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And if you do implement rules for social encounters you get the backlash like for Ultimate Intrigue ('why do we have to have rules for roleplaying')
Of course some things were good with 4e. And I acknowledged the fact that 3E is far from being the most roleplay rpg. But I really like the comparaison with Descent. Maybe it was the DM not immersive enough, or myself who was not in the right state of mind for this game. They even have video games mechanics like taunt. And far less utility than in 3E outside of combat. Having classes like Bard or Alchemist encourage roleplay because players got to invent songs or play mad scientist.
My point is that I hope they use some mechanics in PF2 to increase the immersion and possibility outside your class feats.
And as for « discussions » rules it feels always inadequate. What I do when I GM is to give a bonus depending on what the character told me if it fits with the situation on a social skill. Then he make his roll, unless he was so convincing that a roll is not needed. But if he did not said something of value he still got his test without malus or bonus. Because maybe his character is more proficient at talking than the player himself.
So far it worked Well.
4e was a boardgame, not a role playing game. Every time I played it I felt like I was raiding on World of Warcraft. That Marking was utterly nonsense roleplay wise. There was no roleplay at all, and the system was very immersion breaking.Speaking as a non-fan of 4E: This is categorically false. It is indeed a roleplaying game. Heck, it has about as much support for noncombat abilities and stuff as 3E did. Which is to say: not much. That was one of my biggest gripes with it: not enough static powers or at-wills related to out-of-combat stuff, which was a missed opportunity.
The rules don't ever force or rule roleplaying, and it was indeed a roleplaying game. Says so right on it. You had a character who leveled up, adventured, and participated in fantasy stories. It may not be your cup of tea, but the whole "board game" thing was and still is absolute nonsense. It was scarcely more dependent on the map and minis than its predecessor. It has as many rules that had to do with roleplaying as 3E: none.
If you want to argue 4E's flaws, argue the flaws themselves. Don't try repeating the same tired statements proven to be patently false over and over. And again, I say this as someone who didn't care for 4E.
PF2 looks like they're taking some of the concepts from 4E and running with them in a far better execution.
I played only one D&D 4E character, a paladin named Gardain. The system did not feel like a boardgame. However, Gardain felt more like a collection of class abilities than a fictional character until I had done a few actions--"Gardain stands in the fire to get close enough to evil cleric to cast a spell."--that felt in character rather than mechanical. My Pathfinder characters start feeling like fictional people when I pencil in their decisions on their character sheet.
Most of the roleplaying support for Pathfinder is in the modules and the splatbooks such as Pathfinder Player Companion: People of the North. Roleplaying requires NPCs with backgrounds and concerns. I also used the downtime rules out of Ultimate Campaign when party members wanted to set up businesses.
The measure of support for roleplaying is how much the roleplaying can affect the game. A character could love drinking and gambling in a tavern, but if doing so never leads to new contacts or change in wealth from winning or losing, then the system does not support roleplaying in taverns. In Jade Regent my PCs made political deals with powerful evil NPCs rather than defeating those NPCs, because the party's goal was political power. Pathfinder roleplaying allowed that.
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I'm just saying that in my experience it wasn't shown, or sold as a role playing game. That with all these little extras that came in the demo box it seemed it be combat first and foremost.
It's a role playing game yes. But from my end it looked like and played like a skirmish game or one of those bored games that plays like a roleplaying game. And I don't think I feel I can shake that built in stigma of it now
And again, it's probably due to first impression and bad demos along with my own head. It is a roleplaying game but to me it's this werid combat game where you can roleplay.
This is all confusing and I probably shouldn't have said anything, I'm going around in circles now.
Well, now, see, that makes a little more sense. In my experience, it was shown as a roleplaying game, but the focus was squarely on combat stuff. Of course, so it was in 3E as well. And I didn't really care for its powers and stuff. So I get that. I guess all I can really say is be careful with loaded terms like "It isn't a roleplaying game" or "4E is an MMO!" Trust me, 4E wasn't my jam, either, but it did have some good concepts, even if the execution was lacking.
