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While making a possible playtest character, I found an awkward skill feat overlap. The character has the Spacefarer background and the Hotshot leadership style. Both of these give the Express Driver skill feat.

Is there an established procedure for this? I took a look at player core and by RAW you can substitute skills but there's nothing for skill feats. Take another skill feat of the same skill? Instant retraining? Tough luck?

I'm sure this can already happen in PF2, but the playtest is the first time I, personally, ran into it.

I already did this with the Commander, and this time it's Guardian time.

The Party:
Level 1 Dwarf Guardian. Sword and Board, Furious Vengeance threat technique (it never came up, by the end of the adventure I forgot about it)
Level 1 Human Nephilim Rogue
Level 1 Aiurvian Cleric (Warpriest, Gorum)
Level 1 Human Witch (Starless Shadow)

This is a VERY favorable party for the Guardian. The Rogue, the Cleric, and the Witch's familiar all very much want to be close but not to get hit. Intercept Strike came up quite a bit. Albeit, there was one situation where an enemy the Guardian was adjacent to damaged an ally the Guardian wasn't adjacent to, where Intercept Strike would have been very nice. In fact, given Guardian's job it might have been more productive for Intercept Strike to depend on the enemy's location in general.

The Witch's familiar having that defensive option meant that it did not hesitate to use the hex-familiar double threat... save that the Witch often just destroyed everything with telekinetic projectile. Hard to find the actions to move the familiar with at level 1.

I tried very hard to remember all of the Guardian's functions... to limited success, as I eventually forgot about Furious Vengeance. Intercept Strike is, as mentioned, good. Raise Shield was helpful. Taunt is a problem.

The Guardian plays, I suspect, a lot like what a fighter plays like without the upsides. You move in, you make attacks, you raise shield. The hard part is finding a time to taunt in there. As many other tests have shown, the best time for taunting is an enemy that can't get to you in the first place.

When the party got to level 2, I gave the Guardian a Bastion archetype for free reactive shield. In retrospect, this was a mistake. Either the Guardian wants that reaction for Intercept Strike or it wants to use Shielded Taunt. That said, Shielded Taunt is not good for the shield side of it; it is in effect removing the AC downside of taunt and making the DC +1 harder. It is, fundamentally, a good feat. It's just that it's patching Guardian's holes, not building on something that's already good.

Okay, I need to go over this: what is Shoulder Check for? Seriously, what is it for? You make an unarmed attack, and... the target is off-guard for the rest of your turn. Not anyone else's turn, just yours. For you to make an attack at effectively -3. Or another shoulder check at -2? This would be good on a Rogue (except for the armor requirement) or a Monk (except for the armor requirement) or maybe certain fighters? On Guardian it's a squeaky toy. It does nothing to defend allies or increase your own durability.

Now, I did use Shoulder Check on the regular... as an agile attack. The most useful thing it did for me is letting me make a gauntlet strike with full hands. EXCEPT that if someone asked me, as a GM, if they could kick someone, I'd say 'go ahead, make a fist strike for it.' Shoulder Check has taught me to respect the D4, it put in some solid damage and even killed a kobold or two, but realistically the thing that the actual feat is about doesn't do anything.

(Actually, come to think of it, probably a lot of Guardian feats would go great on fighter...)

I think that this character would have gotten more defending done as a Champion. It would have done more damage as a fighter. Intercept Strike is, in fact, baseline good, it just has limitations that keep it from being a solid core to the class the way that the Champion Reactions are.

Taunt is a paradox, it doesn't fit into the standard martial action flow, and oh yes when the enemy succeeds against the taunt it bites. Crit Successes are whatever, the monster has won and is free, fair enough. On a normal success you still take the -2 to AC and saves for what? The monster to have a -1? It feels a bit like a robbery.

I'm not sure how I'd fix Guardian. I'm not sure what the original plan for its action economy was. If the idea was making Taunt a core part of Guardian's gameplay... this kit doesn't work with it. Taunt will need to be dialed up, and the Threat Technique will need to be completely overhauled into something more impactful.

Actually, let's talk about that, too! What's the design space of Threat Technique? It's so basic, such minor advantages. Is it supposed to be like Ranger's Edge? Because it isn't, it isn't near that impactful. If you added a Threat technique that allowed you to get a bonus level 1 Guardian Class Feat, it would be taken 100% of the time. If you added a Guardian Class Feat that gave you access to the other Threat Technique, it would not be taken.

