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I knew someone would cherry pick that:)
the difference is a dead animal is dead, a gaming system is a product of the community, as long as the community is alive, engaged and vibrant the game system will to, no matter how much you add to it:)
The problem is with ever-increasingly number of options is threefold:
1- It makes the game increasingly unwelcoming to new players. Having to know 100 options is intimidating enough. Having to learn 5000 of them is basically telling them to not even bother (specially when half those options are traps)... And without new players, the game dies.
2- It makes the game more annoying to use. It's not fun to search through dozens of awful feats such as "Sure Grasp", "Water Skinned" and "Canny Tumble" just to find the few feats, spells and archetypes that are actually worth a damn. I dare say over 50% of the the game's feats/spells/archetypes are so bad, they might as well not be there. Ivory tower design is a great marketing idea for card games, but it's horrible game design, even more so for a cooperative game such as tabletop RPGs (at least for the players).
3- It increases the chance more stuff will break the game, therefore reducing the fun of veteran players. Or at least those who care about balance. If you don't, good for you... But decreasing the fun of players is never a good thing.
Like any other ever-expanding set of rules, Pathfinder will eventually collapse under its own weight. It's a question of "when", not "if". And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.
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we've been using PFRPG exclusively for 5 years now, and we have yet to run into something and said "thats broken! there is no way it can be fixed" we have fun with it, and thats good enough for me:)
1: "Having to?" Are you saying new players 'have to' buy all of the books and absorb all of the newer content to play? That they can't, say, start with the core rule book and absorb more as they care to? The pathfinder police come to their door if they don't collect and use ALL of the books? Someone can come to the game with just the core rule book, make a character with just the core rule book, and have that character work just fine in a game with just the core rulebook. The existence of the other books does absolutely nothing to change that.
True. You can even use a single class and still have fun. But players will naturally want to explore their options. More than a few character concepts are not possible to fulfill with the CRB alone... At least not in any satisfactory way.
2: it really takes you that long? It sure doesn't for me. You know, you don't have to know all of the options, I repeat, to make a perfectly viable character. You don't even have to know that all of the options exist to make a perfectly viable character.
"That long" what? I didn't specify any time lapse... But in anyway case, it's not about taking too long, it's about it taking longer than it's needed. Instead of looking through 10 useful choices, I have to sort those 10 from the 20 other useless options that add nothing but page count to the game. IME, few players want overpowered characters, but none them want to make weak ones.
Adding things like "Water Skinned" only makes character building more time-consuming and frustrating. Even with HeroLab (which I use and recommend to everyone), it's annoying to scroll down dozens of crappy options just to find the ones that are actually worth considering.
3: a game breaks if a GM doesn't pay attention. It happens exactly as easily with just core as with any other combination. There seems to be allot of mountain/molehill going on here.
The ever-increasing number of options forces the GM to put more and more time and effort into balancing the game. Time and effort that could be going into making the story more interesting.
You seem to be missing my point. I'm not against the expanding of the rules.
I do not consider new options to be bloat just because I don't use them . What I call bloat are those "non-options", the ones that are so bad, no player will ever take them in their right mind, and if they do it for flavor, they are punished with bad mechanics instead of rewarded for focusing on their character concept.
If an option is actually viable (not "hey, in this very specific circumstance that happens maybe 1% of the time, this thing is kinda useful"), I don't call it bloat, even if I personally never use it. (e.g.: You will never see me using Cleave or Weapon Specialization, but even though I think they could be better designed, those feats not bloat IMO, just options I don't like).
And I'm not talking about things that are not great, but can be useful (such as Dodge or Combat Expertise, although the latter could lose the Int prerequisite) either.
What I call bloat are things like "Canny Tumble" (useless) and "Body Shield" (shouldn't even require a feat).
People keep saying canny tumble is useless. I don't get it. What is useless about it? +2 to hit for something that characters who tumble tend to do a lot of the time seems pretty decent to me.
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I knew someone would cherry pick that:)
the difference is a dead animal is dead, a gaming system is a product of the community, as long as the community is alive, engaged and vibrant the game system will to, no matter how much you add to it:)
we've been using PFRPG exclusively for 5 years now, and we have yet to run into something and said "thats broken! there is no way it can be fixed" we have fun with it, and thats good enough for me:)
Basically, I agree with you. However, there IS a danger in expanding the system. The devil is in the details, and it is often small things that do it. Feats like Dervish Dance (Dex to melee damage with scimitar) from some obscure book (well, Pathfinder Campaign Setting: The Inner Sea World Guide is not THAT obscure, but neither is it core) change how the game works. When they were making the Swashbuckler, this single feat lead to pages and pages of discussion, which eventually resulted in the Fencing Grace feat (which does the same for the rapier). Little changes like this have far-reaching repercussions and make the game more complex, even for the designers.
