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The orders are the equivalent of the druid "subclass", but what set them appart from most other subclass is the ability to pick multiple of them, thanks to the order explorer feat, giving the druid access to a great amount of customisation. However, one big point of contention is that the "evolution" of these order aren't automatical as the druid level increase, but rely on spending class feat to keep the order feature relevant through the level range. Because of this, druids are somewhat limited in their feat choice, doubly so if they "double dip" through order explorer. Another issue is that the orders do not interact with each other, giving the druid little reason to "commit" to multiple order, and thus greatly reduce their future choice of class feat as they will need to "feed" each of them to keep them relevant.

This homebrew is thus an attempt to give some payoff for druids of multiple orders, by making them interact with each other, to make order explorer a more interesting option to build around.

Ancient Orders

Ancient Orders are "mid game" orders accessible only via a level 10 feat, that require the druid to already have picked the "order explorer" feat (and thus to belong to at least two orders). Each allow the druid to pick a bonus feat of level 8 or less amongst those that require their specific order to get access to, give a "payoff" that link both of the orders together, and open access to a short list of "Ancient order feat". Here's a few of those I though about so far :

Life Order

Life Order Initiate FEAT 10

requirement : animal order, leaf order (or variant of either order), order explorer

You are initated to the secrets of the ancient druidic circle that considered all life as equal and worthy of protection. Your leshy familiar can Ride you or your animal companion without any penalty to either of them, as long as you and your companion are at least one size larger than your familiar. If your animal companion is larger than you and have the "mount" special ability, you both can ride it without any penalty. Your leshy familiar treat difficult caused by plant or fungus as normal terrain, and greater difficult terrain caused by such spells as difficult terrain, even if they were magically created. Any creature it mount also gain these benefits. If you have the "Woodland Stride" feat, you and your animal companion gain this benefit even if your leshy isn't Riding you.

You gain one of the following as bonus feat : Incredible Companion, Floral Restoration, Order Magic.

Special : If you belong to a variant order, you may instead take a level 6 or 8 feat that require that variant instead of the listed bonus feat. The feats "Grown of Oak" and "Garland Spell" affect your animal companion as if it was a leshy familiar.

Three of One Mind (1 action) Feat 12

Requirement : Life Order Initiate

You and your companions understand each other at a deeper level. You can use this action to Command both your animal companion and Leshy familiar at once, allowing both of them to use two actions, in any order.

Special : If you have the Call of the Wild feat, your leshy familiar can use it's inner magic to Sustain a Summon Animal or Summon Plant or Fungus spell you casted, as long as you Commanded it this turn. Creature that can perceive magic can sense that the magic is comming from it, and may act accordingly.

Archdruid of life FEAT 18

Requirement : Life Order Initiate

You understand the deepest secrets of this ancient circle, and your companions with you. Your leshy familiar and animal companion become immune to damage from spells you cast with the plant or fungus trait. Your leshy familiar can Ride any greature at least one size greater than it without imparting any penalty. Your leshy familiar now treat any difficult, greater difficult or hazardous terrain caused by plant or fungus as normal terrain, even if they were magically created. Any creature your leshy familiar ride gain these benefits. If you have the "Woodland stride" feat, you and your animal companion gain these benefits even if your leshy familiar isn't riding you.

Sky Order

Sky Order Initiate FEAT 10

requirement : storm order, animal order (or variant of either order), order explorer

You are initated to the secrets of the ancient druidic circle that looked up to the sky and saw the wind as an ally. Whenever you gain a fly speed (or as long as you don't lose your flight speed if you naturally have one), your animal companion gain a fly speed equal to it's land speed or Swim speed, whatever is greater. If it naturally have a flight speed equal or greater than it's land speed or Swim speed, it instead gain one more action each round, which it can use only to Fly. If your animal normally have no fly speed, then it must end it's turn on solid ground, or start falling.

You gain one of the following as bonus feat : Incredible Companion, Wind Caller, Order Magic.

