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The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?
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Things I expect we won't see changed:
Global proficiency system
Level as a modifier to everything
Every class feature being a class feat
Non scaling spell's
Goblins as PCs
Alchemists in core.
The tone of legendary feats
The way martial attack powers (feats. Whatever you want to call them) are being designed.
Things I expect will be up for tweaking:
Amount of HP dished out per level
Individual feats and spells
Resonance
Critical success/failure system ( tweaked. Not overhauled).
I'd like to be wrong. But I am not very hopeful at this stage.
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I think that the ball is well and truly rolling; they've forked out the cash to get Reynolds to illustrate, they've thunked out the rules and played with them, they have an idea that they think is close to ready for the masses to play with. I don't think the ball could be stopped at this point. (I don't particularly want it to be, either.)
They aren't starting this playtest to decide what their latest system is going to look like; they've already designed the system. They're doing a playtest to make sure that it's balanced and enjoyable to play.
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I think the way one might approach it and reason it is going to matter a lot to if one comes off as angry or belligerent they may find nothing they say is taken into account.
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The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?
I’ve been a fan of Paizo for ten plus a bit years and I can’t think of a company that listens to its fans more consistently and conscientiously. However, I think we should all be careful not to conflate “doing what I told them I wouldn’t like” as “not listening”.
Paizo are designing a game for a myriad of customer tastes. By necessity that will involve compromise to some degree (I doubt even they will be happy about every single choice they make). They have to walk the tightrope between broad enough to be financially successful and narrow enough to carve out a suitably distinctive niche in a crowded market. I bet there’s an awful lot of handwringing (and drinking) at Paizo between now and April/May-ish next year..
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Well, who know really, but i would assume them to change anything system related and so on... just numbers or other one liners and such.
Pretty much small things and balance things, which some seem to think is really important.
So if when that book does come out i think the changes are for the worse... well lets just say my hopes wont be high for the final work.
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Well its probably gonna depend on how many people want an aspect changed too. if like 99% of people decided they hated the new action economy it might be perceivable to see that changed. Altough I doubt that's the numbers we would see I am frankly looking forward to it.
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Things I expect we won't see changed:
Global proficiency system
Level as a modifier to everything
Every class feature being a class feat
Non scaling spell's
Goblins as PCs
Alchemists in core.
The tone of legendary feats
The way martial attack powers (feats. Whatever you want to call them) are being designed.Things I expect will be up for tweaking:
Amount of HP dished out per level
Individual feats and spells
Resonance
Critical success/failure system ( tweaked. Not overhauled).I'd like to be wrong. But I am not very hopeful at this stage.
Agreed. The book has already been written and major changes based on player feedback just will not happen. Minor tweaks are expected since glitches will most likely be discovered once those of us well outside the Paizo bubble begin playtesting.
Between the success of the We Be Goblins line and the PFS Goblin race boom being one of the most asked about organized play rewards....Goblins as PCs is entirely our fault.
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The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?
What about the large amount of players who want those things? Should we completely discount their opinion because it's different from yours?
The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?
I think most of the things that you've brought up will be implemented either way, of course they might be tweaked based on the feedback, but I think you've raised a bigger point without putting much thought into that aspect: What is the cut-off point to ditch a feature? What are the criterea going to be to evaluate the playtest? We will find out in August I guess, but I'm eager to see their approach.
Also, I wouldn't put too much stock into forum posts to measure the general opinion of these features, because it feels like a vocal minority "dooms" any new announcement and many others over-analyse everything, while most players probably don't even follow theses blogs, but will wait for the finished product.
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I believe early on, it was said that Paizo Staff haven't completely agreed on the scope of all of the changes. So they went with the highest level of change in some areas for the playtest, with the intent to scale back if they end up being untenable.
But don't expect them to completely throw out entire mechanical systems because you don't like them.
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The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?
I'm sure they have good intentions, but practically speaking this board, Reddit, and more provide so much feedback that they'd be drowning in it.
When the playtest gets rolling they'll start issuing surveys. Then your ratings of various features are more likely to influence things so long as the masses of people agree with you.
In my own case, I'm too much of an edge case for Paizo to spend any time listening too me. I'll still participate in the playtest, but their early marketing/blog effort isn't really headed the same direction that I am. I'm expecting to part ways with Paizo to some extent.
