Snes's page

5) New Doctrine: Also, only having two subclasses seems weak for the Cleric, especially when every other class that has subclasses has at least 3. I’ve seen a lot of people begging for a scaled fist doctrine, and I can ge behind that. Have the warpriest’s holy symbol provide the same benefits as the dragon disciple’s ‘scales of the dragon,’ and have them treat their favored weapon as if it was unarmed strike . . . and you are off to the races.

1dM has a video that presents the argument that the design space for cleric doctrines is very small, and may already be full. He argues that the warpriest doctrine was added specifically to appease playtest players who wanted a more combat-focused build for their clerics, and that the class as a whole wasn't designed with the idea that it could expand out into multiple sub-classes.

So I agree that the +2-1+Free spread did edge a lot of ancestry/class combinations out of the realm of optimization, including ones that made sense on the surface (dwarf bard, catfolk cleric, elf champion, gnoll druid, lizardfolk witch). However, I also see the point of people who appreciated the potential ancestry-coded flaws provided for worldbuilding and roleplay opportunities.

Here's an idea I had to compromise the two positions: during character creation, each player always assigns two free boosts. But, before they do, they have the option of first taking a set boost and a set flaw specific to their ancestry. This represents the average case for that ancestry, but with the acknowledgement that there are plenty of people at the edges of the bell curve that don't fit the average case, especially among adventurers.

Elves for example could get +Dex-Con. So if I wanted the typical lithe archer, I could go +Dex+Wis+Int-Con and be perfectly happy fitting the archetype. Or, if I wanted to break the mold and go for a front-line barbarian, I could forgo the preset stats and put my two free boosts into +Str+Con, trading one fewer boost for zero flaws.

You could even use this feature to tailor some ancestries to particular regions. A character guide could contain a line like "Goblin from this region have the optional starting ability scores of +Cha-Con instead of +Cha-Wis to reflect the highly spiritual goblin tribes found here."

]The Eidolon that the Summoner summons.

Nobody cares that the summoner summons an eidolon, they care that the summoner doesn't summon other things.

You missed my point.

Summoners summon.

Someone coming from P1 and going “ oh they had a pool for summon spells that lasted longer than normal in P1 so they’ll surely have it in P2” is an assumption and failure on their part, not on the name of the class.

In P1, just like P2, the main thing of the Summoner is the Eidolon. Guessing they have that would have some base. Assuming any other class abilities directly carried over exactly into the new edition is just that, an assumption. And a bad one at that.

A lot of people assumed that a new class called "summoner" being introduced in a game that already has a mechanic called "summoning" would be naturally good at that mechanic. It's like if they added class called "illusionist" that used Penn & Teller-style slight of hand tricks instead of illusion magic.

The "Sike You Thought" style of dismissing player assumptions does not lead to an enjoyable play experience for anyone other than you. Generally speaking, it is the developer's job to correctly set player expectations, or at the very least to not set up false expectations whenever possible.

People bringing up different potential names for a class in construction is fine.

Demanding it not be called Summoner anymore because it didn't meet your specific criteria on what a Summoner from this or other media is got old real fast.

This isn't for my benefit. I'm making this suggestion on behalf of everyone frustrated with the lack of free summon spells included in the class, which is a clear departure from the class' 1e design. "The summoner is called 'The Summoner,' therefore it should be the best at summoning" was a common refrain all through the playtest, up to and including this very discussion thread. Changing the name adjusts player expectations so they don't go in looking for class features that aren't there.

Keep in mind, in the 1st edition, your druid was normally, a reasonably strong spell caster, that had an animal companion, and could transform themselves into an animal as well, pretty much out of the box.

In second edition, these are all paths you can choose, with some potential to dabble between them a bit if you prefer.

We have the same situation here, I think. Aspect that were just baseline as part of the Summoner, have become Paths that you choose, no doubt for a combination of balance and choice metering. Rather than having a summoner with plenty of summons, generally stronger than a wizards, plus a companion creature stronger than you average companion (and likely more versatile), they are taking what they felt was the most iconic part of the summoner and making it the main thing. Yes, perhaps the 'master summoner' will eventually come out,potentially replacing the Eidolon with a font of summoning spells, and the ability to boost them similar to how a regular summoner boosts their Eidolon.

An option for a summoner to lose their eidolon so they can get a bunch of summon spells makes about as much sense as an option for an oracle to lose their mystery so they can get a bunch of divination spells.

