Disappointing

[dmwcarol]

We had a go at the mythic playtest this past weekend using the scenario provided with the rules, so here is my feedback

Firstly I should say that I was playing a bard – this really didn’t help as there was nothing in the playtest that did anything to boost the bardic abilities and what I could use of those that were on offer was very limited. I appreciate that the playtest doesn’t include everything and am really only stating this for balance since my experience was so negative.

The first combat where we faced mythic creatures as non-mythic players was fun. The creatures posed a bit more of a challenge and we had to be that bit more on our toes as a result. However, once we were through the first round where we discovered just how many attacks they were getting it didn’t seem much different to any other combat. We’re used to things being hasted or slowed etc so they didn’t seem anything extra-ordinary.

From there it went rapidly downhill. As soon as we had players with mythic abilities it became less about roleplay and more about book-keeping. The combats seemed much longer and slower and if you weren’t spending your mythic points to act twice each round there was a lot of waiting around for your next turn. Of course, we were trying to use the abilities as much as possible so we could see how they worked so maybe this wouldn’t be the case in a normal game. Although for me just having to keep track of the damage I’d taken from mythic creatures separately from that taken from non-mythic because of the healing options was already one level of book-keeping too many. Plus of course having to track mythic points usage and which abilities burned those points. It made everything more complicated.

It looked like a nightmare to GM - trying to keep track of who was acting once, who was acting twice, where the second action would move to if they delayed on the first etc. It also wasn’t always clear whether some things happened once a round or once a turn and whether action twice in one round meant you had two turns or just two action – I expect there will need to be amendments to the text throughout the published works to clarify this should Mythic be released. For example bleed damage or saving throws v poison – do you bleed faster if you’re taking two actions a round? Does poison hit you faster? If you had said you were going to act twice but fall unconscious on the first do you have to stabilise or lose a point of bleed on your second action?

From my pov as a mostly non-combative bard it was majorly dull. I’d play some bardsong, maybe fire an arrow or cast a buff spell and then wait for an hour or so until it was my turn again. I did try wading into combat but the mythic abilities don’t make much difference in terms of AC or HP and none at all in terms of saving throws so I still felt way too vulnerable and even with the mythic powers I wasn’t hitting that hard. Blowing all my mythic points would take just a couple of rounds and achieve very little. Similarly for spell-casters. Acting twice a round just burns through your spells even faster.

I didn’t feel at all “mythic”. A 6th level mythic character is easily outclassed by a 7th level character of the same type because the 7th level character gets extra abilities, better BAB and saves, additional spells and a whole host of other advantages depending on character class. Sure you can wade through the commoners and minor beasties but that’s a given for any mid-high level character anyway.

You couldn’t safely face higher CR monsters as a mythic character because the combats so often rely on you having the abilities you gain at higher levels (like being able to fly or see invisibility) and the higher saving throws, so the only way to use this is to fight mythic creatures which puts you back on a level playing field where the old system with the simpler book-keeping is a lot more fun.

I don’t think this adds anything worthwhile to pathfinder at all and will not be playing again.

[Pendin Fust]

Have you tried the Marshal path ability with the Bard? My party's Bard/Marshal is absolutely making the encounters super easy.

[Darkorin]

dmwcarol wrote:

It looked like a nightmare to GM - trying to keep track of who was acting once, who was acting twice, where the second action would move to if they delayed on the first etc. It also wasn’t always clear whether some things happened once a round or once a turn and whether action twice in one round meant you had two turns or just two action – I expect there will need to be amendments to the text throughout the published works to clarify this should Mythic be released. For example bleed damage or saving throws v poison – do you bleed faster if you’re taking two actions a round? Does poison hit you faster? If you had said you were going to act twice but fall unconscious on the first do you have to stabilise or lose a point of bleed on your second action?

First of all, Amazing Initiative is going to change, you can found the current options here

Second:

Amazing Initiative wrote:

At 2nd tier, you gain a +20 mythic bonus on initiative checks. In addition, you can expend one use of mythic power each round to take an additional turn, treating your initiative for this second turn as your initiative roll without the +20 mythic bonus. Using this ability is a free action that must be decided at the end of your first action during the round. This additional turn allows you to take the full range of actions available to you, but both turns still only count as one round for the purposes of durations and other effects based on rounds.

If you read the bolded part, it states clearly that it counts as a single round, so you don't bleed faster, you don't make more saving throws, you don't have to maintain your performance, etc. for your second "Turn".

One of my question to you is: Why were you keeping track of which ability burned your mythic points??? I really see no use to that. And To book-keep your number of mythic points is not something that unusual. I mean, you do keep track of the number of spells you used, of the number of round of bardic performance you used, etc.

Yeah, the bard already has a lot to check, but it's not really that much more. And what you describe about your experience... it seems like your role in combat was one of a regular bard... Did you exploit the new powers you had? What Mythic Path did you chose?