The latter amuses me because it misses something obvious. Those MMOs were inspired by D&D in the first place, and it came full circle by taking a few elements from the very games it inspired.
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I wouldn't go that far. But, the 3e engine does have its share of problems. Magic item Christmas tree/Big Six, class imbalance across levels, wands of CLW, and so on. So both 4e and PF2 are trying to improve on the same base, and the designers likely identify a lot of the same problems. They will probably not come up with the same solutions in all cases, but they likely will in some.
This is well-put and really cuts to the heart of the issue, I think. The designers aren't necessarily copying 4E or even 5E. What they're doing is identifying and coming up with solutions to a lot of the issues present in 3.x/PF, as Wizards did with 4E, and so there may be some similarities at times. Same goal, different methods.
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Two of the major reasons I abandoned D&D 4e and switched to Pathfinder were automatic no choice skill advancement of everything, and NPC construction being different than PC construction. Based on what we've seen so far, I am at this stage concerned that PF2e is going to be enough like D&D4e that it will be a game I'm not interested in playing.
I will get the playtest document and I will give it a chance, but right now color me concerned.
D&D4e was an attempt to fix all the perceived balance and math problems of D&D3.5, so considering that Pathfinder carried many of theses issues over from 3.5, it makes sense that they would end up in some parallel places when trying to "correct" them. I think one of the issues D&D4e had was that, actually, players didn't want these things "fixed" as much as the loudest voices seemed to clamor for - and also, these fixes went too far in the name of balance at all costs. That's why D&D4e had accusations of classes being essentially "samey," because they had a much tighter mathematical balance. I find that level of balance boring to play, personally. I prefer carefully constructed imbalance so that each class has moments to shine and moments where they are less effective.
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It’s not 5e. You get to make meaningful choices every level. Level is more meaningful, rather than less.
It’s not 4e. There’s Vancian casting and resource pools, as well as passive class features. You can also pick whatever skills you want, and you get more as you level.
PF2 also has some unique stuff. All classes get customization and features. Feats for skills and your ancestry no longer compete with other feats.
Save that skills now have nobody who isn’t great at everything.
It’s not 5e. You get to make meaningful choices every level. Level is more meaningful, rather than less.
It’s not 4e. There’s Vancian casting and resource pools, as well as passive class features. You can also pick whatever skills you want, and you get more as you level.
PF2 also has some unique stuff. All classes get customization and features. Feats for skills and your ancestry no longer compete with other feats.
Sure, PF2 isn't 4e - it is Pathfinder 2. I wasn't wondering whether PF2 will be a clone or copy of 4e, but rather if 4e fans would see it as a spiritual successor. In other words, given the chance, could 4e fans like me - trying to create a better sequel to 4e - plausibly end up creating Pathfinder 2.
For example, I suspect that if I had been designing 4th Edition part 2, I would have re-instituted spell slots and the 9 levels of spells, while also increasing the number of passive class features and resource pools. In fact, this philosophy seemed to be the sentiment of 4e fans on EN World during the D&D Next playtest. Unfortunately, perhaps the 4e fan's biggest fear - lack of meaningful options at each character level - ended up being possibly 5e's greatest weakness.
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But they shouldn’t be better at those things than a trained individual.
The game that was effectively a slight rewrite of an older game had more non-combat abilities than a game that completely overhauled non-combat abilities......4e was a boardgame, not a role playing game. Every time I played it I felt like I was raiding on World of Warcraft. That Marking was utterly nonsense roleplay wise. There was no roleplay at all, and the system was very immersion breaking.Speaking as a non-fan of 4E: This is categorically false. It is indeed a roleplaying game. Heck, it has about as much support for noncombat abilities and stuff as 3E did. Which is to say: not much. That was one of my biggest gripes with it: not enough static powers or at-wills related to out-of-combat stuff, which was a missed opportunity.This is completely incorrect.
Open the 4e PHB. Count the number of non-combat abilities.
Open the Pathfinder CRB to the Spells section alone. Count the number of non-combat abilities.
I'm just saying that in my experience it wasn't shown, or sold as a role playing game. That with all these little extras that came in the demo box it seemed it be combat first and foremost.
