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Hi Paizo community and team!

I know we are way past the playtest and the Guardian is likely heavily in development, but I have what may seem like a weird ask:

Please, give some thought to class options (an archetype or feats) that improve how the Guardian plays out with medium armor or unarmored.

The reason I'm asking this is simple: heavy armor is massively more powerful than any of the other options.

+1 AC over the rest of the armors, which cap at +5 vs +6 for Heavy, is a huge incentive to go that route.

Right now, there is only ONE class that gets a major defensive benefit to not using Heavy armor: the Monk.

Before, the Barbarian used to be an option too, but with Armored Rager being a class choice, there's few incentives to remain with Medium Armor.

For this reason, rather than keep centralizing all defensive characters around Heavy Armor, I'd love to see maybe some class archetypes that trade features to make the Guardian function better without Heavy Armor, or perhaps less features/Class Feats that increase in effectiveness with heavier armors.

It seems like we keep getting more and more incentives towards it when the game already rewards using it baseline.

Thoughts?

I don't get it.

All Heavy Armor is +1 AC more effective than all Medium Armor. That's a huge bonus right off bat.

Do features need to give a bonus based on whether the user is using heavy vs medium armor?

I just don't get what this type of differentiated bonus is adding to the class experience.

The whole set up of the class provides very little in helping bring fights to a close, and from my party's quick arena death match yesterday, I kinda wished we had a Fighter or Monk instead to draw the fight to a close faster.

So Ferocious Vengeance is very nice, a very good damned-if-you-don't...

...but we are missing the damned-if-you-do! The class is missing a "you hit me, now I get to put some extra hurt" somehow.

Namely, it would make a lot of sense to have a "Come Get Me" reaction from Taunt -- it's not easy to get off, so some way to punish those who actually hit you would be great.

This all being said, it's hard for me not to want to see both Threat Techniques as necessary for the class.

1. Get rid of Anathemas. I wanna play a Barbarian without being told how they should act. If you want to keep them, keep something SUPER specific that won't interfere with the regular flow of character building.

2. Get rid of the AC penalty on Rage. -1 is MASSIVE, and causes Barbarians to be health piñatas at low level. I've DM'd multiple games where the Barb just blows up because of big increase in critical chances. The class shouldn't be strictly a damage dealer, it should be allowed to be the tank for the party too. The AC penalty needs to go... can be replaced by Clumsy, Stupefied, or whatever, but get rid of what makes the class so dangerous to frontline with.

3. Let Fury increase damage from 2 to 4 as an Instinct ability. No Lv1 Barb Feat can compete with the Instinct bonuses AND +2 to damage.

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:

• General feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that do not scale.
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  
• Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  
• Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

I highly doubt big changes are on the way for the Monk, if not many are primed for the Fighter either.

Both classes are relatively simple to play, with the Fighter being geared towards using many different attack actions, and the Monk geared towards using more non-attack actions.

However, I think this simplicity plays against the Monk because it reduces design space. All the new Monk feats outside of Rulebooks are Ki Spells because it's really hard to find other ways to give it more depth.

For this reason, I believe Monks should have a subclass feature: stances. This would mean making stances mandatory, which I won't imagine to be a 100% popular idea, but right now stances have such a high power level that it seems reasonable.

Making stances part of the core class would encourage stance-dancing, something that many Monks opt out from because using once stance means not benefiting from your investment in another.

By having a feature that, says, forces players to pick two stances at Level 1, then you bake the cost of the stances into the chassis. Doing so, you set up a play-pattern for Monks: switching from once stance to the other as it's benefitial to you.

You could add extra stances at certain levels (to say something), adding additional depth along the way.

This would create a more complex play pattern, but much more replayability, and the ability to add more variety of content since Monks will have a subsystem that is not Ki that they'll be juggling with.
Creating tools to switch stances quickly and boost their benefits would become something that Paizo could design around.

I'm sure this will be one of many threads that will spawn about the subject (I expect many people to mention Advanced Weapon proficiency as well), but I honestly just have one request:

Please move away from having Shield Block as the sole General feat oriented towards giving players a defensive reaction.

Pathfinder 2E is extremely elegant and obviously my favorite system. But as it stands:

• - Having Shield Block be the only defensive reaction option among General feats makes every character that wants one orbit towards it, even if it doesn't fit the class fantasy;
• If you play a class that gets it for free, it feels like you are wasting your class' power budget if you don't want to employ it;
• - Shield Block as a General feat is TOO appealing, Reaction is a MASSIVE upgrade in action economy for any character, so you will orbit towards having one if you are able, particularly if you need to stand in melee combat;
• - Other "defensive reactions", like 1H parries, Nimble Dodges, etc. are easy to get with Class Feat investment, so it's not clear why Shield Block has laxer access requirements if it's not that different in terms of power-level;
• - It feels against the design philosophy of PF2E to mandate a specific combat style/equipment loadout... wouldn't it be wonderful if, instead of gaining Shield Block, classes like Champion or Fighter gained a Defensive Reaction of their flavor of choice?

I'm sure Core will come with other ways to make Shield Block more appealing (looking at Sturdy...), so with a power-up, we could also have a wider array of options from the get-go.

Thank you!

Hi forum!

I am writing because I am very curious as to what is the design vision for General Feats have for character building, as at this time I feel they are pulled into different directions without being particularly effective into any niche for a character.

There are not that many General Feats to start off, so I expect we may see more support for them in the future.

That being said, I am not sure what to expect. I see them being used for different things to varying levels of effectiveness at their role, so I'd like to hear your experience with them, but I'd love to hear from designers what is the plan for the future.

Let me preface this topic with a statement: I think General Feats failed to find their niche into character building, because they have an identity crisis.

