I know that polymorph spells were broken in 3.X, but 1st edition Pathfinder polymorph spells don't make sense. Why can I not get as strong as a giant ape when I polymorph into one? Or as swift as an air elemental? I want a polymorph system where I get the physical stats of the creature I'm turning into. If I turn into a dragon I want to be a fricking dragon! I'd prefer not to be allowed to turn into the pale shadow of the intended creature. Each polymorph spell could use a table of appropriate creatures you can turn into just like Summon spell lists, so that balance can be preserved and people can still turn exactly into the creatures they choose leaving out overpowered monsters.
Because creatures have irrationally high stats, and if you get what you polymorph into, you become irrationally powerful. Gaining the strength of a giant ape might not be groundbreaking, but gaining the strength of the Tarrasque will be.
I like the idea of a table of stuff you can polymorph into, similar to Summon monster. *IF* the table is carefully balanced, it might work. However, I feel a lot of people will not like the idea of having a limited amount of things to polymorph into.
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I don’t want this.
In 3.0 & 3.5 the Druid dominated even more than it does in Pathfinder. Because Physical Stats became very dumpable due to outright switching your physical scores with that of the creature you emulated while keeping your mental scores. It also needed much heavier reworking of the character sheet every time you shapeshifted.
Pathfinder fixed a major problem with polymorphing, and stat boosting items by not allowing ability score swaps from spells and items. Ability score boosts are still the best innovation for making polymorph magic non-disruptive and viable at the table.
It's a hard thing to balance. Is it a good idea to allow people to dump all physical stats and still be good at combat? Is it better to restrict people to a small, unexciting list of shape options, or to allow PCs to turn into anything they want, which encourages players to comb through hundreds of options looking for something overpowered?
I don't think implementing this in a balanced fashion would be something you would actually want.
If you replace stats, you get free dump stats with no meaningful consequence. I think it's fair to say that a Druid with a strength of 7 should not be able to spend the day stronger than the Fighter, or more dexterous than the Rogue. That's probably a limit of 15 strength, maybe 17 if we're feeling generous. Ditto for dexterity.
For dragons, red dragon would be wyrmling only, and just if we're being generous. So you can turn into a fricking adorable dragon.
Gorilla is manageable with 15 strength, but no lions, tigers, or most bears. Brown bear sneaks in at 17.
For an air elemental, that would be small only to avoid maxing out dexterity, and earth would be small with a strength limitation. Fire and water get up to medium.
Is it a good idea to allow people to dump all physical stats and still be good at combat?
No, it's a bad idea.
It's also not a good idea that a single spell can convert a non-combatant into a better combatant than the pure combatant classes.However, that depends enterly on the table of monsters you can polyomorph into. If you are able to polymorph into a goat, a horse, and a dog, you will not outshine the fighter. If you can polymorph into a dire tiger, a tyranossaurus, and a pyrohydra, then you probably will.
Polymorph needs to be handled carefully. "I can't do anything you can do, but better" is a bad goal design for spells.
Just saying, would prefer 'full body transformation' versus whatever 'watered down' stuff exists in Starfinder. This 'half-measure' stuff like the Ranger Shifter, Feral Hunter, etc, etc isn't very good from a flavor perspective, imo?
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For the most part I actually liked how they function in PF1E. Hopefully PF2E doesn't make them weaker and/or less versatile.
There's no polymorph in Starfinder at all.
The problem with "full body transformation" is that you need to carefully select a list of pre-aproved and playtested possible things to polymorph into. Polymorphing into a wolf never cause issues. Polymorphing into a dire tiger, or into a giant octopus to get 8 attacks, it's a different issue.
There's no polymorph in Starfinder at all.
The problem with "full body transformation" is that you need to carefully select a list of pre-aproved and playtested possible things to polymorph into. Polymorphing into a wolf never cause issues. Polymorphing into a dire tiger, or into a giant octopus to get 8 attacks, it's a different issue.
Well, if I can't polymorph into a decent dragon like Maleficent why do I need magic for? Balance is important alright, but if everything in the game needs to conform to strict balancing rules all the time just for the sake of balance itself, then magic just becomes inert. Magic is this wild powerful thing, trying to conform it to mundane standards just kills its wonder, it just looks like a fictional utilitarian tool, this fictional counterpart of technology.
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Well, if I can't polymorph into a decent dragon like Maleficent why do I need magic for? Balance is important alright, but if everything in the game needs to conform to strict balancing rules all the time just for the sake of balance itself, then magic just becomes inert. Magic is this wild powerful thing, trying to conform it to mundane standards just kills its wonder, it just looks like a fictional utilitarian tool, this fictional counterpart of technology.There's no polymorph in Starfinder at all.
