As far as I'm concerned all the pre-remaster dragons are still fair game, both for GMs and player options. (Except in some very particular cases where it is apparent that they didn't want PCs getting physical damage resistance from certain dragons anymore.)
There's the circuitous route to get the pre-remastered dragon bloodline powers with the pre-remaster Dragon Disciple archetype onto another bloodline. You just need to play the right race, i.e. a Kobold with the correct heritage.Actually the last point is about getting access to the Uncommon archetype. A PC story steeped in draconic theme might be enough to get access too. Yup, access and prerequisite are different.
I don't agree as ancestries have abilities [feats] that they get from levels. A level 1 DC can't tell you about a high level unique orcs Spell Devourer.I assume that would apply to level as well. A high level unique orc shouldn't just be treated as common to know things about orcs, but you should also be rolling against the base Orc DC, not the one boosted for this individual's level.The rules also tell you that Unique doesn't apply to the DC to recall about the general creature type. There are other examples of this without touching PC ancestries. Dragons are a big one. It shouldn't really be harder to recognize a red dragon based on its age. I always use the lowest level version of species to determine whether PCs know the basics like temperament, fire breath weapons, or a weakness to cold. If an ancient red dragon has abilities the younger versions lack, you'd need to hit the higher level DC to be aware of it.
Remember that if a spell hasn't been reprinted under the same name in the remaster, you're still allowed to use it. That is important because there are less spells with attack rolls in the remaster, so you'll still want to use Shocking Grasp, Ray of Frost, etc. (That hasn't changed yet, right?)
Because level adjusted by rarity is not the only way to set the DC for monster identification. It is just the simplest way. People see the listed Recall Knowledge DCs and think they are as "canon" as the monster's AC and saves. Case in point, the OP, who not only misunderstood RK DCs but things like Exploit Vulnerability. Here is what the rules actually say:
The problem is people don't spend as much time reading these rules as they do looking at stat blocks on AoN, so they start to think those DCs on AoN are scripture instead of baseline suggestions.
Whether or not that SHOULD be the case from a balance perspective, the rules aren't ambiguous. Attended objects aren't damaged by AoE, and exposed familiars are. Narratively, I'm also not sure how to justify giving them blanket AoE immunity without changing the definition of familiars from enhanced animals to something closer to eidolons that are the caster's magic shaped into flesh, sharing the casters hit points or something. I would be into that concept but it's a big departure.
What is the Witch losing here?It looses reasons to main class Witch instead of just Archetyping into the class. They are core selling points, just not very strong ones. Wizards aren't considered a very strong class, but with familiar thesis they get: - being a full spellcaster with one extra spell slot
Drain bonded item + extra slots is a lot of added power. Plus, the wizard doesn't need their familiar on the front lines to activate a core class feature or refocus. Witches do, which means they should be sinking some of their additional familiar abilities into survivability. (Flight and life link being my favorites.) So you wind up with less room for other familiar uses, like spell batteries or scouting. Or compare the witch to the bard. The same number of slots, an extra feat from their muse, counter performance, and more hit points. Plus better base proficiency in weapons, armor, perception, and skills. The patron hex cantrip combined with that familiar ability are at best equivalent value to inspire courage alone, with the exception of the Resentment. The hex/patron familiar combo might provide a better set of bonuses but they are single target where compositions effect the whole battlefield and often at longer range. I really like the remastered witch but they just aren't that strong a class, and the hidden advantages of an immortal familiar is basically the top mechanical appeal of the class for me. Otherwise I would just play a reflavored wizard.
By RAW, familiar satchels don't take damage when they are being carried, so they are a solid way to protect a passive familiar. You lose the visual of it riding on your shoulder though.
Flying brooms feel a bit like motorcycles to me. They are providing the propulsion, but you still need to stay balanced on them. Whether that should cost actions, hands, or both, I don't want to weigh in on. But from a flavor perspective both are justifiable.
