Resonance: what do you think?

[RumpinRufus]

The continuity break is very striking to me.

For a game that's nominally set in the same universe as PF1, it just seems weird that heroes used to carry dozens of magic items, and now they'll only use one or two of the strongest possible magic items they can get their hands on.

[QuidEst]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

edduardco wrote:

This is more than just CLW wands, this is also replacing the body slots, and hopefully charged items.

I will also support the idea of exempting single use magic items of Resonance cost

I understand the idea of wanting to get away from the Big 6, but doesn't simply banning stat/save/to hit boosts from items and giving inherent character bonuses already do that? The system in unchained was workable, and if tweaks were needed then tweaks could be made. How in the world is it better, or "more Pathfindery" to make everything you do tally against some score determined by how likable you are?

In thinking about it, it's partially the fact that this system is based on Charisma that's bothering me. There is no logical, in-game explanation for why people who are more fun at parties should be able to use magical items more often. It's strictly a metagame construct to boost the usefulness of a stat that the designers have decided is underutilized.

It’s the stat formerly used for using magic items and for intuitive magic being used for using magic items. The qualities that give someone a commanding presence or personable impression are also the ones that allow them to be more in tune with magic items.

[edduardco]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

edduardco wrote:

This is more than just CLW wands, this is also replacing the body slots, and hopefully charged items.

I will also support the idea of exempting single use magic items of Resonance cost

I understand the idea of wanting to get away from the Big 6, but doesn't simply banning stat/save/to hit boosts from items and giving inherent character bonuses already do that? The system in unchained was workable, and if tweaks were needed then tweaks could be made. How in the world is it better, or "more Pathfindery" to make everything you do tally against some score determined by how likable you are?

The body slot is still somewhat cumbersome and limiting in some cases, why can't you benefit from multiple amulets or more that two rings for example. It really make things simpler, and it encourages that you have fewer but more powerful items as you level instead of being a walking Christmas tree.

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

In thinking about it, it's partially the fact that this system is based on Charisma that's bothering me. There is no logical, in-game explanation for why people who are more fun at parties should be able to use magical items more often. It's strictly a metagame construct to boost the usefulness of a stat that the designers have decided is underutilized.

I partially agree with you that Charisma is a little bit off with regards to magic items, but really that ship sailed long ago when Use Magic Device was tied to Charisma in 3.0.

[GreyWolfLord]

In AD&D I believe the spell goodberry could cure 2-8 HP worth of wounds. It could ONLY be used once per day on any one person. Simply make it so that cure or healing spells in magic items can only be utilized once per day per person.

If they get the point of carrying 200 wands of CLW, make it so that cure and healing spells can only be placed in staff or heavier weapons. Sure, they can carry all they want but eventually they'll realize they have better uses for encumbrance (or bulk) than to try to carry even 10 weapons simply for a CLW spell.

There are so many other solutions one could implement rather than going nuclear with resonance if the only reason is to stop wands of CLW (I think there are probably other reasons for resonance than just this though).

The easiest of course (and I think they may have said they are doing this already which would imply resonance is there for another reason) is to simply say, wands of CLW do not exist and are impossible to create.

[Aldarc]

Dαedαlus wrote:

Here's another side effect of potions using resonance (that's the only thing I know for sure has to go, so that's what I'm pushing for strongest. Everything else, we'll wait and see):

Imagine the scenario:
In a climactic fight with a dragon, a fairly unpopular commoner, fleeing the fight, was struck by a collapsing building and is bleeding out on the ground. The fighter, wanting to help the commoner, rushes over, fumbling for his emergency potion. He pours it down the throat of the dying man.... and it does nothing. The poor guy, level 1 with a -1 CHA modifier, has no resonance points, and fails the coin toss for the potion to work. He dies anticlimactically.

Most mechanics like this in D&D and PF often have "X/day + Stat (minimum 1)" usage to accomodate for this sort of cornercase scenario. But even then, I would say that it makes the Medicine skill all the more important, and I'm all for that.

[Hythlodeus]

RumpinRufus wrote:

The continuity break is very striking to me.

