Meet the Crew of the Zoetrope!

I'd like to maintain the current Awaken Animal that only increases the animals mental capacity. The ancestry can come from a new ritual, and I don't care if it is or isn't called the same thing, or the same ritual but a higher rank version.

I would still like the in-world room for creating intelligent animals without automatically granting them size changes, bipedal locomotion, and prehensile thumbs.

I am extremely excited for this book release. (I had said elsewhere that I'm really feeling nostalgic for both Pathfinder and Starfinder and I'm seriously thinking about getting back into these RPG systems/settings.

Howl of the Wild looks and sounds amazing, incredible, and FUN! Not familiar with Kent Hamilton but his artwork is stunning. The attention to minute details is awe-inspiring. I'll definitely be picking up this book. (Related question ... will there be a pocket edition? It's become my new favorite style for RPG books).

Not a deal-breaker if not (it seems to me that the Lost Omens books don't have pocket editions).

Not sure if I'll re-subscribe to the RPG line or not. But seriously thinking about re-subscribing to the AP line.

Thanks for rekindling my interest in Pathfinder (and Starfinder).

Dean

So good news, this book is actually part of the Core RPG line, not the Lost Omens line, so the likelyhood of getting a pocket edition is high!

Personally, I'd rather not give them prehensile thumbs. That still wouldn't solve the "awakened snake PC" problem. My vote would honestly be to just handwave it. Every animal has "some means" of holding things, unspecified. A lot of cartoon media just lets animals pick things up without clarifying--the characters of My Little Pony literally just grab things without any explanation, because who really cares? A snake grabs things in its coils. It's not that important. It's a Rare ancestry for a reason, after all.

Throwing in my random desire to see Ipotanes/Hippotaynes and, to a lesser extent, Ichthyocentaurs as possibilities somehow, some way, in the future. Ipotanes could be possible as a Centaur Heritage, or hand waved as an Awakened Horse. Ichthyocentaur could also work as Heritage or distinct Ancestry sometime later (maybe an eventual High Seas book).

In fact, just give me all the probable Centaur possibilities. Onocentaur. Pterocentaur. Unicentaur. Alacentaur. The theoretical, yet unheard of Mulecentaur.

To be fair, you could possibly handwave most of these through some combination of Centaur + Versatile Heritage. Centaur + Tiefling/Nephilim could be a decendant of a Nightmare, for example.

Pterocentaur.

For game balance reasons, I would assume that no ancestry is going to provide flight or even "strong" gliding (i.e. acrobatic, maneuverable, combat-relevant) at chargen. So I think some bat, avian, or butterfly-type hybrids and awakened animals are either going to be disappointing (to those taking them for the wings), or will be entirely absent so that Paizo can avoid player-GM arguments over 'how much flight' being a thing.

The strix actually have a variant rule attached for first-level flight. My guess is awakened animals will have the same. That said, I've seen Paizo designers saying that they may not feel as strongly about flight being a problem as they used to, so who knows? It'll be a Rare ancestry, after all. Hope springs eternal.

That said, winged ancestries are pretty prevalent in the game right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see more.

The strix actually have a variant rule attached for first-level flight. My guess is awakened animals will have the same. That said, I've seen Paizo designers saying that they may not feel as strongly about flight being a problem as they used to, so who knows? It'll be a Rare ancestry, after all. Hope springs eternal.

That said, winged ancestries are pretty prevalent in the game right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see more.

1st level flight? Where is that variant?

Kobold Catgirl wrote:

The strix actually have a variant rule attached for first-level flight. My guess is awakened animals will have the same. That said, I've seen Paizo designers saying that they may not feel as strongly about flight being a problem as they used to, so who knows? It'll be a Rare ancestry, after all. Hope springs eternal.

That said, winged ancestries are pretty prevalent in the game right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see more.

1st level flight? Where is that variant?

It's just a general variant for ancestries who should all be able to fly from the Ancestry Guide.