If you were built for skill-checks and not for combat, I do understand, and I find it normal that you did not have that much fun, but I don't think you should blame it on the mythic rules.

The sample adventure is great to test the combat, but for skill-check based characters, it's not that good.

[dmwcarol]

Pendin Fust wrote:

Have you tried the Marshal path ability with the Bard? My party's Bard/Marshal is absolutely making the encounters super easy.

No, we've only played the once. I did like some of the abilities that Marshal and Guardian had to offer and some of the other abilities that were not suited to a bard looked cool too, but overall I really don't think they added up to any improvement over simply advancing to a higher level character.

[Pendin Fust]

dmwcarol wrote:

but overall I really don't think they added up to any improvement over simply advancing to a higher level character.

It's a good thing it's not either/or! You get the things granted from tiers in addition to normal leveling. For example, the Marshal ability of Rally allows you and all of your mates within 30 ft to reroll a d20 (and activating this ability is a swift action so you still get to act normally). Couple that with a Full Attack (and rerolling 1 of the attacks) or rerolling a crit confirmation...getting past SR...etc.

From a non-combat perspective, they definitely have not released the content yet that would be interesting. But in terms of supporting combat...there's tons of mileage already with the Marshal/Bard or Guardian/Bard paths.

[dmwcarol]

Darkorin wrote:

First of all, Amazing Initiative is going to change, you can found the current options here

Noted

Darkorin wrote:

Second:
If you read the bolded part, it states clearly that it counts as a single round, so you don't bleed faster, you don't make more saving throws, you don't have to maintain your performance, etc. for your second "Turn".

I didn't make my point very clear, sorry - the words round and turn mean different things in mythic, but they have been used interchangably pretty much everywhere else until now which caused confusion.

There were lots of other areas where the wording wasn't as clear as it could be - for example the Archmage option includes Enduring armour which doesn't seem to work for spontaneous casters as they can't keep slots empty - does that mean only prepared casters can use it?

Darkorin wrote:

One of my question to you is: Why were you keeping track of which ability burned your mythic points??? I really see no use to that. And To book-keep your number of mythic points is not something that unusual. I mean, you do keep track of the number...

I wasn't meaning keeping track as in recording each use but as in having to keep checking whether points were required to do what I wanted to do. Of course that would come with familiarity, but having more stuff to look up just slows things down. It's more rule playing than role playing.

I put the comment at the start to explain that I hadn't really had the opportunity to do as much with the playest as the melee characters - I know that was inevitable with the scenario being basically just a string of combats and me not playing a melee character but I also know that the players playing melee characters enjoyed it no more than I did.

I don't think the game needs anything to focus the action any more on the combats than it already has. But then my preference is for lots of character based roleplaying with the combats passing by quickly to keep the story moving - the play test made the bits I enjoy least take up much much more of the playing time and require much more effort in terms of book keeping and I'm never going to be a fan of that.

[Hama]

dmwcarol wrote:

I didn't make my point very clear, sorry - the words round and turn mean different things in mythic, but they have been used interchangably pretty much everywhere else until now which caused confusion.

I have to disagree. Differences between rounds and turns have been explained in the core rulebook quite satisfactory. Good enough that most people get that a turn is a small part of a round wherein a single character gets to act.

[Jason Bulmahn]

Hey there all,

First off, thanks dmwcarol for giving your feedback. I appreciate that took the time to give us some thoughts on your experience.

We realize that there are some issue with the current rules and that is why we are playtesting. As it turns out, many of the problems you describe have to do with a few issues that we are taking a very serious look at. Trust me when I say that Amazing Initiative is going to change. Its too problematic in its current incarnation, and causes way too many book keeping problems for the GM. Thanks again for taking the time to give us your thoughts.

I hope you will give this another look as it progresses through the playtest process.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer

[Starsunder]

Jason Bulmahn wrote:

Hey there all,

First off, thanks dmwcarol for giving your feedback. I appreciate that took the time to give us some thoughts on your experience.

We realize that there are some issue with the current rules and that is why we are playtesting. As it turns out, many of the problems you describe have to do with a few issues that we are taking a very serious look at. Trust me when I say that Amazing Initiative is going to change. Its too problematic in its current incarnation, and causes way too many book keeping problems for the GM. Thanks again for taking the time to give us your thoughts.

I hope you will give this another look as it progresses through the playtest process.

Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer

Are we going to receive an updated mythic ruleset PDF, Jason?

[Hama]

Nope, most possibly not at this time. Maybe we will receive a new batch of mythic stuff to playtest in a month or two.

[Enlight_Bystand]

Hama wrote:

Nope, most possibly not at this time. Maybe we will receive a new batch of mythic stuff to playtest in a month or two.

Jason has said in his State of the Playtest thread in General that there's not going to be an entire new PDF, but there will be some posts coming with revised rules to test.