For a game that's nominally set in the same universe as PF1, it just seems weird that heroes used to carry dozens of magic items, and now they'll only use one or two of the strongest possible magic items they can get their hands on.

I guess the last PF AP will not only have to deal with the rise of Goblinkin but also with Nethys finding out what Aroden is up to and joining him, leaving Golarion behind

[dragonhunterq]

Resonance is going to have to be absolutely amazing in the playtest, because the more I think about it, the worse it sounds. I don't have an issu with the big 6, nor with spamming CLW. This is potentially a deal breaker for me.

[thistledown]

I think it's a terrible idea. The only pathfinder I do is PFS, and everyone is expected to spend their first prestige to buy some kind of healing wand. If they can't use it themselves, it's lent to someone else in the party to use on them. Because the alternative is that every party needs SOMEBODY to suck it up and play a dedicated healer. Yes, I've seen some people choose to make dedicated healers (mostly oracles), but that's not something that should be forced on anyone.

So if this is implemented, some other viable form of healing that anyone in the party can do without building for it must also be implemented.

If it's limited to non-consumables... maybe. I've got the same concerns that suddenly every item has a hesitation that it'll prevent you from using some other item later, but with proper planning that part might be manageable.

[kyrt-ryder]

Matthew Downie wrote:

Arakasius wrote:

kyrt-ryder wrote:

Arakasius wrote:

CLW spamming is an abomination that prevents this game from ever being streamed online.

How???

Because if after a tough fight the players discussed poking someone with a stick 45 times to cap them up to full the audience would laugh and tune out. Have you read any fantasy novel where the heroes do that after a fight? It takes most tension out of fights (and especially out of any dungeon crawls) and short cuts a resource in the game. Generally players in rough series of fights should expect to not be at full health til they full rest, but current PF is balanced around some idea that you cap everyone up. Verisimilitude Is a thing and this idea of wand spamming completely breaks it. People don’t watch streams for mechanics, they watch it for role playing, memorable characters and heroic acts. CLW spammage undercuts all of this.

Suggestion: Add a new consumable - I'll call it a Healing Reservoir. Anyone can use it. It heals 100 points of damage, at a rate of 10HP per round spent holding it and not moving. It costs, say, 300gp.

No more wasting table time rolling dice for healing after a battle. Just work out how much healing you need and deduct it from the Reservoir's total.

(This assumes, of course, that we want PCs on full HP at the start of every encounter. If we want more of an 'attrition' game where you're trying to conserve your health over a series of battles, then limited healing based on short rests, spells, and Resonance items makes more sense.)

A healing reservoir sounds fantastic, at least in lieu of an effective [and free or very cheap] Heal Skill.

[Gregg Helmberger]

KingOfAnything wrote:

That's a really limited view of what charisma represents.

Even if Charisma means other things (which it may or may not -- I've never seen a logical explanation for how it does something other than that that wouldn't logically be better covered by Wisdom), it *still* has the effect of making likable people able to use magic items more often. From an in-game viewpoint, what's the relationship?

Let's define it as "force of personality" instead of likability. It still doesn't explain why a magic item works more often for person with more magnetism than it does for someone else. If a magic item works more often on A than B, why don't spells? Or supernatural abilities? Isn't magic magic? Is the magic that powers items some fundamentally different type of force than the magic that powers spells or supernatural abilities? If so, that opens up a whole other kettle of fish. If not, the spellcasting for everyone, not just bards and sorcerers (of the new core classes) should be contingent upon it, as should supernatural abilities. And items themselves should be variable based on the Charisma of the maker -- after all, Charisma should determine how much magic the maker can infuse into an item.

None of these questions had to be asked before Resonance.

[Mulgar]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

edduardco wrote:

This is more than just CLW wands, this is also replacing the body slots, and hopefully charged items.

I will also support the idea of exempting single use magic items of Resonance cost

I understand the idea of wanting to get away from the Big 6, but doesn't simply banning stat/save/to hit boosts from items and giving inherent character bonuses already do that? The system in unchained was workable, and if tweaks were needed then tweaks could be made. How in the world is it better, or "more Pathfindery" to make everything you do tally against some score determined by how likable you are?