Flying PCs: Certain ancestries, such as strix or sprites, have wings. The presented ancestry rules intend to provide a good combination of story and game balance for most groups. However, some players might have character concepts that don’t fit this assumption and might wish to fly from initial character creation. At the GM’s discretion, the GM can grant these PCs a 15-foot fly Speed, replacing any other abilities that involve flying, such as the strix’s Wings ancestral trait. In this case, any feat that upgrades the PC’s flying capabilities, such as the strix’s Fledgling Flight and Juvenile Flight feats, might instead upgrade this Speed by an additional 5 feet. However, GMs who allow this option should be aware that a PC who can constantly fly can trivialize many low- and mid-level challenges, consistently outshining or leaving other characters behind; the GM should consider this option very carefully before allowing it and adjust the game accordingly.

Evan Tarlton wrote:

Kobold Catgirl wrote:

The strix actually have a variant rule attached for first-level flight. My guess is awakened animals will have the same. That said, I've seen Paizo designers saying that they may not feel as strongly about flight being a problem as they used to, so who knows? It'll be a Rare ancestry, after all. Hope springs eternal.

That said, winged ancestries are pretty prevalent in the game right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see more.

1st level flight? Where is that variant?

It's just a general variant for ancestries who should all be able to fly from the Ancestry Guide.

Quote:

Flying PCs: Certain ancestries, such as strix or sprites, have wings. The presented ancestry rules intend to provide a good combination of story and game balance for most groups. However, some players might have character concepts that don’t fit this assumption and might wish to fly from initial character creation. At the GM’s discretion, the GM can grant these PCs a 15-foot fly Speed, replacing any other abilities that involve flying, such as the strix’s Wings ancestral trait. In this case, any feat that upgrades the PC’s flying capabilities, such as the strix’s Fledgling Flight and Juvenile Flight feats, might instead upgrade this Speed by an additional 5 feet. However, GMs who allow this option should be aware that a PC who can constantly fly can trivialize many low- and mid-level challenges, consistently outshining or leaving other characters behind; the GM should consider this option very carefully before allowing it and adjust the game accordingly.

Wow. That's actually more generous than the 5' fly speed I'm using in my Gargoyle ancestry draft for my home games.

It's just extra work for the GM to ensure that there are no encounters or problems that one PC (but not the rest) can trivialize by "you can fly".

It's just extra work for the GM to ensure that there are no encounters or problems that one PC (but not the rest) can trivialize by "you can fly".

In three different editions of D&D and dozens other ttrpgs, this is a problem I've literally never encountered.

Evan Tarlton wrote:

Kobold Catgirl wrote:

The strix actually have a variant rule attached for first-level flight. My guess is awakened animals will have the same. That said, I've seen Paizo designers saying that they may not feel as strongly about flight being a problem as they used to, so who knows? It'll be a Rare ancestry, after all. Hope springs eternal.

That said, winged ancestries are pretty prevalent in the game right now. I wouldn't be surprised to see more.

1st level flight? Where is that variant?

It's just a general variant for ancestries who should all be able to fly from the Ancestry Guide.

Quote:

Flying PCs: Certain ancestries, such as strix or sprites, have wings. The presented ancestry rules intend to provide a good combination of story and game balance for most groups. However, some players might have character concepts that don’t fit this assumption and might wish to fly from initial character creation. At the GM’s discretion, the GM can grant these PCs a 15-foot fly Speed, replacing any other abilities that involve flying, such as the strix’s Wings ancestral trait. In this case, any feat that upgrades the PC’s flying capabilities, such as the strix’s Fledgling Flight and Juvenile Flight feats, might instead upgrade this Speed by an additional 5 feet. However, GMs who allow this option should be aware that a PC who can constantly fly can trivialize many low- and mid-level challenges, consistently outshining or leaving other characters behind; the GM should consider this option very carefully before allowing it and adjust the game accordingly.

Thank you!

In three different editions of D&D and dozens other ttrpgs, this is a problem I've literally never encountered.

I mean, for example, if you can fly all day and have a cantrip that does damage, you can defeat an infinite number of bears without taking any damage. You will just eventually get sleepy and fly off where the bears can't get you.

There's also stuff like "Pit traps are not a problem when you can just fly out of them."