That's not true because the whole marketing campaign revolved around role playing.
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Funny, everything I've seen suggests that PF2 is trying hard to be a remake of 5e rather than an update to PF1.PF2 isn't a spiritual successor to 4E, it's a mashup of 4E and 5E attempting to distance itself as far from PF1 as possible.Everything I have seen so far indicates that PF2 is still going to be closer to PF1 than either D&D 4e or 5e.
As for me, I’m liking most of what I see, a couple of things I see I don’t like (the max hit points each level, still a little dubious on resonance, but hopeful), but I really look forward to seeing the whole elephant come August so I can weigh in.
If at some point they released a piece that didn’t resemble one of those two ...
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Good options to actually tank are something I'd love to see in PF2. In PF1 it requires a couple specific builds with a decent amount of investment, I'd like it to be a lot easier to pull off this time, but not necessarily tied to or forced on specific classes.
Might be. I stopped playing 4e right before PH3 I think. I don't remember barbarins having any mark when I GMed 4e, but you are right anyways, what I meant was not that fighters/paladins/swordmages had the ability to mark, but that they had the ability to punish said marked character, and that imposed penalties to marked characters so they had to focus aggro on them.
I will never be opposed to good options.
I did not like how 4e tied those mechanics to classes. I felt it pigeonholed the classes too much. A feat to somewhat "mark" your target is a better solution, in my opinion, that a built-in mark trigger in some classes.
For example, I'd like to have the option to build ranged fighters, or swordmages that are strikerish instead of tanks, or controllish. I like to have the option to build a muscle-mage that fights in melee, and so on. Some classes wil naturally gravitate toward certain roles (a cleric will normally make a better "support" than "controller", with a wizard being the opposite), but I didn't like the way 4e told you "you are a wizard. This is your job in the game, and you can select different kinds of powers for that, but that's your job".
I had other issues with 4e too (the way combat worked, made it too sluggish, the strong emphasis in squares and grids, and the way magic items were handled, for example. Specially magic item crafting). However, it did have things I liked, and still like when I find the same concepts in other rules (like Unchained, for example). The reduced skill list. The fact that it recognizes level as a fundamental part of character power. Streamlining of rules. The use of keywords. A focus on a tight math (Although 4e then fumbled the execution of said math, and had to add "math fixing feat taxes"). The different way of building monsters. There is a lot of stuff in 4e that could be great, with a different execution.
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the ruleset of dnd 4e was not bad persay... though what they did to the FR was a big turn off... and not just to me.
that is all I will say.
Edit: do not reply to my post, even more so if you think it may cause bickering
Per se, not persay (Latin)
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So PF2 seems to go with an approach where you choose from different class abilities each level rather than having a fixed progression, and because that is a marginal similarity on this VERY SUPERFICIAL level that makes it just like 4e?
I don't think that's an apt comparison until we see that literally all of these abilities are active use abilities that you have to choose to use in lieu of other abilities. Because that is how 4e class powers work. You choose one to use and use it very much like a spell, except that you can do some at will, some once per encounter and some once per day.
And I heavily doubt that. I think many of them will have static bonuses, additional reactions, alterations to the character's action economy, effects they can add to other actions like for example attacks (perhaps even multiple ones) and so on.
Add to this that in 4e magic was baked into these class powers while PF2 is retaining its basic casting system.
Building the characters may be similar, but i think playing them will be an entirely different glass of water.
Building the characters may be similar, but i think playing them will be an entirely different glass of water.
In Hero the change from 3rd Champions to 4th Hero and 5th Hero to 6E Hero had some major changes to how a character was built. The play at the table still felt very very similar.
I expect that will be the case with PF2. Characters will be build diferently, and the action economy may change and we call BAB a skill, but the actual flow of the game will still very much Pathfinder.
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As long as it does not have floating, treadmill DCs, which make the campaign world UNSTABLE and LACK VERISIMILITUDE, it will be fine. Both 4E and 5E (to a certain extent) suffer from this, making in-game stats have unstable values in interacting with the world.I am not a 5e expert, but I am pretty sure it does not have that problem. I am something of 1 4e expert, and it definitely doesn't.
