I enjoyed being able to take part in the feedback and having the developer's chime in personally with their thoughts and acknowledging ideas/problems with certain classes.
What I didn't like was the short timeline for the revised versions of the classes. With less than a week for most, it was difficult to throw together some games.
People gave great insight and a lot of great suggestions were made. I'm very glad that the public had the chance to chime in and help make the classes better than originally presented.
Lead Designer
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Hey there folks,
The short time frame on this was an issue and I would have loved to have given this one more time, but that is a very hard thing for us to accomplish. Playtest eat up an extraordinary amount of time from the design team, so we need to keep them somewhat limited in scope. In my experience, most of the feedback dies way down after 4 weeks, but can flare back up with a rerelease or additional content. I would have liked to release these in waves, but the timing was not right on this playtest.
In the future, this is something we will strongly consider, especially if we ever do anything of this size again.
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
I think it would have been useful to know at what stage of development the playtest was in, for instance was it at the stage where ideas were being tossed about and seeing what was good/wasn't good or closer to the end stage where you were balancing numbers to see if the numbers were right but the concept wasnt going to change.
Arcanist and warpriest falls into the 1st category and bloodrager into the later category i think with skald somewhere in the middle.
I think too many forum posts were tied at cross purposes with some people discussing the braod strokes and some the details.
First off, thanks again for the transparent nature of the playtest and the chance to have back-and-forth discourse with the development side of the house.
As almost everyone mentioned, the shorter time span for this playtest was a negative, especially given the rather large changes in iterations of some classes.
I think that this may have led to some skewed playtest #’s as well, given that a large # of your playtest data comes from PFS, which would have much lower level play than what one would hope would be average life performance for a character. I’m not sure how feasible it would be for the PFS systems side of the house, but if there was a way to encourage or allow PFS players to test higher level classes during the playtest period (maybe count them as GM credit for PCs as well, or give out boons similar to the Holiday or PF Tales Boons for no-credit scenarios? – I’m not sure what the right answer is) I think you would have a lot more concise feedback on play above 3rd level. I really wish I hadn’t run out of time to run through some higher level short scenarios for these before the cut, but c’est la vie.
… also, the edits to the first pages of the classes showing the most recent updates / errata was incredibly helpful!
-TimD
Some of the classes had a final update as to the design direction they will be taken in, sometimes more specific for certain things sometimes less specific but still a general picture. Supposedly all the classes were supposed to be "wrapped up" in that manner. Am I missing where that was posted, I'm not seeing it for all the classes. Those threads were locked/archived, so I'm not sure if that was posted somewhere else rather than un-lock those threads temporarily just for that purpose...?
Said this in the blog post thread, but just wanted to reiterate my appreciation for the designers - Jason, Stephen, and Sean - the feedback you guys gave was great, and you weathered the negativity and even the slurry of boundless enthusiasm very well. I hope the playtest went as well for you as it seemed to from my perspective.
I know that several of the classes I either disliked from the start or was on the fence about, and they ended up turning into the classes I am most anticipating for the final release. A couple of others I was excited about, but didn't quite get into during the first release and never quite got around to being able to turn my full attention to, but I am hopeful that others did and that you all have a solid handle on what to do with them.
(At least a couple I didn't really start to discover until near the end, but they intrigue me enough that I'm probably going to play around with them on my own.)
In any event, this was enlightening and fun, and I thank you all for giving us the opportunity to play in your sandbox while you're still getting the toys ready for public consumption, and can't wait until August.
Oh, and I think all the class threads should have ended with a "To be continued...?" post. :p
Some of the classes had a final update as to the design direction they will be taken in, sometimes more specific for certain things sometimes less specific but still a general picture. Supposedly all the classes were supposed to be "wrapped up" in that manner.
I think it just depended on how the main designer for a given class opted to close out his thread. I don't believe there was any "wrapup mandate" for any of them.
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I mean, PFS players were sent an email encouraging them to use these classes. Then on the Additional Resources page, it specifically instructs players to keep up-to-date with messageboard clarifications and adjust their PCs accordingly. But then the most recent playtest blog contradicts this, saying to use the playtest PDF.