Special : If you belong to a variant order, you may instead take a level 6 or 8 feat that require that variant instead of the listed bonus feat. If you have the "Storm Retribution" feat, that reaction can also trigger if an opponent that is at most 30 feet away from you critically hit your animal companion with a melee weapon or an unarmed melee attack, and the forced movement is based on your companion position instead of yours.

Wind and Talon, Fangs and Lightings FEAT 12

The learned how to talk to the wind, and it carry your command. Whenever you cast a spell after using an action with the spellshape trait that cost at least one action, you can Command your animal companion with a free action.

Special : If you have the Call of the Wild feat, you can instead Sustain a Summon Animal spell with a free action. If you have the Primal Summon feat, you can Sustain any Summoned creature with the Air trait as well.

Archdruid of the Sky FEAT 18

You have learned the deepest secret of this ancient circle, and your companion have learned to play with the wind and storm you conjure. Whenever you deal electricity damage to a creature, your animal companion consider them off guard until the end of your turn. Whenever your animal companion successfully strike, grapple, push or disarm a creature, they receive a -2 malus to their saves and are considered off guard against your spells with the air or electricity trait until the end of your turn.

Warden of Wildwood seems to sell itself on the fantasy of being defenders of the wood. The player guide make it very explicit than beyond morality, what unite the PC here should be before all the will to defend the woods, the way they chose to do so is secondary, they can be peace loving or anti colonial assassins, but their motivation must be to defend and care for the wood.

Yet the summary of the adventure I can see on the store (as well as disussion on this AP I've seen elsewhere) imply that the main villain isn't any threat to the wood, but extremist trying to fight back against the aggressor "the wrong way". Now I won't say that ecoterrorism is good or anything, mad druids or fey or elemental commiting mass murder to defend nature are villain worthy of being defeated, but... To have them be the main villain the "defender of the wood" AP?

It's would be like an AP were the PC play rebels against an evil regime, except that the main villain are other rebels going to far, and the "victory" is just a return to the status quo were the evil regime still rule uncontested. Sure, evil bloodthirsty revolutionary can be villains, and could actually work great as secondary villain in a "rebellion" AP, but when the adventure sell the fantasy of being a rebel, it's expected that the main villain is the evil regime, or at least some structure/character representing the regime. Since the whole appeal of playing a revolutionnary to begin with is to fight the system, not to protect it from outside. Or for another exemple, it would be like a "crusade AP" (like wrath of the righteous) that focussed not on fighting evil demons but instead of fighting overzealous inquisitors, they may be villain, they may be powerfull enought to be the big bad of an adventure, they shouldn't be the big bad of the crusade adventure.

With the way the player guide present the situation (and with the way I perceived this AP before reading it), I would expect the lumber consortiom or something akin to it to be the actual bad guy, so that the player can defend the woods against those that seek to destroy it. Defending the people from outside the forest (including the evil lumber consortium) from the revenge of those within is the exact opposite of the fantasy that this AP seems to represent, it's not being defender of nature, but defending peoples from nature's revenge.

At the very least, it seems like a failure of the player guide to set such expectations on it's "morality" section and not follow through with it, but it actually feel in tune the way the AP "present itself" on the outside as a whole, from the name, look and promotional arts, it really feel like this is meant to be the "defend nature" AP. If the villain was meant to be "nature extremist" from the inception, I don't think it the AP should have presented itself that way.

I do have to say however that while I was eyeing this AP and intended to maybe DM it, I haven't read the modules (yet), I'm reacting purely on the "summary" section from the store and on various bits of info I gathered around the internet, so it is possible I somehow misunderstood everything and the main villain really is part of those people aiming to destroy the forest for profit. If it's the case, feel free to laugh at my overreaction.

Slings are very cool weapons, especially if one is tempted to do a "low tech" campaign or to play a character that hail from a commonner or farmer background. Yet, amongst other ranged weapons, the sling weapon group is kind of left behind. It doesn't have the allmighty "reload 0" of the bow that allow it to have as good an action economy as melee weapon, and doesn't have the plethora of specific feat meant to alleviate the slow reload that crossbow or guns have. So I though I'd make up some feats meant to make slings actually interesting to use and viable as a main weapon :

Seeds of power // Feat 4

Druid
You can imbue plant seeds such as chessnuts with primal magic, allowing a chosen spell to sprout out of them. Every day during your daily preparation, you may craft up to three spellcraft sling amunition by using small seeds or nuts. The item level of these amunition may not exceed your level, and these amunition only last until your next daily preparation. You may only use these amunition with primal spells, and only you can store a spell inside them.

