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If you look at the core classes, you notice a clear distinction in the kind of feats Martials and Casters get. Martials get feats that give more actions than they cost, eliminate MAP, or straight-up give you extra actions per round. In other words, Martials get feats which directly improve their power. Casters, however, tend to almost exclusively get feats that provide more utility, often by providing more spell slots, or focus spells, but these don't actually change how much damage a caster can deal in a round. Very rarely do casters get extra raw power or action economy. The few exceptions here are Quickened Spell, which is limited to once per day, and Effortless Concentration.

If you look at the Magus's feats, you can clearly see that the devs are working under the caster paradigm when designing these feats. Where a Fighter gets Agile Grace, lowering their MAP with agile weapons across the board, or Paragon's Guard, letting them use Raise a Shield for free every round, the Magus gets the equivalent of Quickened Spell, letting them use Striking Spell for one less action, once per day.

I really think the devs should be working under the Martial paradigm for the Magus. Give us a level 12 feat that lets the Magus cast Shield or Raise a Tome once per round for free. Give us a combat maneuver to reduce the target's saving throws, like the Swashbuckler's Bon Mot. Give us a cool reaction attack feat like every single other Martial class gets. Give us something new on par with all the cool stuff other Martial classes get.

I noticed a strong combo with Aggressive Block + Flinging Shove. If there's an opponent within 10 feet of a precipice, you intentionally provoke an attack of opportunity from them, then when they hit you, you shield block, and Aggressive Block, to automatically succeed at pushing them over the edge. Because they just used their reaction, they won't have a reaction free to grab the ledge, and will fall all the way down.

However, this hinges on you being hit. Is there any way to ensure that your opponent lands their hit? Can you choose to drop your guard and take a hit?

Let's say you have Quick Climb, giving you a climb speed equal to your land speed, and you put on your Boots of Speed. The Boots of Speed give +5 movement speed to your land and climb speeds. Does that mean you get a total of +10 ft to your climb speed?

Breaking it down, you get a +5 foot land speed, except your land speed already defines your climb speed, so your climb speed goes up implicitly. When the boots of speed then give a +5 foot climb speed on top of that, your climb speed ends up 10 feet faster than when you started.

The playtest doc's wording says that the familiar is the one learning new spells. Now, the witch can cast those spells through the familiar, but I don't see anything in the rules prohibiting the familiar itself from casting spells it knows.

Right now the multiclass caster rules are in an awkard place where they simultaneously feel weak, but are actually quite powerful. For example, with just two class feats, you unlock spells up to 3rd level, giving you spells like Haste and Fireball, but at the same time, it doesn't feel like you're playing a proper gish because you only get one spell of each level. I think we can use this observation as a basis to rebalance things so that early level multiclass casters are mechanically weaker in the short-term, but feel better for the person playing them.

For example, what if, instead of getting a spell of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level for your Basic Spellcasting feat, you got three 1st level spells, and one 2nd level spell? Personally, when I go for a Gish character, I'm looking for synergistic buffs, utility spells, and situational attacks to add variety. Getting those extra 1st level spells would give some room for that variety, while at the same time, probably being mechanically weaker than a well-placed fireball that wipes out the room.

The next pain point for multiclass casters is the dead levels. Specifically, the fact that the 8th level Breadth feat gives only a single 1st level spell for four levels, and there's no other progression. This means that you probably don't even take the Breadth feat until much later. This is where 3rd-level spell slots should go. I'd certainly pay a feat to make the jump to 3rd level spells, and it definitely feels better than paying a whole feat for a single 1st-level spell.

In light of these observations, I've created this mockup of an altered multiclass spell progression.

My goals were:

* Same highest-level spell progression
* Get lower-level spells faster, so you can hit the ground running.
* Feat costs shifted closer to the lower-levels to compensate.
* Fewer dead levels
* Close to the same end result at high levels

Criticism welcome.

So when you take the Leshy Familiar feat, your old familiar just gets up and leaves you. The first thing I thought of when I read that was the TunnelBear VPN Software uninstall screen. It's just a really awkward thing to happen, especially if you want your Witch's familiar to play an important part in their backstory, or their relationship with their patron.

Could we get an option for this feat, so that you can take it at 1st level, like an Archetype?

