Not having played the class yet, feel free to ignore this.
I find it odd that we need a class to have a separate mechanic for a "secret identity", and would take 5 minutes while getting their asses handed to them to use the skills they already have. It make no sense to me, mechanically, or role-play wise.
Why the need to separate them? Isn't this stuff what the disguise skill is for?
If it is needed for extra flair or rule system to track who's on to you or who's not, why not use a template or archetype that can be applied to any character class? Or even some kind of gestalt set up, where one side is the social ID and the other is the class, and they use the disguise sill or magic to obscure their real identity?
Please don't respond with "filling a niche". You can fill the same niche with the proper story, GM and use of the disguise skill and/or magic.
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I'ma gonna start getting' belligerent if'n you kids don't start spelling k'reckly.
Look, Je Hex thinks the class is awesome. But he isn't really articulating why beyond saying it's an awesome concept.
Other folks are not necessarily disagreeing with the latter - it's definitely a...concept. Which may end up being cool.
Posters are merely reiterating, over and over and over that the mechanics are shoe-horned and constrained by interactions with a book that has not been designed yet, and the combat functionalities of some of the specialisations are either less than stellar, or are currently being employed by other base classes with better results.
Now I'm a shallow aesthete, I like the rule of cool and the awesomeness of shiny concepts. But they need to be shiny and awesome in the field, or they are merely concepts, not classes. Being thematically evocative does not make a base class. Having potential does not make a class.
Being functional, and hopefully, with new and exciting mechanics, does.
There are a few in the playtest but they ain't amazing, and they need to really provide some distance from existing "bunches of mechanics that can be used to represent an infinite amount of themes and character concepts" to eke out a little space. To hold it's own. Niches and roles be damned, but ersatz copies and mere shadows of whispers of clones? No thanks.
How awful is that?
I can't even really think of a character concept that would fit the spellcasting vigilante concept...Dr. Fate
Doctor Strange
Etrigan the Demon
Pre-New52 Allen Scott Green Lantern
Zatanna Zatara
...
Most of those would fall into the wizard category more then the Vigilante though. The people who claim that other classes do it better would have a point there.
MOST of them have nearly non-existant secret ids... and they rarely do anything WITH the social forms. Costumes are little more then a magicked up trenchcoat...
other then Etrigan... that's probably closer to an alchemist ;)
Many magical persons in comics don't have secret identities if they follow the 'spellcaster' route. Partly because science fiction has been very prevalent in with comic superheroes. This gets a little different in some other countries. If you count every magical girl after Sailor Moon and every magic based Tokusatsu hero you get a big example. Although I'd argue that Vigilante has more room for magic than it has for spellcasting. The Arcane Strike ability and Mystic Bolt seem great but spellcasting itself feels off.
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Joe, you're the one who set the awful and beligerant tone and then perpetuated it. When you spit fire, expect fire back.I would argue that titling a thread "... Doomed to Obscurity" is setting an awful and beligerant tone. So I don't think Joe, "started it."
I guess it depends on what "tone" you read it in. I see it as a question with hopes of finding an answer they hadn't noticed before.
As far as I can tell, the Devs have been very silent on the entire Playtest so far, (not uncommon, but aggravating).
Many magical persons in comics don't have secret identities if they follow the 'spellcaster' route. Partly because science fiction has been very prevalent in with comic superheroes. This gets a little different in some other countries. If you count every magical girl after Sailor Moon and every magic based Tokusatsu hero you get a big example. Although I'd argue that Vigilante has more room for magic than it has for spellcasting. The Arcane Strike ability and Mystic Bolt seem great but spellcasting itself feels off.
Always hated that term, (magic boy/girl). :P
But honestly, many superheroes or all varieties don't have an alternate identity. Luke Cage/Powerman runs a business. Doctor Doom runs a country. But the entire Fantastic Four are well known world-wide. Captain America was a warhero and later President. The original iteration of Thor didn't have an alternate identity as much as a guy that could call on the power of Thor, in a sense. It has nothing to do with spellcasting, really. The Punisher just doesn't give a crap, except when he makes one up to infiltrate something short term.