Here is my categorization of current General Feats:

ABSOLUTE BONUSES
This type of General Feats are able to increase certain innate attributes of a character without any conditionality. They are good at any point of the game.
- Ancestral Paragon
- Fleet
- Incredible Initiative
- Incredible Investiture
- Toughness
- Untrained Improvisation

PLAYSTYLE ENABLERS
These General Feats are focused in enabling playstyles outside of the regular Class-enabled choices.
- Shield Block
- Ride

COMBAT UTILITY
These are oriented towards utility in combat - providing niche bonuses that are too narrow for a full Class Feat, but could be still good to have around contextually.
- Breath Control
- Diehard
- Feather Step
- Skitter

PERCEPTION SKILL FEATS
These General Feats are basically skill feats in term of power level, but since Perception is not technically a skill, they need to be picked up via General Feats.
- Thorough Search
- Expeditious Search
- Supertaster
- Incredible Scout
- True Perception

NON-SKILL UTILITY
These General Feats are "quasi" skill feats but not tied to a skill itself, and provide non-combat utility.
- A Home in Every Port
- Fast Recovery
- Improved Repair
- Hireling Manager
- Keen Follower
- Pick Up the Pace
- Prescient Consumable
- Prescient Planner

DISPOSABLE BONUSES
These types of General Feats grant a bonus to your character that becomes relatively weak/obsolete as you level up.
These are:
- Armor Proficiency: After level 13, it becomes an aesthetic choice.
- Canny Acumen: In a power troth between level 9 and 17 where it provides no bonus.
- Weapon Proficiency: Obsolete by level 11 at the very latest.

My own personal considerations for each of these:

• Absolute Bonuses: These are always good to have around and patch up certain parts of your character. Beginner-friendly and helps you round up characters.
  
• Playstyle Enablers: PLEASE SIR CAN I HAVE SOME MORE. I feel like current design wants these as archetype feats, but Shield Block is a great example of how they can be successful without being tied to class feats. Maybe you are playing a Ranger and you want an excuse to go 1H + free hand without dipping into archetypes. Maybe you want to go unarmed - is a 1d6 weapon that strong of a boost you should archetype for it? I'd love to see feats here that improve otherwise-weak things like dueling capes and such.
  
• Combat Utility: These are all over in terms of power level, but there can certainly be room here for more. For example, this could be a great place to have Boarding Assault type of things for Pirate campaigns without needing to foster free archetype or going down on class feats. Stuff to fight ghosts for haunt campaigns, etc. I'd also like to see more sense-related things here, like Blind-Fight - certainly powerful but could be a good high-level option if there's more General Feats for the 10th level mark.
  
• Perception Skill Feats: I think marking these as general feats is a relic - I don't see why these couldn't be skill feats. Surely, True Perception is quite powerful, but is it any more powerful than other Legendary Skill Feats?
  
• Non-Skill Utility: These are good, particularly if you have a well-rounded character that wants to contribute more to storytelling than combat. I feel the current choices are too niche and I'd like to see catering to more things.
  
• Disposable Bonuses: I feel like we should stop seeing these at all, or see "retweaked" versions that improve the way they scale. For example, Canny Acumen feels like it should provide a different bonus after 9th level when everyone has full Expert saves, rather than promise a bonus for 17th level and ask you to rough it out with effectively -1 General Feat. I guess Retraining is a choice, but it also feels like these were afterthoughts.

Thank you for reading, and I hope to hear from all of you too!

I love Monks and I think they are one of the best designed classes in PF2E.

I like everything about them except one thing...

In the very specific case that you:

• Want to go STR-focused
  
• Aren't going with Mountain Stance

...then, you kind of need to go for 20 DEX to maximize AC with Explorer's Clothing/Bracers of Armor.

I wouldn't have a problem with that if it weren't for the two +1 ASIs you need to spend (usually at levels 10th and 15th) to do so.
This leaves a sour taste to me, as most other classes start branching out into tertiary scores after 10th, just to round out their characters.
Meanwhile, my Monk "loses" 1 ASI to go from DEX 18 to 19.

It's an extremely minor thing, but for the same reason, I think it could be optimized...

What if we had a variant Explorer's Clothing/Bracers of Armor that required STR 18 to use, and had +1 AC bonus and +4 Max DEX?
It would be functionally identical to Leather Armor, save for the Comfort trait, but locked behind a high STR requirement to prevent use from casters. It could also be a nice option for other martials characters interested in going buck naked!

Not much more than the thread title.

I recently rolled a Dhampir Desecrator and I'm having a blast, and I'd love to be unburdened by ancestry.

A 1st/2nd level feat that unlocks Negative Healing for Evil Champions would be fantastic.

"Make a melee unarmed Strike. If you hit and the target is alive, anytime during the duration, you can spend a single action, which has the auditory and concentrate traits, to speak a word of death that could instantly slay it."

"A spell or effect with the auditory trait has its effect only if the target can hear it. This is different from a sonic effect, which still affects targets who can’t hear it (such as deaf targets) as long as the effect itself makes sound."

As written, Quivering Palm can be delivered but it has no effect on deaf targets.

You could argue that the Monk itself is the target of the auditory effect, so it doesn't matter if the target can't hear... but then, why wouldn't it be a sonic effect instead?

Is this something that should be errata'd?

I was very excited for 2E when it rolled in, but, as someone who wants to be in the game for the long haul, I've found archetype design to be very flawed.

The reasons for this are twofold mostly:

1. Some archetypes do what Skill Feats (and some General Feats) are supposed to. A lot of them are focused on flavor and out-of-combat skills – being forced to spend Class Feats on these goes against the design tenets of 2E in general. That is, that optimization (Class Feats) doesn't need to be sacrificed for roleplaying (Skill/General Feats).

2. Some archetypes openly invite for optimization-through-roleplay. This was one of the most egregious problems of 1E, with every Paladin out there being raised by the Fae to get some extra juice out of Lay of Hands. The same appears in 2E, with some Class Archetypes granting the benefit of several feats at the same time, and some of them giving Class Feats and then some more (like the Lastwall Sentry or the Student of Perfection).\

These are all issues that can be solved, but they require designers to consider them as issues that need a fix.

1. They really like shields. I'm not totally against that, but it seems that it's too widely applicable, with Monks having no in-built defensive Reaction. The few exceptions being Crane Style users (circumstance bonus overlap) and Bo Staff users. Even Grapplers, Tiger Style and Ironblood Style users can easily accommodate them – Grapplers and Tiger Stylers use bucklers, Ironblood users can just skip Ironblood Surge.

