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1 - Pathfinder, both core and supplements, are rather tame compared to 3.5 in terms of power imbalance. Sure, there are full casters vs. martials, but at least there are no more I WIN BUTTONS such as shapechange or wildshape.
2 - Not gonna happen anytime soon.
3 - HeroLab is great, if with slightly quirky interface.
4 - You're golden.
5 - Changes were made generally in the "less broken" direction (concentration is harder, polymorph spells and wildshape nerfed into the ground)
6 - If anything, Paizo books can be accussed of being too tame instead of too powerful.
7 - By some accounts the best selling tabletop RPG currently. Paizo is currently expanding the business, not folding it.
8 - you will be fine. Also, all the rules are open content and available for free online on Paizo's PRD and fan-made PFSRD, so you can try before you buy all that you want.
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Hopefully what I can say to you is worth it. I have been playing RPG games for over two decades, I've played and DM/GM'ed both AD&D, 3rd Ed, 3.5, Pathfinder and 4ed.
I will say that Pathfinder is incredible. When I made the switch from 3.5 to 4ed (Also was not aware of Pathfinder at the time), I really missed the character customizations, You could have a group with two barbarians in it, and both could be completly different. Where as in 4ed, everything is very cookie cutter.
But that part that made me switch was finding out that the company that supports 4ed (name removed) was going to be switching again to a new rule system. It was then that I found Pathfinder and fell in love with the system.
Paizo has stated that they will never change the base system rules, they will add to, but never cause you to have to buy all new books.
I use Hero Lab and it is incredible, it can be expensive if you plan to get all the data sets, but as you get additional licences, you can install it on multiple machines. It does allow you to make characters easily within minutes.
Pathfinder is very healthy as they are currently the highest selling game right now. If you invest, you won't be disappointed.
I highly recommend switching as my group did the same switch and we haven't looked back since
I've been running a table and playing for over two decades. So far, our group has most enjoyed D&D 3.5. We switched to 4E, not knowing about Pathfinder, and, we made it work but, we all missed a lot about 3.5, even though we still had enjoyable sessions.
With D&D switching again, and us having to re-invest again, we were considering just going to Pathfinder...
I never played 4e because I couldn't find a group. Everyone that I know who tried it switched back t0 3.5 or pathfinder.
I switched to pathfinder and like it quite a bit better than 3.5. I think they cleaned up a bunch of the problem.... 2 - We're looking for a system that isn't going to change every few years...
Expands with new books, but I haven't seen any significant changes. Some people have been clamoring for a pathfinder 2.0, but I have seen no indication that it is in the works.
...3 - We really liked the web tools of 4E, and we don't mind paying money for good electronic tools. How good is Hero Lab? The old eTools for 3.5 was spotty, while the 4E tools have been more solid...
I haven't really used Hero Lab much but it seems decent. I would say there is less electronic tools for PF than for 3.5. I can't compare to 4.0.
...4 - We have thousands of miniatures and environments and have always loved using them. Since Pathfinder is similar to 3.5, I assume this isn't an issue...
We still use all of ours with no problems.
...5 - Is anything in Pathfinder's basic rules more broken than some of the 3.5 stuff? Or do the changes help it?...
I would say that mostly the changes helped things.
...6 - What supplements are the "most broken"... besides the core rules, which other books would you add without ending up with auto-death combos?
There are a few to watch out for. In large groups, summoners (because of masses of creatures without the caster being threatened) and bards (because their major buff affects everyone) have gotten some broken complaints. Gunslingers if you let them use the modern weapon rules. Those are the ones I hear the most complaints about. But I think they are manageable without needing to ban them.
...7 - How healthy is Pathfinder? Are we going to invest in this just to have it change or go out of business in a year? (best intelligent guess)...
As far as I can tell it still has some significant growth (slow but steady). Individual game shops have been closing in my area. But it is all available online.
...8 - I'd describe our group as highly tactical, where combats have always involved a lot of chess-work and swat-team type tactics. They love planning and preparing for a battle, and missed buff spells a lot in 4E...
Still got all that with even some more options than 3.5.
...We're leaning towards switching to Pathfinder, but, just looking for some level of confirmation that 6 guys aren't going to invest hundreds of dollars and be disappointed...
I think you will be happy with it. But to be sure I would just do the Core Rule Book and 1 copy of the bestiary first to see how you like it. That is really all that is needed.
You will see alot of bad rep for the monk and rogue here on the boards. I personally don't think it is as bad as some people seem to think.
Many agree that the base rogue is pretty week and the monk is a struggle for someone who is not an expert player.
But I've seen both do well with the GM having to pander to them.
I especially like what they've done with the sorcerer and oracle to keep them from just being watered down wizards and clerics.
Pathfinder did two major things to the 3.5 base rules - They made being a single-class character more useful by ensuring you got something every level (either class feature or feat or ability bonus... sometimes more than one). They also often replaced punishments with benefit (leveling in a favored class gives you a bonus, but not leveling in the favored class has no penalty).
Furthermore, they increased customization. Many classes have a choice of abilities each level. Rogue tricks, fighter/ranger/monk bonus feats, barbarian rage abilities. You can make very different versions of the base classes. Even wizards and clerics get schools/domains with specific special abilities.
Another major boon was with archetypes. You can further customize a class by replacing some abilities you don't care for with abilities you want. A bow-based fighter trades in some of his martial versatility for bow related bonuses. A rogue can trade trap-related abilities for increased beating the crap out of someone abilities (the Brute archetype).
As for eTools, d20pfsrd.com is fully compliant with smartphones and tablets. HeroLabs is supposed to be a very good (though not always perfectly correct with rules) character creator. Paizo is also creating a virtual game table product for online play (alpha version was demo'ed at paizocon, you can find details and screenshots in a recent paizo blog post).