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What about the large amount of players who want those things? Should we completely discount their opinion because it's different from yours?
Of course not. The dilemma all games have is that each person wants something different.
The nice thing about Gobo rules is they can be ignored by folks that don't want to use them. Other kinds of rules changes cannot be ignored or replaced as easily, specially as games continue to be leveraged by automation to manage character generation and play.
A game system with a more modular design and where automation supports a variety of different options, GM-controlled configurations, and house rules would be appealing to me.
Ultimately, as GMs, we face a very primal decision: "Which game system best supports the story I want to tell?"
You can't blame folks for advocating for things that best fit their goals.
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The Pathfinder Playtest itself is probably set in stone. Second Edition isn't. And I highly doubt they're gonna really actively incorporate any feedback into 2E before the playtest rolls out this summer. I imagine they're already definitely keeping an eye out for common complaints and such, but I'm not expecting anything to change before the playtest even officially starts.
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Well, the playtest is meant to test the design, not crowdsource it. Anyway, reading this forum for a while makes it clear that there is at least two very strongly opposed camps on every issue. Fundamentally, the Paizo team needs to position the game somewhere that can work for the majority of both camps. That's very tricky, and it implies that few people will get 100% of exactly what they want.
In the Know Direction podcast, they said that, whenever faced with a choice in the design, they went for the more extreme version, assuming that the playtest would be the correct venue to find out if they need to pull it back.
But the fundamental structure is unlikely to change. What makes the system's math work couldn't be touched without a complete redesign of it all. So, individual feats, bonuses in certain mechanics, etc can change, but not the proficiency concept for example.
I think John Lynch's list is a pretty good guess of what's fixed and what might still move.
Id expect some of the math to change, but most of the concept decisions have been made.
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at this point, I think the only thing commentary on the boards will do is ensure that during editing and particularly points that people keep misinterpreting are explained a bit better.
As for the playtest itself, when it officially starts, than the only expectation for changing will be bits and bobs and details. The entire system is heavily based off of the current action/skill/proficiency system. They are not going to be substantially altering that, since potentially you get into a Jenga situation where changing something inherent to the system causes lots of things to fall apart. Flavor things like the goblins also will not be changed.
I expect you will see things like feats/spells/spell-lists/ancestries/class abilities/aspects of resonance changed depending on feedback. Maybe some stuff like how death/conditions are handled as well. If you hate the proficiency system you are probably out of luck.
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Maybe they are waiting for us to have the books in our hands (and had a week to read them) before they completely revise the entire 2nd edition to our varied whims?
Id expect some of the math to change, but most of the concept decisions have been made.
I agree, and see that as a best case too. I think in whole as with the playtest of PF 1, they have a goal will drive at it and unless some math goes terribly astray will not change paths. Sure if some math shows an issue they will likely invesitgate and move the math about. But barring that, no the play test is to gather support and for free advertisement of their new product. They may even hide the most contentious parts to reveal after the play test.
Play test, report your issues, concerns and math. Hey maybe they will surprise you.
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Maybe they are waiting for us to have the books in our hands (and had a week to read them) before they completely revise the entire 2nd edition to our varied whims?
They might also just wait until Pathfinder 2nd edition has been in print for a while, and start up again with stealth rule changes via errata. Like they continually did with PF1
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I think Paizo is always listening but that doesn't mean they are going to just change something just because some vocal folks don't like it. The purpose of Playtest is as far as I know to polish off the rough edges, like adjusting tiny bits or discovering corner cases, not changing whole systems or core aspects already in design for two years.
RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32
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Remember, if you want the developers to pay attention to your feedback, you should be sure to playtest and not just theorycraft. It's the basic scientific method - ideas are tested by experiment. Even if you can't get a group of friends together to try things, you can still run mock combats on your own to demonstrate a point.
I've playtested several games in my time and there are many situations where something I thought would be a problem turned out fine, and I found other things I'd never considered. For example, right now I'm absolutely convinced that adding nat 1/20 autofail/autosuccess on skills is a bad move that will allow ridiculous situations - but I won't really know for certain until I get a chance to try it.
So if there's an aspect of the new system that you really think needs changing, make a note of it, and when the playtest book comes out, do your darndest to show how it's flawed in actual play. That's how you get things changed.
