The Gleeful Grognard's page

I run it as my players ask to recall knowledge and generally have no idea what skills will be rolled (secret check). Quite often they can infer and I encourage my players to ask "do I think I would know much about this topic" if they aren't feeling confident.

It plays smoothly at my table and since embracing secret checks meta gaming is extremely low and the group just roleplays whatever they get.

Rules that I have as options:
- players can choose to play premaster alchemist, oracle or wizard. (Before anyone gets grumpy, the alchemist had its upper ceiling lowered for mid and high level play if you had decent system mastery). Ancestors and Lore oracles get house fixes though.

Rules I kept premaster:
- grab and trip don't use the new system. I find it makes weaker enemies less interesting (since they still need to hit) and stronger enemies significantly swingier. It worked well previously. (I ran this remastered till this year, a new change but it immediately had an impact)

I don't really avoid premaster monsters and view them as one big collective.

Not really a remaster thing, but I have found lately that when running on foundry I am not allowing things that cannot be automated well that I have seen impact play speed (by hand or by module) and keeping a list. It is a short one, but it has been worth it from a tedium reduction perspective.

The biggest difference we noticed is that some spellcasters had learned pre-Remaster Ray of Frost and others had learned Remastered Frostbite. Frostbite is supposed to be the new Ray of Frost, but the spells differ a lot. Ray of Frost has 120-foot range and targets AC. Frostbite has 60-foot range and requires a Fortitude save. They think Ray of Frost is better.

Another difference is that the players like Reposition.

Half damage on a miss and it doesn't worry about allies giving light cover by being in the way. Plus it leaves you without MAP which allows for cheeky third action full attack bonus shots with a weapon (ranged or reach)

They must really value that range (which can be great, don't get me wrong, but still).

I just wish FAQ had more of the FAQ answered... clarifications if they are sticking points within the community are important too.

D&D may have an awful system too, but having a place to ask questions and also a dedicated location for the most common answers is better than what we currently have. Although maybe it will improve over time... we are many years into pf2e now though

On the topic of paizo staff not commenting. I know they don't on rules, which is fair (imo it isn't the place for it, better errata system is what is needed not bespoke answers)

But outside of that we have had people commenting on products, in adventure threads and James especially when it comes to lore.

Is it every post? No... but it is frequent enough that I am not surprised by it when it happens. These are community forums first and foremost, not a line to Paizo.

I miss Mark Siefter. Everything else aside he just seemed like a fun dude and it was good to see him become more and more comfortable in video interactions.

Plus his explanations of why usually resonated well with my autistic mind.

That is useful but you can get d8 1 handed thrown weapons with a Returning Rune/Thrower's Bandolier, that will do more damage. Or if you invest feats then an automatic repeating hand crossbow will work better at high level. Or just get an action to reload it while doing something else. Or even just a reload weapon you use once per encounter then discard till the end of the encounter.

High level casters tend to have better things to do with their actions than a d4 weapon attack. There are lots of single action spell options out there. High level martials almost certainly do.

It is just for the weakness triggering and ability to use poisons and magic ammunition (as I said), returning runes are a no go as well because they take up an element.

Having 6 shots is enough to last basically any encounter thanks to the mentioned other single action options. Single shot ranged weapons are a waste of gold, even if they are d8... it is just not that much of a damage boost compared to bypassing resistances or targeting weaknesses.

Not saying it is going to be a must pick, but it is cheap, effective and offers some options that other simple proficiency casters don't otherwise have.

Air repeaters are awesome for casters, highly recommend. 6 shots an encounter for those extra 3rd actions, can have 3 damage property runes for the sweet weakness triggers, disabling regen and occasional armour destruction (depending on campaign themes), uses ammunition so poison and magic ammunition are options.

It is often a better investment to have a secondary weapon like this that skips being up to date with striking runes than getting defensive runes asap as a caster.

Yeah I don't think this is a thing that non-GMs ever actually like. Players will generally accept it, especially when it's not really being thrown in their faces. Ultimately players benefit from things being easy for the GM, and making creature stat blocks easier to create and work with is good for GMs.

I would argue it is more complex than that, players can appreciate something without knowing that it is what they are appreciating. Asymmetrical monster design is a big part of what keeps pf2e combat engaging. Not talking about this specific example, but in general

"You can't do this because you're not mythic, but that doesn't apply to the NPC that just did it" doesn't fly, by comparison. It's not internally consistent within the rules, or the setting. It feels like an arbitrary restriction put on the PCs that will be ignored anytime it becomes inconvenient for the plot. Players don't like that.

I feel this is a disingenuous way of framing it, especially since the example of an npc like the runelords was given before. What James was saying from what I read was that npcs who have access to stuff like this do so through other equally uncommon or particularly unique means.

It would be like calling out it as being unfair that belcora can have the gauntlight created for her and the PCs can't just create a similar magic structure. Of course npcs often come part and parcel with new abilities, spells and items that players didn't have access to purely from levelling.

