TxSam88's page

I also prefer prepared casters better than sorc/oracle for new players, as the spontaneous classes require a ton of character decisions before session 1 that you end up stuck with and will be slow to correct when they become points of regret. I’m probably in the minority on that.

I don't expect the FIRST character that a full table of newbies play to be gaining many levels. I expect them to see perhaps 3-4 games before they are scrapped and then the players build their real characters for a campaign.

I think I've already mentioned, the point of the beginning characters is to teach basics. How to attack in combat, how to move, how to do skill checks, the point of armor class, how hit points work, etc., perhaps allow them to level up a couple of times to see how that works.

So avoid any class thats complicated - this includes multi classing, characters that have have multiple changes in combat like blood ragers, etc.

I also expect the GM to have a very heavy hand in helping with those level ups - to help the player understand exactly what is happening and to avoid those bad decisions.

Remember this is a discussion about a table of nothing bot Newbies, everyone except the GM having never played before.

I also advise novices to stay away from rogues and similar classes. I am a veteran player and found them hard to make work when I tried them. You have to survive in combat with modest armor and set up sneak attacks, neither is exactly easy. I nearly always play full casters so am no expert, but it's hardly the way to introduce the game to a novice.

We have found the opposite - Rogues are one of the best characters for newbies to play. they offer more than just "I swing a sword" every round, since they are typically the scout, the lockpick, the trapfinder, etc. so it gets the player more involved in the game, and since they don't do a ton of damage in combat, tend to not be the prime targets of the bad guys.

(as for making a rogue work I find it super easy)

that's a good set of characters, but I would never give any of them to a set of Newbies.

When it comes to Newbies, I would stick to Core Races, No archetypes, no classes whose stats change due to things like rage, no multi-classing, and keep all the casters in the group as either spontaneous, or prepared, but not a mix. I would also have the number of casters in the group maxed at 2.

for Newbies, learning the games basics is key, this means employing the KISS system, Keep Is Simple, Stupid.

so
Human Fighter, longsword, halfplate. 17 Str, 16 Con, weapon focus.
Elven fighter, longbow, chainmail, 19 Dex, 15 Con, weapon focus
Dwarven cleric, warhammer, breastplate, 17 wis, 17 con, weapon focus
elven wizard, int 17, dex 15, Spell focus
halfling Rogue, 17 dex, 15 int, TWF

this is the party I would hand to 5 newbie players. if only 4 players, I would drop one of the fighters, and let them have both a longsword and longbow.

Sure - they are humans about 18-35 with some experience from DnD3.5, DnD5, PF2. [/ooc]

I would not classify anyone who's played 3.5 to be a newbie at Pf1....

Although the idea of the sorcerer and the oracle is tempting, it's not the best for beginners, since even though they provide good abilities You need to have a good understanding of the spells you choose, and you can only change one spell at level 4 every 4 levels. It's better to go for Arcanist if what you want is It's about casting a continuous spell while simultaneously testing each spell separately shaman is also a good option instead of the cleric, as for the rogue even is it good I prefer the bard, you will get a good support, skill user and a face for the party

I was just thinking that a spontaneous caster would be easier than a prepared caster. and with 2 casters already in the party, the bard would be a third, and I'd think that explaining spells to 3 players instead of just 2 would take a little too much time. Combined with the complications of the bards inspiration/performance, would just be more complications than needed for an all newbie party.

To be fair, the request for PFS legal was kind of buried down in the request. And it’s not like these threads can’t be googled up based more on title than content. So giving non-PFS options isn’t unexpected.

I do agree that Kasatha and Multi-attack shouldn’t be a default assumption though. It’s one of those things you have to ask the GM about, like playing a summoner.

Even outside of PFS, Kasatha and Multi-attack would require GM approval.

As for the original OP question.

I'd really just stick to the classics

Fighter (melee) and or Ranger (Ranged)
Cleric or Oracle - Oracle is probably the simpler to play
Wizard or sorcerer - Sorcerer is probably the easier to play.
Unchained Rogue.

But for beginners I would recommend another class that is designed to enter melee, e.g. a paladin, rather than an unchained rogue.

Unchained rogues have a lot of rather complex game mechanics. Second, you need to be able to go into melee while only wearing light armor and try to set up sneak attacks. This makes you very dangerous and vulnerable, which can easily make you dead.