Again, I feel that this wouldn't be nearly as much of an issue with people if they had called the class something else. Later down the line they could introduce a summoner archetype that any spellcaster could take that gives them access to bonus summon spells, as well as extra features for summoned minions.

For real though, the lack of a universal Summon Creature Font (or whatever they might have called it) that doesn't eat into their 4 daily Spell Slots is a crippling blow, we can only hope that this is added again with the full release.

Wizards, Sorcerers, Druids, Clerics, Bards, and Witches should NOT be able to use Summon X more times a day than a Summoner (even after considering they have a permanent Eidolon that's slightly more powerful than an Animal Companion), it just makes no sense at all.

I'll reiterate what I said during the playtest: the class should be given a new name to avoid this kind of expectation.

Could somebody explain to me what Vancian casting is and why it's disliked? I have like no frame of reference for this topic.

The mammoth that I'd most like to see killed is the six ability score paradigm. Traditionally, Dexterity and Constitution are on-average the most valuable scores, while Charisma is frequently the least valuable. You'll notice that there are currently no PF2 ancestries that feature a Dex flaw. I'm in favor of splitting Dex into two skills (one for manual dexterity, the other for agility and balance), and either combining Con with another ability or making it separate from the ability score system entirely.

The odd thing to me is the Survival skill. Since Nature is a main skill in PF2, why not fold Survival into it? They're both Wisdom-based and the feats that aren't inherently Nature themed are still mostly used in nature, but usable in cities. If Nature were still Int, the divide would make sense.

I suspect a part of that is because they wanted each of the magic traditions to have a dedicated skill that wasn't used for much outside of Recall Knowledge rolls and the like. Combining Nature and Survival means Nature is significantly more valuable of a skill than Arcana, Occultism, and Religion.

Emphasis mine.

The problem with a summonless summoner, is all your left with is "Eidolon-Bro the class", which isn't a bad thing necessarily. But Galorian (and hence the mechanics built around it) is a very humanoid-centric setting (as compared to something like Starfinder.) In such a humanoid-centric setting and rules, the answer to the question of "How and where did you find that thing?" has to be either "I tamed it." or "I summoned it."

If your answer is the former, you're basically a ranger or druid with an Animal Companion (and we have rules for those). And if your answer is the latter, the question then becomes "How?"

"I invoke it," says the invoker. Or "I call it," says the caller. There are plenty of things you could name the class to refer specifically to the eidolon that don't set up the expectation of bonus summon spells.

That's what I'm saying; "summoning" is not "Summoning", but "Summoning" is "summoning". That is the basis of this entire thread. That is the problem. The word has two different meanings here.

Think if summoning were animals and Summoning were dogs, then the Eidolon is a tiger. It is not a dog, but is an animal. Roughly half this thread is people reading Summoner as the Dogger and being confused as to why it uses a tiger and why some people think tigers are dogs, and the other half is reading it as Animaler and being confused as to why some people don't think tigers are animals.

The basis of this entire thread is that I've heard a lot of people say that the summoner needs more summoning because it doesn't feel enough like the summoner, to which I respond, I don't want more summoning, so maybe it shouldn't be the summoner anymore.

Then everyone went off on a 100-comment debate about what "manifest" means.

Periodic Reminder - the Playtest Summoner left out Summoning related class features, intentionally, to focus testing on the Eidolon since Paizo already knows how Summoning functions.

It should not be taken as implying that the final class will not have additional support for Summoning.

I've seen this asserted multiple times, but as yet nobody has cited an actual source from the designers that this was their plan all along.

It would make sense if it was inside your head, as it were. There's a lot of that in fiction: a powerful being taking residence inside a character's mind, commenting on what happens and engaging in conversations that seem one-way to anyone watching them.

I don't care if the summoner summons their eidolon or manifests them or whatever. The issue is that by calling the class "summoner" players expect them to be the best class at all summoning magic, just like how the investigator is the best at investigating.

It should not be called something else.... they just need to bolt on the rest of the Class Features that they seem to have intentionally left OFF the Playtest that they felt are in a good-way in order to make them actually fulfill the role they're supposed to play, namely, actually Summoning things.

The Summoning Font is missing, I am confident by-design as I suspect what Paizo needed was for us to test Chassis of the Eidolon only without any meaningful customization. The Font and Evolution Customization are almost certainly done and being tested internally since what they really needed help with was to find out how the Action Economy works and how well people liked the new Subtype-Choice system that's akin to the Unchained Eidolon but without any bells or whistles.

