dnoisette's page

The fact that insofar Paizo didn't address some of the critique which was frequent on the boards (eg. the "it isn't PF1" one, the "monsters should be built like PCs" or the "casters are too weak" one and of course the "wrought treadmill, verily" one) while tackled other comments that were frequent (ancestries, out-of-combat healing, signature skills, untrained being too low) tells me that they are unwilling to change some very specific things about the game, no matter how unpopular

This. Bolded part is mine.

Every time a playtest group gives up, it seems to be for very similar reasons, among which are:

- Monsters are pure killing-machines and their stats make no sense

- PCs don't feel heroic for their actions

- Combat takes too long and gets boring very fast

- The attack routine is always the same, because there's only one that works : get into melee>strike with melee weapon x2, rinse and repeat

- Magic is underwhelming and casters are worthless

- The game is too complicated and that complexity doesn't come with additional depth of play

Clearly, with so many different people coming out to say their farewell and listing these issues in their feedback, something needs to be done to address them if 2nd edition is ever going to be successful.

Am I missing out on some drama?

It has to do with players providing feedback and the perceived reception of it by Paizo staff, judging by devs posts on these forums.

I won't say more, last time I did, my post was deleted and so was Vic's.

My playtest group feels essentially the same.

We're still giving Chapter 4 a shot because a lot of us loved the Kingmaker AP and exploration rules but that's about it, and I don't think we will make it to Chapter 7, for similar reasons... :/

All of my players are now rolling exclusively martial characters, with 2H weapons only, and they're more or less clones of each other.
Their attack routines are the same (with the odd, "I start raging" action thrown here and there).

When Chapter 1 started, I had a Wizard, Alchemist and Sorcerer in this 5-PC party.
During Chapter 2, I had a Druid, a Wizard and a Bard.
Then Chapter 3 happened and I was left with just one Cleric (despite the rules for playtesting, since no one wanted to play a spellcaster anymore).
Now, none of my players want to play anything else than Fighter, Monk, Rogue and Ranger (with TWF or bow since the rest doesn't work at the moment).

I am DMing and I love describing PCs' actions in combat.
I'm running out of synonyms to eloquently describe a sword or axe attack and it's getting incredibly boring.

Some major changes will need to happen before we consider committing to 2nd edition at release.

Here is a revolutionary idea.

Stop Taxing Spellcasters through a Feat to earn Spell Points. Just give ALL Spellcasters Spell Points out the gate, and let them use them to Recover Spells = 1 level/point spent.

You know what...I'd actually love that!

However, in that case, would you keep school/composition/bloodline powers using the same number of spells points they do now?

I can easily imagine every spellcaster saving their spellpoints for extra spell slots and powers falling on the side as a result. :o

Except for clerics. If you enjoy the support role then clerics are still viable.

My players agree, which is why the only remaining spellcaster in the party is a Cleric. :)

Go look at the shapechanging Druids. It's the same thing. They were used to being able to shape change for hours. Now, it's been reduced to a battle at time and they hate it. Duh.

It's not just the fact that a use of wildshape lasts only for 1 minute.

It's also the inability to do so much as drink a potion (let alone cast a spell) while it lasts, which forces you to pop out of your form and then burn another one again to get back into the fight when your HP are low (+ the loss of actions for doing so, 1 to end the first form, 2 to cast the new one).

Surely, considering your concerns with Rangers and the action economy loss of Hunt Target, you can sympathize.

This essentially means you can have 1-2 encounters a day before sitting on your hands (because a Druid with max STR has no more than 4 uses of wildshape per day until level 15, or level 8 with a specific selection of feats).

My one player that tried the Druid and ditched it had not even played Pathfinder 1st edition before.
He came to the game a new player, tried a Druid, then tried a Barbarian and then told me he's never playing a spellcaster again in this edition.
He had no preconceived notions about what a Druid should be, he just found it less effective than his Barbarian and later, his Paladin.

So much for your argument that "Paizo has to know that this perspective is skewed because the playtest consist of people who are mostly familiar with casters from PF1", I guess.

You think that casters have been brought down to a power level comparable to martial classes.
I think the nerfs were way worse than that and make them less valuable than just having another Fighter in the party.

We're going to have to agree to disagree.

Have no fears, in the end, I am growing more and more confident from the devs' posts here that Paizo will follow your stance.

I will then stop playing, others will as well and the Pathfinder community will shift to something else while we, older greedy spellcaster players, all move on to another game.

Time only will tell if this was a smart move, from a business standpoint.
I don't think it is, because I met enough new players in my gaming career who immediately wanted to be a Wizard -without knowing if this was a powerful option or not-, but I might be wrong.

Lots of good stuff I wish I could have formulated so eloquently myself.

Amen.

Someone mentioned in this thread that casters being no more valuable than martial characters will increase the desirability of said martials.

That's not how it is right now: non-multiclassed spellcasters are less valuable than anything else and, as a result, my playest group now consists of 4 martial characters (Fighter, Paladin, Rogue, Monk) and one multiclassed Cleric/Fighter.
Nobody wants to try a pure spellcaster again until they (hopefully) are fixed, after having played one themselves. :/

So I guess the thing is that per 1.4 a Gnome who selects "Deep Gnome" literally is a Svirfneblin, but they don't get features even close to what made those a 24 RP race in PF1. But I don't think you are any less of a Svirfneblin if you start with 2 SLAs instead of 5 and you don't have spell resistance.

So why should PF2 Drow be fundamentally different? I mean, by all means print some elf ancestry feats about poison use or how growing up in a chaotic evil culture changes you or whatever, but I feel that if a Deep Gnome can be a Svirf then a Cave Elf can be a Drow.

Like I see no reason Duergar shouldn't be a Dwarf Heritage, honestly.

The point others and I are trying to make is the following:

They could be Jinin but nothing says they may be Drow and have their distinctive physical features, for example.

You keep making this an argument about how powerful the race is, for some reason.
You seem to believe that we all want Drows to return so we can have an uber powerful ancestry to play with.

Let me tell you: give me an heritage feat for elves that says "You are a Drow, your people has dwelled underground for millenia as part of the group of elves that fled the surface as the Earthfall approached. You have distinctive dark skin, white hair and red eyes." and I'm going to take it in a heartbeat.
Even if it doesn't give me anything mechanically.
I would take it even if it meant I gained nothing from my heritage other than fluff.

I don't care about Drow being a powerful ancestry, I care about being able to roleplay an actual Drow without having to pretend it's actually a regular Elf in disguise.

Players were asking for more stuff, but probably not like this. Really just 2 versions of each race would have been fine just to show the proof of concept. What people actually wanted was more of the feats being baked in at the start. Like the regular sky citadel/underground Dwarf could get Stonecunning, Poison resist and Unburneded all together at the start and be more like a PF1 one.

This does mean you have to come up with new low level ancestry feats that actually feel like feats, though.

This is a perfect summary of what I expected from this update, and thus the reason why I am currently very disappointed.