Disagree - Rogues are one of the best characters for newbies to play. More complicated than a fighter type who just attacks every turn, but not overwhelmingly complicated like an inquisitor or a spellcaster.

The character has much more interaction in the game due to trapfinding and lockpicking, so the player doesn't just sit and watch during most of the game.

while we do let our new players have input in their character choice - we always try to steer them towards a rogue type.

Paladins are very bad for beginning players due to the Alignment restrictions on play.

Actually he is wrong about the need for GM approvals.

Kasatha x4 - Not a Core race = GM Approval

Multi Weapon Fighting x4 - Monster feat = GM Approval

So at least 8 GM approvals needed for the party as written, and that's before I take a close look at the classes.

TxSam88 wrote:

Joynt Jezebel wrote:

I am sure...

How about one that doesn't need an insane number of GM approvals.... one that Newbies can handle.

LoL, well if you have time to criticize (not that you're wrong) maybe you could show us how it's done by posting your group according to the initial post. Easy with a PC build tool. Building is always harder and takes more skill than tearing down.

As already mentioned, just make sure the traditional bases are covered - the traditional Fighter, Magic User, Cleric, Rogue - or anything that can replace them is a good starter party....

And since the OP was discussing NEW PLAYERS - nothing that would require GM Approval...

I am sure this is not what Azothath had in mind when starting this thread. I will present a party which is both very effective and absolutely ridiculous.

How about one that doesn't need an insane number of GM approvals.... one that Newbies can handle.

Too boost your Caster level even more, pick up a Blazing robe and the Varisian Tattoo feat.

Mysterious Stranger wrote:

How about the daring champion cavalier? They get both the swashbuckler's precise strike and the cavalier's challenge. That allows them to add twice their level to damage, even if half of it is not multiplied on a critical. After the second round they can spend a swift action to double the bonus of the precises strike so they are adding three times their level. If you really want to get absurd use the VMC to gain the paladins smite evil. Now they get twice their level that does multiply on a crit, plus their level that does not multiply and it gets CHA to hit and ignores all DR. They also get another benefit depending on their cavalier order.

flying blade 3/virtuous bravo x is on my list of builds i’d be interested in trying someday (full attack at range adding 2xlevel to every hit with smite active).

I'm currently playing a Virtuous Bravado, using a Glaive (Dex build with bladed brush and mythic weapon finesse). Smiting and then using a panache to double precision damage is pretty lethal.

Mysterious Stranger wrote:

How about the daring champion cavalier? They get both the swashbuckler's precise strike and the cavalier's challenge. That allows them to add twice their level to damage, even if half of it is not multiplied on a critical. After the second round they can spend a swift action to double the bonus of the precises strike so they are adding three times their level. If you really want to get absurd use the VMC to gain the paladins smite evil. Now they get twice their level that does multiply on a crit, plus their level that does not multiply and it gets CHA to hit and ignores all DR. They also get another benefit depending on their cavalier order.

flying blade 3/virtuous bravo x is on my list of builds i’d be interested in trying someday (full attack at range adding 2xlevel to every hit with smite active).

I'm currently playing a Virtuous Bravado, using a Glaive (Dex build with bladed crush and mythic weapon finesse). Smiting and then using a panache to double precision damage is pretty lethal.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/background-skills/

Not sure it solves your problem- but wanted to make sure you had seen Background skills. It's something we've been discussing about using in our home game.

That being said, I think being able to have 2xlevel in ranks is pretty broken. Our party is currently 8th level, and already we are seeing 35+ skill checks in some cases. with most DC's topping out around 30, I'm not seeing a need for making them easier

You don't need an odd race? The original didn't require a specific race at all. The kitsune is hardly an odd race, even being common in society play.

We don't play Society rules in our home game, we play by the book rules (Modified by our house rules), and Kitsune, is an "Other Race" which generally need GM approval.

But - I'll go see what I can build up and compare the 2....

Dice damage doesn't scale much, so is usually not that important. Consider unarmed attacks dealing 1 instead of 1d3. That's only an average difference of 1 more damage per hit.

Tiny beast shape gives +4 to dexterity. So, that's a total +4 to Attack. +5 to AC with the natural armor from beast shape 2. Eventual +2 to damage, which I'd personally use an agile amulet of might fists to achieve. You can two weapon fight your unarmed strikes, using your bite as a secondary attack.

