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wiggy99 wrote:

Castilliano wrote:

(On the flip side, one can reach anime & superhero levels of dominance by doubling proficiency for level, where even heroes w/o powers aren't threatened by thugs unless those thugs have catchy names and odd clothing choices.)

Haha, that was funny.

Castilliano wrote:

Also, one could subtract level from proficiency & DCs maxing out at subtracting the PCs level. So if the PCs are 5th level, their 3rd level enemies would subtract 3, 5th level 5, and 7th level also 5, which keeps bosses bosses while keeping minions threatening. Essentially the PCs will never be bosses, at least not until WAY higher level, yet they might face legit solo enemies who wouldn't in turn have to be WAY higher level. That'd be pretty gritty IMO, yet players could still feel a sense of accomplishment as...

I like this idea a lot! I am not sure if the villains will be too common if I substract their own level from the DCs. I mean essentially a level 10 guy would get -10 that's a major nerf.

If my PC was only level 1 the DC of the Monster would only be reduced by 1 and therefore a level 10 threat would still be incredibly tough rather than almost possible to overcome.

Thanks.

And -10 from a from a level 10 guy is only a nerf if their target numbers aren't also reduced by -10, which they should be. Proficiency also shows up in Armor Class & ability DCs, so instead of having a +20 to hit AC 31, they'll have a +10 to hit AC 21. Where it makes a difference is when facing opponents of different levels, in which case they're all moved closer to each other; their success rates become comparable (bosses get nerfed, minions get buffed); or when it's a static DC (like for terrain or Medicine, though one might want to tweak those since some level proficiency is assumed for rarer terrains/higher DCs).

It'd remain impossible in practical terms for a level 1 party to take on a level 10 threat even w/ level proficiency subtracted. Too many hit points, too much damage,...

I think this change could also allow for some interesting retainer based gameplay.

(On the flip side, one can reach anime & superhero levels of dominance by doubling proficiency for level, where even heroes w/o powers aren't threatened by thugs unless those thugs have catchy names and odd clothing choices.)

Haha, that was funny.

Also, one could subtract level from proficiency & DCs maxing out at subtracting the PCs level. So if the PCs are 5th level, their 3rd level enemies would subtract 3, 5th level 5, and 7th level also 5, which keeps bosses bosses while keeping minions threatening. Essentially the PCs will never be bosses, at least not until WAY higher level, yet they might face legit solo enemies who wouldn't in turn have to be WAY higher level. That'd be pretty gritty IMO, yet players could still feel a sense of accomplishment as...

I like this idea a lot! I am not sure if the villains will be too common if I substract their own level from the DCs. I mean essentially a level 10 guy would get -10 that's a major nerf.

Thank you for the answers guys. I think I understand now why I will have to substract the Level of the Monsters from the DCs if I run with "Proficiency Without Level".

On a side note, if I were to do this, would me allowing the boni from ABP to stack with High-Quality Items (which essentially are magical potency runed items but reworded) break the game? In essence, as far as I can tell, the max. bonus a PC would get is a +3 at any time on top of the ABP.
Also keep in mind that when using these High-Quality Items I do not want to allow for the Devastating Weapons (aka. striking) or Resilient Armors.

Thanks for your thoughts.

So I want to shift my PF2 to a more low magic world than Golarion.

In order to achieve that I'd like to utilize the following Variant Rules as provided by the GMG:

https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=1356

Magic Item Variants: Automatic Bonus Progression & High-Quality Items

https://2e.aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?ID=1370

Proficiency Without Level

Now it seems that ABP and High-Quality Items would not really work well together numberwise, unless you were to remove some of the bonus progression from the ABP, as far as I can tell by the RAW.

However, I want to keep High-Quality Items (sans Devastating Weapons / Resilient Armor) in the game, to still give my players some cool choices when it comes to gear, while not having to meticulously keep an eye on item progression as per default and reduce the overall amount of magic in the game. That would mean that the High-Quality Items essentially still give boni like magical items that would stack (?) with the boni from the ABP.

I can see that this would favor the PCs in terms of game math, therefore, and also for a more gritty overall tone, I thought about putting the Proficiency Without Level rule into place, which reduces the proficiency buff based on level, scaling down the power-curve of the PC.

Generally, the Proficiency Without Level rule implies, that a DM adjusts the DCs and monsters to accommodate for the lower overall proficiencies. However, as I am giving the PCs the ability to stack ABP with High-Quality Items, I thought that by not adjusting the DCs I could basically give them the boni they would normally get via Level Proficiency in the form of items.

Of course this would not achieve the exact same feeling and balance as per the original rules, i.e. you wouldn't have items for every skill. That means overall the difficulty of the game would increase (which is ok for me) but at the same time, even if a PC stacked the item bonus of a High-Quality Item with the ABP, it would also not be too overpowered.

It'd be nice to hear some thoughts on this by DMs that have some experience with PF2.