2. Stances are a bit off a mess. So Crane Style has a great exploration bonus, except you can't use it during exploration. Mountain Stance users are very vulnerable before they get to activate their stance, and have the dubious "touching the ground" requirement – does that mean they are unable to use this Style while on a boat? Not to mention both of these stances work really bad with Fuse Stance, which is supposed to be a great feat.

3. Way too many Class Feats... are basically Skill Feats that don't work well with actual Skill Feats. Dancing Leaf, Flying Kick, Water Step and Wall Run are basically Skill Feats – except that they don't play along that well with Quick Jump, Cat Fall, Wall Jump, Steady Balance and Cloud Jump. Even Winding Flow is a bit lackluster, considering Step Up is a thing.

4. Monastic Weaponry is terrible. The only exception is the Bo Staff for its reach. Otherwise, Monastic Weaponry doesn't even allow a ranged build. Having access to weapons in general doesn't do much, particularly considering that monk weapons are so rare that you won't even find unique Monk weapons to make the feat worth it. The feat needed extra power built into it, like special actions such as Quick Draw.

5. Until more Ancestry Feats are released, Monks have a dearth of options. All the weapon feats are extremely incompatible with the Monk's unarmed focus, so that means a good deal of the feats available are literally unusable for Monks. This is mostly a "feel bad" type of thing that surely more content will solve.

6. You kinda have to game Backgrounds. The attribute game got much better than other editions, don't get me wrong. But it still feels pretty bad to be forced to game your background to be allowed to make a build. The fact that Monks need specifically high DEX and good STR, or otherwise high STR and good DEX except for a single build makes it so that Background selection is not a purely roleplaying element. This could be solved with a Class Feat that allows AC to be based off of mental stats instead of DEX, which should be pretty fun to recreate the old-school Monk feel without the troublesome Mountain Stance.

1. Are there any viable Monk weapon builds? Seems to me like the only niches they have is disarming and easy access to other damage types. The versatility of weapon switching is cute early on, but as runes come to play, a playstyle that mixes weapons seems very expensive.

2. Is there any reason not to go with a shield + Shield Block, other than aesthetics? Other than Crane Stance builds, Monks don't really have good reaction options for defense like a Rogue's Nimble Dodge. So there's a big incentive to spend bucks on a Steel Shield and a general feat for Shield Block (or Lastwall Sentry Dedication, for that matter), and be able to use reactions defensively at demand.

One of my concerns with the Playtest was the fact that lacking good baseline reactions increased value of tools like the shield spell, which provided a very applicable reaction option at a very low opportunity cost.

Classes like Monks, who didn't have a good reaction option, were funnelled into either those or Crane Style, since otherwise, you had little to do with your reactions.

I'd like to know eventually if there are more options – like easy access to a Fighter's Attack of Opportunity or a Rogue's Dodge.

So, are we seriously wrapping up 1E without a fully INT-based (Un)Monk archetype?

So, are we seriously wrapping up 1E without a Rageless Barbarian archetype?

So, are we seriously wrapping up 1E without a juicy late-level Gunslinger feat to encourage single-class builds?

So, are we seriously wrapping up 1E without Alchemist discoveries that grant them outsider-binding abilities?

I don't think there's a right time of day to bring this up, so, sorry, designers.

I've been ruminating a lot about this subject, and my experience with the Playtest has made me more and more certain about the fact that 20 levels is not the best fit for PF2's system, and something more compressed like 10 levels would be best.

The reasons why I believe so are three-pronged:

1. Exciting action system... that you don't get to play with

The first moment when I realized that the progression was borked was during character creation for my Playtest run.
My players looked starry-eyed when I explained the action system... but completely crestfallen in actual play when they realized they had way too many actions. Tossing them out into low accuracy attacks felt terrible to them, particularly when their normal attacks had weak accuracy to start with.

I could tell that what they wanted was to interact with the system in more ways.

That's why I believe 20 levels is a disservice to the action system – every class should get a pack of abilities, modified by their Class Feats, that allows them to interact with the action system in satisfactory ways, and diluting a class into 20 levels make it so that the ramp-up time until this happens is excessive.

2. Lots of choices... and few exciting ones

Class feats, skill feats, general feats, ancestry feats... it's great to have so many choices around, but they aren't very impactful. A lot of them feel weaker because they are tied to feat-lines, which seem to predetermine your class progress – why wouldn't a Ranger that gets Monster Hunter go with all the rest of the line?
Skill feats feel like they could be too narrow to be properly used too. This is particularly salient in Backgrounds for campaigns – there are too many of them that grant a skill feat you'd use once at best.

This leads me to believe that 20 levels dilutes the power of the options. In a concentrated affair with 10 levels, you could make fewer, more meaningful choices, that got rid of feat-lines and each stood on their own. For example, the Monster Hunter pack would combine most of the utilities spread out through the levels (subject to balance, of course). A Ranger picking Monster Hunter would be great at an area, and have room for improvement in the rest.
Similarly, concentrated skill feats could provide general bonuses, specific bonuses and even extra combat actions all in one.

3. +level to everything warps play through 20 levels

Die has 20 sides. A 20th level character has a full 20-sided dice over a level 1 one. That's not a problem in itself, but when DCs come into play, math collapses, as a lot of people may have brought up in 1.3.

If you had 10 levels instead, the same system would have another texture and provide more grounded results. Concentrated feats would make 10th level characters better at processing dice, rather than better at outputting higher numbers. That would make the progression feel much more natural.

New PDF seems the same as before, bug in the update?

So one of my favorite types of campaigns to run are Survival campaigns.

I also like to create scenarios where resources are limited, like wartorn countrysides or perilous forays into Underdark-like locations.

But Create Water & Create Food (and Goodberry of course) are the type of element that completely shut down a whole campaign-style from a low level. Furthermore, they devalue Survival as a skill.

For this reason, I would be very grateful if, baseline, they had an expendable reagent cost.

Otherwise, it's back to an edition full with houserules to make adventures work.

Look, Paizo, I'll save you guys the trouble of scratching your heads trying to figure out why the Ranger isn't working: it's spending levels of class budget in features that are binary and conditional.

Trackless Step is actually the most minor offender, because as a 5th level feature, it seems not to be taking anything from the class budget... that being said, it's something that would be very situational as a Skill Feat even. Maybe you can find another cool, more applicable feature to add in here.