That said, the designers of Pathfinder are not paralyzed with balance concerns. That would be even worse - not to wake a sleeping edition war, but 4E's attempts at absolute balance were not encouraging. Pathfinder is a game designed to be fun to play. If this makes some characters "stronger" than others under4 certain conditions, so be it. I fully support this philosophy, and your second quote tells me the Pathfinder designers has held to it without really breaking anything major.
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I knew someone would cherry pick that:)
the difference is a dead animal is dead, a gaming system is a product of the community, as long as the community is alive, engaged and vibrant the game system will to, no matter how much you add to it:)The problem is with ever-increasingly number of options is threefold:
1- It makes the game increasingly unwelcoming to new players. Having to know 100 options is intimidating enough. Having to learn 5000 of them is basically telling them to not even bother (specially when half those options are traps)... And without new players, the game dies.
2- It makes the game more annoying to use. It's not fun to search through dozens of awful feats such as "Sure Grasp", "Water Skinned" and "Canny Tumble" just to find the few feats, spells and archetypes that are actually worth a damn. I dare say over 50% of the the game's feats/spells/archetypes are so bad, they might as well not be there. Ivory tower design is a great marketing idea for card games, but it's horrible game design, even more so for a cooperative game such as tabletop RPGs (at least for the players).
3- It increases the chance more stuff will break the game, therefore reducing the fun of veteran players. Or at least those who care about balance. If you don't, good for you... But decreasing the fun of players is never a good thing.
Like any other ever-expanding set of rules, Pathfinder will eventually collapse under its own weight. It's a question of "when", not "if". And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.
When I started on 3.5 they already had a lot of splatbooks out. I did not try to learn all of them at once, and neither do I try to learn all of Pathfinder's books as soon as they come out. However in both cases I did learn the majority of the options for both systems. I have never met any new players who tried to learn all of the books at once in either system, so I doubt that will contribute to the fall of PF, unless I have just happened to only run into the minority of new players.
I do agree that some feats in Pathfinder such as Sacred Geometry and Prone Shooter should have never have seen the light of day.
Referring to the original question: Nope! Not concerned!
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Referring to the original question:
No I'm not concerned. Quite frankly I look at the fact that people have been complaining about bloat since the APG came out that the entire complaint and the people who do are a joke.
It comes down to this: you either feel compelled to buy and use everything or YOU DO NOT.
If you feel compelled to to buy and use everything and then complain about the fact that the company in question makes to much content and that it's overwhelming? Then the problem isnt the company or the developers or the content creators it's YOU.
I have several Warhammer 40K armies. I started out with ONE, a vanilla Space Marine force. Over the years I've built an Eldar, a Dark Eldar, a Tau, an Ork, a Space Wolves and a Tyranid army.
At no point did I start complaining to Games Workshop about TOO MANY ARMIES!!! TOO MUCH BLOAT!!! as that would have been the rantings of a completely irrational and questionably sane person. No one and I mean NO ONE forced me to spend the money on those armies. I WANTED TO. I take FULL RESPONSIBILITY for my purchases and support.
RESPONSIBILITY.
MINE.
People keep saying canny tumble is useless. I don't get it. What is useless about it? +2 to hit for something that characters who tumble tend to do a lot of the time seems pretty decent to me.Several awful prerequisites for a mediocre +2 to 1 attack...and the existence of a waaaaaaay better feat but with fewer feat taxes?
Which one is waaaaaaay better?
I could see canny tumble used by something like a monk, on a charge to a large creature. Charge and use acrobatics to tumble avoiding the AoO (at +10 to avoid impacting movement and preventing the charge) and get +4 attack for -2AC. Worst case, you provoke the AoO just like you would have without canny tumble.
Whelp, yeah, canny tumble is utterly completely bloat in that case. It is completely eclipsed by a feat which is 1) easier to get and 2) provides more benefit.