I now have no idea whether (for instance) a PFS slayer needs to meet prereqs for his Combat Style talents or if a PFS brawler needs 13 INT for Combat Expertise for the next eight months.
This would follow the same conventions as everything else in PFS, treating the playtest PDF as the "rulebook".
That is, follow the rules in the PDF, treat messageboard clarifications as errata to those rules.
I think it just depended on how the main designer for a given class opted to close out his thread. I don't believe there was any "wrapup mandate" for any of them.
Ah. Well, then I'll just say that doing that's a great way to close out the playtest, sharing the impact of the playtest with all participants.
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Are you going to Release a "Final thoughts" post detailing where you intend to take the classes from here?
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I agree with what many here have said.
Nice playtest, but it felt rushed.
You all rocked, but SKR and Stephen rocked more;)
Stuff I’d like to see in next playtest is:
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Some notes about general problems I'd like you to take a look at:
Some facts:
1) Before this playtest each role in a party (full arcane caster, full divine caster, full BAB meat shield, skill monkey and even 6/9 utility caster) could be filled by AT LEAST three different classes. The exception was the trap expert. There was only one vanilla class that had trapfinding.
2) Armor comes with a max dex bonus, that often handicap dex based characters.
3) Skills are almost always hardcapped at what's "realistic" or "humanly possible", especially true for the all of the movement skills.
4) Melee characters have always suffered from the problem of “if I move more than 5 ft and lose my iterative attacks.”
5) Archery is more or less impossible as a concept if you are a rogue (you can’t flank with a bow) even though her stats and flavor should fit that concept.
6) Precision damage is problematic. There seem to be a myth that if “the rogue could always be getting sneak attack damage she'd rapidly outpace the fighter's damage output”. This has been proven false. There are play test experience to back that up, but more importantly there are math/DPR threads where apples and apples are compared and the rogue comes out as one of the weakest classes in the game (if not the weakest), even if we assume she be able to full attack with a flanking buddy.
SA is problematic. It is even problematic when you actually can full attack with a flank.
7) Unlike Barbarians there are only two kinds of rogue talents: rogue talents and advanced rogue talents. Barbarians have rage powers where you need to be level 6, so these powers can be “more powerful”, than low level powers. Some of the rogue talents suffer from this (minor magic is one). This also means that there are some must have talents, like Combat Trick or Finesse Rogue, but these are just feats any class can pick. So it is not until level 10 you get the really good stuff, because there are no improved or greater rogue talents, there are only advanced talents and the others.
Rogues got skills that don’t compensate for her lack of combat effectiveness, she can deal with traps that can be dealt with by others (spell casters, archetypes and now two new classes), she is ‘agile and mobile’ but can’t utilize this since she lose her my iterative attacks if she move more than 5 ft and archery is more or less impossible because you can’t flank with a bow. It is not until level 10 she can get the really good talents and by level 10 her “combat problem-solving utility” is surpassed by others classes that on-top of this has more combat effectiveness, be it by being able to inflict direct damage (Wizard, Druid, Ranger, Alchemist, Magus, Inquisitor, etc. ) or buffing allies (Bard, Oracle, Wizard, Witch, etc.). And finally: she is not very good at killing stuff and she can’t take on a foe one-on-one because she needs a flanking buddy and she can’t feint as a swift action or some are immune to SA.
Conclusion: A) you are going to run into trouble if the Rogue is your benchmark. The Investigator, Slayer and even Swashbuckler will all suffer from one or more of the trouble listed above, especially Investigator and Slayer. B) Throwing rogues a bone in the ACG would be a good idea. Swift feint and new talents would be nice, but creating a feat or rogue talent that grants dex to damage, see below, would be nice. C) If two other classes with trapfindning makes the Rogue obsolete, so be it. Forcing a player to play a rogue, because the party needs a trap experts and a skill monkey is bad. Also remember that both the Investigator and Slayer have two parent classes, making them too weak compared to their other parent will make them problematic.
So, for those of you who want to peruse the playtest threads, they can be found HERE
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Thanks Jason!