Nature's Edge seems pretty terrible for me because you rarely get to decide when natural difficult terrain appears to exploit it. It's nice that it works with Snares, but it seems to say that you waste class power if you don't get them. What if Nature's Edge had an "always on" bonus that allowed you to deal extra damage to flat-footed enemies or something?

Wild Stride comes extremely late, and the fact that it doesn't help with magical abilities seems pretty bad. Most other classes have easier ways to dealing with it that also help against magical difficult terrain too, and the fact it does nothing against hazardous terrain seems like a pretty sad 11th level feature.

The Ranger is already encouraged to bring the adventure to the wilds thanks to having Survival and Nature-related abilities, why double up on that?

ALTERNATIVE TITLE: General Feats should get the cut.

3rd level and every four levels thereafter, your character gets a weaksauce General Feat. They do very little, and they don't add much to your character.

To me, that seems like wasted class budget.

If they were gone, we could have unique, class-based alternatives to whatever you could want a General Feat for.

For example, rather than Great Fortitude, a Wizard could get:

Midnight Oil – Feat 4th
[Wizard] – You become Expert in Fortitude saves, and the amount of time you need to spend to take a long rest is halved.

Similarly, why do Bards need to get Diehard when they could get:

The Show Must Go On – Feat 4th
[Bard] – You die from the dying condition at dying 5, rather than dying 4. When you succeed or critically succeed on a recovery saving throw, you may attempt a Performance check against the same DC. If you succeed or critically succeed, you may reduce your dying condition by an additional step.

Sincec CR0 enemies count as PL-2 against a PL1 party, would an Elite CR0 enemy count as PL-1, or would it count as PL=, just like a CR1 enemy?

I think something that could be very useful for the playtest community would be a series of blog posts talking addressing some of the status on the class design goals of each class as well as referencing the concerns by the community.

For example, a blog post on Fighters could contain:
- Summation of proposed changes and added features for the final version.
- An explanation as to why light/medium Fighters are discouraged.
- Addressing why Attack of Opportunity is baseline if archers can't make good use of it.
- State of the multiclass options.

And so on for each class.

We could have an update like this, say, in 3 months or so. With weekly blog posts, it'd take around 3 months to publish each one of these updates. So we'd still have half of the playtest to address any follow-ups to them.

So far I've only skimmed the rest of the chapters beyond the first one, so I had a pretty simple question:

Other than in The Heroes of Undarin, would it be disruptive to have some of the PCs repeat characters?

We have two healers so we could transport those characters to Affair at Sombrefell Hall, and our party Ranger could appear in In Pale Mountain's Shadow.

Would this cause any major disruptions?

Hi there, forum.
I'm going to start posting in-depth threads about my concerns with Monk class design. It's my favorite class, and while I consider that PF2's basic structure has a lot of potential, there are several issues I have that I think are tethering down the class from developing as a fully-fledged option.
While I initially wrote down my reactions to the class in this thread, I wanted to fully delve into each concern to see if the Paizo team can shine some light on their stances on each issue. I'll try to make a post on Monk class design once every week to avoid flooding the board.
Without further ado, I'll dig into this.

We've begun character creation for Doomsday Dawn, and two things about Monks became clear:

• Monks are extremely fragile early on. Even an 18 DEX Monk (which isn't going to be the baseline for all Monks) has a 15% chance to be crit by a Goblin Commando, one of the early enemies of the Playtest. Having high TAC is nice for sure, but the fact that early on, Monks are hurting for AC so much warps their value for the stat altogether.
  
• Monks have a significant incentive to pick up the shield cantrip through Ancestry feats or Arcane/Divine/Occult multiclassing. Due to having only one specialized reaction to boost defences, two feats deep into Crane Style, Monks are encouraged to nab the cantrip to obtain a quick on-demand boost to AC while also having an option for a reaction. Given that there's otherwise no good choices for defensive reactions, this seems like the overwhelmingly optimal course of action.

It's clear how both issues are related, but it's also noticeable how easy it would be to patch this in the Monk's favor: just give Monks a baseline, 1st level ability to on-demand increase their AC as a reaction.

This would require a rework of Crane Flutter, certainly, as the baseline defensive reaction would likely overlap with Crane Flutter's functionality... but I also believe Crane Flutter is problematic as it encourages NOT spending the turn in Crane Stance as much as ending the turn in it. Every other stance motivates you to use it to gain access to special actions – Crane Style/Flutter motivate you to do other things and then hop back into Crane Style to use the reaction.

Adding a baseline defensive reaction for Monks at 1st level would reduce the attractiveness of shield, reduce early game fragility, and spur a redesign for Crane Style/Flutter to be a better stance to use proactively.

Thanks for reading!

The +2 AC granted from Bracers of Armor is, in terms of budget, insanely great.

While most other classes are paying 25 GP for +1 AC and saves, Monks only need to fork out 35 gp for +2 AC and +1 to saves.

I think the bonus is too frontloaded for Monks – at least Sorcerers/Wizards get to cast mage armor before they get the bracers, reducing the potential benefit from acquiring a pair.

I think perhaps a set of bracers of armor that only adds a +1 item bonus to AC could be made available for, say, 100 sp?

Hi everyone! I'm planning to create a megathread later where I expand on each one of these topics later on, but I wanted to give a quick run-down of the things I've seen that need some work on the Monk class.

Once GenCon is over, I'll create a similar thread with fully detailed explanations.

THE ISSUES

1. Very limited trained skills. 3 + INT seems very restrictive.
Fix: Bump to 5!

2. VERY FEW SIGNATURE SKILLS. Doesn't allow for a lot of variation between characters.
Fix: Add Occultism (philosophy, esotericism), Performance (particularly fitting) and Medicine (very iconic).

3. VERY LIMITED INCENTIVES FOR ABILITY SCORE VARIANCE. As the class is very tight on their requirements to deal damage and maintain a good defence, there's little driving you away from wanting to pile onto STR/DEX/CON and call it a day. Even Ki Powers seem very optional in this.
Fix: First, allow Ki to be keyed off INT, WIS or CHA, to player taste. Then, add the following two Class Feats:

4. LACK OF RANGED WEAPON PROFICIENCIES CREATES LARGE GAP IN CAPABILITIES. Being able to efficiently attack from range is an essential part of a martial character's toolkit. There's a large incentive to get Monastic Weaponry just for this reason, and it gives a "feel-bad" vibe to be spending a Class Feat in covering a glaring weakness instead of growing more powerful, even if they are the same thing.
Fix:Grant proficiency with Monk weapons baseline, but don't allow them to be used with Monk feats and features unless you spend a Class Feat.

