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The real question here is, what exact are we expecting witch patrons to be? All we know is that they'll be concrete beings rather than nebulous metaphysical concepts, with Baba Yaga being a single example. But we really don't know what else. People are assuming that we'll see fiends, celestials, fey, and great old ones, based on how 5e warlocks are implemented, but considering the core differences between that and pathfinder 1e's witch (spontaneous cha caster vs prepared int caster), are those assumptions really valid?
I just realized there's two different warlocks in this very thread... @Scott wynn Just hyperlink your google doc. Easier for everyone that way (if you don't know how, click the "show" button under the text box).
Y'ask me, Shaman should be Primal, not Occult. I didn't say occult, I just said prepare-any. If we NEED a prepared-any analog to sorcerer, the shaman's whole thing with directly borrowing power from spirits (which could really be anything...outsiders? nature spirits? dead people? who knows!) can be represented by the spells being whatever tradition the spirits themselves use. Wandering spirit would also grant a handful of spells from another tradition. Primal shaman is the obvious other option, of course. But enough shaman talk. This thread is about witch.
Where does it say that divine magic only comes from deities? In Golarion, the only beings who can choose to grant divine power, rather than pass it down involuntarily through genetics, are deities. Note that my comment already take demigods into account when I said "deities". Looking back at PF1, the Witch class had several options for connecting them to divine sources that weren't deities. Some examples would be Celestial Agenda (patron), Demon-Sworn (archetype), Infernal Contract (Patron), and Pact Witch (archetype). My biggest problem with those patrons is that being invested with power by a group of minor planar beings doesn't sound like an int-based casting class at all. They felt a lot more like options for a charisma-based caster instead, like the 5e warlock. I would also be pretty disappointed if infernal contracts are a witch patron rather than a class-agnostic option, like rituals. I shouldn't have to multiclass witch to play a fighter who sold his soul to be the best swordsman alive. In fact, witch wouldn't even make sense. ...worship isn't generally done unwillingly, while contracts can easily be made under duress or while being tricked. Unlike Clerics, the Witch class didn't have language saying they lost access to their magic/abilities if they don't follow their patron's wishes. That's only 1e witch, where patrons are ill-defined forces of nature and metaphysics. 2e witch patrons will be tangible beings, which makes me think that witches will have anathema, just like druids and clerics.
Not all druids directly worship powerful entities of nature, but plenty do. Worshiping the the forces of nature itself also includes at least paying respect to those beings. It's not that you can't gain power from a powerful representative of nature by doing its bidding, it's that you can already play that very concept as a druid. You don't need the witch class at all. Personally, I see the Witch as the best choice for being a pick-a-list prepared caster since like the Sorcerer - their power originates from a distinct and highly variable "other" element (bloodline/patron) which they have limited control over. As long as enough emphasis is put on Patrons and their pact/contract, I don't think the Witch having an overlapping spell list will make them overlap too much with other casters. By overlap, I mean that all arcane/divine/primal witch concepts can ALREADY BE PLAYED by being a wizard/cleric/druid, barring the infernal contract idea (but I also have other desires for how that's implemented, see above). Occult witches meanwhile fill a specific niche that can't be represented by any other class or class combination in the game.
We have a similar problem with draconic sorcerer already. A green dragon sorcerer can't cast entangle, a spell like ability shared by all green dragons, without being crossblooded. Silver and gold dragon sorcerers can't cast divine spells at all despite their ancestors having them. Instead of future proofing the class like that, I'd personally want to see feats and archetypes that address these issues independent of class. For the theme, one complaint I saw in PF1 was that too much theming was spent on the sort of stereotypical evil fairy tale Witch while not giving enough options for others types of Witches in tales/myths/etc. If the PF2 Witch becomes strictly Occult, I kinda worry that themes related to the Primal/Divine side of Witch stories will get muted/ignored in the class mechanics in favor of this stereotype. Considering that bards are occult, I'm not worried about stereotyping. Are bards also cackling evil hags? Besides, I think if we're ever getting a prepared-any class, I hope it would be the shaman. The 1e witch felt way too similar to the shaman already, which in turn makes the shaman one of the thematically weakest classes.
If you're an arcane witch with a tome, why are you not a wizard? Besides, if you want to be a wizard with hexes, you can multiclass witch. A spellbook witch would be completely redundant. Again, the issue with prepared anything rather than prepared occult for a witch, is that they'd step on the wizard, druid, and cleric's toes. Hexes mean little in terms of mechanical difference when you can just multiclass to get them.