An oak tree is still an oak tree in 4e too.
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glass.
4e has rules.
5e has difficulty DCs. It does not tell you what DC climbing a tree is. It is up to the DM to determine if the tree is of "medium" difficulty to climb.
5e gives no context to this difficulty. "Medium" for the person attempting? Medium for their level? Or just "Medium" in a game/world sense. Regardless, difficulty is not defined in physical in-universe or even in-game terms. It is purely a DM gut check. Your DM's feelings comprises the entirety of Skill DCs outside of opposed rolls.
So I don't understand comparing the 5e skill system to anything. It's function depends entirely on the DM.
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Higher level characters will be okay at everything is not the same as everyone is great at everything.
OF 1st ed characters "suck" at all untrained skills. OF 2nd ed characters wont. What is the phrasing to say "Not suck" that won't cause responses of "untrained characters aren't <insert descriptor here>, you clearly don't understand the 2nd ed philosophy"? Because getting that spiel every time someone tries to point out 2nd ed characters are going to be more trained in EVERYTHING than 1st ed characters is getting really tiresome.
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4e has rules.
5e has difficulty DCs. It does not tell you what DC climbing a tree is. It is up to the DM to determine if the tree is of "medium" difficulty to climb.
5e gives no context to this difficulty. "Medium" for the person attempting? Medium for their level? Or just "Medium" in a game/world sense. Regardless, difficulty is not defined in physical in-universe or even in-game terms. It is purely a DM gut check. Your DM's feelings comprises the entirety of Skill DCs outside of opposed rolls.
So I don't understand comparing the 5e skill system to anything. It's function depends entirely on the DM.
I'll be honest, I think that's a distinction without a difference. If I, as the GM, want a tree to be harder to climb, I will describe it in a way that indicates it's harder to climb (It's a baobab not an oak, it's rotten in places, it's haunted, etc.) What determines the difficulty of climbing the tree is still "how hard I feel it should be to climb" which will always be the case because the tree does not exist until the GM puts it there and the players don't know anything about the tree save for what the GM tells them.
I mean, it would be weirder if all oak trees were exactly as hard to climb as all other oak trees. I mean, if someone asks "how hard would it be to climb that tree" I guarantee my initial response would be "not very" or "a little tough" or something else qualitative not "the DC is x".
There may well be some convergent evolution, since they are trying to solve a lot of the same problems that the 4e designers were trying to solve. I suspect that PF2 will make significant improvements in usability and balance of PF1 while remaining its own thing.That said, if they did have 4e-esque things like significant martial healing, that would be fine by me.
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glass.
Not may will. No one has noticed this and it makes the whole 4th edition toxic rhetoric that more sad
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As long as it does not have floating, treadmill DCs, which make the campaign world UNSTABLE and LACK VERISIMILITUDE, it will be fine. Both 4E and 5E (to a certain extent) suffer from this, making in-game stats have unstable values in interacting with the world.I am not a 5e expert, but I am pretty sure it does not have that problem. I am something of 1 4e expert, and it definitely doesn't.
An oak tree is still an oak tree in 4e too.
_
glass.
4e has rules.
5e has difficulty DCs. It does not tell you what DC climbing a tree is. It is up to the DM to determine if the tree is of "medium" difficulty to climb.
5e gives no context to this difficulty. "Medium" for the person attempting? Medium for their level? Or just "Medium" in a game/world sense. Regardless, difficulty is not defined in physical in-universe or even in-game terms. It is purely a DM gut check. Your DM's feelings comprises the entirety of Skill DCs outside of opposed rolls.
So I don't understand comparing the 5e skill system to anything. It's function depends entirely on the DM.
The sample DCs given in 5e are not relative to character level. If you have the basic understanding that the untrained person has no proficiency bonus and an ability score around +1, and also that characters naturally progress in their abilities through the levels, via proficiency bonus and ability score increases, these are fairly easily understood as absolute values.