It's definitely not going to be like the 5E playtests, in which WOTC used numerous comprehensive player surveys to guide the development of the very core of the game. It will be more about polishing and tweaking, as others have said. I don't even think Paizo is planning to do surveys the way that WOTC did; Bonner said they'd be doing several "polls" over the course of the playtest, which to me means something a little narrower in focus.
Not to say this is a bad thing—I trust Paizo to develop an interesting and fun game—but the development of the core of the game will be significantly less driven by player feedback than 5E. Case in point, the core mechanics of PF2 seem to be mostly complete and settled, whereas in 5E core pieces of the system still hadn't been developed one year into the playtest. The first 5E playtest package only had 4 classes and 5 levels of play, none of which even remotely resembled the final game; for PF2 we're starting with more or less the complete game, and it seems already pretty polished.
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Obviously some things are more likely to change than others. The list of races and classes probably won't change (though many features of them will), the four stages of success/failure probably won't change (though many details regarding how each stage is reached, and the effects of each stage, will), the use of a uniform proficiency system across skills, attacks, spells, saves, etc, probably won't change (though again many of the details regarding how they progress, and the effects of success, will). Things like resonance, how "superhero-y" high-level skill feats turn out to be, and so on, are things that I expect to change quite a bit in light of feedback.
I doubt we'll see any major changes regardless of what the playtest results are - Paizo already has a mostly complete draft that they're happy with and will mostly be looking for minor mathematical issues and the wording of certain abilities.
I'm puzzled by sentiments like this. So let me repeat some reasons for being more hopeful about the impact of the playtest.
1. There will be an entire team of developers, working 40+ hours a week, who will be spending most of their time developing the game after the playtest document has been released. For 6-8 months.
What do we think they'll be doing all this time? Reclining in lawn chairs and sipping Mai Tais?
Paizo is not a big company, and they're investing an enormous amount of resources and man-hours to this. This is not an allocation of resources they can afford to waste by twiddling their thumbs and correcting typos.
2. The fear about the lack of impact of the playtest seems to stem from a picture of the developers as a group with a relatively homogeneous opinion of how things should proceed.
Given the remarks we've heard about internal disagreements between developers, and wistful comments from lead developers about how much they'd like to have a couple of "yes-men" on the team for just one day, I think we have good reason to think this is false.
Rather, like most teams of creative personalities, it seems like the developers have widely varying preferences and opinions about a whole host of issues. Consider the many 3rd PP contributions people on the development team have made, advocating widely different ways of approaching the game.
What's seems more likely is that there will be developers championing lots of different ways of developing the game. And the playtest data will make a big difference in determining who on the development team ends up winning these arguments.
Rather, like most teams of creative personalities, it seems like the developers have widely varying preferences and opinions about a whole host of issues. Consider the many 3rd PP contributions people on the development team have made, advocating widely different ways of approaching the game.
What's seems more likely is that there will be developers championing lots of different ways of developing the game. And the playtest data will make a big difference in determining who on the development team ends up winning these arguments.
I think this a very good point.
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I think this a very good point.Rather, like most teams of creative personalities, it seems like the developers have widely varying preferences and opinions about a whole host of issues. Consider the many 3rd PP contributions people on the development team have made, advocating widely different ways of approaching the game.
What's seems more likely is that there will be developers championing lots of different ways of developing the game. And the playtest data will make a big difference in determining who on the development team ends up winning these arguments.
As Owen has mentioned before, during the Starfinder design phase, a key disagreement was resolved via rock/paper/scissors. There is no monolithic "Paizo" opinion. That's something I had thought was true before working here but really isn't (for instance, true story, I had gotten this idea that "all of Paizo" was obsessed with Lovecraft and that it might be a problem for me as a new employee that while I liked many of the Lovecraftian monsters, I found his stories disturbingly racist and didn't enjoy reading them, only to find out that it's a very few people at the office who are really deeply into Lovecraft).
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If Paizo aren't planning on taking comments from the community onboard, they are spending rather a lot of money just for the privilege of ignoring us.
More expensive print options (Canada rather than China so they can get the final copy to the printers two months later than normal); developer time on blogs and forum posts; delaying getting the new product out by a year......