Except that almost ALL warlock feats are designed to boost spellcasting, rather than to improve their martial ability. They also don't have many class features designed to boost their martial combat, barring proficiency increase. A ranger or fighter multiclassed with sorcerer would have a lot more. You also shouldn't use the sorcerer multiclass as a chassis for this, because spontaneous multiclassing is strictly weaker than prepared at this moment, unless you're doing it solely for focus powers. I also suspect that the 1e Magus would be converted to a full caster in the style of the warpriest cleric. A wizard archetype is probably the most elegant way of doing it. They'd lose out the wizard school and legendary proficiency in arcane spells. In exchange they get better weapon, armor, and save progression, and 8hp/level.
The biggest issue I see with giving the witch patron-dependent spell traditions is that it would make witches overlap too much with other spellcasters in terms of lore. Arcane magic is supposed to be rational, following whatever the Golarion equivalent of the scientific method might be. Witchcraft should be quite the opposite, if the 1e witch's lore is anything to go by. Additionally, if a witch is taught by a patron to cast spells using memorization, formulas, and logic (the hallmarks of arcane learning), what makes him...not a wizard? The patron in this case would just be a teacher who ropes their student into a pretty demanding magical contract. And that's the kind of thing powerful users of wizardry already do to their servant/student wizards. Primal patrons would need to be some form of nature spirit, like elementals or fey lords, and paying reverence to these beings in exchange for power is the the druid's niche. In Golarion, the only beings capable of granting divine magic are deities, so divine patrons would have to be, by definition, deities. So what's the thematic difference between a witch who made a pact with a deity for divine magic, and a cleric who serves a deity for divine magic? I can't really see any concept you can achieve with a divine witch that you can't already with a cleric, especially since the fluff makes very little distinction between worshippers of a full god and those of demigods like empyreal lords and archfiends.
So...a few minor issues first: 1. Why doesn't Fiend grant the Divine list? The optional spells they grant are mostly Arcane, anyway. Divine base list with Arcane bonus spells feels way better. As it stands, there's no way for a fiend warlock to deal evil damage, which sounds counter-intuitive. 2. Feats that grant a single spell from another list feels pretty limited, and I don't think any Pathfinder 2e class currently does that. A better implementation would be a feat that allows you to add any spell from a select category/list of traits, depending on your patron (eg, a feat available to the Archfey patron that allows you to select an arcane spell from the Illusion school). Now for the major problem: Overall I'm not sure how well the 5e warlock casting mechanic carries over into Pathfinder 2e at all. As it stands, there's no reason to play your warlock over a sorcerer or a bard. The warlock's casting progression is simply inferior in every way, and by a wide margin. At low levels, being able to heighten any spell automatically to 5th level means little when a bard or sorcerer knows as many signature spells as the warlock knows spells -- and they can heighten their signature spells to whatever level they want. Regaining spell slots on refocus is nice, but I doubt any adventuring day is going to last long enough for that to become an advantage over just having more spell slots. Besides, other casters have focus points too, which means they won't end up with nothing but cantrips even if they're out of slots. At higher levels, a bard has 3 spell slots and spells known for each spell level from 6 to 9, and a sorcerer has 4. Your warlock has 1, maybe 2 with feats (which are all extremely weak compared to bard feats like Deep Lore and Impossible Polymath, or sorcerer bloodline evolutions). Losing this many high level spells is not a fair trade off at all for the ability to recast low level spells, especially considering how few of those a warlock even knows. I would highly, HIGHLY recommend you use Pathfinder 2e native spellcasting mechanics and try to fit the warlock class's lore and feel around it, rather than the other way round.
I currently run Eberron using Pathfinder 1e, and the system is fantastic for it. I'd say it's an even better than D&D 3.5, because of how much pulpy stuff that's built into the system. I'm planning on making a Pathfinder 2e conversion of Eberron as soon as I get my hands on the D&D 5e sourcebooks. I'm also playing a Magaambyan wizard in a Pathfinder conversion of Savage Tides, which not only converts the game into the Pathfinder system but also into the Golarion setting. I also pillaged the advantage/disadvantage system from D&D 5e instead of percentile dice and circumstance bonuses/penalties. It makes a lot of things so much easier, and it's not like the roll twice take better/worse mechanic doesn't already exist in Pathfinder.
Prepared int-based occult caster, using your familiar as a spellbook. Hexes will work like bard compositions. Some of them are cantrips, some of them are focus powers, and some of them are rider effects on other hexes or class spells. You get 1 focus hex spell and 1 hex cantrip at level 1 depending on what patron you choose, and you can get more hexes from your patron's list through witch class feats. Patrons would also grant a bonus spell known for each spell level, often taken out of other tradition's lists, and would impose anathema. I'm wondering if patron choice would limit (or at least inform) your familiar choices too.
