscious mind and fear that causes the shaping of the eldritch to be tentacle-y. The rest of it is the magic of storytelling, the imagination, the ego and ID. But yeah for me its the interaction of imagination, emotion and the subconscious mind.


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Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber
PossibleCabbage wrote:

I think the best way to do a Necromancer is to give the Summoner an Eidolon that's an undead something, and then mix that with the Wizard archetype.

PF2 is just never going to give you the "horde master" where you're controlling a bunch of independent bodies, no matter how much some people want it- since the people who don't want it are negatively impacted by it being possible.

How exactly would its inclusion negatively impact those that don't want it?

Silver Crusade

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Horde masters completely gum up combat so they would have to be designed with them in mind, among other things.


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Rysky wrote:
Horde masters completely gum up combat so they would have to be designed with them in mind, among other things.

Yeah, if my turn takes like 90 seconds and you turn makes like 20 minutes that's going to ruin the game eventually.

So PF2 is careful to not let people have significantly more actions available than another character.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

That only assumes the Horde is treated as as swarm of individual minions and not a group-as-an-entity as some people have suggested.

It also feels weird that Summoning is always consistently fingered as a problem in this respect when casters in general slowed PF1 down a lot and PF2 didn't do a lot to make that better (arguably worse, since many casters have more and broader choices to make at any given moment).


Not to mention that things only slowed down for people not used to how to handle multiple chars or that lacked the amount of dice required for playing that many creatures.

As always a person who know what they want will be much faster than a person who doesn't. No matter how many minions that person has under their command.

Shadow Lodge

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Too bad the rest of us had to deal with the slower person more often than not.


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TOZ wrote:
Too bad the rest of us had to deal with the slower person more often than not.

But the slower person was a time sink no matter what though: slower at picking what spell to cast, then hemming and hawing about where to place it, then pondering if they want a metamagic or if they want to use another action and then what if they instead commanded there pet/familiar to do something and think over what 2 actions they should take...

Or as an alchemist looking over the list of alchemy items they pre-made at the start of the day, pulling out the book to re-read each one before picking. Or... Well, I sure you get the point.

There isn't anything special about summons anymore in PF2 with the sustain and IMO it's BETTER than a lot of other spells as it takes all three actions.

Squiggit wrote:
That only assumes the Horde is treated as as swarm of individual minions and not a group-as-an-entity as some people have suggested.

They have Troop rules in the game for "an organized collection of component creatures, typically Small or Medium in size, working as a cohesive whole. A troop is 16 squares in size and has two Hit Point thresholds in their HP entry, under which it reduces in size to 12 squares and then 8 squares." I think the game can easily handle something between a creature composed of 16 squares of individuals and a normal swarm. Both dramatically cut down on the individual rolls by making group attacks. Seems less onerous than someone with an animal companion[Animal Trainer Dedication, 2nd level], a familiar [ancestry 1st level] AND an Eildon [1st level summoner, with 6 actions/round [2 animal companion, 2 similar and a tandem action for the Eildon]...

Shadow Lodge

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graystone wrote:
But the slower person was a time sink no matter what though

I bet you could tell the difference when they were playing a summoner versus an evoker.


TOZ wrote:
graystone wrote:
But the slower person was a time sink no matter what though
I bet you could tell the difference when they were playing a summoner versus an evoker.

No... Not really. When you can get 21 1st level slots, 21 second level slots, 17 3rd level slots, 17 4th level slots, 13 5th level slots, 11 6th level slots, 5 7th level, 5 8th level and 5 9th level spells for a total of 115 total which might have 115 individual spells in them. So a slow person could take quite a long time at it. Then in the actual casting you could cast Meteor Swarm and Ride the Lightning in a round for 5 area affect attacks to adjudicate [4 40' radius spread and 1 120' line] so you can have more time there picking out areas and then rolling saves and damages than a summoner even if you ignore the time thumbing through 100+ spells before they figure out what to cast.

So, yeah, it's not a guarantee I'd see a difference. A summoner and an evoker can be equally quick or slow: it's the player that the main factor more so than the character. If the player doesn't take the time to look over their options before play starts, rounds will take longer no matter if they have to look up monsters, spells or how their feats work for the combat maneuvers they can do. In the reverse, if a player does the work then an increased in the number of options or rolls you might have doesn't significantly increase their round.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook Subscriber

I now suddenly have the desire to play a Summoner with MC-Ranger and MC-Witch, plus Beast Master and Familar Master. Can it be done? No idea. But I want to try.

Shadow Lodge

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graystone wrote:
TOZ wrote:
graystone wrote:
But the slower person was a time sink no matter what though
I bet you could tell the difference when they were playing a summoner versus an evoker.
No... Not really. When you can get 21 1st level slots, 21 second level slots, 17 3rd level slots, 17 4th level slots, 13 5th level slots, 11 6th level slots, 5 7th level, 5 8th level and 5 9th level spells for a total of 115 total which might have 115 individual spells in them. So a slow person could take quite a long time at it. Then in the actual casting you could cast Meteor Swarm and Ride the Lightning in a round for 5 area affect attacks to adjudicate [4 40' radius spread and 1 120' line] so you can have more time there picking out areas and then rolling saves and damages than a summoner even if you ignore the time thumbing through 100+ spells before they figure out what to cast.