5. BRACERS OF ARMOR ARE TOO LARGE A POWER SPIKE. This odd to say, but Bracers of Armor are too good. For a single item, your AC spikes by +2. No other class gets such a large boost in defences for such a small investment. It makes the class reliant on Bracers of Armor. Wizards/Sorcerers at least get to spend spells early on to get a level 1 mage armor effect until they get their own bracers. If this isn't fixed, Monks would salivate a little too much for this specific item.
Fix:Perhaps grant Monk's the ability to benefit from a special equipment named "Sparring Bracers" or something like that which grants a +1 item bonus to AC for relatively cheap and only Monks can benefit from. It'd become obsolete by level 2 when bracers of armor start appearing, but it won't send Monks into a depression if they can't find them.

6. STANCE SAVANT IS VERY WEAK. It's a very very very poor class feat. All it does is save you 1 action per encounter, and you should be quick enough to not care if you don't have your Stance up on the first turn. It feels like a feat tax to get to Master of Many Styles.
Fix:Merge it with Master of Many Styles – make it grant you the higher power ability naturally.

7. SEVERAL FEATURES TRY TO DO THE SAME THING. While things like Metal Strikes/Adamantine Strikes are probably very powerful in practice, Monks already have Flurry of Blows and Shattering Strike trying to do the "push through resistances" thing. Similarly, Tangled Forest Stance is about enemy movement control, while Tiger Stance is about the same thing – they go about it in relatively different ways, but not enough to justify two different class options I think.
Fix:Nothing particularly comes to mind here, other than making another pass at Class Feats.

7. VERY FEW REACTION OPTIONS. Other than Deflect Arrow, there's Crane Flutter, locked into a Stance featline, and Impossible Technique all the way at 20th level.
Fix:I think more offensive options could be there, like reaction trips against enemies running past you, disarms against enemies who fail to hit you, etc.

8. HOLY HELL +4 CONDITIONAL BONUS TO JUMP ON CRANE STYLE? That's uh, a pretty big bonus. I don't think there's many things that pump a bonus THAT hard. Like, the Discern Lies power is a 4th level power for a similar boost, and it's a limited power.
Fix:Damn that's a big bonus.

9. SOME CLASS FEATS COULD USE CONSOLIDATION INTO SKILL FEATS Wall Stride is cute, but it doesn't sound like someone who's relatively good at parkour couldn't do. Make it a Skill Feat! Similarly, Tongue of the Sun and the Moon is cute and a legacy thing to have, but no one is gonna pick it over combat tools on Class Feats. Just roll it into an Occultism legendary Skill Feat, nu?
Fix:Yeah, what he said.

10. FEW INCENTIVES TO TRY OUT MONK WEAPONS Other than the Bo Staff (which has parry, reach and trip), only the Nunchaku seems interesting (with its ability to disarm).
Fix: Perhaps Monk weapons could have another interesting benefits, like for example, being able to double dip between Brawling + another critical specialization or something like that. You could also grant Weapon Monks access to special Class Feats to combine unarmed strikes + weapon attacks creatively.

Thanks for reading!

The Ranger class seems to have issues stemming from quite a few abilities triggering off bonuses in natural terrain.

This seems like a thematic and mechanical miss to me.

In terms of thematics, the Ranger can represent detectives, bounty hunters, slayers, tomb raiders, bodyguards, pillagers and all sorts of adventurers which aren't intrinsically tied to natural terrain.

In terms of mechanics, it makes players disproportionally favor one type of adventure/setting over others, creating repetitive gameplay patterns.

What I propose is that these features, baseline, are replaced by things closer to Monster Hunter – the idea that the Ranger is the best at finding, tracking and identifying foes is a strong concept that can be applied in a lot of adventures, ranging from intrigue campaigns to dungeon delves and yes, wilderness exploration as well, but also planar exploration too.

So yeah, less "natural terrain", more Monster Hunter would be my advice to tuning the Ranger into its own class with a stronger identity.

While Skill Feats seem nice enough to have around, General Feats seem... off.

Skill Feats and Archetypes are able to help you express who your character is. Even if chosen with optimization in mind, Skill Feats and Archetypes have narrative power.

General Feats seem to be filler, leftovers from a more gamey era. Great Fortitude and Lightning Reflexes don't feel like things with narrative power. They seem like band-aids a player can choose to patch out their weaknesses, rather than finding a better way to express their character.

I think, instead, more focus should be given to Archetypes in the General Feat slot.

Archetypes could fulfil the same mechanical functions as General Feats in providing simple ways to cover up a character, but could also pack narrative power of their own.

Instead of Toughness, what about an Archetype that gives you its effects, and unlocks additional options to be taken as Class Feats like Great Fortitude (with the ability to eventually get Master on Fortitude), and Diehard (plus other cool Diehard-y things).

The Fighter Archetype is a testament that General Feats are improperly packaged, I think.

The Issue
So going through the playtest Monk rules, I could see that the Monk was built to be a frontliner (rather than a skirmisher).

Now, that's perfectly fine, but it seems to me like the only viable builds require stacking DEX. Even if, as the Developers have said, a high STR/low DEX build could survive, there is little incentive to deviate from the high DEX build.

For this reason, I propose the following Class Feat:

Practiced Defense – Feat 1
[Monk] – Choose Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma. While unarmored, you may add that modifier to your AC instead of your Dexterity modifier.

What this does
Applying a feat like this increases the amount of viable Monk builds exponentially. You'll have STR/DEX, STR/INT, STR/WIS, STR/CHA and several DEX variants.

It enables many different concepts by, most importantly, moving the Monk away from the "MMA acrobat" vibe it has now, and allowing for Monks that have a larger focus on esoteric disciplines like Occultism, Religion, Medicine, etc.