We've got a pretty good idea of the full caster formula so far. If you compare the starting class features of the Witch to the Wizard, they seem to line up pretty evenly, except one.

* Patron/Familiar <-> Arcane Thesis (Improved Familiar)
* First Lesson <-> Arcane School
* Spell slots and Cantrips are identical
* Cackle....Arcane Bond?

The one mechanical difference is that the Wizard gets some extra power and flexibility via Arcane Bond, while the Witch gets Cackle, which doesn't appear to have any mechanical benefit at 1st level. Given how closely the Witch matches the Wizard, this seems unintended.

The other main difference is fluff. It's not terribly clear how the Witch's patron choice might tie in with her personality and behavior. For example, with a Cleric, the descriptions of each god provides immediate inspiration for how a Cleric of that god might act. For the Witch, on the other hand, the there's not really any advice or suggestions on what the Patron might be like, and it's hard to be creative when staring at a blank canvas. For example, what does it mean for a deity to use a Witch rather than a Cleric? What kind of relationship is that? Also, why would a Witch with a divine patron share accoutrements and aesthetics such as Living Hair or Swamp Witch, with a Witch whose patron is fey? Are we to understand that all godlike beings agreed on a standard witch aesthetics template?

The fact that the patron is 100% up in the air also means that other class features can't play off the patron as much. For example, the Wizard's Arcane Bond changes when they choose Improved Familiar Thesis, and their School selection forces them to prepare spells of their chosen school. These tie-ins help differentiate individual wizards, constantly remind you of what Wizard you're playing, and ensure your character is always prepared to act out their specialty. The Witch's lessons here seem like the closest thing to this sort of flavor, but these themes aren't reinforced anywhere else in the class. A Sorcerer gets special class feats depending on their bloodline, but there's no class feat support for the Witch's patron at all.

The Fighter feat Aggressive Block lets you either shove an opponent, or make them flat-footed until the start of your next turn (their choice). However, since the enemy is only flat-footed until the START of your turn, you personally can't benefit from this, and if your turn is next, it will accomplish nothing at all.

It seems weird to me that a feat could have no effect, depending on initiative order. Is this a mistake?

https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=363

I'm looking at the proficiencies of a Warpriest cleric vs a Fighter, and it seems that in terms of raw stats, the fighter has +2~4 attack, and +1 AC (Heavy Armor) over a Cleric. That's not a very large gap, given all the spellcasting potential the cleric has. So makes me curious: what else does the Fighter get, that makes up for the lack of spellcasting? This is what I've found so far. Let me know if I missed anything.

* +2~4 Attack
* +1 AC (+3 AC at 17+)
* Attack of Opportunity
* Shield Block
* Incredible Initiative (level 7)
* A level 1 Class feat
* Two additional class feats, that they can change each day
* Reduce Frightened by one point
* About +2 Reflex
* About +2 Perception
* Slightly faster Fortitude saves
* Successful Will saves become crit successes, starting at Expert Proficiency. The Cleric waits until Master proficiency
* More flexibility for what weapon to use

Now that's a lot of stuff, and it certainly adds up, especially the three extra class feats, but I'm still not sure it adds up to Full Spellcasting, which, judging by the multiclassing rules, is worth in excess of 10 class feats. So the only place left for the Fighter to pull ahead of the Cleric, is in the quality of its class feats. Now Fighters do indeed get a lot of class feats that give you two actions for the price of one, or greatly mitigate MAP penalties. Casters on the other hand, don't tend to have class feats that boost their effectiveness so dramatically. So I'd like to know what you think. Do you think Fighters have higher quality class feats than casters? Is the grab-bag of goodies the Fighter chassis provides, on-par with full spellcasting?

Ruffians get the critical specialization effect once from their Racket, and again from Weapon Tricks. Does this mean they can apply the critical specialization effect twice on critical hits with a finesse/agile weapon?

While martials can get a decent amount of spellcasting if they spend all their class feats multiclassing, it's a buzzkill since you don't get any of your normal class feats. I think the current gish options don't have the right balance of spellcasting to martial that people are craving. Martials are too biased towards the martial side, while spellcasters are far in the other direction. I think there's a happy medium to be found, with less spellcasting than a pure caster, and less martial progression than a Fighter or a Champion.

