wegrata's page

Love the changes to witch. The new familiar abilities seem very fun and requires interesting tactics to take advantage of. Hopefully Champion reaction can trigger of things affecting the familiar, would make some interesting collaboration depending on the availabile choices.

A very minor thing I think is funny, is that the witch that explicitly doesn't use study to gain their abilities but a contract with a patron uses int as it's primary ability score, while the thaumaturge which does explicitly study uses charisma. Just a thing that seems mismatched to me.

I'd absolutely love this type of character, Corin Cadence from Arcane Ascension is one of my favorite protagonists. Having that type of capability would be awesome.

Honestly I just want a caster that just uses focus spells and cantrips. No spell slots at all, I think I'd that was made with vanilla enough flavor and decent focus spells, with the ability through dedications to pick up others and have their class features interact with them. Bonus points if the options allow you to narrow your focus.

Unicore wrote:

I am still pretty strongly convinced our 2 new classes will be the Seneschal and the Weaver.

The seneschal feels like it will mostly be a martial character who I am guessing will have a troop minion and otherwise be very buff focused.

I agree with these and would really like these as new classes, although I'm not sure how I would feel about the troop minion, but could be really interesting.

Unicore wrote:

I was pretty uncertain what a weaver could be as far a caster class, but with how long and how many people have complained about wanting a caster not really connected to spell slots, and the popularity of the kineticist, I am wondering if it won't be a class who gets very specific spell like abilities that they can use frequently, by pulling energies from various non-elemental planes. Perhaps it earns its name "weaver" by specifically requiring pulling energy from 2 or more disparate planes, weaving together types of magic that otherwise don't usually mix together.

Honestly that just sounds like the kineticist from different planes. Personally I would hope that this new weaver class would have very different flavor then at will magic pulled from another plane. Something like able to pull on the threads of fate and destiny for allies and foes alike. Mechanically I would like it to do for support/debuff casters what the kineticist did for blaster casters, which is a non spell slot caster, with a strong 'magic' feel.

I wonder what a class that only has cantrips and focus spells, no spell slots could look like with the new refocus rules. Maybe it could increase the focus point cap from like 3-5 as they level up as a major class feature unavailable to the archetype. Feats to unlock focus spells and give them a fair number of them to chose from, some gated behind subclasses and some generally available to the class. Not sure how well it could work it practice though, maybe tough to balance around grabbing focus spells from other classes.

R3st8 wrote:

Ascalaphus wrote:

I think NerdOver9000's idea would be great if you do adventuring days with an absolute ton of encounters, but it's not really good if you have shorter days with a few big encounters that all need big guns. Because their solution really really reduces the amount of spells available per encounter. And in a severe or extreme encounter, you need more than that.

I think the solution is rather in bumping up the focus spells a bit in power, so they sit in between your cantrips and your highest level spells.

It would also be very simple to implement since all you need to do is add the new focus spells and get their balance right, one way to do this is just give each type of wizard the most iconic spells of his school as a focus spell:

evocation - magic missile > fireball > disintegration

conjuration - temporary tool > summon animal > teleport

transmutation - humanoid form > elemental form > dragon form

illusionist - minor image > invisibility > phantasmal killer

enchanter - charm person > heroism > suggestion

divination - detect magic > true strike > true seeing

necromancer - false life > animate dead > could kill

abjuration - mage armor > resist energy > repulsion

Note: yeah I suck at balancing things maybe someone can do better

I love the straightforwardness of this idea. Of course with the switch from schools to curriculums the actual selection of spells would have to change, but there are a couple of good ideas in this list;

- Evocation; yes, giving real big ticket spells through focus points, means you're doing a blast at full volume every encounter. That definitely hammers home the point that you went to this school for blasting.

- Enchantment: at first I was "meh, charm person". But giving incapacitation spells as focus spells actually does an interesting job of making them much more viable, since they auto-heighten. It still won't be enough to do get through...

Slightly off topic, but related to incapacitation. I was thinking about a condition like 4e bloodied, that lowered your effective level. Like at 75% health you'd get bloodied 1, and it would reduce your level by 1 for incapacitation effects. Would allow martials to do their thing and support casters in a really meaningful way.