In thinking about it, it's partially the fact that this system is based on Charisma that's bothering me. There is no logical, in-game explanation for why people who are more fun at parties should be able to use magical items more often. It's strictly a metagame construct to boost the usefulness of a stat that the designers have decided is underutilized.

How in god's name is Charisma underutilized!!!!!

Multiple classes that use it as their main stat (paladin, sorcerer, oracle and bard come to mind). Multiple skills that are essential to the game come to mind (diplomacy, intimidate, bluff, perform and UMD). Several classes use it as a secondary stat (cleric, arcanist). Multiple builds plan to using charisma for practically everything.

I see this as an attempt to both limit magic items and increase the number of stats a character needs to be viable.

[PossibleCabbage]

I mean, if Charisma is the stat for "Use Magic Device" then "Charisma is important for using magic items" was already in the game.

[JRutterbush]

One thing I'd like to reiterate (yet again) is that, despite the fact that people only seem to be discussing the issue of wandspam, that is not the only (or even main, I would argue) reason for using Resonance. It also minimizes resource tracking (one pool of Resonance instead of many smaller pools of x/day uses of magic items), adds interesting choices for players (do I invest in passive items today, or leave more Resonance available for my activated items?), and leaves an opening for future mechanics to expand upon the idea (like classes or options that specialize in Resonance use, or have additional uses for it). And it's easy to modify to suit your own needs: high magic games can give out extra Resonance, games that want to curb magic item use can give out less, and games that want to remove having to decide between worn items and activated items can just give extra Resonance that can only be spent to invest in worn items, or even remove investment costs entirely (though that might cause balance issues).

I wouldn't mind one-shot consumables being free to use, since carrying 50 potions is not nearly as easy as carrying a wand, which still helps solve that problem (and critical failures on skill checks and saves leaves open the opportunity for breakage if someone abuses cheap consumables too much). But investing Resonance for worn items and spending it for activated items is, in my opinion, a major improvement on the current system for magic items, and should absolutely be kept.

[Matthias W]

I'm not bothered from a simulation perspective, because magic is made up. (You can declare that zone of truth works however you like - it's how societies in the game world respond to its availability that I'm going to question.) Maybe magic just likes people who are likeable; that's certainly how sorcery and UMD work. But I am concerned about how this exacerbates the 15-minute adventuring day and the need for (historically unfun, historically overpowered) dedicated healers. Perhaps they've solved those issues so thoroughly that this won't be a problem, but it seems like this is addressing smaller issues at the expense of aggravating ones that were already worse.

[Thebazilly]

I don't think I can fully make up my mind on Resonance until we see how it works in play. I am feeling unsure about it, but there are some aspects I like. Rambling, disorganized thoughts to follow.

Unifying items with charges to one pool is nice. You don't have to remember that you have three charges left on your boots, one on your amulet, and two on your metamagic rod.

The slot system itself is sort of silly to begin with. Why can't you wear more than one magic amulet or more than two rings? Because game balance. I don't really have a problem with a different system for how many items you can wear that exists because game balance. Also, I think the idea that you can "pull off" more magic bling because of more Charisma is hilarious.

I agree that spamming wands of Cure Light Wounds is a silly thing that arose as an exploit of a game system rather than an intended design. I saw another post that pointed out that going in to every fight with full health encourages rocket tag gameplay, and I think I agree with that on a gut level. I think the arguments here are overlooking the possible alternatives between "rest for 8 hours" and "poke each other with sticks 40 times." I can see the possibility of using the Heal skill in an actually relevant manner, or using a wand that requires two pokes instead of dozens. We won't know until we have more information.

I find myself liking the idea slightly more when considering potions as a separate thing. And maybe scrolls. It removes some of the opportunity cost of using your cool magic items, and some of the silly ramifications people have brought up with feeding potions to a commoner, etc.

