CommanderCoyler's page

So Twin Take-down is strictly worse than double slice? Ranger is becoming less attractive.

Twin Takedown is one action, Double Slice is two

1 and 3 I very much agree on, though moving them away from the general feats would highlight just how few of those there are...
I'm fine with trained being the gate to most of the uses of a skill, then feats can pick up the more specalised versions of those uses.

Dragon magazine, even the article in question, was unofficial optional material. Meaning it didn't count. In no official material was there a non-LG Paladin until 3.X.

Optional, yes it was (as all rules are technically). It was also official, as in published by TSR/WoTC.

But you don't care, you've chosen your (ant)hill and you're going to die on it.

In my group, the GM didn't notice for most of the session that the Paladin's Retributive Strike doesn't have the "ignore multiple attack penalty" option that Attack of Opportunity has.

After it was noticed, monsters no longer took paladin's tanking with any seriousness. Although there were 10 more attempts at Retributive Strike from her, she didn't hit once. Adding MAP to the -2 is just too much unless you waste your turn hoping for a reaction that you -may- be able to use, and without any spells or ranged attack (no Gunladins so far, and we all miss those in our group) there wasn't anything for her to do outside of trying to hit them with the slashy end.

You had it right, assuming enemies weren't somehow attacking the paladin's allies on the paladin's turn:

The multiple attack penalty applies only on your turn and resets at the end of your turn. Attacks you can make outside of your turn might include their own penalties

Also, one that I didn't misread but multiple others have: 'Spell rolls' being used for 'spell attacks', i.e. spell attacks being off your casting stat instead of Dex.

Critical failure hurts PCs way more than enemies. Any given enemy is only "on screen" for a few rounds before combat ends. PCs however are there for the whole campaign. A PC rolls hundreds or even thousands of attacks for each one attack made by an enemy. That means PCs will fumble countless times while enemies generally will not.

Fumbles should not exist.

This, and it's a nerf for martial characters compared to casters. Martials are going to be making attacks every round, casters can just cast spells that rely on the enemy saving and not have to worry about fumbling.

If any sort of fumble system is made official, that will be the nail in the coffin for me playing this.

Correct, spells that have attack rolls have the 'attack' trait. Spells that only have attack rolls on certain modes of the spell, such as Heal/Harm gain the trait when used in that way.

This ability grants an attack. For each attack you make beyond the frst on your turn, you take a multiple attack penalty (see page 305).

So, coming off 4e and 5e D&D where two-handed ranged weapons are balanced against one-handed melee weapons of the same 'tier' (simple/martial/exotic), into playing PF2, ranged weapons just feel weak. Their damage output may have felt better in 3.5 where everything had much lower hitpoints, but in pf2 it just feels archaic.

My changes (and the reasons for them) would be:
General rules and Traits
♦ Ranged and Finesse weapons default to Dexterity for attacks AND damage.
♦ Thrown weapons change the attack AND damage of the weapon to Strength. Finesse then changes it to Dexterity as normal.
♦ The propulsive trait changes the damage to (full) Strength mod
A slight buff to all ranged weapons. Flat dice to damage is not threatening at any level of play, and a small (~+1) bonus is not that much more in the scheme of things. Thrown weapons' attacks being off Strength gives strong characters a decent (although still relatively short range) option for ranged combat, with finesse then keeping specific ones (mostly) the same as things are now.

Specific Weapons
♦ Dart and Shuriken gain the Finesse trait
♦ Composite Bows lose the Propulsive trait, Regular Bows gain it.
♦ Longbows lose the Deadly and Volley traits.
Composite bows getting the upgrade of one stat for attack and damage makes sense in a balance sense, with them costing more money. They are also constructed to take the strain off the user, allowing for precision (Dexterity) to have an effect over Strength. Longbows losing the Deadly trait keeps it in line with most Martial one-handed weapons as it's getting damage boosts from Str/Dex now. Keeping the Deadly trait on Shortbows keeps them in line with Rapiers and gives them a different niche to longbows.

