Slayer is tier 4 with the rogue.
A lot of these martial v caster problems comes from people wanting to play the fighter who is tier 5 when all they want is a tier 4 fighter that isn't an Alchemist.
Check this out - Badass Martials
I feel like it gives out of combat utility to martials in fun ways
Giving fighters all good saves, like the (Core) Monk, seems like a good idea as well.
Knowing that Fighters have few weaknesses ("Hmm - I could try to Charm him, but it's iffy whether or not I can") would make casters need to rely on their own bodyguards more.
I mean, shouldn't the Fighter (or most pure martial classes) be just as scary to face as any Wizard? Shouldn't they just radiate with that "I don't want to mess with him!" kind of energy? Barbarians have that, sure. But a standard Fighter shouldn't be any less daunting, imho.
And fix and expand the weapon classifications so that a Fighter can swap out weapons with greater ease than other classes.
Off the cuff, making combat feats scale through bab and skill feats scale by skill rank works. Magic feats should remain linear as they modify spells which are not. Scaling effects of feats should use spell levels as touchstones for power in the field they relate to.
Are there any other cool things like that out there? Cool non-magical abilities that aren't necessarily about hitting someone real hard?Not very many, unfortunately. There's some utility to be had from the Exploit Weakness ability (Martial Artist Monk and Steel-Breaker Brawler), since it lets you completely ignore Hardness with a Wisdom check.
The Slayer's Blood Reader can let you see the exact HP of your Studied Target. So as a Swift you can scan a target and see exactly how well off it is, including Unconscious targets. Would be a great ability for a battlefield Medic.
The Gunslinger's Utility Shot Deed is perhaps the most interesting class feature it gets, and as low as 3rd level no less. Easily stop bleeding, move important small objects (somehow without damaging them), and blowing off locks with a single Disable Device rank.
I stuck with Ex abilities. For obvious reasons, Su abilities that martial classes may still get (like Spell Sunder) were left off.
Blood reader is one of the strongest talents in the game, and does something nothing else can do... give you the approximate level of a target. Assassin on the loose, or want to avoid people for mugging who can put up a fight? Scan people as they pass by to see who the high level targets are. (Rough gauge level = HP/5-8, adjusted for body shape.) Need to know who is the boss vs. minions? Just study them. Vigilante in social mode? So, why does the candlestick maker have over a hundred hit points? No save, either, and as long as you can see the target, nothing stops it.
And even more importantly, it gives more narrative power to the class.
Giving fighters all good saves, like the (Core) Monk, seems like a good idea as well.
Knowing that Fighters have few weaknesses ("Hmm - I could try to Charm him, but it's iffy whether or not I can") would make casters need to rely on their own bodyguards more.
There's a precedent for it - Back in 1st ed D&D, high-level Fighters had all-around the best saving throws (except save vs. spells, where magic users edged them out by one point).
But for some reason, the devs have decreed that all non-caster gotta be weak willed. Even the Unchained Monk. Because taking on hideous monsters with nothing but a pointy stick is something any dunce can do, I guess...
This is one of the things that pisses me off so much about post 3.0 D&D. The Front Liner's effective toughness has been reduced dramatically.
Paizo's just taken it to its illogical conclusion by giving everyone and their dog a s%## will save (even Alchemists for crying out loud).
I think the problem is less that some classes have bad Will saving throw progression and more that failing a Will save tends to be pretty darned horrible. Even at low levels, it's likely you're going to suffer the effects of something like frightened, fascinated, dazed, paralysis, or a suggestion. Those take characters right the hell out of the fight rather than merely provide them an impediment, such as would be the case with shaken or dazzled or staggered or sickened or fatigued. If you had a setup where these more serious conditions were either very brief or didn't come up at all until mid-level range, that'd be another matter and lower Will saves on the martials wouldn't matter quite so much.
FWIW, I actually find alchemists having a low Will save being thematically appropriate. They're mad scientists, after all. What's the saying, again? "You were so consumed with whether or not you could that you didn't stop to think if you should"? Lack of willpower to control their own impulses, among other things, seems fine to me for what's essentially a hybrid combatant/caster class.
I agree with you completely and do exactly what you suggest in my own games, but...taking this turn requires setting specific changes which are almost certainly never going to happen in Pathfinder.5) Give the martials cool non-magical abilities which are actually possible...like trap-building and hypnotism.This right here is exactly why martials already don't get nice things. Because they need to be "actually possible". Whereas magic can do anything because it's magic, I don't have to explain t#!&.
You already put in a nigh-magical version of hypnosis in there, drop the "martials need to be realistic" charade because that's what's holding them back. Everything they get needs to be super limited to the point of worthlessness because it's not "realistic" that they can do anything but hit things.
In skimming through this thread to catch anything I may have missed I noticed this.
Exactly what setting specific changes do you feel are required? How does Golarion need to be any different in order to allow badass martials who go beyond the impossible?
It would require setting-specific changes because giving martials obvious "superpowers" (beyond the ones which can be derived from the BAB and HP numbers - ie. beating a rhino to death) would compel the devs to account for the process in some way, and I doubt they want to go there.