No reason to play a wizard over an arcane sorc now, they are inferior in just about every way that matters.

Optionally maybe sorcerers will also get worse in the remaster. Maybe we'll see bloodlines only get a slot dedicated so it can only cast a bloodline spell similar to what we see here.

dmerceless wrote:

I think the discourse around Kineticist and DPR goes much deeper than the class itself. In fact it's barely even about Kineticist. As long as we don't have a mage-flavored character that can be a dedicated damage dealer in the same way a Barbarian or Magus can, there will be a decently large group unhappy about it.

It's such a big and extremely popular fantasy. Just in the playgroup I run to there are two or three people like that.

The thing is, there are focus spells that absolutely enable classes to just unload giant damaging AoEs willy nilly all day long. Dragon Breath, for instance (especially if you use imperial dragons for the burst pattern). Sorcerers can bring a LOT of gas in the tank.

But the paradigm of PF2 is that martials occupy the throne for single target damage. And if you want the utility of casting with that, Magus and Summoner bring that to the table (and Summoner has an AoE focus blast, even if it's unwieldy... but it's also possible to have it be sonic damage... god I wish it was a cone).

I think anyone wanting a caster to match martials at DPR is going to be disappointed, because the cost for that is stuff like wave casting. That's just how PF2 splits the balance.

I do hope kineticist can provide the flavor people want, but it's certainly not a caster and not trying to pretend to be one mechanically.

Honestly that's exactly what I want in blaster mage. Personally I'd love a class archetype that boosts my damage and drops me to wave casting. can't speak for everyone but for myself and the people I know who want a dedicated blaster option, we explicitly don't want the utility.

Probably that gnomish Flickmace thing could go the way of the do-do, if I've followed discussions here correctly.

late on this, but I'd actually like to see the weapons associated with an ancestry worked with their default ability adjustments. Like why would gnomes use a non-finesse weapon as a base when they're generally more agile than strong.

I'd like to see some expanded relics/soul seeds. Let's get some new elements (ice, lightning, metal, ...) And hopefully an archetype in the same vein to the beastgunner, but without spell casting. Ways to make the relic more integral to your characters identity.

It might bode well for lots of other player options. There's plenty of elements that Monks don't have their hands on yet. It might be fun to see support for, say, primal Magi, or the followers of elemental lords. I was a big fan of some old 4e character tools that let you play as an efreet's servant, and that could be fun too.

I hope we get some good planar locales that support adventures across a variety of levels. I always *want* to like planar play, but it feels so removed from the core setting and so hard to anchor that I never reach for it,

...speaking of, we'll probably resolve the currently-muddy canon on the Goodly elemental lords! I remember that coming up a few years back.

Wondering if we'll see updates for the elementalist to support the new planes. Could also see updates to elemental sorcerer.

Totally Not Gorbacz wrote:

If you're expecting your caster to be a damage dealer just behind martials AND can alter the game with your utility magic at the same time, you're expecting too much.

It all comes down to this.

What are the options for ditching the utility to up your damage?

That's exactly what he said. He intends to maybe try and make it a variant rule. The issue is that, as a PC, you are assumed to have agency over your own actions, and many abilities, especially martial ones, work off that assumption.

The basic rules and storyline for the Intelligent Weapon assumes that you are controlling the body of your NPC Wielder. When another PC gets involved, you now have to figure out which of you are in control. Whose abilities and stats take precedence? Allowing everything to work fully for both PC's creates the potential for becoming grossly overpowered.

I think a good way to handle it could be that a Weapon losses all Class abilities and statistics, but it's Ancestry Feats either still function or can be used by the PC wielding it (should it use actions).

I would also personally really enjoy having Ancestry Feats for them that specifically are made to function for a PC+PC build. Or even, if every Feat had a special clause or effect that comes online, instead of the base benefits, when another PC is wielding you.

I'm sure Mark will figure something out that is satisfying but balanced. Because, at the end of the day, he is going to ensure that it is balanced based on Pathfinder's standard.

Yeah seems like an immobile, untargetable, buff bit, I could maybe see a focus caster type. It's focus spells grant buffs to the wielder's abilities during combat. Maybe some spells that give a reaction on your wielder's turn?