0 reach isn't that bad, especially with a dip of the mouser archetype, which gives you an easier time flanking than just about anyone else for a near constant +2 to attacks.

Obviously this build will be taking every possible option to maximize their dexterity. Maybe you will just have to see it in action.

sounds pretty much like one of my typical Medium size rogue builds.

they come pretty close to that damage, ac, hit, without the costs associated with being tiny, or needing GM approval for an odd race.

TxSam88 wrote:

Oli Ironbar wrote:

So many! But first and foremost is anything with dex to damage and then going tiny sized or smaller. Did this with a swashbuckler monk and it was so very mean.

I guess I'm not seeing it, please explain?

Songbird of Doom was the main origin/popularization of it, though it's possibly more common to do it with a Kitsune with Fox Shape. There are really a lot of possible variations, but it leaves you with a melee that is incredibly hard to hit because of size and dexterity and deals a fairly large amount of damage.

I've read about the hummingbird of doom, and it's pretty nasty, but being Tiny only gives you a +2 Dex and +2 AC, and +2 To Hit, which is all nice and everything.

but their weapons are now tiny so are 2 steps lower in base dice damage, your to hit roll is still based on STR until you get weapon finesse, plus you have 0 reach, can't flank, and risk an AOO to enter an opponents square, and will typically have a movement less than 20'.

All in all, doesn't seem like that great of a trade off, and I love Dex based characters (certainly not earth shattering unless combined with something else)

I mean, it basically gives you +3 to hit (once finesse kicks in), +3 to AC, and +1 to damage overall.... unless I'm missing something, that's nothing to write home about.

The Character I played that got the most irritation out of the GM was an Undead Lord Cleric. Running around the desert with about 100HD worth of skeletal minions was pretty potent.

So many! But first and foremost is anything with dex to damage and then going tiny sized or smaller. Did this with a swashbuckler monk and it was so very mean.

I guess I'm not seeing it, please explain?

Speaking of casters, I'm really digging the Mystic Theurge I'm playing in the Return of the Runelords AP one of my groups is going through right now.

I enjoyed the Mystic Theurge, but falling being in spell progression and overall level did hurt. I found a couple of ways to help mitigate it, but it was still an issue.

Note the word "consistent"...

Impromptu Sneak Attack is limited uses per day. Invisibility lasts for only one attack. And an arcane trickster is... fragile (comparatively); not the best choice to mix it up in melee for flanking as a general tactic.

Obscuring mist and a way to see through it allows ranged sneak attacks each round (while also hiding the arcane trickster from the enemy's ranged attacks) without further actions.

with there typically only being 4-5 combats per day, I find these methods consistent enough to have backstab "most" of the time (usually using just flanking). As for being fragile.... eh, just make sure you have a good healer in the party. never have much worried about being in flanking or not as far as being hit.

An arcane trickster can be extremely effective as a blaster with ranged touch spells.

The issue is setting up consistent sneak attacks at range. One strategy before greater invisibility is available (which can be a long wait) involves obscuring mist and a way to see through it (sylph with Cloud Gazer, wizard with the Air/Smoke school, a goz mask, etc.).

Impromptu sneak attack is available at 3rd level Trickster, 7th level overall, but can cast invisibility at 3rd level overall. if built right.

depending on the character/campaign, I've also gone with the Exploiter wizard, which can use dimensional slide to get into flanking easily, and apply the sneak attack to touch spells like shocking grasp.

TxSam88 wrote:

I switch back and forth between 2WF/Sneak attack builds, ad Arcane Casters. Sometimes trying to combine them.

My Arcane Trickster was so effective at dealing insane levels of damage, that the GM banned the class for a while.

I usually think of Arcane Tricksters as utility. Were you doing most of the damage with your weapons or were you somehow combining them with magic attacks?

Arcane Trickster has access to Greater Invisibility and Haste, combining that with 2WF, and/or spells, both of which can have Sneak damage, makes for a lot of damage. at 14th level, you can have a magic missile do 5d4+5+7d6.

and suddenly that lightning bolt can potentially do 21d6 at that same 14th level, if it's intensified... add on things like Varisian Tattoo, Shocking Robe, and you hit that damage threshold earlier.

I switch back and forth between 2WF/Sneak attack builds, ad Arcane Casters. Sometimes trying to combine them.

My Arcane Trickster was so effective at dealing insane levels of damage, that the GM banned the class for a while.

