BaronOfBread's page

I had a PFS Ancestor Oracle who really leaned into the curse effect and with the Remaster that character is pretty much dead for two reasons. The first reason being that they were Dex based and clumsy would wreck them, but this post is about the second reason.

The second reason is that Meddling Futures, the replacement for the ancestor oracles' old curse, is bad. Meddling Futures has a 1 in 4 chance of getting what you really want, as opposed to the curse which had a 50-50 shot. You can't try to get ready for your action since you only know what is prescribed on that action, as opposed to the curse telling you at the end of your previous turn. Meddling Futures can shut down any action that isn't the prescribed action, so you can't dodge the effect by Raising a Shield or other useful actions that weren't penalized with the curse.

Meddling Futures has some positives, in that it can only shut down one action (unless you try to use an activity like a spell cast) and that you choose when you gamble on it instead of always having it going. But when is it actually good to gamble on getting an improved action vs potentially losing an action? More importantly, how does that math change when taking the gamble costs you?

That's really the rub, Meddling Futures just isn't good enough for a cursebound feat. It gets outcompeted for damage by Foretell Harm and Whispers of Weakness eats its lunch on some skill checks as well as for Strikes (and some other attack trait actions as well). If the idea is that because the feat has a wider variety of bonuses it should cost more, then there needs to be some kind of reliability to getting what you want when you need it otherwise it is just more chances to get wrecked. If an ability is going to unreliably give me a smaller effect than an ability that is cheaper to get and reliable, then that first ability needs a change.

Maybe make the effect more reliable, roll d4s equal to your cursebound value and pick one. Maybe drop the cursebound trait, weaker effects feel justified if they don't increment cursebound. Maybe if you don't use the action during your turn you flat check vs stunned 1 at the end of your turn, getting to choose when you use the action once you know what it is makes the bonus far easier to use. Maybe something else, I'm sure there are upgrades more clever and balanced than those. Maybe its too late for errata to improve it. But I think an upgrade is required for this to not be a dead feat and a dead play style.

I think, jumping in here, it may be good to reinforce the challenging of the assumption that martials should not have a daily resource pool... Beyond that, operating with the assumption of keeping spell slots, I would like to introduce my own idea...

This idea is the ideal that my homerules for Stamina continue to slide towards, though I don't expect martials to make use of additional stamina-powered abilities more than once per encounter. I fear making it more frequent than that would make them feel like spellcasters, just casting iron instead of spells.

As for the cantrips, I think it is necessary for balance that a steady stream of cantrips feels less powerful than a steady stream of martial output. Otherwise the casters go back to being just better than the martials at combat, which is basically just better than martials. That said, I think it might be possible to thread the balance-needle there with additional martial abilities.

Sorry to be blunt, but any design where the GM has to turn on/off mechanics "because that last goblin is no longer a threat" is completely dead on arrival.

Bluntness is fine, here's some of my own: a half-decent GM should be able to come up with a narrative statement to make it obvious to the players that the situation is diffused and over. It's as simple as saying "The final goblin, surrounded by his dead companions, with blood running down his side, throws his spear to the ground and drops to his knees to cry salty tears onto the fighter's boots. What do you do now?" If you can't come up with such narrative statements, don't run foes that can't be individually threatening. Half-clever players and a bad GM can combine to abuse any system with player agency.

Again, all spells would become infinite cantrips castable w/ 0 FP.

Nobody plays a wizard because of the cantrips, that would just be a kineticist. When I said spells I meant powerful effects.

magic write up

Speaking of abusing systems, the easy and obvious abuse case here is that the party doesn't act like you assume they will, pushed by the incentive structure your system establishes. They will throw all the resources they can at each encounter, then wait for those resources to refill before moving forward. That, or they wait after every other encounter because the pool is deep enough. Without time pressure the players just say "our characters wait an hour and a half" after every fight, which costs them 5 seconds and no effort to ensure maximum encounter power. The system becomes an in-encounter attrition system instead of a between-encounter attrition system.

Not to say a GM can't make the system work, they just need to get the time pressure right. For a time pressure to be effective it has to be faster than the time scale for resource renewal. At a 10 minute recharge rate we need to be looking at encounters every hour, at least, before attrition is relevant. Those encounters also need to be hard on average or else the caster isn't blowing more than 6 points per hour, if they have any trigger discipline. I suppose the best way to work this system as the GM is for the players to be told "the evil wizard will complete his ritual as soon as the last light of the sun fades, which your characters know to be in 3 hours", then have four potential encounters before the wizard is defeated. If you run a campaign where similar time restrictions can be regularly used, then I think this system will work well.

There are multiple reasons I think using in-world time as the resource recovery method isn't a good solution.

To start with, it is the system we have right now. The period of time is 1 day, and the recovery amount is everything. Different timed recovery systems are just changing the interval and amount per interval.

It does not solve the 15-minute adventuring day. It just means that you do shifts, one when you start full power and one when you have recovered to full power. If you make the recovery period short, as in get back a spell every y minutes, then you just wait y * (number of top slots minutes) between encounters. Now instead of "we need to long rest, Wiz has no spells", it's "we need to wait, Wiz has no spells". You still have a group of martials playing cards while they wait for their wizard to be useful again, it's just a matter of how long they wait.

The resource management isn't in the wizard's control, it is in the gamemaster's. If the GM provides no time pressure, the resource game is just "dump spells, wait a while". With time pressure, the wizard in a fight does not want to spend his resource because he can't ensure he can have that resource available when he /really/ needs it. The reward for spending his resource, unless it was absolutely crucial for victory, is the party spends less time healing up (assuming something like the PF2 system for healing). But that reward immediately turns into a punishment because now the rest of the party wants to move on faster, while the wizard wants to wait longer. Unless you make the wizard's resource come back fast enough that this isn't an issue, but then we go back to "dump spells, wait" without the "wait". At that point you just have encounter powers with extra steps, which means you aren't playing a resource game at all.

Perhaps my biggest reason to dislike a timed recovery system is that it is all about avoiding casting spells. I don't play a caster to try not to cast spells, I want to cast spells and be rewarded for doing so.

Casters can't start not at full power...

I disagree. A caster starting at 75% power or so should be able to effectively engage with even an extreme threat encounter because, unless that encounter goes quite long, the caster won't spend all their slots. If they are low level they might be at risk of that, but extreme encounters at low level are already discouraged. If the caster hits a moderate/low threat encounter to start with then they can start building power immediately, which they couldn't if they started with full slots. All that said, starting at full power would also work with the system.