I think people have it the wrong way round. True Strike isn't limiting martial caster design. It's an exception to caster accuracy rules that the designers consider to be acceptably costly.

Without true strike being in the game you likely still wouldn't have greater martial accuracy options for casters (at least without class archetypes stripping alot of casting away for it.)

True Strike is a get around the limitation (with clear trade offs), not the reason such limitations exist.

Do you have a citation from a developer for this? If there's one spell that breaks the stacks with everything rule and has to be considered for everything, it's an outlier and the mistake imo. It should have followed the other standard design goals, if it was intended to be universally available and the primary solution to this, then it should have been on all spell lists.

AlastarOG wrote:

As well, as discussed in this thread, you CAN effectively hit in melee or ranged with a caster, just... Manage your expectations.

I've seen the full plate + bastard sword wearing bard in my agents of edgewatch campaign ravage stuff with heroism+true strike + power attack when he was mopping up stuff and wanted to preserver spell slots.

Most interesting was Mark S comments on this. From which I deduce that True Strike is one of the key balance factors. Because it applies to all attacks, its just too strong to give casters better spell attack numbers, or better weapon attack numbers.

IE if you are playing a caster in melee get a ring of wizardry and spam as many true strike spells as you can.

Before you mention that its not available to war priests I'd like to point out the number of Deities that can get it: Achaekek, Cernunnos, Dammerich, Eiseth, Erastil, Falayna, General Susumu, Gorum, Iomedae, Otolmens, Ragathiel, Raumya, Sekhmet, Shizuru, Sorrow's Sword, Yaezhing.

But you could just take a arcane multiclass anyway...

This to me sounds like how true strike is problematic. If a single first level spell has to be taken into account that globally for the game, that spell needs fixed.

Ly'ualdre wrote:

Thank you keftiu for reminding me of my one true love.

High Seas or riot.
Lol

What about a "Low tides" book that focuses on coastal settings and maybe other transitional zones, that can easily feature changing environments between water and land? Or even flying fortresses and tall cliff dwelling cultures. With lots of environmental rules, hazards, skill feats and just a general expansion of the environment as encounter?

Plus Interesting ancestry and cultural development of peoples that don't nation build, but just survive and move around in hostile environments.

I can entirely get behind this. Nothing like a port city to kick off an adventure and meet interesting and weird folks.

Yeah i think it boils down to not offering unsolicited advice to randoms on the internet. Especially those with a large audience, and therefore getting a lot of unasked for feedback. Loving the game and wanting to talk about it are awesome, but forcing someone not interested in having the conversation isn't. Consent matters for everything, even conversation.

I'm hoping we get some interesting alchemical weapons in the book. We have the alchemical cross bow and bomb launcher. Maybe some interesting combination weapons involving alchemy somehow.

I hoping for more content like beastguns and beast gunner archetype. I love the fantasy of a character that specializes in making maximum use out of a class of objects.

Maybe weapons made out of some type of plane touched ore, and a group dedicated to perfecting making and wielding them.

Nah regular and kinetic blasts should have the same proficiency which is why kinetic knight works as a class archetype. If you treat the blast as being solely a spell yeah you will have problems. But realistically it should be treat as a spell only in so much as you are casting a weapon to make a strike, meaning that mechanically it should be treated like a unique weapon type.

As far as provoking goes, you can just say that kinetic blade doesn't provoke AoO. Also if regular kineticist requires burn to use kinetic blade, then kinetic knight as a class archetype can modify it such that it doesn't.

Between kinetic blade not being subject of AoO, being melee only, and Kinetic Knight offering a way to do it without harming yourself, that should be more than enough compensation for it being able to get multiple strike a round no?

I think you and i talked about this in a different thread. For some stuff like this I really like the idea of the spell heightening increasing proficiency rather than damage, and relying on property runes for the damage increase.

Something like an advanced unarmed attack where at certain spell levels you go from trained -> expert -> master and still need handwraps

I could see a that deals electric damage,
Focus Cantrip 1 (Kineticists only)
1 action
Casting stat to hit
1d8 chose energy type damage
1 -> Trained
3 -> Expert
7 -> Master

I'd almost look at it as a one action cantrip This should be about in line with Produce Flame for DPR but different action economy and accuracy and doesn't change much else from what I can see.