The problem with "full body transformation" is that you need to carefully select a list of pre-aproved and playtested possible things to polymorph into. Polymorphing into a wolf never cause issues. Polymorphing into a dire tiger, or into a giant octopus to get 8 attacks, it's a different issue.
I wholeheartedly disagree with the idea that a lvl 15 pathfinder wizard is "just an utalitarian tool" with nothing cool to do just because he cannot become a better fighter than the fighter by casting Polymorph Any Object on himself and becoming a full dragon with all the benefits.
I think there are a thing or two that a lvl 15 wizard can do which is far from being "inert magic". Like teleporting himself, slowing or accelerating time, travelling to other planes, summoning angels or demons, turning people into stone, flying, becoming invisible, or creating mirages. It just does not need to ALSO becoming a better fighter than the fighter with just the single cast of a spell.
However, a few posts ago, you gave us a valid solution. You said you'll rather have no option to become a dragon at all, than becoming the PF version of polymorph into a dragon. That's pretty easy to give. Remove Form of Dragon from NPF and we're done.
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Honestly, the whole issue can be reduced to the first sentence of this very thread. The 3.5 version of polymorph was totally broken. We don't need to go back to broken things.
Magic is this wild powerful thing, trying to conform it to mundane standards just kills its wonder, it just looks like a fictional utilitarian tool, this fictional counterpart of technology.
To me, 'wild' magic implies magic that can go catastrophically wrong at any time. Try to summon an elemental and you might find yourself dragged into the plane of fire. Try to turn into a dragon and you might forget you were ever a human.
Well, if I can't polymorph into a decent dragon like Maleficent why do I need magic for? Balance is important alright, but if everything in the game needs to conform to strict balancing rules all the time just for the sake of balance itself, then magic just becomes inert. Magic is this wild powerful thing, trying to conform it to mundane standards just kills its wonder, it just looks like a fictional utilitarian tool, this fictional counterpart of technology.There's no polymorph in Starfinder at all.
The problem with "full body transformation" is that you need to carefully select a list of pre-aproved and playtested possible things to polymorph into. Polymorphing into a wolf never cause issues. Polymorphing into a dire tiger, or into a giant octopus to get 8 attacks, it's a different issue.
I wholeheartedly disagree with the idea that a lvl 15 pathfinder wizard is "just an utalitarian tool" with nothing cool to do just because he cannot become a better fighter than the fighter by casting Polymorph Any Object on himself and becoming a full dragon with all the benefits.
I think there are a thing or two that a lvl 15 wizard can do which is far from being "inert magic". Like teleporting himself, slowing or accelerating time, travelling to other planes, summoning angels or demons, turning people into stone, flying, becoming invisible, or creating mirages. It just does not need to ALSO becoming a better fighter than the fighter with just the single cast of a spell.
However, a few posts ago, you gave us a valid solution. You said you'll rather have no option to become a dragon at all, than becoming the PF version of polymorph into a dragon. That's pretty easy to give. Remove Form of Dragon from NPF and we're done.
Well, actually when I proposed the list system I had in mind that casters would be able to turn at least into some Large or Huge dragons and that, by the level this were to be allowed, PC combatants would be more effective than the creatures allowed in the lists of such levels. However I underestimated how conservative you people were going to be with which monsters were going to be hypothetically allowed into the polymorph lists.
If your idea was that polymorphing into a white dragon gives you a breathweapon somewhat comparable to a cone of cold, but reusable, together with fly, AC, hp, and combat utility, for a spell roughly the same level than cone of cold, then yes, you understimated how conservative I was going to be with the monsters hypothetically allowed into the list.
Magic is this wild powerful thing, trying to conform it to mundane standards just kills its wonder, it just looks like a fictional utilitarian tool, this fictional counterpart of technology.To me, 'wild' magic implies magic that can go catastrophically wrong at any time. Try to summon an elemental and you might find yourself dragged into the plane of fire. Try to turn into a dragon and you might forget you were ever a human.
Well, to be honest, I don't like how predictable arcane spells always are in D&D and Pathfinder. Not use your two extreme examples and saying I want to make spells SUPER unpredictable, but it would be nice if repeating the same gestures, words, and formula a hundred times didn't always result in the same exact or predictable effect like a science equation. I once wanted to introduce a system where arcane spellcasters would have to roll a concentration or similar spellcasting check for every spell that they cast, and that they could trade a higher chance of failure for more powerful effects, most commonly to apply metamagic feats, or try to cast spell one's not ready to master yet. In the case of failure the spell would simply be lost, in the case of greater failure (like failing by 5 or more, or 10 more, I'm not certain) there would be a wild magic effect. However that precludes in some problems. First, adding a roll to every spell cast in the game bogs down combat even more. Two, coming up with a good table of wild magic effects, possibly using more than one at random. Three, wild magic effects, although fun, do not always fit a certain adventure's feeling. Like making flowers rain instead of the spell working might be a nice effect, but it wouldn't work well when in horror adventures. So I'd probably create different tables for different "climates" of adventure, under the assumption that the environment affects magic as well. So if you fail a spell check in a haunted environment, use this table. If you fail a spell check in an environment influenced by an elemental plane use this table, or this other one if it's a lower plane, or yet this other one if it's Faerie or the Ethereal Plane, and so on.
