Nettah's page

dirtypool wrote:

Captain Morgan wrote:

Unguided wrote:

Personally I'd rather have a 2E to 1E conversion. Grabbed the books on Humble because I'm poor and can't afford the bourgeoisie pricing the 2E books are going for.

I don't think there's a significant pricing difference between 2E and 1E books. At least, not that can't be attributed to being new releases or having larger books on average, plus 10 years of inflation. A hardcover for the PF1 CRB seems to still retail for $50, and that's a 10 year old book.

I think many people are forgetting just how much they utilized free resources to make PF1 work, and those resources are still going to exist for PF2. And PDFs will of course still be cheaper than physical books.

Came here to say exactly this. Yes the CRB is $10 more expensive than the PF1 CRB, but it's 10 years later and the book is a solid 70 pages longer with (I hope) a better binding than the first print run PF1 CRB

On reddit, they said it was 210 pages longer than the PF1 one. This book is going to be an ABSOLUTE UNIT.

Either Reddit is wrong or they have misunderstood. The CRB in PF2 is 70 pages longer than CRB in PF1. However the 210 pages might be a reference to the playtest rulebook. The CRB is 210 pages longer than that.

The bonus there isn't relevant for it to matter since the DC scales. Being 5-15% more likely to succeed or critically succeed is not really worth what you can potentially do with your hands.

Keeping with the current theme, +1 per hand per item quality seems fair. So a two-handed expert gives +2 compared to +1. And since Perform is so limited in use, it's not game-breaking to make it work that way.

That would make both relevant, but +6 just from quality (before going into the magic ones that would then provide +10 i guess) would likely be pretty game altering. Remember you can also use performance in place of other skills. Bards would be amazing at demoralizing with that kind of bonus.

EDIT: Just did the math. That could lead to a level 20 bard with +42 to demoralize when performing. He would scare pit fiends left and right :)

Given that the idea is that the Core class should be viable to play without the Archetypes(including Rogue and Monk regardless of what community says), I would think it actually does come out to be different.

One is suggesting "Maybe this will fit" while the other sounds like "You have to pick these feats to work".

I dunno. It sounds different to me. Having a player's guide say "sea singer (bard) is a suitable archetype this AP" sound different to "Picking up Pirate Dedication, Dirge of Doom, and X Muse are suitable Class feats for this AP"

But this is probably something that deserves it's own topic. We can take it to PMs if you want to continue discussing it.

Personally I also would want you to be able to build multiple archetypes within the class without resorting to picking other class dedications. And I think this will be more the case in the final version of the CRB and likely even more so when additional books start coming out.

So most of the views I have expressed about picking up druid dedication if you want to have magic abilities as a Ranger is limited to the playtest. I don't know, but I could imagine that it wasn't by accident that a class like the ranger didn't have the opportunity to pick up any magic in class, while a class like paladin could. It would (in my mind) be too big a change to add or remove this sort of thing in the middle of the playtest, so Paizo would need to have several different "class types" available in the playtest to get a better sense of the data.

The amount of people suggesting Fighter with druid dedication to be a "stronger" ranger is actually pretty shocking to me. Yes +1 to attack is good but is it really enough make a good "ranger". Currently I don't see fighters really having any support for high dexterity which I kinda see as a must-have for most rangers (wielding light armor to move faster, stealth better etc). A bad reflex save also makes the fighters much more prone to fail against most kinds of traps.

Maybe it's just me that view one of the core niches of the ranger to be the parties scout, which I honestly don't see the fighter/ druid fulfilling. So the argument for the fighter base vs ranger seems to come down to +1 to attack from proficiency.

Fighter/druid might be better fighting with 2 non-finesse weapons and wielding a heavy armor, but is that really a "ranger" at that point?

I feel like my primary complaint about TWF is that it never seems to give you a reason for the super-iconic swashbuckler style TWF. I really want Rapier and Main-Gauche to be a reasonable thing to do, and I'm sorry but it just isn't in the playtest. If I cared about damage I'd use something other than a Main-Gauche (probably a Shortsword), and if I cared about defense I'd just use a Shield and occasionally punch people with it. The ability to trade most of the Shield's defense (1 point of AC and the ability to shield block) for slightly more damage doesn't seem like a reasonable trade off at all. The only other thing a Main-Gauche gives you that the Rapier doesn't is versatile S, which doesn't seem terribly useful compared to picking up the ability to shield punch for bludgeoning damage.

I personally see swashbuckler more as a rapier combined with a free-hand but there are several TWF feats available to give you a better combination than you would get with a shield. And if you are going with rogue or ranger as a base instead of a fighter you wouldn't be able to wield a shield without a general feat.

The idea that everyone is a Gary Stu/Mary Sue unless they opt out is what confuses me.

I don't mean this as an attack, I'm just really puzzled as to how that makes the game better.

I think it's a matter of perspective. I don't see a character with +level to untrained to be good at everything (a Mary Sue type), I just see them being competent within reason at everything and good/great at some things. Especially now with the increased difference between the proficiency ranks, which would end up with +10 difference between untrained and legendary (if untrained stayed with 4 less than trained as it currently is).

In terms of "realism" the idea that a normal capable adventure would be stomped by any basic skill use while fighting monsters that could easily wipe out entire towns seems odd to me.

So that is why I think +level to untrained made for a better game.

The realization that for low-levels medium armor is the better tank option is what let me to the idea of a rogue tank (sure HP is worse than other melees) but a rogue in medium armor and using a shield has a very solid AC while still doing decent dmg thanks to sneak attack. And being one of the highest AC classes combined with Deny Advantage makes you less concerned of being surrounded than even a fighter or a paladin in those levels. And because of sneak attacks enemies might not just want to walk past you to hit the rest of the party.

Agreed. But some of the lower level items also are pretty good. My players had so much trouble grabbing two level 2 items and literally asked to instead grab some level 1 items xD

Just FYI expert items (except heavy armor) are also level 2 items, but they are found other places than the treasure table. I would imagine most players would want expert weapons, expert armor (or regular full plate) or expert tools for most characters, so I think there are plenty of options to choose from.

I'm pretty sure they don't get multiplied in the way you are talking about Urlord. Potency runes just adds a weapon damage dice (so no extra dice on the property runes).

I think Draco is referring to critical hits multiplying property rune damage, which they should do.