It's possible your suspicions are correct, but I'd still really like to see a source for this myself.

No. The class has the iconic class feature that matches the 1E summoner in the Eidolon, and the class essentially has all the same core themes.

Nothing significant changed because of the action to call your eidolon being named "Manifest", and the shared hp and actions are essentially the exact same narrative concept as the original life link.

This doesn't actually address my points. The only change I think is significant enough to warrant a new name is the lack of innate summon monster spells, which I am totally fine with. I think the class is better without them, but if they go that direction, they should drop the name to better set player expectations.

If you're arguing that the class should keep the same name only because that's what it was called in 1e, to that I say that there is president, your honor. The paladin was expanded in scope and renamed as the champion. By that same token, the summoner can be contracted in scope and renamed as the invoker.

Plus, the class is almost certain to have additional summoning support on launch - as such abilities were intentionally excluded from the playtest due to them being known qualities.

I'm going to need a source for this. It seems unlikely that they would cut a significant 1e class feature from 1e from the playtest.

The fact that the class isn't a carbon copy mechanically of the 1E summoner doesn't mean it doesn't have the exact same thematic bones - you just can't look at mechanics exclusively.

I don't understand this line. Can you rephrase this for me?

I've thrown this idea out there in a couple of places and I didn't see a dedicated threat to discuss it. I think the class should be renamed in the final product.

A lot of people seem really dissatisfied with the lack of dedicated summoning abilities in the playtest summoner. I've heard it suggested in multiple discussion threads that they should get some kind of sommon monster focus spell, or even a "summon font" in-line with the divine font clerics have. Personally I'm against this idea because I think it eats up too much design space that I'd like to see reserved for the most interesting aspect of the class: the unique bond with the eidolon.

I do not blame people for coming away with this impression, because it makes sense. The class is called "the summoner," so why do I only get to summon one thing? Therefore, I propose a simple solution to this problem: don't call the class the summoner. I've heard suggestions for alternative names in the past, such as "binder" or "caller" or, my personal favorite, "invoker."

Mechanically, this would mean very little. I like that there are summoner class feats that play well with spells that summon creatures for those who like that kind of playstyle. I just think that being good at summoning creatures other than their eidolon should be something players should have to invest in instead of just getting for free as a consequence of the class' name.

Follow-up idea: what if "summoner" was a general archetype that any spellcasting class could take to get the kind of benefits players want from the "summoner" class?

I like this a lot. I especially like the effects of the curse, very thematic.

I do have a concern about the mystery benefit. Counting telekinetic projectile, oracles only have four damaging cantrips: daze (which doesn't work int he mindless), chill touch (which doesn't work on the undead), and divine lance (which doesn't work on creatures opposed to your god's alignment). It just feels really limiting. Also converting half the damage to a different type feels like a slightly annoying amount of bookwork, but that could just be me.

This is also the only mystery benefit that requires you to be under the effects of your curse to get the full benefit. One bonus damage is fine at low levels, but it'd be really nice if it scaled naturally and was disconnected from the curse.

One final note: the damage on cataclysm (or whatever the spell winds up being named) feels low, and only gaining 1d6 every two levels is not a lot.

Its come up because its represented by a feat in the playtest - which seems to indicate developer interest in the concept at this point, as opposed to down the road.

Sure, but fans of sythesism seem unhappy with how it was presented. It being a class feat that any summoner can take puts limits over how strong it can be. Making it a class archetype brings a higher level of influence over base class features, like how manifesting the eidolon works. I think it's better to wait until it can be done right instead of rushing it out so players can have it asap.

Well a feat chain definitely wouldn't be enough to bring Synthesist to where it should be, but i understand what you mean.

I don't think anybody is asking for all the design space to go to synthesist, only that what synthesist is in the playtest is very disappointing and that it does not reflect the desired playstyle for what people feel a synthesist should be, that is more similar to 1e Synthesist.

Synthesist was a VERY popular archetype in 1e that is very near and dear to many people so the fact a lot of the forums is threads, posts, and comments like "Synthesist needs help" is more just to do with how popular Synthesist really is.

Here's a question: if synthesist was an archetype in the past, why are people pushing for it to be a base class option now? Wouldn't it be more prudent to add it as a class archetype, either in this book or in a future one?