[edduardco]

thistledown wrote:

I think it's a terrible idea. The only pathfinder I do is PFS, and everyone is expected to spend their first prestige to buy some kind of healing wand. If they can't use it themselves, it's lent to someone else in the party to use on them. Because the alternative is that every party needs SOMEBODY to suck it up and play a dedicated healer. Yes, I've seen some people choose to make dedicated healers (mostly oracles), but that's not something that should be forced on anyone.

So if this is implemented, some other viable form of healing that anyone in the party can do without building for it must also be implemented.

If it's limited to non-consumables... maybe. I've got the same concerns that suddenly every item has a hesitation that it'll prevent you from using some other item later, but with proper planning that part might be manageable.

I have never understood this, if healing is such a big issue why is people wasting gold in CLW wands instead of getting something that gives fast healing? Like Boots of the Earth

[ChibiNyan]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

ericthecleric wrote:

In the Know Direction interview, Erik Mona revealed that he doesn't like those wands.

I saw that, and it occurred to me that the best solution to that problem, if a solution was deemed necessary for one guy's pet peeve, was to ban wands of CLW. There, problem solved. You don't need to build a whole new system to justify why using them is now suboptimal.

PFS is a thing, where house rules are not allowed. It's pretty important to the devs that this game mode works as desired by them right out of the box. It's also where the CLW Wand issue was seen the most.

[Gregg Helmberger]

Matthias W wrote:

I'm not bothered from a simulation perspective, because magic is made up. (You can declare that zone of truth works however you like - it's how societies in the game world respond to its availability that I'm going to question.) Maybe magic just likes people who are likeable; that's certainly how sorcery and UMD work. [snip]

I understand what you're saying, but magic should still have some basic rules it MUST follow if it's to be an actual system rather than a handwave and a "Do whatever you want." You need to say "Magic works like this, and it always works like this" if it's not to become simple fiat. It has to have comprehensible and consistent internal logic, even if its absurd in real world terms.

[kurviak]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

There is no logical, in-game explanation for why people who are more fun at parties should be able to use magical items more often. It's strictly a metagame construct to boost the usefulness of a stat that the designers have decided is underutilized.

I just realised ghasts are fun at parties

[thistledown]

edduardco wrote:

thistledown wrote:

I think it's a terrible idea. The only pathfinder I do is PFS, and everyone is expected to spend their first prestige to buy some kind of healing wand. If they can't use it themselves, it's lent to someone else in the party to use on them. Because the alternative is that every party needs SOMEBODY to suck it up and play a dedicated healer. Yes, I've seen some people choose to make dedicated healers (mostly oracles), but that's not something that should be forced on anyone.

So if this is implemented, some other viable form of healing that anyone in the party can do without building for it must also be implemented.

If it's limited to non-consumables... maybe. I've got the same concerns that suddenly every item has a hesitation that it'll prevent you from using some other item later, but with proper planning that part might be manageable.

I have never understood this, if healing is such a big issue why is people wasting gold in CLW wands instead of getting something that gives fast healing? Like Boots of the Earth

People do invest in wands of Infernal Healing as a fast healing alternative. But non-consumable healing like the boots of the earth has been errata'd to not really work. (Can only be activated once per day)

[Gregg Helmberger]

ChibiNyan wrote:

PFS is a thing, where house rules are not allowed. It's pretty important to the devs that this game mode works as desired by them right out of the box. It's also where the CLW Wand issue was seen the most.

To be clear, I was referring to a game rule, not a house rule. If Mona simply can't abide the existence of CLW wands he can make a rule that there are no CLW wands, or any healing wands for that matter. Yes it's illogical and an exception to the way magic is supposed to work for the sake of one man's pet peeve, but Resonance is a much bigger and more intrusive one.

[edduardco]

thistledown wrote:

edduardco wrote:

thistledown wrote:

I think it's a terrible idea. The only pathfinder I do is PFS, and everyone is expected to spend their first prestige to buy some kind of healing wand. If they can't use it themselves, it's lent to someone else in the party to use on them. Because the alternative is that every party needs SOMEBODY to suck it up and play a dedicated healer. Yes, I've seen some people choose to make dedicated healers (mostly oracles), but that's not something that should be forced on anyone.