And it isn't like npcs have access to everything players do by default either. How many npcs are wandering around with hero points and gaining hero points across the session.

Pf2e, whether you like it or not is not a simulation.

BTW I don't like the mythic rules and have in general been a bit burnt out on pf2e post remaster, maybe even a bit before. I don't know if it is why, but since Mark left the design direction feels like it has changed a bit.

However, you are spending a lot of time (to my reading) justifying why your stance is what it is and why that is objectively right. Rather than taking the "I don't like mythic rules, I want alternative access routes for these iconic options. Npcs seem to have access via alternative ways" route.

Edit:

Oh and saying that previous editions didn't have potential demi plane issues is amusing, I get that not all groups had disruptions from it. But it was a meme for one of my old GM's group that create demiplane was the chocks ahoy solution (a reference to a convoluted plan executed at the end of one of their longer campaigns)

That's my thought too. But I also can't figure out any other way to interpret the second part of this post than as saying that buying a brand new rune will cost the rune's cost plus 10% to have it transferred onto the weapon.

Because if you are paying for the rune, it is being assumed the item already exists on a runestone. Which while free to transfer from, cost the seller gold to transfer to in the first place.

So ultimately your cost options would be:

1. Buy a basic magic item outright, the cost is the cost of the sum of the fundamental runes if it is in stock, obtain instantly.

2. Upgrade an existing item's rune to a higher level version, no transfer cost, pay the difference and expect a longer wait.

3. Buy a rune on a runestone to apply to your item. Rune cost, transfer cost and time, runestone cost. Which would be (runecost*1.1)

4. Transfer an owned rune from an item, pay transfer cost, wait transfer time.

5. Transfer an owned rune from a runestone, wait transfer time, pay labour fee (gm fiat, but a sensible fee is 50% of what the rune transfer would have been since that is usually the cost of their labour minus expenses)

(I should mention that I am not saying there is a right or wrong way to run it, just that if you are trying to find guidance via the rules this is the closest as far as I can see)

Is there a way to calculate the cost of they used an NPC?

Sure, assume the NPC has assurance and will take as long as it takes to get the maximum discount or charge twice the base cost if the party want it asap.

Pf2e like most modern dnd likes assumes npcs buy at half and sell at full. Meaning they want a 100% return for their time and resources (which makes sense rough enoughly)

Darksol the Painbringer wrote:

One is Medic dedication, and in actual play, on a Forensic Medicine Investigator; this amplifies their non-magical healing capacity from A-tier to S-tier by nature of improving its Battle Medicine healing, as well as increasing its frequency in-combat as well as throughout the adventuring day.Without it, the in-combat healing would be A-tier at the most, or more accurately, B-tier compared to Chirurgeon Alchemist (who could probably reach SS-tier with it).

That is still available without Free Archetype. Like I said way back here, "I think the mistake many people make is in comparing a Free Archetype build with a build that uses no archetypes at all. That is not the comparison that is needed. The comparison should be between a Free Archetype build and a build using the standard archetype rules."

That may be an S-tier ability. But it is an S-tier ability that is available with the default rules. Free Archetype didn't add it.

All Free Archetype is adding to the build is giving back the Class feat slots so that they can used for other things instead of having to spend those Class feat slots on the Medic archetype feats.

It actually allows for way more than that, especially if the archetype let's you double up on things you want without sacrifice.

It doesn't necessarily improve the individual feat strength, but it let's people who want say reactive strike to get it as well as their level 5 feat option. Or people to pick up rogue archetype so they can boost more skills to legendary by spending both their class and free archetype feats.

Or how classes without spellcasting will almost always want free archetype to get a spellcasting dedication (ideally with a familiar) so they can get independent and cast from scrolls and wands freely, which opens up overall action economy for the party.

Heck even the simple endurance spellcaster where you burn feats to get multiple dedications going at once and overcome the 2 archetype feat restrictions quickly.

Options matter, flexibility matters a lot. But if you and your group don't optimise that way it is fine... just that s tier options don't exist in a vacuum and both options at once is generally better than just one.

A shifting druid with wildshape and a dedication to grab reactive strike is a good move, but the extra feat costs do impact progression in forms which is a problem if you don't have free archetype. Heck you can use a different archetype to start with so you can ditch dex early on, focus on strength, con and wisdom and then grab your reactive strike a little later while maintaining full progression and freeing up a general feat or two for things like toughness rather than armour training.

Is this the best option? No, it is a wildshape druid, just an easy example off the top of my head of how quickly internal limitations can be circumvented so a player who thinks about it can get a best of all worlds scenario.

I prefer to run without it. The games balance doesn't hold up well with it in the long run, and breaks down in the worst way where party members have disparate power levels and quickly encroach on each other.

If the group is roughly the same level of system mastery and has the same level of mechanical focus... it can be okay (although some classes just benefit more than others)

Ultimately I and my group ended up enjoying giving/getting free feats/dedications as a response to events occuring in the game vs a restricted free archetype. And a more enjoyable mid and late level experience because the best gamers of the group didn't relegate the others to supporting character roles or invalidate their fields as often.