ONE MORE THING: what is Guardian's hands supposed to do? Sword and Board? Then you have no hands for using the Athletics checks. Sword and hand? And have no shield? As the shield class? Board and hand? I GUESS?!

Real talk, the most optimal build for this is probably Flail/Shield or maybe Warhammer/shield plus Unkind Shove. Swords, Axes, and other options that don't do Athletics rolls are antisynergistic with Guardian. How about a feat to add Shove to Shields? Or let other weapons do other Athletics tricks in general? I guess Shield augmentations are, really, the secret ingredient here, but Guardian is already very equipment-dependent with heavy armor, shield, and martial weapons. Shield Augmentations aren't even in a mainline PF2 book; they're in Grand Bazaar.

Except for the fact that the ACTUAL optimal build for this is almost assuredly Longbow plus Ranged Taunt Maximum Lame Build. I did not make that one on purpose because the idea of playing that caused me emotional damage.

Why does the 'punch me in the face' class have 10 hp and subpar saves? If it was more focused on disruption stuff, like the notorious Hampering Sweeps, 10 hp and meh saves would by all means make sense. As is, guardian's actual core features, which want you to take more damage and make more saves than anyone else, are on a class chassis that doesn't excel at taking damage and actively dislikes making saves.

I had nothing to do last weekend so I booted up the beginner box in foundry and tried running some of the PCs I'll never get to play through it, mostly to get some practice in the system as I intend to run the Beginner Box for some friends soon.

All the same, I noticed certain things about the Commander which I think are worth noting.

The Party:
Level 1 Elf Commander. +3 Str and +3 Int (as it's a small party), with the banner attached to a shield most of the time.
Level 1 Aiurvian Ranger (Flurry). This ranger took the most damage, and the dice roller give her consistently bad results. I swear that she rolled more crit fails than she did hits. It was surreal.
Level 1 Human Wizard (Battle Magic, Staff Focus). This Wizard taught me important things about recalling knowledge and Focus Spells, but that's not what this is about.
Level 1 Dromaar Cleric (Cloistered, Erastil). He spent 90% of his healing on the Ranger, but Longbow Cleric is no joke; more than once he had a spare action that got turned into free damage with a good roll. Divine Lance also pulled some weight. He also punched out a Xulgath.

Now, running the whole thing by myself has one notable limitation; I cannot keep track of everything all the PCs can do on top of the monsters. Most notably, I constantly forgot that the Commander has shield block, and therefore my impression of the Commander's durability is probably skewed. That said, I don't really have strong feelings about the Commander's durability, so... I guess it doesn't matter.

What the commander wound up doing:
Oftentimes the commander wound up using Strike Hard on the Ranger, which allowed the Ranger to get a good attack in with her longsword (Ranger was dual-wielding a longsword and a handaxe). Barring that, the Commander made trip attempts with her flail, and used Form Up to position the casters. She also had Piranha Assault but that got used exactly once before being swapped for Form Up. Apart from that, I had a chuckle when I realized I could swap in Mountaineering Training to chump the climbing challenges... if I wanted to spend 20 minutes.

When the party got to level 2, Archetype feat slots appeared on the sheets because I forgot I had been testing Free Archetype. Why not? I gave the commander the Marshall archetype aaaand realized that Marshall's Aura is just a smaller version of the banner aura. That does not stack. That's a little disappointing.

Commander pros:

While meta commander will probably be ranged, good armor and martial weaponry means that it's a perfectly serviceable secondary Melee fighter.

The Commander's tactics are powerful and felt, more than once I saw a Commander Tactics play that made me feel very clever.

The Commander's ability to recall knowledge is notable and respectable, and useful in certain situations.

Mountaineering Training is great. Yeah, even if I didn't use it, having RP and exploration tactics is good and I hope more come in the full release.

Commander cons:

Choosing two of your four tactics to have active at a time feels bad. At first level, only having 2/4 feels very nomral for level 1 limitations, but when the casters got more spells at 2 and the commander got nothing it was a little sad. In addition, the fact that there's feats to have more tactics known without feats to allow you to prepare more doesn't feel great. This encourages the trend everyone has noted of Commander choosing their two/three favorite tactics and forgetting about the rest.