So if this is implemented, some other viable form of healing that anyone in the party can do without building for it must also be implemented.

If it's limited to non-consumables... maybe. I've got the same concerns that suddenly every item has a hesitation that it'll prevent you from using some other item later, but with proper planning that part might be manageable.

I have never understood this, if healing is such a big issue why is people wasting gold in CLW wands instead of getting something that gives fast healing? Like Boots of the Earth

People do invest in wands of Infernal Healing as a fast healing alternative. But none consumable healing like the boots of the earth has been errata'd to not really work. (Can only be activated once per day)

Didn't know about the errata, what a bummer

[Gregg Helmberger]

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

[Angel Hunter D]

yeah, Resonance has serious item and PFS economy issues from what we've seen and just makes it sound like everyone needs to work like an Occultist with less cool stuff.

[edduardco]

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

I still think that the people saying that a healbot is going to be mandatory are getting ahead of themselves, we don't know what other changes magic items are getting, or what other abilities can affect Resonance.

[Delnoro82]

Wheldrake wrote:

rooneg wrote:

I agree that it's really unclear how Resonance should work with Potions and Scrolls. They just don't feel like they're in the same league as other items, and you can curb abuse by managing their price if necessary.

As for wands, one thing that jumps out at me is that by virtue of this even existing it radically changes the whole "you're responsible for your own healing" attitude in PFS. If you can't hand a wand off to the friendly neighborhood "person who can actually activate it" and expect them to actually have Resonance remaining to fire a charge off when you need it, then characters without the ability to use healing items are going to be in some trouble.

Potions and scrolls could have different effects without resonance and with resonance: minimum effect/CL without resonance and maximized or at CL=character level with resonance investment.

I just wrote a rather lengthy post suggesting several ways to finesse the suggested resonance investment mechanic so I won't repeat it all here. But there are ways to improve the mechanic we have only glimpsed so far.

This I like. I will be sure to check out your other post.

[MadScientistWorking]

Hythlodeus wrote:

QuidEst wrote:

Hythlodeus wrote:

Arakasius wrote:

CLW spamming is an abomination that prevents this game from ever being streamed online. It needs to die.

but who the hell even does that? it seems ineffective and time consuming. also, as GM, just restrict access to wands of CLW and the problem is solved. no need to 4E the s*@# out of PF

I kind of assumed everyone did that? Lots of my games involve picking up a wand of CLW and using that to top up health any time we need to avoid spending spells. It’s almost always one of the first purchases groups I’m in make, and several guides say something like, “healing is meaningless because you only need to be able to use a wand of CLW.” It’s the most cost-effective healing there is if you don’t have a Cleric.

and as soon as wands of CMN or wands of CSW are in the cards, no one thinks twice about CLW anymore, so it is not like a bunch of 14th level characters are jerking their wands in a circle for hours of gameplay.

And as you said yourself, these wands are a way to play without dedicated healer (which can happen sometimes), so it's in itself a solution to a problem

Actually with the way that the Wands work in PFS CLW wands are always the best way to go. Its one of the stupider aspects of the game that you apparently never noticed but its just cheaper to spam CLW.

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

KingOfAnything wrote:

That's a really limited view of what charisma represents.

Even if Charisma means other things (which it may or may not -- I've never seen a logical explanation for how it does something other than that that wouldn't logically be better covered by Wisdom), it *still* has the effect of making likable people able to use magic items more often. From an in-game viewpoint, what's the relationship?

Let's define it as "force of personality" instead of likability. It still doesn't explain why a magic item works more often for person with more magnetism than it does for someone else. If a magic item works more often on A than B, why don't spells? Or supernatural abilities? Isn't magic magic? Is the magic that powers items some fundamentally different type of force than the magic that powers spells or supernatural abilities? If so, that opens up a whole other kettle of fish. If not, the spellcasting for everyone, not just bards and sorcerers (of the new core classes) should be contingent upon it, as should supernatural abilities. And items themselves should be variable based on the Charisma of the maker -- after all, Charisma should determine how much magic the maker can infuse into an item.

