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Im sorry but it having to be a critical success to work just kills the feat dead for me. Way too circumstantial for a feat of that level and doesnt even get a later feat (tax) like the ranger does to make it viable.

Lawsuits.

Because if they didn't WotC may have taken away the entire game.

Thats a very weak argument. They could of just renamed it while keeping the mechanics like they have done for other spells.

Here are the changes i made to the class:

1. My view of the Witch in 2e is it should be a cross between the sorcerer and the bard. Patrons work like bloodlines but the class itself identifies more like a bard in play style.

2. It is an occult only caster but gains a themed spell every level dependant on the starting patron similar to the sorcerer.

3. Cackle is now the witch's iconic class feature that cannot be grabbed by MCing into it. As an action you can sustain all spells with the hex trait. I changed the name of the original cackle focus spell and made it a higher level option that buffs your normal cackle for 1 round.

4. You gain your first lesson for free at level 1.

5. i removed phase familiar and made it a first level feat that also grants you a converted version of the old dragon magazine spell, familiar enhancer. A first level spell that gives your familiar an extra ability with some caveats.

6. A rebalance of all the hexes so they are in the same ball park as each other and the bard's focus spells.

7. A rework of the original feats that suck as well as a slew of new ones converted over from 1e and just some new ones i thought up.

8. I use a lot of homebrew and Midnightoker's excellent fabled familiar content to upgrade the experience of familiars across the board.

In all this gives the witch a very strong opening package to make up for being a 3 spells only caster with a 4 spell caster's proficiencies.

Ventnor wrote:

What's difference between a monk spending 1 action to get into stance and a fighter spending 1 action to draw a weapon?

Typically, unless you're in a town/settlement/whatever that weapon is out at all times.

You must have a very nice gm because i would not allow a character to always have a weapon at hand for 8 hours of cross-country travel.

1) Advanced Player's Guide 2: Containing 4 new classes preferably including Brawler (because the system is seriously missing an unarmed combat style that doesn't focus on martial arts), and a whole slew of new class feats/subclasses for existing classes along with a ton of new archetypes and class archetypes.

I agree on the apg2 for more content for existing classes and new archetypes but i think paizo really needs to slow it down on the classes and i especially wouldn't want 4 in one book.

i do find it weird that spells like flame blade or shadow blade are still missing after 2 large expansions on spells. Its not like it would be hard to create them. A spell that conjures a weapon in your hand for a minute that lets you strike with a spell attack. Simple.

This is amazing news! cant wait to see the finished products.

This whole file has some very nice homebrew and ive been looking for a solid warlock conversion for some time. im surprised you made eldritch blast an unarmed attack instead of a focus cantrip.

I like to reflavor existing spells and highly recommend doing that.

For example, I had a psychotic character known for ripping out the hearts of his enemies and wanted to use 1st Edition's death clutch. Since it didn't exist in this edition though (and still does not as of the time of this writing), I spoke with my GM and we decided to use a reflavored version of the finger of death spell. It's worked quite well I must say!

DEATH CLUTCH - SPELL 7
[RARE] [DEATH] [EVIL] [NECROMANCY]
Traditions divine, primal
Cast ◇◇; somatic, verbal
Range 30 feet; Targets 1 living creature
Saving Throw basic Fortitude

You chant an unholy litany while reaching out with a grasping motion toward your target. You overwhelm the target’s autonomic processes, causing its heart to beat with such speed and violence that it risks tearing itself free. You deal 70 negative damage to the target. If the damage from death clutch reduces the target to 0 Hit Points, the target dies instantly as you cause its heart to leap out of its chest and into your hand (or at your feet if your hands are occupied). If the target does not possess a heart or heart-like organ, it instead tears free a different life-giving organ, or a large mass of viscera.
Heightened (+1) The damage increases by 10.

Oh man one of my players needs this spell!

Thank you for the advice. I have been doing my best with looking at other spells and sort of re-flavouring them. Ive also looked at 5e and kind of toned them down and 2e-ified them. I just think it would be nice to have some coded reference to fall back to, especially damage averages for higher level spells.