Technically true, but it's a weird case where it wasn't remastered AND the divine spell list suddenly got access to fly. It feels different than, say, shocking grasp vs thunder strike. I've stopped using Air Walk myself.
I'm not fully convinced final sacrifice abuse is a problem. The witch class has some challenging flavor considerations to play effectively. The best patron is at best chaotic and at worse just wants to watch the world burn. The class trends towards vaguely sinister if not outright evil. Playing a witch optimally already means coming to terms with your familiar being "recyclable" in a way you and your fellow PCs are not. If you wanted to cut back on that, I would suggest adding some flavor text about how the familiar doesn't experience pain the same way as a normal animal because it is essentially a spiritual extension of the patron.
I do agree that the current mechanics are pretty punitive. But I think Undying Familiar is one of the few unique advantages witches have over four slot casters. So I hope they would get something new if every class got Undying.Undying Familiar isn't a advantage for the witch - it is a necessity for the class to function. The two aren't mutually exclusive. Undying opens up a variety of play styles other characters can't safely do. Aside from the obvious battle usage, it also makes familiar scouting safer and gives you a way to cycle between specific familiars day to day. If other characters could also do this, I would suggest witches get some kind of buff. Maybe they could revive and heal their familiar as a refocus activity, for example.
The GM screens have the DCs by level printed on them and are one of the most essential purchases you can make. Even playing online they are worth having on hand to reference.
I do agree that the current mechanics are pretty punitive. But I think Undying Familiar is one of the few unique advantages witches have over four slot casters. So I hope they would get something new if every class got Undying.
Yeah, there are specific actions that can only be used in combat, like the Stance trait. But that's a trait thing not a blanket rule. Otherwise you couldn't recall knowledge or lie out of encounter mode.
Yep, not guaranteed the enemy notices but they're definitely getting a perception check and you're risking enemies coming to you which may or may not be to your advantage. Annoint Ally isn't a spell though and it has no audible traits.
I think the witch is pretty fun and involved. But it's higher complexity than a sorcerer or remastered oracle without necessarily being stronger even when you apply system mastery. Some folks don't like that. In particular, you have to really think hard about how you use your familiar and it can be counter intuitive. I wrote most of a guide to playing one but never fully published it. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1y881LdGvXmUWwjxZrMZBC4XwoD8GS3tOPjaz6S2 8zXY/edit?usp=drivesdk
I am in the "Tell Them What You Are Going to Say, Tell Them, Tell Them What You Said" camp (How to Open a Presentation: Tell 'Em What You're Going to Say) of giving presentations. I used to lecture on mathematics, mostly algebra and calculus, and the tough material needed repetition to stick in the students' minds. Is that still the best delivery method when you're doing a panel at a convention, rather than teaching students? Honest question. I would think people who signed up for your panel would be more engaged and they aren't going to be quizzed later.
I'm pretty sure the remaster made it clear you can't apply runes to consumables, even with the bandolier. But I can't be bothered to look it up right now.
Climbing by design should almost never be a scaling DC. ALL climb checks are scaling DCs, even when they are simple. ... Get it? ... I'll see myself out.
I mean they are book publishers, they always care about page count. But they would certainly have more flexibility if this was a player core style new book instead of glorified errata.
Yeah, and Track is in the same boat. If an enemy isn't moving at half speed to conceal its tracks, you're rolling against the simple DC for the terrain. Which reminds me-- Assurance negates the penalty for experienced tracker too. Also tracking is one of those things you might have to roll multiple checks for (if you're tracking for more than an hour) so Assurance can remove failure chance. Assurance Survival also ignores the penalty for Subsisting while adventuring, which is nice if you don't have Forager. Survival isn't terribly useful itself, but if you're leaning into it for whatever reason Assurance ain't bad. Sometimes it feels like an ability that was really designed for NPC Bakers to not mess up their cupcakes or something, though.