So the damage should be 3d10 S + 1d6 F + Str on a hit and 6d10 S + 2d6 F +2x Str + 1d10 persistent fire damage on a critical hit.

I'm not sure whether PF1 or PF2 is more restrictive on role-play. I don't really see either as too much of a burden on it. What I see is that both codify every situation your character can find themselves in with loads and loads of rules, which I'm not in favor of. Combat - sure. Social interaction? Practising a profession? Telling your party about a monster's weak points? Too much codification. Not needed. 5e does without a lot of it and flows beautifully. And really, 5e is the life goal here - of course you can do better, but learn from it and apply what good it has brought to D&D, i.e. a lot.

I'm not talking about premades, I'm talking about templates. Again, in 5e each class tells you what features to choose for a generic member of it, which spells, what gear. It speeds up chargen significantly, if one is so inclined.

I think that is a question of personal taste. I prefer pathfinders way of codifying almost every possible situation, because then there is always specific rules to fall back on that is balanced towards the overall game. Of course in the middle of a gameplay session I won't necessarily spend time reading up on all the specifics if I don't know them and no one at the tables does either, but in a break or after the session I can look it up and see how Paizo had planned for that interaction. But I don't see going towards 5e's way of doing that as a goal, rather the opposite. (Now what the majority wants might be different, I can only speak for myself).

I am not sure I get your point about the templates, how is it different from the iconics in pathfinder? (except that the templates doesn't have the same lore attached and might be a bit more optimized)

Bloodlines are abjectly terrible, and most sorcerer feats are best traded away for multiclass features.

In terms of the concept of the class the bloodlines makes them half-monsters, but I do think most players would like to see bloodlines being a more important part of the sorcerer and getting buffed. I am not sure I agree with the rest of your post, even taking the advanced bloodlines might be worth it just for the extra SP alone. And other than that there are some really cool feats.

What would be better about that system than having all untrained proficency remain the same as trained but at a -4, and then having a 6th proficency "incompetent" that could be applied to the specific kinds of things that people have a problem with characters gaining a level bonus to? (basically some non-essential skills). The advantage of the "incompetent" proficiency being that the entire system remains unified, except for the lowest possible exceptions, rather than flooring Untrained and having to make exceptions for everything that doesn't work without the +level bonus?

Count me in in favor of untrained being level -2 (4 less than trained is) and getting a new "rank" called incompetent that doesn't scale with level and starts out with -4 or so.

This also seems to be the better solution for peoples complaining that the system doesn't support their characters that can't swim, because if untrained is just +0, then they will be able to do some basic swimming without much of an issue, especially if they have above average str. (or at least I would think so, otherwise even trained characters might fail quite often at the first few levels).

I mean, how many bloodlines does the CRB really need? This is the type of thing that it's really easy to expand over time, which is what I expect they'll wind up doing.

As it stands there are 7 bloodlines, two options for every spell list except primal. So I think going for 8 in the CRB makes sense, and elemental seems like the logical choice for the primal list.

I think an elemental bloodline for an extra option of primal spells would make the most sense. But I would like to see some changes overall to make the sorcerer more unique.

Nettah wrote:

I think you are reading table 11-2 wrong if you think the example with 35 rings is unreasonable in terms of gold, as stated the 35 rings is off less value than the difference between a level 15th and 19th item.

Or to take your own example is the 7 rings not better than a single ring of swimming (giving you half your land speed (after amor) as swim speed. In terms of gold value the ring of swimming is the better item.

The question isn't, "Is 7 rings better than a ring of swimming?" or even "Are 35 rings comparable in price to the (purchase not sale) price of a 15th and 19th level item?"

The question is: Do you have an example of a mix of items you can afford that break the game simply because there is a lack of item limit?

You haven't provided any. I'm open to discussing it. I even put forward two examples with clear pricing and 11-2 comparable costing and estimations of what level you'd have to be to obtain them... and how they suck, not break the game with unfathomable power.

If there's a need for an item limit to prevent something abusible, I've yet to see a single example of it.

Well you did use wrong numbers for your examples in terms of when you had that amount of gold available (like I stated in my reply to that post).

And if it isn't the question whether 7 rings are better than a ring of swimming you aren't thinking the question through. Without any limitations on magical items you can use the only limit is gold therefore any items need to be compared solely on the single factor of gold. So any item that has a higher gold price than a combination of other item should generally be better otherwise it wouldn't be purchased.
If you do include a limit on the number of magical items a single character can wield at a time then this dynamic changes.

I (and hopefully others including Paizo) sees the issue with all my 3 examples and why a limit is needed for a better game. If you think all my 3 examples is equally valuable or that the ring of swimming is just as good as the combination of the other 7 rings from your example, then fine you don't need any limitations on magical items in your game.

Ok then you haven't proven that with a single example. An example would be within a gold piece amount that is reasonably attainable, and the effect would be that it breaks the game.

Or am I missing something? So far the only thing I've seen you (loosely) create an example for is three dozen rings of counterspell which are clearly a horrible option for a player who would have to be over level 20 anyway to possibly afford. I'm sorry, but that's not even close to being game breaking or reasonable.

You don't need an item limit to limit that. In your own example, gold limits it. Have anything else?

I can't argue with you when you continue to refuse any point I make with no in-game reason what so ever. I see all 3 examples of my earlier post as "game-breaking" to some extend, if you don't in anyway then we will never agree on this topic. I think you are reading table 11-2 wrong if you think the example with 35 rings is unreasonable in terms of gold, as stated the 35 rings is off less value than the difference between a level 15th and 19th item.

Or to take your own example is the 7 rings not better than a single ring of swimming (giving you half your land speed (after amor) as swim speed. In terms of gold value the ring of swimming is the better item.

The point of this thread is as the title says, questioning whether restrictions on magic items are relevant anymore. Gold takes care of it.

What exactly are you asking or arguing, Nettah? I'm happy to engage, but from what I have seen, you are proving the above point with each example or wandering on a tangent.

I am arguing that yes the limit is very much needed (as I have stated in multiple post).

The reason is that currently the balance of items is off, if you are going by gold alone. As I have shown in my examples, which I am not sure you agree or disagree with at all.

If you want to only go by gold it would be reasonable that items effect divided by it's cost should be close to a constant and I think there are issues with this.
Some of the issues are a likely increase of the weaker magic items cost (which reduce magic items and isn't the most fun) and either the economy breaking or the incentive to facing tougher enemies disappearing.