Squiggit wrote:

Primal only kineticist walls off a lot of their weirder options from PF1 and I'd be really disappointed to see it go in that direction. So I hope there's at least some flexibility there

Like what? You basically had the elements, void (essentially darkness and shadow), wood (as in plants), and healing.

That's all primal. The only thing that seems remotely arcane is aether/force, and you can practically roll that into the air/wind element since it was mostly just moving objects.

When I made my post about it being a class archetype for psychic, I was leaving aether as part is psychic, as it already had the telekinesis vibe.

Hoping it was clear from my other post but I agree with primal. I had that listed as part of my idea for the archetype.

The low level spell slots seem to cover utility and the primal list has the spells that match the old abilities from pf1.

What do we need for the psychic to handle it?

For me it's
Burn, which feels like a way to recharge focus points in 2e
Elemental blast
Amps for buffing your primary blast
Slots for utility talents

Swapping to primal feels right.

I dunno I love the kinetisist as a concept and play style, and they feel similar enough that I could see it as a class archetype

Anyone else half expecting to see kineticist as a class archetype for psychic? Burn for brain drain, primal for occult, different amps?

I was thinking about how to have a class use runestones as a component for it's class features. Something like an arcane smith archetype that can hold a one handed weapon and a property runestone in their offhand. While doing this they apply the rune to their weapon.

wegrata wrote:

One thing I'd be interested in seeing in a weapon summoning cantrip is it creating an advanced weapon unarmed weapon and rather than it automatically scaling damage, it scales proficiency and still uses runes.

Something like
summon sword cantrip 1
1 action
1d6 slashing damage (maybe d8? not sure)
Uses casting stat
Trained prof
Scaling
Lvl 3 expert prof
Lvl 7 master prof

Then you'd still have to participate in buying weapon runes and would still have some of the flexibility it presents.

fully open to damage type/die changes to be more balanced and effective.

Interesting, and well aligned with PF2 norms if a two-action spell and if by level you mean the Cantrip's level not the caster's. Those norms do allow sizable buffs when that buff is patching up a hole. So such a Cantrip would likely be useful for a spellcaster, though unlikely of any use for a martial.

Might even be able to toss in Weapon Specialization.
As for using the casting stat for an actual weapon, that's tricky territory so I'd lean toward no, that the Cantrip gives proficiency only, though damage of course would be the balancing factor.

Sorry missed a bit of it. It's one action, but lasts until the end of your turn. So at best 2 attacks with map, but that may be too much.

One thing I'd be interested in seeing in a weapon summoning cantrip is it creating an advanced weapon unarmed weapon and rather than it automatically scaling damage, it scales proficiency and still uses runes.

Something like
summon sword cantrip 1
1 action
1d6 slashing damage (maybe d8? not sure)
Uses casting stat
Trained prof
Scaling
Lvl 3 expert prof
Lvl 7 master prof

Then you'd still have to participate in buying weapon runes and would still have some of the flexibility it presents.

fully open to damage type/die changes to be more balanced and effective.

I'm super excited about the possibility of Nexus. Using dnd beyond and Avare discord bot has been my favorite way of playing 5e online. I'd love a similar setup to that. Current my group(s), we have a weird setup, uses foundry, which is great for a vtt, but for theatre or the mind type stuff nothing really exists like our 5e setup for pf2.

Trox are lovely, sweet and gentle creatures! I love them!

I love the gentle giant trope and beetles are such fascinating creatures.

As someone pointed out to me in a different thread I hope we get the Throx ported into pf2.

wegrata wrote:

I'd like to see a beetle based ancestry. With heritages like the ironclad beetle and the long-horned beetle. Would be a neat concept for a insect ancestry that's not a thri-kreen

Edit: spelling

So something like PF1E's/Starfinder's Trox? I could get behind that. They even have various sub-species on their native home of Nchak.

I never played starfinder but after looking up Trox all I can say is very yes. Nearly exactly what I had in mind

I'd like to see a beetle based ancestry. With heritages like the ironclad beetle and the long-horned beetle. Would be a neat concept for a insect ancestry that's not a thri-kreen

Edit: spelling

The Raven Black wrote:

PossibleCabbage wrote:

I mean, you could also do the thing that the monk does where you choose between primal and occult (in the monk's case divine and occult).