Another thing that would make Assurance better is if it if you were told what success condition it would net you before committing to using it. I recall needing to scale a rock wall in combat and asking the GM is my character could judge the DC before using Assurance, and being told no. At that point I was basically still gambling on wasting my action.
I think they should have proficiency gated locks while letting anyone roll to Disable a hazard, personally.
Well, someone brought up automatic knowledge as a perk of assurance, and the only time saving actions matters is in combat. Usually in combat RK checks are limited to monsters. (Or hazards, but same difference.) Plus out of combat the whole party can usually roll on RK, and if it's a low enough DC for Assurance to work then odds are someone will succeed at it, maybe even the guy with Untrained Improvisation. So it isn't that monsters are the only thing that RK matters for, but it's not like Assurance is actually helpful for RK on much else.
For a middle ground between the "Gain all the skill feats" and "Gain skill feats only when you get a skill increase", I would like to also bring up the option of "Gain a bonus skill feat at 1st level, 3rd level, and every four levels thereafter" (So 1, 3, 7, 11, 15, 19). You'll much more get the weight of the skill choice whilst not having to deal quite as much with the "Damn some skills have twice as many as others" (The only skills which don't have enough feats for a 1-20 with just the Starfinder Player Core for example are Performance and Lore. There'll still be the issue of some skills shrimply having better feats than others, but again, this is just another compromise option for people to think aboot) I don't think the quantity a player receives is the problem with skill feats. It's that there's too many bad skills feats and the good ones are too clustered in a small number of skills. They are also more complicated to filter your relevant options than your (non-archetype) class feats or (non-skill) general feats. So you're spending the most work on building for the least impact. IMO, Making people pick more skill feats kinda makes the situation worse, not better. "Get all skill feats you qualify for" at least removes the need to bother picking through them. And because there are so few good feats, you're probably not going to feel much difference between someone who has all of the feats vs someone who has all of the intimidation feats.
Yep. One of the fundamental PF2 design principles (and biggest stumbling blocks for people from other systems) is that if something is supposed to be meaningful challenge (as defined by the DC by level chart) you can't optimize yourself out of rolling for it. PF1 would sometimes create incredibly high DCs that you could only succeed at if you built for it, but then might be auto succeeding at it. In PF2, pretty much anything outside of a hazard can be attemped successfully by someone trained or failed at by someone who is a master. You're just shifting the odds around the edges. That's also why you see designers talk about fail forward. If a challenge is supposed to be meaningful but overcoming it is necessary for the story to proceed, then let the roll determine additional consequences beyond halting progress. Assurances can sometimes create interesting choices, in trying to determine if your check is likely to succeed or whether you're better off rolling the dice and hoping to critically succeed. Out of combat, I'll take Assurance to safely scale down the 100 foot cliff with my ally tied to my back. But in combat maybe I really need to get up that cliff as quickly as possible. Maybe Assurance and automatic knowledge are worth it when you can use a highly specific Lore skill. For something like the Inventor's Overdrive, the only way to make it work for Assurance is if Failure can sometimes be an acceptable or even desirable condition. I think maybe they pulled it off in the G&G remaster? On a success, you deal more damage of the type you already deal. On a failure, you deal less damage, but it is fire damage. Hello, second most common weakness in the game. Granted, the Inventor has several ways to build into constant fire damage, but if you didn't spend your more valuable class resources to get it, then on-demand fire on every strike for the price of a skill feat? That's a cheap price.
Yeah DC reductions are definitely underutilized. I also think they are intended to be utilized for rituals because there's no other way to make them worth the risk and costs. I always read rituals as "a thing the GM wants to let us do but make us meaningfully work for it in the story."
Assurance athletics is my favorite use case. By RAW it's the only safe way to scale great heights, and the maneuver thing can sometimes be handy. Beyond that it can be nice for characters with crappy ability scores who wants to be ok at a skill. Gnolls are supposed to be consumate hunters but they have a wisdom flaw, so when I built a gnoll alchemist I gave him Assurance Survival. Survival usually uses static DCs, too.