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Not to add a whisper to the chorus, but I too must say the playtest was too short, especially since it ran over the holidays in which many people such as myself and my two groups were unable to play reliably.
Positive aspects were staff response and interaction.
I'll also throw my hat into the arena of "playtest was too short" commnents. All the other stuff was much improved (although I support Zark's comments above about dex-to-damage and the problem with sneak attack and how that applies to the new classes and the ACG).
I think the ACG playtest was pretty good overall, but also agree it was a bit poorly timed and short. There were a few other class combinations I would have liked to see, but I did like the overall variety of concepts presented.
I can't help but compare the ACG playtest to the WotC 5e playtest, and I must say this one was just all around better done, even given its much shorter duration. I felt more was accomplished in 4 weeks than the many months WotC had.
Thanks to the dev team for all your hard work, it is truly appreciated.
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Every once in a while I take a step back and realize just what's happening here. It's amazing how transparent and open to feedback Paizo is when it comes to their production line (and I'm talking just general forum stuff, let alone the playtest). Most companies do *not* as a rule do this, and I'm consistently amazed at how much the team is dedicated to being upfront and receptive to customers.
I loved having the opportunity of the playtest, and feel this playtest had gone over better than previous ones. It felt far more organized and there was a *lot* of back and forth from the developers that made the discussion move along quicker.
I felt there was a lot more of "Why" behind the choices being made this time around, which helped cut down a lot of the noise from previous playtest discussion.
The survey was a really nice touch as well, and I could see how the number crunching from that alone could give huge insight (pre-changes, post-changes, catching folks who don't like to discuss but want to give their impression, etc).
Despite how short this one was, I think Paizo got a lot more out of this playtest than in the past. It certainly felt so from this side of the process. :)
Liked:
-Lots of dev feedback during the process (though some were more active in some threads than others)
-The fact that much of the feedback given in the threads was taken to heart, even some specific suggestions it seemed (rather than a general "I get where you're coming from, here's my take on it" thing like many companies like to do).
-A "living document" made by the editing of the first posts for teh class threads.
Disliked:
-Survey questions were a bit too vague. Questions like "How does it stack up to each of the parent classes?" felt misleading, since it's hard to get across that "I think this class is in a really good place balance-wise" when "How does it stack up to parent class A" is answered with a 1 or 2 (much less powerful) and "How does it stack up to parent class B?" is answered with a 4 or 5 (much more powerful).
-There were only two rounds of playtesting. A third round would have been very helpful in smoothing out the remaining kinks. IMO it should have been:
Weeks 1 and 2: Initial offering
Week 3: First Revision
Week 4: Second revisionInstead of Week 1-3 being the initial offering and Week 4 being scrambling to look over the revised classes.
-That apparently the class threads have been removed. I'd like to be able to look over them more, especially the opening post for those that were revised, because those FAQ/Errata-esque changes are important to know, and I would like to continue using the Playtest classes until the actual book comes out.
Please bring back the threads. Unless I'm a dummy and they were just moved somewhere.
I agree with this.
Trying to fit in and learn 10 classes at once is difficult. I would have at least like to see 2 revisions for playtesting future classes. If possible doing 5(at the most simultaneously) classes at a time instead of all 10(or any number greater than 5) allows for more focus on each class.
I enjoyed it, and appreciated the patience and work of the Paizo staff. It seemed as though there were a few frayed nerves towards the end, but that can happen with a playtest environment.
In that light, thanks especially for encouraging a more general civility.
I agree that having so many options to playtest at once was overwhelming,
personally I realized that I simply did not have the time/energy to be heavily participating in each class' process,
so I just decided which ones needed the most work and/or interested me the most personally, and focused on those.
Not having all of them at once seems like it could allow more developer focus on each one simultaneously,
sharing insight between devs and allowing more interaction with playtesters.
Since these sorts of things usually pretty quickly come down to:
some things are pretty close to perfect and only need minor tweaking and other things are problematic and need major work,
I think a process built around that recognition, which actually has an extra final round
solely for the cases which most needed extra attention, would really be beneficial.