None of these questions had to be asked before Resonance.

Actually it did. Charisma was always tied into activating magic items.

[Benjamin Medrano]

Personally, I initially disliked resonance. Now I like it. I think it's more elegant on the whole.

I don't want it to apply to potions, though. Everything else? Sure. But not potions.

[Kalindlara]

thistledown wrote:

The only pathfinder I do is PFS, and everyone is expected to spend their first prestige to buy some kind of healing wand.

Oh yes, that. Personally, I'll consider it a point in resonance's favor if Pathfinder Society players are no longer being pressured into spending their Prestige Points the community-mandated way.

[PossibleCabbage]

I'm honestly kind of concerned how many posts have been made in this thread since a lot is subject to change once we're able to see the mechanic in light of the whole of the rules.

After all, it's entirely possible that "Cure Light Wounds" and wands/potions of such is more powerful in PF2, so you need fewer casts of it.

It's likewise also possible that people will need less healing than they did in PF1- shields work like DR now and everybody has a strong incentive to keep their armor class up.

Perhaps there will be feats that a player can invest in if they very much want to be good at using magic items that make resonance a non-factor.

It's kind of a bad idea to draw up battle lines before we can actually read the rules. It's a long haul until August and let's try to keep an open mind until then. Once you've read the whole thing and ran some games with it, by all means cut loose.

[Stone Dog]

+1 for the fact that Charisma has been the stat for pushing magic around with raw mental force since 3.0. Sorcerers and UMD alike. I'm fine with the stat being more than just likability and being fun. If you take Wis as mental Con, then Cha is mental Str.

[KingOfAnything]

As it is in Pathfinder, finding a potion of cure serious is not any more exciting than a few potions of cure light wounds. They are both just a few charges saved from a wand, and are often overlooked. I like that resonance makes finding higher level potions much more exciting.

[Wei Ji the Learner]

Dαedαlus wrote:

Here's another side effect of potions using resonance (that's the only thing I know for sure has to go, so that's what I'm pushing for strongest. Everything else, we'll wait and see):

Imagine the scenario:
In a climactic fight with a dragon, a fairly unpopular commoner, fleeing the fight, was struck by a collapsing building and is bleeding out on the ground. The fighter, wanting to help the commoner, rushes over, fumbling for his emergency potion. He pours it down the throat of the dying man.... and it does nothing. The poor guy, level 1 with a -1 CHA modifier, has no resonance points, and fails the coin toss for the potion to work. He dies anticlimactically.

Oh, and not only that, but the healing resource was completely wasted and out of game the entire table is yelling at the player for wasting the resource -- how dare they take the party's health on the line over the health of some random slob.

[Laurial]

I like that Resonance will create a unified system for tracking magic item use instead of every item having a x/day to track. I also think it will encourage more thoughtful magic item usage, and hopefully allows me to use my favorite magic items more often instead of "just" 1-3x/day. We definitely need to see how magic items and consumables will be changing in 2e to see if the potion problem will actually be a problem, but so far I'm looking forward to seeing how it works in the playtest. For example, the difference between an item that is being wielded vs worn that the devs brought up but didn't really elaborate on. Does that mean offensive magic consumables like fireball wands/scrolls don't count toward Resonance?

Does anyone know what the next blog post will be about? Hopefully it's on Resonance & magic items!

[Wei Ji the Learner]

I'm hoping it's on *redacted* class.

Because that would tie into Resonance if suddenly folks aren't playing *redacted* class because of *redacted*

[Angel Hunter D]

edduardco wrote:

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

I still think that the people saying that a healbot is going to be mandatory are getting ahead of themselves, we don't know what other changes magic items are getting, or what other abilities can affect Resonance.

We aren't getting ahead of ourselves. If we aren't supposed to analyze don't put it in front of us.