One thing that i found disappointing in the release of the GMG and SOM was no rules or guidance on how to create your own spells. I gm 2 spellcaster players, each in different games that have shown interest in making their own custom named spell. At lower levels this is quite simple but as you reach higher levels the damage scaling and effects become a little hard to follow. Is it out of the question that Paizo would be willing to release a supplement on how to create custom spells?

I am amazed at the energy some people will spend just to make sure Paizo bows to their will so that slavery stays in future official products.

Arent you doing the exact same thing in reverse?

The witch is the only class that doesn't lose a week of downtime if their familiar dies, though. Nor does it come packaged with the guilt of getting a little furry animal killed. In practice that is a huge difference in how willing a player is to send it into danger.

I'm sorry but to me that's an incredibly weak hill to plant your flag for the witch's existence in its current state. Being more gung-ho with your familiar is not a big selling point for a class.

Part 4 Class Familiar

1. Bomb Voyage should just use the alchemists attack modifier. All the other familiar abilities use a spellcasters full dc and i dont see a once a day bomb outside of MAP being too ridiculous.

2. Foliage Forger needs a spell check.

3. Skilled blood could do with a better name. Ancestral Skill maybe?

4. Does Bloodline magic allow you to choose a bloodline spell at will or is it chosen at the start of the day? i also noticed similar wording in patron magic and familiar school magic.

5. Patron Magic is ok but i feel it would be better if it got access to spells granted from lessons also.

6. The Witch abilities are very strong which is understandable as it is the supposed draw of the class.

7. I think rune swap should be permanent. This gives at a niche little money and time saver ability.

8. Wild adaptation should last the entire day.

9. Moon guard seems niche enough that you don't need the 1 hour timer. i would make it always on or just make it an activatable ability while in the moonlight.

10. Rising Icicles should have a bigger radius or make it a multiple times a day ability.

11. Could Beguiling attendant be pushed to a 10-15 feet range?

12. Circumventing attendant has a lot of unneeded writing at the end. it should just finish at the "takes no damage from your evocation spells" part.

13. I would be nice and say second hand attendant lets you keep the MAP of the first shot.

Ok im back again for Part 3 Ancestral Familiars

1. Kin connections' wording could be cleaned up abit and made more precise. it took me a couple of reads to figure out all the things it actually does. This may be me being a dumdum.

2. i feel some of the options for the Heritage feats need to be more inline with each other power wise. Mistbreath Azarketi compared to Inured is a standout.

3. Heckle is nice but as i mentioned before familiars really dont want to be in melee so maybe increase the range? Also i see no reason why it has to be flatfooted to only melee attacks. Give spell attacks some love.

4. Spy tunnel is alot of fun and i love it.

3. I may have misconstrued the problem. i talked to my player and his problem was that a precedent had been set by ambassador and snoop so having the starting ability in a specific familiar that focuses on diplomacy and deception have no synergy with these abilities rubbed him the wrong way.

Being passive doesn't mean much as the other abilities confirm that you can assist in exploration activities and i cant think of a reason why you wouldn't command your familiar to do this if you are doing this task. Lie, Gather information and Make an impression are tasks you wont be making in tandem so i don't know why you would need multiple reactions unless I'm missing something? Upping to +2 once the master reaches master would make this quite a strong option and would wipe his complaints as it would just a strong ability that allows you to pass over ambassador and snoop. Maybe add a line saying that this ability counts as those abilities for the sake of any released content that uses them.

4. I think the ability cost was missed so ill concede that.

5. Understandable, the player isnt a big fan of assurance either haha.

6. My only argument is that a charisma caster will probably be the one to actually take a charisma based familiar. Wizards and witches will probably want something more involved with there schtick. Maybe a reroll with a -2 circumstance penalty?

8. Good points but i see it being more of an out of combat ability and if they really need that +2 in combat they can. Bully and Jump scare give plenty of ways to demoralize in combat.