Furthermore, once charged with a spell, only you can handle these seeds without activating them. If anyone other than you handle them (such as to load them into a weapon), they are immediately affected by the spell stored into the amunition, as if you succeeded a ranged attack roll against them. You may load them into someone else's weapon by using an action if you stand adjacent to them and if they yield an unloaded weapon that can use this type of amunition, in which case, they may fire the amunition themselves without risking being affected by it.

This one is obviously really inspired by Willow, and I believe would be balanced by the fact that it both restrict the spell stored to one 1 rank bellow their current highest spell rank (as spellstrike amunition of item level 3 can only store level 1 spells, item level 5 can only store level 2 spells, etc). It also open up interesting synergies if the druid and another player cooperate by standing side to side and the druid load their ally weapon. But of course, the most interesting part of this spell is the multiclass possibility, as the wording allow a martial character with a druid archetype to use their highest level druid spell with their amunition, and martial characters can obviously make better use of these amunition than a druid could.

As a side note, the "if you touch it you get the spell" that was intended to prevent martial player from freely "stealing" the druid spell slot also have the side effect of making them "cursed" trinket that can automatically stick a spell to someone if they touch it. It's unintended, but should be alright, as getting someone to grab a random nut would require some kind of check (usually deception) as simple chessnuts are not usually the kind of trinket people tend to grab. I guess it could be used as an anti pickpocket device if left in your purse, but the interaction is specific (and fun) enought for me to feel that it would be ok.

Stone Juggler (reaction)// Feat 2

Ranger, Fighter, Rogue
Trigger : You attack with a weapon of the sling group that have reload 1.

You are so used to your sling that you can now juggle two munition at once, allowing you to shot twice in quick succession before having to draw any more stones. You reload your sling. You may use this reaction only if you already reloaded your sling once this turn.

A very simple feat, that kinda make sling weapon "reload 1/2", at the expance of costing you your reaction. This would be needed IMO to make slings as a whole viable compared to the plethora of crossbow option or the efficiency of the bow, but without making them "too similar" to either weapon group.

Sling Mastery // Feat 6

Ranger, Fighter, Rogue, thaumaturge
Prerequisite : critical specialisation in the sling group, or in a weapon of the sling group.

Your knowledge of slings allow you to make use of them in a variety of unexpected ways. As long as they are loaded, you may use slings and halfling sling staff as melee weapons with finesse. When you do so, lower the damage dice by one step. This does not fire the amunition, who stay loaded until you use the sling as a ranged weapon. If the amunition have special effect, these are not applied until you fire them for a ranged attack. You may use halfling slingstaff as 1+ handed weapon instead of 2 handed weapons. You may use any light bulk item of reasonable size as sling ammunition, but it is then considered improvised weapon (the GM determine if the object inherit the propulsive trait, and the size of it's damage dice, if any).

This is a fun one, for I have no idea how balanced that is. Everytime I look at it, it seems both too strong and too weak somehow. This make the slings combinaison weapons in some sense, and allow you to use them as improvised flail in a pinch (either because you don't have time to reload or are stuck in melee against something that would punish you for ranged attack). It also allow you to flank with a sling, and to finally be able to 1 hand the slingstaff when you don't actively use it to attack (which IMO it should be able to do from the start). Finally, it allow you to throw random stuff with it, which I feel is one of the biggest thing that is missing from slings in PF2e.

Bomb Slinger // Feat 1

Alchemist

You use a sling to throw your bomb further more accurately. You may use alchemical bombs as sling amunition instead of thrown weapons. If you do so, they don't gain the propulsive trait of the sling (but keep it if they already had it), but use the sling range, potency rune, and use your weapon proficiency with the sling to calculate your attack roll rather than your proficiency in alchemical bomb. Feats that modify your ability to throw bombs, such as Far Lobber or Quick Bomber, don't affect the bombs you throw using a sling, only the ones you throw using your alchemical bomb proficiency.