May seem a little weird, but how would you feel about adding the 'Charge' trait to Shortbows instead of Longbows having Volley? Encourages you to stay mobile with Shortbows.

There are a few other changes I'd make to ranged weapons, but they're less relevant here.

vestris wrote:

I never played 4E how did that work in detail?

So healing surges were a Thing that every class got (I think 2 was base, some classes got more). Any time you wanted (once a fight) you could spend an action to activate Second Wind and heal 1/4 your maximum HP (so if your max was 20 and you were currently at 10, you'd gain 5 to 15).

2 was for the weird vampire class. Normal classes got at least 6+con mod per day.

Several classes had powers that consumed, triggered off of, or otherwise played with Surges. E.g. the warlord (sort a paladin class) could use a (once per fight) power that caused him to spend a healing surge and an ally in 30 feet got the benefits (it was 1/4 of their max, not the warlord's).

That is the paladin's Lay on Hands (except it's melee range), Warlord works like cleric below. Warlord was also an awesome, martial leader (healer/buffer)

Stuff like that. Even clerical healing consumed surges (Cleric targets someone, they spend and heal with a bonus). Healing surges were the primary 'resource' you'd need to conserve across your adventuring day as most of your abilities were either per-fight or at-will. The once-per-day abilities were kind of a toss up (thematically you always wanted to use them on the boss, but mechanically you were best using it on small fry, due to the miss chance against higher ACs).

Bosses (elites and solos) had the same defence calculation as regular creatures of their level. They just get flashier abilities, action points and more off-turn abilities to make up for their disadvantage in the actions department. This is one of the many things I very much wish Paizo would adopt from 4e: The concept of monster roles rather than just throwing a higher level monster at players and calling it a boss.

Anyway, the first published adventure was a revisiting of...tomb of horrors? Classic module, several rooms had traps described except that "someone else already disabled it." The adventure's atmosphere was what caused the lack of surge regeneration, but it had the desired effect of making the players push as far as they could before stopping: if you had all your surges and recharged to max-1 you lost that unspent surge.

I've never played Tomb of Horrors, that rule sounds horrible (heh). Was it cumulative? So if you spent 2 days there you'd be at -2 etc?

Also Action Points encourage players to go as long as they could. Action points let you (1/encounter) take an extra action and you gained one every other encounter. Also certain classes, and every paragon path (kinda like a prestige class, but everyone gets one at level 11) do stuff to interact with Action Point use.

Also, to clarify the (base) rules on resting in 4e:
There are two types of rest, Short (5 mins) in which:
♦ You regain use of any spent encounter powers
♦ You can spend healing surges freely (restores your surge value, typically 1/4 of your max hp)
Then Long (6 hours) in which:
♦ You regain use of any spent powers
♦ Your HP and surges per day are reset to maximum
♦ Your action points reset to 1 (regardless of how many you had)

Thinking more on this, and looking more into the maths: nat 20 being a crit (or, at least one stage up) needs to stay, otherwise you're unable to crit when you'd need to roll an 11 to succeed normally (11+10=21)

I'll let the maths speak for itself

Some assumptions I made during this:
♦ Lone PC is on foot and has +3 for damage modifier atribute at level 1, rising to +5 at level 20. No Feats or Powers to adjust damage or accuracy.
♦ One 'Target Dummy' with AC such that 10 on d20 is a hit for the first attack (so crit on 20). Doesn't move or any other reactions. Not Flat-footed. HP is average for level 1 or 20 as from LuniasM's spreadsheet
♦ The following weapon traits have no direct effect on damage: Attached, Finesse, Free-Hand, Nonlethal, Maneuvers (Disarm/Shove/Trip), Parry, Racial/Class, Reach, Thrown, Unarmed, Versatile.
♦ The following weapon traits have no effect in this situation: Sweep, Backstabber. I may go back and adjust the scenario so that they are counted too.