I also think it might be beneficial to put out initial playtesting drafts for MORE concepts than can fit in the final book.
It seemed clear that there was alot more interest in certain concepts that just weren't explored (Wildshape Master) than the ones that were pursued, and some classes perhaps inherently just didn't have the strongest fundamental design concept.
Since it's hard to get everything perfect on the first try, it seems like making a basic draft of multiple concepts, and choosing the best of the bunch to make the final cut, would be a way to get a feeling for what really are the strongest concepts that resonate most with the audience and are most desired to fill actual gaps in the game.
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In general, I think the playtest was too short for too much. There were 10 classes, and something like 4 weeks to playtest them. While scheduling is tough, it seems pretty clear that a longer playtest would be much more beneficial to the end products. Even just two extra weeks would have been helpful, as that would probably allow a third iteration, which means more refinement.
I also think that for next year's playtest, relaxing the "One thread for discussion!" rule half way through would provide vastly better feedback.
One very common complaint I saw from others (voiced not on the forums) was that you couldn't have in-depth conversations about the the classes. The forum structure is not conducive to multiple topics of discussions, which is what's going to happen when everyone is posting in the same thread. This leaves people frustrated that no one is responding to their posts (the number of times I saw "Since no one saw this previously..." is quite high), leaves people frustrated that they can't broach a new topic that's different from whatever current topic is raging in the thread, and leaves people frustrated that unless the thread's topic dies down, a new topic can't be focused on.
I definitely understand the rationale behind all posts in one thread, as it does make the developer's job easier, and that's why I think the rule should be relaxed only half way through the playtest. That way they can get the focused feedback in one thread early on, and the others can deal with topics in a bit more depth later on.
Plus, most things that are going to be said are going to be said early on in the thread's life, and the rest is just going to be repeating with some new boilerplate :)
Can an edit be made to the swashbuckler class, currently its bonus feat rules state that its supposed to get a bonus feat at every lvl (which isnt represented on its advancement table). Id like to know if this is an out right error or if you actually intend to make the class like that. (note i find him hilarious either way, and the swashbuckler finesse and weapon training make him more viable as a maneuver specialist in my opinion)
Probably simply uncareful copy-pasting of the Fighter's bonus feat entry.
Not sure if this is the right thread for this, but instead of only doing playtests for new content, why not do playtests for old content and release updates based on player feedback?
They generally do not change content once released to avoid any books becoming 'outdated'. They do give FAQ answers to give 'clarifications' which will be included in future re-prints, I assume, but not fundamentally changing how anything works.
In general, I think the playtest was too short for too much. There were 10 classes, and something like 4 weeks to playtest them. While scheduling is tough, it seems pretty clear that a longer playtest would be much more beneficial to the end products. Even just two extra weeks would have been helpful, as that would probably allow a third iteration, which means more refinement.
I also think that for next year's playtest, relaxing the "One thread for discussion!" rule half way through would provide vastly better feedback.
One very common complaint I saw from others (voiced not on the forums) was that you couldn't have in-depth conversations about the the classes. The forum structure is not conducive to multiple topics of discussions, which is what's going to happen when everyone is posting in the same thread. This leaves people frustrated that no one is responding to their posts (the number of times I saw "Since no one saw this previously..." is quite high), leaves people frustrated that they can't broach a new topic that's different from whatever current topic is raging in the thread, and leaves people frustrated that unless the thread's topic dies down, a new topic can't be focused on.
I definitely understand the rationale behind all posts in one thread, as it does make the developer's job easier, and that's why I think the rule should be relaxed only half way through the playtest. That way they can get the focused feedback in one thread early on, and the others can deal with topics in a bit more depth later on.
Plus, most things that are going to be said are going to be said early on in the thread's life, and the rest is just going to be repeating with some new boilerplate :)
I think having a thread on playtesting theories and allowing for other topics on the class would work better.
What products should we cancel so the staff has time to playtest or re-playtest, re-design, re-develop, re-edit, and re-layout older products for this purpose, for free?
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The Men of Paizo Calendar line would be a good first choice.
