DeciusBrutus wrote:
All this discussion of character level, using numbers.
Where was character level discussed? I've read every blog post and literally every post in this forum, and I don't recall seeing a goblinworks post reference "character level" as something that will exist. What properties are each of you attributing to "character level"?
I think they get it from here:
From the Blog, 2012 January 12 https://goblinworks.com/blog/index.html#20120104
"In the tabletop Pathfinder RPG, you earn the benefits of a level all at once as you hit an experience point threshold. In Pathfinder Online, we've turned the system on its head: instead of using experience points as a prerequisite for improving in a skill, improving skills are part of the prerequisite for gaining new abilities. Your character must earn all the things needed to qualify for a new "level," and then you're rewarded with a special bonus. If you want to be a better rogue, you do roguish things and train roguish skills, and at a certain point, you receive a special merit badge recognizing a development milestone, rewarding you with a benefit for your persistence. Like class levels in the tabletop game, there will be 20 of these rewards available for each class type, creating a way to simulate a 20-level progression within our unique system."
Fact:
In Pathfinder PnP, multiclassing makes your character stronger as most abilities are additive - you add Attack Bonuses, you add Saving Throw bonuses and so on.
A lot of the posts in this thread assumes that all bonuses from having earned a "special merit badge" are additive with every other "special merit badge". It is much more likely that you get the best benefits of each type, whatever they are, like multiclassing worked in (classic) Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. Also, some Abilities might counteract each other. Consider the following hypothetical setup for Barbarian and Fighter (based on how I would design the Archetypes to make "classes" make sense).
speculation starts
Barbarian: Must have High rating in Fight, Rage and Fortitude, and not so much in other skills. When reaching a threshold in these skills, as well as a much lower threshold in secondary skills like Willpower, Avoidance, Armor, Stealth, Survival, Tracking and Climbing, as well as doing implied or explicit Barbarian stuff (like killing something in a rage), you get a merit badge which gives you one or more new abilities. For a Barbarian, these would be Rage powers and some passive bonuses here and there, at least some additional hit points.
Fighter: Must have High rating in Fight, Armor and Fortitude. When reaching a threshold in these skills, as well as a much lower threshold in secondary skills like Willpower, Avoidance and a few skills of their own choice, and doing things expected by a fighter (like taunting an opponent away from a teammate), you get one or more Abilities. For a Fighter these would be things like Weapon Specialization and Combat maneuvers like disarm, trip etc.
These abilities could counteract each other: If you used a rage power, for as long as that power was active, and 5 seconds after that, you lost you Weapon Specialication bonuses and couldn't use the Fighter Abilities which are based on the concept of a controlled fighting style.
end speculation
That is how I expect the game to work. Thus, you would multiclass for versatility, not power.