It's honestly pretty easy to avoid wings trivializing fights as a GM, but you need to understand how flight works, and that's not something the game should expect by default. Discourage ranged or mage flier builds. Give NPCs their own ranged attacks or fly speeds. Set lots of fights in cramped areas. Don't allow flying PCs to carry non-flying PCs or other heavy weights. Don't create hazards that a single PC can resolve for everyone, like a rope bridge that needs to be brought up to the other side with no additional complications.

To expand on what I said earlier, Jason Bulman recently appeared to say that flight may not be as big a gamebreaker as they once assumed it would be, since so many PF2 monsters have ranged options--that this is why Starfinder gives flight so earlier on--but that it's probably a little late to restructure things for now.

“Is there any good reason why PF2 design decided to be afraid of fly speeds at low levels to the point where it makes lore-abberant winged ancestries with no fly speed until much later, while starfinder has level 1 fly speeds and it has such a little effect on encounter balance?”

Jason Bulmahn (Dir. Game Design) — Today at 5:19 PM
I think we were very conservative about flying due to what it can do to a lot of encounters, especially against foes without much ranged attacks. That said, in Starfinder, that is far less of a concern, as guns are far more prevalent.

“Followup: Aren't the prevalence of thrown weapons, bows, and creatures with ranged natural attacks an almost identical parallel, though? Even back in the AD&D days, having a backup ranged weapon was always a standard suggestion”

Jason Bulmahn (Dir. Game Design) — Today at 5:30 PM
By and large yes. But we did not know that at the time. Changing that is frankly too "big" for the remaster, so we will stick with it for now.

There's also stuff like "Pit traps are not a problem when you can just fly out of them."

...or fly over them. Similarly, "there's a big thing we need to climb over" shows up from time to time as barrier in wilderness adventures. Easy access to flight also makes it a lot easier to infiltrate low-level fortresses and/or avoid leaving clues when you steal something... and so on.

If you never happen to have any of these sorts of noncombat encounters in the first place? If your combat encounters by default have plenty of ranged options, even at low level? Not an issue. It really depends on which kinds of games you run and/or play in. Thus the "optional" - to let the GM decide for themselves if this is a campaign that can accept that or not.

Jacob Jett wrote:

In three different editions of D&D and dozens other ttrpgs, this is a problem I've literally never encountered.

I mean, for example, if you can fly all day and have a cantrip that does damage, you can defeat an infinite number of bears without taking any damage. You will just eventually get sleepy and fly off where the bears can't get you.

There's also stuff like "Pit traps are not a problem when you can just fly out of them."

Lanzborne, the Fighter [glasses the prairie with his mystical scope of ocularity] “I…see..an infinite number of…bears”.

Aeriyal, the Rogue: “Wha…bears? Owlbears?”

Schtudius, the Battle Mage: [nudges Aeriyal worriedly] “Eh-hem”.

Aeriyal: “Wha…oh, right. *koff* Umm. [restrikes confused but alert pose] “Beakclaws? Or..was it Clawbeaks? Feathergnashers?”

Lanzborne: “…Nah. Just….bears.” [frowns as he snaps shut the mystical scope of ocularity with time worn and professional tap]. “I think we can take them.”

Aeriyal: “Sure, my trusty ever repeating double flaming penetrating enervating crossbow should do the trick.”

Gaslyte, the Thaumaturge : “Or we could, you know, go around…”

Lanzborne: [looks at Aeriyal’s weapon suspiciously] “Say, aren’t you the GM’s boyfriend?”

Aeriyal: [ignoring Lanzborne] “I can fly almost all day. We can be at the coastline by sundown and the Wizard’s stonepirk agents won’t know what hit ‘em”

Gaslyte: [gestures widely indicating the pastoral expanse] “Or we could ignore them and….”

Schtudius: [in some deep thought] “Perhaps an infinite number of bears isn’t exactly an objectively ideal encounter. I mean…infinite is….big. Perhaps an illusion…”

Aeriyal: [jets upwards and off like an arrow…or…bolt] “Yee!”