It really depends on HOW the rules differ. Transitioning from 3.5 to Pathfinder or even Pathfinder 1e to 2e isn't a big deal, because tone and feel of the game stays relatively the same. The way combat turns work differs for example doesn't matter to me, because turn based combat is an abstraction of the narrative anyway, which of course is real time. The mental images a player gets of how combat happens will remain the same as long as the narrative descriptions remain the same. Same goes for different spell names; the change from "cure light wounds" to "heal" cast at level 1 is irrelevant because nobody in character says any of those words. I actually feel like converting from 5e to Pathfinder or vice versa is quite a bit more jarring, because 5e FEELS different from Pathfinder, due to the fundamental difference in how power levels are balanced. If I convert a d&d 5e game to pathfinder 2e I'd seriously consider removing the +level to proficiency, just so I can keep the same gritty tone that comes from bounded accuracy. So to me it depends on whether or not the two systems can be used to tell the same story. If the story I want to tell includes an army of low level soldiers suffering heavy losses to slay a dragon, I would use 5e, because that story is POSSIBLE in that system; if instead I want my story to include a near-invincible dragon that can destroy entire nations, defeatable only by legendary heroes, then I would use Pathfinder instead. As to more significant class ability changes compared to just renaming spells....do people feel like justifying how a character suddenly learned a new feat every time they level up too? The party wizard now carrying a shield can be explained as "he learned to use a shield". It's as simple as that.
Not to mention that almost every class can use their skills as a circus performer. Rangers and druids make for great beast trainers, rogues excel as acrobats, wizards, bards, and sorcerers all make for good stage magicians, fighters, monks and barbarians work well as strongmen (or women), and clerics are good fortune tellers. The only classes that take a little big of work are alchemists and champions. And even if you really don't want to perform, you can still play a guard hired on by the circus to protect them from bandits, wild beasts, and city thugs. That's as "adventurer" as can be.
You do realize that circus performers ARE adventurers, right? Circus troupes travel to a lot of different places to perform, and in a world like Golarion, the wildernesses between cities are dangerous enough that the average troupe has probably defeated (or tamed!) an owlbear or two. Besides, "adventuring" often is a real job in a world like Golarion. In fact if you've read the blog pages on Lost Omens World Guide organizations, like 3 out of 5 of them are "real jobs". Being a hellknight is a full time job, so is being an explorer or archaeologist for the Pathfinder Society, or a professor in the Magaambyan college. As for city guards, have you never watched a police procedural show? Trust the developers to give you plenty of action. If anything I find "simply adventurers" really hard to run from a DM's perspective, because it often ends up with a party that has nothing in common with each other in terms of background and motivation. Not every PC needs to be Indiana Jones, Lara Croft, or Nathan Drake. Sometimes they're also Harry Dresden.
Spells also cap at 3/4/5 (depending on level cap) with anything higher level converted into rituals, if they become necessary. Rituals are core in 2e, so redesigning high level utility spells (eg. teleport) into rituals would actually be pretty easy.
The system I have right now is as follows: - Spells cost 1 + spell level to start - Spellcasters have spell points equal to their spellcasting proficiency bonus (including level) plus spellcasting ability modifier. A multiclassed spellcaster doesn't add their level to their spell point pool. - Starting at level 7, the spell point cost of all spells is reduced by 1 cumulatively each time a spellcaster gains a new level of spells, to a minimum of 1. Highest level spells will always cost 4 points, second highest 3 points, third highest 2 points, and everything else 1 point. - The Expert Spellcaster class feature additionally allows spellcasters gain 1 spell point from refocusing, to a maximum of 1. Basically, if you're out of spell points, you can always refocus to have 1 low level spell to cast. - You can only cast 10th level spells that are unheightened, or heightened from uncommon spells, once per day. You can do so twice per day with a feat. - Spontaneous spellcasters can always cast a spell known at a lower level, but not at a higher level, unless it is their signature spell. For example, if a sorcerer knows fireball at 5th level, and fireball isn't a signature spell, they can cast it at 3rd, 4th, and 5th levels, paying the appropriate spell point costs. - Prepared spellcasters spend spell points during daily preparations to prepare spells. If they have the Expert Spellcaster class feature, they must spend any spell points gained immediately after refocus to prepare a spell.
