First, a quick note: I started writing this a while ago, but getting distracted with other things I never got around to entirely finishing it. I haven't really gone through Mythic Magic and later chapters for this post. However with the forum perhaps closing soon I figured I had better post what I'd got.
So... I have heard that one of the design goals of the Mythic book is to present a system which can actually reduce the need to track complex rules and such. While there are certainly rules in the playtest document that remove unneeded complexity, the purpose of this post is to point out rules in the playtest document that add unneeded complexity rather than subtract it. I have tried to focus on what seem to me to be exceptional cases, but this may still be a question of opinion, so keep that in mind. Also keep in mind that while there may be some overlap between this and a hypothetical "mythic rules that function poorly" list, this is not that list. There may or may not be charmingly simple rules in the mythic document that function poorly, but one thing at a time.
Anyway, here we go:
Aerial Assault
Aerial Assault (Su): When making a charge attack you may expend one use of mythic power. If you do, include a single Acrobatics check made to jump with a circumstance bonus equal to your champion tier × 10. You take no falling damage for height gained as part of this leap. In addition, you may substitute your melee attack for a single grapple check as part of this aerial charge. Any creature you successfully grapple is brought to the ground with you at the end of your jump. This creature takes falling damage for half the height gained in your jump. Alternatively, you may use this leap to empower your charge. Calculate the falling damage appropriate for your descent and add this to the damage caused by your charge attack, if successful.
This one isn't that bad, but things like "this creature takes falling damage for half the height gained in your jump" are kind of unnecessary. One could easily imagine rolling that into the other damage option and just setting damage for both (1d6 per tier, or something) rather than rolling an Acrobatics check to calculate different amounts of bonus damage every time.
Wall Smasher
Wall Smasher (Ex): You can make a bull rush, ki throw, or reposition combat maneuver to smash a foe into a wall (or similar solid object). If the combat maneuver is successful, deal your normal unarmed strike damage to the wall. If the wall is breached, the creature smashes through, taking damage equal to the damage dealt to the wall and landing prone. Otherwise, the creature lands in the nearest empty space. You can expend one use of mythic power to ignore the hardness of the object struck.
This ability seems poorly thought out. Not least because it doesn't seem to have been designed with the actual hit points of walls in mind compared to unarmed strike damage (even wooden walls have sixty hit points, putting them generally out of reach of a single blow from PCs lacking triple digit Strength) but because it will require the GM to determine the composition and construction of the walls and then look up the hardness, hit points, etc in the table every single time a PC uses this at-will ability.
Resolving this ability goes:
-roll combat maneuver vs CMD
-roll unarmed strike damage
-determine composition and construction method of wall
-look up wall hit points at hardness in the table
-roll unarmed strike damage, apply to wall
-if wall destroyed, reposition and apply damage and prone to original maneuver target
-if wall not destroyed, reposition original target differently
Too many dang steps for a fairly basic effect (deal unarmed damage and reposition/trip a foe)! It would be nice if you could use this ability without all the mucking about with wall hardness and hit points. I'm not quite sure how to really simplify it, but off the top of my head, success if your original CMB roll exceeded the wall's break DC seems a bit easier - fewer numbers involved, at least.
Power Current
Power Current (Su): You learn to tap the current of divine power. Whenever you cast a cure or inflict spell or use a class feature that uses positive or negative energy (such as channel energy), treat any natural 1s on the dice you rolled as 2s. This applies only to dice rolled to heal or deal damage. You must be at least 3rd tier before selecting this ability. This ability can be selected up to four times. Each additional time it is selected, the range of natural results increased to the next highest result goes up by one (for example, selecting this twice treats any natural 1s or 2s as if they were 3s).
This one would definitely be YMMV. Perhaps it is easier if you roll dice by hand. Our group plays over IRC and uses a dice roller. It's very easy to tell it to roll 10d6 and total the result. It's a pain to tell it to roll 10d6 and then sort through the results by hand looking for dice that need to be changed. It is more of a pain the more often you have taken this ability, for instance if you are sorting through your 10d6 adding 3 points to the total for every 1 you rolled, adding 2 for every 2, 1 for every 3...
(before anyone suggests it, no, 10d5+10 is not the same as 10d6 treat a 1 as a 2).
If the goal is to boost the channel, perhaps it could be accomplished by adding a static bonus (+1 per tier, or something), a percentage bonus (empower spell for channel), or something else that is more straightforward to apply in practice?
Assured Drinker
Assured Drinker (Ex): You gain a dodge bonus to AC equal to twice your trickster tier versus attacks of opportunity provoked from drinking an elixir, extract, or potion. Additionally, you can expend one use of mythic power to drink an elixir, extract, or potion as a swift action, which does not provoke an attack of opportunity.
This is not terribly complicated I suppose, but certainly more complicated than it needs to be. Tracking fiddly bonuses to AC in different fringe circumstances is one more detail to remember, and it doesn't seem particularly necessary as the ability would probably work just fine if you never took AoOs for potion-drinking at all.
Fickle Attack
Fickle Attack (Ex): Whenever you roll damage for a melee or ranged attack with a weapon or alchemical item, you can reroll any damage die with a result of 1. You must be at least 3rd tier before selecting this ability. This ability can be selected up to three times. Each additional time you do so, the range of the natural results that allow a reroll increases by 1 (for example, selecting this twice allows a reroll on a natural 1 or 2). You must take the result of the reroll, even if it is lower.
This threatens to be onerous in play for the same reason that Power Current is.
Mythic Power Attack
Power Attack (Mythic) Your attacks are truly devastating. Prerequisite: Power Attack, 1st mythic tier. Benefit: When you use Power Attack, you gain a +3 bonus on melee damage rolls (instead of +2). When your base attack bonus reaches +4 and every 4 points thereafter, the amount of bonus damage increases by +3 (instead of +2). In addition, the bonus damage from this feat is doubled on a critical hit.
There doesn't seem to be any need to impose a burden of tracking the bonus damage just from this feat separately from regular damage and imposing a different critical multiplier. Plus, it's unclear exactly how this works. Is it doubled instead of using the normal critical multiplier (unlike normal non-extra-dice bonus damage)? Do you multiply it by the normal critical modifier, and then add an additional doubling? (like normal non-extra-dice bonus damage)? Is this only true of the bonus above normal Power Attack (so is +1 per -1 doubled) or of the whole thing (so +3 per -1 is doubled)...
In either case, adding bonus damage that uses its own special extra rule to multiply on crits is adding one more layer of math to things.
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I hope this post is helpful! Simplifying high level play a bit is a great goal.
agreed on pretty much everything.
I'm not sure I'd be any keener on rerolling at the table, and it certainly doesn't expedite high level gameplay.
Longer turns, complicated mechanics and anything that increases cross-referencing are antithetical to that goal.
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Power Current and Fickle Attack are such worthless abilities that they ought to be rewritten to make them useful. On average, PC just adds 1/6 of a point per die, ie +1 at 13th level. Fickle Attack adds 3/8 of a point of damage if you use a dagger, 5/12 if you use a shortsword or 7/16 with a longsword. Further investment brings even less. It's the same innumeracy that brought you Powerful Sneak.