All in all, I'm much happier with PF than 4.0 or 3.5
The only thing in PF that's actually broken is the Antagonize feat. Even Synthesists are really just 3.5 core druids with 1/2 spellcasting, no companion and immunity to healing.
The only thing in PF that's actually broken is the Antagonize feat. Even Synthesists are really just 3.5 core druids with 1/2 spellcasting, no companion and immunity to healing.
I get what your saying and partially agree. They are very close to a 3.5 druid in playstyle.
However I dont recall any animals in 3.5 that where Huge, had 6 Arms, 7 Primary Natural Attacks, Rend, Pouce, Wings, Rake, and SR 11+HD.
1 - We don't care that all classes are perfectly forced to be balanced. We liked the options of 3.5 and that, if you put more effort into your character, you were rewarded. Our GMs can deal with powerful players or a powerful party and regulate any totally broken combos without being unfair to the player.
If:
Ridiculously powerful characters > Balance, then
3.5 > Pathfinder.
If you want honesty, there it is. Personally one of my favorite things about Pathfinder is that they re-balanced the mechanics while still holding true to 3.5's core concepts. Paladins can still smite and have to be lawful good... you can still run around in a rage, power attacking things... Wizards still prepare spells from a spellbook and sorcerers still cast spontaneously... etc etc. The core is still intact, just tweaked... quite frankly, in favor of balance. That's Pathfinder in a nutshell.
2 - We're looking for a system that isn't going to change every few years.
Each ruleset is its own entity. 3.5 is not 4e, 4e is not Pathfinder, etc. Each of these rulesets are simply tools used to accomplish the exact same thing: sit down with friends, have a DM and player characters, and play a fun Tabletop RPG together. You never "have" to change anything... just because WotC is coming out with a new edition doesn't mean you HAVE to stop playing 4e. Just because some people like Pathfinder better than 3.5 doesn't mean you HAVE to switch. After looking at each ruleset as its own entity, just decide on what you want to play, and ignore everything else.
That being said, I don't see how or why Pathfinder would change, other than updating rules errata and such. Pathfinder is a modification of 3.5, so I can only guess that "Pathfinder 2" would be a modification of 4th edition... or something ridiculous like that. Don't count on it.
3 - We really liked the web tools of 4E, and we don't mind paying money for good electronic tools. How good is Hero Lab? The old eTools for 3.5 was spotty, while the 4E tools have been more solid.
Can't say, as I personally have no experience with Hero Lab. I can say, however, that as far as web tools go, 4e is king. 4e's Character Builder is AMAZING, and nothing with 3.5 comes even close. Again, not sure about Hero Lab, but I CAN say that Pathfinder has by far the BEST online SRD of any that I have seen... including 3.5 and 4e. I know with the 3.5 SRD, they just stopped updating it even though they were releasing new content - so it's not really concise. d20pfsrd.com, however, updates everything with errata, FAQs, and Developer blog posts, so you can always be confident that when you read something on there, it's up to date. Like I said, it's the best I've seen at having a concise database like that... and it's free, obviously.
4 - We have thousands of miniatures and environments and have always loved using them. Since Pathfinder is similar to 3.5, I assume this isn't an issue.
No issue at all. Medium/small creatures are still 1 square, large creatures are still 4 squares, etc. In fact, grid movement and area of effect rules are still exactly the same as 3.5, so if you have any area of effect cut-outs or anything, you can still use them with no fuss.
5 - Is anything in Pathfinder's basic rules more broken than some of the 3.5 stuff? Or do the changes help it?
Short answer: definitely help it. Instead of just making a huge laundry list of some of the changes that NEEDED to happen, here are some examples: the rules for the Paladin's code of conduct actually specify how to handle evil teammates... the "darkness" and "deeper darkness" spells, and the rules for light, are more concise/less confusing, specifying that only "supernatural darkness" can block Darkvision (so you have bright light, regular light, dim light, darkness, and supernatural darkness). I could go on and on and on, but you get the picture... changes for the good. Just never assume that any single thing works the same as it did in 3.5... while Pathfinder pretty much feels exactly like 3.5, most everything has had at least some sort of subtle (yet significant) change.
6 - What supplements are the "most broken"... besides the core rules, which other books would you add without ending up with auto-death combos? (we've always solved that through rational group discussion and house rules if something seemed totally broken because, if the PCs can do it, the monsters will too, so no player wants anything too broken thrown back in their face)
Nothing that I've seen (besides 3rd party material). And if there is, you can bet it will be errata'd.
7 - How healthy is Pathfinder? Are we going to invest in this just to have it change or go out of business in a year? (best intelligent guess)
See my response for #2. As for it going out of business... best guess would be absolutely not. Even if it does, there's already a ton of content and custom character options and monsters out there, that the Pathfinder ruleset as is can suit pretty much any fantasy setting you want to play with countless character options. Just look at how many feats / archetype build options / items / monsters there are right now. If it hasn't already exceeded 3.5's volume of "options", it's close.
8 - I'd describe our group as highly tactical, where combats have always involved a lot of chess-work and swat-team type tactics. They love planning and preparing for a battle, and missed buff spells a lot in 4E.
We're leaning towards switching to Pathfinder, but, just looking for some level of confirmation that 6 guys aren't going to invest hundreds of dollars and be disappointed.
(from what I've seen, we won't, but, we haven't played it for years either to see the warts)
Pathfinder is a highly tactical game. You actually have to micro-manage your abilities. For example, the Barbarian's Rage and the Bard's Performances... they are now measured in ROUNDS per day, so you need to only use them in emergencies / during boss fights. What's more, you can't just "turn on and off" Rage whenever you like, since you're fatigued for a certain number of rounds after. Things like this really make characters think about how / when to use their abilities.