Vition's page

I have to say that overall, I really like a lot of what I see in PF2, but I have a couple of concerns I would like to see changes to. Since the game's already out, they are now potential house rules. I bring these up primarily to see if I've missed any potential snags or brokenness.

The (mostly) binary nature of weapon-based combat is something I'd like to see changed, especially with some of the generally higher defenses many of the monsters have. The second is expanding action economy to work with spellcasting. Ideally, both these would be implemented at the same time, as individually, I think they provide too much of a buff to one type or the other.

Weapon-Based Combat
Miss
The attack roll is below the target's AC by 6 or more. The attack misses, causing no damage. Automatically happens on a roll of a natural "1" (may also include a fumble chance).
Near Miss
The attack roll is below the target’s AC by 5 or less. This attack causes some harm to the opponent but does not truly injure them. The damage done is halved and damage modifying abilities are not included in the damage roll.
Solid Hit
The attack roll hits the target’s AC or exceeds it by less than 10. This attack causes normal damage with the proper damage modifying abilities being applied.
Critical Hit
The attack roll exceeds the target’s AC by 10 or more. A solid hit to a tender area, normal critical hit conditions apply. A natural 20 on an attack roll will also cause a Critical Hit.
Deadly Hit
The attack roll exceeds the target’s AC by 15 or more. For every 5 above 10 the attack roll exceeds the target’s AC the multiplier for the critical hit is increased by 1 (x2 -> x3, x3 -> x4, etc.).**

**I may also just decide that hits succeeding by 15 or more just immediately kill the target, but I include the rules so that the players are aware of how high level enemies might do even more damage to them than they'd otherwise expect.

Spell Casting Action Economy
-Spellcasting is inherently limited in the three action economy. To allow for spellcasting to more directly interact with it, I am including options to decrease and increase the number of actions to cast a spell.
-For damage dealing spells, you can decrease the spell’s action to a single action, but the total damage done is halved (quartered on a successful save). This does not decrease the components needed to cast a spell.
-For non-damage dealing spells, you can decrease the spell’s action to a single action, but the result is always a result below the two-action version.
For all offensive two-action spells, you can increase the number of actions to three in order to increase the DC of the spell by +2.
-Casting multiple spells per round is possible, but at least one of the spells must be a cantrip.
-Haste and other spells, abilities or effects which increase the number of actions can interact with this system. Anything which allows the extra action to be used for a Strike action can be used to interact with the Spellcasting Action Economy.

I'm not entirely sure how to work buffs into this. It might simply be increased duration, or whatever numbers can be increased by some amount. I'm open to suggestions if anyone has any.

Thanks all in advance of looking this over.

I don't think there's a need to create half-caster classes, for similar reasons others have posted.

That said I think there is room to create full caster-based archetypes which delay spell progression for some other benefit, such as martial prowess. The way the feat system is set up allows for a lot of plug and play design space, and the potential for some of them to take away something from a class in order to gain something else is there.

Also, what's the reasoning behind not having points persist from session to session? My sessions are typically only about two hours once a week, and if someone does something awesome at the end of the encounter, I'd end up giving a reward that's going to vanish before they have occasion to use it. Likewise, ensuring everyone has one at the start of the session means the players are pretty much never in a situation where the dying condition actually means they could die.

Since your sessions are so short, I would consider using a two session paradigm for the purposes of hero points. So they get a recharged hero point ever other session, while an earned hero point expires in two sessions. This should give them enough hero points to match the expectations of PF2.

Paizo adventures are generally divided into three to four "parts" per book. Do you think treating each of them as a session for the purpose of hero points is reasonable?

I have noticed, at least historically, that Paizo adventure "parts" do not necessarily include the same amount of content/challenges. So I would consider using 1-3 hero points depending on how many challenges I'm expecting the players to encounter.