I'm not sure shields are melee weapons, I think in some situations they can be used as a melee weapon, but they are listed under armor and shields, not under weapons. If I am correct, then no, they cannot trigger another attack.

Increase by level is only 1/3 of it. You also have dexterity by belts and dexterity by wishes. There are even further ways to gain dexterity but those are not the general case.

both limited by WBL and/or Caster Level, but yeah, plenty of ways to increase stuff.

How do the Mythic Path Abilities Elemental Bond and Elemental Conversion Interact?

If you choose Fire for Elemental Bond, then cast a fireball, and convert it to Cold, do you add your tier to the spell and gain Energy resistance? If so, to what element?

Conversely, if you choose Water for your elemental bond, and cast a fireball and concert it to Cold, does elemental bond kick in and up the level and give resistance? and if so, what element?

Or does something else altogether happen?

1. I'd change to to Snowmen instead of Snowballs.
2. 3 per caster level is far too many. It really needs to be more along 1 per caster level, half that if water.

TxSam88 wrote:

a Magus doesn't get Heavy Armor Proficiency until 13h level... hardly low level....

Is that really a meaningful case for this more general point? As a "general rule", armor heaviness doesn't scale with level. Finding some niche case where it kind-of-almost does scale with level doesn't seem productive to the discussion. Compare that to the baked in ability progression in the game system. Dexterity scales constantly through the entire game for every dexterity build.

Well, Dex can go up every 4 levels, pretty similar to how often the magus armor proficiencies increase, and pretty similar to how often a fighter gets an increase in the Armor Training benefits, which is also about the same rate as how often a swashbuckler gets increases in Nimble.

So yeah IMO, there are some things built into Pathfinder that are designed to prevent a 1st level character from wearing full plate armor and carrying a tower shield, at lease until they go up a few levels, and gain some resources and gain some abilities to offset the penalties. So yeah, IMO normal armor does scale by level - at lease somewhat.

Full plate Costs 1500GP - just WBL alone means the character needs to be 3rd level before he can buy it.

I have to disagree with the idea of AC based on armor scaling with level. While an extremely low-level character may not be able to afford heavy armor, by the time a character reaches 4th level or higher that ceases to be true. AC based on armor may be restricted at low level, but once you get past low level it no longer is a factor.

a Magus doesn't get Heavy Armor Proficiency until 13h level... hardly low level....

It's an issue of scaling. Each armor category is 1 to 2 more AC. Not bad by any means, but it doesn't scale past level 1. Meanwhile Dexterity constantly scales, with multiple paths of increasing your dexterity score.

Saying Strength is equal with dexterity because of heavy armor doesn't seem like a good faith argument. Consider the many penalties and extra costs associated with heavy armor. As I pointed out earlier, a regular suit of full plate is more expensive than a mithral chain shirt. So, the strength character is paying way more to suffer extra penalties. Nothing about that is balanced.

But armor class based on armor is supposed to scale by level, at least somewhat. a 1st level character is not supposed to be able to afford full plate, he's supposed to start off with way cheaper armor. and the armor penalty is supposed to prevent him from wanting heavy armor too early. As he gains levels, and can afford more armor, then he upgrades. This can be seen by how Armor training for fighters kicks in slowly, and the Magus gains armor proficiencies as he levels, etc.

[QUOTE="Mysterious Stranger"

I do not know how long you have been playing, your earliest post I can see is Nov 2nd 2015. That is several months after Pathfinder Unchained came out. Prior to that rogues were considered to be the worst class in the game. The earliest DEX to damage was Dervish Dance in 2011, followed by Agile enchantment in 2013, 2014 added slashing/fencing grace and in 2015 unchained rogue gave made DEX to damage a class feature of the unchained rogue.

The unchained rogue fixed a lot of problems of the core rogue and is a viable class. Sneak attack can be deadly but it is not reliable, without DEX to damage a rogue has very little way to increase their damage when sneak attack is not available. As a ¾ BAB class using feats like power attack that trade accuracy for damage is not a good idea. A core rogue is still a very weak class.

By early days I was referring to prior to 2014.

I have played since the Beta Test at Gencon in 2008 - before that I played 4e, 3.5, 3.1, 2, 1, and basic: starting around 1983. I typically play rogue types or arcane caster types.

My first long term Pathfinder character, which we played Rise of the Runelords, was a chained Rogue, and I never had any issue with it not dealing decent damage.