Those numbers you're throwing around prove the same point. Gold is a severe limiting factor by itself. Nothing you laid out shows that without another limiting factor, the items get out of hand.

I'm in the camp that says you don't need a level or resonance-based limit on how many items you can use at once. Open call for examples that show how that could be abused still stands. I've seen none.

So you think the 3 examples I posted are all equally valuable to a character?

If that is truly what you believe I don't think it would ever be possible to prove the opposite to you. I however don't equal a spellcaster getting 1 extra point of AC and +1 to their resistance to them being close to immune to the most common high-level spells as long as they had a couple of days of downtime to ensure their rings was filled with spells.

1) What's the confusion? I'm adding up the prices. If you interpret the required level from 11-2 differently, feel free to offer your own.

2) Where's your example? I gave two.

What are you adding up though? As I showed in my post a level 13 character has the starting wealth roughly equal to 8,000 gp not 1,600 as your example states.

My examples has been comparing items.
Like: Is 4x lesser ring of resistance stronger than one ring of resistance? That is 5 resistance to four elements instead of 10 resistance to a single one. (980 gp vs 975 gp)

Or what about having 5 resistance to one element and 10 resistance to the four others rather than having 15 resistance to a single one. (4,145 gp vs 4,400 gp)

Would 35 rings of counterspells and a +4 magical armor be better than a single +5 magical armor? (38,875 gp vs 40,000 gp)

And as other have mentioned this is only the playtest document, the more items you add the bigger a concern is it that a 1/day item or other items might break this math further.

Gorbacz wrote:

You think ...

FWIW, I think the following things:

1) PF1e is a big old mess. It's got lots and lots of cool stuff, but it's got almost as many problems. I'm not a huge defender of it in its current form, and I agree that something needs to be done.

2) However, I do not think that PF2e as it appears to be shaping up is the answer. For one thing, I don't think it will really fix the "system mastery" problem as that is a function of Paizo's business model of putting out lots and lots of supplemental material, and there's no evidence that this will change. In a few years, PF2e with its likely large additional number of splatbooks, etc. will require a "M.A. in system mastery," similar to the current PF1e.

3) Paizo has a window of opportunity here to produce a rationalized, reorganized, and reimplemented PF1e, which they can call PF2e for branding reasons. Such a PF1.5 reimplementation could then be followed with a more disciplined and methodical process/schedule of releasing supplemental material so that the problems we see in PF1e (and are likely to see in what looks likely as PF2e) will not reappear.

4) I think such an approach has the potential to appeal to fans of PF1e, folks who liked PF1e in the abstract but have been alienated by its increasing system mastery demands, and non-PF folks with an interest in RPG gaming who get a game based on 10 years of playtesting and problem identification.

5) Finally, I think PF2e as it currently stands could be shaping up as a perfect storm for Paizo. There are large number of folks such as myself who have been turned off by the playtest process and the game we saw there. Amongst the people who liked the playtest games, there appear to be a significant number who don't like what they read in the "Top 5 things to expect for the final edition. Paizo Stream 21/12/18." With neither of these groups on board, I don't see how such a PF2e is successful with RPG gamers not familiar with PF and with RPG neophytes.

Anyhows, this...

1) I agree that is bloated, but also that I wouldn't mind trying something new instead of just the same reskinned (that is pretty much what is achieved with house-rules)

2) I don't see where PF2 is close to the systematic issues that PF1 had that led to this issue. Limiting the number of bonuses that stack, reducing numerical bonuses from feats of all kind etc. seems to keep the game more balanced, and this is a trend that I don't see any indication would be a lot different in future splatbooks. More over it seems that the playtest aim much more towards options being pretty mechanically equal but different more in terms of flavor and playstyle.
So there are fewer "correct" builds and the difference between optimized characters and unoptimized seems smaller, thus requiring less system mastery.

3) Sure they have the opportunity to do that, but it does seem that Paizo is more interested in trying to actually make a new version than trying to "fix" PF1 and clean it up. I don't see how that would be more beneficial towards not getting bloating issues with supplements rather the other way around since if it's closer resembles PF1 it should be more backward compatible as well.

4) Depending on how the final game turns out it might alienate some of the PF1 fans that would rather have seen a game closer resembling that, but players that currently aren't playing PF1 seems more likely to play a newer different version of the system rather than one that is closely similar (but with some issues removed).

5) Maybe, but I don't think so. People would have to be more than a little stubborn to conclude they won't play PF2 because the rules in the playtest weren't to there liking, if the final version is a game they think is fun. Most of the players that had an issue with the hinted changes in the latest stream have only stated that they disagree with some of the changes (most just some of the changes to proficiency) but that they are overall still looking forward to the game. And there is likely a huge (larger than the number of people viewing the forums) customer segment that haven't really been paying attention to the playtest at all and might play the system if the final version is good. So could PF2 be a failure? Sure, but so could 1.5 or just sticking with 1e. In fact it seems reasonable to assume that PF2 has a bigger opportunity to be successful than the other approaches because that is the direction the company went for (and most companies wouldn't take a chance like that if it didn't seem financially sound).

Can I abuse magic items by having a ring on all ten fingers?

This one keeps getting brought up, how unlimited rings would automatically break the game. I'm going to try it right now with a mindset of being reasonable, not having unlimited resources.

Ten Cheap Rings - 1600gp - Level:13-14

• 245 - Ring of energy resistance, lesser: acid (res: 5)
  
• 245 - Ring of energy resistance, lesser: cold (res: 5)
  
• 245 - Ring of energy resistance, lesser: electricity (res: 5)
  
• 245 - Ring of energy resistance, lesser: fire (res: 5)
  
• 245 - Ring of energy resistance, lesser: sonic (res: 5)
  
• 160 - Ring of the ram, standard (2d6 per action, 1/minute)
  
• 215 - Ring of lies, standard (+2 deception, L1 ventriloquism)
  
• Nothing cheap left.
  
• Nothing cheap left.
  
• Nothing cheap left.
  

