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Now that my groups have finally passed the midpoint of the playtest I can say that I've got some serious opinions. Here's the short version. Paizo wanted to make magic items more diverse and push players to make tough choices about how they wanted to use their slots. The problem, as I see it, is that Paizo moved all the factors and ended up with a real mess. Resonance was supposed to limit slots, but Paizo applied it to consumables. So only healing items were practical. Instead of fixing resonance to only apply to permanent items, Paizo has dropped it. So that's the end of resonance. But the other half of the issue is that most of the items are rubbish. How is it possible that staffs are less useful than wands???? (Minimum fix on staffs, allow wielder to cast spells in the staff at any level they have [hightened] slots for.) All this effort, and the only items that anyone really wants for their characters are the ability boosts and the weapons and armour. There's a few other items that are usually useful, but in the end all we're left with is the same situation with radically less powerful items. (I'll not rant about the shocking lack of wild Druid's items ATM) With the proficiency system making tiny bonuses into huge advantages (though that is being partially corrected in the final version) there is little hope that we won't have exactly the same spread of magic items in this edition as we had in the last. The last part is the control system of rarity.... In a thousand years of history the only certainty is that the best ideas get popular. So claiming that great magic items, spells or formulae are simply rare is just silly. If it's useful, it will be used. If it's popular it will be mass produced. If it hard to produce, it will be expensive..... Economics never lie. Please Paizo, give this some real thought.
Very well said, and yes please fix the spelling..... And the syntax and grammar and terrible layout, ergonomics, and too many new terms. Elves and dwarves ARE DIFFERENT RACES!! The word "race" isn't bad, it's just that applying it to humans of differing cultural extraction has always been a thing terrible people do. But yes, yes, and yes to all your concerns. In broad strokes (and I've posted this myself several times) Paizo started with a great idea, and then failed to see it through. Make a simpler mechanism for character creation and play, that allows for most of the flexibility of P1 without the insane number of options. They should have run a closed playtest 2 years ago and worked out all these bugs internally. They should have presented a Beta or Gamma test of a game they were actually fairly sure of. They absolutely had to have a firm point of view and ready answers against the tyranny of fun! My own group is just past the halfway point in the playtest, so there's near 100 years of roleplaying experience that Paizo wasn't willing to hear from before making huge changes. They've chosen to crowdsource a gaming system, and I'm so worried that it's turning into pablum. I really hope Paizo takes a year to really sort the dross from the gold. I'll always be a roleplayer, but only some very serious work can keep me playing Pathfinder.
I'm finding that the way DC's are generated doesn't seem to reflect how easy it is for higher level characters to accomplish mundane tasks. Playing "The Mirrored Moon" it's clear that setting all DC's reletive to the PC's level isn't the way to go. I'm playing a 9th level Druid, so searching a hex of forest should be easy, right? Nope. Even with my survival maxed out at 17 it's a near impossible roll. If this is sensible narrative, then most druids would spend levels one through eight completely lost in the wilds. The idea that anyone other than a druid or ranger could ever cope in a hex map would therefore be rediculous..... The upshot is that searching doesn't make sense on a sliding scale DC. Infact, my thinking is that DC's should only EVER change if NPC'S or campaign forces make the search harder. Filling the forest with illusions, moving the search to another plane, or tracking enemies near or above the party level would certainly up the DC. But just because you're running a 9th level adventure doesn't mean that every step of the way need be a 9th level challenge. I've found that my players get a lot more enjoyment out of their levels when I remind them of all the things that used to make trouble. Quickly searching a section of map that used to take days to complete is an excellent way to show them how far they've come. I strongly believe that DC's are something that GM's need to balance in the moment. Using the provided charts, decide on a DC that reflects the abilities of the player. Playing the piano is far easier for a piano player; and searching the forest isn't a challenge for a character in tune with it. I'd love to see your thoughts!
I should also clarify that I didn't find the DC charts helpful. I have yet to see a system that really deals with scaling fairly. But ultimately, the issue is that PCs need to be challenged by things they aren't trained in and less challenged by things they are focused in. The GM should be providing challenges that the PCs are not always prepared for. While the DC table is a good guide for what a challenging number would be at a given level; the GM should have a grasp on what is difficult for each of their players and give DC's based on that.