DC 5 "Very Easy" is something that most people succeed at most of the time.
DC 10 "Easy" is a task that untrained people can reliably accomplish as long as they have some aptitude (i.e. a good relevant ability score)
DC 15 "Medium" requires training and aptitude to complete reliably
DC 20 "Hard" is difficult to accomplish even for people who are trained in the task.
DC 25 "Very Hard" will require someone with extensive training to realistically achieve
DC 30 "Nearly Impossible" is a task that few have ever accomplished at all.
I agree that the way the rules are written does not make this clear enough and a short explanation like i have given just now would go a long way though.
Given that the entire position your describing isn't actually based on any facts as nobody has seen the rules yet and only glimpses of the pre-playtest rules haven been made public. The argument is based on something you assume and well ass u me...
I don't think that's really fair to say. We had a blog on proficiency bonus. High-level characters really do have a higher bonus than low level trained characters. Those are confirmed now, and it seems pretty reasonable to have an opinion on that, even if there will be other factors at play. While personally, I think those other factors sound like they'll be enough, that's also speculation and well into my own opinion.
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That's why D&D4e had accusations of classes being essentially "samey," because they had a much tighter mathematical balance.
I have a pretty distinct impression this is wrong. I don't see people objecting to the math of 4e making it feel samey as the nature of abilities. All the classes utilizing pretty similar mechanics to kill things dead, and a lack of focus on non-combat powers and abilities. I could be wrong about that, but Pathfinder seems to have a lot more ways to build and operate a character. Resource management, utility, combat paradigms, and spell versatility seem to be marks in PF's favor.
I did not like how 4e tied those mechanics to classes. I felt it pigeonholed the classes too much. A feat to somewhat "mark" your target is a better solution, in my opinion, that a built-in mark trigger in some classes.
I'm with you there.
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That's why D&D4e had accusations of classes being essentially "samey," because they had a much tighter mathematical balance.I have a pretty distinct impression this is wrong. I don't see people objecting to the math of 4e making it feel samey as the nature of abilities. All the classes utilizing pretty similar mechanics to kill things dead, and a lack of focus on non-combat powers and abilities. I could be wrong about that, but Pathfinder seems to have a lot more ways to build and operate a character. Resource management, utility, combat paradigms, and spell versatility seem to be marks in PF's favor.
The point I was trying to convey was that the reason all the classes got similar abilities at the same level was to tighten the math. If you have a striker at level X, they need to average DPR Y with their daily powers, so every striker must have a daily power that can hit that target. Repeat for every other power - oh, and you can't include too much stuff that doesn't do damage, because that could lead to unforeseen imbalances. Now no one is special.
The point I was trying to convey was that the reason all the classes got similar abilities at the same level was to tighten the math. If you have a striker at level X, they need to average DPR Y with their daily powers, so every striker must have a daily power that can hit that target. Repeat for every other power - oh, and you can't include too much stuff that doesn't do damage, because that could lead to unforeseen imbalances. Now no one is special.That's why D&D4e had accusations of classes being essentially "samey," because they had a much tighter mathematical balance.I have a pretty distinct impression this is wrong. I don't see people objecting to the math of 4e making it feel samey as the nature of abilities. All the classes utilizing pretty similar mechanics to kill things dead, and a lack of focus on non-combat powers and abilities. I could be wrong about that, but Pathfinder seems to have a lot more ways to build and operate a character. Resource management, utility, combat paradigms, and spell versatility seem to be marks in PF's favor.
Well no because each class had a secondary role which was readily evident in how it changed mechanics. Also, as I said earlier utility abilities that people claimed were missing was there at the start and castable by all the classes.
So PF2 seems to go with an approach where you choose from different class abilities each level rather than having a fixed progression, and because that is a marginal similarity on this VERY SUPERFICIAL level that makes it just like 4e?
I don't think that's an apt comparison until we see that literally all of these abilities are active use abilities that you have to choose to use in lieu of other abilities. Because that is how 4e class powers work. You choose one to use and use it very much like a spell, except that you can do some at will, some once per encounter and some once per day.