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As Owen has mentioned before, during the Starfinder design phase, a key disagreement was resolved via rock/paper/scissors. There is no monolithic "Paizo" opinion. That's something I had thought was true before working here but really isn't (for instance, true story, I had gotten this idea that "all of Paizo" was obsessed with Lovecraft and that it might be a problem for me as a new employee that while I liked many of the Lovecraftian monsters, I found his stories disturbingly racist and didn't enjoy reading them, only to find out that it's a very few people at the office who are really deeply into Lovecraft).
What is the best way to give you our honest feedback? Creating a thread risks inviting a flood of people who insist X is the worst thing ever just because it's not PF1 (see Goblin thread). I would like to see a series of questionnaires to help the more shy forum members to voice their opinions. ("How do you like idea A, rate 1 to 11" etc.)
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As Owen has mentioned before, during the Starfinder design phase, a key disagreement was resolved via rock/paper/scissors. There is no monolithic "Paizo" opinion. That's something I had thought was true before working here but really isn't (for instance, true story, I had gotten this idea that "all of Paizo" was obsessed with Lovecraft and that it might be a problem for me as a new employee that while I liked many of the Lovecraftian monsters, I found his stories disturbingly racist and didn't enjoy reading them, only to find out that it's a very few people at the office who are really deeply into Lovecraft).What is the best way to give you our honest feedback? Creating a thread risks inviting a flood of people who insist X is the worst thing ever just because it's not PF1 (see Goblin thread). I would like to see a series of questionnaires to help the more shy forum members to voice their opinions. ("How do you like idea A, rate 1 to 11" etc.)
A series of questionnaires is definitely one of the tools we're planning to employ!
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If Paizo aren't planning on taking comments from the community onboard, they are spending rather a lot of money just for the privilege of ignoring us.
More expensive print options (Canada rather than China so they can get the final copy to the printers two months later than normal); developer time on blogs and forum posts; delaying getting the new product out by a year......
One could argue its simply advertising and getting people to try the product.
Look I say try the play test stuff, give feedback but I have no expections even if the boards agreed that X needs change that we would see the change requested. I also think they might just sneak in the most contentious stuff after the play test to avoid negative feedback they simply don’t want to hear.
For all the flaws of the DnD Next play test they certainly did use the feedback to modify the game sometimes. Not as much as some would like, more then others, but certainly in ways you could identify. DoM and Martial Healing were too very hotly debated topics and on both they decided to scrap what 4e had done to get more buy in from the pre-4e crowd. Because frankly they needed it. They also used the playtest to beat the drum that it was more 2e like then anything else, and its early fans adopted that stance and statement even though anyone how played 2e can see how patently false it really is. It gave them a slogan to cry out that would bring players of older editions back and they was their primary goal. And it worked.
I don’t know what Paizo’s goal is with the play test, maybe they think the changes they made will be so well recieved once actually used it will bring in everyone, maybe they think it will help them settle some issue they can’t agree on. Who knows. Not I. But my theory is better to say your piece and be ignored then never speak up at all. Also to the poster who wants to put in their input but is nervous about starting a shouting match, don’t be afraid. One many people out there are decent and will let you say your peace and even if they disagree not fight you on it. And two these boards are it seems pretty well moderated. Please say what you think you need to, even if I disagree, I want to hear it and I want you to be safe to say it.
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I think expressing our input is good and necessary, and regarded as such by the folks at Paizo...in the playtest.
We are not yet in the playtest and know too little of what it will be like to give informed opinions on, well, much of anything. So...right now? Any ideas we express about how to change things are pretty much worthless due to our collective and unavoidable ignorance.
So, yeah, I think the folks at Paizo are very willing to listen to our input in the playtest. Once it starts.
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I wonder how granular the questionnaires will be. When I was brainstorming ideas on how one would best create a "Feats Unchained" book for PF1, I was thinking open up a giant survey - for each feat, it would ask two questions:
A: How powerful is this feat compared to the other available options? (1) Much less powerful, (2) Less powerful, (3) About the same power, (4) More powerful, (5) Much more powerful.
B: How interested would you be in taking a feat like this if it were rebalanced? (1) Not at all interested, (2) Possibly interested, (3) Very interested.
Then focus on the feats that scored high on B, and try to bring them to around a 3 on question A.
And you could do iterations - Maybe they see the Dragonheart feat is a 1.2 for power, so they give it a boost and add a rebalanced version to the survey. Then they see it's still a 1.8, so they rebalance it again and find this version is a 2.5, with a score of 2 on question B - done!