10. knocking it down to +1 seems like a fair compromise.

12. That is just me being a dumdum and forgetting the traits.

15. Yeah grapple is a bit strong. But do remember it does take a lot of setup and it will not be viable in a lot of battles as it cant burrow through stone and will only be moving 5 feet a round while burrowing.

16. Maybe make the move speed while in the item slow. like 5 ft a stride as it slowly floats around?

17. Good idea on Well Read do you have any ideas on Obscure Recollection because at the moment it just seems to be a weaker Second Opinion.

19. Nah just keep it as is. We gms can just say "something, something, iron in your blood."

20. Again, me being dumdum

ive been away for awhile and this all looks really cool. Ive asked for access.

Large ancestries seem like the thing people want explored and paizo has been open about looking into it. I would like minotaur and centaur.

I was very confused about this bombshell that "oriental" is a racist term as in the UK its just a word for east asia or people from that region.

Oh man thats amazing news! i will be waiting to see this released. Do you have a release schedule or is it too early days yet?

Potency runes are a must have item baked into the system anyway. i would prefer a universal potency rune system for all classes than a spellcaster having to grab a singular item that they may or may not find.

Definitely off with the current balance.

( just checked dragons, and the difference would be from 2 to 4, even considering the +1 vs spells and magical effects).

Hope they add a X use per day or something sort of drawback ( like using the spell like to was 1 or 2 level lower).

Not to say the "free action" metamagic, which seems to say "I don't care about action economy management".

Disappointed.

Im not sure what your talking about?

This feels like its a must have item for spell attacks when it could of been simpler to just implement spell attack bonus items or runes. Im not going to complain because we at least got something that powers them up.

I like fanatic's ideas but i think the divine list just needs more elemental based spells. we need more calling on the god's wrath sort of thing. Shooting out divine bolts out, conjuring sacred fire or making a host of ice and water spells that use holy water.

I give my witches their first lesson for free.

As long as people continue to try and compare the classes in 2e to 1e classes they are always going to be unhappy. Personally I'm super excited for SoM, I'm playing a modified version of the playtest Magus. I hope they kept the arcane fist. I haven't seen much in the way of support for an unarmed magus

I don't think anyone was comparing it to the 1e version here. It just has a lot of holes in its design that need filled or tweaked in comparison to other 2e classes in my opinion.

Im looking through it all steadily and i must repeat these are some great ideas. i do have two points so far.

1. I think there should be a more unified design structure to the specialty familiars. The level access to abilities is a bit all over the place where certain familiars top out at level 12 while others at level 8.

2. I feel the nerf to magic item adept is too much and making it cost the same amount of actions for you to cast makes it a "well what's the point" feat. Maybe make it the capstone feat and more like the spellcasting ability where they can only use low level wands and scrolls.

Im wondering how balanced a familiar having a battle form would be. Either from a feat or familiar ability that gives them certain stats or lets the master cast battle form spells onto them.

This is an expansion that familiars really need and also makes the witch a much stronger option. I will be very intrigued in how you handle the advanced abilities.

I actually dismiss that errata. It makes finesse weapons with other traits weak and basically cuts dex based fighters from performing half the games combat actions.

The new hair feats just make me roll my eyes. They strung out 5 feats when it should of been 2-3 max. It is yet another case of the designers being afraid to give spellcasters any kind of martial alternative and making a cool concept from 1e such a hassle to get going.

If Witches automatically got Basic, Greater, and Major Lessons at levels 2/6/10 instead of having to purchase them as Feats, how would that change your perceptions of the Class, and is that something you'd agree with?

It would definitely put it in a better standing for me. I just feel its missing the flavourful feats that set it apart from the other classes, at the moment its just a weak wizard.

This is why i want spell school archetypes that really let you focus on and strengthen the weaker spells in the system. a conjurer line which gives feats so you can make summons the same strength of relative level animal companions would be great as well as some action economy boosts too.

P.S. Cackle should of let you sustain a hex for free for 1 minute.