I'd also like to draw attention to this. I've played some chapters of the playtest with this variation and didn't have any issues. Remember, players would be picking just how much expertise they can get in each proficiency. Legendary (+10) isn't automatically received at level 20, they have to invest 7 proficiency increases (Out of 10 total) to reach that bonus. So getting +10 to attack and armor, for example, isn't possible. Also, while "incompetence" frees up a proficiency increase from anywhere, I've specifically said that increase can only be allocated to skills.
Incompetent: You have avoided this sort of ability throughout your life, whether by fear or scorn you have no interest in these pursuits. You may choose any proficiency to be incompetent to gain 1 skill increase of your choice. (Proficiency=Level-6) The reason I suggested this was 2 fold. One, to illustrate exactly what happens when you focus too much on your career. The other reason is to give an actual depiction of what happens when you focus on your career. It works from either prospective. This is fair, simple, realistic, and flavorful. As for being complicated? It hasn't changed the system or mechanics in any way. You will still have little circles to check, and a regular occurrence of checks that would be noted in your class progression. The only big difference is that you can choose if you don't like the regular. This is Pathfinder. If you can't customize, why play? What I'm suggesting is huge customization in a simple mechanism. Thanks for your feedback, keep it coming!
I've been mulling something over since August, waiting to see if Paizo would take it further than ditching signature skills. Why stop at such small differences in proficiency? Let's expand the mechanism to add some real differences between characters! In this variation I would assume all characters to start at untrained, but have the option to be incompetent in order to focus their efforts elsewhere. Below I have listed the expanded range of proficiencies. I do not believe this will effect balance. Characters should absolutely be excellent at some things and rubbish at others..... Incompetent: You have avoided this sort of ability throughout your life, whether by fear or scorn you have no interest in these pursuits. You may choose any proficiency to be incompetent to gain 1 skill increase of your choice. (Proficiency=Level-6) Untrained: No practical experience (Proficiency=Level-4) Competent: Practice without formal training (Level-2) Trained: Proficiency equals Level Expert: Focused training and extensive experience (Proficiency=Level+2) Master: Clear insight into the finer points of these abilities (Level +4) Prodigy: Exceptional skill and talent
Renowned: (Level+8) Legendary: (Level+10) In addition, I suggest that players add an extra skill increase as determined by their intelligence modifier. Divide 20 by the modifier, rounded down; so a character with a +3 Int Mod would get one more skill increase every 6 Levels. Each PC would get one free proficiency increase to be applied to anything they choose at each odd level. Yes, this would replace the class ability proficiency progression! Lastly, remove all level restrictions! Release the One Trick Ponies!!! Lol I look forward to hearing your feedback!
Meaning, I just let my players spend their points however they want and all classes form their pools the same way. Wild Druids get 1+Strength Mod to start.
Putting aside the vestigial scimitar proficiency, Paizo started out with a clear eye on bringing back the big Druid abilities while keeping them balanced. Some have moaned about the lose of spell casting while in Wild shape, but they might not realize that Druids could never do that for the first 30 years of (TTRPG's). But I have been excited to see some effort to give back the great druid powers, by forcing characters to pick where to focus. I would suggest that all forms scale up to 9th; giving different spells some flavour focus. Maybe insect form could have the best AC with a spell turning ability at high levels? Animal form could give access to Were Forms with a conditional bonus to your AC, and/or options to call a pack of the form you assume. Wild Morph should have a horns/antlers options with a charge attack.... Ferocious form should give more access to Dire Animals and Magical Beasts. Pest form should give access to swarms that run off the Druid's HP total as a temporary pool. Just a few ideas off the top of my head, so please let's hear your own ideas. Remember, strict efforts to balance everything lead to a fairly boring game. But having options that amount to important tactical advantages give players far more interesting ideas of how to play their abilities.
I fully agree, and play this as a house rule. The support for this decision came right from Paizo. As they made healing easier and easier to get, but ignored the bizarre seperation of the healing powers of Clerics and Paladins. Same can be said for Druids. Just give us a pool of points with bonus points for specialization and additional feats. Wild Druids should get 1 use, plus Strength Mod, 1 per 2 feats, while others who take the Wild shape feat don't get the strength mod bonus..... Just a suggestion.
I am assuming the same thing! The huge number of potential typos throughout the book is rediculous.
