I'd also like, as a small request, to see Swim and Athletics condensed into one skill, like Athletics from 5e. It's really weird that my super strong fighter might be great at climbing but can't swim more than twenty yards out to sea without drowning.
I believe Athletics was mentioned in one part of the podcast (according to the summary I read), so I think you're getting your wish... which was one of my own, TBH.
Please do this: Make singular archetypes affect multiple classes and were the old prestige class options.
Example 1: Arcane Trickster for Rogues and Wizards.
Example 2: Champion of Irori for Monks and Paladins.
Example 3: Rage Prophet for Barbarians and Oracles.
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Please Do:
Keep the game recognizably Pathfinder. Stay true to the spirit of 3.5 that so many people still love. Let there be consequences for acting foolish or taking on things way over your head. And if things get really hairy, TPK should still be a perfectly valid outcome.
Please Don't:
Just copy 5e. Don't make rolling for stats optional, nerf the monsters until they're laughable, reduce a curse or lycanthropy to a minor inconvenience, chainsaw the number of skills, or make it impossible to kill a character because they get a thousand and one saves. The reason I love Pathfinder even more these days is because it isn't the "play on easy mode so you'll never die, just roll 2D20 because why not" garbage that is D&D 5th Edition.
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DO
-Implement combat maneuvers as something everyone can do without having to take AoOs or invest any feats in them.
-Implement other ways of attacking opponents with mundane means other than to deal damage to them. Again wihout having to invest feats into them, and make these things viable compared to the default attack.
- If you're going to have weapon focus and specialization, and similar class features or feats, apply them to weapon groups, not specific weapons.
- Make the weapon groups a part of the weapon's profile, not something that needs to be looked up in a class's rules.
DON'T
- Flatten proficiency bonuses. I don't even dislike the idea, but i would like one of my big heroic fantasy RPGs to keep an amount of granularity that lets me be especially good at some tasks and average at others.
3. Use of the Female pronoun in the text. This is unbelievably distracting. Centuries of use have neutered the male pronoun. There's nothing chauvinistic about using it and it makes the text easier to read and understand.If you find that distracting, the problem is you, not the text.
Honestly, I wouldn't mind them switching to the a neutral "they." If only so I could drink the tears that would flow so abundantly.
I don't rightly care which pronoun they use, the only thing i would say is that "they" would probably get clunky and confusing at times, so at least keep it to an unambiguously singular pronoun. Make that "it" if you have to.
please: add the unweighted pointbuy as a character building option, the weighted one stinks. come on if the players are subbosed to be the heores then we cshould have the stats to back it up ... just nothing that goes over 18 without racial bonuses( ie the elf's bonus to dex)
( the unweighted is always-1 from the point buy pool)
Given that at least two of the PCs in the Glass Cannon Podcast each had a stat of exactly 18, a system like that seems highly likely.
Please Do: Include chase rules in the core book
Chase rules resulted in the single worst PFS experience I ever had.
The GM essentially took my character away from and told me not a single ability I invested significant resources in was available for use.
The character in question was an oracle/barabarian with a 50' base move speed and the ability to move as an immediate action. Sorry, not allowed immediate action moves in a chase (which would have ended the chase 1st turn).
Handle Animal check as the means to bypass a horse? When I can double a horses CMD on an overrun maneuver? Not permitted: overrun was not an available option.
Wall in my way, no problem, one swing of my Admantine Earthbreaker fixes that. Opps, sorry, can't just go through the wall in chase scenes.
And on, and on, and on.
RPG Superstar 2008 Top 32, 2011 Top 16
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Please Do: Include chase rules in the core book
Chase rules resulted in the single worst PFS experience I ever had.
The GM essentially took my character away from and told me not a single ability I invested significant resources in was available for use.
The character in question was an oracle/barabarian with a 50' base move speed and the ability to move as an immediate action. Sorry, not allowed immediate action moves in a chase (which would have ended the chase 1st turn).
Handle Animal check as the means to bypass a horse? When I can double a horses CMD on an overrun maneuver? Not permitted: overrun was not an available option.
Wall in my way, no problem, one swing of my Admantine Earthbreaker fixes that. Opps, sorry, can't just go through the wall in chase scenes.
And on, and on, and on.
Volkard, first, I didn't say include the existing 1E chase rules as written and without change, I just want to have mechanics to deal like things like chases as part of the core rules.
Second, it sounds like you had a poor experience with a specific GM. I've had them too occasionally, and they suck, and sometimes can color your perception of specific parts of the game if you associate the bad experience with them that way. PFS also has some limitations of having expectations that everyone's on a level playing field and GMs can't diverge from RAW. I know if you'd had that character in my game I'd have certainly allowed alternate options for chases than what might have been written if they made sense.
