Extroth's page

In Ironfang Invasion, there's a hobgoblin manual on catching elf magic users that states there is a small bone in the thumb and pinky which prevent people from casting when broken. Not sure if that's still true with the changes to somatic components, but it could be.

That's super interesting actually. I figured it would be the pointer finger and thumb--but do casters point with their thumb and pinky finer when casting? That's a really interesting mental image.

Extroth wrote:

Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?"

If you were playing a superhero game, would you want to be a non-hero? Or would you want every NPC in the game to be a super? I'd say no, simply because part of the reason I play RPGs is to play a cool character who is not like everyone else, and who has way cooler abilities than almost everyone else. I can't speak for other players, but if PCs were not special I wouldn't play in the first place.

Maybe we just have a philosophical difference then--because I have played a non-hero in a superhero game. And I have run a game where most of the population had powers (think my hero academia).

But in that case, there is a logical, in-universe, explanation, superpowers are rear things caused by genetic quarks or very strange circumstances. If in Pathfinder all spell casters were sorcerer’s I would buy this comparison.

Extroth wrote:

Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?" if they are then how do they get that specialness in-universe? Why is the Pathfinder society even a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the talents needed to join up?

Why are Doctors a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the resources and talents needed to join up? The fact that 99% of people can't do something is the reason the organization exists.

This is a fair point, though funnily during the middle ages most doctors were actually really bad at their jobs. It wasn’t until modern communications and education networks came into being that it was possible to spread proper knowledge of medicine. I could totally see a world where there are only a few “real” wizards and everyone else is faking it. But that doesn’t really lead to the kind of high fantasy adventures Pathfinder is known for. There are an awful lot of magic items and magically constructed creatures wandering around the dungeons of the world for only a “few” wizards to have produced.

The logic of the PCs being special is simply a result of the fact that they're the main characters of the story. And since it's an interactive fiction medium, the PCs being the only ones that the GM can't control the choices of makes them pretty special indeed. The kind of special that breaks prophecies, for example, simply by showing up in a world.

I understand that this is the case from a meta-perspective of course. And when playing tabletop games you sometimes can’t get away from the meta. But that was not really the context of this thread. If we’re going to think about the implications of the game mechanics as elements of lore then these are the questions we have to ask. If people don’t want to think about these implications I can respect that. People play these games for different reasons. My players come to the table for RP and world-building. And we’ve gone whole sessions without combat.

Now responding to the thread more generally: if an NPC dies when they hit zero hit points but a PC lives--consitently--every time. Then there is in fact an in world difference between these two beings. Maybe it’s not clear what it is--but there is a difference. If you want to handwave it and say that’s only a gameplay mechanic then there is probably a good chance that some NPC’s in the world have lived when dropping bellow zero hit points and it’s just not relevant to the players. In which case the points being made are still valid.

You can’t have it both ways.

I don't think I particularly like the philosophy I'm seeing in this thread where people dismiss NPC as not having access to cantrips or magic at all just because they're an NPC. NPC's are made helpless enough by not being able to take classes at all--why do we feel the need to deny them their heritage feats too?

Also, I've never been able to follow the logic of "PC's are special?" if they are then how do they get that specialness in-universe? Why is the Pathfinder society even a thing if 99% of people can't even come by the talents needed to join up?

My wizard needs to learn magic from somewhere--they probably had to learn it from an NPC--and then that NPC had to learn magic from someone else. Do you see how this doesn't add up?

I'm actually trying to figure out which combinations don't work. I'm sure some of them are subpar, but nothing seems unplayable. I think it makes sense to avoid redundant features. But even then some sorcerer/wizard combos I've seen look very good--at least on paper.

I'm actually an experienced play by post role player. As I grew up in a small town that didn't have a large roleplay community. I actually didn't know D&D was a thing until going to college.
And oddly enough, I had been designing a ruleset for a play by post rpg myself before Covid-19 hit as I find that D&D and pathfinder are not the best for those rules, but I still have a fondness for the old play by post style.

So first let me give you some ideas that will make life easier for a GM running a play by post-game.

First abstract distance: Instead of telling your players how many feet they are from the goblin tell them how many move actions they would have to take in order to get to the goblin. Pathfinder 2nd edition's flexible action system is actually really good for play by post games.

I like what you're doing with initiative as it keeps those rolls relevant without bogging down the game. My solution to this was actually skipping initiative most of the time and letting players take their turns when they had time to. Or even saving actions until they see what the foe was going to do. It doesn't break things as much as you might think.

Next, you need to have a different type of dungeon layout then you do when playing in person. I base my play by post dungeons off those old MUD games that I used to play, back in the day. You should have a clear number of exits, and you should describe them as being, exit to the north, exit to the east, etc...that keeps it easy for players to visualize.

I also find it helpful to divide the game into episodes to keep things moving. If the players travel or the setting changes you can change the episode. This should give you the opportunity to recap in some way. And let me be clear, even if you don't use an episode type structure. Recapping is important. Even though the players should just be able to slide back up the chat to see what happened last, a lot of times they don't and they need to be reminded of what's happening and why they're doing something.

Do away with rules that require action vagueness. Most of the time the RAW state that the players don't know what a spell being cast is unless they can make the relevant skill roll. This doesn't work in a play by post. When an enemy spellcaster casts a spell, write. Goblin sorcerer casts fire ball. Then on a separate line write "These players need to make a reflex save."

I hope that helps, honestly, I find that while Pathfinder 2nd is an okay game to do a play by post game with. The complex network of skills and feats that make up the character sheet makes it much harder to keep track of who can do what. And players tend to forget their options quite a bit. That for me was always the hardest problem to solve.

Good luck, and stay safe.

I come down fairly middle of the road on these arguments. I think the issue is the wizard specifically is boring. But I do understand the resistance to making changes. In 1e most casters could just end combat and there was very little a DM could do about that most of the time. 2e does a lot of work to make it so everyone can contribute to combat without the combat ending as soon as the caster's turn comes around. But the Wizard is so dang generic that I would only play it as the "Default" arcane caster option right now and the moment an archanist or something like that comes out with more interesting class features I'm dropping the wizard, like a hot potato.

If you don't think that's a problem then nothing needs to change. But personally I think if your core classes are made obsolete by additional classes you've closed off a lot of design space. Let's face it, one of the things that makes pathfinder so good is the amazing amount of class options that we all know are going to come eventually. But right now the wizard is the white bread of casters, kind of bland and not very good for you.

Thinking about it further if someone had asked me to design the wizard for 2e I would have probably just skipped the wizard and make the arcanist the primary prepared casting class. We could still call it the wizard if people got super defensive about tradition and flavor. But that's just me.

Heck, when the bard was the jack of all trade master of none in 1e at least they had tons of skills and amazing role play potential.

Honestly, for me the wizard feels like a good multiclass option but not something you would play pure. If I want to play a pure caster it seems like the sorcerer is the better option.

And all of this talk about wizards feeling boring and underpowered is making me wonder if they will release the archanist class. Because if it's anything close to it's 1e counterpart the wizard would be obsolete right then and there.