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Simply put regarding bloat, no, I have no problems with it. And though it has been responded to by about half the responders to this or any 'bloat thread', I don't play PFS (and would never do so), so any PF game I run is a homebrew. I always limit what races, classes, feats, spells and whatnot to the specific needs of a given setting or campaign. I almost never allow players to choose any possible choice in race, class, etc, though creative players can sell me on the idea of something I previously decided to not include - so I will bend if necessary.
For the most part, I don't want Paizo to stop releasing new options for the game. I certainly don't buy into every book release, but many, even the most recent are definitely buys for me. If Paizo stopped creating "bloat", I'd probably look to a different game to play, so I hope they never do.
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Whelp, yeah, canny tumble is utterly completely bloat in that case. It is completely eclipsed by a feat which is 1) easier to get and 2) provides more benefit.
Canny Tumble (Combat)
Your acrobatic prowess distracts your foes.Prerequisites: Dodge, Mobility, Acrobatics 5 ranks.
Benefit: When you use Acrobatics to move through an opponent's threatened area or space without provoking an attack of opportunity from that opponent, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus on your next melee attack roll against that opponent, as long as you make that attack before the start of your next turn.
Disorienting Maneuver
Your erratic movements disorient your opponent.Prerequisites: Dodge, Acrobatics 5 ranks.
Benefit: If you successfully use Acrobatics to tumble through an opponent's space, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus on attack rolls against that opponent until the start of your next turn. If you choose to make a trip attempt against that opponent, you gain a +4 circumstance bonus on your combat maneuver check. This bonus on trip also lasts until the start of your next turn.
Technically, Canny Tumble works when you use Acrobatics to move through an opponent's threatened area, while Disorienting Maneuver only works when you make the more difficult check to move through an opponent's space.
Disorienting Maneuver is still clearly the more powerful option with fewer prereqs, but there are instances when you could use Canny Tumble when you could not use Disorienting Maneuver.
Aha! There is a difference! I missed that. Yes disorienting maneuver is easier to qualify for, presumably because it has a harder acrobatics check to make for it to kick in.
So, could you have both canny tumble, and disorienting maneuver, and tumble through threatened area, and opponents square to get a +4 on the next attack?
My hunch is that they wouldn't stack, because they are both circumstance bonuses. But I forget if that one is an exception or not.
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And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.I'm curious about what you mean by this comment, specifically.
I find it pretty hard to believe you don't understand what he meant by that comment, but anyway, here's the link.
Even Monte Cook has distanced himself from that stance these days (although it's kind of expected, given that that essay was at the center of the majority of most people's critical thoughts about the man).
And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.I'm curious about what you mean by this comment, specifically.
I find it pretty hard to believe you don't understand what he meant by that comment, but anyway, here's the link.
Even Monte Cook has distanced himself from that stance these days (although it's kind of expected, given that that essay was at the center of the majority of most people's critical thoughts about the man).
Thanks for that. If anything I'd say pathfinder has a lot more "timmy abilities" than it does ivory tower design to it.
Publisher, Chief Creative Officer
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I find it pretty hard to believe you don't understand what he meant by that comment, but anyway, here's the link.Even Monte Cook has distanced himself from that stance these days (although it's kind of expected, given that that essay was at the center of the majority of most people's critical thoughts about the man).
Sorry, I should have been more clear. I understand the phrase and I've read the essay. What I meant was in what ways, specifically, Lemmy thought that Paizo had fallen into the habit of "ivory tower design."
And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.I'm curious about what you mean by this comment, specifically.
I find it pretty hard to believe you don't understand what he meant by that comment, but anyway, here's the link.
Even Monte Cook has distanced himself from that stance these days (although it's kind of expected, given that that essay was at the center of the majority of most people's critical thoughts about the man).
I used to read Monte's blog, and I didn't remember that article from 6 years ago. And I'll admit, when I hear "Ivory Tower" I think of isolation from the "real world", which Paizo's history of playtests is definitely far from isolation from its playerbase.
Certainly the core rulebooks tend to be collections of tools without a lot of explanation of intent, which does follow the 3.X pattern. But all the other Pathfinder lines, APs, Player Companions, etc, give a lot of "designer intent" on how to use those tools.
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(...) If anything I'd say pathfinder has a lot more "timmy abilities" than it does ivory tower design to it.
Yeah, my bad. In my hurry to leave home because I was late, I made a mistake and mixed up the terms. What I meant is that the continued publication of "timmy cards" (i.e.: trap options) unnecessarily hasten the bloat effect that every game with ever-expanding rules suffer...