(Note, people would not be expected to answer about each and every feat - the webpage would just display one at a time, and let the user keep going for as long as they wish.)
So, a similar type of survey could possibly be used for PF2. It's less straightforward than for PF1 because people are less familiar with the PF2 system, so may not be able to judge the balance properly at first. But, it would still give an early indication about which feats are wasted space that no one will ever take, vs which ones are too-powerful options that may become all-but-mandatory.
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I think that the ball is well and truly rolling; they've forked out the cash to get Reynolds to illustrate, they've thunked out the rules and played with them, they have an idea that they think is close to ready for the masses to play with. I don't think the ball could be stopped at this point. (I don't particularly want it to be, either.)
They aren't starting this playtest to decide what their latest system is going to look like; they've already designed the system. They're doing a playtest to make sure that it's balanced and enjoyable to play.
Which, to me, is good news, because it makes it pretty unlikely they'll cave and create Pathfinder 1.5E. Stuff like monsters built on PC rules, martials not having anything cool to play with, all of that which the detractors are clamoring for (and already exists in the game they currently have) is a dealbreaker as far as 2E goes. So if they don't carry forward with the changes, I certainly won't be interested.
Fortunately, I believe as you do that this stuff is already well underway, and they're not looking to radically change fundamental pieces of the system, but rather fine tune and balance certain things. So, I'm hopeful!
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I think folks assuming that the changes will be minimal are ignoring the way the last playtest went. There were some pretty significant changes between the beta and final version.
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I think perhaps part of the problem may lie in an important distinction, playtesters are not designers. I've seen enough playtests on these forums to know that seemingly self-evident bit of wisdom can be forgotten quite easily. When we forget that, we stop being helpful to the playtest. Major changes like goblins being added as a core playable race aren't what we're testing, we're testing how things like ability scores might unintentionally make for an overly powerful build compared to every other race (as a possible example), but we need to actually test that, not just theorycraft it.
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I think perhaps part of the problem may lie in an important distinction, playtesters are not designers. I've seen enough playtests on these forums to know that seemingly self-evident bit of wisdom can be forgotten quite easily. When we forget that, we stop being helpful to the playtest. Major changes like goblins being added as a core playable race aren't what we're testing, we're testing how things like ability scores might unintentionally make for an overly powerful build compared to every other race (as a possible example), but we need to actually test that, not just theorycraft it.
I could get behind that opinion if and only if Paizo decided to come out with the stance that there are non-negotiable aspects of their designs. As it stands now not pointing out severe flaws that ruin play experience outside of the testing parameters is going to be difficult for most people.
A: How powerful is this feat compared to the other available options? (1) Much less powerful, (2) Less powerful, (3) About the same power, (4) More powerful, (5) Much more powerful.
I dont know if they should judge option power by a survey like this...
I dont know if they should judge option power by a survey like this...
A: How powerful is this feat compared to the other available options? (1) Much less powerful, (2) Less powerful, (3) About the same power, (4) More powerful, (5) Much more powerful.
Not blindly for sure. It's just a way for the dev team to know where to focus their attention.
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Things I expect we won't see changed:
Global proficiency system
Level as a modifier to everything
Every class feature being a class feat
Non scaling spell's
Goblins as PCs
Alchemists in core.
The tone of legendary feats
The way martial attack powers (feats. Whatever you want to call them) are being designed.Things I expect will be up for tweaking:
Amount of HP dished out per level
Individual feats and spells
Resonance
Critical success/failure system ( tweaked. Not overhauled).I'd like to be wrong. But I am not very hopeful at this stage.
I could see a world where Goblins as a PC ancestry moved from the CRB to the Bestiary, and I think the level of tweaking to the critical success/failure system is likely to get puts it more in the first category than the second, but other than this I pretty much agree with this classification.
I think folks assuming that the changes will be minimal are ignoring the way the last playtest went. There were some pretty significant changes between the beta and final version.
It's more that people have different ideas on what "minimal" mean. I don't believe the underlying system such as proficiency or how actions work will change, simply because it's going to be the pillars of the game. BUT...there is a lot of other stuff that probably can and will.
But some people would consider anything but a ground floor rewrite of the game as pretty minimal.
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Starfinder Design Lead
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As Owen has mentioned before, during the Starfinder design phase, a key disagreement was resolved via rock/paper/scissors.I'm still very curious what this was.
