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Looking at the fighter preview, I see that arbitrary level prerequisites, a constant headache in PF1, are alive and well.
From the preview: "At 6th level, fighters can take the feat Shield Warden, which allows them to use their shield to block the damage taken by an adjacent ally. At 8th, they can even get an extra reaction each turn, just to use shield block one additional time. (And yes, they can spend this extra reaction on another use of Shield Warden.) At 14th level, a fighter can use their shield to protect themself from dragon's breath and fireballs, gaining their shield's bonus to Reflex saves."
Why does a fighter have to be level 6 to be able to cover an ally and 14 to use a shield against dragon's breath (an iconic fantasy image). You are paying a feat for the ability (explicitly in the first case, second isn't clear), how is that an insufficient cost? Why continue loading on unneeded prerequisites that delay concepts from coming online or push options outside of the band of normal play?
Looking at the fighter preview, I see that arbitrary level prerequisites, a constant headache in PF1, are alive and well.
From the preview: "At 6th level, fighters can take the feat Shield Warden, which allows them to use their shield to block the damage taken by an adjacent ally. At 8th, they can even get an extra reaction each turn, just to use shield block one additional time. (And yes, they can spend this extra reaction on another use of Shield Warden.) At 14th level, a fighter can use their shield to protect themself from dragon's breath and fireballs, gaining their shield's bonus to Reflex saves."
Why does a fighter have to be level 6 to be able to cover an ally and 14 to use a shield against dragon's breath (an iconic fantasy image). You are paying a feat for the ability (explicitly in the first case, second isn't clear), how is that an insufficient cost? Why continue loading on unneeded prerequisites that delay concepts from coming online or push options outside of the band of normal play?
I think you make a very good point. Some abilities are too strong to allow access at early levels, but the examples quoted above don't strike me as overly powerful. I hope the devs have this on their radar.
So are you saying they should be able to do all that at level 1? What takes the place of level unlocks then?
Abstracting from the issue of what's appropriate to what level (and whether fighters are able to keep up with the options provided to other classes, and so on) I do think level is good prerequisite. The main alternatives are to gate behind more specific prerequisites, which (especially when they proliferate) encourages highly-planned-out characters who are trying to reach benchmarks on schedule rather than develop organically, and dropping prerequisites entirely, which removes a useful tool for getting abilities that scale or balance against each others. (There's also having feats scale with your level, which I think is also good, but which doesn't make sense for all concepts.)
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I don't argue that level prerequisites should never be used (though many abilities can be scaled so they are very rarely needed). My contention is that they should only be used when needed, not slapped on every ability because that's the Paizo way. Spending a limit build resource (a feat) to get the ability to spend a limited action economy resource (a reaction) to protect an ally is not the kind of thing that requires superhuman levels. Obviously we don't know all the material, but 'shield tank fighter' should be achievable at level 1, not 'wait until level 6 because yeah'. Being a defender is a simple, iconic, core character concept.
A level 6 prerequisite in this context is exactly the same as a BAB +6 prerequisite in PF1.
That said, I do agree that my personal preference in this case would be that Shield Warden be available as a feat from level 1, and the level 14 one to block area attacks be available starting around level 6 when area attacks are starting to be a common thing parties have to face.
It does seem rather strange in some cases.
For example, Shield Warden is basically a reworked Bodyguard, but any fighter in PF1E can start with Bodyguard level 1. And with a good Dex Mod, use it a lot more times than you can apparenlty use Shield Warden in a given round.
The rest is hard to compare without full access to everything. Gating things behind Level is fine if the power level of what you're gating is up to par. If it isn't, you just get late-game underpowered abilities.
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A level 6 prerequisite in this context is exactly the same as a BAB +6 prerequisite in PF1.
That said, I do agree that my personal preference in this case would be that Shield Warden be available as a feat from level 1, and the level 14 one to block area attacks be available starting around level 6 when area attacks are starting to be a common thing parties have to face.
BAB prerequisites had the exact same issue in PF1; they often seemed to be assigned without due cause.
I would argue that no prerequisites at all should be the default; add them if they are needed mechanically (the ability builds on another ability but can't fit as a scaling increase of the base) or if they are required for balance (granting an ability that cannot be accommodated at a lower level).
Basic fantasy tropes should not be locked to high levels.