I just allow people to open and close their eyes at will... avert gaze still serves its purpose for the most part and well if a player comes up with a good work around then all the better.

If a player can fall prone for free, closing and opening eyes should be fine.

Why would you restrict it at all?

It's so situational, I would feel bad to try to limit the rune against the player.

Fighting enemies in armour is situational? It is pretty common in my experience.

Tridus wrote:

Squiggit wrote:

... What were they thinking?

...

I suspect someone was worried about the question "does hardness apply to this?", wanted to preemptively answer it, and it just kind of went from there.

Yes, I suspect it was something like this: "We wrote '3d6 acid damage to armor'. Oh, no! Someone would just think that it simply applies through hardness! And it's acid, it only makes this seem more likely as the image of acid burning through everything is so popular in movies! We need to fix this! ' (before applying Hardness)' Done, now it looks like normal damage."

And... ba-dum-ts! Now we have a phrase which some interpret as ignoring hardness.

That is actually quite likely the answer... since the object damage rules outside of shields are not in a single localised place.

Specifically it makes it clear that armour has hardness and hp values that should be looked for, because for someone who hasn't read materials (which is now in the GM core for extra opacity)... that isn't clear.

Although it really begs the question, why not put the values with the items like shields...

"Before applying Hardness" means that you apply the armor's Hardness to the acid damage, so no, the acid damage from a corrosive rune does not ignore Hardness.

Yeah, otherwise it would say after hardness or the usual "ignores" language.

However it is unclear and redundant language. Still miss that faq button.

For what it is extremely broken in humanoid heavy games if run as ignoring hardness. I tend to rule in players favour when things are unclear and ran it that way for AoA when I was first running the game... it was extremely potent on the flurry ranger with a bow.

One of my DMs bans Tailwind Wands

I kinda do this... but instead of banning them I weakened the heightened effect and put another two heightened tiers.

It is exceptionally powerful in the hands of an organised party for its cost and tends to devalue a whole heap of class options.

I didn't do this because it was powerful though, because I ran two campaigns and it was a boring mechanical choice with no RP attached.

Another similar change I have made is reducing the amount of extra dimensional storage across the board. Because I found players got type 1 bags of holding and stopped caring for higher tiers and bulk became a thing of the past so early. I tend to change this depending on campaign though.

I don't think I have actually banned anything else though, rarities get played around with and some options are disallowed for lore / theme reasons but they are fairly few and far between.

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

Greater weapon spec doesn't work RAW

I think they likely do RAW. Which is why I left the uncertainty in my statement. It is not a modifier or a bonus. Go back a reread the many arguments on it before. It is far from clear.

Yes yes, not responding to you on that matter. Seen your arguments, not what the sentence says and don't feel like doing that again.

It says what can only be adjusted by two modifiers and any penalties, additional damage isn't a modifier. Which is why it is called out as an exception, rage would not need to be mentioned otherwise.
It doesn't and has never said it can only be modified by two modifiers and anything else that isn't a modifier.

Paizo may intend for it to be otherwise, but since they have refused to FAQ it despite it being the topic of some of the longest and most tiresome threads on this forum we have no basis for RAI.

Attack modifier should be equal since it explicitly says it and its AC are the same as your own, not your unarmoured attack or anything just the same.

Greater weapon spec doesn't work RAW, although the rage damage increases that come when you get it do. Battleform rules are a bit restrictive in that regard and can only be modified by circumstance and status bonuses normally, and no exception is given for greater weapon spec.

"If you take on a battle form with a polymorph spell, the special statistics can be adjusted only by circumstance bonuses, status bonuses, and penalties." - polymorph trait

This is why rage is specifically called out as being allowed, a specific overriding general.

As for the strengths

- extremely fast fly speed

- darkvision and scent

- temp HP (although, 10 is eh)

- can choose your resistances or target your enemies weaknesses energy wise. (I would assume you are allowing premaster dragon types since they were only removed due to orc)

- can choose useful movement types (burrow, climb and swim being especially useful)

Couple that with having functional hands many combat actions can be used for the most part.

Whether this is enough for the barbarian is up to the player, but I would say generally the flexibility overrides the damage loss if the player views it as a toolbox. If they are just looking for it to be a flat character upgrade, then it will always be disappointing.

I let PCs upgrade items using the dcs and costs for level found in the GMG.

Simple, fast and does the job of keeping static DCs and bonuses viable.

If there are higher level variants that also upgrade DCs they become necessary at that level.

but owlcat's mythic classes were for a single player game and so could be grotesquely overpowered (Zippy magic, anyone?) without much issue.

To be fair, the mythic rules for pf1e felt like they were designed for a single player game and were grotesquely overpowered.

Yeah I did something similar. I disagree with people suggesting it is a minor difference, it starts out similar but by mid level when you have an extra 8+ spells you can cast or heighten at will it really helps imo.

Something I added to it was any prepared spell can be swapped out with the school spell with 10 minutes.