If the summoner has negative healing (due to being a dhampir, for example) and someone casts a one-action heal on the eidolon, what happens?

Oh one other thing I forgot to add!

"Select a resistance from this list (B/S/P/acid/electricity/fire/cold/sonic/negative)

Select a weakness from this list
(B/S/P/acid/electricity/fire/cold/sonic/negative)
Each one is equal to 5 or half your Eidolons level. Whichever is greater."

This has precedence as seen with Tempest Oracle granting 5 fire resistance, 5 electricity weakness right out the gate at level 1.

Tempest oracles only get that weakness and resistance when under the moderate effects of their curse, not all the time. If you give players too many free customization options, especially ones that aren't thematically tied together, you wind up with players only looking to min-max. Every eidolon will have slashing resistance 5, sonic weakness 5. Or as it's also known, slashing resistance 5.

But it can be both. Easily. There currently isn't a Class for 'be a Dragon', but it would be casually easy to make Summoner that Class with only a few very minor rules tweaks, and that being the case, why not do it?

Your vision of the Class would still be supported and other people would also be able to have theirs. Why must your version be the One True Version?

I'm opposed to summoner as a "you turn into a dragon" class because I feel that vision usurps the identity of the eidolon. Your eidolon is no longer an entity in its own right, it's just a suit you put on and take off. I'm more more in favor of "you can summon a dragon and also you can turn into that dragon." Save turning into other creatures for another class where that's the main focus.

I like the synthesis feat because it makes synthesis summoning optional. The feat doesn't need to be published as-is, it can be buffed or changed to fit the needs of the fantasy. If players are dead-set on synthesis manifesting being the only option for a dedicated synthesis summoner, then maybe the whole thing should be cut from the base class and made a class archetype, either in this book or a later one.

Sure, but in comparison to Oracle Mysteries or Sorcerer Bloodlines, type of Eidolon currently has a very small impact. It determines Spell List, two skills, and literally nothing else on the Summoner, and only a few specific abilities on the Eidolon itself. There's plenty of room for another choice there.

I'm totally fine with the final version of eidolons having more benefits and customization options. Some options include giving the summoner a unique focus spell, a bonus cantrip, or a special ability akin to blood magic or mystery benefits.

My problem is that most of the "customization" suggestions I've seen involve overhauling major features of the class (cutting spellcasting, changing manifesting your eidolon works, removing the eidolon entirely in favor of a bunch of summon spells). If those kind of options are ever presented, I think they're best saved for class archetypes.

And it also has been stated why this isn't a satisfying solution. Let's take the synthesis summoner for example :

It currently cost you a level 1 feat and isn't a good/viable combat option among other things. To make it a great combat option, it would require a few feats at least. This means that if you want to play a synthesis summoner and you don't really care about the standard eidolon, then you're forced to either play a gimped character or in a way you don't want to play and later on, you get a viable character, but with a gimped feat progression (because of feat taxes) and a bunch of abilities that you won't use at all...

If you don't care about the standard eidolon, why are you playing a summoner? Summoners are the "conjures a powerful unique ally" class, not the "turns into a dragon/angel/ghost/beast" class.

Yeah, Wizards get both a Thesis and a School. I think Summoners getting both an Eidolon Type and a Class Path is entirely reasonable.

Apples to oranges. Sorcerers don't get an option to completely change how their bloodline spells manifest, nor do oracles get the option to significantly alter the way curses work. Not all class options are equally impactful; just because one class gets two lower-impact options doesn't mean all classes are entitled to two options.

Or just have different paths for different types of summoners as has been suggested before.

It seems clear to me that the different eidolons are intended to be the different paths for the class. They're analogous to sorcerer bloodlines or witch patrons. Different paths beyond that point should be relegated to feat trees.

2. Summoners don't actually summon anything. There's a bit of Feat support, but with only four spells a day, and likewise only four in your repertoire, I'm not even sure the Feats are really worth it. Some inherent Summon ability, perhaps as a pool like Clerics have for Heal or Harm seems like it would be a good option. This is a power up, but frankly not a very big one given the action economy...

I'm against this idea, at least as far as comparing it to clerics' divine font. If summmoners get do get bonus summon spells, I really think they should be gated behind a feat, not built-in as a class feature.

I've said this before, but I think keeping the name "summoner" was a mistake. Binder, invoker, caller, eidolist... anything that doesn't set up the expectation that conventional minion summoning is their modus operandi.