This feat was needed, using slings to throw bombs or random other object is a stapple, yet there is currently no alchemist-sling synergy. So this is a way to correct this oversight. The fact that it inherit the "reload 1" from the sling, and that the player won't be able to use their quick bomber with thir sling should balance the massive increase in range. Furthermore, it's important to notice that the sling potency rune don't stack with the item bonus to attack that some bomb carry, so the rune only improve lower level bombs (and other runes don't apply to the bombs, as it would be too hard to rule how each propriety rune affect each bomb otherwise).

I'd like to know what people thing of these, and if anyone have more idea to make sling more usefull and interesting.

I’m building a potential low level adventure where my players will be trapped in abbadon from the start, and their goal will be to survive and escape the plane. Because of it, I made up rules of how hexploration work here (as well as homebrewed some suitable low level monster/hazard since apart from the cacodaemon, all PF2 daemons are mid or high level), and I though I might share them to get some feedback (and for other people to use in case something like “low level abbadon wilderness survival” appeal to some people).

Abbadon hexploration :

Abbadon have a variety of different type of terrains, but all share the same basic properties.

The only “natural” source of light in the plane come from the perpetual eclipse which make everything appear bleached, and put the plane in a perpetual state of low light. If the group have a member without low light vision or darkvision, and don’t travel with an open light source, their speed is halved when considering the travel speed of the group. Travelling with any source of light (such as a torch) negate this penalty but is much more likely to attract the attention of the plane many predators (giving a “bonus” of +2 to any random encounter check, since random encounter check start an encounter if the check succeed).

Most of the plane being silent and open mean that it is hard to avoid notice while traveling there. If the group is trying to lay low and to avoid attention from the native daemon (which they probably should do if they are low level), traveling cost one more travel activity, as if the terrain type was one step worse. As most of abbadon is inhospitable, most of it is either difficult terrain or greater difficult terrain already, which mean that it typically take three to four days to leave a hex for a party with a movement speed of 25 feet. Not taking those precaution mean that any random encounter check is one step “better” than what’s rolled. If you don’t wish to roll for random encounter, simply follow this rule : if they stay discreet the player should encounter hazard that are dangerous but not deliberately hunting for them, such as hostile hunted, “Abbadon’s beasts” (see bellow latter), or a dangerous feature of the plane, while not taking precaution mean that the player should encounter daemons themselves that are specifically hunting them down, and likely to pursue them even if the players manage to escape with their lives.

While the plane is almost always eerily silent, and always seems unmoving, it coil around those that dare to travel through it, twisting their path to push them toward danger, away from their objective, or sometime in circle, even if they only ever marched in a single direction without ever turning. Even roads might twist like a snake beyond the horizon to guide the fools that trust them toward their destruction. All attempt to travel to a neighboring hex need a sense direction check (using either survival or abbadon lore) to readjust the direction of the group whenever the plane twist itself around them.

Even in terrains that should be easy to get a sense of direction in (such as a plain with easily recognizable landmark), this insidious shifting makes it hard not to get lost in. Not only does these checks always carry the -2 malus for not having a compass (as they simply do not work in this plane), the shifting impose an additional -3, meaning that all of those checks are done with a -5 malus. However, if one member of the group succed at aiding the one trying to sense direction (using either survival if the sense direction check use abbadon lore, or abbadon lore if they use survival), this secondary malus is negated, on top of the usual bonus for the aid action.

A critical success always lead the group to the chosen hex, while a normal success lead the group to either the chosen hex or one of the 5 hex adjacent to it (that aren’t the starting hex). To determine which hex they find themselves in, the GM can either chose it themselves (representing the malevolent will of the plane), or you can simply assign a number from 1 to 6 to each hex, and then roll a D6 (this may cause the group to jump an entire hex, as abbadon need not to follow the logic of the material world). A failure mean that the group is going in circle, and stay in the hex they started in (taking perhaps days of travel to find themselves in the exact same place). A critical failure mean that the plane is leading them toward danger, and the player should face a dangerous encounter, on top of which they either stay in their hex, or even move back a hex.