My goal was less to make the wizard stronger with the original change and more just to give non universalists a reason for being outside of guaranteed uncommon spell access (teleportarion ftw)

When I wanted a more survival focused game I made each ration weigh L and I removed all dimensional storage options.

It was a sandbox hex crawl and while it worked somewhat. I find PF2e too quickly outpaces mundane challenges for me to to bother with it again.

If I was to do it again I would probably add a spoilage roll each week (flat check), track rations by the week and give them 1 bulk. Is it realistic? No, not really... but it would be easy to track and abstract what would be interesting for my group.

The poison system basically encourages pounding in as many exposures as possible as fast as possible. This makes them very powerful against single, vulnerable targets, but harder to use in more general conflict, especially because it's hard for a non-monster to actually have that many doses on hand and is action-costly to apply them over and over.

Of course, poison immunity is common, so it's important to have other options anyway.

Flurry hunters were damn scary with the old toxicologist backing them up in high level play.

That said, poison immunity being common is a bit misleading. It is ubiquitous to some creature types that are numerous, but you aren't necessarily going to be fighting heaps of those creature types outside of a campaign centred around them.

It is in fact quite common for the majority of creatures in APs to not be immune to poison (bloodlords being an exception)

But yeah other than that my groups never struggled to understand poison rules outside of my forgetting whether they triggered at the start of a turn or the end of a turn early on. really quite like how they work, and virulent afflictions are damn scary.

Finoan wrote:

Yes, it means that you don't have a superpowered weapon that is better than anything money can buy.

That's a really funny and not at all loaded way to describe someone using a class feature.

Wait till they find out about vicious strike ;)

Jokes aside, I will houserule this for my players. I am not a fan of a class feat being quite this meaningless, it is worse than the battle oracle focus spell imo.

It isn't like champions are topping any damage charts even if they get an extra 1d6, weakness coverage is nice and all, but champions get fewer attacks than most martials if they are playing to their strengths.

Speaking personally only: For the life of me, I don't know how or why TTRPG publishers haven't all come to the an agreement and consensus in the modern era that PHYSICAL books are luxury products and should be priced accordingly. I don't mean luxury as in "something you don't need" but rather something that is not only replaceable with a functional equivalent that but also only really even continues to exist because of its own collectible or aesthetic appeal. The VAST majority of people who actually play TTRPGs these days use electronic devices to look up information for their games, use reference tools, PDFs, builders, free online databases, 3rd party services and similar options to play the game.

I'd be willing to bet, if I were a betting man, that 9 out of every 10 physical books sold, even when they are USED at least once for the purpose of "adding" material to the content a group can use at their game never actually get USED or looked at more than a very brief browsing to enjoy the art during character building or as a reference during gameplay.

They are bought because people want to support the publisher and the folks want to feel like they own a piece of the game for themselves. As such, it's not really so much of a tool, and it's also not a commodity but it's more like a piece of art than anything else but... it's not PRICED like one.

Personally, I say that it would be for the best to charge $100 USD for anything larger than 220 pages, $80 USD for books that are smaller than that. Special variant cover books should go for 20% more, and the "leather" cover ones should be twice the price. NOW, bear in mind that I think these marked-up physical books should have ADDITIONAL packaging, be non-refundable once the packaging is opened and all universally come with a 1-time code to unlock the PDF for an Account and that would add some weird friction with regard to how subscriptions on the website work but... yeah, maybe it's a hot take but the margins being so freaking slim on the physical books makes...

The majority of people I know who buy books do so because they are easier to read than a screen and more likely to be picked up. They are also bought primarily by GMs.

I am surprised that this is not more common in your experience.

I also saw Tian Xian world guide go for a msrp of over $100usd in Australia and then not sell (having to be heavily discounted months later), so how would you approach making the books more palatable if you are suggesting they should be 20% or more expensive than that?

Really enjoying dynamic token rings for the most part. Let's me make a token ring and background suitable for any campaign and then apply it to the world.

I have also been using the tinting background or ring feature to differentiate PC rings too. Just so nice compared to the past experience of having to make a new token every time I wanted to change style.

A wasp swarm uses Swarming Stings against a creature with 1 HP and the Diehard feat. The creature critically fails the Reflex save, taking double piercing damage and exposing them to Wasp Venom. The creature critically fails the Fortitude save, taking poison damage and becoming clumsy 2. What happens?

A. Creature goes to dying 2 from Swarming Sting's piercing damage because they crit failed. They then go to dying 4 because they crit failed the Fort save. If either the piercing damage or the poison damage is at least double their max HP, they die of Massive Damage.

B. Creature only goes to dying 2, treating everything as one instance of damage. If the piercing and poison combine to be at least double the creature's max HP, they die of Massive Damage.

A. Nothing in the rules suggests the damage from the poison combines.

Wasp venom and swarming stings are distinct.

WWHsmackdown wrote:

I've always be down for the street sharks look. That wedge shaped head is as iconic to me as golarion goblins and skittermanders now

Part of my problem is precisely this connection.