I am going out on a limb and saying that Microsoft probably has more employees than Paizo...just wild speculation there :)
But more seriously...any time they spent on updating released products is time they can't spend on new products. They have a pretty insane product schedule and a small staff, and whats more need to "finish" products way ahead of time to get it to the printers and back in time.
Updating a pdf really doesn't save them much money, versus a book. Printing is a relatively minor component of the cost. It's layout and formatting that really takes the time and money, and anything other than minor errata throws off word counts and page layout, meaning whole chapters need to be redone.
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Late to this thread, but thank you Jason, Sean, Stephen, and the rest of the team for the opportunity to playtest the 10 new classes coming in August. Can't wait to buy the book.
I actually liked how all of the classes came out at once. It gave me something interesting to read and plenty of options for different play styles. I will just say +1 to the idea of a longer playtest, and for potential Pregens for PFS playtesting.
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What products should we cancel so the staff has time to playtest or re-playtest, re-design, re-develop, re-edit, and re-layout older products for this purpose, for free?
For free?
Why not re-release it as like the super duper special edition version of the book? Like the Xth anniversary edition? Kinda like the Rise of the Runelords you guys did?
Or back when you were making the Dragon Magazines, you released a hard back book version of 'the best' that was a bit of a re-playtest, redesign, re-develop, re-edit, re-layout.
Like you could possibly start up an Ultimate (Class) line. Like Ultimate Rogue - Which features Rogues, Their Archetypes from APG to ACG, Possibly including nongolarian stuff from the soft back books.
Though the time for it.. That'll be the hard thing. And I'm not certain if the books would be something profitable. I look at it though like the Mongoose Press's Quintessential (class) line they had going back during 3.5 where it had things in it that you could use even if your DM didn't allow 3rd party stuff, due to 'guides' and the like in the book. Basically they were things that thought slightly outside the box, or sometimes in the bag of holding.
Im not seeing why you would have to cancel any products. You may as well say that you shouldnt have done the ACG playtest in the first place, because the time spent playtesting it costed you money and you could have simply released it with no playtesting and started getting the money in faster.
Playtesting before a book comes out provides valuable feedback to the design team, AND is good PR for Paizo.
Or that spending money on the software to make PDFs was a bad idea because, well, you could just mspaint something together for free, without paying for a software licence...
Our house creates our books on Macs running Adobe products, which have built-in functionality to create PDFs. In other words, it's money already spent--as much as it's money already spent on the ability to create text that is in italics or boldface.
And its not "for free" because you are committing to developing and updating a product.
It's for free because we wouldn't be charging people for these updates. Unless you're suggesting we do charge for these updates, which means we'd technically be charging for errata, which isn't cool.
A portion of the money you get from sales (and however else you generate money) should go towards updating products
We are satisfied with books when they go out the door. If we discover problems, we issue errata. Issuing errata usually takes a few hours of the design team's time, a few hours of the editorial team's time, and a few hours of the layout and tech team's time.
What you're suggesting is adding a playtest period to update books that were finished months before. A playtest eats up about a week of the design team's time, and a similar amount of time for the editors, layout specialists, and PDF team.Adding a playtest to further, which generates more sales in the future because customers are happy to buy a better working product as opposed to refusing to buy one that works partly.
I disagree that our products "work partly."
It also generates goodwill and improves your brand image because customers know you will continue supporting a product instead of simply releasing it, getting as much money as you can and dropping all support for it bar the bare minimum FAQs (which still do not address a lot of questions that frequently come up on the forums, see rules forum).
I disagree that our FAQs are the "bare minimum." I don't think you understand the amount of work that goes into reviewing the flagged FAQ questions, evaluating the rules in question, and creating a consensus response.
For free?
Why not re-release it as like the super duper special edition version of the book? Like the Xth anniversary edition? Kinda like the Rise of the Runelords you guys did?
You mean the extra product we did last year in addition to all the other books we published last year, the book that made us late, required the staff to work overtime, and greatly added to everyone's stress?
Like you could possibly start up an Ultimate (Class) line. Like Ultimate Rogue - Which features Rogues, Their Archetypes from APG to ACG, Possibly including nongolarian stuff from the soft back books.