Players may decide to no actually try to go anywhere, but simply go where their step lead them, or may try to “trick” the plane by marching in the opposite direction of where they want to go, while trying to bait a critical failure. Any such attempt invariably lead to dangerous, yet strangely rewarding, situation. Doing so always end up triggering a severe encounter at the very least, but also guide the players toward important things, either uncovering landmark, resources or secret as if they accomplish the reconnoiter activity if there are any of them undiscovered in their hex, or moving them to an adjacent hex where such undiscovered feature exist if there are none. It’s better if this rule isn’t explain tho, and is left to the players to stumble into and discover themselves.

There is however a way to completely avoid these effects, certain important feature of the plane that simply cannot shift. If the player move alongside these path, they don’t need to roll to find a way, and always move as they want, as they do in the material plane. The most obvious of these feature is the Styx and it’s many affluent, following the river, either up or down, always lead the player in the chosen direction. Then, there is the border between the different domains that compose the plane, as each can be strikingly different and don’t quite obey the same rules (altho they all follow these rules). Finally, there are the “monolith roads”, special roads marked by the presence of monolith regularly spaced, just close enough from one another that when one travel on these road, one of them is always in sight (road without these monolith, or with monolith “too spaced out” so that you might spend stretch of roads without seeing one can twist just like the rest of the plane).

Those who know this feature of the plane tend to refer to these in a certain way, saying “the veins” to talk about the Styx and it’s affluent, “the scars” to talk about the border between domains, and “the nerves” to talk about the monolith roads (there’s a trend in my setting of people that know a bit about abbadon to talk about the plane as a whole as if it’s a single “living”, or at least sentient, entity). Daemon alone know how to travel the plane perfectly, without needing to either roll or follow these path. As such, another method to travel precisely where you want within the plane is to have a daemon serve you as a guide, although of course such daemon will require a suitable payment and might chose to betray you anyway.

Because following these path is often the only way for the hunted and the strangers to the plane to reliably get anywhere, they also are a prime hunting ground for daemons. Following the Styx at low level might be especially unwise, as it’s populated with powerful piscodaemon and thanadaemon, and it’s very waters are an anathema to life. The monolith roads meanwhile are arguably a trap themselves, here to funnel their prey onto a predestined path so as to make them easier to locate (meaning that encounters with daemon are far more likely here), but since it’s also used by “guest” of the plane, such as people involved in the soul trade and daemon cultist, the monolith roads might be amongst the only places where the group might “talk their way out” of an encounter with hostile daemon. The border between domain meanwhile tend to be less frequented by daemon themselves, but traveling alongside them mean that the group expose themselves to the dangers lurking in both domains.

I've been reading lost omen : impossible lands, and the blood lord AP the last few weeks. I really like the country, I see interesting plot threads abound in it, and the AP is so far (midway throught the 5th module) one of the best AP I've read full stop, I really want to run it (or play it) someday. However, there is one crucial lore point that so far have been eluding me, which is "how are laws made in Geb", as well as "what does the blood lords do exactly"?

I know the country is ruled by the ghost king Geb, who is uninterested in actually rulling and thus delegate most of his power to his blood lords, who are a group of roughtly 60 people get to "rule" geb in his stead. But how do they do that? They don't seem to be any assembly or council where blood lord gather to decide on legislation. The title of blood lord don't seems to come with any "area of responsibility" (like economy, city planning and such), so it's not as if each blood lord had a say on specific part of society (in which case blood lords would be analogous to ministers). It also doesn't come with an "estate" that blood lord can rule as they see fit, so it's not analogous to feudal lords either.

The description of what they actually do in the lost omen book was rather vague, and from what I'm seing in the AP, being a "blood lord" just mean "being important", there seems to be no responsibility involved, nor any actual power except for the fact that killing you is now "more of a crime".

So I'd like to know if anyone can give me more detail about how things actually work here. Are the blood lords basically "courtier" without any actual power except for their position that allow them to try to influence the king? Do they have any hard power at all? If so, how do they use it?

