Paizo Friday 05-04 with Logan Bonner


Prerelease Discussion

1 to 50 of 65 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Silver Crusade

21 people marked this as a favorite.

For reference, here are my notes on last night's Paizo Friday chat with Logan.

Divine spell list (09:22):
Clerics “get to choose from everything on the divine spell list” like in PF1

Anathema (11:40):
“Any of the classes that have a stricture on their behavior will have anathema” (“this applies to a lot of classes”)

Violating Anathema (13:24):
“For most of the classes if they’ve got magical abilities they lose some or all of them. We kind of suggest, this is what typically happens.” But for Clerics, especially given the multitude of gods and shades of grey and to allow flexibility between campaigns, “we didn’t want to go, you do these five things and you can’t cast spells anymore. We didn’t want to go too exact with it because you’ve got your Gamemaster there, and you are going to have to deal with things that aren’t cut and dried sometimes. So we wanted to give you a really strong framework for how it works but not make it overly restrictive by saying, ‘here are your deity favor points and they tick down by one every time.’ But we do give a pretty clear portrait of like, typically you’re going to lose your spellcasting and your Cleric magical abilities when you fall out of favor with your god. And alignment affects that to. Because each deity allows certain alignments.” Talks about specifying alignments each god allows (can’t worship Asmodeus if you’re neutral).

10th-Level Spells (20:18):
Access with a 20th-level feat to get a 10th level spell. Some of them are the ultra-powerful Wish, Miracle, etc. from PF1. Can cast once a day, doesn’t have the expensive material component anymore. There are also new ones. E.g. Avatar, become an avatar of your deity. “You just hulk out and become a kickass avatar of Gorum, or not-as-kickass avatar of Shelyn. You kind of embody your deity for a little while.” “There are also a large number of spells that you can heighten to 10th level for extra effects and ridiculous things.” There “aren’t a whole lot of slots for them, and we kept the number of 10th-level spells relatively small especially since the playtest document had limited space. But there are a lot of things that you can heighten into those slots that can really kind of blow your mind a little bit.”

Spell Slots for Clerics (28:20):
Some interesting talk from Logan about the designers’ perspective on the reduced number of spell slots. The only newsworthy bit I caught: Logan mentions feats that grant more spell points and feats that grant more cantrips.

Proficiencies (32:20):
At 1st level, you start out Trained in a bunch of stuff. Your skills, your armor and weapons. There are a few classes that start out with some Expert proficiencies (the Cleric is not one of them), e.g. Fighters are Expert with weapons from the jump. A 1st level Cleric is Trained in her spell rolls: She adds her proficiency modifier (= level since she’s Trained) + Wis mod. “Anything that’s using proficiency is always using your character level.”

Deities & Domains & Spells Teasers (37:03):
“I grabbed a couple deities who have similarities in their domains but are very different in their attitude.” Iomedae and Gorum, who share three domains: Confidence, Might, and Zeal. Iomedae also has Truth where Gorum has Destruction.

Deity spells. Sarenrae gives you fireball. Nethys “is going to be really interesting. I think some people are going to flip their wigs when they see what Nethys gives.” Iomedae gives true strike, paralysis, and fire shield. Gorum gives true strike, enlarge, and weapon storm (new spell: “you take your weapon and swing and make a cone of weapon attacks, you wreck a whole bunch of people”).

The Confidence domain has veil of confidence as its initial Domain Power and delusional pride as its advanced Power (you have to feat into the advanced Powers). Might has athletic exploit and enduring might. Zeal has weapon surge and prepare for battle. Destruction has destructive cry and destructive aura. Truth has word of truth (you cast the spell and say something that you believe to be true, a symbol appears to verify to others that you are speaking honestly—or at least believe you are—your deity vouching for you) and glimpse of truth.

New divine spells. Crisis of faith: cause target to have a crisis of faith, mentally hurt them—if they crit-fail, they can’t cast divine spells for a while. Disrupting weapons: turn a bunch of allies’ weapons into ones that can disrupt undead and deal more damage to them (starts with 2 weapons, heighten to affect more). Revival: (9th level) heals in a burst, temporarily brings back to life dead people (with temporary hit points and a time limit before they go back to being dead).