I'll never tell. :) (I mean really, GMs have enough problem running games with a player saying "That isn't a REAL rule, we got it out of sheer luck!")
But seriously, it was a case where two ways of doing things were equally valid, equally popular, and everyone agreed that either was fine, we just had to pick one.
So I suggested RPS, and a decision got made.
Also, I was told not to do that anymore. :)
More relevantly, there was a core Starfinder RPG rules subset crucial to every part of the game which we discarded, due to overwhelmingly negative feedback, at the very last possible moment. And by overwhelmingly negative, I mean that in the private out-of-house playlists, and several playlets we ran in-office, and in a blind test we did with people who had never seen any version of the rule, we got a much-more-than 95% negative reaction, and about 2 total defenders.
I liked the original way of doing things. I didn't come up with it, but I strongly backed it as the right answer. We tried three versions of it, because I strongly believed it was the best solution for the game.
But, clearly, I was wrong.
So when we got down to the last day we COULD make a change and still have ANY playtest feedback on it (just internal and blind at that point--the out-of-house stuff was all over), and the feedback of the latest effort to fix it and explain it simply failed spectacularly (in that case, a 100% "I hate this" rating, though admittedly from a smaller group), we (James Sutter, Rob, and I) decided that regardless of what I had thought would be smartest, that system had to go.
So, even though the book was in layout, and we were supposed to be doing things like making sure the text flowed properly and the pictures, and even though this touched on nearly every part of the game, we took the time and effort to hack out the entire whole system (not a drop of which remains in the game), and replace it.
And that system was received very well, both in the few playlists we crammed in and in the months since the book's release.
Now, I am not on the team working on Pf2. I can't be--I have Starfinder products to work on. But I know that when we were getting feedback for Starfinder, nothing was completely off the table. Of course, there were things some folks disliked which we decided there were valid reasons to keep. It's not design by democracy, and 55% of the people responding disliking something doesn't automatically mean it'll get cut. But when the Starfinder team, to our shock, discovered there was something with near-universal hatred (to a higher degree than I have ever seen in any other game I have ever worked on), we changed it.
I would not expect anything to hit that bar in the Pathfinder Playtest. Certainly nothing has hit that bar based on current reactions. But I didn't expect to hit it in the Starfinder playltest either, and when we did, we made the choice that was best for the game.
Damn now I wanna know what this system was that touched the whole starfinder game.
Me too!
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One of the most interesting design insights that came during D&D 5E's development was that a given concept or mechanic had to meet a 70% favourable public feedback threshold to make the cut. Just under 70% and they would rework the idea and release another version for playtesting. Significantly less than 70%, and the idea would either get completely scrapped or sent back to the drawing board for a total redesign.
This is perhaps a gross exaggeration, but one could make the claim that 5E was an RPG designed by committee/focus group. Whether or not you like 5E might inform whether or not you think this is a good approach to game design.
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My hope is that playtesters will have a lot of influence on the new system. I have a few players now who are somewhat skeptical about the new system and how much Paizo will listen. I think that we need to believe that our input makes a difference. It may make adopting a new system easier.
It took a LOT to convince a former group that I was in to move from AD&D 2nd Edition to 3.0. I think that we need to have a playtest where everything is transparent and above board. We also need to try to disagree with each other respectfully.
I am somewhat on the fence on goblins as PCs in the Core rulebook. However, I am going to see what the rules look like and respond. In my current PFS group, we have people who are great at mastering rules and finding flaws and loopholes. So, I look forward to the playtest.
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The main question I want answered is just how much is Paizo willing to listen to its fan community? If, for example, enough people have a huge problem with goblins being a core race, NPCs and monsters working differently than player characters, or some other aspect of the playtest rules that is supposedly hardwired into PF2, will they be willing to listen to what the players want and change it?What about the large amount of players who want those things? Should we completely discount their opinion because it's different from yours?
Please note that I never once said I don't want Second Edition to happen or hope Paizo cancels the playtest. I know good and well that won't happen, and would honestly be disappointed if it did. Change is not a bad thing. If things don't change, they die, and I DO NOT want that in the least. My question is what Paizo is willing to change based on players' opinions. Is it just about tweaking a feat or skill here and there, or would, for example, they be willing to put tengu in as a core race if enough people said they wanted it?