Mind blowing! Just to get 7 rings and nothing else, you need the average wealth of a level 13-14 character. Someone tell me how this needs an additional limit of #magic items per character via some resonance-like mechanic. Now let's try to break the system with 10 rings:

Ten Uber Rings - 27650gp - Level:L20+

• 4400 - Ring of energy resistance, greater: acid (res: 15)
  
• 4400 - Ring of energy resistance, greater: cold (res: 15)
  
• 4400 - Ring of energy resistance, greater: electricity (res: 15)
  
• 4400 - Ring of energy resistance, greater: fire (res: 15)
  
• 4400 - Ring of energy resistance, greater: sonic (res: 15)
  
• 1950 - Ring of the ram, greater(3d6 per action, 1/minute)
  
• 925 - Ring of counterspells (attempt to dispel 1 specific spell)
  
• 925 - Ring of counterspells (attempt to dispel 1 specific spell)
  
• 925 - Ring of counterspells (attempt to dispel 1 specific spell)
  
• 925 - Ring of counterspells (attempt to dispel 1 specific spell)
  

I'm not sure you can afford this even at level 20 given the 11-2 player wealth table. This assumes you have no magic weapon, no magic armor, no wand, no staff, no nothing....

I can't even. You are directly taking wrong information and presenting it as fact. Like how do you ever get 1600 gold worth of stuff from 1 level 12th, 2 level 11th, 1 level 10th, 2 level 9th and 1000gp which is the lowest of the two levels you emulate. (Spoilers this is closer to 8000 gp worth)

I have time and time again compared items and I would say shown that the value from an item divided by it's cost is nowhere near a constant. If that is not the case what would ever be the argument for spending more on higher level items instead of using that gold value to get 2-3 times the effect for the same price?

I don't intend to be rude but at this point I am unsure how you can keep not answering any of the questions anyone else puts forward, yet still keep saying that you are very open to see someone show why a limit is needed. It's beyond me honestly.

A 700,000 sp item or 700,000 sp's of items is nonsense. It makes as much sense as a horse sized duck or 1000 duck-sized horses duking it out.

I expect a GM to challenge her players and reward them in a manner befitting everyone's expectations of fun. I don't currently have a plan to use resonance or item limits in my homebrew PF2 world. Open invitation to people who have a real example demonstrating some need for a limit system beyond resources.

Nonsense doesn't count. Investing an obscene amount of money in blocking every spell... as I mentioned, it won't block an axe. That's how that player would get challenged... but I wouldn't advise them to go that far anyway. It would be absurd.

"37 items confuses me." Don't keep 37 items then. Keep what you have a plan to manage and use effectively. That's on you, not the system to tell you not to be ridiculous.

My players have bigger goals than "upgrade my gear with every penny I have!" They want to world-influence and invest in kingdoms. Magic items are not their #1 focus like many people in the PF1 PFS world heavily distorted.

What are you trying to accomplish with this post? In your original post you asked the question whether or not we thought that a limitation needs to exist besides the item cost. Now I have in several post raised the problems with not having limitations, and your respond is either that is not realistic (why you never mention) or that your table doesn't play according to the rules and you limit the amount of items players get by what you give them and what they are allowed to buy.

I don't necessarily power game myself, but in any world where magic isn't limited I would expect intelligent foes to do so to a reasonable extend. That would include a necklace of rings of counterspell or just your hands filled to the brim with them, maybe not 73 but spending 30k gold to be immune to several castings of the most common spells would more than be worth it for any intelligent villain.

And your argument that my 700,000 SP item or 700,000 sp's worth of items is nonsense, why is that? A pc at level 20 is likely going to be have the option of making this choice, so it's a very real question. Even the rings of resistance argument you chose to skip because it didn't fit your argument that loads of items is just ridiculous and that Paizo shouldn't be concerned with making balanced rules because your table plays by house-rules that make the rules borderline obsolete.

Ah yes, I do have a limit - sensibility. It's one paizo has as well. They reference it as wealth per level. This varies by table, but they have the concept. Why use a limit on top of that?

Why use four lesser rings instead of a standard? Because they don't stack. I've yet to see one example of how magic items need to be limited beyond the wealth concept.

As stated because currently they have balanced items around resonance along with gold cost. And balanced item with body slots in PF1.

I know they don't stack for the same element, but nothing is stopping you from getting a lesser ring of fire, cold, acid and electricity. So having resistance 5 to four elements is arguably better than resistance 10 in a single one.

And I have no idea how your limits regarding what PCs can buy actually is, so whether or not it's sensible is hard for me to say. But if your campaign is in Golarion I would expect for the players to quite easily being able to abuse low-cost magic items and buy a bunch the second they hit a large city. I am not saying they are doing this or that you would expect most groups to try and break the game, just that a limit on magic gear seems quite reasonable and prevent this for all tables and not just tables that have kinda house-ruled in a sort of limitation of their own (like yours).

It's hard to argue that the rules can't be bend towards a certain power gaming style if you don't allow this style at your table, but you have not answered whether you think a 70.000 item is equal in strength to 73 rings of counterspell and that sort of shenanigans.

I don't see any problems with it. Why would I introduce a limit? I'm not giving my players that many magic items each. I'm not giving them time or resources to craft or buy that many. I don't have anyone trying to play ridiculously. If you introduce a mechanic or support it, you should have a reason. The burden isn't on me questioning its purpose. The burden is on substantiating it.

Well you do introduce a limit if you limit the amount of items they can buy, this however is just a different limit than the one Paizo included in their ruleset. But in your version there is hardly any incentive to sell magic items, so after a certain amounts of levels it would be likely that your characters would run around with tons of different items.

Nettah wrote:

The DM of wrote:

Can you give an example of an item that would cause this problem?

Well it's hard to know exactly what could become a problem, since items haven't been changed to account for no resonance, so how there effect looks now is unknown. But in general all items that let's you use them a number of time per days are balanced towards this being a limited resource (currently with resonance), removing this limitation might make it too strong compared to consumables.

Ring of counterspell is one of the few I can see with potential to break the game. For 925 gp + the cost of a spell you get a "free" counterspell only requiring a reaction. If there is nothing preventing you from using 50 of those (except gold) you can really amass insane spell defense without the highest cost.

You came up with one example that would require 50,000 gold pieces. That's a massive limiting factor. It would give you great temporary spell defense but no defense versus for example a +3 great axe. That's not a realistic example to call for a limit on magic items worn at once.

That's what I'm asking for. How could it be abused? Costing 50k in gold is not abusible in a normal campaign.

Then how many does it take to be abusable? There are items costing upwards of 70.000 gold, does that stack up with 73 rings of counterspell? Would you ever go for a standard ring of energy resistance over 4 lesser ring of energy resistance (unless you had directly planned to go to that elemental plane)?