Assurance on Recall Knowledge freaking sucks, though. You almost never know the DC, but usually the checks you really want to succeed on are against higher level foes. And by RAW you can't retry once you've failed, so Automatic Knowledge is worse than useless most of the time.
I'm gonna be honest, I just straight-up tell my players what RK skills would be appropriate. I'm pretty generous with Recalling anyway, because the conservative reading of the rules is kinda bad. Same. With RK costing an action and having a critical failure condition, doing anything else is too punitive. Players need to make an informed decision over whether they should bother trying. They already don't know the DC. (And frankly I might consider telling them that, as well.) IMO Pathfinder and D&D GMs are just way too stingy with information in general. Sense motive is pretty much the only exception there.
Just remember that fascinated is almost useless in combat if you're spending mad resources to get a Nosoi for Anything other than roleplay.
T If you take the Ulfen Guard Dedication you can easily stay behind your designated ally with a reach weapon too. I think the problem is rarity is, sometimes, used for balance. It's not supposed to be, and usually it occurs for narrative breakers rather than combat balance. But some of the Lost Omens content feels like they made it uncommon because its balance is sus. Like, several GMs I know will pretty much reject anything out of the Firebrands book. And while lots of uncommon options have an Access entry, those just create opportunities for characters to take it. It's really rare to see an uncommon option that has a prerequisite like this, which makes it feel like the perfect storm to be rejected.
The biggest problem with Staves is their spell ranks trail behind their item level, and it only gets worse as you level up further. Blasts and incapacitation effects won't be useful when they are stuck at 3-4 ranks below what you can cast. So you want spells which are useful at any level without heightening. This will also let you maximize your uses per day thanks to how charges work. My go to picks are Staff of Phantasms and Staff of the Unblinking Eye. Phantasms has some of the best spells in the game in and out of combat, and even the basic version will remain useful at level 20. I like it on prepared casters because I can almost always guarantee I will use multiple castings of the basic illusion spells in a day, so dedicating a single slot ups my versatility significantly. The bonus on disbelieve is nice, too. Unblinking Eye is great on spontaneous casters. Sure strike isn't as spammable as it used to be, but you can probably find a use for it once an hour. Otherwise it has a ton of utility options to pick from, and a +1 status bonus to initiative which is just absurdly good by itself. On a bard, Codas are worth consideration. There are some decent spells among them, and the bonus to performance checks can save you a little gold and investiture. Druid options are less appealing unless you took that illusion feat or multi class. Staff of healing is ok. Spore Shepherd's staff seems like it was misprinted, but there's a PFS note to use it as is. If you can get one through boons or something it is a steal.
T If you take the Ulfen Guard Dedication you can easily stay behind your designated ally with a reach weapon too. I don't disagree with the rest of your post, but I'm perplexed why people talk about this archetype so much. It's VERY strong, but it has a backstory hook for its prequisites, not just its access. And that hook is extremely specific-- you have to be a member of the elite bodyguards of one of the Grand Princess of Taldor, one of the most significant rulers in the world. You're "loyal to the Primogen Crown only" and pretty much have to be always on a mission from said crown. Outside of PFS, it seems like it will almost never make sense in adventures, certainly not for a low level character you begin the story as. Even if your GM is ok with the narrative angle, the archetype is power creepy enough to give them pause. GMs who are that lax about consistency of both flavor and crunch seem rare.
You can add "gunslinger proficiency" to the list of relevant differences since G&G got remastered. Attached weapons vs combination weapons epitomizes the complexity of guns in this system. The differences are specific and significant. In a vacuum at level 1, attached weapons + gun is usually stronger, both for action economy and for damage die + traits. Saving on rune costs were the original advantage of combination weapons, which means they had no advantage when ABP was being used. Now, gunslingers will probably stick with them for the sake of proficiency despite their weaker starting stats. That said, if you're not planning on building a switch hitter you lose very little at low levels sticking a bayonet and reinforced stock on a primary fire arm, just in case you need it.