Personally, I'm considering something similar to how it seems to be working in Knights of the Everflame, where a point recharges roughly every hour, more or less depending on the content of the hour. My sessions usually run about 3 hours, so a typical session will see 2 or 3 hero points given.

My definition of a "feat tax" includes:

1) Something that gives a numerical bonus to put your expected number mathematically where it is supposed to be for a certain level.

2) Something required for another feat you want for your character build but does little else for your build.

So while technically speaking, every feat gives something to a character, there are some that are used so infrequently that the bonus they give is worthless.

@graystone

One of the stated goals of the playtest and PF2 was to make choices meaningful. Considering the amount of effort you are putting into making your alchemist, it seems that they have succeeded in this situation.

Either work with potentially being encumbered, or toss a stat boost into STR.

Other options have also been mentioned - spend some of your starting or early cash on a mule, meaning you might choose to forgo getting certain other items as early as you would prefer.

Meaningful choices.

2D10 doesn't work without some significant other changes to the system. I tried it with 5e and it just got messy. It's also not a great curve, 3d6 or 3d8 would be much better (personally I'd like to see a 3d8 system at some point, it simply sounds interesting).

For me, this looks like a character where the GM didn't quite do his job when he introduced the new game (yes, I read that the OP was also a GM). As a GM myself, I expect to have greater system mastery than my players do. My response to the character would be as follows:

"You made a dwarf fighter as your first character, huh? Can I look at your character sheet?... It looks like you dumped charisma, it's possible you may want to rethink that. As a front-line fighter there's a very good chance you are going to be taking some damage, and magic items, particularly including potions, use a resource in this game based off charisma. With an 8 you won't reliably be able to use healing potions at level 1, and you might even be at a disadvantage in using magic items at later levels. All your stats matter for important parts of gameplay now, so you have to make decisions on what you are willing to go without."

Knowing my regular players, whoever made this character would have follow-up questions where I would probably expand on the rules regarding resonance.

And you keep saying that it's a yo-yo, with just a slowed condition upon stabilization. It's not. If you're knocked unconscious, you have to stabilize at the start of your turn, the same exact time you gain your action and reactions. Regardless of whether you do or do not stabilize (which is a result that happens after your turn starts, which the condition already states while you are unconscious you do not have, nor can you gain, actions of any kind, and after any sort of actions or reactions you normally get for the turn), you do not have any actions until you are conscious, and remain conscious, for the following round. When that turn comes (which everyone else will have acted for their full allotment of actions as normal), THEN you apply the Slow factor (because that also applies at the start of your turn, which the stabilization check bypasses when you make it and apply its results), and THEN you can act normal. I've already went over in detailed analysis the implications how the current rules absolutely screw these players over and, compared to PF1, doesn't bring them back in the fight any faster or smoother.

False. There is a clear order and priority to how to the "Beginning of the Turn" portion of a turn takes effect. Regaining actions comes last, after the roll to stabilize. It actually does become a yo-yo effect with a slowed condition. For reference, this is located on pages 304 and 305.

I won't argue that it does not penalize those who become unconscious, but I personally prefer that to "heal" "full-attack" "knock back down" "heal" "full-attack" ... I simply feel there should be some real consequence to being knocked out (I don't consider becoming prone and dropping weapons to be enough), the idea of a character probably not effectively contributing to the rest of the fight is perfectly fine with me (this is of course assuming a regular, 2-3 round, fight, said character would still be able to contribute effectively to a longer fight).

A couple of ideas have struck a chord with me about how to redo some of the weapon oriented ideas. In particular the massive decrease in power of primarily weapon using classes when they no longer have access to their higher level weapons. While I liked the idea of making damage be based on the level of training/expertise a character had in a particular weapon I didn't feel like it worked as the 'whole story' so-to-say. Overall, the idea is to decrease the reliance on the "magical" part of the leveling treadmill, a non-magical weapon will be quite effective and the magical portion will be a nice bonus rather than a requirement. This is an idea I came up with (and of course pulled from other suggestions on this forum, sorry for not referencing you, I read posts a couple days ago and can't remember the handles of those who I'm borrowing parts of this from).