If your idea was that polymorphing into a white dragon gives you a breathweapon somewhat comparable to a cone of cold, but reusable, together with fly, AC, hp, and combat utility, for a spell roughly the same level than cone of cold, then yes, you understimated how conservative I was going to be with the monsters hypothetically allowed into the list.
There's no problem in being a spell level higher than 5, there's no reason this new system would have to use 3rd ed's or PF1ed's framework of when such spells are available. And could limit how many times you can use breath weapon along the duration.
Actually, the Polymorph subtype spells aren't broken in 3E (only the Core ones were).
These spells were cool. hey turned you actually into the creature, but no Con change HP, you got temp hps instead.
Examples:
SHAPE OF THE HELLSPAWNED STALKER
Transmutation (Polymorph)
Level: Sorcerer/wizard 3
You take the form of a hell hound (MM 151). You gain 10 temporary hit points, which disappear at the end of the spell's duration. See the Polymorph Subschool sidebar on page 91 for more details.
You actually become a hellhound (no stat changes because your physical stats turned into theirs).
One of the stronger ones was Trollshape:
SHAPE OF THE HELLSPAWNED STALKER
Transmutation (Polymorph)
Level: Sorcerer/wizard 3
You take the form of a hell hound (MM 151). You gain 10 temporary hit points, which disappear at the end of the spell's duration. See the Polymorph Subschool sidebar on page 91 for more details.
Why strong? Regeneration.
The lowest level (1) was a Druid spell (Aquatic Escape) that turned you into a carp and a Spider one that turned you into a medium spider.
My opinion:
When you cast polymorph, you are effectively changing your "race" to that of the creature you are becoming. If you are physically weak for a human/elf/dwarf/whatever, you are going to be physically weak for whatever you turn into. That might be pretty strong compared to your previous form, but not as strong as the average of the creature you just became.
Most "strong" creatures have a base of 15 + modifiers for STR. If you are a 8 STR caster trying to polymorph into one of these creatures, your STR score should be about 7 less than the base creature's.
This both makes sense, and keeps casters from stomping on everyone else's toes (as much).
There is also the issue of complexity. It's much more simple to say, "here are the stat changes you get" than it is to say, "go look up the creature in the Bestiary and modify it's stat block in these ways", especially since, in my experience, casters of such spells expect the DM to pull the monster's stats out of their rear.
Player - "I turn into a dragon!"
DM - "Okay, how does that change your stats?"
Player - "I don't know. You're the DM."
DM - "....Alright. Sorry everyone, give me a minute while I look this up in the Bestiary and do some conversions."You would think Players would do this work for the DM ahead of time, but ultimately, they find themselves in a situation where they haven't planned to turn into something, but it would just be so perfect right now.
My caster has Form of the Dragon 3. He turns into a Red Dragon every time. It's a separate character sheet in my folder. I state that I cast the spell, then I swap character sheets. Done.
Sorry about the rant.
I like your idea, although depending on what creatures at what spell levels would make the cut in the list system I proposed I might prefer the list system or not.
About the DM-player dynamic, if you're a player at my table and you don't know how your ability works exactly, unless you're a beginner you simply can't use the ability. Go do the heavy lifting and come back to try and use the ability again.
FWIW, I'm currently playing my first major polymorphing PC, a lion shaman druid, I'm just fine with the current PF1e rules and don't see any reason to change them for PF2e.
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Well, a big part of how strong the new polymorph spells will be is how natural attacks will work in 2nd ed. Without full-attack-actions how many attack’s do they get per round? From the glasscanon podcast it looked like one per action, atleast the skeleton they fought got one claw attack for one action. If so does it even matter how many different natural attacks you have?
Would there even be a difference if your form has one bite or 20 arms with claws? If you don’t get more attacks then why should you even use natural attacks when normal weapons are so much easier to enchant or pierce DR with.
And what about pounce, pretty much the strongest ability polymorph spells give you? Does it even exist in 2nd ed? At this point in time we know pretty much nothing, nevermind how polymorph spells will work.