Gaslyte: [sits down, hurriedly fumbles with a tome] “The treatise says there is a western path through the moors…”

Lanzborne: “Nope, bears it is.”

Schtudius: “Infinite XP…”

Gaslyte: [stops flipping pages, and covetously, fervently prays over an arachnid pendant before surreptitiously hiding it beneath their ebon mailshirt] “Surface dwellers!”

The way you defeat an infinite number of bears if you encounter them, is if you defeat a sufficient number of bears, the bears themselves will realize "this is not the best thing the infinite number of bears could be doing with their time which is less infinite" and they decide to leave.

Like you cannot stop an infinite number of bears from leaving a place they don't want to be.

Or use honey.

Not a single human among them. Finally, I see all of my parties represented in media.

Dare I ask if the Zoetrope is supposed to be a reference to Noah's Ark, especially with the animals in command / at the forefront of the crew?

(very creative and funny names)

I just coundn't resist a chance at a compliment for those epic punny names...

It's honestly pretty easy to avoid wings trivializing fights as a GM, but you need to understand how flight works, and that's not something the game should expect by default. Discourage ranged or mage flier builds. Give NPCs their own ranged attacks or fly speeds. Set lots of fights in cramped areas. Don't allow flying PCs to carry non-flying PCs or other heavy weights...

Yeah...the problem is that feels a lot like "you took this cool ability, but oh look, all opponents now have the ability to counter it and all traps are now built expecting it" which nobody likes. Not the player, not the GM. It's much harder to redesign encounters in a way that lets all the players shine *without* making flight irrelevant or countered.

[shrug] I'm fine with the Paizo option text. Let a million different tables bloom. :) But if you ask me to predict the level 1 feats that winged ancestries will get in the new releases, my prediction is something more like Wind Pillow than true flight.

Jacob Jett wrote:

In three different editions of D&D and dozens other ttrpgs, this is a problem I've literally never encountered.

I mean, for example, if you can fly all day and have a cantrip that does damage, you can defeat an infinite number of bears without taking any damage. You will just eventually get sleepy and fly off where the bears can't get you.

There's also stuff like "Pit traps are not a problem when you can just fly out of them."

I mean...I suppose we can can concoct any manner of deus ex machina to trivialize all of a game's bits and bobs. IMO, this is a malfunction of the GM and not the game's mechanics. I'm pretty sure your flyer won't be able to trivialize one of my bears encounters... I'm also not certain where you'd go where the bears won't get you. Town maybe? (Then the bears become someone else's problem I suppose.)

I'll also point out that there're are more kinds of traps (and hazards) than just pits.

But I can see some folks are just really pig-headed about this, which is really a demonstration of lack of imagination. Which is pretty sad since we should be celebrating this game instead of picking stuff apart.

I mean...I suppose we can can concoct any manner of deus ex machina to trivialize all of a game's bits and bobs. IMO, this is a malfunction of the GM and not the game's mechanics. I'm pretty sure your flyer won't be able to trivialize one of my bears encounters... I'm also not certain where you'd go where the bears won't get you. Town maybe? (Then the bears become someone else's problem I suppose.)

I'll also point out that there're are more kinds of traps (and hazards) than just pits.

But I can see some folks are just really pig-headed about this, which is really a demonstration of lack of imagination. Which is pretty sad since we should be celebrating this game instead of picking stuff apart.

So let me see if I'm parsing your argument correctly...

Sir, your argument does not reflect well on you.

Flight would be incredibly balanced in PF2 if it took an action to sustain it.

That aside, I am glad to see mobility and diversity winning over staid abelist humanocentric ideas.

Another thing about Awakened vs "Folk", beyond thumbs, is that as stands Awakened doesn't change size.

Awakened mice could have a problem...

Another thing about Awakened vs "Folk", beyond thumbs, is that as stands Awakened doesn't change size.

Awakened mice could have a problem...

Until they hop onto their large-sized construct companion. Then it is everyone else who could have a problem!

Another thing about Awakened vs "Folk", beyond thumbs, is that as stands Awakened doesn't change size.

Awakened mice could have a problem...

Tiny Sprites are in the game for some time already.