Can't cast outside of combat...

Utility casting outside of encounters needs to have a cost, and this system makes it so there is a limited cost. Limited, because you probably break even on those casts slot-wise, but it costs you 10 minutes per cast to do so if you want to keep those slots ready.

Objection to only in combat functionality...

As my original post said, it's not only in combat. Breaking positive is only in stressful/chaotic scenarios and the narrative reason is given. "Only in certain scenarios" functionalities are fine if a suitable narrative reason is given, but providing one would require more than the space in an action text. Even then, it is magic and magic is a place where sometimes a wizard just has to say that "that's how it works". Y'know, like every magic system.

Warmup PVP...

Not stressful/chaotic, unless of course there is some underlying drama and the characters aren't pulling their punches on each other allowing for risk of serious harm/death. Training and actually doing are different things. This also doesn't work if you treat your game as having a narrative element, because as it turns out, unless your party is a group of sadistic and masochistic villains that want to try and kill each other every morning for power, fireballing your fighter in the morning will lead to problems immediately. Which will make the situation become stressful/chaotic, but will also make your wizard (or fighter) dead.

Leave last foe alive...

See warm-up PVP, unless of course the last remaining goblin is in fact a threat to the party, at which point that is what we call managed risk on the players' part. Fireballing rabbits isn't stressful, fireballing a straw dummy isn't stressful, fireballing a level-3 goblin who is paralyzed and held down by your martials isn't stressful (unless you have moral qualms about torturing something to death, at which point maybe you wouldn't do that).

Dead combat actions...

I don't see how it is really that different from taking the Aid action or other numerical buffing action. The difference is the time frame we are looking at for the action investment to potentially payoff. That said, I am perfectly willing to admit that the balance could be wildly off between the various action costs and allowing for better economy on the spell recovery could be correct.

The reason I tie the resource recovery to the resource use, and make the "combat" version more powerful, is that this puts the spellcaster in control of getting their resources back while ensuring there is some risk still involved. This system allows a caster to always start fights with a big spell, then by turn two they should know if they need to throw another one or if they can start building resources.

Well, here's my pitch for something that would work in PF2.

Casters start with 2/3 or so of their slots. Everyone gets the following basic actions.

Reclaim Magic [Manipulate, Concentrate]
1 to 3 actions
Choose a spell you cast from a spell slot since the start of your last turn or choose a spell you cast from a spell slot that has a duration and that hasn't expired yet. Make a check using the appropriate skill (Arcana for an arcane spell, etc) or your spell attack modifier against the level-based DC for the spell's rank. If you spent three actions, reduce the DC by 5. If you spent one action, increase the DC by 5 and any spells you cast from spell slots this turn are disrupted. If you have already cast a spell from a slot this turn, you can't use a 1 action Reclaim Magic. You can't Reclaim Magic multiple times from the same spell.
>Crit Success: Gain spell points equal to half the spell's rank, rounded down to a minimum of 1. Then you choose to either make the spell slot you cast the chosen spell from unexpended as if you had not cast from it or you gain spell points equal to the spell's rank.
>Success: Gain spell points equal to the spell's rank.
>Failure: Gain spell points equal to the rank of the spell minus 1, to a minimum of 1.
>Crit Failure: Gain spell points equal to half the rank of the spell, rounded down to a minimum of 0.
In stressful situations, such as in combat or high-stakes social interactions, ambient chaos makes spellcasting more erratic and prone to generating excess energy. Outside of those situations, because there is less energy to reclaim, reduce your degree of success by one.

Channel Magic
10 minutes
Expend any number of spell points. Fill spell slots with total ranks equal to the spell points expended. If you prepare spells, prepare filled slots as you would during daily preparations.

The basic premise is that in an easy fight you don't have to go hard with spells, so if you throw a slotted spell you can take a turn off to potentially turn that slot into a higher rank slot. Once you have a few levels you can even upgrade lower rank slots with single actions while still dropping focus spells, cantrips, or spells from items. In hard fights you can't build up your resource because you will be too busy dropping slotted spells. This system also adds pseudo-Spell Substitution to all prepared casters since they would suffer the most from not starting with their full array of slots.

Ignoring my next post a moment, I think giving martials an attrition-able resource is better than pursuing the endless adventuring day. I like the Stamina optional rules for this, though I have layered a bunch of homebrew onto the Stamina rules when I use them since I find the base rules a bit underdeveloped.

When I ran something like a "gritty realism" adventure I threw together a slap-dash homebrew mess. It ended up working with no adjustments throughout the adventure and it looked a little like this (this game was a few years back so this might not be 100% accurate):
Proficiency Without Level (Untrained +0, Trained +3, Expert +5, Master +7, Legend +9)
Stamina rules
Your class only increases your hit points and stamina at level 1.
Heightening spells doesn't increase their damage/healing.

The game didn't go above fifth level and we didn't have a primary caster in the group, nor did the party get any striking runes. Enemies I ran were levels -1 to 2 and I didn't run any proper "boss" encounters, but I did run some encounters with tons of enemies that the party had to play smart around.

If we had a primary caster I probably would have limited the damage/healing/temp HP that spells could dish out.

Deriven Firelion wrote:

I don't know why you keep arguing that the words "visible" have to written for you...

Let's be clear here, YOU claimed the rules stated that the aura was visible. YOU claimed the rules stated it made the kineticist spottable. And the rules say no such thing. Are we agreed on that?

Quote:

It seems that the designers neither wrote down the elements clearly invisible or wrote down the aura had to visible because they very much left it up to the player and GM to work out how that works.

It is impossible to cover every possible rule scenario. Which is why certain rules like Kinetic Auras, stealth, and a variety of other rules that can't be covered are left more open for a DM an player to work out in play.

I disagree, because I think you are conflating different rules cases. The rules cannot cover and we shouldn't expect them to cover every potential use of an ability. But if a feat, class power, spell etc. always causes some effect, then absolutely we should expect the description to mention that. A fireball may light the area on fire, so that isn't mentioned. If a fireball always, in every circumstance no matter what lit the area on fire, then the description of the spell would mention that, because that's something the GM would have to enforce, all the time, no matter what the player wanted....