The issue is that currently magic items are balanced towards a limitation, removing this limitation hurts the balance. So how do you rebalance them? A certain value/gold would have to be followed for all items, otherwise a lot of items would never be used. However this would either make lesser magic items much more expensive (not fun) or let more powerful items become cheaper (thus available to characters of far lower level, which could hurt game balance). This could again be "fixed" by not letting you characters gain gold at an exponential rate, but what is the monetary incentive to fight tougher enemies then?

So my argument in short is: Yes limits on magic items are needed to balance the game. And limiting the amount of permanent magic items a character have access to is the best way to do this rather than using only gold as a limitation.

Now you might not agree with this, and for most tables it might not actually matter at all, but I think the same could be set about pretty much every effort to make the game more balanced.

Gold cost has always been the most effective way of limiting the power of magical items. Body slot designations are also a great way to do it. There was never a reason to reinvent the wheel with PF2.

Personally I just like the simplicity of 10 items you can be invested in rather than using body slots, but for a lot of tables it might boil down to one and the same.

I do however think a limit is needed to not let any item simply be valued as benefit/gold alone, but rather come with an opportunity cost as well. Otherwise stacking tons of low-cost high value items would always be used. Like getting 5 different rings of lesser resistance before upgrading one to a standard version.

Tridus wrote:

As for if some limit should exist? I think so. Having someone wearing 37 small items for various activate or other effects would slow down play dramatically and likely become optimal if its doable.

Aside from haste, you don't get more than 3 actions per round. I don't see how it could slow down play. Do you have an example?

More choice, more items to look up for the effect etc. However I don't see the extra time as the primary concern, but rather 1/day items that you own multiple copies of.

So some limit, say 10, seems to benefit the game by making you make choices regarding equipment. For some tables this might be too limited, but it also seems like the number could be house-ruled to something else without breaking the game.

Gut reaction,

A lot of the loudest most toxic people here seem to have gotten what they want and now a great system is just PF1.5 with all of the problems it had before.

Reaction after some caffeine and examination,
The Proficiency change can be dealt with, still sucks.
Reducing the DC table is meh, resonance was an ok idea that didn’t jive with everyone so not surprised, and they didn’t kill +level to proficiency. It’s still PF2, but I’ll need to work on it.
Also flavor, I like flavor.

I think it's a bit unfair to assume that the changes are only due to the loud unhappy posters and not in any way to survey data.

Without seeing the rules I think I could also assume with 95% assurance that house-rulling untrained to be -2 + level won't break anything in the game (and personally I would rather deal with the oddness of good performances coming from the untrained barbarian or a monster, than make a number of skill completely unusable for certain players). So if the untrained is not done satisfactorily I will likely just house-rule it back to the playtest way.

I think simplifying the DC table is a sound move and then either make easy or harder task adjust the DC by a set amount or by a certain level range.
I do hope that they hold back with increasing spells power, so it doesn't break the martial/caster balance but if the blast spells are any indications it should be fine I think.
I did think resonance was an okay system, and that focus for items showed great promise, but alas not everything can be the way I prefer it.

Would you achieve this by making up new types of bonuses, because if so I don't see how this makes the game any less complicated. Overall I think conditions should always be applied to the person suffering them and not the other way around (thus getting penalties rather than given others boost, even if the math works out the same), but I can see how flat-footed from flanking does seem to be a bit of a different scenario.

But to change flanking to become a +2 flanking bonus and having flat-footed be unrelated to flanking doesn't seem to be a perfect solution either.
Overall I think they should stick with the current system.

This is properly the first announced change I'm not really on board with, I really am going to miss +level to untrained skills. Now of course it's hard to know how they will be changing the amount of skills you get over your adventuring career, but I do feel like big changes are needed for that to balance this new proficiency system.
Depending on how well that is executed I do feel like a house-rule to change untrained proficiency to -2 but getting +level is going to make the game more enjoyable for me. I have previously stated that it was quite easy to house-rule +level to untrained away, so I can't complain that now I am the one forced to use house-rules if I want the system to behave how I like it.
Most classes seems to only be able to perform the skills they start with for the rest of their days now unless some serious changes are coming, because I really can't imagine it being worthwhile to use skill increase to get more trained skills now that the numbers have increased.

I do like that proficiency levels matters more now and hope the math doesn't feel broken because of it, previously I had wanted legendary to scale to +5, so it being 6 points better than trained is pretty close to that. Lately I had gone away from wishing for a numerical bonus and rather for the "bonus" to come free skill feats and unique uses gated by proficiency, but I think I'm fine with it. I do wonder how they are going to adjust weapon and armor proficiencies for the different classes, I liked that the fighter was more accurate than the others but having a +2 over them seems like it's too much, so the best solution is likely to keep all martial on the same proficiency level over their adventuring career. So it seems a bit funny to me that most opponents to the previous proficiency system complained that it made character feel to similar, while this change might actually make this even more the case than it was previously.

The changes to the DC table seems good. I assume having task being "easy" or "impossible" will now be done by adjusting the level, this seems like a nice change to keep the game simple.

I'm sad that they couldn't get resonance or focus to work in a satisfying way, resonance might have been a broken system but focus (just for items, not as a replacement for Spell Points) seemed like it had some very good potential to me.

More options is something we knew were coming, but I am obviously in favor of this. Better spellcasting also seems good (but hopefully not by too much).

Well it's 2 out of 6 cantrips (8 if you count chill touch and tanglefoot), so it's a pretty big percentage of the cantrips. I'm sure with splat books there will come more cantrips so maybe damage ones that doesn't require attacks. In general when you are throwing something or using a ray it does seem like it should be a ranged touch attack to me.

However I do think tanglefoot should be a reflex save instead, but it's not that important to me one way or the other.

Personally I would like to see the focus being on making domains and their powers more attractive and increasing the potential of the divine spell list a bit. Removing some of the free channels was a must I think, because that single class feature was a better or at least equal healer to all other classes. I do like healing being useful in combat now, but a single class feature shouldn't allow that kind of healing ever, healing can be fun but if all combats required you to go through several hundred extra hp from a near limitless source of healing it would simply start to drag combat out.

Personally I don't see clerics being in that bad of a spot, but I can understand the sentiment that every spell prepared that isn't a heal have a hard time stacking up, and it obviously shouldn't be like that.