Things I learned or had confirmed for me:
♦ Dice size trumps all, except in a couple of circumstances (deadly when you can only hit on a crit)
♦ A d3 'weapon' exists! It's universally awful!

I'm slight towards keeping the system has is, but more so for balance purposes then love for it. I believe having to prepare spells is the price paid for having access to all the spells on the list {note statement does apply a bit more to classes like Clerics and Druids, but Wizards can also achieve this within the limitations to there spell book.)

For spontanous casters, casting from a limited list (downtime activity only to swap) is the price paid for being able to decide what spell slots are used for in the moment.

Now, to be fair, I wouldn't mind a system which has a way of granting prepared casters a bit of spontaneity/lessening the hassle of preparing each day , but not at the expense of spontaneous casters being overshadowed because of it. {Making one option better can also then make the other option worse if not done/ balanced right. If you make a prepared casters ability to cast spells Spontaneously, closer to that of Spontaneous caster, without giving something up for it, then the Spontaneous caster is weaker by comparison, has then the Prepared caster can roughly do there job, while still being able to swap out spells for more ideal ones, as situations pop up.)

Sponteneous casters are always going to be overshadowed. Prepared casters know their whole spell list (effectively in the case of Wizards), and can swap out spells daily to suit what they're doing. Spontaneous casters get stuck with the same spells for most of the adventure.

'Key ability score/modifier' as a term ties into certain feats, features etc.
For example, spellcasters have their spell point pool key off it:

You gain a pool of Spell Points. Your maximum number of Spell Points is equal to your key ability modifer. You regain all your Spell Points when you prepare your spells (see Daily Preparations on page 192)

They'd have to go through and change all the references to 'key ability modifier' to the intended stat(s) for the class if you allowed more key ability scores.

A solution could be to allow characters to choose between their key ability score, or Con for their class boost at creation. Gives a bit more leeway AND allows 18 con at level 1.

I am in agreement, as long as the janky, 'Use the ritual skill in place of another skill, except it takes 10 mins and costs money' type of ritual don't get ported over too :)

I want players to roll saves, roll attacks, roll defenses, roll skills, roll everything (unless their character has time/competence to just get the job done without a roll).

I don't want monsters and NPCs to roll anything. I want their stuff to be static.

Defense check vs Attack DC
Reflex Save vs Monster Breath Weapon DC
Will Save vs Spell DC.

Always be putting the power in the PC's hands.

Whilst this idea is interesting, and I would like to see it as an option (put somewhere prominent, like the start of the GM section/book), I do feel like the 'attacker rolls' system or the current system should be standard. DMs like to roll dice too!

The GM will call upon you to attempt a check whenever you need to resolve a conflict or test your aptitude at a particular task or challenge. Examples include any attempt to attack another creature in combat, using skills, and resisting the effects of a dangerous spell that has been cast upon you.

Another instance of a relevant piece of information not being in the same section as a rule involving it, but its still there

Many have noted that monsters have too high skill, perception, attack, and save bonuses, as well as too high AC. As far as I have observed it, they all seem to be about two points too high.

What if, when the bestiary was written, the rules for TEML was different? Instead of the -2 that lack of training/proficiency gives now, there was a +2 bonus that came with being trained?

Today, the XTEML (X standing for unskilled) bonuses are -2/+0/+1/+2/+3. With my proposed earlier setup, the XTEML bonuses would have been +0/+2/+3/+4/+5. That is EXACTLY two points better at basically everything. Very similar to how much all monsters seem "off" in ability.

Speculation, but it fits the facts I see.

(Slightly off-topic but) I would prefer the UTEML starting at 0, less negative maths. Removal of negative maths was one of the reasons behind the death/dying changes, so why is negative maths still in a thing that applies to (almost) literally everything in the game?

Ok, your other thread on this topic started to turn against you, so you made a new one

The problem is that people are passively *too* good at things. The Barbarian should be able to hold a conversation, but he shouldn't be able to out-diplomacizing the Bard.