You probably wouldn't be punished for it, but Cayden Cailean certainly would not approve. Buying slaves to free them rewards slavers, because they only care about getting money, not where their slaves are going after they get paid. If a slaver can get enough people to buy his slaves and free them, you're not ending slavery -- you're just turning slavers into kidnappers who demand ransom. Cayden Cailean wants to see all slavery gone and slavers get rightful comeuppance. He would prefer you use violence or guile against slavers rather than play by their rules.
I can see not wanting a non-caster character to get a free 8th or 9th level spell (regarding Syberis marks). But I wonder if it wouldn't be as big of a deal at 16th or 17th level. Definitely as a focus spell, so it couldn't be spammed. Innate spells actually work better, and make more sense. They're limited to 1/day after all.
The issue with sturdier NPCs is that PCs are supposed to be slightly stronger than the average person of their ancestry, even at start. They aren't necessarily BETTER at everything (eg. skills or spells), but they would be above average in combat abilities. Making the average adult level 3 means that a starting PC can only be a teenager, which is a bit restrictive. As for numbers bloat, why not just remove level from proficiency modifiers? That would approximately half all bonuses to rolls by the time you get to level 20. I don't think you should be doing anything to modify damage, though. There's isn't really any difference between a level 10 fireball vs a level 6 fireball when cast into a crowd of commoners.
Two things would be useful here. First of all, like many people have suggested before, I would love to read about the impacts of the adventure path (assuming PCs win, of course) on the geopolitical situation. A mini setting update, sort of like the changes Pathfinder 2e has compared to Pathfinder 1e for individual areas. This would be very useful for groups who run all their adventure paths in the same continuity, which I've been lead to believe is very common. I'd also like to see a few alternative scenarios for how the adventure could be changed, now that the writers have the whole picture in mind and could easily see whatever flaws or missing pieces had been in the story. Ideas like how to foreshadow the final villain if they came out of nowhere, or how to expand on important NPCs in the campaign if they seem underused, or even ways to replace a certain segment with another (say, replacing a dungeon in a book, with another dungeon published later in an adventure module). Obviously this is aimed more towards people who are only picking up a complete adventure path after it's complete, but from my experience not many DMs decide to modify adventure paths to suit their liking BEFORE having read the entire thing anyway.
Have we heard anything from Drop Dead Studios on this topic?
If you're only giving the initial trained skill (eg Acrobatics and Athletics for fighter, Crafting for alchemist, etc), but not the x + int mod additional skills, then it's fine, as long as the new trained skills don't stack. I wouldn't allow a character to be trained in an additional skill of their choice either, because multiclassing already grants you tons more proficiencies than normal.
I suggest the following then: - If any of your classes start Expert in a save or in perception, and increases to Master or above, you gain Canny Acumen for that save or for perception if your total levels would not allow you to reach Master in it before level 17 - Whenever one of your class levels increases a weapon proficiency, it increases all your trained weapon proficiencies (except for advanced weapons, which stays one proficiency level below). If you don't progress to expert or above before level 11, all your trained weapon proficiencies (barring advanced weapons) increases to expert at level 11. - Whenever one of your class levels increases an armor proficiency, it increases all your trained armor proficiencies. If you don't progress to expert or above before level 13, all your trained armor proficiencies increases to expert at level 13.
Summoner would be extremely difficult to do, since companion rules are pretty bare-bones right now. I'd probably just use the sorcerer as it is to represent a warlock in the 5e style, which...also works nothing like a summoner. The only thing I can think of is to let the warlock pick a list of summonable creatures as their "eidolon", and just reskin each higher level version of the creature as the "leveled up" version of the previous one. To illustrate why a real summoner would be difficult, you'd basically need to create a bunch of base stats from scrach, and make them workable within the 10-class-feat paradigm. That is, each advancement would cost a class feat, as opposed to the fairly exploitable evolution point mechanic from 1e. I can't imagine the amount of work that would go into homebrewing the base stats for an outsider for each of 9 planar alignment, plus genies, elementals, fey, shadow plane denizens, aberrations, undead, and golems. That's a whopping 16 base types, and each needs at least two feats per level. Assuming most feats can be shared between multiple types (all fiends, all celestials, between genies and elementals, etc), you're still looking at something like 100 feats to write. Good luck if you're willing to start on the endeavor, but I wouldn't bother at this point.
Skills I dont think interact with regular multiclassing, except for initial proficiency: Which I feel should work but not increase proficiency, much like making a skill into a class skill twice had no effect. What I mean is that multiclassing doesn't grant you new trained skills at all, and skill progression follows total character level, not class level. No matter what your class combination is, you always have a skill feat at odd levels and a skill increase at even levels. Whenever you take a level of rogue, count the skill increase at odd levels and skill feat at even levels to be a rogue class feature instead of part of the regular skill advancement. Maybe that's exactly what you're saying, I'm just clarifying my intent.