[M1k31]

It seems to me that the best ways to fix Resonance(assuming no other rules change it enough to fix the issues) with regard to single use items would be to either:

1. Take potions off the list.

2. Potions used after resonance is 0 affect the user based on a "minimum effect" system(like saves affect certain spells when they can't reduce the effect entirely), so for things like poison you are never unaffected, while healing does a straight stabilize + 1 hp.

3. Potions use a different resonance style system based on the imbibers Con + level unaffected by regular resonance.

[Starbuck_II]

Dαedαlus wrote:

Here's another side effect of potions using resonance (that's the only thing I know for sure has to go, so that's what I'm pushing for strongest. Everything else, we'll wait and see):

Imagine the scenario:
In a climactic fight with a dragon, a fairly unpopular commoner, fleeing the fight, was struck by a collapsing building and is bleeding out on the ground. The fighter, wanting to help the commoner, rushes over, fumbling for his emergency potion. He pours it down the throat of the dying man.... and it does nothing. The poor guy, level 1 with a -1 CHA modifier, has no resonance points, and fails the coin toss for the potion to work. He dies anticlimactically.

Actually, that is pretty climatical. It would be no worse than failing a heal skill check.

I think it is level + Cha mod (minimum 0), but maybe it is possible to have negative.

[KingOfAnything]

Angel Hunter D wrote:

edduardco wrote:

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

I still think that the people saying that a healbot is going to be mandatory are getting ahead of themselves, we don't know what other changes magic items are getting, or what other abilities can affect Resonance.

We aren't getting ahead of ourselves. If we aren't supposed to analyze don't put it in front of us.

Instead of assuming a system is broken from our limited preview, let's predict which systems they came up with to make it work well in the game.

[The Dandy Lion]

I like the concept of resonance quite a bit, but I am dubious of its scaling. At low levels, scrolls are a huge part of caster life - we'll have to see how the new cantrips are, I guess.

All I really know is that we have way, way, way too little info to make any judgement on the mechanic just yet.

Also, resonance is making me wonder if we'll see offensive items with actually reasonable DCs as a result of this. Fingers crossed.

[edduardco]

The Dandy Lion wrote:

Also, resonance is making me wonder if we'll see offensive items with actually reasonable DCs as a result of this. Fingers crossed.

Good point, maybe now all items will function similar to staffs, using your CL and ability modifier for DCs, it would make sense given that Resonance gives the impression that characters are investing a part of themselves when activating magic items.

[DM Livgin]

A lot of shooter video games moved away from fixed non-regenerating life pools and changed to quickly regenerating life pools. This is a good parallel to the cure light wounds wand spam. (A good video by Mark Brown on this here.)

A big reason video game designers did this was to make encounter design easier. This way when designing individual encounters, the players enter on a more even playing field and the difficulty can be fine tuned for players with full life. This is not necessarily bad, but it is a design choice that affects how much a days encounters influence later encounters (bad luck creating a death spiral, or early luck making later fights easier).

Applying resonance to healing options is a move in the other direction, a way to connect the difficulty of the day's encounters more strongly. This is great for manipulating the theme of your game; taking a beating is not something that can be shrugged of by a dozen charges on a weak wand. This reduces the staying power of martial characters, moving them toward the limited firepower of casters (I think this is good, not because it is anti-martial but because it even things out and makes encounter design easier. At low levels you don't want too many pure casters right now because someone actually has to carry the party). I wonder if this will make magic item design easier to balance. This pairs well with the shield hardness ability. This makes traps an even more effective healing tax.

I'm concerned this is a bad move because; Encounter design for published material is now more difficult to balance correctly (I play PFS where it feels that every encounter is balanced to assume everyone has a cure light wounds wand). Reducing the staying power of martials is taking away nice things (but adventure design that puts a low level caster through 40 rounds of combat without rest might be be poor design. PFS Specials, I'll looking at you). It limits the design space of HP sponge character builds.

[Knight Magenta]

I like resonance more then item slots. But I dislike it as a universal pool. Resource pools have become very common in PF because they make book keeping easy, but there is a Design trap here. When multiple abilities all key off a single resource pool, they must have a similar power level. Otherwise, you are forced to save your pool to only use it for the most powerful ability.