Flight would be incredibly balanced in PF2 if it took an action to sustain it.

Most of the ways that low-level flight is potentially game-breaking aren't really affected by whether or not it takes an action to remain aloft. A lot of them don't involve combat at all... and for the ones that are built to allow for flying characters without real troubles, having to spend an action a round seems like it might be a bit punitive.

So let me see if I'm parsing your argument correctly...
- GMs shouldn't mind having chunks of their toolbox trivialized, because they still have some toolbox left. Losing pit traps is fine. You still have other traps that are not pit traps.

Wrong already. Flight is as much a tool in the box as bears and pits.

- A true GM should be able to work around this with no problem.

Facts. Although I'd drop the word "true". Any GM should have the skills to know when and where to employ bears and pit traps to challenge the players in manners that aren't easily trivialized.

- This means that those who don't like this optional rule are simply stubborn, and, further, opposition to using it is tantamount to complaining about the game, because clearly this optional rule (with serious built in warnings) is the way the game was meant to be played.

Nope. Clinging to the notion that "giving players flight out of the box is game-breaking" is what's pig-headed.

Frankly a close reading of the CRB and GMG reveal that the manner in which the game is meant to be played is up to individual tables. In my opinion, no table should dismiss the optional flight rules out of hand. They're good and not unbalancing.

- In conclusion, anyone who doesn't agree with you on the matter of this optional rule isn't being properly supportive of Paizo/PF2

Sir, your argument does not reflect well on you.

Hyperbole and personal attacking here. I've said no such thing. Merely that those who choose to believe that flight is going to trivialize their games lack adequate imagination to see how it won't. It is a fantasy game afterall. If your poaching bears in the forest, I shouldn't be surprised if the forest's protectors come calling. If we're talking encounters, then the GM needs to have a thorough understanding of their players' characters. And thereby, plan accordingly. This doesn't mean don't use bears and pits. It means use bears and pits creatively.

Ultimately, I think there is a difference in GM skills at play here. I come from an old school place where we were encouraged to paint outside the lines, build our own worlds, and customize our stories to our players characters. Dealing with mechanics like flight is par for the course in my case. I don't consider it a meaningful challenge to keep it from trivializing anything. A good skill for GMs to develop is dealing with mechanics like flight which are quite ubiquitous in many other ttrpgs (where they again fail to trivialize things). I reject the thesis that flight is game-breaking. But I also have more than three decades running games like this one. YMMV

Darrell Impey UK wrote:

Another thing about Awakened vs "Folk", beyond thumbs, is that as stands Awakened doesn't change size.

Awakened mice could have a problem...

Until they hop onto their large-sized construct companion. Then it is everyone else who could have a problem!

Pathfinder needs "Awakened Ferrets in mech suits" badly...

So one thing Pathfinder 2e is set up to do is to empower GMs to shut down certain things that will break specific plots or scenarios that the GM has planned without having to do things like "seed anti-teleport traps everywhere.

So sure, there are absolutely stories where "one member of the party has infinite flight from level 1" is not going to be a problem, there are assuredly plenty of stories where it is. Pathfinder 2e is set up to enable the GM to tell the sorts of stories that the GM wants, and if the GM wants to tell a story where "flight is rare and limited at low levels" they should be able to. You might have done a lot of work before you even know who the PCs are and having to find out "oh, I have to rewrite a bunch of this because one of the PCs can fly" kind of bites.

But another reason to not allow unlimited low level flight potentially is that anytime you're singling out one member of the party as especially capable or incapable, that kind of sucks for at least one player. It's like how you don't run a lot of scenarios where "darkness is a problem" with parties that are like a Dwarf, a Goblin, a Tiefling Elf, and a Regular-Degular Human (all darkvision except the last PC) or with parties that are like an Orc, an Anadi, an Iruxi, and a Halfling (nobody even has low-light vision except the Orc.)

So one thing Pathfinder 2e is set up to do is to empower GMs to shut down certain things that will break specific plots or scenarios that the GM has planned without having to do things like "seed anti-teleport traps everywhere.