This is where the (up to) 12 difference I mentioned in my last post comes in. On-level DCs (that should be 90% of what you're rolling for), at this point in time, are generally based on the highest a PC can achieve.

The Wizard should be able to pick a lock in a pinch, but he shouldn't be disarming incredibly difficult traps and stealing siege weapons in plain sight (barring magic, of course).

Untrained uses of theivery (p159):

Palming a small (usually of negligible Bulk)...

Stealing a small (usually of negligible Bulk) object from another person can be very difcult...

Trained uses of theivery:

I'd be happy to have a +1 weapon just do +1 (or +2 or 3) damage as well.

That would require other ways of getting the extra damage, such as 4e's getting better powers as you level up, or 5e's extra attacks. Otherwise hp soon outstrips the damage you can do and fights will take ages

I like this, it keeps the flavour while making superstition totem less gimped.
Does mean a couple totems' anathema get a little weird though, like a dragon totem barb will only not defy their relevant dragons or a superstition barb will only leave a group for refusing to stop casting magic at him while raging.
Maybe an alternative could be one effect all the time and a more severe/restrictive version while raging?

I will add my agreement to this and also:
Preparing heightened spells (and especially learning them as a spontaneous caster) the pf2 way feels a lot worse than the 3.5 way of having multiple versions of spells (e.g. cure X wounds) to me at least. I know it's to the same effect, but when preparing for example a heal spell at level 3 I don't feel like I'll get as much out of it.

So, it looks like simple weapons start(ed) at d6 for one handers and d10 for two handers and martial weapons d8 for one handers and d12 for two handers. Then the following things lower the penalty by one each (to a minimum of d4, which is the reason why so many weapons are d4):
Reach: Increases the number of things you can attack without moving
Agile: Effective +1 to hit on attacks after the first each turn
Fatal: Improve damage by two die types on a crit and add an extra die of the new type
Forceful: +1 damage (per die) per attack after the first each turn with the same weapon
Finesse: Use dex to hit.

Now for my opinions:
Reach is fine with losing a die type, getting to hit more things (or hit past allies) is very useful.
Agile: the +1 to hit (5% extra hit and crit chance) is worth losing 1 damage per hit. Especially as no agile weapons are two-handed. This lets you pair an agile weapon with a non-agile one to get your full power on the first attack, then weaker but more accurate second and third attacks.
Fatal: Works only on a crit, but is a damage increase. I'm on the fence.
Forceful: If, if you hit with all three attacks in a turn works out the same as a non-forceful weapon. Needs a buff, maybe double the bonus?
Finesse: Offers no mechanical advantage, doesn't need to be penalised.

Saving throws I can understand the existence of, although I support decoupling them (and skills) from ability scores. For example, a rogue could still try to dodge a fireball by quickly moving to a less-hot part of it (Dexterity), while a wizard is more likely to use some quick counterspells to lessen the damage (Intelligence).

As with 'saves are defences', that is also how 4e did things, not sure if the resoning the same, but it worked great there too.

This is something I'd very much like to see. Having different rules for magic vs martial leads to weird things, like a blinded wizard still knowing exactly where to aim his fireball for best effect and there being no penalties involved.

Isn't that more or less how DnD 4th edition handled saves? Basically turning them into armour class against different effects?

It is, yes

Instead, we should be comparing 2e classes to each other (e.g., can the 2e barbarian dish out comparable damage with comparable survivability to the 2e fighter?), or comparing 2e classes to 2e playtest content (e.g. can the 2e druid contribute as much in the playtest scenarios as the 2e cleric can?).

This is something a lot of people here on the forums need to take to heart.

Leafar Cathal wrote:

Please, don't. That way, some players will be confused about how many dices would they roll. If it hits 5 enemies, two of them succeded, two of them failed and one critically failed. How many dices do they roll? Three for the first two, six for the other two who failed and twelve for one of them?

Seems over complicated. I like the idea of rolling once and halving/doubling, which is the way we do with 1e and it's easier because it's basic math.