Possible Ramifications
One possible ramification that comes to mind is the appearance of "multiclassed casting Monks". They'd stack up on a single mental attribute and pick up Multiclass Archetypes to gain casting abilities.
I... think this might be fun? These characters would obviously take a large opportunity cost – the class chassis would be great for defenses, but a lot of budget would be wasted on unarmed abilities that won't be put to use, and they'd never have higher proficiencies in Spellcasting. So it's a very limited trade off?

The other possible ramification is that casters could pick up the Monk archetype to get Practiced Defence. Considering that 2 feats would be needed to do this, it seems to me that it'd be simpler to pick up armor proficiencies.

Closing
Anyway, thanks for reading, hope you are able to apply this <3

The title should read: "that should make most people happy", of course.

Let me preface this proposal with the considerations in mind when formulating it:

1. DEX-to-damage should be an option. I don't find it necessary for the game, but there's enough traction and history behind it that it should be present in some way.

2. DEX-to-damage should a General Feat available at 1st level. It should be a General Feat to allow any class to take it. As it affects character development and could be integral to some concepts, it should be readily available at 1st level for players to pick it up.

3. DEX-to-damage should have a cost. If DEX-to-damage were a General Feat with no other caveats, the opportunity cost of it would be very low. Sure, you have less damage potential than a STR character. But damage is a very narrow dimension. By focusing fully on DEX and eschewing an ability score completely, the DEX-to-damage character is presented with many more choices and narrative power, as a high STR score cannot compete with a mental score in terms of versatility.

4. DEX-to-damage should not be appealing to every single Finesse user. This is a personal take, but I do believe that mixed scores should have their own reward. STR 14/DEX 18 is as much as a character expression as STR 10/DEX 18, and it shouldn't be punished by making it unviable in every way.

With this in mind, I present you Finesse Striker, the General Feat:

FINESSE STRIKER
Feat 1
General, Combat
When you attack with a finesse melee weapon, you may add your Dexterity modifier to damage instead of your Strength modifier. While using this feat, any attacks you make beyond the first take an additional -1 penalty to your attack roll.

Now, wording on the second part might be wrong, but you get the idea – it's reverse agile.
What does this General Feat accomplish?

1. It enables DEX-to-damage from 1st level to every single class.

2. It's penalty isn't massive, but provides a real choice. Those who want DEX-to-damage to make a single, precise hit should find the Feat perfect. Those who want to be wild slashers need to consider pros and cons, and I'm sure both decisions could be valid depending on player goals.

With this feat, I could see 4 martial archetypes arising, each distinct and with enough interesting things to each own!

A) The Tower – STR 18+, DEX 10~. This guy goes full hog on STR, leaving their Reflex saves exposed and losing out on several skills, but having higher damage potential and more mental skills or HP to spare. For example, a metal-clad Paladin who wants to focus on developing CHA/WIS to be a better negotiator.

B) The Striker – STR 16/18, DEX 12/14. This girl misses out on the mental skills, but enjoys higher damage potential without endangering their Reflex saves and DEX skills. For example, a ranger who wants to still be a good sneak without losing combat potency.

C) The Shredder – STR 12/14, DEX 16/18. This guy wants to go with Finesse, but they don't want to be worse at hitting subsequent attacks – they want to be good at barrages of quick strikes specifically. For example, a monk who wants to be able to lay down some Fist of the North Star action.

D) The Piercer – STR 10, DEX 18+. This girl doesn't want to go for the trophy to the highest damage, but she wants to have good damage output among her many tools. For example, the cunning rogue who spends actions readying for the perfect Sneak Attack.

Discuss!

Dwarven Scholar!

Thinking about ideas for a Dwarven Scholar Bard... of course, it'll be a Dwarf.

So far, I'm considering the Chelish Diva archetype to get armor proficiencies up to Heavy Armor, eventually.

Another option would be rolling with the FCB armor proficiency from Dwarf and just work with a bit of a higher DEX.

Now, the real question is what I'll do with the Combat Feats... besides sharing Power Attack, which seems to be the best choice altogether, any other ideas of things that could fit?

I think I'll likely just swing a Heavy Pick or a Battleaxe and use the Bard rerolling abilities to attempt to hit with Power Attack.

For context:

Is there an action requirement for this?

The Commune With Spirits ability has a 1 minute casting time for some spells, but I don't think this ability was intended to have a 1 minute preparation time before combat, nu? Seems like a free/swift action, or a move at most was the intention.

Given all the ACG editing issues, I think a clarification would be in order.

Here's a thought –

1. Remove all ACP from items, increase their Bulk accordingly instead. Also, remove movement speed penalties from medium/heavy armor.

2. For every 1 Bulk you carry above 5 Bulk, you get a -1 penalty to STR/DEX/CON checks.

3. For every 5 Bulk you have above 5, you reduce your movement speed by 5 feet.

4. You subtract your Strength modifier from your total Bulk to determine penalties.

Obviously the numbers here can be tweaked and arbitrarily chosen, but this system would achieve:

• Making Strength relevant to every character who wants to make STR/DEX/CON checks and may go over their Bulk limit. For example, a Rogue with 6 Bulk could boost their DEX skills by getting a +1 modifier on STR to handle Encumbrance better.
  
• Preventing movement speed penalties from medium/heavy armor from applying on players who have high Strength, which doesn't make much sense. It was always a bit of a let-down that a 24 STR Battle Cleric couldn't move effortlessly with heavy armor just because they didn't have that one class feature.
  
• Removes ACP from the game and merges it into a more meaningful, coalesced subsystem.
  

Introduction

Through this post, I'll talk about a phenomenon that is observable in 5E. I'll posit this phenomenon is a detriment to the game, both in terms of thematics and mechanics; and I'll foray into how PF2E is tackling it and where there may be danger.

What is the STR/DEX Dichotomy in 5E?

The STR/DEX Dichotomy is a character development property of 5E.

Due to the game mechanics, there is little to no incentive to pick up STR if your character is DEX-based; simultaneously, STR-based characters receive minimal returns from investments in DEX.

This leads to STR-based characters who keep minimal, sometimes negative, DEX, and viceversa.

The one exception is found where characters are mandated through class features to avoid doing so – the Barbarian forces the player to use medium armor and make STR-based attacks if they want to fully enjoy its class features.