Learning spells has become a drawback. Clerics, druids, and animists don't need to learn common spells-- they just get them. While this has been the case for decades, previous editions made the wizard's list the most versatile and powerful by a country mile. That is no longer the case. The wizard list is still the biggest, but many of its best spells are now shared by occult, primal, or even divine. With spell slots being more limited, you can only utilize so many spells, and with casting generally being more limited only so many spells are worth using. You can't even call the spellbook for arcane a balance consideration, not when the witch learns spells the same way regardless of which list they pick. It's legacy baggage which never quite caught up to the new design.
The correct answer is likely a 20th level guardian, fighter, or swashbuckler fighting a hoard because both have feats that give them a bonus reaction at the start of every enemy's turn. Besides that, you want whichever class gets the highest number of reactions + extra reactions from a commander all + a free archetype to let them get additional reaction feats from another class. (That usually won't be a thing until really high levels either, as those fears start popping up at level 8-10 for their base class.) Does it count if you turn reactions into free actions? Because Recognize Spell + Quick Recognition deserves mention. Outside of 20th level shenanigans, my vote goes to the Champion with Quick Shield Block, Blessed Shield, Shield Warden, Shield of Reckoning, and Divine Reflexes. Technically this is only three reactions. However, pre-remaster it was essentially 3.5 by letting one reaction combine shield block and your champion reaction. Post-remaster, Shield of Reckoning got new text allowing it to apply to Quick Shield Block and Divine Reflexes. So you're compressing 6 reactions into 3. If Quick Recognition counts you're effectively at 7. I haven't read all of Battlecry yet, but I don't think the Guardian can beat that until level 20. But at level 20 with free archetype they can get their own Boundless Reprisals + Sheild of Reckoning + Reaction Time + Champion reactions + Quick Block + Quick Recognition. Reaction Time states shield block counts as a guardian reaction, so I think Sheild of Reckoning can be used on every single bonus reaction. That effectively doubles your reactions per round. So you wind up with 2*(Base + Reaction Time + Quick Shield Block) + 1(Quick Recognition) + 2*(Number of enemies.) So 7 + the number of foes.
But Unchained came 4 years before PF2e's release. It wasn't even close to be sendoff for that edition. It wasn't even the last book with classes on it. A lot of the Unchained changes wound up in PF2, though. The action economy, monster building, ABP, barbarians using temp HP and bonus damage instead of STR/CON boosts, eidolons becoming less modular and more template based. Plus, officially PF2 launched in 2019, but most of these rules were already in use for the play test in 2018, and I'm pretty sure Paizo staff were building and playing those rules on the DL for years. The Pathfinder Second Edition playtest was officially announced on March 6, 2018. The playtest itself was launched on August 2, 2018. They didn't build an entire new system in six months. But had they announced the system's development years prior, people would be less likely to buy PF1 books. In retrospect, if Unchained wasn't a send off to PF1, it was certainly a stepping stone.
"Is actually good but feels bad" is an unfortunately common complaint in PF2. It's also one most of the community struggles to internalize and doesn't always see why every option (or their favorite option) can't just be as powerful and easy to use as every other option. Personally, I enjoyed summon spells in PF1 and continue to enjoy them in PF2. I can't spam them every turn or even every combat, but I'm not overshadowing the rest of the party or slowing down combat with 1d4+1 extra turns either. I enjoy unilateral problem solving and there are very few spells in PF2 that let me do that like summons thanks to the highly cautious design. I've got summons, illusions, and not much else. Even stuff like Charm and Dominate is hard to utilize because of Incapacitate.