Again I ask, what products should we cancel to make room in our schedule to release the products you're suggesting? Our staff is at capacity, we can't just do more products in a year--at least not without quality suffering, or creating staff burnout.
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All lot of the opinions I would express about the playtests have already been touched upon, so I'm going to address some personal observations.
First up, I will acknowledge that I had next to no interest in the Slayer, Shaman, Hunter, or Skald. I payed closest attention to Swashbuckler, Arcanist, Investigator and Brawler, while keeping tabs on Bloodrager and Warpriest.
That said, I really appreciate Stephen's postings on the forums. Especially the Investigator. He posted frequently, and was very receptive to ideas and criticisms while explaining the whys and why-nots to various ideas. I really appreciate how open-minded he was about changing Studied Combat/Studied Strike for the Investigator. This is an example of what a playtest thread should have been like.
On the other side, I did not see Sean and Jason posting very often in the threads they were 'in charge' of. By in charge, I mean that, it seemed like the threads were divvied up amongst the developers and they were responsible for responses in those threads. The exception being the Brawler thread in which Sean post regularly, though not to the extent Stephen was. Jason, I felt you had the least amount of presence in the playtest, though you did something awesome when you polled the Warpriest thread about how we think the Sacred Weapon damage dice/crit range should work, however, there was no follow up to the initial poll.
I felt that some of the 'hot topic' subject should have been more opened to development or ideas for changes. An example from the Brawler thread was Awesome Blow being largely unuseable because of the massive CMD's of enemies at high levels. Size, being the primary issue, in that as monsters get larger, they get bonuses to strength (just for being big) and bonuses to CMD (also for being big); this means size of the creature impacts their CMD on two separate fronts.
Another example from the Brawler, is the Brawler's Strike ability, that myself and numerous others had issues with. I started going through both Brawler threads and counting the number of individual posters that brought up the Brawler's Strike in some fashion, and I stopped counting at around 30 people. The reason I stopped, was because in the original thread, there were 43 people contributing to that thread, and 38 to the Revised Brawler thread. 30 people out of the two threads (and that wasn't all of them either) is a significant portion of the people posting. Despite the number of people having issues with the Brawler's Strike ability, it was absolutely not up for discussion for potential changes (barring changing it from Su to Ex, which still doesn't make sense). Many people, myself included posted alternate ideas for it that were flatly refused.
In contrast, when people found issue with Studied Combat/Studied Strike, Stephen was very open to alternate ideas, listened to our posts and responded on why some things worked and why others didn't.
The Warpriest also had a better handled issue in the form of the Sacred Weapon ability. With it's scaling damage dice, and as written, crit modifiers of the original weapon, Warpriests of Saranrae (or other gods with high-crit weapons) would be an absolute nightmare in battle. Jason had the idea to poll the community and for three separate ideas.
In both examples by Stephen and Jason, they listened to the community and asked for our input on a 'hot topic' item, instead of out-right refusal.
Being more open to ideas and input is something I would like to see from future playtests.
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I liked the idea of putting errata and changes in the first post, I just wish the execution had panned out better. Or the 'legality' of the posts were more official, especially for PFS players. I'm not a fan of PFS, but I know lots of people do play it and do enjoy it and I know they are bit frustrated and/or confused about what is considered 'PFS Legal' for the ACG classes.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Or the 'legality' of the posts were more official, especially for PFS players. I'm not a fan of PFS, but I know lots of people do play it and do enjoy it and I know they are bit frustrated and/or confused about what is considered 'PFS Legal' for the ACG classes.
Tell them to re-check Additional Resources; a Venture Officer and I compiled some of the more concrete designer statements about the classes, and the campaign coordinator copied them into Additional Resources, specifically to address the ambiguity you're talking about. Hope it helps. :)
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I think they mean all the ones that are not there, (does the Brawler/Warpriest count for Fighter levels, can you take Extra _______, can you apply an existing parent class archtype if it would otherwise work, does the Warpriests increased BaB for a specific weapon allow them to take Feats using that BaB or do they need to use their normal BaB, things like that.