EDIT: grammar.

Its not hard. If every target crit succeeds you don't roll damage. If one or more targets succeed roll 3d6 and note the result, if one or more targets failed roll another 3d6 and note the result, finally, if any targets critically fail roll another 6d6 and note the result. Apply the appropriate total result to the appropriate targets. Boom done.

Alternatively:

Quote:

A burst of fire explodes. Creatures in the area must attempt a Reflex save with the following possible results:

Critical Success The creature is unaffected by the spell.
Success The creature takes 6d6 ÷ 2 fire damage from the spell.
Failure The creature takes 6d6 fire damage from the spell.
Critical Failure The creature takes 6d6 × 2 fire damage from the spell.
Heightened (+1) The damage taken by the creature increases by 2d6 (before being modified by success or critical failure).

That first suggestion is still a lot slower than the caster rolling all the dice, then the target halving or doubling as appropriate.

Also Success is first as it's the most likely to happen, crits should only happen 5-10% of the time.

Quote:

Again, you leave my name out of the quotes, you really do not think I am a person.

Lol, sorry man, but your posts are making less and less sense to me. They do not seem to me to be germane to the topic at hand and you are taking offense to me using quote tags instead of using this forum's arcane software (seriously, these forums are straight outta 1992).

Reading how 4E did it, I can better see why that edition failed. PF2 is attractive to me since it is crunchy without getting into the weeds of that kind of finnicky nonsense. Looks like a board game to be honest.

Anywho, I also still have not seen a compelling reason why dex to damage is needed for all. Literally. No actual reason other than player envy ("I want it cuz I want it!" lol).

So, lets just agree to disagree.

4e 'failed' because of mostly non-game reasons: Player perception of the game despite not having played it and not having a SRD.

But anyway, this is about getting dex to damage. You know what, you win, I don't care any more. I'll play out the rest of the playtest and then not buy the books when they come out if this imbalance continues.

Damanta wrote:

Clumsy is the next big issue. This basically means that any heavy armor user will be easier to trip than any other class, because there is no reason for anyone not wearing heavy armor to not put one of the 4 stat boosts at level 5/10/15/20 into dex. (The other 3 stat boosts will go to con (fort + hp), wisdom (will + perception) and class stat or charisma if class stat is dex or wis already.)

It's easy to come up with cases where this isn't true, though. Like if I have a cleric of a deity that has a good sacred weapon (e.g. Shelyn) and I want to both fight and heal, I want to invest in Wisdom (to cast), Charisma (to heal), Strength (to hit), which leaves me with 1 more stat boost and since I'm a d8 class I would prefer to put those into constition so choosing heavy armor lets me boost those four stats. I can just take lightning reflexes with a general feat to shore up my reflex saves and stop at 14 dex so I can wear splint mail.

and another general feat for heavy armour proficiency which, unless you're human, you're not getting at level 1. So you'd be at sub-par AC for at least 2 levels.

2. Variety of characters are actually not really a variety when you homogenize them. They are the same mechanically if all stats function increasingly the same way and armor does the same thing regardless of how light or heavy it is. You can call it different but we both know you are just advocating that things function more similarly.

This is why I'm saying things need to be different elsewhere (e.g. class mechanics, feats and traits for weapons). Making a set of weapons weaker than others is varitey, yes, but not good varitey. In practice, finesse weapons being weaker just means that everyone's gonna go for the non-finesse weapons.

q3. A dex fighter loses, what, a couple points of damage since he can still have a decent strength score (and likely would want some strength for composite bows). "Half his expected damage"..what complete nonsense.

Maybe 'half' was hyperbole, but let's maths this out:

Malkyn wrote:

DataLoreRPG wrote:

Quote:

You haven't answered the question: Str characters already need some dex for AC, how would changing something unrelated make them more MAD?