No offense kyrt, but I find your accounting of gods as non-magical (your example with Thor) rather glib, and I promise you it would get eviscerated if it were ever put forward as the official ontology of Pathfinder. Mundane martials is a "legacy system" going back to OD&D, and while the devs have shown a certain willingness to cheat their own system with unexplained "extraordinary" powers, I doubt they are prepared to simply blow it up and re-write the relationship between martials and magic. Whether or not I think they should do it (I do think they should) is not at issue here.
Giving fighters all good saves, like the (Core) Monk, seems like a good idea as well.
Knowing that Fighters have few weaknesses ("Hmm - I could try to Charm him, but it's iffy whether or not I can") would make casters need to rely on their own bodyguards more.
There's a precedent for it - Back in 1st ed D&D, high-level Fighters had all-around the best saving throws (except save vs. spells, where magic users edged them out by one point).
But for some reason, the devs have decreed that all non-caster gotta be weak willed. Even the Unchained Monk. Because taking on hideous monsters with nothing but a pointy stick is something any dunce can do, I guess...
This is one of the things that pisses me off so much about post 3.0 D&D. The Front Liner's effective toughness has been reduced dramatically.
Paizo's just taken it to its illogical conclusion by giving everyone and their dog a s%## will save (even Alchemists for crying out loud).
I think the problem is less that some classes have bad Will saving throw progression and more that failing a Will save tends to be pretty darned horrible. Even at low levels, it's likely you're going to suffer the effects of something like frightened, fascinated, dazed, paralysis, or a suggestion. Those take characters right the hell out of the fight rather than merely provide them an impediment, such as would be the case with shaken or dazzled or staggered or sickened or fatigued. If you had a setup where these more serious conditions were either very brief or didn't come up at all until mid-level range, that'd be another matter and lower Will saves on the martials wouldn't matter quite so much.
FWIW, I actually find alchemists having a low Will save being thematically appropriate. They're mad scientists, after all. What's the saying, again? "You were so consumed with whether or not you could that you didn't stop to think if you should"? Lack of...
It is actually kinda humorous how disproportionate the effects of failed saves are for each save...
Failed Fort Saves either kill you outright, or really hurt in the long run (poison and diseases).
Failed reflex saves tend to be mostly hitpoint damage. Nothing really fancy...
Fail willsaves are pretty much even worse than a KO. It either takes you out of the fight or,even worse, makes you actively hinder your party. Things like Dominate can cause you to actually hurt your party. Illusions can be quite crippling if used effectively (for instance, using darkness to temporarily blind a fighter then using Viel to look like an ally and convince the fighter the other player is the bad guy... ).
Mundane martials is a "legacy system" going back to OD&D, and while the devs have shown a certain willingness to cheat their own system with unexplained "extraordinary" powers, I doubt they are prepared to simply blow it up and re-write the relationship between martials and magic.
Re-writing magic-martials relationship probably will also entail rewriting relationship between magic-spellcasters and all supernatural abilities.
Probably something along the lines or two main ways to utilize magic.
One through concentrating it mostly within body to achieve superhuman feats and different ways of circulating magic within to strengthen different abilities (ki, prana, etc.). While using it in this way there is little waste and character runs out of power only then he is physically exhausted.
Second way is gathering magic outside of body and shaping it in different forms to craft spells. It is much more versatile (there is is no body to put constraints on the form of spells) but wastes energy and leaves its practitioner vulnerable to physical assaults especially at close distance where without strengthening of the body he does not have time to react to threats and can't take damage that others throw his way.
Though such approach to magic will need certain re-imagining of spells and supernatural abilities especially in concerning AMF and similar things. Bordering on total rewrite.
Mundane martials is a "legacy system" going back to OD&D, and while the devs have shown a certain willingness to cheat their own system with unexplained "extraordinary" powers, I doubt they are prepared to simply blow it up and re-write the relationship between martials and magic.
Re-writing magic-martials relationship probably will also entail rewriting relationship between magic-spellcasters and all supernatural abilities.
Probably something along the lines or two main ways to utilize magic.
One through concentrating it mostly within body to achieve superhuman feats and different ways of circulating magic within to strengthen different abilities (ki, prana, etc.). While using it in this way there is little waste and character runs out of power only then he is physically exhausted.
Second way is gathering magic outside of body and shaping it in different forms to craft spells. It is much more versatile (there is is no body to put constraints on the form of spells) but wastes energy and leaves its practitioner vulnerable to physical assaults especially at close distance where without strengthening of the body he does not have time to react to threats and can't take damage that others throw his way.
Though such approach to magic will need certain re-imagining of spells and supernatural abilities especially in concerning AMF and similar things. Bordering on total rewrite.
Yeah...I think your take on how it might look, and the level of fundamental change it would require is pretty accurate. My own implementation of "martial superpowers" is similar to what you describe. Martial characters in my world tap into the ambient magic of the world/life (something not unlike Yoda's description of the force) as they advance, and pick up passive abilities which eventually transform them into demigods without ever really "working at it", or even being aware of what is happening. Under this paradigm everyone has magic inside of them, and the potential for great power, but it is only the rare few who actually realize this potential.
Spellcasters, on the other hand, put their magic to work by opening temporary rifts to other planes, and creating effects by shaping the energy which passes through them. It's easy enough, then, to define an AMF as something which shuts down spells without interfering with the less showy supernatural powers of the martials.