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Please keep it backward compatible: If I can still use old stuff with a bit of work on my part I'm in. If you give me a conversion guide to make that easier to do all the better.
Please don't: Simplify Monster and NPC creation. Or at least give both options for both Simple & Detailed Monsters. Orcs can be Simple. An Orc Warchief should not be simple. A pack of Kobolds can be simple a Dragon should never be simple. The Big Bad Evil of an adventure should never be simple.
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I see lots of people have posted their desires with respect to specific nuggets of rules. I'll try to be a little bit broader than that.
Please remember that we (the players) have chosen Pathfinder over the competitor for a reason. We are willing to accept slightly more complexity in our game system. For me, I like the ability to customize my character as I progress up levels.
Please remember that we (the players) do have experience with the competitor. Choose your terminology carefully. "Skill Proficiency" may mean something to you, but it has context for us from the other game. I don't want to be forever trapped by my first level decisions on skills. My character should be able to grow in new directions as he levels up.
Please carefully plan your transition - particularly for Society Play. You won't have 150+ 2E society scenarios on day 1. There should be an overlap of 1st Ed and 2nd Ed during season 11. Use 1st ed legacy boons similar to the high level faction boons in Starfinder -- allowing us to transfer or grant boons to our new characters. Don't limit those boons to high level 1st Ed characters. Some of us don't have those high level Society characters.
I don't think there's a single archetype concept I'd actually prefer to play over the core class as is.
I could not disagree with that statement more unless it included the words “nazi” and “puppies”! Archetypes are awesome. They’re the main thing that makes Pathfinder stand out from D&D. I would almost -always- prefer an archetype.
3. Use of the Female pronoun in the text. This is unbelievably distracting. Centuries of use have neutered the male pronoun. There's nothing chauvinistic about using it and it makes the text easier to read and understand.
Totally agree here, though. There are better ways to be inclusive than torturing the English language.
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Please do:
Make cantrips worth using at all levels of play over conventional weaponry. Nothing more heroic than a wizard using a hand crossbow because it's better than ray of frost.
Alternatively, make cantrips a single action. That way you have the cantrips be less individually powerful, but you could fire off more than one in a round. Maybe even a real spell and a cantrip, if you're safe enough. It'd be a lot cooler than the usual "I cast haste and end my turn".
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Do:
- Keep alignments.
- Either eliminate the Sorcerer delayed casting progression or make the human racial bonus universal and give the class four skillpoints as with the Oracle.
- Give monsters abilities which deal with the action economy advantage a four player party has against them.
- Make high level monsters tough enough to withstand several rounds of combat against a four member player character party. I.e. "Balors are scary again at their challenge-appropiate level".
Do not:
- Make low level spells useless at higher levels
- Christmas tree effect (this seems to have been taken care of)
- High level rocket tag
- Gorbacz :p
Please Get Rid Of
Touch attacks.
At least with the current interpretation, when monster touch AC actually goes down when increasing in level. Find some other way to do this, like using Reflex Defense (10 + reflex save).
Losing Dexterity bonus to AC
It never made sense to me that Dexterity would not help in one of the situations it would seem to matter most, surprise. Make flat-footed etc into a flat bonus.
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Please do this;
Keep set DCs for skills, or at least a list of firm examples for each skill from the easiest to its extraordinary limits. I can't stand fiat from potential tyrannic problem GMs who wrongly claim that things proven in RL to be possible as impossible and refuse valid check attempts...
Remake sorcerer spells to work without the "artificial" feeling Vocal and Somatic components. I believe you should replace them with something more "natural" for a in-the-blood caster, like Logic and Emotion from Occult Adventures.
Include most major breeds of true dragons in the new Bestiary, especially the Imperial ones. This one is just personal preference, but it doesn't seem right to see only the western-style chromatic/metallics only in the first and most important monster book.
Please don't do this;
Destroy PC-NPC transparency. Now, frankly I don't care about the uplayable monsters, but for playable races, like in Starfinder's Alien Archives, the dealbreaker for me was that the books explicitly split a same creature's player version and NPC version's racial features (like the skittermander), and it was a nightmare. At least for potential playable creatures, please keep the transparency.
About skills
Console the skill list. Spellcraft and Survival can merge with Knowledge skill. But some of the PF1 consolidation actually went too far. In particular, I miss the Search skill. Now that Perception is not a skill anymore, perhaps Search should return?
The Feng Shui 1E game has a really interesting concept of contact and knowledge elements of skills. You can use any skill as a knowledge skill in its area of competence - Survival is also Knowledge Nature, Craft (weapons) is also Know (weapons). Contact element means you can make a skill roll to see if you can find an old acquaintance in the business your sill covers - like findings scouts and thieves using the contact element of Stealth and mages with Arcana.