I appreciate this particular exchange because you use Fireball as an example immediately after saying something isn't visible without being called out as such. Fireball is a great example of something that is visible without being called out as such. Sure, the spell isn't subtle so you know that wizard cast a spell, there was a "roaring" sound, and you feel really warm now, but the rules don't say you would have seen anything. You know what else isn't called out as explicitly visible? A longsword. No part of their description indicates that they can be seen, felt, or heard. You know about how long they are, that they have one or two edges, and that they are swords.

At the end of the day, things are noticeable or not in-fiction based on what the group decides. Some things don't need any discussion, like a fireball (hopefully), and others apparently do, like an open kinetic gate.

I propose an errata to the Inventor's armor innovation. The subterfuge suit should be +2 AC/+3 Max Dex instead of a +1 AC/+4 Max Dex because the Inventor who chooses that as their innovation can't cap AC until level 5.

[I, too, shall shorten things a bit]

I like mutagens, lots of my characters have some alchemical abilities. I can understand not liking them, but I sure do.

I see Aid used by players in games I run fairly regularly, though I don't see it much in the games I play in (different groups). I find that Aid is not as strong/reliable as Clue Them In, but I admit that is certainly partially because I rarely run or play above level 10. If Aid is frequent and reliable at a table, Investigator is significantly worse because Aid can also cancel out the benefit of Pursue a Lead.

As I said, any specialist ...

We are just going to have to disagree here. I think being able to match (or almost match early on) dedicated specialist classes in their primary skills while also being better than everyone else in multiple other skills should nominate a class for "best at skills".

As for the Rogue, yes the Rogue will likely be better at DEX or STR (but not both) skills at half/most levels. Any other skill group is a wash, however, because while the Rogue could start with a 16 WIS, they can't start with 16 WIS and 16 INT without sacrificing their DEX/STR. While a low level Rogue has an easy time starting with a better bonus in WIS skills (which lasts until about level 9), they will be behind in any INT skill. This, and the Investigator is still getting Pursue bonuses on other skill groups, letting them easily make up for their required INT investment by just being +1 on most things (until they are +2).

I think you mean 18, which is the issue ^^

I do not, because Investigator's don't need that. If you don't have 12 STR you grab a chain shirt, you will have -1 to Stealth and Thievery but that is acceptable. If you don't think it is, then you can have 1 lower AC which I found to also be acceptable.

That can differ heavily based on equipment...You might also want to invest anything in CON eventually

Alchemical Investigator gets mutagens, which provide larger bonuses than permanent items and they have enough to be covered for a day. You also have enough ability boosts to increase CON if you aren't also boosting CHA a bunch. I will also stand by the idea that an Investigator is fine leaving DEX at 18 even if planning on using DEX weapons, and thus can be boosting both CHA and CON after level 5.

as I pointed out, Aid exists and can be used by everyone...

What are you using to Aid in identifying the magic on the tree? Its probably Nature, which you probably don't have raised much because if you did, you wouldn't be the one Aiding unless your party has significant skill overlap. Aid isn't that good in a lot of investigation stuff, because unless there is skill overlap, the Aid just isn't that likely to be applicable nor be a larger bonus outside of physical activities.

And again, "good" is not the same as "the best".

If they aren't the best, who is better? It isn't the Rogue, because the Investigator is just better with Pursue a Lead. Tome Thaumaturge has an argument because of the daily retraining of the Tome, but they have similar MADness issues and don't have Pursue a Lead, Clue Them In, free mutagens, nor as many skill feats.

That because the flavour isn't "instead I shoot the guy", but would be "instead I try to hit the guy in a different point or try to compensate for how I saw him dodging my shot" (or something like that). That is exactly the same thing you can do now with switching targets, just not limited to a second person for no reason. There is more than one way to attack a person.

That is not exactly the same thing at all from my perspective. Saying that "shooting this guy won't work so I shoot at a different guy" is very different from saying "shooting this guy's knee won't work so I will just shoot at him generally". If that flavor works for you, alright, but it sure doesn't work for me.

... what I care about is the regular Investigator ... That would make for a cool feat, though. Scaling medium armour plus a small goodie to equal the Sentinel Dedication and voila.

That change doesn't benefit the "regular" Investigator as much as it does the "off-brand" ones.

I would love to see that feat or the base proficiency change, but I don't have much hope for either.

That's because there is little reason to not hard-commit either way.

I suppose I don't know a good reason to hard commit to one over the other, other than rune costs.

As for advantages for melee, it is easier to justify in-combat Aid while in melee. It also opens space for Athletics and other skill actions you need to be in the front line to easily use, like Battle Medicine. The DEX ones should probably grab a Gunner's Bandolier for easier target switching, though.

Why the griffon cane, though?

The two-hand trait. You can run around with it 2-handed until you need an open hand for Athletics actions on bad DaS or whatever 1-hand actions you have. Takedown Expert lets you not need to put your hand back on for damage and makes it so you can use feats that call for keeping the hand open like Dueling Parry or Combat Grab if you go for them, as well as letting you pull a gun or potion or whatever.

Hatchets are also nice with Sweep+Agile making second attacks on your DaS more frequent.

The swap of "can" and "must" really bothers me on a flavor level. It reads to me as "My plan to shoot the guy isn't going to work, so instead I will shoot the guy." That change also benefits the Investigator with a big two-handed club more than the Investigator with a bow or rapier, because the club guy doesn't care about losing out on the Strategic Strike damage. He's just as happy with the free action pseudo-True Strike and his Power Attack.

What I would rather see is medium armor proficiency (because I actually do like the smart muscle archetype) and a couple of feats. Specifically, things like Dueling Parry, Hunter's Aim, and Tamper. Feats or class features that grant an action or reaction if "You used DaS on your last turn and did not replace a roll with your result" would also be nice. Maybe make them comparable to the Inventor's Unstable feats, with 10 minute cooldowns and powerful effects.

I will also say I think there should be less divorce between melee and ranged Investigator's in these discussions. Investigators can swap between melee and ranged easily because of DaS, and any Investigator who doesn't carry a melee and ranged weapon is leaving value on the table.

I regularly see people say "the Investigator is the best at skills", but I think there are a few issues with that claim.