I can't shake off the feeling that players in 2nd edition are asked to buy back everything a race would previously give them - and at an agonizingly slow pace, as well.

It's already bad enough that the caster proficiency bumps cost you class feats at those levels, it'd be even worse if there were additional spell DC feat taxes.

I should probably have mentioned that, for me, increased proficiency in spells should not come at the cost of a feat.

Assuming increased spell proficiency no longer comes at the cost of a feat, then picking Spell Focus and its greater variant to boost one school of your choice becomes less of an issue for me. :)

I think what you've listed is just the tip of the iceberg. The entire spell list needs a serious second look, because a lot of spells are simply never worth using (never mind where you think magic should be, these spells simply are not worth your actions to cast). I don't think spells like mirror image would be quite so problematic if other spells were up to shape.

I know.

I could as well, but Kalindlara nailed it: I want to play as a Drow, not a Cave Elf.

I specifically asked my DM about this and his answer was: well, Cave Elves are just regular elves whith darkvision because they have lived underground, they are not Drow and they don't have their physical or magical features.
In short, no, I am not allowed to play as a Drow. :/

So, in the end, after reading 1.4 again, I have to say the following about ancestries:

Pros:

I like the idea of Heritage feats. I think it's a step in the right direction but there are several issues here that need to be addressed.

Cons:

- Most of the names for Heritages range from somewhat weird to openly bizarre.
For instance, if Cave Elf is meant to be Drow...why not call it Drow?
And if it's not meant to be Drow, then it's even weirder.

- Terrain variations should not be heritage feats for specific ancestries.
An Arctic Elf and Snow Goblin and exactly the same, mechanically. This is because adapting to a specific environment is not something restricted to some races, anyone can do it.
These terrain heritages should become available to all ancestries and the ones that have them should receive REAL heritage feats instead, something that pertains to their ancestry and their ancestry only.

- There is a distinct balance issue with many of the ancestry feats.
I'm pretty sure I'm going to see a lot of Barbarians (or just generally warrior-type characters) that have a Gnome best friend now.
Vivacious Conduit is way too powerful.
Same with Multitalented. I don't look forward to DMing for these characters that have two archetypes already by level 9.
I have had multiclassed characters in 1st edition but, most of time, it's just a combination of two different classes, no more.
One of my players is now rolling a Sorcerer/Ranger/Cleric.
I don't feel good about this.
At this point, it's basically just stitching different parts on a character and it makes it feel more like a golem than a real person...

Not what I said and I am not about to get into a forum battle with you. Refer to my post for my actual words.

I did : "you still have folks ranting at them on the forums and claiming that its just "not enough."

I'm not ranting, I'm voicing my concerns and you're dismissing them as "a rant".
I too have no further interest in discussing with you, so we're good.

This has to do with Dwarf having been overpowered as compared to...well, basically every other Ancestry, really. At least in terms of chassis.

I just asked my players who rolled Dwarf characters about this: none of them felt particularly OP and the whole playtest group agreed that Humans was by far the best ancestry, solely on account of the power level of ancestry feats available to them.

I'm going to take your word for it since I did not try that ancestry myself. Maybe Dwarfs were indeed the best but the way it is now, they should probably roll back some of the changes to make them on par with the rest.

This was a very responsive patch by Paizo. The patch even addressed the concern folks had about some ancestry feats seeming weird (like a mutation or whatever). Its kinda disheartening that even when they respond to community concerns and do good work, you still have folks ranting at them on the forums and claiming that its just "not enough."

Well, for my part, I think this is great work and I want to congratulate them on a job well done. Its not perfect (nothing is) but it is a very large step in the right direction.

So, according to you, it is wrong of me to state that I am disappointed, and that, unlike you, this update is not what I hoped for?

It's called feedback for a reason: it can't always be good.

I was pretty positive about the changes from 1.3 and I am happy with the new Battle Medic and Natural Medicine, for instance, but I'm really unhappy about ancestries and I should be allowed to say so just as much as you're allowed to say you feel good about it.

Most of the heritage feats feel really bland and uninspired to me, some are even copy/pasted (Arctic Elf/Snow Goblin).

I mean, it's great that you're happy with the update but I don't see how my opinion is supposedly less valid than yours.
I'm not just offering praise so, of course, I am not allowed to voice my disappointment, I must just be "ranting".

I'm terribly underwhelmed.

I now have to select the corresponding heritage feat to gain Unburdened as a Dwarf...and I get nothing more than I used to from it.

I'm sorry but "giving more at 1st level" for every ancestry was supposed to be the goal here and it's an epic failure.

I half expected the Elven heritages to all be terrain variations but I'm still completely let down.

A Snow Goblin and an Arctic Elf get the exact same bonuses. I don't see how that helps make you feel more "goblinish" or more "elvish".

Some of the new feats are incredibly OP while others are just meh.

I don't really now how else to convey what I want from ancestries.
I thought the staff had it right this time from hearing the stream but a quick look at 1.4 is enough to say they didn't get it at all.

I agree that Sorcerers do not feel so different from Wizards at the moment and it bothers me.
They're spontaneous casters and they have "bloodline" instead of "school" powers, but that is it.

I would like them to feel mechanically different, and not just with how they prepare spells.

Dangerous Sorcery somewhat achieves that, for example. You deal more damage with your damaging spells and only Sorcerers have this feat. This makes Sorcerer the obvious choice for blasting and gives them some sort of unique identity.

Now, I would like something similar but which does not require a feat.
I'd like Sorcerers to have something baked-in the class' primary talents to make them stand out and help differentiate them from other casters.
It's important that I stress the fact that I do not want something more powerful but rather something different.
I want it to be something that makes a player want to play a Sorcerer instead of a Wizard, not over a Wizard.

For instance, a player who is interested in having a TWF character can go with the Ranger because he likes the mechanics of Hunt Target or with the Rogue because he likes Sneack Attack better.
Whatever the player decides, their character will be very good at TWF but it will feel and play differently.

I want it to be the same with spellcasters, equal power level, just different options that makes you question what type of spellcaster you want to be.

Honestly, I feel that Sorcerers, instead of being limited in what spells they can heighten, should have had the ability to heighten them at will and without restrictions.
But that is something they would share with Bards and does not make them truly unique.

Maybe have Sorcerers interact with metamagic in unique ways?

This is amazing!
Now I want my own 3D printer... :o

* The following spells and powers should have their critical failure effect on a regular failure instead:

-Charm
-Cloak of Colors
-Command
-Crushing Despair
-Daze
-Earthbind
-Echoing Nightmare
-Fear
-Ghoulish Cravings
-Hideous Laughter
-Litany against Sloth
-Mariner's Curse
-Nightmare
-Overwhelming Presence
-Phantasmal Killer
-Possession
-Spellwrack
-Spiritual Epidemic
-Synpatic Pulse
-Unfathomable Song
-Weird

*Barkskin should receive a serious buff, the DR it gives is pitiful and you gain weakness to the most common energy type on top of that?
For a 1 minute duration?!