Avoid feat taxes altogether. Stack total spellcaster levels for spell slots, but limit the highest level of spells known to individual class levels. If you end up with higher level slots than the highest level spell you know, you can use them to prepare heightened lower level spells, or cast heightened spontaneous signature spells. I would also suggest you ONLY divorce the 3 spells per level progression from class. Wizard bonus school spells, cleric channel energy, and even the sorcerer's extra spontaneous slot per level are class features. A wizard 7/sorcerer 4 will have the same number of "universal" spell slots as a level 11 wizard, that is, 3 spell slots each for spell levels 1 to 5, and 2 level 6 spell slots. In addition, they can prepare bonus school spells as a level 7 wizard, and has a bonus spontaneous slot each for level 1 and level 2 spells that can only be used to cast sorcerer spells. The extra spells at low levels is intentional to balance out the inability to cast higher level spells. I don't think arcanist casting is appropriate either. I recommend the following for mixed spontaneous/prepared casters: You must choose during daily preparations whether or not to prepare a spell into each spell slot. If you prepare a spell into a slot, it becomes a prepared slot with which you can only cast the spell you prepared into it. Otherwise, it becomes a spontaneous spell slot and you can only use it to cast a spell from your spell repertoire. Bonus spontaneous slots gained from sorcerer levels can only be used to cast sorcerer spells. Proficiency increases (outside of skills) are such a pain to balance given how no class has the same progression. I'm really tempted to just turn it into tracks with fractional increases (like fractional BAB and Saves). Effectively, a class that improves a proficiency at 6th level has 1/6 while one that increases it at 8th has 1/8; so a lv 3/lv 4 character with those classes would have 3/6+4/8=1 and increase the proficiency at lv 7. That's extremely complicated and still unlikely to be universal. Just don't let them stack, period. I would just add a clause such that whenever you get to a level where one of your classes improves weapon/armor proficiencies, ALL martial weapon and armor proficiencies gained from all of your classes improve to the same degree, and advanced weapon proficiencies improves to one step below unless that class feature specifically improves advanced weapons. For example, a champion 1/wizard 11 gains wizard weapon expertise, which gives you expert in only wizard weapons. However, since you are trained in all simple and martial weapons from your level in champion, you can increase all simple and martial weapons to expert instead. You don't need to do the same for saves or perception, since saves that lag behind too much can be caught up with Canny Acumen.
Basing proficiency on character level would be complicated since every class increases different proficiencies at different times. I would recommend keeping them separate. If you start trained in one thing from you first class, and multiclass into a second class that grants you trained again, you stay trained. If you multiclass too many times, you might end up being trained in a bunch of stuff that will never increase to expert. Consider if these characters lacking behind by 2, 4, or even 6 points is reasonable; if not, you might want to add a clause that after a certain level, all characters become expert in every non-skill ability they're trained in, Again I heavily recommend you leave skills out of initial proficiencies when taking a new class. Saves and perception should be included on second thought. Stacking levels in all spellcasting classes is absolutely necessary for multiclass casters to function. You'll have to decide how the spell slots are going to work. All prepared or all spontaneous is easy (just let them prepare any spell from any class into any level-appropriate slot, or cast any spell known with any level-appropriate slot). But if you're say, wizard 5/sorcerer 2, how do the spell slots work? Do you have fixed numbers of prepared vs spontaneous slots? Or can you treat any slot as prepared or spontaneous? Can you sacrifice a prepared slot to cast a spontaneous spell? Multiclassing in 2-level chunks doesn't seem quite necessary as many class features are as strong as class feats if not more -- a new proficiency tier in weapons or armor, or a new level of spells, for instance. You should divorce skill increases and skill feats from class tables, as well as general and ancestry feats. And ability score increases too as mentioned before. Any time you take a level of rogue you get an extra skill feat if your new level is odd, and a skill increase if your new level is even.
@Bandw2
What's wrong with a weird looking number? Hit points look like weird numbers all the time anyway. I don't consider having a non-rounded number to be inelegant, nor do I think doing any math on the same scale as getting hit in combat to be inelegant. If someone needs a calculator to calculate their spell points, they'd already use one when taking damage anyway. Plenty of people have already suggested to prevent nova with a limit on the highest level spells cast. A maximum of 7 or 8 spells of your second highest and above, and a maximum of 3 or 4 of those spells being your highest level, should do the job. As for spells, I'm OK with using spell prerequisites to balance out the inherent flexibility of spell points. I'm also okay with a progression that allows lowest level spells to be cast for free so as to keep the numbers small. I just don't feel like homebrewing Spheres from the Scratch. I like it and all, but Drop Dead Studios do have plans to release it for 2e and I'd rather use the official version of their classes.