Weapon effectiveness comes from 3 different aspects of the weapon and the character wielding the weapon: Skill level, quality and potency. In this suggestion the only part that double dips is the skill level.

Skill level determines the number of dice rolled to determine the overall damage of the weapon. (not sure if the strength mod should be multiplied as well, nor the potency, though I'm leaning towards yes for the strength mod and no for the potency damage)
Untrained weapon damage is equal the the weapon die -2 plus strength modifier damage. (So a longsword would do 1d8-2 + str mod damage)
Trained weapon damage is equal to the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 1d8 + str mod damage)
Expert weapon damage is equal to two times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 2d8 + str mod damage)
Master weapon damage is equal to three times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 3d8 + str mod damage)
Legendary weapon damage is equal to four times the weapon die plus strength modifier damage. (Longsword: 4d8 + str mod damage)

The quality of the weapon determines the ease of use of the weapon being used, effectively adding a small bonus or penalty to the attack roll.
Poor (or crude) quality weapons levy a -1 penalty to the attack roll.
Normal quality weapons do not effect the attack roll.
Expert quality weapons grant a +1 bonus to attack rolls.
Master quality weapons grant a +2 bonus to attack rolls.
Legendary quality weapons grant a +3 bonus to attack rolls.

The potency of a weapon is a magical effect that increases the damage the weapon deals. (My intention with this is that it isn't entirely necessary for magic weapons to keep up with the AC of enemies, but the damage is potent enough to make up for the change)
Tier 1 +1 damage
Tier 2 +3 damage
Tier 3 +6 damage
Tier 4 +10 damage
Tier 5 +15 damage

Good ideas? Bad ideas? Too much? Too little? Too different?

This is probably one of those places where you might want to use the Special Circumstances and Traits section (pg 327). I would use the higher of the two options and then give a bonus depending on how well the creatures hid (ie. their stealth check).

Just kind of spit-balling here, but I'd roll a group stealth check for the ambushers, then compare it to the perception of the characters (probably the one with the highest perception - depending on what that one is doing though). Without playing yet, I would probably set the bonuses at beating the static perception to be +1, beating it by 4 or more +2, beating it by 7 or more +3, critical success +4. Then with the reverse causing negative modifiers. With a maximum bonus being the difference between the perception and stealth bonuses.

Like many here, I also feel like the difference is too insignificant. I actually think the numbers proficiency should give should change depending on what the are actually being applied to. For me it comes down to a trained person should be reliably better than someone who is untrained, while an expert should be [i]reliably[i] better than someone who is simply trained, etc...

As for what's appropriate, testing should be done, my gut says that skill proficiencies should have a greater distinction than armor, weapon, or saves.

My thoughts for skills:
Untrained: -4 (that whole +1 for level thing doesn't matter here, as everyone gets it so it becomes a wash and whatever penalty is given is the penalty)
Trained: 0
Expert: +3
Master: +6
Legendary: +9

Armor, weapons, saves:
Untrained: -2
Trained: 0
Expert: +2
Master: +4
Legendary: +6
(the -2/0/+1/+3/+5 is also tempting here)

1. Feats should be "unchained" from classes.

I can certainly see what you are saying here, but I like the idea that they are chained to certain classes. What I would like to see is those chains loosened a bit, and allow other classes to dip into them at a later time than the class they were intended for. An example might be a class level 5 feat becomes a general feat for characters at level 8 or 10. This gives certain classes an advantage in certain feats but doesn't strictly lock them to the class.

2. Resonance solves a problem that never had to exist.

In a couple of the games I've played, I've seen this be a bit of a problem. Not so much the wearable items, but the extremely versatile wand of cure light wounds. It was too easy to suddenly always have everyone at full HP at the beginning of every fight. I'm not sure yet if resonance was the proper way to go about it, but I can see the issue it is attempting to rectify.