Proficiency can be good if they extend the competence of a skill. In the podcast, there was mention of a proficiency that let the Heal skill actually restore Hp. This is good!
Keep skill ranks for maximum consolidation. But reduce other skill bonuses. Tears To Wine was ok at low levels when the bonus is +2, but gets insane later. And avoid the "100 things to improve a skill by +2" paradigm. The last goes for all things, not just skills.
Include several levels of failure and success. If failing to sneak by an opponent automatically means I get spotted, this is a big disincentive unless you are very, very skilled. The normal result of a failed skill check should be more along the lines of "action wasted, nothing happens", the way it currently is with the Climb skill. For Stealth this can be "you step on a branch and the monster stirs; this task is simply too hard for you". The player can then press the issue and roll again; on a second failure the result really is bad.
When PCs have abilities that allow them re-rolls or to roll 2 dice and pick the best, either have no daily limit or make them use the ability AFTER rolling. This avoids the 2 minute break while a player tries to decide to use his 2 dice now or not.
Include rules for group tasks that are better than just Aid Other. Including my own group stealth rule for PF1 for an example of how this can be done.
Group Stealth
When a group of creatures tries to move stealthily the following procedure can be used. Each character makes a Stealth check. Use the best result; the character who rolled the best result is on point and the first to enter new areas. Each character beyond the character with the best roll penalizes the main character's Stealth check by -4. If a character's Stealth check was 10 or more the penalty for that character is reduced to -2. This is a variant of the aid other action. Characters can hang back to lessen the impact they have on the main character's Stealth check. Being 50 ft. away or behind a corner allows a character to not roll Stealth and always provide only a -2 penalty. If the distance is 100 ft. or more or the character is behind a closed door, the character doesn't count at all.
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Fair.
Please do: Look at that dead level for entering a PrC like Eldritch Knight. There's a lot of turn-off to taking PrCs when you take it to be a more versatile caster, but it hurts your casting progression...even worse if you're doing so with an already-delayed spont class.
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Please do this:
Make combat maneuvers something that all Martial characters are capable of (I.E. remove that AaO if they attempt it) instead of them having to feat tax into each type of maneuver. Anyone that trains in martial tradition will generally know how to bull rush/trip/disarm/etc. Now some (think monk) might specialize in it further, but don't punish the Fighter because he didn't take the feat. Think modern military, they train with guns and traditionally that's what they use. However they are trained in close combat situations as well and know general basics of disarming, tripping, and grappling.
Keep prepared casters, and keep the meta magic advantages they have in some way. Perhaps if a Wizard prepares a spell with meta magic, then it increases in spell level like before but it doesn't require an additional action. Whereas a spontaneous caster can do it on the fly but it requires additional actions for them.
It's race, add ancestry if you want, but it's race.
Re-vamp the social skills, as written they are easily abused, oh look the level 7 fighter made the dragon shake in his pants! Absurd.
Simplify weapon damage dice
Close Weapon - D4
Light Weapon - D6
One Handed Weapon - D8
Polearm - D10
Two Handed Weapon - D12 (The D12 needs more love in Pathfinder)
Maybe instead of increasing/decreasing the dice with size, you can simply things by baking in a size bonus/penalty instead of having to refer to a chart that changes the dice and you go from say 1d12 to 3d6
Instead let the varied weapons do something unique to the weapon. Trip/Disarm/Grapple/Etc.
Get rid of 0 level spells - this I detect magic/poison/alignment/evil all day long is ridiculous in my opinion. Or at least put a limit on them 5/day or something.
"You enter a room, (description) what do you do?"
Paladin - "detect evil"
Wizard - "detect magic"
Druid - "detect poison"
"You are approached by someone walking along the street"
Paladin - "detect evil"
Inquisitor - "detect alignment"
Druid - "detect poison"
Wizard - "detect magic"
Make all stats more relevant to saves (I do like the concept of each stat relating to particular saves in the game).
Make magical items more meaningful and not something so "necessary" like stat items.
Remove the requirement that a weapon has to be +1 before it can have a special ability, this just seems silly. If the wizard can enchant it with fire, why does it already have to have a +1 bonus?
Make the +1 scale mean something though like it should, as far as overcoming DR or the like. So you have the choice between special effects or static bonuses that help overcome certain defenses.
Allow for specialization but feats like Weapon focus/specialization could relate to groups of weapons instead, providing the martial some flexibility so he isn't boned when he loses his Greatsword and is more apt to make use of that magical Greataxe you designed instead of discarding it because he sucks with it.
Please Dont Do This:
Remove the alignment system entirely. This entire debate of "why must the Paladin be lawful good, I want all of the paladin's goodies but I want to be chaotic as I wish" is nonsense. A paladin should have something that sets it apart (like it does currently) but it should also have the restrictions it has, that is WHY it is not just a Fighter.