*Buff spells in general (target "you" or other "creatures", no harmful effects) should have a duration of 1 minute per spell level, at the very least.
All of them should come with the possibility to be heightened to the next level for a 2 minutes duration or the level after that for a 3 minutes duration and so on.
In an ideal world, I'd be a 1 minute per caster level duration but it's pretty clear that's not Paizo's stance on "bringing magic to a balance point" so it's never happening.

*Mirror Image requires a small nerf: bring back the part where it says "If the attack misses by 5 or less, one of your figments is destroyed by the near miss."

*Rope Trick should be a 2nd level spell, no reason why it should be a 4th level spell, especially with the rarer tag.

*Uncommon spells should not be a thing at all. All of the potentially game-breaking options have been nerfed in several ways, no reason to arbitrarily keep players from accessing them as well.

*Nerfs on utility spells should be rolled back (Prestidigitation, Feather Fall, etc.).
These do not make a player or a party overpowered by any means but not having the options we used to for these spells is a roleplaying and quality of life loss.

And the big three, for me and my players, which are required ASAP:

*Casters should gain increased proficiency in their spells at a different rate: make it expert at level 8, master at level 12 and legendary at level 16.

*Casters need to be able to boost their save DCs but I'm advocating for something more permanent than has been previously offered in this thread: bring back Spell Focus (as a feat level 4) and Greater Spell Focus (as a feat level 10) for all spellcasting classes.

*Monsters' saves are way too high at the moment, 60% to 80% chance that they will save against spells is not balanced.
They need to be brought down.
Italics here because I cannot stress that enough.

"I've had a couple of players field non-offensive casters* with 16s in their primary stats and they've been fine in low level playtest sessions."

I would question what it means that the players "have been fine" here.

People have different expectations.
One of my players is always happy so long as his character survives, even if he didn't do much in a fight, because he is so much into roleplay that he acts exactly the way he would if he were in his character's shoes and if he were, he would only be concerned with survival.

Me, I would find it unbearable to merely be able to "survive" in a fight. Once again, different expectations.
That's why I'm being cautious with the above statement.

If we assume the player above is in the right then somehow it means my expectations are necessarily wrong and I don't see what makes them less valid than anything else.

"Summoning spells are really good and interesting at the mid levels. Specifically, when the druid in my Pale Mountain game dropped a fire mephit between the enemy's front and back lines and it set half of them on fire before soaking up a bunch of attacks and then exploding for even more damage. It was pretty awesome."

This situation worked for the Druid because the DM obviously went after the Fire Mephit. It would not have soaked up any damage otherwise.

"The classes that have magic are still more powerful than the classes that don't."

That doesn't mean much by itself. I assume there is a context for this sentence but right now, I'm left wondering:

For me, it's a flat out NO to all of the above so I'm not sure exactly what makes spellcasting classes more powerful.
I don't know what that person meant or what they were referring to with that statement.

"Spellcasters can cast two spells in a round pretty regularly. I've already seen it plenty of times in my play test sessions.

Usually, it's combining an attack spell and Shield, or casting a spell and using a power (which is basically a spell in every way except name, and is even cast by using "spell" points), and I expect I'll see plenty of true strike added to spells that require attack rolls. All without any added metamagic or magic item expense."

This one I agree with. Spellcasters can have the ability to cast more than one spell in a round.

"So 1st and 2nd level blast slots are better than they were in PF1 because of how weaknesses work. Odds are you don't have enough cantrips to cover every elemental base, so your low level blasts can help with your coverage like you're playing Pokemon. And that is on top of their other advantages-- AoE, range, persistence, reliability."

I was nodding in partial agreement until I read the word "reliability".

"And to echo something I said on another thread there are a lot of spells that are very good in lower level slots, just not damage spells. True Strike is an amazing buff and Ray of Enfeeblement is a solid debufff, both level 1 spells that don't heighten. Level 2 invisibility and mirror image are both great defensives, and Haste and level 3 Fear are an amazing buff and excellent group debuff respectively (Especially now that Frightened penalizes AC and DCs!)."

This I agree with. First positive comment I'm willing to say "yes, that is right" about it.

"From my play experience, it seems increasingly clear that, whatever it says on paper, casters only feel a bit weaker at lower levels (first couple parts of Doomsday Dawn). Sure, they may not be gods from level 7+ like in PF1, but they still feel competent and impactful once they get some additional spell slots and higher level spells...Whatever it says on paper, *actual play* does not suggest casters uniformly suck."

So, casters are weaker at low levels and then they just become on par with other classes?

"When I've playtested casters I didn't feel bad or mediocre. And the people I've seen who have made those complaints have framed them as not being as overpowered as they were. To borrow a phrase "a loss of privilege is not discrimination". Casters were too good. Lowering their power level is not inherently over-nerfing them."

Once again, different expectations. My own are not met with the current state of arcane spells and arcane spellcasting and I feel mediocre.

The question is, does Paizo even want us for customers?
Maybe they don't, maybe this game was not meant for us and I'm not angry about it.
I'm angry about them not openly stating whether that is a real fact or not.

Time will tell, I guess. Jason Bulmahn said magic surveys would come, latter, after "other things that need to happen first".
I don't find that extremely reassuring but it's not like I can do anything more than I already have about it. :p

dnoisette wrote:

Paladinosaur wrote:

Was drow as a heritage mentioned?

No, it has not been mentioned yet, or I'd be throwing a party already! :D

One can hope, though.
The only thing we had about elves were "arctic elves" and "sea elves" but I'm not sure whether Mark used these as generic examples or if they are indeed two of the final heritage feats.
They seem rather bland compared to the possibility of having Drow heritage or just simply compared to Fell Gnomes, so I'm hoping these are not actual heritage feats.

Well I can't speak much to the Snow Elves, but the Aquatic Elves of yester-edition had a full-fledged Swim speed, which would be quite the addition for some campaigns (probably the ones where being an Aquatic Elf would make the most sense anyways TBTH) and will probably come up at some point in a lot of pre-made campaigns anyways.

Oh, I agree, Aquatic Elves are a very flavorful and useful addition to the game.

Things can need improvement without being a binary waste of character or table presence. Respecting that is a part of respecting that other people have enjoyed what they felt was "meaningfully contributing."

Binary waste of character or table presence is surprisingly how one of my players just described his character in Chapter 3. Guess what class he played?

It seems to me I should be allowed to state things the way I and my players experience them. It's just as much disrespective to dismiss my opinion on account that you feel it's hyperbolic.

It's not hyperbolic for me and my group. It's exactly how we feel and I have no better way to put it.

There are positive aspects with the playtest, a ton of them (we love the new action economy, archetypes for multiclassing, the concept of having skills feats, unique monsters' abilities in the bestiary...), but none have to do with spellcasters, as far as me and my players are concerned.

We have nothing positive to say about spellcasters, except for Clerics, who are so strong right now I might even tag them OP (has a lot to do with Channel Energy effectively tripling their number of spell slots available at level 1).