Playing with 9th level spells is even rarer than playing with a fast summoner.


I've played with summoners and evokers, and evokers are definitely faster. Consider that not only is a summoner looking up what all their possible summons are, because who is going to pick those beforehand amirite, but they are also reading what all of their possible summons can do.

All that time being sunk figuring cones and where to place explosions and whatnot, compound that, because not only is the summoning specialist having to figure that out for themself with whatever spells they may have, but they also have to look it up for each of the creatures they can call, too. It's going to take even more time if they want to compare the relative effectivness of their possible summons, as well, which has happened when I was at table.


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Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber

While, I am sympathetic and ultimately agree with the issue of summoning taking longer then usual. It is possible to mitigate the time by, planning a head, and a player should be considerate of the table and do their best to have a plan by the time their turn comes.(Sometimes something unexpected happens before your turn and you don't have enough time to replan)


Perpdepog wrote:

I've played with summoners and evokers, and evokers are definitely faster. Consider that not only is a summoner looking up what all their possible summons are, because who is going to pick those beforehand amirite, but they are also reading what all of their possible summons can do.

All that time being sunk figuring cones and where to place explosions and whatnot, compound that, because not only is the summoning specialist having to figure that out for themself with whatever spells they may have, but they also have to look it up for each of the creatures they can call, too. It's going to take even more time if they want to compare the relative effectivness of their possible summons, as well, which has happened when I was at table.

I don't see this any different than a caster not reading any of their spells or feats and having to look each up when their round comes up, "amirite"? I expect as much preparedness from ANY character with a lot of options they can use. For example, I'd often see people with 'cheat sheets' with the most used options with the basics written down for quick use and that applies to spells used or creatures summoned. If you're always flipping the book for abilities, you're eating up more time no matter what the class is. I think people are recalling the summoner flipping through the book looking for monsters and forgetting the caster that's flipping through all the books looking up their spells: in both cases though these things are easier with things like links built in to your sheet on device so you can quickly hop to what you need.


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If a conjurer doesn't have a shortlist of what they want to call out, they need to make one.

Edit: That said? The best part of online play is having tabs open to Nethys to quickly reference things.


graystone wrote:
Perpdepog wrote:

I've played with summoners and evokers, and evokers are definitely faster. Consider that not only is a summoner looking up what all their possible summons are, because who is going to pick those beforehand amirite, but they are also reading what all of their possible summons can do.

All that time being sunk figuring cones and where to place explosions and whatnot, compound that, because not only is the summoning specialist having to figure that out for themself with whatever spells they may have, but they also have to look it up for each of the creatures they can call, too. It's going to take even more time if they want to compare the relative effectivness of their possible summons, as well, which has happened when I was at table.

I don't see this any different than a caster not reading any of their spells or feats and having to look each up when their round comes up, "amirite"? I expect as much preparedness from ANY character with a lot of options they can use. For example, I'd often see people with 'cheat sheets' with the most used options with the basics written down for quick use and that applies to spells used or creatures summoned. If you're always flipping the book for abilities, you're eating up more time no matter what the class is. I think people are recalling the summoner flipping through the book looking for monsters and forgetting the caster that's flipping through all the books looking up their spells: in both cases though these things are easier with things like links built in to your sheet on device so you can quickly hop to what you need.

I'm actually recalling what I said. Somebody who summons looking through all the books for the perfect creature versus someone with their spells maybe figuring positioning and that's it. I've even had people with their spells on little note cards to be able to look them up easily, but turn to their collection of bestiaries when it's their turn to summon something. Obviously YYMV, but that's been my experience.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I think the problem of summoning really comes down to the idea of it vs the mechanics of it. It's not a simple mechanic, no matter how it's implemented, because there's no computer to automatically determine how the summon should work like in many video games. There's also a greater breadth of options for a summon to act than in other games based around summoning. The idea of summoning is really interesting and I find it often catches the eye of newer players. The more experienced players seem to see summoning as a mechanical mess and slog and thus avoid it. Some choose to directly tackle it, but it's still a long arduous process in my experience.

Summoning does not particularly work well in TTRPGs, change my mind.


I mean the thing is, you don't prepare your spells in the middle of combat. Either you're a prepared caster and you already figured out what you're casting today (so you can cast a spell on the hopes it will be useful, since you don't get refunds), or you're a spontaneous one and you only know like 11 non-cantrip spells and you already learned how those work.

The problem with the minionmancer is that not only do you have more dice, since you have more bodies, but also that "flipping through the bestiary" is something that does take place in combat.

I think the best you're going to get for the swiss army knife summoner thing are things like evolution surge where your beastie can grow wings temporarily because you magicked them.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
PossibleCabbage wrote:
I mean the thing is, you don't prepare your spells in the middle of combat. Either you're a prepared caster and you already figured out what you're casting today

You might have already figured out what you're casting today, but you still have to decide on the fly which of your half dozen or more unique spell slots you're spending at any given point.