It's hard to remove the CHA tax on clerics though, because a bonus spell of the highest level is an incredible strong value for a stat, so maybe that could be changed in some way. For instance clerics getting 1+half cha mod of channel energy instead, and then give them another 1 or 2 extra channels based on level to make up for it.

Well technically the character could get a lot more xp than the rest of the group, so he would catch up, since all the monsters would be a higher relative level to him than they are to the rest. So if the monster is level 5 it would contribute 30 xp to the budget (for a 6th level party) but the level 1 guy would get 160 xp from the monster instead. You could also say the party of 3 level 6th and 1 1st would count as a level 5 party in terms of encounter building, and then the level 5 monster would count for 40xp in the build, reward the 1st level with 160xp and the rest of the group with just 30xp each. (There are no rules for this, but it would be quite easy to simply do the math. Whether it's fair or need some balancing is up to the GM, I really don't like level difference in a party so I wouldn't use it)

However be careful with this; falling several levels behind will make that character quite useless, so I really don't think there should be any official rules in any core book for this. If the GM is capable of handling a party of quite different levels he should be able to house-rule an xp system that makes sense.

I ran a game once (8? 10 years ago?) with a Necromancer that made it to Neutral Lich, and the party was successful for several reasons, most importantly: everyone worked together to have fun.

As your entire post shown, special character concepts can be a lot of fun, but it did require some work from the other players and you as a GM to get there. And that is of course how it should be, and in a home-brew setting it can easily be ruled that raising the dead isn't one of the most vile acts, thus letting more good/neutral characters that isn't strictly opposed to the undead can work together with a necromancer for extended periods of time.

I think your post show exactly why the OP's wishes aren't feasible (especially in core), since he have earlier stated that he don't want the concept being dependent on house rules or home-brew and it seems he prefers to work against his fellow characters (in secret) and not with them.

I like the new multiclass system, and overall I don't see the point of multiclassing at first level.

But it might simply be the we have a different understanding of first level, but the character concepts you mention doesn't seem to follow my understanding of what a first level character should reasonably be able to do. I seem them as a character that have graduated from the NPC life, but only recently. He hasn't seen a lot of combat or other things yet (otherwise he would be above first level).

I would like (in the future) to see a class that is more a mix of caster and martial from the get-go, and who won't see 10 levels of spells, because I think that is a reasonable concept missing. And if your group was interested in more advanced concepts starting from first level I would either consider starting a bit above that anyway, or talk to the GM about letting players have access to a multi-class dedication for free or something similar. Optional choosing of class features etc. could also be a thing, but I would save this for an advanced players guide, and maybe then wizards could swap some feature for an extra general feat or similar.

But as of right now I don't see the need for a 100% elf wizard to generally know how to use heavy armor effectively, it would seem more reasonable for that character to need multiclassing, and ending with medium armor seems perfectly fine which could be done in a lot of different concepts at level 3. (heavy armor is kinda bad right now though, so maybe that changes). And for the record I don't think most characters even of the fighter/ paladin variety will actually get their hands on heavy armor until level 2 or maybe even midway to 3.

Ranger: make crossbows better!

What did you have in mind? Personally I think crossbows are in a decent spot for the ranger now thanks to Crossbow Ace and the updated Hunt Target regarding range and allowing precision damage instead of improved MAP.

Maybe let Crossbow Ace do full wisdom mod to damage instead?

Well I think there might be some kind of misunderstanding.

First of all, you are right it doesn't make any sense for the forest etc to scale with your level unless enchanted or something else (which is why its not supposed to in the rules) but it does in the specific playtest adventure to gather data about how easy you succeed etc.

Secondly you are not lost or anything if you fail the check, you just don't search the hex faster. So if you don't succeed it takes two days and if you succeed you do it in only 1.

This is mostly just about being lucky but two turns in a row my paladin used retributive strike to crit and kill some greater shadows preventing some nasty hits on my teammates.

Also alchemist overall felt quite powerful in the pale mountain scenario, especially against the mummies where I could hit several with splash and activate their weakness.

Yea especially at that level fire elemental seems quite a bit above the rest (just make sure the explosion doesn't hurt your group more than the enemies). The fact that your summons can't get their reactions makes the air worse (and earth later on). Btw do we know how the water elemental out of water will work with the summoning trait. It's slowed 1 and can't take reactions normally. Would that do nothing or reduce it to a single action every time you concentrate?

A fighter putting their high stat in Strength is considered optimization now? We have very different definitions of that word if following the basic ability score advice of every D&D-alike ever constitutes optimization. That character spent two out of 13 feats, and 34k out of an expected 108k money. And I showed that even without spending the money he's better than a PF2e fighter at hitting equal-level foes.

I would have thought it was a straw man argument, but it seems some people literally want to make the least effective build choices possible, along the lines of an Int 8 wizard, and somehow have that still make a character comparable to someone actually designed to be good at their job. That's...not what I want in a system. I want to choose to be actually good or actually bad at things. I don't want to make a character who is "bad" at something only to have the system prop me back up to a 40% success rate. I also don't want to be "good" at something with only a 60% success rate.

As to why to still keep the d20? Because you can't be great at everything. Your best stuff should basically eliminate the need to roll - but you'll be average at some stuff, and bad at some stuff, and for those things the roll is still valuable.

I agree that isn't even close to be an optimized fighter. But I don't think you can compare the to hit of a fighter in pathfinder 1 to pathfinder 2. The core of the math has been radically changed. You may disagree with what you think is a suitable to-hit and what pathfinder 2 is doing. Personally I like that armor is also valid and that both scale accordingly, at best I might give some monster -1 in AC, but overall I think with the new crit system and various buff/ debuffs in combat you will actually hit quite often.

I don't really see you ever been good at something and being at 60% while bad is 40%, more likely 70% and 30% (once you are a hitting the midlevels).

Wait, will there be no more update? Does that mean there will be no major redesign from now on? I'm really depressed, because I anticipated we would be able to see the sorcerer class update(so that it can become more different from the wizard class), increased spell slots, and the most importantly, the complete redesign of monsters(or at least giving the ability scores back to the monsters). Will there be no such update and the final version will be largely the same as the 1.6 version?

As mentioned before the playtest is pretty much over, so there will be no updates (at least not planned) before the final release, however a lot of things are bound to change for the final version.

