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My friends have started a new campaign using the Pathfinder setting, starting out at level 1. The DM has set the game in the area of the River Kingdoms, but we started with a mini "pre-game" adventure just to get our feet wet with our new characters.
I chose a half-orc ranger and rolled well (19,16,15,12,17,11 after racial mods). Here's my thoughts so far. I'll try to keep it class-specific, but the odd note on other rules is bound to sneak in.
Character generation:
LIKED -The stat bump to str and wis made the half-orc an ideal ranger, and the int penalty didn't hinder the number of skill choices since I rolled really well. Even if I dump-statted Int, the 6 skill ranks would have cushioned that blow. The racial weapon familiarity (orc double axe) was nice too and saved me a feat. I chose improved initiative as my starting feat.
DIDN'T LIKE -Allocating skill ranks was fast, but I did miss the old system where I could have a smattering (1 or 2 skill ranks) in a larger field of skills.
LIKED -The boost in HP was welcome. The party has a lot more HP than the usual 3.5 group, thanks to the upgrade to Toughess and favoured class rule. The dwarf cleric had the highest count at 17, but 12 HP for a level 1 ranger was still respectable.
Class Abilities:
LIKED -Increase to HD, rest of the level one abilities appear the same.
DIDN'T LIKE -Changes to Track. This bonus feat used to be a defining role for the class, but now everyone can do it with a survival check. The bonus is okay, but does nothing at level 1.
Play Begins
We ran a short mini adventure to get used to the new characters and gains some XP for the first session. We rescued some kids from an ankheg. It basically involved a few skill checks and a short combat, plus dealing with the aftermath of the encounter.
Skill checks:
LIKED -The party had to make a survival check to find and follow the tracks of the missing children (easy DC 15). The ranger did his job there very well.
DIDN'T LIKE -Once we found the ankheg tracks (burrowing marks, footprints, acid slopped on ground), he was unable to identify what kind of creature it was (knowledge arcana is not a class skill and the few skill ranks prevented taking a smattering in knowledge skills). Thankfully the wizard made his roll to ID the beastie.
PROPOSED RULE CHANGE: If Track is becoming a skill check rather than a feat, why not give the ranger a class ability to identify creatures by their tracks? Perhaps not going as far as the exact creature (eg. kobold), but what about size, type and subtype (small humanoid, reptillian)?
Combat:
We fought an ankheg; a hard encounter for 4 level 1 characters. The cleric almost died (thankfully had 17 hp or he would have died from the first bite). The illusionist stunned/blinded the beast with a colour spray in round 2, so it became pretty one sided after that. That saved our butts, so a shout out to Archade for good spell choice!
The fight was fast and the beast died when I rolled a natural 20 and confirmed the critical with my axe (did 35 points of damage when it had 2 left). We saved the day, and the kids!
The aftermath involved the cleric using a heal check to heal an injured child (bleeding out from an ankheg bite) and channeling positive energy to heal the party. This is a good bump to the cleric's skill set! The ranger cleaned goo off his axe.
There you go! Hope my feedback helps.
PS this is my 3rd attempt to post. Server keeps eating it. If duplicates appear, please delete them. (Thank goodness for copy/paste)
I like your idea of formally letting tracking checks grant information like size, number of legs, and type. I know in my 3.x game I have a druid PC with goggles of following, and I've had to figure out stuff like "Okay, what information can you glean with a 45 tracking check? The third humanoid had a slight limp..."
Previewing articles doesn't seem to reset a timeout; if it takes too long to write up your post, then you'll need to start over and repost it. Cut & paste is how I get around it, too.
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I like your idea of formally letting tracking checks grant information like size, number of legs, and type. I know in my 3.x game I have a druid PC with goggles of following, and I've had to figure out stuff like "Okay, what information can you glean with a 45 tracking check? The third humanoid had a slight limp..."
Maybe there could be some sort of (ranger only) bonus to tracking that allows the character to identify traits about the creature that made the tracks.
If you make the track DC, you learn the number of creatures and sizes. For every X points you exceed the DC, you gain more information. Type, subtype, specific type of creature etc. as you roll higher and higher.