In comparison to dex builds, obviously

Quote:

Your 'meaningful' choice: 'Do what I say or go home'

Lol, we are done

Question, dude: you played the game at all, or are you an armchair analyst? If the latter, do you have numbers to back up your claims? Because plenty of people are giving data on how the two would be different but competent in their own ways. People are suggesting ways to make certain shortfalls work (heavier armor really does need some adjusting, dex to damage or no). But all I've seen you do is play goal-keeper. So, you got numbers supporting your nay-saying? Have you tried playing a dex-based non-rogue martial? Do you have any empirical evidence that things currently work fine when so many disagree?

Running two games currently. One game that recently started has a half-orc dex based fighter.

Trust me, this is all just basic player envy. I have seen it ruin games from table top to mmo. But, heh, I am sure Paizo can parse through this silliness.

Just listen to them. They want to simultaneously give folks dex to damage then BUFF the otherside. If dex to damage would bring balance any buffing would not be necessary. Instead, they are all after that precious DPR and are devaluing everything else the build gives you. That single-minded focus does not reflect actual play. It reflect the sort of arm-chair analyst mentality you referenced where the entire game takes place on a table of DPR values.

They are just envious of that ability. They want to poach it. This has nothing to do with "effectiveness."

Again, you assume and treat us not as people with thoughts and feelings but as strawmen, or words on the internet for you to say no to.

My wanting for dex to damage is not envy, envy would imply that I am playing a dex based character and feeling like I don't match up to others (which is reasonable, given the system). I am coming from having played 4e extensively and loving the variety of characters you can make, with all of the stats to weapon attacks being available. I then look at pf2 and its backwoods keeping tradition for tradition's sake, when the number say that a fighter shouldn't lose half his expected damage just because he wants to use a different weapon.

(Also: I thought you were done)

coup-de-grace has been removed because someone decided that wasn't fun so now it's impossible in the game world

Coup-de-grace, as an action, got removed because it's now on every instance of damage

Claus Böhm wrote:

2. Buying/nitpicking equipment like backpack, waterskin, chalk etc takes a long time and almost requires a spreadsheet. Please include some basic kits that can be mixed and matched - I mean we dont buy each thief tool individually.

My goodness, yes. PLEASE. To add on to your feedback, I think a "quick chart" of character backgrounds and races with the attributes they influence would be helpful because the even 10 ability scores were hard to keep track of when you had race then class then backgrounds.

+1 on the kits suggestion.

Quick suggestion too: I'd choose Class, then Ancestry, then Background and do the stats in that order too. That way you're picking in the order of most importance to your character to 'least'. Means the stats go from the most fixed to the most free too.

1 a : a mythological or legendary figure often of divine descent endowed with great strength or ability

I think he was more going for that

Thankfully, the lesser version (that the Mummy Guards inflict) at least, doesn't seem to do much, especially if you're not a bard or sorcerer.
Would you be able to stay in a holding pattern of being at stage 1 of the affliction by passing the fort saves? After your initial fail to contract it of course.
Either way seems, tedious to have to constantly roll every minute/day. Imagine taking a rest after the mummy fight and potentially having to make 540 rolls over the 9 hours of rest then daily prep...

I will just repeat by making dex damage available to all and decreasing heavy/medium armor penalties all you are doing is making the game worse.

If you want to go damage, go strength. If you want to go mobile, go dex. For the benefits of both, you can be a rogue but you arent quite the combat beast other martial classes are.

These are meaningful choices. Making everything samey is the worst possible option. It is why I am leaving 5E despite sinking quite a bit into 5E books. It has that same samey design you guys are championing here.

Please stop just saying 'its making it worse' and instead say 'it's making it worse because...'. This thread is full of legitimate reasons why dex to damage should be a thing (balance, more build options etc) and you naysaying. It is not a proper argument.

And with the above I am not diminishing your concerns. Dex is a strong stat, it adds to (ignoring attacks): reflex, stealth, theivery and acrobatics. Strength is too though, it adds to (again, ignoring attacks): carrying capacity and athletics, which may seem less but every combat manuver as well as some alternate movement types (climb, jump, swim) are tied to athletics.