What complete redesign of monsters? They have said that the monster math was off, so that will obviously be fixed, but other than that I don't see any need to redesign monsters? And monsters aren't missing ability scores? (They just only post the modifier instead of the number, but I don't see that being an issue).

Do you have 14 or higher strength? If you do some kind of propulsive weapon is likely better, but otherwise I would just go with the crossbow. But between spell points, cantrips and spells I think it would very rarely see use, since it won't be magical and you don't get any bonuses to wielding it. (If you have the proficiency to use a shortbow, then go for that).

Now I don't know which domain you have taken but if you need ranged fire power rather than just being the healer, firy ray (from the fire domain) can be a decent ranged option instead of a weapon for some fights. 2d6+wis vs touch attack is quite a lot better than any shortbow or crossbow.
If you want to go all out you could even get expanded domain and advanced domain for either 7 or 8 spell points and some extra powers.

But I for one is not sure that spending actions firing a subpar ranged weapon would even be worth the action (and the resources in terms of higher dex, bulk and gold spend on the weapon), instead of using movement, demoralize, take cover etc. You already have 6 spell slots and at least some spell points. And if you pick spells with concentration it should be able to last you through longer fights (like spiritual weapon, 1d8+wis is again far better than any ranged weapon).

You could pick up Ray of Frost and Electric Arc. The latter will deal up to 2d6+2xWis damage (albeit split against two targets) making it the most damaging cantrip and it's often better to deal guaranteed damage - even if it's only half due to a successful save - than risking to deal no damage at all with a ranged attack.

Well that damage wouldn't be for another level, so at best it would be 2d6 (split between two targets).

I view bards as one of the most versatile classes, so it really depends on what the goal with the character is. That said here are some of my overall thoughts.

1) It really depends on the direction you are going but like most other classes dex, wis and con is always good (I would say in that order). If you are going for Bardic Lore and a skill monkey aspect I would also value intelligence to buff the lore skill. If you are a swashbuckling type strength is obviously important to increase damage.

2) I think all but Dwarf is actually pretty decent for Bards. Elf isn't that good either unless you value intelligence. Darkvision is always good to have, but I think Bards can go without it easier than a lot of others. Humans are always a good choice but overall I think your friend can go with the race he prefers without it being a big deal powerlevel wise.

3) The difference between the muses aren't big (you can always get the level 1 feat of another muse; so the spell might be a deciding factor. I think bard can do well with summoning monster and true strike is also pretty strong. Soothe is a worse heal, but if the group could use the extra healing the option is always good to have.

4) Well you get your first level feat from the muse, the second level feat is likely just expanding on what you picked earlier or getting a second first level feat if that is more interesting for your build. I think I like triple time the best of the 3 possible choices, but I would seriously consider picking another first level feat or a second level feat if you already have 2 first level. Of course there is also the option of going with class dedication on level 2 and 4 (I think bards can do a lot of good things with class dedication feats, but the options are simply to broad to mention here).

5) I like Performance as well, especially if you have Versatile Performer. Demoralize is likely one of your go to actions most turns so having a high modifier in that is very good. I would still get trained in intimidation, diplomacy and deception even if you do go for Versatile Performer, but it lets you focus on increasing Performance instead of all of the skills.
Stealth, Thievery and several knowledge skills is always a good choice. Bards gets more skills than most, so the bard can help cover some of the areas the party might otherwise be weak in skill wise.

I know most of what I have stated isn't very specific. If you (or your friend) can tell us more about what you are trying to do with the bard (and maybe what the rest of the party looks like) it would be easier to come up with more precise recommendations, because the bard can easily be build several different ways all of them being strong in their specific area.

There is nothing stopping you from doing it. However since casting summon monster is 3 actions to cast, I think you can only ever have 2 summoned monsters active by the use of quickened casting (which in turn requires the spell be 2 levels below your highest spell slot).

So I hardly see this being a thing in actual gameplay, but it is theoretically possible. Unless I missed a rule somewhere.

Which weapon traits stack?

No, the question of this thread, not "the only real question," is whether the damage gap between weapons gets too big when extra dice are applied when weapons are magical. Or should magic weapon dice be normalized to some extent?

Paizo Forums pro life tip: Read the original post and thread title before posting. If you just want to shoot the sheet, post your own thread.

Scale not stack (that's a typo on my part), but backstabber, charge, forceful, twin and to some degree fatal all scale with weapons getting more dice.

I have read the tread, and as I said the only thing to discuss (at least in my opinion) is how big the gap needs to be between the weapons. I didn't say that was limited to them being non-magical. So yes it could be argued that the gap past a certain point of potency runes is too big thus limiting any "real choice" in terms of weapon selection. I don't think so, but if the issue is that say +9 combined damage would be too big a detriment for a lot of weapons to see play something would likely needed to be done. I do feel strongly that equal + from potency runes is a non-starter as I mentioned since quickly every two-handed weapon will be "worse" than every one-handed weapon and agile will be king.

Apparently spending a few weeks fighting monsters makes you better at stuff you've never tried before than people who have spent their entire lives studying that same stuff, but with no monster killing. A new wizard who has spent his entire life to this point absorbing as much arcane knowledge as exists has probably a +5 Arcana, which means a barbarian who has spent his entire adult life at war and has never even really had the inclination to crack a book without pictures in it has somehow, through osmosis, by 6th level, absorbed more arcane lore. The barbarian apparently learned all this while slaughtering orc lairs and so forth. And sure, we can justify this for individual cases - but this is true for every skill, that it's not just possible to go from novice to really good in weeks, but absolutely required in every skill's untrained uses. The wizard by 6th level has somehow picked up more about repairing weapons than a youth who's been a blacksmith's apprentice for years. And the wizard has no choice in the matter. And yes, the trained people have a greater breadth of what they can do with their skill, but you shouldn't get better at even the untrained stuff than a lower level character with justified expertise.

In PF1e you could become an instant expert in skills without justification. In PF2e you must. Combine this with scaling DCs and you have a situation where characters aren't allowed to be either good or bad at anything - you must always trounce lower level tasks while struggling against equal/higher level ones, no matter what your concept says you should be good at. Welcome to mediocrity for everyone.

Never mind the fact that since Recall Knowledge is untrained, any random tavern with 20 people in it knows pretty much everything that it is possible to know. Somebody in there will roll a 20 and autosucceed.