The pyrokineticist, hydrokineticist, aerokineticist, and geokineticist would be primal, but the telekineticist, chaokineticist, arakineticist, elysiokineticist, and pyschokineticist might make more sense as occult.

There's no reason you can't make the class accomodate both Nature and Occultism depending on other choices, since that's just a choice of tertiary stats.

That is interesting since Primal and Occult stand opposite to one another as far as Essences are concerned.

Maybe the Kineticist should tap directly into the Essences : Material for those you identified as primal and Spiritual for those seen as occult.

This would also nicely explain why they are not casters, since they would not be relying on any Tradition.

I do appreciate someone else drawing upon the fact that Primal and Occult stand opposite each other. And I very much like the idea of them directly interacting with a single element instead of the Traditions as we know them. Really carves out the "weird, not-quite-magic" space they occupy, and I do hope that's what happens when they come back.

That juxtaposed against the thaumaturge is kinda interesting to me.

Kineticist drawing from the bottom of the stack if you will by interacting with the essences directly vs thaumaturge drawing from the top by taking a bit here and there from all traditions and therefore all essences.

Kinda neat conceptually for me

3. I really wish that Paizo would have taken the time to differentiate Pathfinder magic from classic Vancian magic. Focus spells are nice, and I like the changes made to existing spells generally. Like making Magic Missile and Heal variable action spells. I just wish that More spells were altered like that.

I'm hoping we get an updated words of power to demonstrate this. The new action system could work really well here.

What do folks think about it being a will save vs class DC? Especially for debuffs type effects?

I guess it depends on the fluf for what makes the most sense. If I'm using my connection to divine the weakness or if I'm using it to create the weakness.

Like does the connection tell me the creature is weak to something or will be sickened by it or is th connection creating the weakness.

It's magically enforcing a psychosomatic effect on a target. You're saying in a powerful magical sense, "this goo on my sword, well it affects you (werewolf) just like silver" and the universe and by proxy the werewolf says "okey dokey boss"

That's my take on it.

I think people are misunderstanding me. I didn't say spells were weaker, just that it was a common pool and that spells in general are stronger than caster feats. This shows up in the that on average caster feats are less powerful than martial feats. Just that it's on average asymmetrical, not bad just different budgets.

One thing in this I kinda find amusing is casters with spells is kinda what folks are asking for with feats.

Large pools that can be taken by multiple classes. Exactly what we get with spells.

The only real issue I see with casters is that a lot of the feats don't feel impactful or fun and people are wanting the things that make $CLASS unique to be impactful and fun. Take the comparison of bard to witch, bards unique abilities are more impactful than a witches, even when the witch has the occult list, the bard is viewed as more fun by many.

It's another place where casters and martials are designed differently, where martials get more of their power budget in unique class feats and features while casters its more in spells and spell selection, similar to 1e.

I'd really like to see Rougarous show up, and some kind of ogrekin/half-ogre. The last could be a versatile heritage I'd think.

For my group it was the fun toys being used against us in a pivotal moment that was demoralizing.

The +10/-10 is fun to be in the winning side of but not on the losing, and it's especially prevalent in trivial and sever encounters.

I said it earlier in the thread, by the proficiency without level optional rule helped out a lot with it. We don't get to use crit ad much, but neither does the enemy.

It also helps summons feel less useless as you level up.

YuriP wrote:

SuperBidi wrote:

PFS adventures are made with random players/characters. They have a strong potential in going south.

I read some PFS books and they have shorter adventures less encounters and apparently more easier. Could may useful for new players and others players that fell the APs too difficult?

PFS adventures are, overall, easier. But... What makes them sometimes hard is that they are far more random. The characters don't know each other, the players don't necessarily know each other, etc...

I've played once with a single martial in a 6-player party. It went fine, but these are the games that can spiral out of control very easily.
And even outside that extreme case, you may end up with a configuration that just doesn't match, or players that don't click together, or just flat out beginners/bad players that are crippling everyone.

One important thing to take into account in PF2 is that everything is super balanced. If one character doesn't meet the expectations, the game becomes far harder. When I was playing the first 2 levels of my Alchemist (level 1-2 Alchemist is a chore) I was really feeling it as most adventures where quite hard compared to those I was playing with more efficient characters.