Plant Banner is garbage. At first level it gives you half your Int in temporary HP, which for a Int 3 Commander is ONE. I did briefly consider whether a +3/+# commander was a mistake-wait. Would a -1 to hit for +1 temporary HP per round only when I'm using this otherwise niche feat be worth it? No. No it would not. When the party did a rest I swapped the feat out for Combat Assessment. which never worked for me because of bad rolls but is solid on paper.

The commander's banner passive buff means so little. It's a +1 against fear. This came up once. Yes, at higher levels it's going to be more common, but all the same the main thing the banner did is provide a conduit for her tactics. You could take the banner out completely and have the tactics have a 30-foot range (/other suitable 30-foot limitation) and nothing would change.
(The one time a fear effect came up it targeted the Ranger, that +1 did not make a difference)

Commander really wants some of the Fighter feats. I assume they will come in the full release and were just out of scope of the playtest, but it really does.

Overall, I think that Commander is solid. Certain tactics and feats need some adjustment, but overall the core of the class is good with two notes:
1) The preparation limitation on Tactics feels bad. I appreciate the tricky balance there and the intended limitations with the ability to swap tactics in a refocus break, but the idea of having two tactics until I get to level 7 does not make me want to play Commander, especially when 90% of the time they will be the same two tactics.
2) The banner is pointless. It does not impact your hands, its buff is meh, there's never a situation to have it stowed, and while this didn't happen in my playtest if it would have been destroyed or stolen the fear effect from that would have been the insult to injury of the Commander's class features ceasing to work entirely.

Altogether, for all its foibles I had fun with this solo test, and I'm sorely tempted to throw together another party and run a Guardian through the Beginner Box, too.

So, I've been mapping out the proficiency progression for all the classes, and I noticed something that needs to be, in my opinion, directly discussed: Guardian's Saves are dissappointing.

Let's start with Ranger as a baseline:
Fortitude: Expert at 1, Master at 11
Reflex: Expert at 1, Master at 7, Legendary at 15
Will: Trained at 1, Expert at 3

This clearly gives Ranger a very strong Reflex save, and a distinct weakness in Will. Okay.

Guardian:
Fortitude: Expert at 1, Master at 9
Reflex: Trained at 1, Expert at 5
Will: Expert at 1, Master at 15

Wait a second, Guardian, the dedicated tanking class, has no Legendary saves at all? Not even at level 19?

It's best save (Fortitude) progresses slower than Ranger's (Reflex). It's middle save (Will) progresses slower than Ranger's (Fortitude). It's worst save, Reflex, progresses slower than Ranger's Will!

Of course, of course, Guardian has Guardian Mastery, which allows it to use its armor bonus to AC instead of Dex, which is good. Except that Guardian Mastery comes online at level 19, so you spend 90% of your progression on poor Reflex scaling and using Dex for your save.

Maybe that comparison is skewed, Let's compare instead to a frontline heavy armor class, Fighter. Guardian and Fighter have very close save profiles, he Good and Mid saves are the same. But, fighter's weak Save, Will, progresses at level 3 with its bonus vs fear immediately.

But Guardian actively wants to be targeted by the enemy, maybe even using Taunt to increase save difficulty. Fighter can take damage comfortably, but it isn't its first duty; it's a solid frontliner with excellent damage. This is not the save profile of something with saving throws as a strength!

I haven't had an opportunity to playtest Guardian, but this is in line with others' observations about guardian: Guardian has trouble with saves, especially reflex, double especially when taunting. If Guardian is supposed to be the tankingest class in Pathfinder 2... why doesn't it have at the very least fighter-level saves?

If I had to pick one single worst thing about this situation, it would have to be that Guardian Mastery's Reflex Save bonus is really cool and should definitely be in the class, but as a core part of the class. As a capstone it's little more than a crown. Move the armor modifier to Reflex down, I think it's reasonable at level 5, or 7, or 9; anything is better than it currently is. The success to crit success effect can go with it, come in later, stay at 19, or even fall off the face of the class entirely.

I would like to hear from people who have playtested Guardian: How bad is the save situation, really? Are the numbers lying? Is armor to Reflex Bonus really that powerful? Has anyone actually played a guardian at level 19?