And I heavily doubt that. I think many of them will have static bonuses, additional reactions, alterations to the character's action economy, effects they can add to other actions like for example attacks (perhaps even multiple ones) and so on.
Add to this that in 4e magic was baked into these class powers while PF2 is retaining its basic casting system.
Building the characters may be similar, but i think playing them will be an entirely different glass of water.
Based on the fighter preview, and assuming that other classes get powers similar but distinct from Sudden Charge, Whirlwind Slice, Double Slice (Twin strike?), Debilitating Shot (which is the exact name of the 4e power that also slows on a hit), then I think that PF2 characters will play very similarly to 4e characters. The fighter even has a special punishment reaction as its level 1 class feature, just like the 4e fighter. Assuming the PF2 fighter gets the option to pick a power that allows him to defend allies (perhaps with his shield), then 4e fans can even build their PF2 fighter to fill the traditional 4e “Defender” role if that is something that they are excited about.
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4e has rules.
5e has difficulty DCs. It does not tell you what DC climbing a tree is. It is up to the DM to determine if the tree is of "medium" difficulty to climb.
5e gives no context to this difficulty. "Medium" for the person attempting? Medium for their level? Or just "Medium" in a game/world sense. Regardless, difficulty is not defined in physical in-universe or even in-game terms. It is purely a DM gut check. Your DM's feelings comprises the entirety of Skill DCs outside of opposed rolls.
So I don't understand comparing the 5e skill system to anything. It's function depends entirely on the DM.
I'll be honest, I think that's a distinction without a difference. If I, as the GM, want a tree to be harder to climb, I will describe it in a way that indicates it's harder to climb (It's a baobab not an oak, it's rotten in places, it's haunted, etc.) What determines the difficulty of climbing the tree is still "how hard I feel it should be to climb" which will always be the case because the tree does not exist until the GM puts it there and the players don't know anything about the tree save for what the GM tells them.
I mean, it would be weirder if all oak trees were exactly as hard to climb as all other oak trees. I mean, if someone asks "how hard would it be to climb that tree" I guarantee my initial response would be "not very" or "a little tough" or something else qualitative not "the DC is x".
When I GM, things just are. My setting of difficulty happens before the session.
So if the players want to interact with an object that I didn't plan around, I prefer the rules providing a DC not my gut.
I prefer when the players surprise me. If I'm always making up DCs on the fly, I'm always controlling the players, which bores me.
So I don't place "medium trees", I place a tree and the DC can be determined by the descriptions in the climb skill table.
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Based on the fighter preview, and assuming that other classes get powers similar but distinct from Sudden Charge, Whirlwind Slice, Double Slice (Twin strike?), Debilitating Shot (which is the exact name of the 4e power that also slows on a hit), then I think that PF2 characters will play very similarly to 4e characters. The fighter even has a special punishment reaction as its level 1 class feature, just like the 4e fighter. Assuming the PF2 fighter gets the option to pick a power that allows him to defend allies (perhaps with his shield), then 4e fans can even build their PF2 fighter to fill the traditional 4e “Defender” role if that is something that they are excited about.So PF2 seems to go with an approach where you choose from different class abilities each level rather than having a fixed progression, and because that is a marginal similarity on this VERY SUPERFICIAL level that makes it just like 4e?
I don't think that's an apt comparison until we see that literally all of these abilities are active use abilities that you have to choose to use in lieu of other abilities. Because that is how 4e class powers work. You choose one to use and use it very much like a spell, except that you can do some at will, some once per encounter and some once per day.
And I heavily doubt that. I think many of them will have static bonuses, additional reactions, alterations to the character's action economy, effects they can add to other actions like for example attacks (perhaps even multiple ones) and so on.
Add to this that in 4e magic was baked into these class powers while PF2 is retaining its basic casting system.
Building the characters may be similar, but i think playing them will be an entirely different glass of water.
I disagree. These look just like feats the way they work today.
That special punishment is just an Attack of Opportunity. The only change is that fighters are the only class that gets this automatically while others have to buy it.I still don't see any sign of encounter and daily abilities. And especially no sign of the exact same structure being adopted by all other classes.