All lot of the opinions I would express about the playtests have already been touched upon, so I'm going to address some personal observations.
First up, I will acknowledge that I had next to no interest in the Slayer, Shaman, Hunter, or Skald. I payed closest attention to Swashbuckler, Arcanist, Investigator and Brawler, while keeping tabs on Bloodrager and Warpriest.
That said, I really appreciate Stephen's postings on the forums. Especially the Investigator. He posted frequently, and was very receptive to ideas and criticisms while explaining the whys and why-nots to various ideas. I really appreciate how open-minded he was about changing Studied Combat/Studied Strike for the Investigator. This is an example of what a playtest thread should have been like.
On the other side, I did not see Sean and Jason posting very often in the threads they were 'in charge' of. By in charge, I mean that, it seemed like the threads were divvied up amongst the developers and they were responsible for responses in those threads. The exception being the Brawler thread in which Sean post regularly, though not to the extent Stephen was. Jason, I felt you had the least amount of presence in the playtest, though you did something awesome when you polled the Warpriest thread about how we think the Sacred Weapon damage dice/crit range should work, however, there was no follow up to the initial poll.
I felt that some of the 'hot topic' subject should have been more opened to development or ideas for changes. An example from the Brawler thread was Awesome Blow being largely unuseable because of the massive CMD's of enemies at high levels. Size, being the primary issue, in that as monsters get larger, they get bonuses to strength (just for being big) and bonuses to CMD (also for being big); this means size of the creature impacts their CMD on two separate fronts.
Another example from the Brawler, is the Brawler's Strike ability, that myself and numerous others had issues with. I started going through both Brawler threads...
Well, regarding awesome blow, I believe it was SKR who said at the end of the thread that they were taking away the size penalty for a brawler using awesome blow on larger opponents, so that issue was addressed.
I have to agree that an alternative ability to Brawler's Strike as written would have been cool, but that's a minor issue for me. I thought that the devs were very open to listening to feedback and the changes that made (particularly the ones posted at the end of the Brawler thread, like increased uses per day of martial manuevers) reflected that.
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my biggest issue with this play test, and this may be because you haven't made them yet, was that no sample feats were given for these classes. without feats we cant possibly give accurate feedback because even just one good feat can make something a powerhouse.
i hope you guys release a second playtest before releasing the books with sample feats and a close to completed version of each class.
i mean how many more witches do you want to make?
i mean how many more witches do you want to make?
Twelve.
The Advanced Races Guide introduced new info on existing races and then had a whole section of the book devoted to custom-creating unique races.
I seem to remember some discussion about how, if the Advanced Class Guide were to include guidelines for custom-creating unique classes, the ACG would not be able to be as codified in that regard as the ARG was.
I took that to mean that there would still be a section on custom-creating classes.
Is that still the case? And if so, will we see any hints or previews of the lines the development team is thinking along?
From my understanding of posts made by developers, there will be a chapter devoted to creating custom hybrids, but it will not include a class-builder - it will be more along the lines of theory and design path approach guidelines than a point buy.
my biggest issue with this play test, and this may be because you haven't made them yet, was that no sample feats were given for these classes. without feats we cant possibly give accurate feedback because even just one good feat can make something a powerhouse.
i hope you guys release a second playtest before releasing the books with sample feats and a close to completed version of each class.
i mean how many more witches do you want to make?
[Emphasis mine] I said this from the get go. I'm frankly astounded that these were shells to be used with old feats.
However, it makes a certain design kind of sense - check the baseline abilities, then once the play test is complete, take them back to the designers and create feats that won't break the game and do complement the classes, and other classes.
Remember also, that if a bunch of experimental feats were added to the play test, there would have been Core and Base classes clamoring to use them, and using them in play tests with the Hybrids, thus further muddying the playtest feedback.
I guess, in a perfect world, after the shine is polished on the Hybrids, the shiny Hybrids could get another turn with the proposed feats, but we all now this isn't a perfect world...
According to SKR, due to the book production time (editing, layout, graphics etc), printing turnaround time and product launch schedule, there won't be another play test of the ACG material.