Make subclasses like Rogues Racket, Cleric Doctrine, Barbarian Instinct, Druid Order.

Some possible options:
Transmogrifionist - Change the Eidolon to adapt quickly
Synthetist - Move around in the fused with the eidolon
Broodmother - Multiple weaker eidolons that can act together to accomplish something
Caller - Less focused on the eidolon, more focused on summons.

Summoner already has subclasses: the different eidolons. Same way witches have lessons, sorcerers have bloodlines, and oracles have mysteries.

Basically thread title. 4 spells known total and you have to choose summon x feels extremely weird for the class called the Summoner.

It's for exactly this reason that I supported the idea of changing the name of the class to something like "binder" or "invoker." The focus of the class should be on the unique nature of the eidolon. That's the cool, unique thing summoners bring to the table, not their ability to constantly summon minions. Those two class features always felt very disconnected.

I like the idea of there being feats that make summoning creatures better to appeal to players who like that playstyle. I don't like the idea of summoners getting extra access to summon spells just because it's in the name.

Misfire should be there. It's always been a problem with guns, and still is today.

I don't see how it's any more of a problem than swords getting dull or bowstrings snapping, two other real-world weapon malfunctions that the rules of the game completely ignore.

If misfires exist in any capacity (and I don't think they should), they should be only be a factor when the person using the firearm is untrained with them. If someone builds their character to use guns, their guns shouldn't randomly break in their hands. As I've pointed out before, casters no longer have to make concentration checks to see if they randomly loose their spells. The same courtesy should be applied to firearms.

I would make that an action.

"If your last action was a Strike with a Critical hit"... Or maybe 2 actions.

Either way, not a simple add on.

A triggered action doesn't really make sense. If anything I'd make the feat an action that includes the attack. Again, I want this to work with ranged attacks as well as melee.

I figured that it had enough boxes you had to check to make it fair as a freebie: it has to be a critical hit, it has to be a nonlethal attack, and it has to deal bludgeoning damage. There are comparable feats that offer similar straight-upgrade effects.

My feat still requires players to make an attack roll first, so it's not like it's entirely outside the player's hands. I decided to make it not an action so it could potentially work with any source of bludgeoning damage. I wanted to leave the option open for players to make amusing and clever plays like taking out a guard with a thrown rock.

How does this look?

Knock-Out Blow Feat ??

[Incapacitation]
-----
You can render a foe unconscious with a concussive blow to the head. When you critically hit with a a nonlethal attack, if your attack dealt bludgeoning damage, the target attempts a Fortitude save against your class DC with the following effects.

Critical Success The target is unaffected and is temporarily immune for 1 minute.
Failure The target is stunned 1.
Critical Failure The target falls unconscious for 1 minute.

Invictus Novo wrote:

...

Occultist - Archetype - they always came across as rather gimmicky to me and I think they would make a good Archetype for a lot of 2e classes
...
P.S. please don't hate me if I didn't do your favorite class justice :)

I hate you.

;)

What is an occultist to you? I'm trying to wrap my head around the concept. If it really can be summed up as "They collect magical trinkets that give them spells" then it's entirely possible that it could work as an archetype instead of a full class.

Nope, for jurassik park example...i'm pretty sure the childrens are not hidden but they are undetected. The raptors use scent as imprecise sense but the children are using stealth.

I am not native English but for me "hidden" should also mean that the enemy does not know your position, perhaps for this reason it causes confusion. For me when someone knows the position you have to use "detected" the exact opposite of the hidden meaning.

That's a fair interpretation of the word. The problem is, if the condition we currently call undetected was renamed to hidden, then what do we name the condition we currently call hidden?

One reason they might have gone with the names they did is so that the result of successfully performing the Hide action is that you become hidden.

The problem is that there aren't two English words that can easily differentiate between "a creature knows you are present but doesn't know where you are" and "a creature knows where you are but can't perceive you directly." They went with undetected and hidden, but honestly hidden could have worked for either one of them.

Considering how distinct all the different geniekin are, I presume that there will be different versatile heritages for each of them.

That said, I was rather disappointed by how they handled versatile heritages in the APG. When the book dropped, I was not looking forward to choosing between low light vision, low light vision, low light vision, low light vision, and low light vision, with all additional customization options gated behind an ancestry feat.

I would have preferred it if the versatile heritages gave your the option to take any lineage feat for that heritage as a bonus feat or take improved vision.