Favored weapons. Nethys’s favored weapon is the staff—not the quarterstaff. “We looked at how the quarterstaff is working and were like, ‘how many Wizards will actually want this?’” The staff is a one-handed weapon that does more damage if you use two hands if you want to.

Items & Magical Properties (43:50):
Logan mentions the returning property: “you throw the javelin and the javelin returns to you, you don’t have to spend an action drawing a new one.” News: “There’s a new category of items that could make an item like that return once, that we’ll probably be talking about more when we talk about magic items. But there’s kind of ways to play with some of your gear using a specific new category of item.”

Cantrips & Heightening & Dispelling (45:52):
Question: how do non-damage-dealing cantrips heighten? Logan: depends on the cantrip. E.g., the sigil cantrip (replacing arcane mark) lasts longer; detect magic gives more information. There are a few that don’t really scale up, like prestidigitation—“there’s not really a lot of places for it to go.” One of the main things about spells is that the level matters more for dispelling, higher level dispels lower level. For categories of spells that auto-dispel each other, like light & darkness spells. So your light cantrip gets stronger, you can use it to dispel magical darkness just by casting light if the darkness is a lower level.

Magic & Alchemy (47:10):
Question: “Where does alchemy end and magic begin?” Logan: general thematic line between the two, Alchemy is typically something that a chemical reaction could do, though in some cases (e.g., mutagen) that’s pretty extreme; making someone levitate is more like magic. Alchemy could do that kind of thing only in a very specific, special case.

Weapons (48:20):
Since magic weapons do additional dice of damage, what happens to weapons that do multiple dice of damage? “We don’t have any weapons that do multiple dice as their base damage. So the greatsword is now a d12.” Weapons on a more strict 1d4 to 1d12 scale. The weapon traits make a much bigger difference for how the weapon functions.

Potions (50:15):
If potions are no longer spells-in-a-can, what do they do? Depends on the potion. “They’re all written from scratch.” Scrolls & wands are still just spells. Didn’t want to have those and then also potions doing the same thing. For potions, there’s a shrinking potion, a healing potion, a dragon breath potion, stuff like that. A bunch of different options. A lot more flexible now. Still a few that work pretty much like spells.

Magic Weapons (Runes) (51:50):
Are proficiency runes limited by item quality? Logan discusses potency runes. Can transfer from one item to another by re-etching them. Can upgrade them by altering the runes. “They are limited by quality. The total potency you can have on an item depends on the quality. You have to have a Master-quality weapon or armor to put, I believe, a +3 or +4 on it. Expert-quality for anything lower than that.” Another category of runes: property runes. Same concept as weapon properties in PF1. Quality of the weapon limits how many property runes it can have. So quality is a cap on potency and on the number of properties. So it has to be a pretty high quality weapon to be both flaming and frost. And even higher to have both of those and vorpal. — Can upgrade specific weapons (e.g., flametongue, celestial armor) by increasing potency, but can’t add properties.

Quick Draw (54:36):
Quick Draw feat to draw weapons still a thing. Does it affect other items? “I don’t remember.” But there is such an ability for the Alchemist, who can pull bombs and [Logan makes a repeated throwing gesture with his hands] and pull two alchemical items at a time.

Resonance (55:34):
Resonance determines how many magic items you can use safely in a day. If you run out of resonance you can try to use more items, but each time there’s a greater chance that the item won’t function for you or that you won’t be able to use any more items that day. “Usually you’re only going to push your luck if you need that healing potion really badly ... We really want to see how that playtests.”

Proficiency & AC (56:30):
How does proficiency interact with AC? “The same way as with everything else. If you’re wearing armor you’re untrained in you’re going to add your level minus 2.” If Trained—your level, 10, and your Dex. If Trained in armor and Untrained in shields, and “trying to wear a shield, you don’t really know what you’re doing so you’re going to use Untrained for your AC because you’re wearing one thing you’re Untrained in.” Most classes that get armor, especially the better armors, are going to get shields at the same rate.

Arcane Spell Failure (1:00:00):
Is arcane spell failure still a thing? “It was for a long time, and then at one point we just kind of said, ‘These are the only people who are worrying about this. Do we really need it?’ So we are playtesting without arcane spell failure. So we’ll see if there are a bunch of Wizards who buy into heavy armor and run around wearing full plate. We don’t know if that’s going to be an exciting enough use of their feats to do that and we kind of want to find out.”