I hear people all the time talking about the issue with sneak attack damage being unreliable, and I just don't see it - I pretty much always get in sneak attack damage, and the additions that have been made have just made it easier.

The easiest way to increase damage on a rogue is TWF, and then invest in weapons with various elements. just a single element on 2 weapons and you have effectively increased your backstab damage by the equivalent of 2 rogue levels.

But we're moving way from the OP discussion. I'll just say that I'll take any DEX build over any STR build anytime.

You may have missed some key details. It was never adding dexterity and strength. It was replacing dexterity with strength, like weapon finesse replaces strength with dexterity. But also it still applies the max dexterity limit of armor to your strength bonus, so if you are wearing full plate it will probably cap out, even with a fighter’s armor training. I like how this works because strength builds would also gain the option to benefit from lighter armors.

Instead of a full feat chain, I may just give it a prerequisite of shield focus. This would put it in a comparative middle place between weapon finesse and dervish dance.

Nothing in your original commentary stated the character would get DEX or STR.

I still find this unnecessary - STR builds can wear Heavy armor, whereas DEX builds usually don't.

In the early days of Pathfinder before DEX to damage became available DEX based builds were almost non-existent. The only ones who bothered with them were standard rogues. During that time rogues were considered a useless class.

Fundamentally disagree - I've been building Dex based builds without Dex to DMG since day one, TWF rogues are can be devastating builds.

So, if you had this option, would you think it was clearly better than choosing a dexterity build?

No - not really.

Once your AC climbs above 26-28 anything else is pretty much no longer necessary. Any monster that can hit you, won't miss the rest of your party, so Encounters become imbalanced.

Aside from that, I'm of the camp that DEX builds are superior to STR builds, so it would take more than an AC boost to get me to switch.

STR based characters already benefit from Heavy armor and Heavy shield, and at early levels (even late game depending on the build) can have some of the highest AC's in the game. We don't need to make it even easier for them to have high AC's.

For example - a 1st level fighter with Full plate she heavy shield starts at a 21 AC before we apply dex.

if it were a dex fighter with 20 dex (18 max dex plus racial), in a chain shirt, they max out at 18, 20 if they want to carry a heavy shield, but more likely only a buckler at most, so 19 AC.

So the STR based fighter is already 2-3 points ahead before magic, feats, and class abilities come into play.

In our current campaign, we're only 8th level, and the Paladin can already hit a 30 AC - while the next best in the party is a 23. I see no need to make it easier to boost the AC.

I assume you also want to remove the rules that you can simply buy spells in the local market

Does anyone know which of these documents is updated more frequently? I haven't noticed any differences between them so far, but if discrepancies do appear, which one should be considered the authoritative version?

Neither are updated any more as Pf1 is done. There are discrepancies, I've personally found 3 or 4. When that happens the AON (Articles of Nethys) is the definitive source.

That said, it seems plausible to imagine a boxing glove or other non-weapon that can cover the fist without turning it into not a fist weapon.

Like Handwraps?

Handwraps?

Single move action to retrieve a stored item
Second move item to ready a shield.

Readying the Shield can be done with a move.

https://www.d20pfsrd.com/Gamemastering/Combat/#TOC-Actions-In-Combat

So the way S&S handled mass combat fights was that the party was fighting the other officers, not low level NPCs. Make the Pirate Officers same level/APL as the party, and you'll probably see less difference. As for the rigging, I seem to remember a swing over attack that you use in book 1.

As for Gunpowder/firearms - we used it in S&S And also in Reign of Winter, and while it fit both of those campaigns, we've decided it's just too broken for general use.

If your complaint is that the GM is purposefully out to get you, then they could just use entangle effects or a web, then your cover or AC doesn't even matter, they don't have to use any action on the enemies. If that's the case, you're already screwed. But again, if in any game you want to remove concentration checks or make them easier (assuming you do it fairly and the NPCs get it too), it's not going to wreck anything (except the PCs that are trying to stop an enemy from casting a spell).

No, the complaint was that we shouldn't need to worry about any and all of that, Not for a game that's meant to be fun. We decided that none of that tactical thought was fun, and certainly not casting spells isn't fun. so we just removed that whole ruleset from our game. Suddenly games were more fun, combat when quicker, spells were cast, and there was a joyous shout throughout the land.

But back to the original question: yes, we found that disrupting a spell was far to easy.