There is also a lot of the cases where it's impossible to have an alternate identity. The Thing can't change. Cloak and Dagger likewise became something else and can't go back.
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Joe, you're the one who set the awful and beligerant tone and then perpetuated it. When you spit fire, expect fire back.I would argue that titling a thread "... Doomed to Obscurity" is setting an awful and beligerant tone. So I don't think Joe, "started it."
If you had actually READ my opening post, you would know that I am simply addressing the fact that the Vigilante needs BIG changes or it will simply fade into becoming a class people forget even exist. This was a major problem back in 3.5 because Wizards would literally just pump out classes just to pump out classes, which caused many classes to feel forgotten and many people forgetting their veyr existance.
If they don't get better they will just fall by the wayside. I'm not being all doom and gloom, I've jsut played this game long enough to know what will happen, and I don't want to see that because I actually LIKE the concept of this class, just that the mechanics are not there.. at all.
Where's Chicken Little when we need him?
Him? He still needs 45 round to finish putting on his hero disguise...
If the class is not needed, then it should fade into obscurity.
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Joe, you're the one who set the awful and beligerant tone and then perpetuated it. When you spit fire, expect fire back.I would argue that titling a thread "... Doomed to Obscurity" is setting an awful and belligerent tone. So I don't think Joe, "started it."I guess it depends on what "tone" you read it in. I see it as a question with hopes of finding an answer they hadn't noticed before.
As far as I can tell, the Devs have been very silent on the entire Playtest so far, (not uncommon, but aggravating).
I believe I remember the Devs stating that they prefer to stand back during the beginning of the playtest to not "pollute the stream" as it were. They feel, IIRC, that they get better and more relevant playtest info if they stay silent at the beginning. By this point in time I would think that it is a built in expectation of the playtest process. But hey we are all entitled to how we feel. :)
I went back and reread the posts centered around Joe Hex and I found nothing belligerent in his initial post(s). He(?) simply stated that the Doom and Gloom he perceived was an over-reaction. Or at least that is how I read it. And no matter what "tone" you mean to use "Doomed to Obscurity" is going to be perceived as Doom and Gloom by that average reader. At least that is how I see things.
If the class is not needed, then it should fade into obscurity.
They are past the point of no return on wether this class gets made or not.
Regardless of how good the vigilante is, it will be a new base class released in ultimate intrigue.
The best we can hope for is trying what we can to make this class even remotely work.
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Joe, you're the one who set the awful and beligerant tone and then perpetuated it. When you spit fire, expect fire back.I would argue that titling a thread "... Doomed to Obscurity" is setting an awful and belligerent tone. So I don't think Joe, "started it."If you had actually READ my opening post, you would know that I am simply addressing the fact that the Vigilante needs BIG changes or it will simply fade into becoming a class people forget even exist. This was a major problem back in 3.5 because Wizards would literally just pump out classes just to pump out classes, which caused many classes to feel forgotten and many people forgetting their very existence.
If they don't get better they will just fall by the wayside. I'm not being all doom and gloom, I've just played this game long enough to know what will happen, and I don't want to see that because I actually LIKE the concept of this class, just that the mechanics are not there.. at all.
I did read your first post and the reality is that you offered no options or alternatives, that combined with using a phrase like "Doomed to Obscurity" is going to read like Doom and Gloom.
That said I was trying to make a comparative statement that Joe Hex had not been belligerent in their initial posts as someone else was claiming. It was not my intent to attack you personally in that and I apologize if you feel attacked.
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I'm almost always impressed with what Paizo puts out. They've done an exceptional job, so far. The Vigilante strikes me as an incredible concept, one I've made use of in the past. I have every reason to love this - except that it's simply not in the least viable. It's a disaster - too weak to even stand up to base characters, when it's not specifically gimped, and degimping takes longer than any combat I've ever run in Pathfinder.
This class is incredible.
Yeah, there is refinement needed,that is why there is a PLAYTEST. Creating threads declaring the class doomed, or broken, a week into the playtest is ridiculous.
I'm sure they mean it in a "if nothing changes" manner of speaking.