Yes, sorry. I was thinking exclusive vs inclusive.... But I encourage you to think about the implications of raging out of combat. Perhaps you won't stop pulping corpses until you can get it under control (possibly destroying some loot). Or you must make a single non-lethal attack against the nearest person each round you fail to regain composure (like the half-hearted hits in a tantrum....) On the whole, I'd prefer this rule as part of a feat anyway. Like perhaps a +1 to hit while raging but you can't control coming out of the rage. Thanks for the comments, thoughts? The flat checks of 5, 10, 15, and 20 are really 20%, 45%, 70%, and 95% chances of dropping out of rage. That gives the expected total lengths of rages as:
A Constitution-based check would have harkened back to the tradition of more Con meant longer rages. I have a few qualms:
Turkeycubes' system, "If you want to make rage seem more uncontrollable, than give a flat check of 4 to come out when the player wants," sounds more controlled rather than more uncontrollable. It does have the advantage of delaying the d20 rolls...
Hey, I totally agree! What I think we see here is an entire class that is built around the fear that multi-class characters will actually get more powerful. So you want to give us the flavour of mutagens without any real benefits? It's just as powerful in the narrative to do some shots at the start of combat than to drink a mutagen that gives item bonuses less than the bonuses you'd have at that level! The bombs have been mostly fine. But, because the first impression most players have is "that sucks!", that's the only alchemist I've seen. I think the key is to stop thinking of the alchemist as creating items. Items are weaker in this version of the game, to just provide little buffs situationally. So just restrict the alchemist to making things for herself! Elixirs can be shared, but not bombs or mutagens, so characters will have to build based on using their abilities and skills rather than just doling them out to others. Also, stop being so scared of synergy! I'm building a Bruce Banner/Hulk and while I love the idea of a Barbarian/Alchemist, the Alchemist devotion adds nothing to the base class, and I can actually get a much more convincing Hulk using just the base class. With high Intelligence and lore skills he's Banner'd out. But I love the flavour of him in the lab, searching for the right ingredients to make Steve Rogers. Please Paizo, fix this! It's like you put the Alchemist in the base classes just to make us hate it!
I'm totally puzzled by this change to the rage ability. A flat check with a cumulative 25% chance to come out of rage each round after the first? If you want to make rage seem more uncontrollable, than give a flat check of 4 to come out when the player wants. If they come out of the rage, they are fatigued 1. If not, every round you fail to hit under the check the check increases by 4 and the fatigued condition increases by 1. So if in round 4 you role under 16 you're barbarian would be out of rage, but fatigued 4. If you want to keep a limit on rounds of rage (and nothing more out of control than endless rage) then start the checks automatically on the last round of a given rage. Thoughts?
Thanks for all the great comments, I'm glad people are reading and engaging. But I think I need to clarify, because some readers seem to think that I didn't know a playtest was a test of playability. Obviously the playtest has a shelf life and would not be the final game, I never assumed it would be. My issue is with the shelf life length, not it's inevitability.
I get that developing a game system is tough, it's why most of us just find a system that mostly works for us and then maybe make a few house rules. I've played and GM'd for a long, long time. Generally, finding a group to play with once per week is about as much as most people have time for. So it's a little tough that so many changes come down the pipe from players who have time to blast through the whole playtest in a month. Some of the changes are solid, and mostly I'm surprised that they didn't get picked up before going to print. Its not cool to sell a hardcopy that you never intended to be accurate for more than a month. At a minimum most of us would like a single unified PDF of the book to download whenever you change things. Putting in the work of editing your book for each change might help you slow things down long enough to get things right. I've enjoyed Pathfinder for 10 years and I want to see this new edition become even better! The problem with RPG's is that player and GM experience is the biggest factor in playability. Rules as written are the beginning of learning the game, not the end. There need to be more debate and understanding about why things have been changed. I like resonance! A high magic world can still have fewer magic items and less usable versions. I agree that spending resonance for potions is too much, same for scrolls, and maybe consumables should have a longer duration so players can buff up before heading into danger. There's clearly room for some change, but what I'm seeing is that this version of the game is heading into the same crowd-sourced hot mess that first edition became. There should be a cost to getting a character to do what you want, but that cost is better served by teaching GM's to be open, flexible and able to handle unbalanced parties. The best adventures of literature never include a balanced party. Paizo, please stick to your guns a little longer. Spend more time publishing explanations and contextual suggestions for your rules rather than just changing them. Help new players and especially GM's understand how they might find roleplaying solutions to their complaints. Just dropping more rules as written to give the people what they want will just make for more of a mess.... And maybe some of you remember how many 2nd edition ad&d books were sold that were mostly about flavour, and not loaded with new classes and feats? There's a market for RPG books that are actually about roleplaying! I hope you agree, and thanks for the great times paizo! |