I would rather if instead of going into the bestiary it was a simple template and like illusory creature where it uses the caster stats on the summon. The rank of the spell could define the amount of HP, damage a abilities that it have. IMO, it's the step they'd need to take to make summon spells stronger in combat. Regular summon spells are not meant to be a default combat strategy. If you want to use conjured creatures as your primary damage source, you need to use an eidolons, or maybe even Incarnates. Putting an extra body on the field is already useful if your ally needs a flank or you're fighting an unintelligent foe who will target the closest warm body. They can be psuedo wall spells, clogging up narrow hallways or slowing down reinforcements while your allies chop up the enemies in front of them. Any action your enemy wastes attacking the summon is essentially stunning that foe. The fact that the body can have any ability out of the bestiary compounds this. I've used large or huge flying creatures to fish multiple party members out of lava, saving their lives. My Kanya/Muse Azata showed up so often we made her a character in her own right, providing mobility, courageous anthem, holy damage against fiends, and a little healing of people went down or just to top folks off and keep us moving after the fight. Even her counter performance came in handy once or twice. Summon dragon provides you just about every damage type for weaknesses you can hope for (well, if your GM lets you use OGL content, but just about all the remastered dragon content was written to be compatible with legacy dragons), with both AoE and single target options. And of course there is spell casting. A single high rank prepared spell (or spell on your reptoire) can be turned into a variety of lower rank spells should you find yourself in need of them. You can't expect a single spell to do all that and then also deal better white room damage than, say, lightning bolt or floating flame. The problem with summon spells aren't that they are undertuned; they just require system mastery and patience to use well. The problem, IMO, isn't that summon spells are weak. It is that they are hard to use. It's like the pre-remaster alchemist. With system mastery, their versatility lets them shine in a variety of situations by granting access to so many different tools. But you have to comb through the monster archives to find the hidden gems and then remember that creature when the perfect situation for it arises. And remember, summon spells are not meant to be the only thing in the only tool in a caster's repertoire/preparations. Just having one or two available gives you access to those options when you want them, while your other slots can be devoted to your work horse spells like heal, blasts, illusory creature/object, slow, etc. Really, summons embody the precarious balance point casters occupy in the system. They can do so many things that they can't also be the best at damage or they invalidate other options. Which brings us back to where they were in PF1, and PF1 summons didn't give you access to nearly as many creatures as PF2 summons. Publishing a separate line of spells that act as Kryone describes to achieve a more reliable and simple damage source is a reasonable suggestion, but it doesn't mean the existing summon spells get to be stronger. You can have one or the other, but not both in the same spell.
Or hey, how about you maximize recharging vials by handing allies an appropriate mutagens on their every skill check? It's not narratively weird at all if your bard does a vial of LCD you hand them just before they start their diplomatic overture to the king. It's really strong but also infuriating.
I always respect your take on the alchemist, but I'm not clear what thoughts you're looking for here. It sounds like you've used your system mastery to retain your enjoyment of the class despite your initial misgivings about the remaster. So, good? I'm glad the remaster wasn't the full battle oracle experience for you.
I mean you can use it semi-frequently if your party lets you scout ahead so you can Mark people before combat begins. I just haven't found scouting to be as popular in PF2, which I blame partially on misunderstandings like many in this thread around how the stealth rules work. It's kind of like snares or switch hitting. They are really really good if your party cooperates, and nearly useless if your party does not. Edit: the archetype adds a fair amount of raw combat power, but it's namesake ability is one of those things that usually works better for NPCs.
It is clearly intended to work on horseback. Whether the author forgot you couldn't use regular longbows on horseback or they knew it and intended it to be a specific exception doesn't really matter IMO.
That makes sense. I suppose my issue stemmed from believing that initiative was rolled the moment hostile intent was known and/or declared. That shouldn't really matter. Even if the GM decides Mark for Death triggers initiative (despite it clearly being intended for use pre-combat) the result is you Mark for Death turn 1, your foes "pass" because you haven't done anything to reveal yourself and you're still unnoticed, and then you use Assassinate on round 2. Of course if you have allies with you they might screw that plan up, but that's a problem with the archetype rather than the rules. Assassinate isn't really a thing standard adventure design supports.