It's a massive time sink, especially for newer players, and for all this talk about streamlining it's a real shame PF2 did absolutely nothing to fix this like, say, 5e did with their modified preparation system.

Quote:
but also that "flipping through the bestiary" is something that does take place in combat.

I don't disagree, but in the context of "this is why we can't have this in PF2" it doesn't really make sense to me, because PF2 summoning already works that way. Again, it's a bit of a missed opportunity that Paizo didn't try to streamline that, but it's how PF2 is.


Memyselfishness wrote:

I think the problem of summoning really comes down to the idea of it vs the mechanics of it. It's not a simple mechanic, no matter how it's implemented, because there's no computer to automatically determine how the summon should work like in many video games. There's also a greater breadth of options for a summon to act than in other games based around summoning. The idea of summoning is really interesting and I find it often catches the eye of newer players. The more experienced players seem to see summoning as a mechanical mess and slog and thus avoid it. Some choose to directly tackle it, but it's still a long arduous process in my experience.

Summoning does not particularly work well in TTRPGs, change my mind.

For all my griping about summoning, that's mostly for PF1E/3.5, which is where I've had the most experience of it. I think PF2E's done summoning pretty well. Being limited to one summon outside of stuff involving Effortless Concentration and that summon sharing your actions with you cut down a lot on the possible turn bloat. There's still flipping through the bestiary, true, but even that doesn't feel quite as arduous IMO since A, the possible summon list for any given spell is smaller, and B, it's almost guaranteed that combat-ready summons will be as close to your level as possible, which further cuts down possible choices and book flipping. That latter point doesn't hold as true if its out of combat and you need the summon for utility, but you're not on a timer there so who cares?


Memyselfishness wrote:
Summoning does not particularly work well in TTRPGs, change my mind.

I think it depends on the expectation.

There are two instances though that I think help:

1. Final Fantasy VII/Golden Sun style summoning - aka the creature shows up and does something sort of like a spell would but doesn't actually "fight" in the traditional sense (could swear this exists currently or was teased at one point but maybe I'm crazy).

2. Troops/Swarms to emulate "mass" summoning where the collective operates as one individual

Now, if those does scratch the itch for you, then I think we're getting too hung up on the mechanical implementation and not necessarily the concept being fulfilled itself.

And I think in PF2 there's a good amount of room for both of the above to take shape in some way.


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Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber

Hunh?!? I thought this thread was about the upcoming class playtest...


PossibleCabbage wrote:
I think the best you're going to get for the swiss army knife summoner thing are things like evolution surge where your beastie can grow wings temporarily because you magicked them.

If that's it then that concept is dead to me to be honest: there isn't ANY difference between evolution surge on a pet and a similar spell that I could use on myself so the summoning element is just scene dressing IMO. Add to this that I don't really see the Summoner as a summoner and his pet as not a summoned and it would break down even if I pretended it was all summoning.

PossibleCabbage wrote:
I mean the thing is, you don't prepare your spells in the middle of combat.

Well that isn't exactly true. Things like Infinite Possibilities exist that allow you to pick a spell from your spellbook in combat. There is also people that horde scrolls so it can be looking through the book for that instead of a prepared spell: people can have a LOT of spells available especially if scrolls are found as loot on a regular basis.

Perpdepog wrote:
I'm actually recalling what I said.

Note that I used a general term and didn't direct it at anyone in particular. People in general have selective memories [even me]: it's just a fact.


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Ashanderai wrote:
Hunh?!? I thought this thread was about the upcoming class playtest...

In a round about way it is: some people are saying 'we wouldn't see X class because of..." and other are saying 'no, you could be that because of Z..." and it's just a debate over examples.


Graystone wrote:
Perpdepog wrote:
I'm actually recalling what I said.
Note that I used a general term and didn't direct it at anyone in particular. People in general have selective memories [even me]: it's just a fact.

You also quoted my word choice from my post, which made it feel more directed than you perhaps intended it to.


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Perpdepog wrote:
Graystone wrote:
Perpdepog wrote:
I'm actually recalling what I said.
Note that I used a general term and didn't direct it at anyone in particular. People in general have selective memories [even me]: it's just a fact.
You also quoted my word choice from my post, which made it feel more directed than you perhaps intended it to.

Sure you are a person so you are included in people. You are a person aren't you? ;P


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graystone wrote:
Perpdepog wrote:
Graystone wrote:
Perpdepog wrote:
I'm actually recalling what I said.
Note that I used a general term and didn't direct it at anyone in particular. People in general have selective memories [even me]: it's just a fact.
You also quoted my word choice from my post, which made it feel more directed than you perhaps intended it to.
Sure you are a person so you are included in people. You are a person aren't you? ;P

Some days I'm not so sure. Personing is haaaaard.

I'm also banking on some martial classes being the new ones that come out, but that's also about 80% wishful thinking by weight because I'm really taken with the idea of a tactician-type class.

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