As for the morality of the game, yes people aren't always lawful, they aren't always chaotic, and they're capable of both good and evil. It's still a good system for certain class requirement tenants, spells, and a general sense of things.
Separate rules for monsters/NPCs if they're the same thing as the players, that is nonsense.
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PLEASE DO :
- Remove alignments, or make them optionnal. You could use the Unchained rule about loyalty, I think it is pretty cool. Outsiders can still have a loyalty toward a classic alignment though.
- Convert non-core classes. Maybe not in the core rule book, but quickly. I have fallen in love with many classes from those sets.
- Add Aasimar/Tieflings/Dhampirs and rebalance them. Aasimars are OP compared to Tieflings. Also, Tiefling and Dhampir racial archetypes are not really interesting compared to vanilla Tieflings and Dhampir. I never had Goblin PCs at my table, but I regularly get Aasimars, Tieflings and Dhampirs, since they are more suited to society.
- If racial heritage is important, add some Dawnforge-esque vibe to it. I liked how you gained new options from your class AND from your race.
- Make sure your rules are clear. I can't recall how much time I lost debating if I can use certain spells as an Eldrith Archer, if my Eidolon keeps its equipment on him if he is dismissed, if my Eidolon/Animal Companion/Mount/Familiar earns Mythic Ranks, etc etc...
- Allow players to trade STR to damage for DEX to damage without having to have a specific class or be mythic. Maybe tie the STR/DEX choice to the weapon you use ? A dagger or a rappier could be DEX to damage since you have to target specific body parts, while two-handed swords could be STR to damage because it's heavy you have to swing it with strength. We could also have some weapons which let you choose between STR and DEX, such as short swords who can be swung Barbarian style or Swashbuckler style.
- Get rid of focus, or at least lower the DC. I hate it when my boss is casting a spell and is suddenly c*ckblocked because a PC had the genius idea to hold their action to throw magical returning, Smite Evil infused daggers the moment the boss starts casting, leading to a 70+ DC to cast Shield.
- Keep the option to add PC class levels to monsters. Mimics with rogue levels will never get old.
- Keep the monster archetypes such as evolved, young, giant...
- Keep mythic rules.
- Rework apparitions if you keep them. The conditions to disarm them are too much farfetched. I'm playing through Carrion Crown and Strange Aeons, and every time the players encounter an apparition, either they are blocked by it and the DM has to drop heavy hint for them to understand, or the DM has to homebrew new ways to defeat the apparition, or they need a specific class to defeat them (Druid for Cold Spots for exemple)
- Rework how multiclassing works. Multiclassing can become way too OP as well are way too lame, depending on how you do it, very easily. On the same table, I saw a Conjurer/Oracle so bad the character had to be redone, and a Warpriest/Oracle/Paladin so powerful he automatically succeeds every Save he does and deals 3 to 4 times the damages of a two-handed specialist Hunter.
- Incidentaly, either rework Prestige classes, or remove them completely, and don't make Prestige classes too Golarion-lore-heavy. As for now, either they are only worth for one or two features, but not worth loosing your main class's levels (Arcane Archer's homing arrow, Shadow Dancer's shadow teleport), either their power are already emulated in a better way with base classes or archetypes (Eldritch Archer (Magus) > Arcane Archer, Shadow Caller (Spiritualist) has the Shadow Dancer's teleport) or are too lore-oriented which can sometimes make the most interesting prestige classes inaccessible for whatever reason (Assassins have to be Evil while I don't see why we can't have a Vigilante/Inquisitor-style Assassin with Good alignment, for exemple an assassin working for a Good god ; or Agents of the Grave, who have to be Evil only because Necromancy is seen as a bad thing in Golarion). The only prestige classes I find interesting nowadays are the Mystic Theurge and the Pathfinder.
PLEASE DON'T :
- Use a D&D5-esque feat economy. It's lame. I don't want to have to sacrifice stats to get new options.
- Lock too many feats and reactions behind some classes. I'd like to see reactions being available to multiple classes (for exemple, the Sudden Charge can be a Warrior/Paladin/Barbarian/Magus/Sorcerer with a close-combat lineage reaction).
- Make background too important for skills. I like playing a rich noble girl who is proficient in lockpicking and stealth because she is following the teachings of a thief to spice up her life, or a barbarian who lived her whole life out of society and is the best cook because she fell in love with gastronomy when she was level 2.
- Use Unchained poison/curse/sickness rules. The weakest poison can kill you, even with a max ranked First Aid character with class proficiency.
- Use Unchained scaled spellcaster level based on damages. One hit and your wizard becomes pretty much useless (at least at first level).