The problem is ability scores. The Investigator is extremely MAD. A regular Investigator is practically forced to start with 18 INT and 16 DEX. ... That means, while you have a broader base competence than essentially all other classes, you'll only ever be the best in things that are INT related and have something to do with the current line of inquiry. ... That is still a lot in most games, but far less than "being the best at skills".

Investigator does indeed require a 16 in DEX to cap AC if they aren't picking up extra armor proficiency. So yes, they will not be able to be better than the Druid at Nature or the Cleric at Religion for the first 9 levels. But then the Investigator has at least a 14 WIS and a +2 from Pursue a Lead, which puts them at 1 less than the dedicated class, which is easily fixed through mutagens as an alchemical Investigator. But the Investigator doesn't even need to be better than the dedicated class because they have Clue Them In, making the dedicated class better just because the Investigator is around. That, and the Investigator could be competing with at least a second dedicated class at that point. While any individual Investigator is not the best in every skill, they will be the best in what they choose to be.

As for needing 16 DEX, I recommend playing a STR Investigator as they are good fun (Takedown Expert and a Griffon Cane are great). As for competing with the Thaumaturge, in a campaign you can generally use Additional Lore to keep up.

Do you want to make DaS way more interesting? Just change the word must to can from:...

Does that make it better? Yes. Does it make it more interesting? No. Just being able to ditch the roll means you don't have to think about planning or anything, and makes the dedication's Devise way too good for the likes of the fighter and magus. I have seen a magus with the current dedication Devise, giving them a free action almost-True Strike is just bonkers.

Investigator is generally fine, but a couple of new class feats would make the class easier to work with. I say this as someone who has played two investigators and plans to play more, whether or not anything changes for the class.

Investigator is not going to be the biggest damage dealer in a party, nor should they be. In fact, I think they should generally not match the rogue in damage. This is because, simply put, investigators are the best at skills. Rogue comes second because the investigator is +1 on the rogue some of the time with Pursue a Lead, +2 after 9. Then you can add mutagens/elixirs if you are in alchemical sciences for more bonuses, or you can get other skill related benefits from the other methodologies. Yes, half of an investigator's skill feats are required to be on mental skills, but in my experience that isn't a problem. Being the best at skills should cost something, and a little bit of damage is where that cost is being paid.

In combat, your trick is that you know a roll before you try it. You need to have a plan for as many results on that Devise as you can, or else you are leaving value on the table. If it is a 3, maybe you throw a cantrip (spell attacks are fine btw, Devise only cares about Strikes) or skill actions. On an 18, maybe you Strike someone else and then your target. On a 20, maybe you pull out that gun you imported from Alkenstar. Whatever they happen to be, have multiple plans.

I do think it would be good for the investigator to have in-class feats that help with that. Probably skill actions based on their methodology, non-Strike actions that do useful things against singular boss enemies.

That said, my biggest problem with the investigator is Diverse Lore. While I also quite like the look of the thaumaturge (haven't tried it yet, though), I do dearly wish that they didn't get that feat. A general lore that scales better than any other option; I think it is out of line and makes them head and shoulders above other Recall Knowledge options. Of those options, the investigator was previously the best.

We have alignment for a number of reasons, one is that it is short-hand for anathemas and edicts. Let's take some of the Empyreal Lords as an example. Judging by the information available for some of them in PF2 but ignoring alignments: Dammerich would be fine with torture, Lymnieris could support hired killers, Tanagaar would appreciate surprise murders, and Winlas would be down with human sacrifice. Sure, those misconceptions could be cleared up with a few paragraphs describing their holy goodness, but instead we can just list their alignment and save page space. That and we don't have to list every creatively evil act under the anathemas of each god currently listed as good.

We also have alignment because PF2 isn't a system built for a world of grey-and-other-grey morality, it is built for white-black morality with some grey in the middle. You don't necessarily need alignment for that, but it certainly helps. Especially if you want a class that is all about crusading for good; smite evil works best if baddies come with an evil label.

For passives you can at least use Intensive Vulnerability to draw them back out once you hit 9th level.

I'm not sure you can do the free implement swap with Intensify Vulnerability.

Relevant text from Second Implement:

While you're holding an implement in one hand, you can quickly switch it with another implement you're wearing to use an action from the implement you're switching to. To do so, you can Interact as a free action immediately before executing the implement's action. This allows you to meet requirements of having an implement in hand to use its action.

Intensify Vulnerability isn't an action from the implement, it is an action from the class and the benefit depends on the implement used. That said, I think it is pretty reasonable to read it so Intensify Vulnerability lets you do that but I wouldn't count on it.

Abilities to deal with invisible creatures are actually kinda common throughout the classes like blind fight. I wonder just how common invisible creatures are. If they're as much of a threat at those mid to high levels as those feats might suggest, the lanterns anti-invisibility is the strongest example as it shuts creatures down and reveals them to the party. Does anyone know just how common it is?

Pretty much every martial has a feat for this by level 8. I do wish the Thaumaturge had a feat option instead of needing an adept Lantern for invis, though some could use glitterdust scrolls I suppose.

I noticed a little bit of trashing of the Lantern implement in a different thread and decided I have enough thoughts I should put them in their own thread.

I am somewhat conflicted about the Lantern because on one hand it has narrow use cases that are uncommon unless you are in the "right" campaign, but on the other hand it is oppressively powerful within those use cases. You can walk around a room a few times and be quite certain you will have found everything to be found there with just the initiate benefit, but in most games I have played in or run you will very rarely have anything to find. Adept pretty much nullifies invisible enemies as a problem, which makes any enemies that rely on it chumps but won't do anything against a bear. It just feels like it will either be a seldom relevant class feature or something that breaks a campaign over its knee, which means it basically has no home on any character.

You can't even really build around it. The best I came up with was some kind of Recall Knowledge build to make use of the status bonus, but the Tome just does that better (though you could stack those, but then you have two passive implements in hand). It's a real shame, the adventurer with a lantern presented as he delves into the unknown dark is an iconic visual and this would have been a great way to fulfill that fantasy if the implement was more broadly useful.

Those are some of my thoughts, what about you folks?

I am hoping to play the Thaumaturge soon, it looks really cool. Hopefully I can justify running a Tome-Wand guy with all of the scroll feats so I can run around pretending to be Gandalf (knowledgeable in many things and occasionally doing magic of note).