Summons are pretty bad in pathfinder 2e, to put it lightly. Due to the way they heighten, they need to always occupy your highest spell slots, and due to the way number increase with levels, even there they are often very underwhelming, as they lag 4 to 5 level bellow you. The only uses for summon is on low level, where the gap isn't as wide, and for summonning "bards", or as I call them "buffing totem", creatures summonned here only because they can provide buffing ability instead of directly helping you in battle.

On top of everything, summonning spells usefullness vary depending on wether you are on an odd or even level. All spellcaster receive a minor power boost on odd level, when they unlock a new level of spells, but they still increase their spell attack and spell DC on even level, which mean that their spell "keep up" with the increase in resistance/AC of your foes. Summonning spells on the other hand, get no bonus at all on even level, which worsen them once more.

However, there is a variant were summons are better (but still not overpowered), which is the "proficiency without level" variant. This "tighten" the number, and make the summons "keeps up" better with the foe you are facing. They are still 4 or 5 level behind you, but not adding the level to every number effectively give them a "+4/+5" bonus to each of their stats. They are still behind, for creature statistic increase faster than their level, but not as drastically. However, using that variant rule just to make summon betters is the same as using a bazooka to kill a fly, warping the whole game just to accomodate this one ability.

This however gave me the idea of "fixing" summons by mimicking that rule for summons only. Hence this homebrewed feat (that should be made unavailable if you are already playing in a proficiency without level game).

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AUGMENT SUMMONNING ◇ - - FEAT 4
Traits : Cleric, Druid, Metamagic, Summoner, Witch, Wizard

You manipulate magical energies to empower the creature you call forth. If your next action is to cast a summonning spell, it cost one focus point to cast it.

Any creature summoned by such spell share your level, increasing it's statistics by the difference between it's original level and your own. This does not affect the summon HP, but it does it's AC, resistances, attack bonus, skills, perception, as well as all of it's DC.

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The feat end up giving a buff to every summon, and that buff is comparatively "bigger" for low level summons (summonning a -1 creature on level 20 give it +21 in each of it's stat, while summonning a level 15 creature only give it +5), but high level summons should still be better as statistic increase faster than simply "one per level" (and because HP don't increase with this feat). It should however make slotting "low level" summon spell better and sometime worth slotting, instead of forcing them into "highest level slot only".

The "cost one focus to cast" was made to avoid "spamming summons", which seems to be the biggest fear of people that don't want them to be "too good". That way, you can't continuously summon "on level" creatures during a single encounter, as you are limited by your focus pool. I limited it to the classes that I felt had the "strongest thematical ties" to summonning, but other spellcasting class could still access it throught multiclass at level 8 (and since it's homebrew, you may allow other classes if you feel that they deserve such feat too).

Also, I called it "augment summonning" in reference of the PF1 feat, forgetting that it's also a (very underwhelming) wizard focus spell. You may call it "superior summonning" instead if you want.

The witch class seems to be widely considered the worse of all class, seemingly lacking both flavor and raw power.

It all come from how they were in first edition, their definning characteristic were the hexes, "spells" that could be used all days like cantrip, but far more usefull. Pathfinder 2e, by introducing focus spells, and by making cantrip heighten automatically, basically gave these option to every spellcasting class, giving the witch no real definning mechanical identity. Despite the choice of patron allowing them to pick any of the magic tradition, all of them appart from occult already have a prepared spellcaster, and the witch compare unfavorably to any of those spellcaster, being able to cast less spells than the wizard, but not having the added resilience and raw power of the druid and cleric.

This homebrew is thus a try at making the witch both more powerfull and more mechanically unique compared to the other classes. I also wanted it to "justify" the choice of magical tradition, by making it a unique enough class that people would want to try it for multiple traditions. The flavor come from how they were played in PF1 : witches are spellcasters that could prepare and cast a gigantic array of spells... But who actually prefer to stick to a chosen few, which are their specialty. Since focus spells are basically meant to be that "favored" spell that spellcasters cast more often than the rest, I decided to base this archetype around them, but since multiple spellcasting class are already somewhat "focussed" on their focus spell, I decided to add a twist, which is that these witch can actually chose any low level normal spells as focus spells.