I would put together a list of every spell that fails at delivering meaningful impact (to me) and explain why, but magnuskn did that way better when (s?)he started this thread.

I had my own surveys up for magic recently because I wanted to have an idea of the proportion of people that had a similar experience than my players and I and the proportion of those who didn't.

That thread was locked after about 60 people took the surveys and I must admit it doesn't exactly makes me want to try and contribute lengthy feedback anymore. :/

I really hope Drow a core heritage.

(I will be ignoring all naysayers on this.)

I've spent the last hours (ever since watching the stream, in truth) researching on how to summon a devil and make a pact with them for this to happen. :P

*just joking of course*

Seriously though, I will be extremely disappointed if Fell Gnomes and Goblins are in but Drows are left out because...reasons?
I'm getting the nagging feeling that elven heritages will end up being a bland variation of City Elf, Wood Elf, Arctic Elf and Desert Elf and now Monday can't come fast enough. :o

So you want to be a full spellcaster with one of the better spell lists in the game (Heal and Fireball both) and also a respectable frontline fighter at the same time? No, they make you have to switch back and forth, you can't have both at once.

That seems reasonable to me.

Not being able to heal yourself up when needed -if Wildshaped- by drinking a common mundane healing potion is not reasonable.

You seem to come from the assumption that I want the Druid to just be awesome and have it all.
That is not the case.
I just want Druids to have the ability to get through more than 2 encounters a day before they turn to less than average Fighters.

It's not about being able to buff yourself like there's no tomorrow while you're wildshaped, it's about being able to stay in the fight without burning 2 wildshape uses per spell.

Otherwise, you can keep the rules as they are, forget about Natural Spell altogether and give me more uses of Wildshape per day.

This is still a huge loss in terms of action economy and DPR but, at least, it allows me to play a Wildshaped Druid that can actually, you know, wildshape reliably when they get in combat situations...

dnoisette wrote:

I'm guessing his opinion is quite unpopular at Paizo because the intent was pretty obviously to have Wizards wake up under PF2E rules and realize their magical connection has been severely impaired.

I suspect that it's more a difference in how "fulfill his role and do what he does just as well as he could in the first edition" is seen. I think a different metric is being used for "just as well" than we're using. That and I'm not sure we're on the same page on "role" either.

"Just as well" means just that: with the exact same end results.

Now, in order to achieve the same end results with a spell than you did in 1st edition, you have to hope the enemy will critically fail, which is 5% of the time...
Phantasmal Killer is a great example of that.

Here's a spellcaster-helping idea: Refreshing spell slots in 'short rests'

It pushes casters towards a more-frequent, less-flashy position than PF1, but is a very achievable change. How's it feel to people in this thread?

This is an interesting proposal.

This helps a lot with buff spells having a low duration because you'll be able to use more of them per day.

However, the core issues with spellcasters at the moment is that most spells have very little effect when the enemy saves and they save ALMOST ALL THE TIME.

Giving you more spell slots just gives you the ability to try and fail more times per day. Not great.

Until monsters' saves are fixed and some of the nerfs rolled back so that each spell actually has a significant impact, more spell slots simply won't help much.

I have hopes that James Jacobs may influence the PF2E devs a bit, because on the Roll For Combat podcast he was on, he said that in his ideal vision a caster who goes to sleep under PF1E rules and wakes up under PF2E rules could fulfill his role and do what he does just as well as he could in the first edition. Which is... not the case at this moment.

I'm guessing his opinion is quite unpopular at Paizo because the intent was pretty obviously to have Wizards wake up under PF2E rules and realize their magical connection has been severely impaired.

Your link does not seem to be working for me, however?

I suspect there will not be a natural spell in this edition - all the combat transformation spells have the text "Your battle form prevents casting spells" (or equivalent language for Avatar). Presumably this means that the developers see casting while shapeshifted to be unbalancing...

I disagree with them on that point but I think you got it right.

In that case, Wildshaped Druids should at least be able to drink potions when they require (much like any other regular martial character), or anything else really, because their action economy totally breaks as soon as they start taking hits in combat which happens...all the time.

I'm not sure you understand how vigor works.

1st round, you rage.

That's 13 temp hp at 1st round
Second and 3rd round you vigor.

Ah, so that's what you were doing. Using an action for Vigor each turn.

You are still losing an attack each round just so you can keep up in terms of defense or play tank (whatever that means, since a good DM will simply ignore a tanky character and move on to bashing someone else whenever they want - and no, your damage being subpar to that of a Fighter will not make you a threat to deal with urgently).

I'm amazed.

P. S.

If you instead want great AC as well, go animal skin+bracers with high dex and a shield instead of vigor for your 3rd action (you have a D10 "no hands" weapon and a d8 agile simultaneously with your shield for damage). Bracers are equal to a leather, bracers with animal skin are equal to studded but unlimited Dex bonus. Meaning that if you start at 14-16 dex which is more than reasonable, you can still have the "7 armor bonus" even while raging. (although personally I would only do that on a rogue/monk MC barb where dex is main stat for the sweet +7 dex bonus to AC while wearing "studded" for +9 to AC vs other people's +7)

Animal Skin only comes online at level 6.

Barbarians are not proficient with shields so now I'm spending a general feat, wasting an action and reaction each turn that I should have been dealing more damage so I don't die.

Besides, with that DEX modifier you're going with, you probably have either:
- poor CON modifier and lower amount of temporary HP + lower amount of DR
- poor STR modifier and lower accuracy + lower damage

Yeah, looking at these options, I'm pretty convinced Barbarians were not intended to be the ultimate tank in this game.

They have mechanics to survive with their low defense and supposedly do a lot of damage in the meantime.

Unfortunately, the action economy of Rage, the round you spend fatigued and the lack of better proficiency in your weapons make it so the last statement (do a lot of damage) doesn't work right now.

At 9+ you gain around 29 hp/4 rounds easily.

That's on average 7hp/round

You only gain temporary HP when you start Raging.

With 18 CON, at level 9, you gain 13 HP and that's it.

If you want more, you're gonna have to keep reapplying your Rage every round and that is one big a** DPS loss like no other.
What's the point of having extra damage per hit if you lose the opportunity to attack once each round?

Barbarian also has access to Renewed Vigor as a level 8 class feat. It lets you trade an action for Temp HP = 1/2 level + Con. At level 8, when you get it, that should end up being 8 HP for a single action. That's roughly on part with a Fighter raising his shield against a monster that is likely to hit you no matter what (equal level or higher). It's not a terrible bump to the Barbarian's HP pool and augments that "29 every four rounds" rather nicely.

Renewed Vigor will grant you 8 HP, according to my previous example (level 9, 18 CON).

I'm not saying Barbarians can't soak up damage.
But they can't be tankier than Fighters.

Or rather, they can be, if you want to reapply your Rage every round.
In that case, Fighters win the DPR race by a large margin and their higher AC means they're not much worse at surviving the fight anyway.