Unfortunately, that kind of build does run into one of the two problems I have with the Thaumaturge: passive implements really mess up the "hand" economy. I plan to solve that by going Kitsune for melee and ranged unarmed strikes, but I don't want to have to do that for each build where I want a passive implement and a non-Weapon implement.

The other issue I have is the Lantern implement, which I think discussion of deserves its own thread.

You don't get to say this:

It's easy to forget because even being the type of person who posts online puts you into a very insular group, but the vast majority of people playing these games aren't going to abuse mechanics like Free Archetype in an attempt to break the game. Most people playing TTRPGs aren't min-maxers or people with a bent towards optimization.

Then immediately say this:

Class feats have a very narrow focus and on classes that aren't focused on support (IE, most of the classes in the game) you have little flexibility to make choices in the service of your party instead of the optimization of your own playstyle.

And call it a cohesive message.

Peak of which for me is the capability to more fully embody my character fantasy, instead of hewing only to Paizo's interpretation of what my character can be. My nature-based herbalist doctor only exists and only works because Free Archetype can build off...

This is the only reason to want FA that holds any water with me (other than for everyone to be Pirates, which is great because YARRRR). Even then, I am of the opinion that your concept is probably cluttered, bloated, or should just be a higher level character.

As a player, I don't like FA. I dislike not getting to make as many hard choices while putting together a character build, it makes build choices feel cheap and largely unsatisfying to me. Also as someone who just builds characters for no reason, FA frequently requires me to either staple a second identity onto a complete character or just grab some power boosts. Ultimately, FA ruins the elegance of making an effective and clean character by adding unnecessary bells and whistles.

As a GM, I have never used FA. I offered it to the group I usually GM for and they decided against it. Most other games I have run were for below level 4, at which point FA isn't worth granting.

Dhampir gets better with an evil champion.

I think I still lean towards my Alchemist recommendation. You probably won't be able to keep the whole party on their feat by yourself before level 7, so convincing at least one of the rogues to drop a skill feat on Battle Medicine would be a good idea. After that you can probably handle most of the party healing through the improved Battle Medicine lock-out bypass and being able to chuck Healing Bombs.

Investigator did get better in my estimation with the last slot filled, but if the party can get to level 7 the Alchemist is my favorite. It is possible to build a support Investigator, but you have to lean into archetypes pretty hard.

I know it already was mentioned, but you do need a one handed weapon for Dueling Parry. You should at least pay lip service to that rule in the guide somewhere to avoid someone getting hit with a surprise when a GM points it out.

A really good weapon (but advanced) you didn't mention is the Bladed Hoop. d8s if you two hand it, d6s if you no hand it.

Giant Gnolls get a circumstance bonus on Shove and Trip, so they may be worth mentioning for Gymnast use.

Goading Feint and Disarming Flair are both staples for a tankbuckler build for their respective Styles. They are fine pick-ups at level 2 or with Natural Ambition, or instead of the parry-and-others feats if you don't expect to have the action economy.

If you have access to the Drow Shootist archetype, then Fighter may be worth a look. Ranger may also like it for the proficiency increase.

Fighter starting Point-Blank then going down the Double Shot tree could be pretty good, and with Shootist you can have the improved proficiency track with a second weapon group so you have something to do if you run out of ammo. May I recommend Brawling and Iron Fists?

Ranger is great for the Flurry Edge. Add in Hunted Shot and Quick Draw and you are on your way.

I think Gunslinger is the least exciting of the classes for this, unfortunately. The useful feats come on late and you have a hard time using the class features.

At the end of the day, ranged dual wielding isn't very supported. The benefit you will get out of it is you run out of ammo slower with a second magazine. If you play Ranger, you will want that second magazine.

As for Forensic Medicine + Medic, I think it is a good combination. Not for the bonus to the healing amount, but for the more available burst healing and action economy help from Doctor's Visitation. You get to do the thing you want to do more often, better, and for fewer actions. Plus, you are out at 4 so it isn't a huge cost.

Without Medic, you can't move and double Battle Medicine someone for huge healing with two actions (starting at 4). Without Forensic Medicine, you can only heal a party member twice a day (pre 7), and only one of them twice.

With only one of them you are a secondary healer. With both you can be a primary healer.

The Methodologies don’t make any major difference to your build. Alchemical Sciences is the most useful. Choose the one you like.

Got to disagree here. Your methodology choice informs the rest of your build, whether you are becoming a solid party medic, the recall knowledge guy, the face, or a buff/utility provider. You can just grab a methodology and ignore it for the rest of your build, but I don't think that is the best way to go.

Athletic Investigator

Having Strength means you miss out on good ranged attacks but you have a reasonable Athletics skill to do grabs and trips as a Plan B.

Worth remembering is that your Devise works for ranged attacks. I recommend carrying a ranged weapon (guns are great for Investigators) even if you aren't good at using it without Devise.

I am going to recommend Alchemist here, but not Chirurgeon because it is pretty underwhelming. I would go Bomber or Mutagenist.

I have played an Investigator with Medic (similar theme to what you have, actually), my experience is that in the early levels you have a hard time figuring out what to do with your actions when your Devise is bad. Investigators really need things to do when their Devise is bad, and Battle Medicine doesn't fit the bill very often. If you don't want to do any magic then you are going to be having a hard time avoiding bad Devise rolls in solo encounters. Melee Investigator runs into action economy problems because if your Devise is bad on the guy you are next to, you have to move to a different one. That said, if you carry a Slide Pistol or something that can alleviate the problem because Investigators are fantastic switch hitters. Just remember that Investigators are kind of squishy for a martial.

As for Alchemist, Alchemists work great with a bunch of martials/skill monkeys. Mutagens/elixirs will help them do what they do better and get around some problems that you normally need casters for. Add in your ability to target weaknesses (which I normally discount because not that many things have weaknesses, but fiends tend to have them so it is relevant here) and let your friends target those as well by passing around bombs, you have a fantastic force multiplier character.

A nice trick is dropping a smokestick on your Rogue and feeding them a Cat's Eye Elixir. They can Hide in the smoke for SA and ignore the concealment with the Cat's Eye.

*edit: If you have a barbarian instead of a champion, then Investigator rises in my estimation for the party. They will want that healing since your party won't have other healing capability and relying on elixirs is kind of crud.

To me there's really not as much separation between rules and lore as people tend to say there is; not outside of the core mechanics of how the game works at least.