I don't get why not having a 10th level spell slot is considered a balancing factor. How many games actually get to the point where that's relevant?

Sauce987654321 wrote:

It could be something like gaining a bonus against targets wearing manufactured non-magical armor equal to their armor bonus

How do you tell which monsters have protective exterior armor?

It could be roughly determined from the monsters' AC and reflex saves. Your AC is 10 plus your level plus your armor's AC bonus plus your proficiency with your armor plus your dexterity modifier. Take out the armor's AC bonus and you have 10 + level + dex mod + armor proficiency. If we assume that a monster's armor proficiency is roughly equal to its proficiency at reflex saves, then that's basically the same thing.

Add 10 a monster's reflex save modifier. If that number is greater than the monster's AC, then the difference is (again, roughly) how much benefit the monster is getting from whatever armor it has.

Not saying I like the idea of armor-piercing bullets, but it's feasible.

My thought process was that I was following the standard 2e feat trick of combining a group of actions into one activity that is one action less (draw weapon + move to enemy + attack + keep moving), but I sort of botched it by only letting you move up to one Speed total. I also completely forgot that the Samurai Dedication would almost certainly come with Quick Draw, compared to which Lightning Draw is slightly better (I'm pretty sure Quick Draw still triggers reactions) and slightly worse (you can Quick Draw any weapon).

Version 0.2

Lightning Draw [A][A] Feat 8

[Archetype][Open]
Archetype Samurai
Prerequisites Samurai Dedication
Requirements You have a sword that isn't drawn and at least one hand free.
-----
You make a lunging attack as you draw your sword in one swift motion. Stride up to your Speed. At any point during this movement, you can Interact to draw a sword and make one melee Strike with it. This Interact action doesn't trigger reactions, and the enemy is flat-footed against the Strike.

Lightning Draw [A][A][A] Feat 6

[Archetype]
Archetype Samurai
Prerequisites Samurai Dedication
Requirements You have a sword that isn't drawn.
-----
You make a lunging attack as you draw your sword in one swift motion. Stride up to your Speed. At any point during this movement, you can Interact to draw a sword and make one melee Strike with it. This Interact action doesn't trigger reactions.

If you're 12th level, you can then Interact to stow that sword as a free action.

Since we're generally discussing Psychic classes now, what about the Mesmerist? Class Archetype, Bardic Muse, different class entirely with new mechanics, what?

I've only ever read the class, so I have no particular attachment to it, but I'm curious what others think.

My thought was that multiple occult classes (psychic, mesmerist, possibly spiritualist) could be combined into one class with different disciplines. Just like druids pick an order to focus on one area of nature, this class pick a discipline to focus on one mental ability. Telekinesis, mind reading, hypnotism, maybe even communing with the dead could all be areas of focus.

You could also recreate psychic magic's emotion and thought components with a metamagic action or feat that replace any verbal and somatic components of a spell with "phrenic components" or something that lets them cast spells while remaining perfectly still and silent.

This already exists within the rules. There's an action called "Ready" that lets you prepare a single action or free action to do outside of your turn in response to a defined trigger.

One thing that I found disappointing was the fact that the heritage feat for all the versatile ancestries was low-light vision across the board. I was hoping for some more unique benefits for the different ancestries.

The prevailing theory is that it'll be a Class Archetype for Cleric.

Seems like a big waste to me. I think there's plenty of thematic and mechanical distinction to the inquisitor to warrant its own class.

My question is if the concept is narrow enough to be expressed in 3-6 feats spread out over 10-14 levels. A vigilante can; it is essentially the alternate identity and stuff you tack onto that. The Cavalier I'd argue was not faithfully transported if the final version greatly resembles the Playtest archetype. You get an Order that does nothing, a horse you could have gotten from 4 other archetypes, and a banner (and not even any of the cool banner abilities). Hopefully a lot of the mechanics they left on the floor will be picked up by Champions or another class (or they figured out how to cram in at least some of the old orders).

What would you say is the threshold?

The threshold is pretty much the opposite of your concern: is the concept broad enough to have anywhere between forty and sixty feats exploring it? I'm currently on the fence about whether or not the shifter concept has that much depth. It's possible that it does. But when I look at the wild druidic order and see about half of the functions of the shifter class already available, it does make me wonder.

There's as much substance as Paizo's willing to put in. I think anything could be its own class if they felt like it.