I like this in theory, but it has the problem of a huge range of low level spells costing the same when you're high level. No one will ever cast any spell at level 1 when you're spending the same resources to cast it at level 4.
If we're talking verisimilitude, we're going to be here all day. Pathfinder is a turn-based game, which means verisimilitude will always have to give way to tactical play and balance. Another issue I've just noticed in terms of initial proficiencies: all classes increase all their initial proficiencies at different levels. That means when deciding what initial proficiencies are ommited by multiclassing into each class, you also need to decide how class features that increase them later work.
I'd prefer to stick to a single pool, something like Dreamscarred Press psionics. It had more math than slots but not more complex than the math you do when you take hit point damage, and it's arguably more intuitive than spell slots (at least it was for me).
There's a really good reason why AoOs are less common this edition. The developers want a game that is more movement and positioning focused, so that characters are expected to move around the battlefield rather than stay in place and full attack every single round.
The main problem with removing level scaling (or reducing scaling) as is has to do with how critical successes and failures work. With normal level scaling, you're expected to critically succeed far more often against lower level enemies, and critically fail far more often against higher level enemies. Without level scaling, lower level enemies are not JUST more difficult because they're harder to hit or hit you more; their crit ranges would also be closer to those of the same level.
Except that the higher pools can be converted down to lower pools, hence the extra math. Plus, what kind of spell uses what pool also changes as you level, which is another layer of complication. One pool with restrictions would be simpler as long as the restrictions are simple, eg. you can only cast your highest level of spells 3 times per day. I like the theory of that system. I'm just looking for something a little more elegant.
Pathfinder 2e classes are far more front-loaded than 1e. I suggest you first decide what level 1 features a character gets when they take a level in a different class. Obviously they'll need to gain training in class DC for the new class. I would suggest leaving out skills, saves and perception entirely, since those can be obtained easily through feats. But there still remains weapon/armor proficiencies that are harder to get, as well level one class features. For example, fighters get attack of opportunity at level 1, an EXTREMELY useful ability that's hard to come by. If you decide to give it to characters who multiclass into fighter, you'll make fighter-dipping the best option for a huge number of martial builds, just like in Pathfinder 1e. I also recommend you look into how class levels stack with each other. In 1e, they simply don't, and therefore a character that's wizard 10/fighter 10 has neither the spell levels and DCs to reliably cast nor the BAB to reliably hit. 2e characters have +level to everything trained and above, so even without stacking levels in different classes, their abilities would remain functional if we just look at bonuses and DCs. However, they would lack high level class feats and features like high level spells and weapon damage bonus from specialization. How competitive would this be with a level 20 wizard with a fighter archetype, or vice versa?
D&D 5e doesn't remotely scale to level, and I would consider it to be in the same family of games. A lot of players come to Pathfinder from 5e, after all. I've seen lazy 5e DMs reuse the same enemies over and over again and I consider it a DM problem rather than a system problem. When I want to expand the level range of enemies, it's because I frequently find a new thematic monster for the current arc that's unfortunately a few levels below the PCs. Now in Pathfinder 1e I could just give it templates, class levels, or advance its HD. But it's still extra work I would have to do to prep. I don't see the point of doubling level, because it would just further restrict the level range of enemies you can use. That's assuming you use double level scaling on enemies as well -- if you don't, then you'll run out of monsters to fight at higher levels since you'll just crit the hell out of everything. If you want something mythic, high levels already have that feel (legendary skills and all) without needing more numbers bloat. Half/third/quarter/zero level scaling all seem useful as fine-tuning tools for DMs that want it.
This is the best idea in this whole thread, IMO. I'd maybe want to tweak this concept more and turn it into a whole new class/magic system rather than try to replace the existing casting system. This is really just a more complex way of saying that you are limited in how many higher level spells you can cast, though. I would much rather just have a shared pool and additional rules for how many spells of your highest level (or highest two levels) you can cast per day. I am fully aware that spell points would be a bit more complex than spell slots, due to the math involved. I would keep the math down to the absolutely necessary and avoid adding more.