Losing the dragon stuff is fine but like, stubby limbed short mnonstery humanoid with big heads that are often used comedically is already very trodden territory for Paizo, and kobolds had a problem of sometimes feeling too similar to goblins even before the update.

And a big issue I have with 90% of leshies in art :(

This product doesn't contain the PDFs - would it be possible to create a bundle that consist of both?

Isn't that because the playtest adventure will be free like doomsday dawn?

RAW you lose all air and the spell wouldn't go off.

Air bubble is an edge case because it is a reaction but RAW you will still fall unconscious before the spell went off (keep in mind the spell is not rendered useless by this, it is most often used for allies anyway)

The subtle trait removes the need for incantations so conceal spell spellshaping lets you cast while suffocating.

As for my own ruling, I would allow reactions triggered by the person starting to suffocate to go succeed but still have the person fall unconscious and start dying if it didn't give them air like airbubble does.

All other spells I run as per RAW, if it doesn't have the subtle trait they aren't being cast unless the player wants to try for RP reasons.

The reason for this is because aid is heavily restricted.

Restrictions to consider:
- requires GM approval of the skill and approach you want to use
- requires the person you are aiding to both take the triggering approach and be able to once their turn comes around
- requires you to still be able to take the action
- in combat you generally need to be within 5ft
- requires an action (that competes with single, double and triple actions, from spells, items and class feats/features)
- requires a reaction
- only impacts one roll, and that roll can also fail

So I HIGHLY recommend not hindering aid by giving it a higher DC. A meme in PF2e is every +1 matters... but a +1 for a single roll that takes an action and reaction as well as requiring you to be in a dangerous position mid combat...

DC20 was better balance across levels than DC15 is, but DC15 allows people to get at it from level 1 in combat.

Another reason is you aren't always going to be able to use a maxed out skill, using a tertiary skill without item bonuses or 18+ in the ability should be fair game in mid level and above play.

Now bards get some stuff that makes it super powerful, but that is bards and a different discussion. That is how bards modify and use aid, not how aid itself works.

Putting it another way, aid is one of the most narratively rewarding actions a player can take. And with a static DC it becomes "how much do I help" or "how can I help" rather than "I would rather just do something I know will work"

I have not seen them yet, but I am interested to see if the Oracle is the new terrible class, surprisingly good, or somewhere between.

It isn't a terrible class... it is just a flavourless caster for the most part with a totally optional curse to its playstyle.

As long as it keeps 4 slots it will generally be more powerful than before.

Regarding prepared casters and wizards I think two change would make them a lot more appealing to the average player.

Prepared casters:
- 10 minutes to swap out a spell becomes standard.

Wizards:
1. You can change any prepared spell to a curriculum spell at will during casting.
2. Non universalist wizards gain a repertoire of 1 spell per rank known and can sponaneously cast all of their curriculum spells via it (all are considered signature for the purpose of heightening). This would be replacing the extra slots.

Power creep has been getting increasingly unreal since Howl of the Wild. Seems like the 1e developer mindset has found its way into the proverbial 2e henhouse.

I do wonder how much has to do with the design lead change from Mark Siefter.

One note, I am kinda disappointed to see that paizo seems to be a bit gun shy when it comes to nerfing things. Synaesthesia for instance stayed the same and while I didn't want it to be bludgeoned into the ground scaling the debuffs on degree of success rather than just duration would have made a big difference.

Dragon Claws got a bad rap imo. They were a full 1 minute free claws. No concentration. The extra damage scaled up to 3d6, and they gave you resistance to boot. Even better, the later bloodline spell 'Dragon Wings' gave you the option to use two focus points for claws when you cast the wings.

In theory, the focus spell and it's later twin we're really thematic and impactful. The issue came from putting them on a caster frame with no means of capitalizing on the full possibilities. (Much like the current hiccup occuring with Battle Oracles now.)

Honestly it makes me want design a class archetype for both "subclasses" on these two classes. Turn them into wave caster gishes, power them up into a stronger frame and let them go to town. Enhance the blood or curse aspects a bit. Will be some fun developing while I wait for the next scholastic school year.

It bugs me that some folks are cheering for the replacement to dragon claws... it is a two action attack focus spell... with cantrip tier damage. It is almost always beaten out by save cantrips.

I don't require something to be optimal, but damn it would be nice to see it useful at all. I see it as even more situational than dragon claws.

I don't know, I am certainly not against the idea. But I am not sure how well they can represent it via an Iconic.

I also don't want it to be furthering the fetishisation that is so common in geek media regarding autistic representation. The best way to sidestep that issue is with fleshed out characters that have story involvement, which could occur with an Iconic... but is unlikely to because of how/why they exist.

For the record I am also on the autism spectrum, my father was also diagnosed in 2020 and I am pretty confident my late grandfather and my aunt on my father's side are also.

But it is extremely broad and more inherently formative to who someone is than sexuality, gender or in many cases physical disabilities are. Not more important mind you, just more formative as it touches on literally every aspect of life and who someone is by its very nature.

