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Pathfinder2 review:

In 20 years I have played, read or game mastered more systems than I can count. Some I loved, some I tolerated.

I can still remember how pleasantly surprised I was by Pathfinder 1 compared to 3.5 of the 'original role playing game.' Unlimited cantrips? AWESOME. Hey look, easy multiclassing! Better Grapple rules, introducing a single stat to consolidate trip, grapple, disarm, and with the Advanced Player's Guide, new types of maneuvers into one defense stat and one offense stat. Added to that, solid reasons to take a class to 20 levels. Best of all, fighting classes all got a much needed overhauls. No system is perfect, but Pathfinder had done a really good job of giving players options. And it has been a blast to play. Pathfinder Society served both as an entry point for new players and a fun way to be able to drop in and just play. If there is one problem is that it tried to put a rule to everything and has some inconsistency problems here and there.

The challenge with any follow on edition is keeping what made the previous edition awesome while both fixing problems and innovating. For example, the "original role play game's" conversion from 2nd to 3rd did a marvelous job of making it easier to follow and easier to get involved, while keeping the flavor that made the 'original game' what it was. Then the 'original game' put out 4th edition. It likely wasn't bad, but it fell flat with my gaming group. By the way, this is not the only system I've seen this with. Mechwarrior's 3rd edition fell flat with me because of how they handled origins.

Which brings me to my first impression of the new edition. My first impression on reading the play test was, in a word, "Meh."

There are several interesting ideas, but the implementation is lacking. Take ancestry feats. This would be a good idea, if the way of giving them to players hadn't involved stripping off Pathfinder racial traits and spreading them up levels. This is fixable. Give them 3 feats to pick from 1st levels. Dig into the Advanced Race Guide and bring the alternate traits in as new 1st level options, and come up with some either upgrades or improvements for higher levels.

Likewise, since everything seems to run off of attribute bonuses, instead of the attributes, why not just go directly to the bonus. Ie "All characters start at +0, human can select two +1's to any two stats, to a maximum of +4" instead of the extra complications. It's been done elsewhere, for example, Mutants and Mastermind's 3rd edition. It's not a bad simplification. Move the 'random roll' stuff over to GM section as an optional rule. Speaking of GM's section. Get the GM stuff back in the main book where it belongs. Players will buy the Bestiary on their own. Honest!

Multiclassing under the new system is less than impressive. Pathfinder1 made it easy and if a player really wants to dabble in ten different classes, they can, but have solid reasons not to. This system.. not so much.

Other easy fix to my mind is to return combat feats back to general. The only things that should be in those classes should be things that should ONLY be for those classes. Half the fun of Pathfinder1 was making combinations like a wizard who could fight using stances or with dual weapons, even though the character was pure wizard.

Honestly, I'm mediocre on the change to skill points. I like Pathfinder skill points, but I do appreciate fighters getting a badly needed extra skill. On the positive, I like skill feats and the fact that they come up frequently. The removal of CMD and CMB I will have to play test to judge what I think.

Backgrounds are a neat addition to replace traits, with Lore coming from the background of the character. Though it might be interesting to have feats that play into that background feat.

The other problem is resonance. I get the idea, but I don't think it works. It does not make a magic item unique... it makes it another limited resource. Honestly, 3.5's Weapons of Legacy or Scaling items (first place I saw it was Arcanis, but I think I saw it in 13th age as well) might be a better idea. The bonded Item from Pathfinder's wizard and Paladin classes were a neat idea as well as something that would grow alongside the character. I'm neutral on runes. They're nice, and would be a cost saver in a campaign at higher levels. Again it's nice, but not spectacular.

Honestly, my first impression is that it needs at least another year of development beyond what's planned and really go back to ones and try to recapture that magic, because from where I sit, this edition just doesn't have it.

Thank you for listening.