Like a couple other posters, I have never known Readying-against-spells to be a specific issue - the cost is very high, and the potential payoff is no better than the AoO you probably would have got anyway (although TBF, you do get both). So it is rarely attempted.

There is an issue with pure-caster enemies in small rooms without minions being underwhelming, but that is mostly due to AoO not readying. And the solution is some combination of a) don't use those encounters, or b) accept that they're going to be relatively quick and easy and move on. House ruling to help those encounters would have knock-on effects on encounters which are less unfavourable to the caster.

the issue is not whether the party uses the tactic or not, but whether the GM uses it or not. And for the GM to simply add a couple of extra mooks with bows whose job is to look for casters and shoot them when they cast, purely for spell disruption can and does effectively negate a spellcasters effectiveness in any combat.

we saw that it was way to easy to disrupt spells. all it took was a ready action to make an attack when they cast, not to mention the standard AOO if you are in melee range. and the concentration check never caught up with the damage dealt.

We decided it was really not in the spirit of the game, so we just threw it out. No concentration checks in our game.

TxSam88 wrote:

I'll admit raising the DC is good, but we find that most things pass saving throws far too often as is, and we've already experimented with raising all DCs to the highest DC a character has - and so far it hasn't seemed to increase the fail rate enough. We're beginning to think that DC's need to be increased even more to have a failure rate over 10-20%

Are your targets NPCs with character levels or monsters?

In my experience, most monster saves are easily pierced when the encounter is CR appropriate (unless you are my player that feel that anything that doesn't have a 95+% chance of success is useless). NPCs' saves can be way better if they are built to have good saves, but, generally, they still have holes in their defenses.

Both - I've had entire campaigns where the bad guys, minions, monsters, and npc's rarely - if ever - fail a save. to the point that many of my caster builds no longer take spells that allow a save or target the enemy.

And yes, I've done things to increase the DC of the spells.

At 15th level a fireball or lightning bolt is not designed to be used against the boss, it is for taking out numerous minions. The saving throws for the minions should be substantially lower than the boss. That means a boost of +2 to the DC of the save should be fairly useful. As I mentioned before the staff also means the DC of the save uses the characters stat bonus and feats. Compare that to a wand of fireballs and the fireball from the staff will do much more damage and be harder to resist.

The staff also gives a +2 luck bonus on AC and saving throw. Luck bonuses are probably the rarest bonus in the game, so the bonus from the staff will usually always benefit the character. It is also a +2 quarterstaff. The value of those abilities is worth at least 22,600 gp without factoring in the fact the AC and Save are luck bonuses.

By having a bunch of commonly used spells available in the staff also allows the character to expand their options considerably. If the character is a wizard, it allows the wizard to use his own spell slots for other spells, while still having access to some basic damaging spells. For a sorcerer it gives them access to spells they normally would not have that take advantage of the characters stats, feats and level.

I'm not saying the staff overall is ho-hum - just that particular bonus. I'd happily take the staff on any arcane caster build I typically play.

Raising the DC by 2 is more useful than you think. That is the equivalent to having both spell focus and greater spell focus. Heightened spell also stacks with those. Staves also allow the character to use their own ability score, feats and levels on the spells from the staff. Adding heightened spell to that can result in some very high DC's

Both fireball and lightning bolt are area of effect spells. That makes raising the DC even more useful. With a single target spell raising the DC means one target is more likely to fail and take full damage. On an area of effect spell more creatures are affected so the effect multiplies.

In the case of ray of enfeeblement, the DC as you pointed out is raised by 4. That is a substantial increase in the chance of the target taking full effect.

I'll admit raising the DC is good, but we find that most things pass saving throws far too often as is, and we've already experimented with raising all DCs to the highest DC a character has - and so far it hasn't seemed to increase the fail rate enough. We're beginning to think that DC's need to be increased even more to have a failure rate over 10-20%

but that's all another discussion.

As for this staff, the Heightened spells seem relatively "ho-hum" for a 15th level staff of this cost.

Heighten raises the spell level, not the caster level.

So all it does then is increase the DC by 2 (4 in the case of Ray of enfeeblement)?

seems almost worthless.

A staff of power lists a number of spells that have been heightened to 5th level.

Since the Staff is 15th level, and you can use it's level unless your level is higher, does the heighten on those spells really have any benefit?

Or should they have been heightened to 15th level?