What I don't want to ever see are mechanical representations of autism or any other neurodiversity in game, but I generally trust paizo not to muck that up.

I guess it will depend on the iconic and trusting in paizo not to look for an "autistic class" to associate with it.

Alchemists previously were weak in low level play, and required system mastery to make good in mid and high level play. Where they could shine really brightly but only if the player leaned into the class advantages.

Now they are quite decent in low level play, and fall off a bit for mid and high level play. I wager they will still be seen as the ugly duckling of pf2e and sadly this time there won't be any real system mastery arguments. But at least they won't be terrible in the hands of a newbie who wanted the flavour, just kinda subpar.

Oh they have new rules for bulk where large characters are concerned, weird.

You basically is ruling that anything that goes up more than Air Walk requires a Maneuver in Flight.

Again nothing in the rules states that more than 45 degrees is a steep ascent/descent you are basically house-ruling here.

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

- "If not why the hell I will waste an action to Maneuver in Flight making a check with risk of failure if I can simply move a bit horizontally and prevent the "steep ascent"?"

Because it restricts how you can move and what spaces you can go through.

Sorry but I don't understood what do you want to say here. What restricts how I can move and what spaces you can go through?

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

- "Why I will waste an action to Maneuver in Flight making a check with risk of failure if I can simply use a reaction to Arrest a Fall or if I don't want to go down so fast why not just do the same as I made to ascend just moving one square horizontally?"

Same as above but with the added element of, you may not have a reaction (either through spending or denial) or may have already spent your reaction... and you might want to actually choose where you move to. If I am arresting a fall I may take no damage and fall 50 ft. But I may only want to descend 20 feet.

I just need to descend in circles like a vulture (that why I said that I just need to move a bit horizontally without need to use Maneuver in Flight).

The Gleeful Grognard wrote:

As for rolling only when in a dangerous situation... that imo is just a good call in most cases. Don't make players roll when failure would have no consequences at all. Just slows games down and causes players to check out, even if players profess to liking the click clack of dice.

But usually the failure consequences are just don't move. But I agree that just slows down the game.

Slow down and read "the way I rule" is my being fully aware that it is my ruling and not my saying this is how the system is written.

As for your comment vs air walk, yeah? Not sure what your point is. My players prefer stable guidelines and this makes the rules at my table clear for them and angles past 45 degrees are objectively steep. Something being steep is generally considered to be when its vertical axis exceeds its horizontal axis.

Why you can't just circle down/up, because if you don't have the space or don't want to be moving through areas of danger (say reactive strike) then it restricts you. It isn't something that always matters, which is why it isn't a problem as a mechanic.

And for failure consequences, not moving in combat matters. In scenarios like high winds, chases or with something else going on it matters. My point is out of combat with no risk attached I just assume PCs can take their time and do it.

So at my table manoeuver in flight rarely comes up, because PCs and NPCs can do things in other ways most of the time or have large bonuses and or assurance so it can be ignored for those who plan to do it all the time.
But when it does come up it is because the PC wants to do something they are either not good at and the situation demands it or they are forced into it.

Keep in mind most true flight doesn't come into play until level 7 for PCs.

The way I rule it is steep ascent/descent is anything beyond 45 degrees and manoeuver in flight replaces fly for the actions that are required for it.

E.G. flying vertical requires the check and you move up to your fly speed as a part of that action. Speed adjustments for moving up or down are then applied as appropriate.

As for reasons why:
- Actions that grant fly subordinate actions or let you take fly actions in place of strides do not allow for manoeuvre in flight actions.

- "If not why the hell I will waste an action to Maneuver in Flight making a check with risk of failure if I can simply move a bit horizontally and prevent the "steep ascent"?"
Because it restricts how you can move and what spaces you can go through.

- "Why I will waste an action to Maneuver in Flight making a check with risk of failure if I can simply use a reaction to Arrest a Fall or if I don't want to go down so fast why not just do the same as I made to ascend just moving one square horizontally?"
Same as above but with the added element of, you may not have a reaction (either through spending or denial) or may have already spent your reaction... and you might want to actually choose where you move to. If I am arresting a fall I may take no damage and fall 50 ft. But I may only want to descend 20 feet.

As for rolling only when in a dangerous situation... that imo is just a good call in most cases. Don't make players roll when failure would have no consequences at all. Just slows games down and causes players to check out, even if players profess to liking the click clack of dice.

Age of Ashes is an excellent AP with a really really really weak start and like all APs requires a bit of rewriting to tie things together, but since books 3-5 all tackle one enemy group directly, book 6 tackles their originator. And book 2 and 6 tackle the bigger overarching threat that created the reason for villains. Any decent GM can do a lot with it.

But boy the first book is just... bad, and the second really falls down a bit with the hexploration (but is an excellent setting). If I was to run it again I would simplify the first book, remove the goblin blood caves and have the party do an old fashioned dungeon delve to save the goblins from what came from below.

Also, the keep really needs a better map.