To that end, if Paizo releases a half-caster class, what should their casting progression look like? Off the top of my head, I've been thinking of options like:

1. Same as Multiclass caster progression
3. Limited spell slot progression, but heavy use of Focus Points
4. Lots of spell slots, but they're low-level
5. Just use magic-themed at-will abilities a la the Warlock from 3.5.

How does Specialty Crafting work with a Staff of Healing? Is it woodworking because its base is made of wood? Is it Artistry because it's capped with jewel-encrusted gold ornaments? Would metal staves be covered by Blacksmithing? Could you conceivably make a metal Staff of Healing that is covered by Blacksmithing? Or does Specialty Crafting not apply, because it's a magic item?

I've seen people rate the +speed feats pretty highly, so I figured it'd be worth mentioning that a level 2 wand of Longstrider gives 8 hours of +10 speed (status bonus) every day, for a one-time cost of 160gp.

I love the Oath feats for their roleplay potential, but I absolutely abhor them as Class feats. For the same reason that skill feats were separated from general feats, I think that these Oath feats shouldn't be put up against class feats.

Now of course, the feats themselves are incredibly powerful when they come into play. If you're fighting vampires the whole campaign, then Shining Oath is nuts. But in most campaigns, where you're not focused on any particular enemy type, you end up with a situation where 90% of the time the feat is useless, and 10% of the time, you're slicing your way through enemies like butter.

I don't think that's the way to approach situational feats in general. I think it would've been better to give a more moderate bonus against the selected enemy, together with some other bonus that's more widely applicable, but also useful against the selected enemy. For example, for the dragon oath, you could set it up so that it provides a smaller damage bonus against dragons, but in exchange, the player receives some way of giving yourself acid, fire, lightning, and/or frost resistance. The resistance is useful against dragons, and also useful in other situations as well, so you don't regret taking the feat all the rest of the time when you're not fighting dragons.

I think the best option, however, would be to just provide the oaths as an optional class feature instead of a feat.

Most level 1 focus spells tend to be weaker than normal 1st-level spells, but I was looking at the Sun Domain's Dazzling Flash, and it looks legitimately on-par with 1st level spells. Compare it to Color Spray, which is quite similar to it, and in most cases, both spells will achieve the same effect. Not only that but Color Spray is already a really good spell, so getting that on a focus spell is a great pickup.

The thing that really made me go wow about Dazzling Flash, however, was the part where its area increases to a 30-foot cone! I would legitimately take this spell on my Wizard and cast it with 3rd-level spell slots if I could! And getting it back with just a 10-minute rest!? That's nuts! For the power this spell has, I'd expect it to unlock at level 8, but it comes at 1st level!

What's more is the multiclassing potential. I legitimately think this one focus spell is 100% worth two feats, no questions asked. Not only is it probably the best 1st-level focus spell, but it gives you an extra focus point for taking it!

Iomedae previously had the Sun domain, but now that seems to be exclusively Sarenrae's. Is this a lore change? An oversight?

Hypnotic Pattern says that upon one of several triggers, an affected creature makes a Will save, and if it fails, it becomes Fascinated. No duration, just Fascinated. Is that until it leaves the pattern? For the Pattern's duration? As long as it can see the pattern? As long as it continues to do one of the things that trigger a Will save?

Also, am I correct that by and large, Fascinate's combat utility is primarily anti-spellcaster, and does little to stop martial characters? I don't see anything in Fascinate that would stop someone from striding or striking, and only a select handful of martial feats have the Concentrate trait, so martial characters would be mostly unaffected by Fascinate, correct?

https://2e.aonprd.com/Spells.aspx?ID=157

Say my character has a staff, and some item crafting feats. I'd like to make a metamagic rod, but instead of making it a separate item which I'd have to pull out and fiddle with all the time, could I make its effects a part of the staff instead? Same for Pearls of Power. Could I just integrate them into my staff instead of having them be separate items?

Those items are all slotless, so they shouldn't carry any additional cost for combining their effects.

It seems awkward and comical for a magic-user to have to carry around dozens of magic sticks, and much cooler for them to carry a single powerful staff.