... All the other major rule sections (ancestries & backgrounds, classes, spells, feats even, and more) the rules that are there either create lore or are the representation of lore...

For that to be true, you need rules that inform/describe the setting. Unfortunately, one of the major prices of separating the player rules and the NPC rules is that PC rules no longer inform the setting, though they may describe it.

The majority of rules in PF2 do neither of these things. The only part of a class that adds to lore is the intro page because we can't assume any part of the rules apply to the world. An NPC does not have a class, they just do whatever their stat block says they can. They might have features from multiple classes or none whatsoever. Plus there is level scaling and some NPCs being different levels in different situations. Also, the majority of class feats/features are only applicable in encounter mode and specifically in combat encounters.

Ancestries and backgrounds have the same problem classes have. As an example, orc NPCs almost invariably have Ferocity, but orc PCs have a ton of other options and so might not have it (not that I don't see them almost always take Ferocity). Plus the PC version of that feature is different from the NPC version.

Some features do describe the world, like clan daggers or a line of flavor text in a feat tied to some in setting character. But they are the vast minority.

"but I think our "rules heavy" books should be closer to 75% rules than 66% rules."

That kinda feels like splitting hairs if I'm being honest.

Fair enough. If I am honest with myself, I would prefer the "rules heavy" books look like the APG. Which has ~10 pages out of 270 dedicated to lore/context (I counted 9 but I wasn't being too thorough).

By the way, for reference, Guns & Gears has 159 pages with rules text out of 236 pages. This number includes the glossary as rules pages and any page with any rules text even if it is ~20 words or an optional sidebar.

Our "rules heavy" book is ~33% "no rules" pages. Albeit a few of those are full page pictures, there are also a few "rules" pages with two sentences or a tiny amount of sidebar that has an optional rules element.

How much of our "lore heavy" books are rules? I am using Lost Omens World Guide since it is my only "lore heavy" book. There are 35 pages with rules text out of 135 pages, which includes pages with the rules for pesh and similar items as well as those with tiny sidebars with optional rules.

Which means our "lore heavy" book is ~26% rules pages, with most of those pages having only a small amount of space dedicated to rules.

As for my opinion on that bit of data, if there were no rules elements in the lore books I wouldn't care (though there should probably be some to sell flavor), but I think our "rules heavy" books should be closer to 75% rules than 66% rules. A page or two that give a bit of context for automotons is fine, but the history of Alkenstar should be in a Lost Omens book instead.

I don't give a flying rat's rear about the lore portions since I don't actually like Golarion as a setting. As such, I would prefer if Paizo were to separate the lore and rules parts of their rulebook line into separate books that can be purchased separately or as a bundle. Or perhaps just sell "reference" versions of the books that hold just the rules in a smaller, probably paperback, form. That way I don't have to spend money on product I don't want for the product I do want and the book I get will take up significantly less space.
Honestly, the reference book/pamphlet is probably a good idea anyway, even if it only comes in a bundle with the full book or pdf. I'd pay an extra 5-10$ for that.

It would have some similarities to the Binder, in that they choose from a list of "Powers for a day". That said, I don't think the similarities go much past that.

The Runewright should get 3-4 runewords from level 1 instead of the Binder's one vestige until level 7(?) so they have in-the-moment choices right off the bat. The Runewright should also be limited by the action economy instead of cooldowns, mixing various-action abilities together to create something closer to a caster in feel instead of a psuedo-martial with some magical powers. This class could also lean towards a more backline style by putting runewords on other party members that are frontliners, though it would be cool to have a subclass that enables them to frontline by putting all the runewords on themselves.

As I mentioned in my original comment, it would be nice to somehow make use of the existing spell lists instead of making runewords sit by themselves like vestiges do, but I didn't come up with anything I thought was any good for that.

And also the cool rune fluff.

Apparently I didn't make it clear, but the idea is that the runewords last until your next daily prep and you don't expend them when you activate them. When you write your runewords for the day you are selecting which magical effects you have and where they will come from, similar to a prepared caster working with cantrips.

Not sure how this would work with current lore for rune magic in Golarion, but here is an idea I had.

Runewright
You write runewords, sequences of runes that you can later channel magic through them to create effects both great and small.

During daily prep you can write x runewords. You can write these words on objects and willing creatures. More runes/day at higher levels.
You have the Channel Power activity. 1-3 actions, targets 1 runeword within 30ft. You activate the runeword's 1, 2, or 3 action ability.

Here are a couple of example runewords I have tossed together.
Valor, write on a creature
1 action- The runeword creates a 5ft aura for 1 round, granting allies in the aura a +1 status bonus to attack and damage rolls.
2 actions- As 1 action, but the aura is 15ft and lasts 2 rounds.
3 actions- The creature the runeword is on may Stride or Strike as a reaction and is quickened 1 for 2 rounds. The extra actions can only be used to Stride or Strike.
Ice, write on a creature or object
1 action- The runeword creates a 10ft burst of difficult terrain within 30ft of itself. This terrain lasts 1 round.
2 action- The runeword grows ice on an enemy within 30ft of itself, that enemy makes a Fort save. Success: clumsy 1 for 1 round. Failure: clumsy 1 and slowed 1 for 1 round.
3 action- A wave of cold blasts out in a 30ft cone from the creature or object the runeword is on. The cone leaves difficult terrain for 1 round and deals xd8 damage (basic reflex) to each creature in the cone.

Feats
Meta-rune feats: Meta-rune feats would work like metamagic except instead of spending extra actions to enhance spells, you write them into one runeword each during daily prep. Might need some reworking.
Runedance: Focus spell or once per 10 minutes action that swaps runewords between two creatures/objects.
Feats that temporarily consume runewords for cool effects. Perhaps do things like get extra actions for Channel Power, recharge Focus, or just blow up runes that don't normally do damage.

Subclasses
Safety Words: Gain a reaction that reduces damage from a hit on a creature you have runes on, based on how many runes are on that creature.
Re-writer: You can spend 10 minutes to erase one of your runewords and write a new one. Perhaps scaling to a better rate at higher levels.
Meta-writer: Your meta-rune feats can apply to an additional runeword each day.

It would be good to make the runes use the spell lists for future proofing, but I didn't come up with a way to merge those systems well.