Sounds exhausting. I can't recall my players having this much teleport at their fingertips.

So sure, there are absolutely stories where "one member of the party has infinite flight from level 1" is not going to be a problem, there are assuredly plenty of stories where it is. Pathfinder 2e is set up to enable the GM to tell the sorts of stories that the GM wants, and if the GM wants to tell a story where "flight is rare and limited at low levels" they should be able to. You might have done a lot of work before you even know who the PCs are and having to find out "oh, I have to rewrite a bunch of this because one of the PCs can fly" kind of bites.

A good rule of thumb (advice from a veteran DM), lean into a character creation session so you know what's what. Some anecdotes from history. Most folks start with modules/APs. In my day we played the starter adventure, IIRC, it was called something like "The Terrible Trouble at Tragidore." I was a player, not DM. It was fine but knowing I'd soon be DMing, I found the adventure structure to be a narrative straight-jacket.

Once you move on from canned adventures/APs, then you write your own. That's pretty natural. As you're doing that you might start bottom up world building the way DM Lair describes it. This is all journeyperson level and, where if you give players free reign at character creation, you could be bit by something unexpected. IMO, this is the most frustrating stage for GMs because at this level of expertise there's a tendency to overprep your narrative and the players can easily make choices that disrupt it. Ironically, I experienced the most problems with this level of storytelling with FASA's Shadowrun game. If you don't want your players to wreck things, this is the level were you need to discuss with them ahead of time and negotiate with regards to your expectations as GM and their expectations as players.

Eventually, you'll either burn out storytelling at the journeyperson level (because players are not interested in the story you as GM want to tell--they want to tell their own stories, and they should, that's really the GM's remit, facilitating the players in telling their story), or you take the next big plunge--top down worldbuilding. In top-down world building the focus is on designing a sandbox through which manifold stories can be told. One of the activities you'll engage in during the top-down approach is reading and re-reading rules multiple times in order to situate everything in your setting just so (like a complex pattern of dominoes). You should expect to take and make lots of notes. Through all of this you will achieve mastery.

From there it becomes observational. The players make the characters in your sandbox and you tailor the story to them. Because really, at the end of the day, it's their story. You already did your part, organizing a space in which their story can happen. If they want to fly, blow crap up, etc., etc. Let them.

Additional helpful skills for master GMs to develop include: ad libbing, making up crap on the fly, and knowing which rules need to closely followed, which ones to ignore, and which to pay lip service to are vital skills to develop here. It's helpful if you've played and GM'd multiple different ttrpg systems (at a minimum I'd say 7 or 8 minimum). Be sure to at least play, if not GM, Torg. Observe its Drama Deck in action. I only ever interacted with Torg as a player but the narrative impact of the Drama Deck was a lesson I took to heart.

But another reason to not allow unlimited low level flight potentially is that anytime you're singling out one member of the party as especially capable or incapable, that kind of sucks for at least one player. It's like how you don't run a lot of scenarios where "darkness is a problem" with parties that are like a Dwarf, a Goblin, a Tiefling Elf, and a Regular-Degular Human (all darkvision except the last PC) or with parties that are like an Orc, an Anadi, an Iruxi, and a Halfling (nobody even has low-light vision except the Orc.)

This is a non-issue if you tailor the story to the players rather than try to jam all the square pegs into your matrix of round holes. Write for them. Don't make them jump through hoops for yourself.

I won't lie, my way of GMing isn't for the casual GM. But then again, I don't think a crunch-heavy system like PF2.r is for the casual GM either. It has so many delightful sub-systems that can take the game from zero to 120km/hr in seconds. For more casual GMs, they are plenty of light-weight systems that have great balance points, e.g., Lasers & Feelings.

For the record, the most trivial thing to do in any TTRPG is to deliver a TPK. Even D&D3.5 presented no obstacle to this and I suspect it's equally possible with D&D5. If PF2.r does anything, it makes this trivial thing even more trivial.

EDIT: Upon reflection, we have here an almost Han Solo v. Obi-Wan Kenobi kind of difference in world view. IMO, there's no such thing as luck. If you aren't deeply plugged into character creation as a GM, then you're basically relying on luck to keep everything going to plan, instead of planning for the choices your players are making.