Also the next one I may be a bit biased towards because I am running / propping it atm. But if you treat gatewalkers and stolen fates as one big adventure where a motivation of twisting fate is fixing the negative aspects of the end of gatewalkers (and letting the negative aspects actually happen) it can work.

But gatewalkers does need a decent amount of fixing imo, firstly it isn't remotely an investigation xfiles adventure, secondly nearly all the villains are best served by removing "they are evil and unhinged" and leaning into nuance. Imo it is the best set piece adventure of the lot though and it has some really fun villains to play with.

I really dislike arguments that revolve around something happening or not that isn't to do with the system as justification as to why something is good/bad

Sure a GM might not give the resources required to buy / learn more spells... but if the party is starved for wealth then the martial will be hurting even more without runes. Now you could say the party will give the martial more money and the wizards will go without, but that again isn't a matter of system but rather a matter of how GM is running and how the players are playing OUTSIDE of system expectations.

It is like saying consumables are trash because a party has a bunch of people who forget they exist or have phoenix down syndrome.

Also, learn a spell is extremely cheap and an exploration activity. If there is more than one caster in the party you won't even have to seek out other spellcasters to learn from to get a massively expanded spell list. Yes there will be niche campaigns where you have no access to other spellcasters at all and are unable to learn new spells, but it is not core to the PF2e experience.

As for casters being weak... I have also run a lot of APs. Age of Ashes, Extinction Curse, Agents of Edgewatch, Abomination Vaults (on my third group atm although they are only level 3) and have just started Gatewalkers to lead into Stolen Fate.

Casters in my games have universally been extremely valued and often been the MVPs. Even with low level play, my second AV group had a champion, rogue, druid and wizard... and the druid and wizard were not only the answer to many issues but frequently out damaged the rogue and champion where a meme was every time the casters were major contributors it was exclaimed "the casters, so bad, so terrible". And both players were the least experienced; it was their first time playing casters.

Then there was Age of Ashes where a player couldn't make it for the last 2 sessions of the campaign and I wasn't willing to delay any further. So his friend who had never played PF2e before but had GMed pf1e and been a player in my 5e group took over his character. Not only did he play the bard exceptionally well, he was by far the most influential force in 6 of the final 8 encounters, which was notable as I ran a chunk of those as a boss rush with no time to rest or recuperate including only two rounds to ready themselves to fight the final boss.
Which shows how much the player themselves matters (he is currently playing a wizard in my third AV group and is consistently very useful, despite the party being a rogue, kineticist and fighter)

Does this mean spellcasters will always be powerful, hell no... does it mean there is one optimal build. Not even close.

One thing I will say though, spell substitution is probably the only wizard thesis I would take. It has more of an impact early game before you can load up on niche scrolls but it is still really useful for whenever the day doesn't proceed as expected.

> rewards specializing over generalization

Just a quick note before I go to bed, I have run a LOT of PF2e since it launched. And I cannot disagree with this more, PF2e punishes specialist builds quite a lot and thanks to the way it's math works really rewards people for branching out.

Not to say people have to, but they will generally be more powerful for doing so.

> I mentioned once that, shouldn't the GM be able to balance for a team composition. D's defense was that, "the encounter calculators don't account for bad party comp

I mean, I wouldn't recommend a new/learning GM having to do the work, but the easy answer is just run easier combats. If the party struggles with severe, run moderate. That is one of the wonderful aspects of a working encounter system.

Oh and just to put your mind at ease somewhat. PF2e is far from the TPK machine that people make it out to be, as a rule I tend to see players dying most when they are stuck on optimisation concepts from PF1e/5e.

But I have run a party in which every PC was a primary spellcaster, one where some PCs forwent fundamental runes to differing degrees to invest in more interesting active use magical items. And another where the cleric had a strength penalty and no dex, as such played with -6 to -9 less AC than the fighter (which means they could get crit very easily)... and it all worked out fine.

There are ways to build a non functional party/PC... but it is quite difficult.

Just to clarify things, Player B has no problem with D playing what he wants to play. And if what he wants to play fills a niche or completes the party comp, fine. His issue was D mainly coming in with the PF meta mindset instead of just making a character out of the air he wanted to play and just be like "this is what I'm playing."

See... B does seem to be stepping into the bad/wrong fun side of discussions. I could see it more if player D was telling other people to choose different options, complaining about having to play support or something similar, but you haven't indicated as such.

PF2e is balanced enough that a meta minded player won't upset party balance or play style. Let alone a support character. Not a dig at 5e (I still run 5e) but it isn't 5e.

If there are concerns about whether player D will roleplay well or create an interesting character, that is a different kettle of fish. But not really related to filling gaps meta wise (one of my current players loves playing support and is mechanic minded so he looks to that first and then comes up with a compelling character idea tweaking it as he goes. Another player from the past only ever played guide builds with meme personalities that ended up basically being themself... but that was an issue with the player and no amount of forced suboptimal play would make them create interesting characters)

As for potions, I wouldn't allow no interact usage. It is a part of how the game works and interactions with flat checks, reactions like reactive strike and turn planning keep it interesting imo. It also becomes pretty boring and powerful as the game continues if it is allowed to spread to other potions and consumables, and immersion breaking if it doesn't.