Well that is the issue with level overall. You spend several years studying magic or training your fighting skill to reach level 1 capabilities and depending on how quickly you level you could be way behind years of training in a few weeks. This isn't a flaw specific to +1/level but rather to a system with levels overall (at least if levels aren't limited to once a month or year etc).

The barbarian unless trained in arcana (and if so why should he be punished) is -4 compared to wizard (before int modifiers or items) and all he can do is recall various knowledge on subjects, he can't learn/identify spells, read magic text etc. So the biggest flaw is the amount he has become better (in all areas, fighting included) in a short time. I still wouldn't trust the barbarian to know obscure and strong monsters weaknesses with certitude, but low level enemies sure.

But to me it seems that what you are actually saying doesn't make sense is levels rather than the proficiency bonus. Finally in my view, a lot of the mechanical aspects doesn't have to make a lot of sense, a lot of it doesn't (how could you ever justify hp), and in a "realistic" world levels would never be a thing. But Pathfinder is a system that uses levels, so you have to view anything according to that framework; and if you by fighting monsters for a few weeks magical get years worth of training in combat, spellcasting etc I don't see why you wouldn't also get better at various other tasks.
If the campaigns lasted longer with more downtime thinks would start to make more sense, but that is not always a fun way to play the game.

And maybe you don't view a difference in skills modifiers of 8-10 to be a big deal, but that is close to the difference between succeeding and critical succeeding or failing and critical failing and could often be the difference in actual gameplay between two characters. I don't like that in PF1 the difference between skills at first level could easily be 10-15 and by the later levels 40+. Of course there are certain things only the trained/expert or better should only be able to do successfully and that is why there is proficiency gates.

So here's the issue with your math: In the entire game there are only 8 items that give a bonus to Performance checks, counting the various forms of items with multiple levels. Of those 8, only 1 of them (a level 18 item, not a small cost even by level 20 standards given you should only have 2 at that level) gives a +5 bonus, half of them require 2 hands to use (including the one +5 bonus item) so Gods help you if you want to do something crazy like wield a weapon or staff or something, and the half that don't require 2 hands to use only apply to specific checks (two of which even if we argued that Lingering Composition used a Performance-based perform check for it, which can easily see table variation, wouldn't count anyways given that Lingering Performance is a Verbal component (aka Auditory Performance as per the rules of Bardic Performances) and the items only give bonuses to Dance (aka a Visual Performance).)

Well if the bard wants to be the absolutely best at performing he would have to use his hands to wield his instrument for +5. Otherwise a persona mask (item level 15) still gives a +4 bonus, which should also be enough to ensure that he almost always succeeds. Likely being +36 on a DC39.

I do however not favor the scaling skill DC of lingering composition and threat wounds (I'm unsure how to best handle this skill). And I think lingering composition might instead simply be a flat check on dc 11 or 10 that you can reduce with certain class feats or features. But it's not gamebreakinig to me either, so if it stays the same way it's also completely okay with me.

I find peoples hatred of 10-2 so weird, and while I do agree the world shouldn't automatically scale with you, so does Paizo. It's clearly stated in the rules that the world doesn't arbitrarily scale, so all 10-2 really is, is a helpful tool. I do however want Paizo to make a more larger list of what level certain challenges would normally be, and I think they plan to do so in the final version.
(And yes there is the fear that adventuring designers will automatically scale the world to party level, but let's not assume that is the case before it actually happens; in DD they specifically did this to test the success rate of skills rather than follow their own rules)

You all do realize that "you can voluntarily lower your own stats for no tradeoff" is basically a non-starter, right? First, this is a team game, so choosing to make yourself weaker to no benefit is disrespectful to the other players that need you to be up to par. It also means this option likely won't be available in PFS, for that very reason. A 10 in an ability score is not a "flaw," it's average.

The solution should be to make all ability penalties meaningful, so it's a tough choice to take them, rather than to eliminate having them all together. It's the same design attitude that drove me away from other editions - "Fixing this option is hard, so we'll just get rid of it." I don't like PCs with three 7s either, but I should be able to make a character who is actually clumsy or foolish and get some tradeoff for it. I should also pay, in game, for that clumsiness or foolishness.

Well the same argument could be made for not using dump-stats to min-max your character in PF1. "You aren't pulling your weight and you shouldn't be allowed to play a non-optimized character!" That is crazy talk to me. Secondly based on this system in no way is 10 an average stat. The few npc's listed has a total modifier bonus of +7 (at level 0); +9 (at level 3) +13 (at level 5). So the average stat is 12+ for low levels and 14+ for fifth levels and further increasing.

I don't get the point that if your character is flawed in some way he automatically gets a bonus for it, having a disability doesn't automatically make you better at other things. Choosing to not focus on something to spend time/ resources focusing on other stuff does. Sure a blind person is better at navigating the world without sight, but that is purely through hard work and how the brain functions focusing on other stimuli, a person with muscle atrophy isn't somehow smarter or wiser than everyone without it.

It's okay if the game aren't for you, not everything can be for everyone. But the argument that +1/level or that lack of getting bonuses from flaws should be the reason for it seems weird to me. I see that earlier you also mentioned monsters getting comparably weaker as you leveled for on-level challenges, this again doesn't make any sense to me, either the foe you are facing is at an equal in terms of power to you or not, the fact that PF2 seems to have figured out a way for this to be true makes me happy. If you want to keep the feeling of out-scaling the opponent simply face lower-level threats.

I think there is room for a more dexterity focused fighter (which will likely be there either in the final version or advanced players guide) I think it’s better for the game if that is designed around mobility, equal masteries in lighter armor or special attacks than by doing +dex to damage.

And the math that OP has linked seems flawed to me for several reasons, among those are that the rapier scales better with higher crit chance, the comparison is between two numbers that is lower than they would realistically be when you add class feats, property runes and more and finally that the two-handed weapons are curve blade and greatsword instead of a falchion (the forceful trait is a big deal).

So the percentage between damage is pretty much worst case scenarios and in a realistic environment the difference would be smaller. So unless the objective is for the two builds to be equal in damage what would a fair drop off of damage be. 5% 10% 15% or something else?

My latest wizard has a 12 int and will not increase it. So Int is not even required for all wizards.

That does limit the Wizard quite a bit, though which is fair tradeoff (low class DC, spell dc, bad for certain skills). I'm assuming it's some sort of warrior wizard you are building then.

But int should do some more to be a more useful stat overall for all the classes.