The damage resistance helps but level 9 is halfway through your character's career. You have to survive (and hopefully have fun with) the first 8 levels before you get there.

I remain unconvinced. :/

I feel it's important that I emphasize the following: I'm not advocating for Barbarians to become better at taking damage.

I want them to become better at dealing damage and I think that extra tiers of weapon proficiency throughout a character's career would go a long way in helping that happen.

dnoisette wrote:

Why is Natural Spell not in the CRB?

I'm not a developer but my personal opinion is because wild shaped druids casting spells are overpowered in PF1. They can be built as combat monsters or (generally in elemental form) they can be casters with several huge advantages over other casters.

Besides, they have to have SOME cool things for the later splat books :-)

I understand the intent and I'm pretty sure that was it as well.

However, this turns out to be overly punitive in play.

I have a great example with one of my players who had shapeshifted into a wolf at level 4. He took two bad hits in a row in a single round and was left with 3 HP.
He could not cast his Heal spell and get back to the fight without having to burn one extra use of his Wild Shape pool.
At level 4, he only has 3 uses in total per day.

So fine, Druids should not be able to cast while transformed because balance.
I find that extremely arguable, but alright, that's how it is.

The issue is that they can't drink a potion either.
They can't even rely on mundane healing or Battle Medic because it is a fine manipulate action.

I find that is a big deal because, for my player, it meant he had a choice of not being able to shapeshift at all for the remainder of the day...or he could just go down this time and hope someone will have him drink a potion or he makes his Fort save. :/

Not exactly the kind of choices one should have to make.
When a Fighter sacrifices an attack to drink a potion, he loses DPS on that turn, he does not sacrifice his ability to attack for the rest of the day!

I will say, though, from someone with a background in how to write (and analyze) survey questions, the devs need to seriously work on writing their survey questions. Without imputing nefarious intent, it is very clear (to me, at least) the expected response to most of these questions, and I would guess that the survey results are biased because of this.

That was extremely obvious in the earliest surveys, especially the one about classes. It still shows in these most recent surveys and it's quite clear what you're expected to answer relative to each subject.

Each question feels more like wanting validation than objective feedback.

For example, you can answer that you would prefer not to have a single proficiency system for all different game elements.
It's great that this is an option.
However, the rest of this section in the survey will only ask questions that are relevant if and only if you agreed that you want to have a single proficiency system for all game elements in the first place.
If you don't want that, none of the other questions will let the devs know how you would like something else implemented.

These last two surveys are better honestly.
Yes, the bias still shows and it's often not possible to clearly choose an answer that truly represents your opinion but I can see that a lot of efforts went into including a wider ranger of options and possible feedback, which I am truly happy about.

Not everyone has a background in statistics and I can understand it being a difficult job to produce a solid and unbiased survey.
I had so much trouble with that by the end of my graduate studies that I deliberately chose a subject that would allow me to go with qualitative surveys, which are much more opened and investigative! (something totally impossible to do when you have more than 20 respondents per interviewer BTW)

Folks...

There will be a survey targeting spells and magic specifically.

We are trying not to release too many all at once because we get a lot less responses when we do.

It's very good to finally know for sure that this will happen, thank you.

Its funny how folks get so riled up over this stuff.

Waiting 2 months for an answer will do that to some people and I am totally willing to acknowledge that I am not a very patient individual. :)

Alright, I'm hoping a dev will come by this thread to clarify their position, even though I know chances are it won't happen.

Why is Natural Spell not in the CRB?
Was it an omission?
Was it intentional to remove this feat and make it so wildshaping Druids can never cast spells without sacrificing two of their uses of Wildshape in the process?

Is there any chance this feat will make it in the final version?

Wildshape only has minutes duration. You can only effectively use it in combat situations but if you want to cast a spell, you have to give up your current form AND recast it afterwards?

If you have 4 uses of Wildshape per day, this essentially means that casting a spell in each encounter means you can have no more than...2 each day.

If that was the intent, it's broken. Why add mundane healing if some classes are still going to have 5-minutes adventuring days?

For starters, with medium armor being equal to heavy now, and the way ability boosts work, a barbarian will be more tanky than a fighter due to getting quite a bit of temp HP every 4 rounds. Add that vigor is now a very nice "3rd action" and DR and a vision starts forming.

A Barbarian will never be tankier than a Fighter.

Fighters are not supposed to boost their Dexterity, they're meant to keep it low and enjoy the benefits of better proficiency with heavy armor than any other class in the game (except Paladins).

If a Fighter wants to use medium armor (they do get expert proficiency after all) they can. They have enough room to start with 14 DEX, 14 CON, 18 STR and 12/14 in whatever else you like.

A Barbarian has no such possibility. They can never wear better than medium armor but it will take them a lot of time to catch with the max DEX modifier they're supposed to have to work with medium armor.

This is because Barbarians must start with 18 STR and 16 CON. Sure, you can start with just 14 CON and push DEX to 14, why not after all?

Except you always lose 1 AC when raging and up to 4 AC when the rage goes way! You'll never have the AC of a Fighter, even if you try your best at it.

You'll have more HP. Up to 3 extra HP per level, and your temporary HP. Barbarians don't mitigate damage with armor, they do so with their health pool.

If you build for very high CON, you can have an impressive number of HP and temporary HP.
The bad news is, monsters hit for a lot of damage and will usually take all of your temporary HP in one hit.

Fighters tank damage with armor, Barbarians tank damage with their HP and yes, that makes them weaker.
I can't let you say they're much tankier, that's just wrong.

At level 6, a Dwarf Fighter with 16 CON has 88 HP.
A Dwarf Barbarian with 18 CON has 106 HP.
When the Barbarian rages, he gains 10 temporary HP.

The Barbarian has 28 more HP than a Fighter when raging.

The Manticore, a 6th level monster, attacks for average 16 HP on a hit.

You won't even mitigate two full hits with your temporary HP.

The Fighter has 16 DEX and is wearing medium armor, say a +1 breastplate.
That's 24 AC, 22 TAC.
The Barbarian only has 14 DEX, otherwise they couldn't also have 18 CON.
They're also wearing a +1 breastplate, for a total of 23 AC, 21 TAC.

Except when raging, this goes down to 22 AC, 20 TAC.
On a turn that rage runs out, it goes as low as 19 AC, 17 TAC.

See where I'm going with this?

You're at least 10% more likely to get hit every attack and you don't even have enough HP to soak up more than one attack in full before you're on equal ground with the Fighter.

No, Barbarians are not tankier than Fighters.
They're different, because HP and not armor is their defense.
But they're not better and never will be.

Wildshape is terrible in this edition.

It's not that bad.

At their respective spell levels, most of the polymorph spells will grant you:

- better AC than you normally have and on par with medium armor + max DEX
- no more speed reduction or ACP
- increased speed on top of that
- extra hit points (worth a full class level)
- additional senses (low-light vision, scent...)
- decent skill bonuses
- better attack roll than you normally have
- better damage bonus than you normally have
- a large selection of damage types and utility (climb, swim...)