The thing with Golarion is it is basically the world as the modern west coast liberal believes it should be, which isn't a surprise considering where Paizo is located. Good and Evil are measurable parts of the world and are easy labels for what is okay to attack. Through the availability of magic, sex/race can be changed at the drop of a hat, which isn't to say that there were any differences between the sexes to begin with in Golarion (other than what parts they have, if even that). Members of the acronym make up large portions of the population. Vigilante killings are largely considered good, but the death penalty is considered bad.

Using a different moral lens requires breaking Golarion canon or using a different setting.

An earlier thread on this topic…

Missed that thread when I checked earlier. Not much I can do about it now.

The old thread: https://paizo.com/threads/rzs43ha3?Would-it-be-better-if-Find-Flaws-didnt

Non magic for that particular example? Yeah I'd have a problem. But the Thaumaturge is using magic, just not spells.

And not for Find Flaws, as it does not have the magic trait and is therefore a non-magic ability.

We should make Find Flaws not be a Recall Knowledge (RK) check for a few reasons. Before we go into the reasons, I want to put forward what I think that looks like so I can explain how the change improves the Thaumaturge.

Find Flaws (1 action, Magical, Thaumaturge)
You call on the stories and symbols relevant to your foe, using the nuggets of truth to instill a new truth into your target. Using a skill that could be used to RK about the target, you roll using CHA instead of the usual ability modifier against the standard level-based DC of the target's level. This check has the effects of a RK as well as the following effects. (Actual effects unchanged)

So, why do I think this solves problems?

Firstly, by explicitly making this ability magical and flavored as "story-based truth-making", we can justify using Charisma because we are doing magic stuff in a similar vein to the Bard. We also move the mental justification from "How does Charisma help me recall information?" to "Why does magically evoking stories give me information?", which should be an easier justification. This also explains why the weakness you get from Esoteric Antithesis only applies to the target and not others of their kind.

Secondly, by making this not a RK check, we can avoid some skill feat interactions. Primarily, we can avoid making Unmistakable Lore a mandatory feat. I don't know if it would end up that way with the current version, but I am concerned it could (when combined with a generic lore skill you can't critically fail the current Find Flaws, which means you could ignore Charisma and skip advancing your knowledge skills). If we still want Dubious Knowledge to work with this, we can do that in the class ability that grants Dubious Knowledge.

Thirdly, by making this use the standard level-based DC, which RK uses most of the time, we avoid the DC modifiers that apply to RK that come from the rarity of the creature. This solves the issue of the Thaumaturge being bad at hunting Dracula, the Frankenstein Monster, and That Orc With A Name. This also gives the Thaumaturge a niche separate from the current RK classes, the Rogue and the Investigator, which it needs because it doesn't have the skill increases every level that those classes have. You may not be able to name every Fae, Golem, and Ooze you come across because you can't keep up every skill, but you can reveal that the Witch King's prophecy used lower case "man" instead of the commonly assumed upper case meaning.

Thoughts?

BaronOfBread wrote:

Squiggit wrote:

BaronOfBread wrote:

Then it shouldn't be recall knowledge then, should it?

Why wouldn't it be? You're recalling knowledge. So it's... recall knowledge.

If it's recalling knowledge, why doesn't it use the attribute that is supposed to be used with the skill you are using?

Because you're using a special feature that changes that attribute. Find Flaws is not the first nor will it be the last ability that does this.

Sure. So you would be okay with a non-magic class feature that let someone use Constitution for Acrobatics checks to Squeeze? Or how about Charisma to Perception for finding secret doors? Or Dexterity for bulk limits?

An ability like that needs to be narratively justified. Charisma for recall knowledge is very difficult to justify. The closest thing I have thought of so far is flavoring as a retroactive Gather Information, but then there is the problem of Gather Information being a Diplomacy check (or Society with a feat, but then you use intelligence as normal for Society) so it still shouldn't be recall knowledge.

That said, I think there could be a Charisma based ability that has the same benefits as recall knowledge, but that ability isn't actually recall knowledge.

BaronOfBread wrote:

Then it shouldn't be recall knowledge then, should it?

Why wouldn't it be? You're recalling knowledge. So it's... recall knowledge.

If it's recalling knowledge, why doesn't it use the attribute that is supposed to be used with the skill you are using?

Also, the important part of the statement I quoted was this:

I assume because Find Flaws is not supposed to represent the same thing that recall knowledge is.

Because if that is correct, than recall knowledge should not be the action that the thaumaturge takes.

Intelligence isn't the primary metric to determine how good you are at a skill, proficiency is.

If you assume trained, because anyone who cares will be trained, then additional proficiency is in a pretty tight running with the ability score. The 8 INT master of the same level as the 18 INT trained is at a disadvantage. The master might have a couple of skill feats beyond the trained, but their bonus is worse.

Find Flaws is a case where the game deems it appropriate use charisma instead of intelligence to recall knowledge, I assume because Find Flaws is not supposed to represent the same thing that recall knowledge is.

Then it shouldn't be recall knowledge then, should it?

Small counterpoint that Known weaknesses works the same (single target) despite being a straight INT RK check. Even more odd is the critical result that gives your allies a bonus against that specific creature. I RP it like "this skeleton has a weak lower jaw."

Oddly, this has never raised the kind of arguments about RK and, in this case, INT vs WIS that we see here.

Why would there be any problem with Known Weaknesses? It is a regular RK. I have thought of the attack bonus as a "this one has a particular flaw in its defense that some of its kind possess."

The way that Esoteric Antithesis is currently written, you end up swinging with the best weakness if you get to use the action. So if you use that feat chain to remove critical failures on Find Flaws, you always end up knowing the biggest weakness of your target. Meta gaming doesn't even have room to get involved.

That is the weird thing about Find Flaws, failure basically means you get a correct thing, an incorrect thing (both from Dubious Knowledge), and with an additional action you also learn and equip the highest weakness. The only case in which you don't get two pieces of useful info is when you critically fail, and even then you know that you got incorrect info from your recall knowledge, which is kind of useful in itself.

I don't want an Int thaumaturge because that is far to similar thematically to an investigator who is prepared, which I can (and have) done by playing investigator.

As for Wisdom vs Charisma, I think it comes down to flavor and where we stick magic traits. Current flavor text/magic traits make me think this should be a Wisdom class. Knowing the ways of the universe and noticing the tiny connections between disparate things is very Wisdom to me. That said, if Find Flaws was combined with Esoteric Antithesis to get the magic trait and some flavor text about convincing the universe to tell you secrets, I would be a lot more fine with Charisma.