I wouldn't allow it. It let's players choose which of the attacks will hit and let's them load up on that specific roll (sticky bomb for alchemist for instance) and it also avoids the scenario where you can get critical failures.

It goes against the spirit of the feat and is a flat power boost letting you entirely ignore AC.

Maybe that's the point; 3d6 of varying elements is mathematically strongest but boring.....incentivising getting a flaming rune on your vengeance sword AND two other interesting runes instead of squeezing out an average 6 extra damage

Are you saying paizo wanted to incentivise other property runes so:

- They disallowed stacking the same rune because that was mathematically beneficial and players would gravitate towards it over other property runes.

- They allowed stacking of different runes because although being mathematically significantly more beneficial than stacking a single rune it is boring and players aren't likely to choose mechanically strong boring options.

Stacking single runes is an average of 3.5 extra damage per rune. But stacking multiple is potentially much higher thanks to weakness coverage and differing crit riders.

I can get behind the logic to a point, but the idea that one was disallowed because it was boring, and the other was allowed because it was boring and mathematically powerful feels odd.

Maybe the answer for my games is simply to give damage runes a trait that denies etching of other damage runes (and gives blade ally champions an exception for their feature ofc)

But this is all off topic at this point.

On the tangent of added damage property runes I find it so weird that paizo specifically forbids doubling or tripling up on the same type.

There is almost never a scenario where having 3d6 extra fire damage is worth it over having 3 different damage types (four if you are a blade ally champion) that can each trigger weaknesses and bypass resistances or immunities a creature might have.

It also incentivises getting opposing damage types to best cover your bases.

It feels super flavourless to me and explicitly denies flavourful options.

Your consumable example doesn't make it a better feat given that group with even a moderately competent caster with a heal spell will keep a player from dropping without a consumable at low level and at higher level you have a sufficiently high hit point pool to not need a consumable during combat.

My experience with healing consumables consumables is more that they are used in addition to any healing. Or as pre-emptive topups so casters don't have to waste slots on heals when they could be doing something more impactful/interesting (as a martial losing a second and third attack is far less impacted than a caster losing two attacks.)

Then we branch out into non healing consumables and thrown items which is where I have seen quickdraw being used for the most in mid and high level play. "I will swallow splash so I can trigger weaknesses" is something I have seen a lot. Chugging a mutagen to cover for a save weakness mid combat is another common one. And then there are the various situational potions that are nice to have on hand just in case and cost very little.

I also can't be particularly excited about that one. I'm glad it will exist for the people it's useful for (i see questions like "Is there a good statblock I can grab for a [Level X] [Class Y] NPC?" in some PF2 related discord servers often enough). But it's not something that I personally have a lot of need for, since the NPC building system has been pretty fast and effective when I've needed it.

For me it was useful for on the spot npcs I hadn't planned for rather than for custom npcs. At least in pf1e, but I can't see how this would change if I had access to it as a resource in pf2e.

I think my group would riot if I asked to take a 10min break to stat up a handful of npcs mid session lol.

Regarding that's odd, I had concerns initially but after running the game for an investigator I am less bothered by it. Is it auto success perception at times... sure... but it is only one thing that strikes the player as odd, often someone sees it anyway so the player gets extra context and it has sparked a number of the interactive player/GM conversions that people above indicated they were concerned about losing.

As for my remembering it, I had the player prompt me for a bit and gave them permission to do so Incas they thought I had forgotten something, but honestly just treating them as if they were doing a quick search of a room whenever they entered a location became pretty second nature to me.

That said, I had already overcome some of my hesitance to roll free gameplay after I embraced passive perception as functionally a roll floor in 5e.

This is not to say the investigator is fine though, devise a stratagem is an awful mechanic in play (at least during low levels) and follow a lead I find to be clunky.

They don't exist as a balance tool, but rather as an easy way for GMs to prohibit something without creating too much fuss about it. I don't like that idea because TTRPGs are a hobby that mainly involves talking, and if a GM wants to remove certain options its as easy as that GM saying "This isn't allowed" instead of trying to justify that with the rarity traits.

It isn't about prohibiting though, it is about creating a permissive environment where the onus is on the player to ask and not the GM to have to comb through every choice.

Then there is the psychological difference for people between asking for something, people being told they have to ask for literally everything (the tashas cauldron approach) or being told no out of the blue like in pf1e.

Yes there are arbitrary elements, but it creates a structure for a GM to build off of or to lean on. The game is filled with arbitrary design decisions and cut off points.

But it very much exists for a purpose; beyond new or inexperienced groups.

As someone else said, the issue is what rarity traits cover rather than the trait themselves. As it stands rarity means both how common something is and whether it is restricted for choice or not. But I also get why paizo didn't want to create two traits for the same rough mechanical purpose. And rarity parses better for most than unrestricted, restricted, gm only, gm only unique.