Consider the monk. Ki can be used for a bunch of stuff, but the extra attack is by far the most powerful. So if you wrote a ki power that let the monk cast detect magic, it would never be taken. However, that seems like a neat power for a certain flavor of monk.

I think pigeonholing all magic items to the same level of power is boring and will contribute to the current situation where 80% of magic items are not given a second look.

[Covent]

KingOfAnything wrote:

Angel Hunter D wrote:

edduardco wrote:

Gregg Helmberger wrote:

And obviously people are right when they say that Resonance makes a healbot more necessary than ever. Unless, that is, we're going to see a 4E-style system of self-healing, or that system as adapted by 5e. Which, you know, they're totally not copying 5e so it can't be that.

I still think that the people saying that a healbot is going to be mandatory are getting ahead of themselves, we don't know what other changes magic items are getting, or what other abilities can affect Resonance.

We aren't getting ahead of ourselves. If we aren't supposed to analyze don't put it in front of us.

Instead of assuming a system is broken from our limited preview, let's predict which systems they came up with to make it work well in the game.

If the resonance system is as described, to combat the needed healer problem, the "Well I know the town is in danger but we are out of resonance and no one has any healing spells, as we all played martials/arcane casters so lets rest" issue, or the "But I don't want to use my cool powers to patch up Bob, I want to use them to be a raging engine of divine justice" problem I would recommend making healing more easily available via the heal skill, short rests, or meditation. Something like this, available to all classes, would be needed.

To combat the "sell all consumables as who has spare resonance for those" problem I would make resonance not apply to potions/scrolls and change wands and similar wondrous items to simply use one resonance per use but not have charges. This would mean the main difference between wands and staffs could be, due to the announced spell scaling changes, that wands use a DC based on the minimum DC for the wand and staves use your DC.

Also since HP is going up and apparently the amount healed from potions is going down, the ratio of damage to health to healing will need to be very tightly scrutinized.

This does create the issue that potions/scrolls become more desirable as they do not use resonance, but their cost would be GP and actions and could be tuned to the new PF2 WBL system. They are already changing costs of everything as shown by the iconic fighters purchases with his 15 starting GP.

When you get down to it however resonance actually makes the "Big 6/Best items only" issue worse. Now you do not have room for fun or fluff items or utility items until you have all of your +X items accounted for with resonance. Depending on how may they leave in the game this could be levels 5+ or levels 8+ for non charisma based characters.

This also makes martials more MAD as now you need Str, Dex, Con, Wis, Chr. Maybe things are different in PF2 and you don't need Dex for a Str martial at all or you don't need Wis for saves anymore, but at this point we do not know and it is a concern.

In short resonance needs substantial changes as does WBL, healing, HP, how all magic items work, MAD issues, and others I surely missed.

[ericthecleric]

Perhaps the reason that resonance is tied to Charisma is as follows:
Friendship Is Magic! So the more likeable you are, the more friends you have, and the more magic you can use!

;)

[Dragon78]

Well charisma is the stat for Use Magic Device.

I am not a fan of this mechanic at all especially for consumable items like potions and scrolls.

[KingOfAnything]

Covent wrote:

the "But I don't want to use my cool powers to patch up Bob, I want to use them to be a raging engine of divine justice" problem

This, at least, is addressed by making healing a separate pool from other spells.

[Darksol the Painbringer]

Yeah, resonance as it stands wouldn't work for us, but using it as a limiter on accessing a given charged item would both solve the CLW wand debacle and avoid the stepping on other magic items' toes.

[RumpinRufus]

Knight Magenta wrote:

will contribute to the current situation where 80% of magic items are not given a second look.

I think this is a serious problem.

KingOfAnything wrote:

As it is in Pathfinder, finding a potion of cure serious is not any more exciting than a few potions of cure light wounds. They are both just a few charges saved from a wand, and are often overlooked. I like that resonance makes finding higher level potions much more exciting.

This is not my experience at all. Potions of Cure Serious are used for in-combat healing and are tremendously valuable and sought-after.