I think that is the big hurdle for people to buy into Charisma as the primary stat, because using Charisma to recall knowledge just isn't thematically sound unless magic is involved.

16
You are running, scrambling, fleeing, across an open meadow. The grass, the ground, even the sky are all calling out for you to run, run faster, faster! You look around wildly, trying to see what you are fleeing from but there is nothing but the field, the wind, and a sky so empty even the sun is missing.
Then, with a sickening crunch, the calls to flee turn to mourning as the sky cracks like a pane of glass. The cracks spread, reaching the horizon, then racing across the ground. All about you pieces of the sky rain down and the ground falls apart, dropping into an empty blackness.
Soon all that is left is a single patch of grass you cling desperately to. The grass laments that you could not run fast enough, that it is over, that all has come to naught. With that, it bids you adeu and falls into that endless void, leaving you to fall alone, screaming, into the abyss.

17 Now this one is a bit more intense, so I am going to spoiler this one. It is also better suited for a noble or similar character.

Deriven Firelion wrote:

This is simply not true.

It is from my perspective.

Deriven Firelion wrote:

If you have 10 feats and have to make hard choices, then you don't get to pick the best of each option.

Not true, as an optimizer WILL take the best 10 options by definition or they aren't am optimizer are they?

Do you really think there are only 10 good options, one at each level, for each class that includes archetyping? No wonder you find characters look the same in the early levels. The real wonder is that you think that somehow they differentiate at high levels despite you claiming the "one good option" problem is still there.

Deriven Firelion wrote:

If you compare an alchemist to an alchemist with Free Archetype, the alchemist with Free Archetype will perform much better because he can take all optimal Alchemist Feats while bolting on an additive class like a Wizard

No he will not... You only have so many actions. Add 200 spells per day to an alchemist and 20 rounds of combat per day and they are only going to get 20 spells cast and that pretty much means they didn't get any benefit out of alchemist. Again, there are only so many rounds and actions in an adventuring day so when you have the most viable options from your class, adding the most viable options from another doesn't mean much because to use those, you eat into your main options.

Do you always perform the same three-action rotation each round in encounters? Do you never find yourself in situations where that rotation wouldn't be the best option if you had some kind of spell or alternative strike-based feat available that was also fully powered by your build?

I am beginning to suspect that the reason there are disagreements here is because of a difference in what is considered optimization.

This is the hill you have chosen to die on. Free archetype.

Of old age apparently, since my opinion keeps being challenged with the same points reworded.

As for a response to graystone I have this:

You don't need free archetype to do that, you just need to accept that you are specializing into a niche and will have less general power.

You will note all of those things take feats (sometimes ancestry, but that is still a resource being used) unless your base class grants them. Those are feats you now have a bunch more of from free archetype, making things come on line earlier and granting you more of them.

and this:

BaronOfBread wrote:

I do not think adding more things to a character makes them more interesting by default.

By default? No. However it does expand your options, which can be very interesting when you've already explored all the base options a few times.

It does not expand your options; you still have the same selection, you just get to take more at a time. Could you please explain what you mean by "base options"? I am having a hard time figuring out what you mean by that.

BaronOfBread wrote:

Having flaws and weaknesses ... come up with.

Myself, I think THIS is where we diverge: nothing about this optional rule gets rid of flaws and weaknesses. My wizard doesn't get better proficiency limits for weapons/armor [it caps at expert], it doesn't change my saves, it doesn't alter my stats, and while it might add skills those skills mostly need your base classes Skill increases to bump up so the inherent limitation is still there...

When I say weaknesses, I do not mean just what proficiencies you are low in. I include holes in your kit. A wizard doesn't heal in combat, unless he takes Battle Medicine (and he won't be that good at it) or he archetypes. Free archetype makes that easy to get. A champion in full plate tends to not have a good range option and tends to be immobile. Free archetype makes it easy to get a long range cantrip and the Jump spell to get around. A barbarian lacks action economy feats, fighter dedication clears that up and makes it so you don't need to debate getting AoO or your 6th level instinct feat.

BaronOfBread wrote:

Accelerated advancement ...

*shrug* I wouldn't say it's a substantial power increase: it's an increase in versatility but you still have same limitations every character has. As such, it's a lateral move in power for the most part. This too is a place where we disagree, as for most people In know, it's that versatility they want and not a grab for more power...

Versatility is power.

I often use it so I can take feats [class or archetype] that are mostly niche and/or flavor that I normally wouldn't take because they are not that universally useful ... try it out without impacting the party/character performance.

Do you ever take Archaeologist/Linguist/Celebrity without free archetype? If not, why not? Is it because you see them as weak options? Assuming that is true, since a couple of folks have already called them such in this thread, you don't take them when you don't have free archetype because you want a more powerful character. If you play with free archetype so people take these archetypes, you are doing so because you/they do not want to give up the power of other feats so you/they can fill out your/their character concept. You don't need free archetype to do that, you just need to accept that you are specializing into a niche and will have less general power.

Seems we do agree.

BaronOfBread wrote:

Do you ever take Archaeologist/Linguist/Celebrity without free archetype?

Yep, I sure have.

BaronOfBread wrote:

If not, why not? Is it because you see them as weak options?

Weak? I don't see it.

...

Good to see I am not the only one who likes these non-combat archetypes (one of my favorite characters was an Archaeologist). That said, others cited thinking that kind of archetype is weak and not normally worth taking as a reason to have free archetypes. If you disagree with them about those archetypes, that's great.

BaronOfBread wrote:

That said, it is fine to want stronger characters.

I like more interesting characters, which free archetype allows.

Here we have perhaps the core disagreement. I do not think adding more things to a character makes them more interesting by default. Having flaws and weaknesses makes a character interesting, giving them more stuff takes away weaknesses and makes them less interesting in my eyes. Problem solving is the same way for me: the fewer tools I have, the more interesting the solution I need to come up with.

BaronOfBread wrote:

You might be enabling concepts that have too many identities to be properly made without the extra feats, but that is different.

Or some of us might say that the standard way doesn't allow the breadth of character identity to fulfill the concepts we want to play in a timely manner.

Accelerated advancement is increased power, no matter what name you give it. And if you want that, that's just fine. But I don't want it, which is why I don't like free archetype.