I disagree. These look just like feats the way they work today.
That special punishment is just an Attack of Opportunity. The only change is that fighters are the only class that gets this automatically while others have to...
But the 4e powers could have been presented like 3.X feats without changing the way they worked in play. The presentation was part of the feel of 4e, and I was just speculating that the PF2 Class Feat presentation may be nostalgic for those that remember first cracking open the 4e Players’ Handbook. Again the AEDU structure isn’t important to me as a 4e fan, as I was fine with the 4e Essentials evolution where the martial classes encounter and daily powers were removed in favor a series of maneuvers and stances that they could do at-will. The Essentials classes even gained passive class features at higher levels, such as the Rogue (Thief) improved initiative and improvements with rogue weapons received at later levels.
Once again, I’m not saying that PF2 is a clone of 4e. I’m saying that what has been presented so far might have been the natural continued evolution of the system had 5e not tried to distance itself so much from 4e. In other words, it’s entirely possible (and more likely than not from my point of view) that when I first crack open the PF2 Core Rulebook and when I sit down to build my first character and I when I play my first session, that I’ll feel like the spiritual successor to 4e has arrived. My question for everyone else (though I have seemed to have worded it poorly) was whether or not you feel it likely that PF2 will attract all those 4e fans still searching for a spiritual successor to one of their favorite editions.
I take it that your answer is no, they should search elsewhere?
Remains to be seen. The only 4E players I know personally have switched over to 5E. They are not hard core gamers, actually id describe them as causal. They would at least give PF2 a whirl and could probably causally comment on the systems comparisons.
The hardcore 4E players I know online have a great dislike for Paizo for various reasons. They dont seem terribly interested in PF2. Which is, unfortunate, because id like to hear more of their opinions.
Many of the proposed changes thus far remind me more of the Iron Kingdoms RPG and Shadow of the Demon Lord than 4th Ed. I think the designers at Paizo play many games and have seen some innovative ways to do things outside of what d&d has done. Should be interesting to see how Pathfinder 2 fits it all together.
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As far as people talking about DCs and system similarities, I do think the new "4 degrees of success" model makes it very difficult to compare the math for the new system to any existing systems, especially till we get a better sense of how many things have critical successes and failures. While the new edition is going to have some similarities to many games currently in existence, I think it has one major ace in the hole that really has me excited:
There is no other RPG (not even 1E Pathfinder) that is built around the lore and in-depth story that is the world of Golarion. I know that some folks want to be able to strip the mechanical content from the story easily, but I feel like the lore of a RPG world is necessarily dependent upon the mechanics used to portray it and this is a mechanical system being designed to be able to tell the full story of the world I have had the most fun playing on, even going back to Forgotten realms and Dragon Lance.
That gives me a lot of hope, because I think that the story-tellers at Paizo combined with their own system and not a piecemeal system held together with duct tape (albiet a very good duct taped system), are going to result in the most fun adventures, modules and continued world building we have ever seen in a PRG universe.
(to make this post thread topical)
4e introduced some of this fusion of mechanics and story, but never got off the ground. Some of the mechanics were incredible, some were wonky, but I feel like we never got the feel of what 20th level+ characters tied into the setting would feel like in a unique and interesting way. If the new version of Pathfinder ties its mechanics to the world they have built successfully (which I feel like they are doing), then color me very excited for a system that better fits my favorite universe to play in.
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Honestly the only thing I see so far from pathfinder that makes me think 4E is the feats every level which in theory could equal 4E feats plus AEDU powers. That being said, Vancian magic is a part of P2 which never appeared in 4E and classes in 4E have built in abilities where P2 you have to buy those powers, same difference between racial (ancestry) abilities for 4E characters vs the ancestry build options for P2. If you never take an ancestry feat after level 1 in P2 you will look vastly different as a race from a 4E character. Also the monster hit points from the playtest don't seem to carry the 4E bloat.
This is all speculation. The only thing that really is solidly in from 4E is DOMA and I despise it. I have my stake ready to stab that vampire in the heart! Death to DOMA!