Going by the 1 to 48 scale, you have the following for a wizard going by a straight up spell slot conversion (before adding school spells): 1 - 4 points
As you can see the jumps in points is significantly higher at odd levels, where you get two new slots to go with the higher level spells known. However, with spell points rather than slots, gaining new spells is a large power increase even before spell point total increases, because spell points can be used free-form, or almost free-form if we're implementing a penalty for casting too many high level spells. So I'm considering something like the following instead: 1 - 4 points
Basically, you start with 4 points, and each level you gain spell points equal to the cost of the highest level spell you can cast. As for recharging spell points with the refocus action, I'm considering each refocus raising your spell points to the cost of the highest level spell you can cast. That is, if you already have more spell points than that, refocus simply doesn't grant you more spell points. Refocusing like this also ensures that you won't have 1 spell point left over that you can't use, which would otherwise be rather frustrating at low levels.
If 5 minute adventuring day is a big problem the one solution I can think of is to have a smaller pool but allowing it to regen. Effectively, sacrifising the ability to nova high level spells for considerably more low level casting. But, just like any rule this has problems, in this case it makes spellcasting not as limited as it's supposed to be. I've considered it, but in my experience with psionics it hadn't been a problem. Caster players learn pretty quickly to conserve their points after they nova a miniboss and another one shows up. It's just part of the learning process of playing mages. Besides, mana pools already add math to spellcasting. I don't want to add more. Although tying spell point regeneration to refocusing might also work. Each time you use the refocus action, you also regain some number of spell points as a function of your spellcasting proficiency, perhaps?
A question I would ask is, what is the goal of such a redesign? I think a mana pool means less variety in spells cast, as people default to using their strongest stuff all the time so they don't have to keep the rest of their spells in their head space. It encourages 5-minute workday for the same reason. I think stating why you want such a system up front can help when designing it (and help others giving advice or feedback). I don't like spell slots. I think that resource management for spellcasting is more fun when it's more freeform. I also prefer spell variety to come from creative solutions based on circumstances, rather than enforced by mechanics, especially for a spontaneous caster. It doesn't feel fun when I can't cast a fireball because I've used up "level 3 slots" but I can't sacrifice say, 2 level 2 slots to make it happen anyway. The restriction comes across as arbitrary. Five minute workday is an issue that's better addressed by having many small enounters and a few large encounters, rather than by spellcasting mechanics. Feel free to disagree with me, obviously. It's just that from personal experience I had a lot more fun with Dreamscarred Press psionics than I did playing a slot-based caster.
I feel like if people want to fully remove alignment (rather than just convert damage types to "neutral" sounding names with some minor mechanics adjustments), you should actually just not replace them with anything. If it's alignment damage added to a weapon attack, just make it deal the same type of damage as the weapon, or alternatively extra damage of a type that makes sense for the deity. If it's alignment based damage reduction, change it to materials-based damage reduction. Any outsider that's neutral good or lawful aligned can be harmed by silver, and any outsider that's neutral evil or chaotic aligned can be harmed by cold iron. If it's a spell that deals alignment damage, change it to an energy type that makes sense for the deity. If it comes from a sorcerer bloodline instead, just change it to a different spell.
Level + casting stat is actually how Spheres of Magic did it, which usually comes to either freely cast something at half caster level, or spending 1 point to cast at full caster level (or combine different effects).
This is actually exactly what I was thinking! It's better balanced than 1 to 10 or even 1 to 19 and way less ridiculous than 1 to 512. One change I would makes is that 10th level spells would still be considered a different type of spell, and therefore can't be cast with spell points unless you're heightening a common spell. I also think that spell points should increase at a relatively steady rate, rather than have sudden jumps whenever you gain a new level of spells. Having points rather than slots makes those increases a lot more powerful, after all.
I like what a lot of people see as "uncanny valley" because it challenges conventional concepts of beauty. And I do agree that it's not as creative or fun when animal people literally just looks like people in a costume. I can see it done for movies where they literally are people in a costume, or anime where characters are often designed with cosplay in mind. But an RPG? It can be as wild as you like. In the end I'd probably be satisfied with a large variety. I like my half-humanoids a bit creepy looking but I can understand why others don't.
5e ability boosts give +2 to one ability score, and 5e feats give +1 to an ability score and a special power. The special powers gained from feats in 5e are also quite strong, so in that way I'd equate them to Pathfinder's class feats. I suggest letting characters give up two ability boost for a class feat, or one ability boost for an ancestry, general, or skill feat instead. The additional problem is that, as mentioned by WatersLethe, Str, Int and Cha are dumpable stats for any class that doesn't depend on them. Any pure caster can get away with 10 or even 8 strength. Int is only useful if you're an Int caster or a skill-focused build, since it doesn't govern how many skills you get to increase, only how many skills you get initially. Cha is fairly pointless for anyone who isn't a Cha caster, since skill proficiency matters more than ability mods and you can become very good at social skills by just putting skill increases and feats in them. So in order to avoid min-maxing and stat-dumping, you'd also have to make those three stats do more for characters who traditionally don't need them. For example, using Cha for will saves against mind control, while saving Wis for perception and will saves against illusions. I'm not sure how to make Str useful for anyone unlikely to be in melee, or int for anyone who just don't want to start with extra skills. If anyone has suggestions that would be welcome.