There are 4 major issues for me:

- You don't get to transform into anything worthwhile before level 4 so you're just a very subpar martial character until then - very big issue because fun is dead for 3 consecutive levels.

- You need the Druid's Vestments when you get to very high level of play because your spells no longer keep up with AC and attack roll - not a big fan of mandatory magic items.

- With minutes duration, no more turning into an animal to cross that river, climb that mountain, scout ahead or move your party faster by carrying them on your back.

- There is no Natural Spell feat. This one is the real dealbreaker.
Seriously, with wildshape being so limited in duration and number of uses per day, having to go out of your animal form to cast a Heal spell so you're not knocked out of combat really diminishes the class' potential. Why is this not an option?
I can understand not wanting Wild Speech. Since wildshape is no longer something you can have always on but has its role limited to combat, it's not truly needed.
But Natural Spell?
Come on Paizo, this is what makes Wildshaping so bad at the moment!

1/ I don't get why Barbarians never get past expert proficiency.
They should get expert and master at the same level a Ranger does.

Mechanically, the sluggish condition from the Giant Totem hurts too much with the class' innate lack of accuracy.
The best Giant Totem Barbarian is a Fighter with the Barbarian archetype (in terms of average DPR) and that is sad.

Besides, while I support the idea that only Fighters should ever become legendary in weapons, I don't understand why a class -Barbarian- that is presented as performing well in the role of combatant should not achieve master proficiency.

2/ Besides, I'm not a huge fan of the new Rage action itself.
Whatever you end up doing when it runs out, you'll have such a huge AC penalty that it'll far outweight the temporary HP you gained from raging.
There' a very real chance that the enemy is going to hit you with multiple attacks per round and it hurts really bad.

With the current rounds limitation, Rage should be a free action.
There was a thread at some point that went into great lengths to illustrate how much of a DPS loss it is to constantly have to spend an action to apply/reapply Rage in combat.

Barbarians end up doing less overall damage in a fight than Fighters.
They have slightly more HP but they also suffer from very poor AC, due to the mechanics of Rage.

As a result, we have a class that is supposed to be low-defense, highest-damage and ends up being low-defense, average damage.
Something went wrong. :/

Suggested fixes:

- Barbarians gain expert proficiency in their chosen weapon group at level 3 and master proficiency at level 13, akin to Rangers with their Weapon Expertise/Weapon Mastery class features.

- Rage becomes a free action and keeps all of its current limitations and penalty.

OR

- Rage remains a regular action (not a big fan) but you are no longer fatigued when it ends. In short, you get Tireless Rage at level 1. It also frees up a new class feature slot for the Weapon Expertise/Weapon Mastery suggestion above.

I just wanted to chime in and say: the latest Rules Survey finally gives me the opportunity to pinpoint exactly why I like or dislike a certain feature.

I was really disappointed with the Classes Survey because it did not include any specific questions beyond the point of assessing level of satisfaction.
I don't even know how you can be drawing conclusions relative to this survey because there was very little room to explain why I rated a specific class a 1/5 and another a 5/5.

This new Rules Survey finally asks the right questions and actually investigates why a player appreciate parts of the rules and not others.

Please, keep doing the same with any future survey, I cherish the ability to give actual feedback and I don't mind sitting for 2 hours to answer them!

BTW, are you planning to have surveys that cover spells and the use of magic at some point?
I have both positive and negative feedback regarding those and I feel I have never been able to comment on these specific aspects of the rules.

They have sometimes been touched indirectly but the idea of adressing the whole theme directly feels taboo, for some reason?

I think it not necessary to go into details with how involved I have been in threads that discuss magic and spellcasters over the past few weeks.
Those that spend a lot of time on the forums will probably have come across one of my posts on the subject already.

It is a topic that is important to me and it has generated a lot of discussions, most of which usually end up with the same 3-4 people on both sides (myself included) going back and forth over the same issues.

A lot of people are making assumptions and support their claims with the fact that it's what "the majority of players" wants.
Yes, I acknowledge I am one of these people because...I'm only human and I have my own faults.
I'm working very hard at improving on them, don't worry. :P

I have been feeling extremely let down with official surveys, especially the one about classes, because I felt I was unable to convey the feedback that I wanted about magic and spellcasting classes.

The surveys did not go into enough details that I could explicitly express why I was unhappy with most of these classes.
The latest Rules Survey does a better job at giving players the opportunity to provide explanations for their resulting levels of satisfaction and I hope this continues in future surveys as well.

However, I have given up hope on having surveys to cover the topics of magic, spells and spellcasting classes.
It was teased in the Twitch stream that the Rules Survey would cover aspects of the rules for magic and this section ended up being about...magical items only.
What a disappointment.

I'm a very curious individual. I want to know what the playerbase thinks and where it stands when it comes to the current version of spells and spellcasting classes.
Am I truly in the vocal minority?
That might totally be the case.
Unfortunately, none of the Paizo surveys so far have been able to answer my questions and so...I came up with my own.

Below are five individual surveys that cover each of the main spellcasting classes in the CRB.
They do not review spellcasting archetypes, only the primary classes.
Feel free to complete just one if you do not have feedback on all classes or complete all of them if you would like!

They focus on asking questions about the following:

* number of spell slots available per day
* number of spells known at each level for spontaneous casters
* heightening spells for prepared and spontaneous casters
* increases in spell DCs and spell rolls proficiency
* spell points usage across classes
* power level of spells relative to each spell list and classes (Sorcerers having access to all of them makes them unique)

Quick but essential disclaimer:

If no one answers and it goes unnoticed well...I guess I will have wasted 2 hours of my life but other than that, no big deal. :D

Bard Survey

Cleric Survey

Druid Survey

Sorcerer Survey

Wizard Survey

You should, theoretically, be able to see what other respondents answered but I'm not sure how it works because I have never used Google Forms before.

When I wrote my thesis, I did qualitative (as opposed to quantitative) surveys only and those do not fit well into forms, so this is a first!

Thanks for the really thorough analysis! It was so detailed I was able to run some numbers on it, and the quoted bit seems like the lion's share of the problem; 8 of your 12 hits were negated by mirror images, meaning that the images extended the fight by a factor of 3x as many hits (so instead of winning on round 7, you would have won fairly early on round 3).

My group had a similar issue with wrath demons in Shattered Star where they could cast mirror image to get much more durability than a mook should have (even though my group was "critting" them a fair amount), and mirror image is way worse with a boss that you'll miss a lot anyway. I initially specced it so mirror image lost an image on a critical failure, but that seemed like you lost images too quickly so it was changed later in the process to remove that part. I already had my eye out from my playtest, and this is good evidence that we definitely need to look at mirror image closely.

Again, thanks for the feedback!

Except PCs will also be using that same nerfed (new, I guess?) version of Mirror Image and those who can cast this spell are nowhere near as resilient, dangerous and powerful as the Brain Collector.