Why is the STR/DEX Dichotomy bad for the game?

There are two facets of the game which I consider to be negatively impacted by it:

• Thematically: Having light, nimble characters with no sinew is a whiff; street rats, acrobats, brawlers – all of them require muscle to climb, run, jump, dodge, deflect, pry open, and so forth. Encouraging them to keep 8 STR makes them more of a game construct than an individual in a fantasy setting. The opposite case is also true – while hulking STR-balls with no speed are as conceivable as DEX-amassing mousers, most real warriors of all stripes should have picked up some motor coordination with their training.

• Mechanically: When STR or DEX are more valuable than the other, the baseline for characters created with the less optimal attribute should be lower, and it should make anyone who is being relatively pragmatic on character creation disregard one of the main core attributes as a viable option.

What went wrong in 5E?

5E did not attempt to splinter the Dichotomy with its systems. Instead, it tried to balance STR and DEX so the decision to invest in one or the other was a function of player preference rather than calculation.

It failed to do so effectively, as the following systems proved insufficient:

• Encumbrance is unpopular: Yes, I know, dear reader, that your playgroup is draconic about it, and your Rogue once drowned because she was carrying one too many candlewicks. But let's get real – very few people apply Encumbrance systems, and there's somewhat of a taboo to apply them. There's also the issue of the fungibility of Encumbrance – there's little to spend excess Encumbrance ON effectively.

• Small combat niche: STR only has an edge over most DEX playstyles when using 2H weapons, and only prevails over TWF in terms of output when using a specialized feat. This makes STR-based characters all too similar and crushes expression.

• Athletics has diminishing narrative power, and negligible mechanical power: The Athletics skill, in 5E, as a narrative tool, becomes easily overtaken by mundane and magical means of mobility quite quickly. Jumping, technically a province of STR, receives a very minor benefit with further investments in attribute scores. But the real killer for Athletics is that its use to perform combat maneuvers like grapples or shoves is easily counteracted by the rocketing STR/DEX attributes of enemy monsters, making only hyper-specialized builds able to use maneuvers effectively.

• Heavy armor has the usual downsides: It's quite costly, takes prohibitively long to don on a pinch, interferes with Stealth. Medium STR characters are relatively discouraged from using heavier armors too. But I'd also like to mention proficiency. Proficiency is very hard to obtain normally, restrictively so for most classes. While it's tossed out commonly through some features, proficiency still makes concepts like a 2H wielding Sorcerer hard to fulfil.

• Unchecked DEX applicability: While STR saves are rare and STR checks uncommon at best, DEX-based skills and tools are widely applicable and DEX saves are largely commonplace.

What is PF2E doing well?

I don't believe PF2E is as susceptible to this Dichotomy as 5E, because it has a few advancements over it, as noted below:

• Easy Encumbrance: Let's not kid ourselves – it's likely not going to be widely applied. But ease to calculate is probably going to come in handy. That being said, I do still wonder if Encumbrance will be fungible.

• Higher scaling weapon dice and broad weapon types: This should help out give STR-builds more identity and so on, but here's something to keep in mind – if STR's main claim is that a +5 greatsword deals 5d12 vs a +5 rapier dealing 5d8 (to oversimplify things), that's still just a minute dimension of the game, whereas DEX is affecting lots of subsystems. It didn't work in 5E, and wouldn't work in another system.

What is exposing PF2E?

Now, while some things may safeguard this new system from this pitfall, there are some worrying things that give me pause:

• Armor is still very punishing: Armor is still costly, imposes ACP, takes really long to don, and yes, armor requires a hefty proficiency.

• DEX-to-damage is a thing: There's no penalty for DEX builds dumping STR, but there's equally no reward for boosting STR. It'd be nice if Finesse Striker and similar features still factored in STR somehow.

• Pushing Athletics to work for maneuvers means curtailing narrative power due to skill feats: Well, that. I can't be great at maneuvers without sacrificing Skill Feats and Training I could have used to expressed my character in roleplaying terms and such.

• STR doesn't contribute defensively: At least 5E had the rare STR check, but it seems like STR doesn't even contribute to Shield Block hardness or the effectiveness of armor.

What would I like to see in PF2E

Well, if eliminating Finesse Striker is off the table (which I think would be the most elegant solution), I think the following could be considered:

• Increase baseline ACPs, and have STR reduce ACP across the board. This would make DEX builds more interested in STR, and would allow STR builds to use DEX skills effectively.

• Add STR to Shield Hardness/Dents: It'd make sense that if your body is allowed to take some of the recoil, then your shield should suffer less. Perhaps allowing STR to ignore Dents somehow, or increase Hardness, that would be a fun way to work around it.

• Make maneuvers Attack-based: Disentagle Maneuvers from skills. Let STR-characters have more room for expression while maintaining combat versatility.

• Rethink armor proficiency: Just gonna leave this out here.

What's the point of Constitution?

Here's a stat that seems unnecessary. It's the reward for players who overspecialize and ignore other stats – and it's not that great at that either, particularly in a system with limited attributes as this.

The retroactive gaining of HP when CON is boosted seems like antiquated design.

Fortitude saves are a thing, but wouldn't it be easier to tie Fortitude with Strength? I know that being buff doesn't make your immune system better, but, kept within the realms of common expectations, the hale and hearty usually have a good deal of strength too.

Dunno, just seems to me like there's not much there for CON to do.

If no, then why do we need an alignment restriction?

Feels like needlessly tying yourself up on building up a core class. You could use it to make NG, CE, etc. Paladins too.

Yes, this is the 5E treatment, which has some issues – namely, dealing Radiant damage even with Evil Paladins – but nothing that couldn't be solved with the right mechanics and a thesaurus to rename everything that has been slapped with "..of Justice".

I know there's another discussion about the identity of Monks ongoing, but I think it is focused on the Western vs. Eastern axis, to its detriment. I will ask of anyone posting here to refrain from those matters, and take them to that thread.

It is no secret that the Monk has been my favorite class for a while. The Unchained Monk was a breath of fresh air, but only in mechanical terms. Thematically, I think an exploration and "unchaining" of the Monk mechanical-fantasy core is yet to be undertaken.