I, and many others in this thread, feel that giving everyone access to dex for damage would not break the game or make it worse. In fact it would make the game healtier.

As an example of how weak finesse/ranged weapons are right now in pf2: 1d6/1d8 damage isn't going to do much to a level 1 monster's typical 20hp, 1d8+4/1d12+4 is going to do significantly more. As has been stated before, this just gets worse as you level and get magic items.

I dont think its a "flawed paradigm" at all. It avoids cookie cutter builds. Open systems suck. If I wanted an open system, I would play BRP, GURPs or Savage Worlds. I am not playing those because I want a class based game with PCs that play differently and have different abilities thanks to their class.

If your solution is to make heavy armor the same as light armor by removing the penalties, then, frankly, your solution is lame. This is another way to homogenize characters and make the game less interesting.

There is a difference between opening some things to all classes and turning it into an open system.

Also armour is already all the same (they all give +7 AC), just heavier armours have massive penalties against all sense of game balance and realism

The suggestions for the recovery DCs are also (still) vague and overly complex.
It should be something like a DC 10 flat check (so 1 is +2 stages, 2-9 is +1, 10-19 is -1, 20 is -2) or a DC 14 + attacker's level fort save rather than faffing with individual DCs for wether the attacker is using magic or physical attacks, the phase of the moon, the season etc.

I'd much rather it just be a standard thing (for both finesse and ranged weapons), and rogue gets some sort of bonus instead. As it stands, you're triply punished for using a finesse weapon:
♦ They have smaller damage dice than non-finesse weapons (something that gets more and more relevant at higher levels with multiple dice from magic weapons).
♦ They use strength for damage, so you either need to put a lot into str (negating the point of using a finesse weapon in the first place) or do less damage.
♦ They either cost more money or have fewer other traits than a non-finesse weapon
Any one of these (preferably the third) would make them balanced. Right now I see no reason for non-rogues (and even rogues only because of SA, which barely makes up the difference in damage) to ever use a finesse weapon

At this point from Mark comments about class feat is clear they are aiming at recreating a 4.5 edition, probably with the aim at catching all orphaned 4e players. I guess it's time they too deserve something new to play.

Kinda how pf1 was for orphaned 3.5 players, except there's also the expectation of similarities to pf1. This brings in some good things (the idea of the Alchemist class, rage for Barbarians being more than daily powers etc) but also keeps some things for no reason other than grandfathering (huge ACP & speed penalties for heavy armour, triple punishment for using finesse weapons, fewer options for martial attacks compared to magic)

Excellent work!
I've done some analysis based on this.

Tables:
Top Left: The data LuniasM collected and averaged

Top Right: The difference between each stat and that stat at the level before. This should stay roughly the same for each stat.

Bottom Left: Removing level from the stats for the stats level directly affects for PCs. This should be the same all the way down, with maybe some jumps to show when PCs get improved equipment and proficiencies.

Bottom Right: The difference between each stat without level and that stat at the level before, again this should stay roughly the same.

It may be the sample size that's causing differences from what should be expected, or Paizo are not using unified maths for the stats. As said above: The stats that, for PCs, are affected by level should go up at the same rate in order to keep parity with PC stats

If you take damage while you’re already unconscious, apply the same effects as if you had been knocked out by that damage. If the recovery save DC for the new damage is higher than your current recovery save DC, start using the higher DC.

So yea, what Ring_of_Gyges said could theoretically happen. I would much prefer it if getting to positive hp makes you conscious, then it avoids silliness like this.

Draco18s wrote:

Essentially what CommanderCoyler is saying is, you've made race selection look like this:

Pick:

• Fixed Boost, Free Boost, Fixed Flaw
  
• Free Boost, Free Boost, Free Flaw

What would literally everyone choose?
The second one.

We already have that with humans picking both boosts and having no flaws.