Resonance (1:00:30):
Resonance uses Charisma from PF1 precedent around Use Magic Device, spell-like abilities, and with the Sorcerer. If magic relies on innate magical power it uses Charisma. That kind of thing. One exception (i.e., the Alchemist).


8 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Thank you for taking the time to do this. Note takers are wonderful people.

Liberty's Edge

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I believe Iomedae gives remove paralysis, actually, not paralysis.


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Hmm I like the vagueness and rulings over rules feel of anathema but im sure plenty wont.

Silver Crusade

Deadmanwalking wrote:
I believe Iomedae gives remove paralysis, actually, not paralysis.

Ah, you're right. I misheard. Thanks!

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Planpanther wrote:
Hmm I like the vagueness and rulings over rules feel of anathema but im sure plenty wont.

That's guaranteed. There's no satisfying the fights-about-alignment crowd. Either the list is too mechanical and rigid (booo!) or the guidelines are too vague and flexible and allowing for GM discretion (booo!).

But the approach the designers have outlined in this and other interviews seems reasonable to me.


I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

Silver Crusade

Noir le Lotus wrote:

I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

Yes, your level applies to your AC through your armor proficiency modifier.

E.g., Warren the Warrior is 3d level. He has Expert level armor proficiency (= level+1), a Chain Shirt (+2 AC), and a 14 Dexterity. So Warren's normal AC will be 18 (= 10 + 2 Armor + 4 Armor Proficiency + 2 Dexterity).

As for how the math feels as it scales vs. attacks, I guess we'll have to wait and see in the playtest.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Charter Superscriber

Thank for the note taking and sharing!


5 people marked this as a favorite.
Logan Bonner wrote:
So if you are 8th level and you're preparing a whole ton of 1st level spells, that's not the most intriguing part of running your character. So we wanted to kinda say we are going to not give you as many spells but kinda do more with those spells.

While I can see where they're coming from, there were many cases where lower-level spell slots were legitimately relevant decisions. That 8th level Wizard would usually have seven 1st level spell slots in PF1. When you look at common spell choices that are useful even at higher levels, there are more than seven: Mage Armor, Shield, Protection from Evil, Obscuring Mist, Enlarge Person, Mount, Grease, Silent Image, Expeditious Retreat, and Disguise Self. Even before considering duplicate preps, circumstantial options, or the fact that wizards often leave spell slots open to prep utility spells later in the day, that's a lot of potentially relevant decisions. To a certain extent, it was that large selection that allowed for some of the more interesting options, rather than picking the same handful of staples every time. If Mage Armor and Shield are obligatory defenses, that leaves one slot for something else on a 3 slot loadout. If there are seven slots, now you have some working room for other options to complement your staples.

If I want to say one thing to summarize my concerns here, it's this: I like spellcasting classes because they cast spells. When a player plays one, it's to cast spells. Being able to spam the Fly spell five times in a row to make the entire party go airborne is part of what makes it cool to play a Sorcerer, having five different 3rd level spells at your fingertips in addition to Fly is part of what makes it cool to play as a Wizard. Don't throw that away.

Logan Bonner wrote:
It was for a long time, and then at one point we just kind of said, ‘These are the only people who are worrying about this. Do we really need it?’ So we are playtesting without arcane spell failure. So we’ll see if there are a bunch of Wizards who buy into heavy armor and run around wearing full plate. We don’t know if that’s going to be an exciting enough use of their feats to do that and we kind of want to find out.

Very interested in this, because my gut instinct is that most won't bother. Carrying capacity alone made armor very unattractive to wizards (which rarely had more than 10 Str) in PF1. Even if there are ways to work around or ignore a non-proficiency penalty, I can see weight alone making it a passable choice for wizards.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Dasrak wrote:
Logan Bonner wrote:
So if you are 8th level and you're preparing a whole ton of 1st level spells, that's not the most intriguing part of running your character. So we wanted to kinda say we are going to not give you as many spells but kinda do more with those spells.