That's why it is a GM Core/GMG rule instead of a player core rule. It very rarely applies to players. But every now and then I tell my players their Spidey sense tingles and a PC or two gets taken defensive actions before they have something to target from the monster pouncing.
Simple: when your stealth check to initiative beats both the enemy's Perception DC and their initiative roll. Or in the scenario where you beat the enemy perception DC but your ally fails to, either by rolling too low or not rolling stealth at all. (With that last one being the most common scenario.) The cited rule about being unobserved is just there so someone who rolls well on initiative isn't punished by effectively having their turn skipped before an attack is launched. Personally I don't separate the stealth for init and stealth for sneaking roll into separate rolls (I can't recall the RAW on that) to avoid the case you're referring to from happening Captain Morgan, unless the enemy has extra bonuses that apply only to init but not their perception (which I don't think is common). I also use the same roll for Avoid Notice and initiative, but it doesn't prevent this scenario. You compare your stealth check for the enemy's perception DC, not their perception ROLL. so it's entirely possible to wind up in this corner case, albeit not incredibly often. It is far more likely to be relevant when a lone NPC ambushes the PCs. Usually PCs start encounters with their party, and even in the rare case the entire party is rolls stealth for initiative someone usually fails to beat the enemy perception DC.
I think you're reading this wrong. A sneaker is unnoticed in one of two scenarios: 1. You rolled successfully to Avoid Notice so initiative is never triggered. (Generally, will only happen you are solo scouting or quiet allies-ing.) 2. When you roll initiative, beat the perception DC of your enemies, and beat their initiative scores as well. The only time "undetected but not unnoticed" applies is when initiative is rolled, you beat the perception DC of your enemies, but one of them rolls absurdly high on their initiative check.
- Ghosts should be able to punch other ghost - Dhampir and void healing PCs being immune to something as essential to adventures as ghosts is bad - Ghosts are like the least evil undead so having them be void energy in its purest form is weird - It's called SPIRIT damage duh
I don't know how heavily the arcane list can be buffed without either: 1. Giving it heal
Outside of healing and condition removal, arcane already gets the best out of pretty much everything. (Well, except Synesthesia.) I don't super love the idea of just printing a better fireball that is arcane only. But I could get behind just giving wizards some healing at this point. They only lack it for legacy reasons, and with wizard schools becoming more about societal roles it makes sense that wizards would start to explore healing. Heal might not jive with the lack of vital essence on the list, but soothe can work with mental essence. And if you can polymorph flesh with material essence there's no real reason you can't stitch it back together.
To clarify, whether characters get their reaction before their first turn is GM discretion. Most GM's treat that as "if you are aware of it you can react to it." But there's no blanket rule that you can't use a reaction before your first turn like PF1. And because reactions aren't universal, I'd argue there are better benefits to ambushes: --Allows high dexterity characters to use a better score than perception, especially when you stack the circumstance bonus from cover. (Lying in ambush, not moving before combat begins, you can get +4, and it is usually +2.) --Rendering the enemy off guard to your strikes as a rogue, or your first ranged strike for other classes. --Makes you harder to detect/locate/target/hit if an enemy goes before you. Even if you (non-critically) fail against the enemy perception DC you start out as hidden with a 50% miss chance.
Disagree on monk. They didn't get bespoke buffs, but they are one of the biggest winners on the general remaster change to refocus rules. Getting to spam Inner Upheaval three times every fight is a great buff to their damage, which is largely what people complain about with them. Other casters benefit from refocus as well, but their focus spells are weaker than top end spells and generally competing with them for actions, so it's really just a sustainability boost. Inner upheaval just straight up enhances something the monk was already going to do every turn, and now you can do it more combat rounds than not.
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