1. Do you currently like pathfinder 1e? (I know it sounds loaded, but please bare with me.)

- Yes, but it was honestly getting a bit bulky with too many options. (in all honesty, I expect a similar issue to occur with whatever PF2 ends up as)

2. Did you once like pathfinder 1e but now find it troublesome? (feel free to give details.)

- I still like 1e, but as above it is a bloated whale of a system at this point. As a GM the more options available the harder it is to prep for, especially when it comes to higher-powered spells.

3. Do you like 4th or 5th edition D&D? (Also sounds loaded but again no judgments)

- There are aspects that I like but others that I don't. In DnD4th I really liked the balance around the classes, but the limited options made for very cookie-cutter builds and the versatility of spell casters was severely diminished decreasing options in play. In DnD5th, the overall simplicity of the game was a bit of a turn off for me, again a lack of options, but in this case as characters grew in their classes. I also dislike the severely curtailed bonuses in DnD5th it makes the roll of the d20 much more significant, so characters that are supposed to good at something can frequently be surpassed by those who weren't supposed to be.

4. Which are you looking for class balance, smoother high level play, more options, or even all of those things? (Small edit: these weren't meant to be mutually excursive, I just want the gist of what you're looking for, feel free to add additional thoughts/desires as well.)

- I feel like class balance is a big one for me, along with smoother high level play. I'm okay with less options overall, but with enough viable options to make characters unique from one game to the next.

5. How do you feel about making the game more accessible in general?

- Absolutely on board with this. I can't see a game system surviving when it caters purely to those who want more and more complications. Getting it to the point where the next generation of gamers can enter into the game without too much fuss, while at the same time not losing its identity, is a GOOD THING.

6. Are you willing to give up on accessibility if you can still gain all of the benefits listed in question 4?

- From what I am asking for from question 4 would actually increase accessibility anyways. Decreasing accessibility will always hurt the game in the long run, the question ought to be what is the right balance.

7. Would you be willing to play an alternative rules system then what we have been presented? (A different version of pathfinder 2nd edition if you will).

- I honestly feel like this is a foolish question. PF2e Playtest has only been available for a couple days, nobody should be so happy with the current ruleset that they can't see changes. In fact, other than those who say something along the lines of "PF2e is broken change it nao!" the counter arguments have mostly been "give it a bit of a chance, play it, then see what needs to change." The knee jerk response is just that, a purely emotional response which has little basis in actual play.

8. And if you said yes to the above question what would you like to see in that theoretical game? (Most of you will see what I'm doing here, I'm finding common ground)

- I want to see a balanced, streamlined game, that still promotes the Pathfinder feel. Unlike some, I like some of what was put out in Starfinder and find that to be part of the Pathfinder identity now, thus some of the Starfinder-ish aspects I find perfectly reasonable in PF2e.

- Expanding on balance a bit more, I would love an edition where spellcasters retain their versatility but don't become virtual gods in comparison to other classes later in the game. I would like to see the balanced play period expanded from roughly levels 7-11. This means less game-breaking spells and more things for non-full casters to do at higher levels.

- Streamlining, there are a bunch of rules that aren't strictly necessary in normal play in PF1e which just serve to complicate gameplay whenever the rules are brought up. Decreasing the number of special circumstances would serve to help that. In addition, as mentioned in the balanced section, fewer game-breaking spells would go a long way.

At a very first glance, this is looking to be a system that I was hoping would exist eventually.

It appears to me to be a middle ground between the complexity of PF1 and the simplicity of DnD5. There's more customization than DnD5 while not going as far as PF1, and it is more streamlined than PF1 while not so light on rules as DnD5 is.