Now I get why all spells have been nerfed to barely viable or clear uselessness.
You're (not you specifically, you as in the whole staff) are designing spells to be balanced primarily for monsters' use.
Even an optimized PC is going to have a hard time with them, currently, and so you nerf spells some more.

The issue is: PCs get lower AC, HP, saves, attack bonus and so on.
Not to mention that they can't burn all of their already-limited-spell-slots in just one encounter.

Sure, the Brain Collector just keeps recasting Mirror Image ad nauseam because this is the only fight he'll ever have in his entire career.

I don't presume you intend it to be the same for PCs, otherwise, retirement pension plans are going to go through the roof in the world of Golarion.

If anything, PCs should get access to more powerful versions of spells and abilities than monsters get.
Take a look at Quickened Casting.
Now take a good look at a certain very high level opponent who happens to have something very unique, Superior Quickened Casting.

How is it that a monster who is already built to be better than every possible optimized character in the party gets access to stronger magic and attacks than the PCs who hope to defeat them?

Nerfing spells to fix difficult encounters is not the answer if you're going to make the PCs using these spells even weaker.

It's been most illuminating really, because I had been wandering exactly what had the thought process been for nerfing all spells across the board.
Having isolated the problem helps, because now maybe there's some chance that we can discuss whether you could consider other options.

Maybe the idea is not to nerf Mirror Image in the first place but rather limit the number of Mirror Image spells that the Brain Collector has access to?

Or just make it so that an optimized character doesn't feel, as the OP did mention, that only their 1st attack has a decent chance to hit in a round?

Don't make it so monsters get worse, make it so PCs get better at handling them.

That way, you make the encounter less deadly and more interesting but regular magic-using PCs don't take an extra arrow to the knee in the process...

Seems the most simple and sensical solution to me.
It's clearly not the one you, at Paizo, went with.
It saddens me greatly but I'm going to keep hoping that there's a way to provide feedback that will make you see it might not have been the better option in the first place.

Besides, I now you can't talk about anything that is under scrutiny at the moment but the particular topic at hand makes me want (no, makes me need) to ask:

Are we getting surveys relative to the use of magic at some point?
Will we be able to assess the power level of spells for each spell list, the number of spell slots each spellcasting class receives and our general enjoyment of them?

You acknowledged in the past having read the popular thread by magnuskn about arcane spellcasters but it's all been radio silence since then and, as much as I want to be patient, your comment about nerfing yet another spell has been really unnerving.

One of my players has quit the playtest after he rolled a spellcaster (new player) and another one is in the process of doing the same (very experienced player), for similar reasons.

I keep trying to remain positive.
I point out all of the changes that happened that they asked for with skills, archetypes, out-of-combat healing and soon to be ancestries.
But the same question always returns about spellcasters and what's going on with them and me telling them "surely it's in the work, it's coming, you'll able to fill detailed surveys for that" is no longer working.
My guys want actual proof that Paizo will at least consider assessing whether people are happy with spells and spellcasters the way they are and they no longer trust me when I tell them to just have patience. :/

Sorry, but as I've said elsewhere, assuming players are stupid and won't do "the right thing", particularly when it's suggested to them, is a totally unnecessary path to go down.

Yes, if it was only a floating boost, with no other guidance, I *might* be able to see a player choosing the wrong thing, but if presented as "you get a floating ability boost, which is normally put into intelligence" or "you get an intelligence ability boost, but may choose to take a floating one instead" will work just fine.

Heck, even 5e doesn't pigeon-hole like this. You can create whatever stat array you want, and you know what, with guidance in the text, most people generally choose something that makes sense. There's no *need* for this level of hand-holding.

I know and I agree. I don't think we can change the devs' mentality when it comes to this though.

I think they should abandon the "single primary stat for a class" paradigm. It makes it really hard to create non-traditional builds, and given they've already had to cave on Ranger, and likely also will on Rogue, why not just have that class boost be a floating one? Let players choose what ability scores they want to focus in. Maybe your Cleric wants to focus on Channel, so they take more Charisma than Wisdom, or your Wizard wants to be good at ranged touch attacks...

This isn't to say classes shouldn't have a "spellcasting" stat, or that there can't be a suggested stat boost (Wizards get a boost to Intelligence, or may take a floating boost if they prefer), but come on, pigeon-holing all the classes as they've done feels bad.

I'm 100% with you on this.

The point for Paizo with the single primary attribute for each class is that it removes uncertainty as to how people will have built their characters and makes the game "safer" when it comes to balancing classes and encounters - in their view.

You see, the intent here is that:

1) New players can't get it wrong.
They will have to boost the stat that is intended to be most important for them and won't be given an option to try something else and "fail".
Why do I say fail? Because the game assumes that your character will have invested in specific attributes and specific items to be relevant at all levels.
If you don't do that, you fall behind. Give a new player the ability to build their character however they like and they might feel underpowered.
Paizo doesn't want that.
It doesn't matter that new players have been doing this for years already and learned from their experiments.

Paizo is going to hold your hand through the character creation process. Don't you dare deviate from that!

Incidentally, the devs also don't care much that the most exciting part of a TTRPG is coming up with unique character concepts. This is true for hardcore roleplayers and min-maxers alike.
Both are looking for something different in the game but they want the same thing in the end: to be unique.

This ability has been carefully removed because...

2) It makes it easier for developers and AP writers to build encounters and offer new content that is "balanced" across all builds.

No, it probably won't improve your enjoyment of the game.
However, Paizo staff wants the game to, first and foremost, be "safe".
Everything is streamlined so that specific builds can't have an opportunity to shine more than what they have decided is the new cookie-cutter for each class.

This game is being designed by game designers, for game designers.
Not for players.

Let's take a quick look at the most recent errata and skills, for example.
Signature skills have been removed, true.
That could happen because their removal was inconsequential, in terms of game design and "balance".
Sure, everyone can now become Legendary in Medicine if they so desire.
However, the levels at which they can achieve the next proficiency tier are still hard coded and you can't change that: it's level 3, level 7, level 15.
There's no way for you to focus on a single skill if you want to.
Instead, the game forces your hand in being good, but not exceptional, at a select few.

This way, it's very easy when designing an AP to determine the highest possible bonus a PC could have in one skill, at a given level.

TLDR:
The game is streamlined for the sake of "balance" (I really hate this word).
Non cookie-cutter builds are not an option and, for this reason, Paizo is never doing away completely with the primary class attributes.

This seems to be an oversight.

Rogues were not originally meant to be able to deviate from the DEX route and thus their primary boost worked just fine.
Paizo probably did not think they would add more paths later on and thus did not realize that other primary boosts might be required once these changes were rolled out.

However, allowing Rogues to choose from 3 different boots would really put them at odds with all of the other classes, who either have a single boost or can choose between two at best.

I think Rogues should be able to do fine with a choice of STR or DEX.
Yes, high Charisma is required for feinting but your primary combat attribute is still going to be STR or DEX in the end.

Why are Sorcerers so OP? An extra spell AND spell slot of every level?

That's not the right question.