As for niche fulfilment. So far, Archetypes have been pretty good at coming up with ways to alter or supplement your core class, but for someone who wants to play a dedicated shapeshifter, a fighter with a couple feats worth of shapeshifting benefits is not enough to fulfill the concept and runs into the same problem fighter/wizard does at trying to replace the magus in not coming online for a long time.

I think any can be turned into its own class, but that doesn't mean it should be turned into its own class. There's a threshold of mechanics that need to be crossed to justify an entire class, which has, in the past, lead to some classes having a lot of mechanical bloat.

This is especially a concern in 2e where a class is required to not only have defining mechanics, but also a few dozen feats going from first level all the way to 20th. I think that most of what I've seen people waning out of the shifter could be achieved by an archetype that grants benefits similar to those granted by the wild druidic order.

Sounds like Shifter multiclass dedication to me

The question is whether or not there's enough substance to the concept to justify it being its own class. Cavalier and vigilante have already gone down that route.

I thinknthst really depends on the gun. A pistol with a small calibre will work best at point blank. But a rifle with a large calbre can have a huge range and still penetrate armor.

How about Penetrate X. Treat target AC as two lower up to X range increments?

********************

Also, after thinking a while, there is no reason why bonus damage needs to be a dice. So how about Calibre X: On a success, add X damage to your roll, this bonus damage is multiplied on a crit. Or alternatively, the minimum damage per dice rolled is X when you roll for damage.

The first version would have Calibre 2 add 2 damage on a success and 4 on a crit success.
The second version would have Calibre 2 make it so your minimum rolled damage is 2. And if you get lesser striking, the minimum then becomes 4, etc.

I think that "deals more damage" traits like this really depend on what the design goal is for guns. Are they meant to be comparable to other ranged weapons in terms of lethality, or are they meant to be significantly stronger, requiring a heavier investment of feats and/or money to use properly?

Speaking of traits, in 1e shotgun-like weapons were given the scatter trait, which meant they attacked in a short-range cone, and a lot of homebrew 2e firearm rules I've seen have replicated that feature. I'm personally not a fan of this, as I don't think any gun has ever had a spread that wide or a range that short. Nobody ever fired a gun and hoped to hit everything directly in front of them. I think shotgun-type weapons should be single-target weapons with short range increments and maybe a trait like spread that reduces the attack roll penalty for firing beyond its range increment from -2 to -1.

I thought I was clear that Versatile and Skilled do fully apply to people outside the Eurocentric fantasy norm. Hunter-gatherers are skilled, priests with extracurricular skills are versatile. However, I don't think the presentation in P2 suggests that. I think it's clear that humans are "regular" and are considered versatile and skilled,, and I think that has a not-incidental connection to the trope white middle-class people are "regular" and are considered versatile and skilled. I think this is really even clearer when you contrast the Versatile heritage with the Quah Bond feat. Clearly, some humans are more versatile than others.

Humans get to be treated as the default because this game is exclusively played by humans. Assuming that everyone who plays the game is straight, white, male, or any other demographic is wrong because this game can and should be approachable to everyone. Seeing as we're all humans, I fail to see how making them the most versatile option is wrong because it reminds you of past decisions that were wrong.

I ran a 1e gunslinger from 1st till 12th level, and though I admittedly used just the relatively low misfire pistol, misfires didn't come up too much. Also, it didn't matter too much. You could have multiple guns plus quick draw, so when a misfire did occur, you could immediately mitigate it without even spending a grit point on quick clear.

That being said, misfire, and the chance of a gun explosion was a fundamental part of guns in 1e. Gunslingers were a little crazy in their willingness to use dangerous and unreliable weapons. I like that, and would not mind seeing some version of that in 2e.

If misfires rarely came up and were easily mitigated, I don't see how they could be called "fundamental." For the same reason spellcasters no longer have to make concentration checks to see if they randomly can't cast their spells, I don't think gunslingers should randomly have their weapons break.

The role of "half-crazy fighters using dangerous weapons" seems to have been usurped by alchemists. Gunslingers seem to be more along the lines of steely-eyed, tough-as-nails warriors who kill with precision.

What would a typical turn for a summoner look like? A typical turn for a fighter is some combination of Stride or Step, one or two Attack actions, and Raise Shield. For a spellcaster it's Stride or Step and two or three spellcasting actions, divided over one or two spells and/or cantrips. So what do summoners do? They have one action tied up in commanding their eidolon, which will probably use both its actions to move and attack or attack twice. What does the summoner do for their other two actions?