People have difficulty with flight. That is not for debate. I think its reasonable to go "GMs should be empowered to make a game that is fun for them and the entire table, and that includes limiting flight at early levels if they see it as a problem" instead of "GMs should let the players have unlimited flight and hope they can make it fun for themselves and the other players"

People have difficulty with flight. That is not for debate. I think its reasonable to go "GMs should be empowered to make a game that is fun for them and the entire table, and that includes limiting flight at early levels if they see it as a problem" instead of "GMs should let the players have unlimited flight and hope they can make it fun for themselves and the other players"

I'm saying the first (and that it's easy). I'm not saying the second. Folks are reading what they want to read when I say, flight has never trivialized anything in any of my games.

EDIT: I should say, I feel like there's some weirdness with the "fun" aspect. Like if you as a player are not having fun because of another player's character concept, then the issue might be with you and not them. Like it's a good thing for players to discuss what they want out of their characters with one another. If someone wants flight and most folks are good with it (and really, why shouldn't they be, same team and all) then the one person who does have a problem is playing with the wrong group. (And ultimately, whether a character can fly or not, that's not what makes the character special.)

Generally I think "the GM has less work to do if certain player options are not available" is a good tradeoff. There are relatively few games that don't happen because "not enough players" after all.

I'm saying the first (and that it's easy). I'm not saying the second. Folks are reading what they want to read when I say, flight has never trivialized anything in any of my games.

I feel like your basic thesis (which you keep hammering) is that you're an amazing GM, so it's easy and not a problem for you, so it shouldn't be a problem for anybody else, and it's our fault if it is. Heck - you went so far as to very nearly outright say... here it is.

I won't lie, my way of GMing isn't for the casual GM. But then again, I don't think a crunch-heavy system like PF2.r is for the casual GM either. It has so many delightful sub-systems that can take the game from zero to 120km/hr in seconds. For more casual GMs, they are plenty of light-weight systems that have great balance points, e.g., Lasers & Feelings.

You straight-up say that anyone who's too casual to get on your level as a GM shouldn't even try to play PF2, and should go off and play an easier game. Kind of a severe case of gatekeeping, don't you think? I don't know about you, but I want new/casual GMs and new/casual players in this game. I want as many as we can get. I want them to have an easy entry and an enjoyable first few experiences, and I want them to buy books and feel good about it so that Paizo can have more money to print new books with.

Oh, and you're also talking down about people who use APs (when that's one of PF2's big draws) and, let's not forget, building this entire argument in support of the position that a specific optional rule, which in its own rulebook is posted with warnings and caveats, should be universally applied.

So... are you really trying for anything here other than bragging on yourself? Because it's not actually making you look like you're a Voice of True Knowledge. It's making you look like someone who has a lot of experience down a very particular path of development who has difficulty even grasping that there might be other, equally valid ways to play the game. Like, sure, your lived experience is a useful datapoint. It supports that yes, under some circumstances, that optional rule is appropriate... and no one was denying that. At the same time, your lived experience doesn't get to invalidate anyone else's. So when people come here saying "Why yes, as a GM, I really appreciate that Paizo gives me the control to not use rules like this if I don't want to." and you respond with "Well, you're wrong and you shouldn't want that." it doesn't make you look like you're an authority on the subject. It makes you look....

Actually, I'm going to let you come to your own conclusions about how it makes you look. Maybe if you think through it, you can come up with a realization or two that you actually listen to.

I mean, it's possible that a PC who can be invisible whenever they want for as long as they want from level 1 would not be a problem in a campaign. Like *everything* you fight has tremorsense and scent or something and the story will never involve conventional "stealth or hiding" (like your campaign is about fighting Graboids, or something.)

But this is probably not most campaigns.

The only problem I see with the excuse of "writing around flight" is that it works better for homebrew campaigns, but is not as applicable for premade adventures, adventure paths, society scenarios, etc.

Like, it can be done, but it defeats the purpose of wanting to use premade works if you are going to be applying heavy mods each time.