This is particularly bad with feats, where most options that do not revolve about full-attacking are punished either by being rather ineffective or requiring an unreasonable amount of investment and effort to pull off (e.g.: combat maneuvers).
These "timmy cards" make the books unnecessary bloated and discourage new gamers to try the system. Thus giving me the impression that Paizo is often more worried about being able to advertise "100 new options in this book!" than being able to (truthfully) advertise "20 balanced and well-designed options in this book!".
IMHO, every option should be moderately useful and reward the investment necessary to get it. If something requires 3 feats, than make it worth 3 feats! System Mastery will still matter because all options being balanced doesn't mean all combinations of options are equally effective.
Of course, this might just be me... Maybe I'm mistaken. Hopefully I'm. But still, it's my impression.
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Canny Tumble and Disorienting Maneuver would be a great example of feats I would have preferred to be consolidated into a single feat covering acrobatic performance. Possibly one that did some other stuff too, because I think they're both below par in terms of the benefit they offer and still would be combined, but charging you two separate feats for if you want to tumble past an opponent fast enough to disorient him and hit better, or tumble by an opponent fast enough to disorient him and hit better... why?
And it would make the feats easier to keep track of for me, which as I noted, feats are one of the parts of the game in which I find bloat to be inherently more of a pain than I do in others.
To be fair, Canny Tumble is past or through an opponent. Disorienting Maneuver is more limited in that it's only through (hence the lower prereqs).
But, yeah, in general, it's unnecessary multiplication of options.
Canny Tumble and Disorienting Maneuver are really great feats to have in some situations.
Like with a halfling monk that took the racial archetype or even with a rogue that tumbles into flanking because the rest of the party doesn´t care.
They sounds like good feats for the gunslinger who accidentally let himself get cornered and needs an out. Granted, a smokestick is probably just as useful....
I knew someone would cherry pick that:)
the difference is a dead animal is dead, a gaming system is a product of the community, as long as the community is alive, engaged and vibrant the game system will to, no matter how much you add to it:)The problem is with ever-increasingly number of options is threefold:
1- It makes the game increasingly unwelcoming to new players. Having to know 100 options is intimidating enough. Having to learn 5000 of them is basically telling them to not even bother (specially when half those options are traps)... And without new players, the game dies.
2- It makes the game more annoying to use. It's not fun to search through dozens of awful feats such as "Sure Grasp", "Water Skinned" and "Canny Tumble" just to find the few feats, spells and archetypes that are actually worth a damn. I dare say over 50% of the the game's feats/spells/archetypes are so bad, they might as well not be there. Ivory tower design is a great marketing idea for card games, but it's horrible game design, even more so for a cooperative game such as tabletop RPGs (at least for the players).
3- It increases the chance more stuff will break the game, therefore reducing the fun of veteran players. Or at least those who care about balance. If you don't, good for you... But decreasing the fun of players is never a good thing.
Like any other ever-expanding set of rules, Pathfinder will eventually collapse under its own weight. It's a question of "when", not "if". And I believe the adherence to ivory tower design is unnecessarily hastening the process.
Here is why I disagree,
1: All that is needed to play is the Core Rules (Named Core Rules for a reason) and the Bestiary 1, Unless they are very new to Gaming in General they do know what a core rule book is. Starting players even I when I was younger started with the Core of each game before going out and getting anything else.2: Having options is not annoying in any way I have yet to find an Archetype produced by Paizo I felt was truly bad some are not optimized but I don't build overly optimized characters and neither do my players. I have yet to have a hard time finding what feats I wanted to use or help my players find them either.
3: It may increase the chance of breaking some part of the game you are including to use but hardly the entire system as a GM I decide what may break my game and choose not to use it. I find having options makes it easier on me to create a fun universe to use a setting for my players, As a Veteran Player (I've been playing since D&D 1E)I have never been not in favor of new material or options, I like options the more the better. I don't see Pathfinder collapsing anytime soon, they have taken a rule set that was having problems and have taken great steps to improve on it. Nothing so far in my opinion has been useless or over powered, the same goes for the 3rd party publishers out there that have also added material to this awesome game. The quality of products has been better now than in the 3.X variations.
Pathfinder releases books at just the right pace I have Adventure Paths, Modules, Pathfinder Society Scenarios. To run games, I have books on Races that add flavor to races I include in my games, Monsters galore, new books with options to use in my games and they keep producing "new" things. I'm happy.