Also, I decided to make this a class archetype, and not an homebrewed "errata version" of the witch class, because I figured that when paizo will make PF2 unchained, they are likely to do the same, and release those Unchained class as class archetype.

Do note that a part of this homebrew is in square brackets. That part is something I'm unsure about (or rather, even more unsure than the rest of the homebrew). It contain a nerf for the archetype, and without it the archetype is undoutably a significant buff to the witch class. However, the witch is rather bad as is, and thus it's possible that such buff wouldn't be "too much" and could be added while remainning balanced even without this significant downside. But given how massively this archetype improve the class, I couldn't post it without adding at least one significant downside to it.

Here it goes, don't hesitate to give feedback:

UNCHAINED WITCH

As an unchained witch, the magic you draw from your patron is unique, and allow you to cast some spells with more ease than any other spellcaster. You revel in this power that none (except for maybe your patron) can copy, and rely on those spells far more than any other. If you choose this class archetype, you must select Unchained Witch Dedication as your 2nd-level class feat.

Prerequisites : You must be playing a witch.

Unchained witch adjustments : At 1st level, chose a level 1 spell from your patron's tradition. It become a hex spell for you, called a "major hex". You may still prepare and cast major hexes using spell slots, but you can also cast them spontaneously using focus point, in which case they are heightenned to half your level rounded up, like any other focus spell. When you cast a major hex that way, it receive a -2 penalty to it's spell DC, spell attack roll modifier, and counteract check modifier.

When your proficiency for witch spellcrafting augment to expert, chose a level 2 spell from your patron's tradition, which also become a major hex. When it increase to master, add a level 3 spell as a major hex. When it increase to legendary, add a level 4 spell. Each time your witch spellcasting proficiency increase, you can swap out one of your major hex for a different spell of the same level of your patron's tradition.

You do not gain the "phase familiar" focus spell. [You permanently have one less spell slot for each spell level, up to the 9th level slot. This does not affect the 10th level spells slot.]

Unchained Witch Dedication -- FEAT 2

Your major hex is a deeply personal twist on your patron's magic, and is drawn directly from you rather than your patron like the other hexes. You may cast major hex on the same turn you cast normal hexes without either spell failing (but you can't cast two major hex on the same turn).

Special You can’t select another dedication feat until you have gained two other feats from the runelord archetype.

In pathfinder 2e, the total number of spell slot is far more limited than in pathfinder 1e. This is in part mitigated by the creation of focus spells, which can be cast at least once by encounter, and the fact that cantrip are automatically heightenned (and thus are kinda usefull during the whole campaign), but it still mean that spellcaster have a much more limited ammount of "daily ressource" to play with.

Given how overpowered casters were in PF1 (and 3.5, and 3.0, and 5e, and...), a nerf was certainly warranted, but this was far from the only one spellcasters received in PF2. Spell utility is now far more constrained to avoid making them simply overshadowing skill check, damaging spells now lag behind martial in accuracy (and their damage, while respectable, are never enought to turn the tide of a level appropriate encounter alone), and incapaciting spells flat out don't work against any creature of a higher level than the party.

So knowing all that, I'd like to know what people think about the amount of spell slot available in PF2. I feel like there's too little of them, and that it further exacerbate the general "feel bad" problem that low level spellcaster have, but I haven't played on this system for that long, so I'd like to know what more experienced people think.

As I've never played one myself, I especially would like to hear what people think about the summonner only having 4 of them at most, and the magus only having 6. Do these class still feel "right" to play? are those slot strictly reserved to "infallible" spells like buff spells or utility spells that require no save nor attack rolls?

I finally finished the mwangi expanse book, and amongst the plot threads I found most interesting was the hungry school (and to a lesser extend, the king of bitting ants, which may be tied to the school since they are both about ants and tied to the color red). But I can't seems to find any more info on the school, is there any other book (from either edition) that talk about it in more detail? Anything that confirm they are tied to each other?

I'm thinking of making an oracle tied to the school somehow, so I would like as much info as possible on these.