I hear it often, make the enemy prepare, but when you want to keep a sense of verisimilitude, that's easier said than done. And some groups won't have enough time to adapt before they are eliminated. So the solution is to either make the enemy more competent and clever than the story intends them to be, to let the enemy always have the perfect composition that coincidentally counters flight, or to outright have to change certain maps to a different, more restricted version, instead of using the original map. Some groups being prepared for specific things is just not thematic, and making them so can risk losing suspension of disbelief.

Having played Eartthdawn - flying is not often an issue. I know I also played PF campaigns where individual characters had flight early on.

In my experience the situation where a single character having flight creates significant issues in a campaign is quite limited. (Provided they can’t carry others…). Of course it depends on the GM and campaign - but it is manageable in my experience.

The only problem I see with the excuse of "writing around flight" is that it works better for homebrew campaigns, but is not as applicable for premade adventures, adventure paths, society scenarios, etc.

Like, it can be done, but it defeats the purpose of wanting to use premade works if you are going to be applying heavy mods each time.

As far as I can tell, PAIZO as a company has had massive success with their premade adventure paths and organized play concept. Add to that, the remaster is happening right now (vs. later) because of the big sales influx Paizo got from new players coming over from 5e. So I would expect that new ancestries and the revised classes to be designed to work well for newish players, Paizo adventure path products, and GMs in organized play. With an inclusion of the "rule zero" concept that more advanced alternates are presented as optional, for those who want them (read: experienced GMs and tables creating their own campaigns from scratch). Rather than vice versa (where the more advanced alternates are the baseline rules and novice groups are given the option of not using certain things).

So while, like Berhagen and Jacob I think I would have little problem GMing flight at a table of my old and experienced friends, I neither desire nor expect that new ancestries will allow full flight based on the argument that folks like me can manage it.

Flight would seem to be a problem for some GMs.

I think it opens up a lot of narrative space once the party goes into cramped indoor/underground places were it becomes detrimental.

Those things aside, and back on course -- how many times is our intrepid crew going to crash due to the laws of narrativium?

PF2 does a lot to make movement a bigger part of encounters and even in two dimensions players struggle to grasp it all. Difficult terrain, balancing, shoving, players wanting to pull and drag NPCs and not knowing how, timing interact actions to allow the opening and closing of door around other characters movements, all can lead to frustration when one or more player feels like the rules are preventing them from being awesome.

Flight both adds complexity and takes away from GMs learning how to make dynamic, 3 dimensional mobile encounters fort by doing simple things like adding slopes/cliffs/moving water/etc. At many tables, once flight is added, players and GMs barely remember to make flying up difficult terrain, much less that movement actions must be spent to maintain it, that getting knocked prone means falling, and that characters can almost never grab an edge with their hands full.

I think it is good to have some levels where players Lear how jumping, leaping climbing, balancing and moving around obstacles and difficult terrain before any characters can just invalidate all of that by ancestry selection.

Darrell Impey UK wrote:

Another thing about Awakened vs "Folk", beyond thumbs, is that as stands Awakened doesn't change size.

Awakened mice could have a problem...

Until they hop onto their large-sized construct companion. Then it is everyone else who could have a problem!

My current group has a goblin artificer who came to a similar conclusion and rides around on their mech companion.

Flying is only a problem if you make it a problem.

Invalidates melee? Humanoid creatures shouldn't be running around without a range weapon, or at least someone that can use them. Also you can always use enclosed spaces.
Gets around cover? This is why buildings exist, use them.
Invalidates terrain issues? Congrats the party is using their talents to solve the problems on their way, why is this an issue?

The only time that flying is a problem is when the whole party has 8 hours of it and can travel at the speed of the wind. Which is only a problem if "the party must take this exact route or else the campaign doesn't work". At that point you have bigger issues than flying, namely a linear AP but sandbox map.

I'm pretty sure Paizo did not make Flying available at low levels just to spite players.

I'm pretty sure Paizo did not make Flying available at low levels just to spite players.

At the very least a misguided sense of "everything must be balanced" regardless of the implications.