A good way could be to simply use "opposition" as the decider of wheter or not the abilities that used to rely on allignement work or not. Is the enemy you are fighting ideologically opposed to you? Does his ethos contrast with yours significantly? This should give more flexibility to the entire system, withut having to sacrifice a big number of important spells. Otherwise there is also the 5e route, where allignment spell now only work on certain types of creatures. I quite like the loyalty/enmity mechanic in theory, and it should work fine for a game focused on organizations without real divine influence, but it becomes a bit difficult to apply when outisders exist. Demons and devils don't HAVE to be always evil in a game without rigid alignment, but it would still be thematically and mechanically strange when your blessed weapon is doing extra damage to a demon who hates you, but not to the exact same species of demon that doesn't hate you. If you want to consider outsiders just another race of creatures like mortals, that's also fine -- it just might not fit most people's perception of these creatures. The 5e route is similar to what I suggested; rename damage names from alignment to something divorced from conventional morality and ethics, and make these magic types only apply to outsiders and divine casters. I added the 1e rule of alignment damage doing half to neutrals back, just so that divine damage spells aren't nerfed.
I'm not sure if making a prepared caster prepare every spell in a point-based system would be too time-consuming at the table. There's a lot of math being done there, rather than just preparing into slots. I like the idea of overcasting penalty for highest level spells -- kind of like the Psychic Enervation mechanic of the Wilder class. It should certainly depend on school, and sorcerers would not suffer from it when casting their highest level bloodline spell. Our first edition games we have been trying a system like this slightly based on the 3.5 spell point system where a level 1 spell is 1 mana, level 2 is 3 mana and level 3 is 5 mana etc. But as you said it had the potential problem of too many higher level spells so we have been trying a split mana for higher level spells. We also gave spontaneous another spell per level usually and restricted prepared to only prepare based on the classes spells per day without adding the attribute. Im not sure how well that would work for 2e yet. I'm not sure if dividing mana into tiers would be the right way to go, although making spells of different levels fall into different tiers is something I'm considering (see above).
The thing is, that's indistinguishable from a spell point system, where level 1 slots are 1 point each, level 2 slots 2 point each, level 3 = 4 points, level 4 = 8 points....until you get to level 10 spells that cost 512 points each.
I don't watch a lot of anime, so I'm not sure what you mean by anime half-dragons. I actually quite like that last one, although I can see why some would consider it to look patchwork or "prosthetic-y", like a Star Trek alien. I personally would prefer finer scales where normal human skin is, for a more consistent look. I don't know if anime is the right way to describe what I'm looking for. Half-celestial and half-fiend characters is the reference point I'm drawing. Finer details like skin or eye color, hairline/ear/eyebrow shape, etc, could be lost in the "dragon" features, but major contours like general facial structure wouldn't be obscured by the dragon-ness. So a humanoid half-dragon would have a humanoid facial structure, a reptilian half-dragon would look closer to the typical depiction, a mammalian beast-folk half-dragon would replace their fur with scales but otherwise look like a cat/wolf/bear/etc, and an avian half-dragon (eg. tengu) would keep their beak.
Pathfinder second edition no longer automatically scales spells with level. That means it would be fairly simple to convert it to a psionics-like point-based system, where raising slot level becomes increasing point cost when casting. At least in theory, anyway. I'm trying to homebrew a mana point system for my home game, because it doesn't seem like there's any news on psionics from Dreamscarred Press at all (seems like they're still working on their Starfinder conversion, so it would take a while). The challenges here is mostly the distinction between spontaneous and prepared casters, since spontaneous casters would lose their biggest advantage in such a system. A second concern is how to limit higher level spells so they not used to "nova".
so it only seems fair to give Spontaneous Casters a bit of a bonus too. I think a good balance between full spontaneous heightening and what we have now is spontaneous undercasting. That is, when you learn a spell you automatically know lower level versions of the same spell, without them taking up space in your spell repertoire. Plenty of people I've talked to about the subject don't even know that's not how it works by default. The only justification I've seen from the designers on why it works the way it does is some comment about players taking too long during the playtest, which from my experience playing 5e is just flat out nonsensical. No one I've played 5e with (including complete newbies who's never even seen an RPG before) ever had trouble figuring out how to cast the same spell at different levels... |