I'm not sure if your campaign has any sort of serious time crunch but if it doesn't here's an idea:

Have them roll initiative, then, before combat actually begins a mist rolls across the battlefield, which quickly clears. Have them make perception checks, with a relatively low DC - they notice that the centaurs facing them are vaguely familiar but definitely different, and that the PCs all now have some vaguely animistic features (not enough to say "that's not human/elf/dwarf/etc. anymore"). The Erlking states "your terms of servitude are complete" and disappears in a swirl of red, orange, and yellow autumn leaves. (as a bonus for the deus ex machina thing, give them all a permanent +1 bonus to their primary attribute, and have the vague animistic appearance change be based around that - dex might be rat or cat features, str might be a bull or bear, int might be alien gray-like, etc.)

The centaurs are now obviously afraid of the PCs, and do whatever they can to avoid combat.

Upon returning to the prime material plane, it quickly becomes apparent that the PCs have been gone for 101 years. Stories of both their heroism and their disappearance have become legend and infuse the areas they affected with their deeds - perhaps some of these have actually been overblown, and when the PCs are finally recognized (probably by an elf, or by stone monuments erected in their honor) the expectations of the inhabitants are very high.

Keep in mind that the Fey realm is very much inspired by the stories and fairy tales of first millennia folklore. The fey love to toy with mortals and with time, include it in your story.

Both of you just gave me a very evil idea which may give me a second opportunity to steal the Raven's Head from the party (the only significant item I wouldn't feel like an ass by taking it from them), involving the spells silence and invisibility. Hmm, maybe the whispering tyrant will get a second chance at the end of the campaign.

Grollub: There's actually plenty of space and weight left in the bag (it's either a type II or III), they skipped a lot of the travel encounters on the way there by flying so most of the items in the bag are very small, with only the 10 sets of leather armor being of significant size. I estimate they've used about 40% of the bag's weight limit, while only around 25% of it's space, assuming a type II bag.

Thanks for the suggestions. >=)

I'm currently GMing a Carrion Crown campaign and in one encounter I replaced a couple of mooks the party would just run through with a couple more challenging creatures. One of the creatures I brought in was a Graveknight Anti-Paladin 7 (The changes I made to the encounter brought it up from a CR13 to roughly a CR13.5). The party eventually overcame the encounter but was unable to identify the Graveknight (there was a Paladin with +15 Knowledge religion who rolled a 1, and a Barbarian 10/Cleric of Pharasma 3, who also didn't roll high enough). I described the armor as particularly unsettling but due to the surrounding environment, detect evil didn't give them any extra information. The armor promptly went into a bag of holding. I rolled 3 days on the regeneration time which is almost guaranteed to pass by before they are able to get rid of the armor.

My question is: How should I play this out? Should the graveknight attempt to pull the first person to reach into the bag into it? Would the graveknight consider simply rupturing the bag (admittedly this would really be a dick move on my part considering how much loot is currently in the bag)?

Thanks in advance for suggestions and advice.

Here's how I'd do it:

Strength check improvised thrown weapon rules with range increments of 5 (due to a largish item not intended for throwing and throwing upwards).

So DC 10 +4 (improvised weapon) +10 (ranged increments) = 24

In other words, it's doable but requires a lot of luck or a combination a people assisting, spells, or items/potions.

I really think a DC 15 attack check is way too low and easy to attain for such an action. Compare the situation to picking up and throwing a 30 pound kid/dog 30 feet. You gotta get a lot of force behind that to make it to the top of the 3rd floor of a building.

In my campaign, Radvir knew they were coming. He had set up an ambush at the store front with the 6 charmed guards and the 3 vampires. I run fire in city areas semi-realistically so, the vampires had switched out their fireball spells for a spell causing the curse of the unlucky (reroll all attack rolls and take the lower result).

Then the basement included Radvir, his 3 spawn, and the 4 vampire enforcers, Radvir and the Enforcers immediately summoned rat swarms and I rolled enough that I simplified them into being a terrain effect for the entire basement. Together that made the encounter challenging for my 4 person party (TWF Barbarian, archer rogue, healy oracle, magus).