Similar thing with Universalist Wizards. Not only does an extra spell slot of every level make them way more powerful than other classes, they’re way more powerful than every other subclass of Wizard!

Universalist Wizards get to use Drain Arcane Focus 1/day per spell level.

A Universalist Wizard at level 1 has exactly one less spell par day than a specialized Wizard.

Focus Conservation (8th level feat) actually makes Universalist Wizard better because they get to cast a lot of extra spells from that feat, due to the fact that they can use their Arcane Focus multiple times per day.

At level 8, that's essentially:
- 1 extra 2nd level level spell per day
- 1 extra 1st level level spell per day

Meanwhile, a specialized Wizard uses their Arcane Focus on a 4th level spell and gain a 2nd level spell for it that day.
They're the same as the Universalist Wizard.

Universalits only become clearly better past level 11.

Besides, have you taken a good look at the other spellcasting classes?
Clerics get weapon and armor proficiencies, channel energy and domains.
Druids get an animal companion/wildshape and the like.

Sorcerers and Wizards have no weapon and armor proficiency, the worst possible saves at 1st level and lowest HP.
They have no immediate combat abilities or additional class features that will help them, short of having to multiclass.

It makes sense they would have more spells per day to keep up.

The core of the issues is that Bards are built using the same model than Druids and Clerics but none of their class features truly help them shine in any other way than casting spells and, for this reason, they end up being lackluster Sorcerers without even a bloodline to boost them.

In short, Bards are severely crippled compared to the other spellcasters.
But it's not because spellcasters are OP.
They all suck, more or less, and the Bard just happens to be on the more side of it.

Secondly, if you want damage, go Gish. If you want anything else, don't? I see absolutely no reason a pure caster should do equal to more damage than a melee caster Gish, considering how much more dangerous is to be at melee range, how much more resources you need to sink to that and etc.

This might have been true in 1st edition.

There are no more AoO tough.
You're not ranged or melee anymore, you're just one of many targets and I can, as a DM, focus your ranged Wizard just as easily as I can focus a melee character.
Being "ranged" does not make you safer in this edition because there are no more frontlines and backlines.
If anything, my playtesting has proven the opposite is true and the PCs I have killed (one melee, three ranged) would tell you the same if they could.

And tell me, how 3d12+7+(1d4+2) persistent, as a TOUCH attack, (shocking grasp)

Two things here.

First, you say the spell targets TAC like it's a huge boon. Breaking news: it's actually required for casters to have a decent chance to hit.
You don't get magic weapons to boost your proficiency with spell attack rolls and your built-in class bonuses appear very late, past level 12.
You can't max out your STR or DEX at character creation, even if you wanted to.
As a result, a Fighter with a magic weapon of appropriate level has better chance to hit AC than you do hitting TAC.

Second, you keep bringing up the spell's persistent damage.
You realize this only comes up in very specific encounters right?
Fighting an animal, undead, dryad, construct, flesh golem, dragon, ooze, etc.?
Not likely to happen.

I have seen enough to know that one combo is not all there is to be a contributor for direct spell damage

There is more than one combo for direct spell damage, I agree.

I like to go nova, have that one big burst of damage on one or multiple foes.
That means I want better damage than a martial character when I do, not just comparable damage.
I used to be able to do that with Fireball in 1st edition.
True Strike + Shocking Grasp was the only way I found to replicate that experience in 2nd edition, although it's single target only.

Casting a summon means losing the chance to cast a defensive buff on myself or allies in the 1st round of combat.
That Fighter/Barbarian with heightened Invisibility does way more damage than a Hell Hound.
He takes less damage from heightened Invisibility as well: the summon will not tank any damage if your DM is not playing nice because...no more AoO.
On the other hand, Heightened Invisibility prevents your ally from getting hit with about 50% of attacks.

Burning Hands and the like are good if you get to use them on a pack of lower level mooks.
I acknowledged that and went with Fireball and Cone of Cold for that reason (have a bit of every energy type + AoE when needed).

If I can manage to tag two enemies with Burning Hands then it means they're standing really close to one another and chances are the party's Barbarian could have cleaved through them more effectively than I did.

That's just my thinking, of course.
In the end, I think we just have different expectations when it comes to performing "well".

It's fine but I still believe I'm not the only one who thinks the way I do and thus my feedback is at least representative of how part of the community will react.
This is the reason why I felt like sharing in the first place. :)

A while ago, I posted in this thread some of the feedback that I received from one of my players who rolled a Wizard character in Doomsday Dawn Chapter 2.
He ended up quite unhappy with his choice and thus, his feedback was mostly negative.

Some people dismissed parts of it on account of the player being fairly new to TTRPGs and lacking the necessary system mastery to make the most of an arcane spellcaster.

I initially thought that might very well be true but I had no means of effectively testing this theory.

While my regular group (I am DMing) will only be starting Chapter 3 tomorrow evening, I had the opportunity to roll a character for Chapter 4 of Doomsday Dawn.
I jumped at it because I would finally be able to determine for myself how arcane spellcasters feel in actual play.

I decided that I wanted to make a blaster character.

Disclaimer: I love blasting and I don't care that some people think it's wrong for spellcasters to do anything other than provide utility for the rest of the party.
When I cast a spell that does direct HP damage, I want it to have a meaningful impact.
That is, I want it to do more damage than an optimized martial damage-dealer.
I can see some people already sharpening their pitchforks: that's just my opinion and I'm not interested in debating whether I'm right or wrong.
I have a limited number of spells per day, martials can swing their weapons all day long. When I cast a blast spell, I expect it will do at least 150% of a martial character's full damage potential on that turn.

Why the initial disclaimer?
So you know what I was going for, whether it can be done and what exactly I was testing the character for.

Now, obviously, my feedback is going to have lots of Chapter 4 spoilers.
For this reason, you'll find the rest of my post under the spoiler tag.
Warning: HWOT (Huge Wall Of Text) ahead. Be prepared and read at your own risk!

EDIT: given the opportunity, I will try a pure enchant/illusion/control spells-based arcane spellcaster in Chapter 5.
I'll be sure to post some feedback about it as well, in the spirit of fairness.
I did not expect I would find a way to make a blaster character work so, who knows what might happen with this new character?

Well...I had not noticed that Tracking was a Survival trained activity but your post was most illuminating and quite hilarious. ^^

I hate to say this, but...

If we're talking about "bad off stats" then Strength and Charisma are at the top of the crap pile.

Strength = Melee to hit, unless you're using a finesse weapon, melee damage unless you're a rogue, Athletics checks, and Bulk, which can be circumvented by a relatively cheap bag of holding.

With trained skills granting an effective +4 to a skill check bonus skills are a big freaking deal.

Strength is necessary for all melee builds, no matter the class you're playing.

Intelligence is only required for Wizards (provided they care about their spell DCs; which they do if they didn't go with buff spells) and Alchemists.
Intelligence is not even required to be a skill-monkey, you just have to go with the right class (Rogue, Bard).