In PF1, overpowered characters were sometimes making the whole adventure alone, so a weak character or even a straight useless character was not causing much issues.

Wouldn't that mean the design goal of making the difference between a well built character and a poorly built one being very small wasn't really hit

What's really helped my group was the variant rule that removes level from proficiency. This helps both summons keep up and boss encounters from feeling "unfair".

The example of the chain from a slave vs a tyrant, could come from an old legend/myth and your will combined with the known myth your ability. In my head there are two parts of this activity, knowing the lore and having your will enforce it in reality, this was represented mechanically by RK skills+charisma.

At least this is how my mind interpreted it.

Yeah but all of that happened over the course of the comics. In the beginning he was kind of a mix between this thaumaturge and a rogue.

I do think a unique lore skill would fit the bill better or even having a new action that's class DC vs will save rather than another skill check, but that's pretty much a focus cantrips named something else.

In this case since it's half recollection and half force of will is why it's charisma for the ability to represent force of personality on reality and recall knowledge to represent remembering the tale.

I think this fits, since your knowledge plays a bigger role as it will generally have a higher number.

It's both though, your recalling is literally what causes the creation.

I kinda agree it could be int equally to charisma in my book, since it's a single act that is both recalling and creating.

I think it helps if you stop thinking of recalling an actual weakness, your recalling a mythical one and your act of recollection is what causes the weakness to affect it.

Lile I recall therefore its real.

Edit: spelling

wegrata wrote:

Golurkcanfly wrote:

wegrata wrote:

Yeah I'd almost like it changed to be a check against will DC of the target and be completely separate from the "common flaws" that anyone can exploit.

Like anyone can use fire against a troll, but a thaum can do fire and oil from some exotic plan that has a similar debilitating effect, but in this case it's the characters will making the oil have this effect rather than anything inherent to the troll.

Like it's the combination of the stories the character heard in their past and their unshakable belief in those stories that makes it, at least temporarily, a part of reality.

The oil and fire plan seems more like something an INT-based class would do, like an Investigator.

Right now it feels weirdly against the flavor of the Thaum, since it's actively encouraged to dump the stat that best represents knowledge and don't really care about actually using fire. The ability just makes you do the extra damage and doesn't actually simulate finding the right tool, just the result.

Bad phrasing on my part, the oil in this case wouldn't be flammable, it would be toxic on it's own without the fire, with the fire it would hit 2 weaknesses.

That would be interesting, but does kinda raise some questions with how it interacts with Recall Knowledge and where CHA comes into play.

I think this plays into the explanation, your belief in those old stories is what makes then true, not anything biological.

Pf has been pretty consistent with cha being the stat for that. I'd say recall knowledge up a to give it the feel of mixing force of personality to cause the effect.

wegrata wrote:

Yeah I'd almost like it changed to be a check against will DC of the target and be completely separate from the "common flaws" that anyone can exploit.

Like anyone can use fire against a troll, but a thaum can do fire and oil from some exotic plan that has a similar debilitating effect, but in this case it's the characters will making the oil have this effect rather than anything inherent to the troll.

Like it's the combination of the stories the character heard in their past and their unshakable belief in those stories that makes it, at least temporarily, a part of reality.

The oil and fire plan seems more like something an INT-based class would do, like an Investigator.

Right now it feels weirdly against the flavor of the Thaum, since it's actively encouraged to dump the stat that best represents knowledge and don't really care about actually using fire. The ability just makes you do the extra damage and doesn't actually simulate finding the right tool, just the result.

Bad phrasing on my part, the oil in this case wouldn't be flammable, it would be toxic on it's own without the fire, with the fire it would hit 2 weaknesses.

Yeah I'd almost like it changed to be a check against will DC of the target and be completely separate from the "common flaws" that anyone can exploit.

Like anyone can use fire against a troll, but a thaum can do fire and oil from some exotic plan that has a similar debilitating effect, but in this case it's the characters will making the oil have this effect rather than anything inherent to the troll.

Like it's the combination of the stories the character heard in their past and their unshakable belief in those stories that makes it, at least temporarily, a part of reality.