I didn't change any of the stat blocks.

You can create a mask using Undead Anatomy I (level 3 arcane spell). It would end up being quite expensive though, the base price would be 30,000gp (level 3 spell x level 5 caster x 2000gp), making it a 60,000gp treasure. If you don't want it to be useful to the party afterwards, it could be cursed to cause the wearer to be subsumed by the psychology of a juju-zombie (say a Will save every round the mask is worn).

I haven't read all of this but went through roughly the first 20ish posts.

My suggestion is in case the ex-paladin wants to atone but can't or won't raise or resurrect the goblins.

Looking at what were originally considering doing, I might expand on the idea. Make him do physical labor, night and day, until he passes out from exhaustion a number of times equal to the number of innocents he killed (don't give him time to fully recover between passing out and starting work again, and if there are any of the goblin tribe left alive have him do the work in their village). Each time he passes out ask him to make a fortitude check check equal to 5 + the number of days worked and if he fails he loses 1 CON until he can rest long enough to fully recover. At the end of this give him the benefits of the atonement spell without the associated cost.

A light version of the above could be a fort check DC 5 + half the number of days worked or each time he fails he loses half a point of CON, only losing one every two times he fails the roll.

I understand that the paladin could very well die doing the above, but consider it something roughly equal to a raise dead on every creature he killed/helped kill, and it represents the pain he put the goblin tribe through to begin with.

P.S. I'm a jerk of a GM. =D

Name: Crothu
Race: Half-Orc
Classes/levels: Level 12 Magus
Adventure: Ashes at Dawn
Location: The Abbey of Sante-Lymirin
Catalyst: Invisible Stalkers

Name: Telven
Race: Human
Classes/levels: Level 12 Rogue
Adventure: Ashes at Dawn
Location: The Abbey of Sante-Lymirin
Catalyst: Witchfires

Telven scouted the room looking for anything of value, unfortunately he rolled poorly on his stealth check and was heard. 28d6 fire damage later, fiery-burny death occurs.

My personal opinion on whether or not the act of killing an intelligent being is evil:

Killing an intelligent being starts at a baseline of evil, is is evil to take the life of any intelligent creature.
Evilness of this act can be modified by the reason(s) it is being done. These reasons can make the killing neutral or even good.

In general my cutoffs are: If the PCs can continue their mission by nonlethal means then they should do so.
If the enemy attacks the PCs then they are fully within their right to retaliate lethally (making it a neutral act)
If the enemy is in the process of acting evilly (such as rape/killing/etc) then retaliating lethally is the proper action (making it good or if not fully good then goodish neutral).
If the enemy is known to have a history of making lethal raids or otherwise killing other intelligent beings, then lethal force in retaliation is reasonable (a neutral act)

None of the neutral acts would have any possibility of causing a shift in the alignment of the PC(s) involved in the act.

As for declared war, any enemy combatant is fair game, and falls into the neutral category for me.

So far this one is pretty fun, melee damage can be low if the cavalier decides not to charge as a couple of the construct encounters showed:

LG Halfling Female Oracle (Enlightened Philosopher and Tongues-Infernal) - Plays as a relatively naive and pacifistic character, speaking infernal in combat made the first introduction to Ravengro citizens ammusing. Also chose to put give her only 7 in Con and has proceded to roll like crap for HP at each level, at level 3 is sitting at 10.

CN Halfling Male Cavalier of the Paw - Is considering taking a few levels of rogue or low templar for some sneak attack damage.

CG Halfling Rogue - Out of character is constantly given suggestions that he should act evilly, hasn't acted on these suggestions...yet.

N Halfling Female Witch

I had no hand in them choosing to be all halflings, and being a new GM I haven't really taken advantage of it from a role-playing aspect

One of the heavenly hosts assumes Andoran would be okay with them taking control in order to purify Cheliax.

Just for something completely out of the ordinary.