I propose that there is a core concept that encompasses the identity of the Monk, and that is as follows:

The Monk is a mystic warrior.

With that being said, here are the things that I don't consider to be part of the identity of the Monk, and thus I don't consider to be necessary to show as core features.

1. Monks don't need have to be masters of unarmed combat.

While they certainly should have the possibility to be exceptional at this, the core concept does not require monks to be necessarily "martial artists." That role, in my opinion, is best left to Fighters.

Fighters represent the culmination of martial mastery. Why would they be barred from being the mundane exemplars of unarmed combat, just because it's a province traditionally associated with Monks?

I think that the Monk class should not be home to the close-quarters action movie stars, and I think the Fighter class should have venues to be competitive in that aspect.

Likewise, the Monk class should have options to ignore unarmed combat and focus on other types of weaponry.

However, the major consideration here is that the Monk, whichever fighting style they choose, are able to combine it with the use of mystical arts.

2. Monks don't have to be Wisdom-based.

I consider that tying the Monks to a mental attribute for their mystical art is a core aspect of the theme – as they walk the line between martial combat and the occult.

But tying their mystic connection strictly to Wisdom is unnecessary.

This may be a little too much for the stated goals of ease of character creation, but allowing the Monks access to mystical powers through study and intellect, as well as through sheer force of personality, does nothing to diminish the core concept.

3. Finally, Monks don't have to be Lawful.

I'll be shorter here, because I believe Paizo is moving away from this type of alignment restrictions, as seen in the Barbarian. But one's ability to entangle oneself with a mystical source of power does not necessarily have to be through Discipline.

INT/CHA Monks have existed in many systems through archetypes – why not make them official from the get go?

ok so I will have issues tracking the 3/1 rage round structure, so what about a class feature that grants extra damage as you go further in your turns?

something that adds 2 damage first turn, 4 on the second, 6 on the last?

that gives me a small motivation to keep track for my own sake

It was previewed that Paladins retain the alignment restriction in their creation. I thought this was a relatively curious choice, but one I can accept thematically to an extent.

However, I fear the alignment restrictions will remain for both Barbarians and Monks, and I think this would be to the detriment of the game.

I will expand as follows, for each case:

Lawful Barbarians:

It is my understanding that Barbarians are chaotic for two reasons: their tribalism, and their willingness to surrender to their primal instincts.

The former is the easiest one to unpack and dismiss. Tribalism is seen as isolationist and individualist, thus chaotic. But this is, in the most part, a fetished notion by civilized societies – the whole notion that our society's communalism and altruism bring about weakness, while tribal peoples can be closer to base emotions due to their individualism is... uh... problematic. So let's do our work and toss it aside.

Now, there's the second component to this – that Barbarians are barred from Lawfulness because of the inherent chaos of the act of raging.

My problem with this idea is the cut-off point. Emotions aren't antithetical to lawfulness. A Paladin's fervor is a similar experience – they submit to the glory of a pure, unadulterated beatific vision. How is that not ecstasy for the Paladin? How is it not a paroxysm of emotion to be a vessel of magnificence?

Both the Barbarian and the Paladin choose to submit to different powers. The Paladin has faith in that power, and believes that power to have an intelligence and reason, yes, but the Barbarian knows the power they submit to as well. Barbarians know its reasons, but the Lawful Barbarian could use this power as a tool to achieve something else.

To illustrate the idea of Lawful Barbarians, consider the samurai. Honorable, loyal, submissive to higher powers. But the fantasy of the samurai is deeply connected with the idea they are able to exert themselves beyond the limits of common human capacity out of sheer mettle.

I'll expand on Chaotic Monks if there's any traction to this thread :P

One of my pet peeves of many systems is how armor works. Particularly, that a lot of lightly-armored characters are relegated to having ungodly high DEX if they intend to survive in combat, whereas that might not always be the case in fantasy in general.

For that reason, I've always liked this gem from the Iroran Paladin:

At 1st level, when wearing light or no armor and not using a shield, an Iroran paladin adds 1 point of his Charisma bonus (if any) per class level to his Dexterity bonus to his Armor Class. If he is caught flat-footed or otherwise denied his Dexterity bonus, he also loses this bonus. This ability replaces his proficiency with medium armor, heavy armor, and shields.

It's simple enough – pile up your DEX + CHA mods and then apply an armor's Max Dexterity.

Suddenly, your Iroran Paladin is free to go with high STR, high CHA, and not-terrible DEX, and they can waltz around with light armor without being tied down to the almighty DEX.

You still can't dump DEX, and you don't particularly benefit from piling up on CHA + DEX together, because you'll eventually hit light armor Max DEX cap with no discernible benefit other than touch AC.

For PF2, I still need to get more acquainted with how stat priority and armor mechanics will work.

But keeping options like this provides a great deal of breathing space for designing unique characters.

I took a break from Pathfinder for a bit, and when I came back, I discovered Constructed Pugilist was a thing.

And it was even PFS legal!

Now, excuse my French, but holy cannoli this archetype. It does this:

1. Enables Brawler to scale competitively since it removes the need for Amulet of Mighty Fists and allows them to get Amulet of Natural Armor. This has been a longstanding balance issue with defensive Brawlers, and the extra wealth comes in super handy.

2. Enables crit-based unarmed builds with Vicious Blades to hit 17-20 crit range with Improved Critical. We're talking about a possible crit build on a class with access to Critical Mastery and a lot of swings to boot. This is pretty damn nice.

Before this archetype, I literally had no interest in the Brawler as an unarmed class, as it was outgunned by every other class and Outslug Style seemed like the only good choice. But this opens up all sorts of unarmed possibilities.

Just wondering.

Most of the creatures I saw in the First Contact or in PFScenarios seem to have overinflated attack bonuses that don't really match their level, so I was unsure if it fits.

Any fun ideas on stuff to do with a Halcyon Druid in an intrigue campaign?

Fun Wizard spells to nab, feat-lines to focus on, and so forth?

Thinking about going with a Powerful Presence Human, aiming for Fey Spell Lore but not sure if there are other high-CHA prereq feats that are worth picking up.

Nameless One looks fun, but the feat-line doesn't have many exciting things going for it.