Going over the feedback for Find Flaws and Esoteric Antithesis, it seems like the community agrees on a few core issues:

1. Recall Knowledge difficulty from rarity (and general integration, given the Additional Knowledge rule).
2. Action tax (generally one action and a roll for every new creature, occasionally two actions or more).
3. Having to re-roll Recall Knowledge against multiple identical creatures.
4. No effective upside against creatures that already have a weakness you can exploit.
5. Very little usage of Charisma, Thaumaturge's key ability score.

With that in mind, here's how I would change the Find Flaws and Esoteric Antithesis if a player of mine wanted to use the class in a serious, long-term campaign:

Find Flaws
[Thaumaturge]
One Action
Frequency Once per Round
Choose a creature you can see or are specifically researching in advance during exploration. Roll an Esoteric Check with a bonus of your Class DC-10 against the standard DC of the creature’s level.
Critical Success You learn all of the creature’s resistances, weaknesses, and immunities. You may apply Esoteric Antithesis to any creature of that kind you encounter until the next time you use Find Flaws.
Success You learn the creature’s highest weakness. You may apply Esoteric Antithesis to any creature of that kind you encounter until the next time you use Find Flaws.
Failure You may apply Esoteric Antithesis to any creature of that kind you encounter until the next time you use Find Flaws.
Critical Failure You become flat-footed until the next round.

Note: “All creatures of that kind” refers to all creatures that use the same statistics, such as all Goblin Warriors (but not Goblin Pyros, even if they are in the same family of monsters).

Feats and effects that refer to Find Flaws’ Recall Knowledge check should be altered to refer to its Esoteric check, and the Lantern Initiate Benefit should be altered so that it adds its status bonus to Find Flaws' Esoteric Check in addition to the current effects.

Esoteric Antithesis
[Thaumaturge] [Esoterica] [Magical]
Free Action
Frequency once per round
Requirement There is a creature that is currently affected by your find flaws in vision that is not currently affected by Esoteric Antithesis, and you have not made any attacks this round.
You Interact to apply specific esoterica to yourself and your weapons; you can perform this Interact action with the hand holding your implement. Your unarmed and weapon Strikes against the creature become magical if they weren’t already, and you cause them to apply one of the target creature’s weaknesses even if they don’t deal the correct type of damage. If the creature has a weakness with a value of 2 + half your level or higher that you know of, set the type of weakness to the creature’s highest weakness and you gain a status bonus to damage equal to the number of damage dice against that creature. Otherwise, you create a custom weakness with a value equal to 2 + half your level; this weakness applies only to your Strikes. In addition, you can use your charisma bonus on attack rolls instead of strength or dexterity against creatures affected by esoteric antithesis. This effect lasts until you use Find Flaws or Esoteric Antithesis again.

End Effect:
1. Recall Knolwedge is entirely separate from Find Flaws. This permits Find Flaws to avoid the rarity penalties, but also means it can't benefit from other bonuses to Recall Knowledge (such as the Scholarly Journal).
2. Action economy is much more forgiving. You can only have Esoteric Antithesis on one target at a time, but all targets that are identical instances of the same creature take no actions to swap between. Find Flaws is only ever one action, spent when you need to change between different kinds of creatures. However, you can't change Esoteric Antithesis between creatures mid-turn: once you make an attack, your current Esoteric Antithesis is locked in.
3. Basic increased damage against creatures you can already exploit the weakness of. It's not a lot, but it makes planning ahead with the proper preparations baseline fulfilling.
4. Charisma can now be used on attack rolls against your current Esoteric Antithesis target.

Possible Issues:
1. The bonus to the Esoteric roll is basically a hypothetical spell attack bonus, but the formula might be confusing at a glance.
2. Given that Thaumaturge's damage is pretty good when it works properly, removing the need to spend an action to change targets is possibly too strong. On the other hand, given Thaumaturge's general lackluster health and saves, it also might just be class balance.
3. Do elite/weak variants of creatures count as the same creature for Find Flaws? GM ruling, I guess.

This obviously doesn't fix all the issues, but I think it's closer to what was intended for Find Flaws and Esoteric Antithesis. It gives a reason for the two of them to be different actions, clarifies the use of using Find Flaws during exploration, and permits Thaumaturge to have good and reliable damage output to go along with its lacking durability.