Which is why they're balanced by having one less boost. Again, the flaw doesn't matter, you're not going to play an ancestry with a flaw to your class's main stat(s) unless something else makes up for it i.e. feats

New Ancestry Table

Dwarf. Ability Boosts: Con, free. Ability Flaw: Chr
Elf. Ability Boosts: Dex, free. Ability Flaw: Con
Gnome. Ability Boosts: Con, free. Ability Flaw: Str
Goblin. Ability Boosts: Dex, free. Ability Flaw: Wis
Halfling. Ability Boosts: Dex, free. Ability Flaw: Str
Human. Ability Boosts: Free, free. Ability Flaw: Free

2) Humans should get their (Free, Free) boost, as is, but with the option to instead get a (Free, Free, Free, Flaw), where the Flaw is subject to the player's choice.

Why would you not play a human under one of these options? As is is now, you're trading two static boosts (and a flaw, but you probably wouldn't choose a race with a flaw in the primary stat for the class you want) for the ability to choose a boost, as well as access to the best feats. This lets humans be versatile with the downside that their stats are slightly worse than everyone else's.

The alternative to avoid that issue is having the caster roll for each character (I think each character absolutely requires their own roll)

This is what I was going for.

Having the caster roll all those saves just seems like it would consume too much time.

I feel like it would take the same or less time than it is at current: It's the same amount of rolls, just from one person instead of potentially multiple (i.e. players in an aoe).

I'm just wondering how something like "Longbow only" and "Shield only" paladins can even happen.

The Shield-only paladin was the result of the player spending their money on a healer's kit and a shortbow, relying on a shield boss for melee. As documented here.

I have now run 8 playtest games.

3 of them had Paladins. Data only comes from those.

Paladin builds:
Sword and board
Longbow only
Shield only

Here are the statistics:

Number of encounters: 8

Encounter 1:
Game 1: 4 PCs against 1 Goblin Dog. Retributive strike triggers: 0
Game 2: 5 PCs against 1 Goblin Dog. Retributive Strike Triggers: 0
Game 3: 5 PCs against 1 Goblin Dog. Retributive Strike Triggers: 0

Encounter 2:
Game 1: 4 PCs against 3 Goblin Dogs. Retributive strike triggers: 0
Game 2: 5 PCs against 3 Goblin Dogs. Retributive strike triggers: 0
Game 3: 5 PCs against 3 Goblin Dogs. Retributive strike triggers: 1

Encounter 3:
Game 1: 4 PCs against 2 Goblin Warriors and 2 Goblin Dogs. Retributive strike triggers: 0
Game 2: 5 PCs against 2 Goblin Warriors and 2 Goblin Dogs. Retributive strike triggers: 0
Game 3: 5 PCs against 2 Goblin Warriors and 2 Goblin Dogs. PCs turned back after disasterous encounter 2. This encounter did not happen.

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Retributive Strike needs to go.

That is evidence that Retributive Strike needs to be buffed. Saying it needs to go from that evidence it like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

I very much agree on both these points.
A 20 is going to be a crit success for 99% of rolls, unless you're trying something out of your league, anyway. Similarly with a 1 for a crit failure, unless you're trying something far beneath you.

'Realistic', in a game where goblins exist in the first place...
Who's to say certain goblins can't focus, like any other intelligent race, and work towards being a holy warrior or law and good?
(Also: have I mentioned today that I am very much against the concept of alignment restrictions)

I've always found it weird in D&D/pf how some spells/effects have the originator roll for how well a spell affects its target (through an attack roll) and some have the target roll (through a save).
How would people feel about standardizing that, so that it's always the entity originating the effect making the roll? It's a simple change, just remove the '10' from the existing DC, move that onto the existing saves, and flip the '4 degrees of success' tables' effects.
You could even go a step further and make attack rolls for spells be against these new F/R/W values (and base them off the casting stat of the class to standardise them, and save space in the books), and give (more) equipment to affect spell attack rolls and 'saves'