I had a much longer, more detailed post but it got eaten...
Anyway,
The Sorcerer seems very lost. The abilities they are granted don't mesh with what the class is. First, they have 1d6 hit points, no armor and a limited spell selection (which limits the amount of defensive spells they will have).
Now, look at the feats and abilities the bloodlines give them: Dodge, mobility, Power Attack, Mounted combat, ride by attack, Sunder, Bull rush, blind fighting and weapon finesse. Most of the bloodline "powers" at first are "punch the dragon, do 1d6+1 damage of x type". What? What the heck is the sorcerer doing punching people? What is even more astonishing is that some of these abilities actually *progress* (poison at 9th level? what?) If you're punching 9hd monsters as a sorcerer you'll be dead pretty quickly. Sure, they have touch attacks. . . but most likely they'll be delivered via a ghost hand, or some other way.
Perhaps the designers envisioned every Sorcerer multiclassing with the Monk. . .but honestly, I feel that many of the bloodline powers and feats seem "tacked on" and not very well thought out. The sorcerer is still too limited and pretty weak in my opinion.
Give them back Eschew Materials as a class feat.
Change their melee abilities to ranged type attacks. Like the Wizard has (1d6 ranged attacks, enhance them as they progress). . . remove any feats that are melee oriented, or add additional feats that aren't melee oriented.
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The Druid:
There isn't any reason to be a druid beyond 4th level. Any decent PrC will advance spellcasting and Wildshape. There should be at least some mildly compelling reasons to stay straight classed, but I don't see the druid as having any incentive to do so. A Thousand Faces lost all of its appeal with the mangling of the Alter Self spell (which, along with all the polymorph changes needs to be reverted back to normal 3.5 rules, IMO). Timeless Body has always been fairly useless in my experience. How many campaigns use ageing? How many last long enough for age to matter? If anyone is playing a long (centuries) campaign, how many of the PC's are *not* elves already?
And the druid has less spells per day now? How is this a good thing?
The druid needs more interesting progression abilities that aren't also progressed by PrC's, in my opinion. What these could be, I don't know so I apologize for not having any good suggestions.
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Actually I found the druid to be quite functional, certainly it is tied down by the whole treehugging/shapeshifting thing but I gave My Druid a Steam Pistol at 3rd level. Now he focuses on Heat Metal spells to boil the water in the gun's pressure vessel and has effectivly become the only Firearm toting Character in a Gunpowder free setting.
He's a Royal Game Warden so the nature thing works well but the firearm thing focuses the class down an alternative path.
He's Doing some werewolf hunting this weekend and is having some bullets made from Silver.
Give them back Eschew Materials as a class feat.
Whilst I don't agree and really like the new Sorcerer and Druid, I do think that Eschew Materials needs to be a bonus 1st level feat for Sorcerers. We've had this house ruled for years and if it's not in 3P, then it'll have to be our first house rule under the new system.
Please Paizo! It makes a Sorcerer more naturally gifted at magic and plain makes sense!
I gave My Druid a Steam Pistol at 3rd level. Now he focuses on Heat Metal spells to boil the water in the gun's pressure vessel and has effectivly become the only Firearm toting Character in a Gunpowder free setting.
He's a Royal Game Warden so the nature thing works well but the firearm thing focuses the class down an alternative path.
He's Doing some werewolf hunting this weekend and is having some bullets made from Silver.
Dude! That rocks!
tfad
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Now, look at the feats and abilities the bloodlines give them: Dodge, mobility, Power Attack, Mounted combat, ride by attack, Sunder, Bull rush, blind fighting and weapon finesse. Most of the bloodline "powers" at first are "punch the dragon, do 1d6+1 damage of x type". What? What the heck is the sorcerer doing punching people? What is even more astonishing is that some of these abilities actually *progress* (poison at 9th level? what?) If you're punching 9hd monsters as a sorcerer you'll be dead pretty quickly. Sure, they have touch attacks. . . but most likely they'll be delivered via a ghost hand, or some other way.
In general I agree that the feat selection for some of the Sorcerer Bloodlines is pretty weak. I'm not a big fan of the melee attacks either though the abberant one is almost decent since you get reach at 2nd level. I'm not sure why wizards (and some cleric domains!) get ranged touch and Sorcerer gets melee touch, doesn't make much sense.
Change their melee abilities to ranged type attacks. Like the Wizard has (1d6 ranged attacks, enhance them as they progress). . . remove any feats that are melee oriented, or add additional feats that aren't melee oriented.
I agree here.
There isn't any reason to be a druid beyond 4th level. Any decent PrC will advance spellcasting and Wildshape. There should be at least some mildly compelling reasons to stay straight classed, but I don't see the druid as having any incentive to do so. A Thousand Faces lost all of its appeal with the mangling of the Alter Self spell (which, along with all the polymorph changes needs to be reverted back to normal 3.5 rules, IMO). Timeless Body has always been fairly useless in my experience. How many campaigns use ageing? How...
I don't get this at all. The druid is very powerful and while the changes made trim that power back a little they are still definitely one of the top 2-3 in terms of total power.
What I don't see is any mention of Natural Spell?? Is this nuked entirely or just hidden somewhere?
Thousand faces is actually better than it was previously. It was previously based on disguise self and only altered the basic appearance. Now with thousand faces you can change into a form with a swim speed and swim under water. It's much much better than it was.
What PrC will advance spellcasting and Wildshape? As far as I know Druid is one of the few classes in D&D that was powerful enough that people didn't feel compelled to PrC out of it. Even if there is a PrC that is out there, the goal is not to supplant all of the PrCs.
clerics need the touch attacks, sorcerers need the ranged touch attacks nuff said!
...I will say a bit more though, I do sorta like the touch attacks (no matter what elemental clerics need to be nerfed of their ranged touch at wills)may be if they could do both touch and ranged, that would be great!
I have to say, I was a little luke warm about the new druid.
I have always loved playing druids. And one of the main reasons was the wildshape ability. It was something unique to druids. something to strive for at the lower levels, and build upon as the levels increased. There was always that rush of adrenalin the first time you used a dire animal form.
Sure, they have expanded it a little to include plant forms and the like....however....
With the addition of all these Beast form and Plant form spells, the druid's wildshape has lost its mystique for me. Now, any SCHMUCK with a spellbook can be a shape-shifter!
Why the addition of all of those shape-shifting spells??? Why can't that just be the domain of the druids?
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I have to say, I was a little luke warm about the new druid.
I have always loved playing druids. And one of the main reasons was the wildshape ability. It was something unique to druids. something to strive for at the lower levels, and build upon as the levels increased. There was always that rush of adrenalin the first time you used a dire animal form.
Sure, they have expanded it a little to include plant forms and the like....however....
With the addition of all these Beast form and Plant form spells, the druid's wildshape has lost its mystique for me. Now, any SCHMUCK with a spellbook can be a shape-shifter!
Why the addition of all of those shape-shifting spells??? Why can't that just be the domain of the druids?
I agree, that used to be the big bonus to playing a Druid!
Uhhh... Wild Shape was *always* "as polymorph" and wizards have always been able to turn themselves into animals.
As for Druid PrCs, I don't actually know of any that advance both spellcasting and wildshaping.