While I can see where they're coming from, there were many cases where lower-level spell slots were legitimately relevant decisions. That 8th level Wizard would usually have seven 1st level spell slots in PF1. When you look at common spell choices that are useful even at higher levels, there are more than seven: Mage Armor, Shield, Protection from Evil, Obscuring Mist, Enlarge Person, Mount, Grease, Silent Image, Expeditious Retreat, and Disguise Self. Even before considering duplicate preps, circumstantial options, or the fact that wizards often leave spell slots open to prep utility spells later in the day, that's a lot of potentially relevant decisions. To a certain extent, it was that large selection that allowed for some of the more interesting options, rather than picking the same handful of staples every time. If Mage Armor and Shield are obligatory defenses, that leaves one slot for something else on a 3 slot loadout. If there are seven slots, now you have some working room for other options to complement your staples.

If I want to say one thing to summarize my concerns here, it's this: I like spellcasting classes because they cast spells. When a player plays one, it's to cast spells. Being able to spam the Fly spell five times in a row to make the entire party go airborne is part of what makes it cool to play a Sorcerer, having five different 3rd level spells at your fingertips in addition to Fly is part of what makes it cool to play as a Wizard. Don't throw that away.

This. Sometimes it really makes me wonder if I'm playing the same game when I see comments like these. Or maybe it's just propaganda for rationalization of the nerf.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

Now I wonder if those "property runes" are interchangeable between weapon and armor like Materia in Final Fantasy. WIll that flaming rune give me fire resistance if put on the armor? That'd be cool.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Dasrak wrote:
If Mage Armor and Shield are obligatory defenses, that leaves one slot for something else on a 3 slot loadout. If there are seven slots, now you have some working room for other options to complement your staples.

That's why stuff like Shield are cantrips now, so (if Mage Armor is also a cantrip) that would give those two spell slots back and you would still have the default 3.

You could argue doing it this way takes away choices from the player but, if Shield is indeed obligatory, there's no point in pretending there was a choice in first place, there was just an illusion of choice.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
ChibiNyan wrote:
Now I wonder if those "property runes" are interchangeable between weapon and armor like Materia in Final Fantasy. WIll that flaming rune give me fire resistance if put on the armor? That'd be cool.

I don't know if that'll happen, as keeping them separated works better for organization purposes, but it would be pretty cool if they did. Of course, I suspect some runes would be specific to one list if that happened, as a Returning armor set would be... odd.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
2Zak wrote:
Dasrak wrote:
If Mage Armor and Shield are obligatory defenses, that leaves one slot for something else on a 3 slot loadout. If there are seven slots, now you have some working room for other options to complement your staples.

That's why stuff like Shield are cantrips now, so (if Mage Armor is also a cantrip) that would give those two spell slots back and you would still have the default 3.

You could argue doing it this way takes away choices from the player but, if Shield is indeed obligatory, there's no point in pretending there was a choice in first place, there was just an illusion of choice.

We also don't know how the new Mage Armor works or if it will be necessary to Heighten it to be usable. Plus even in PF1 it wasn't strictly necessary or even a good choice to prepare those spells, even at lower levels, because it's more difficult to raise AC than it is to raise Attack Bonus and other defenses were just more reliable (aka Mirror Image, Invisibility, Blur/Displacement, etc). And at low levels preparing those means not preparing other helpful spells.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Noir le Lotus wrote:

I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

So I think the idea is that when fighting equal level enemies that -10 is never a sure thing unless the target has very little in the way of defence and you have magical weapons etc to boost up your attack.

It’s not like PF1 when it becomes easier and easier to hit with 2, 3, 4 attacks etc. They still want that 3rd Attack to be something you consider doing something else with.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Joe M. wrote:
Noir le Lotus wrote:

I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

Yes, your level applies to your AC through your armor proficiency modifier.

E.g., Warren the Warrior is 3d level. He has Expert level armor proficiency (= level+1), a Chain Shirt (+2 AC), and a 14 Dexterity. So Warren's normal AC will be 18 (= 10 + 2 Armor + 4 Armor Proficiency + 2 Dexterity).

As for how the math feels as it scales vs. attacks, I guess we'll have to wait and see in the playtest.

I felt worried about how the math scaled too, but I'm less concerned about it now. One, I think adding level to AC represents a pretty fundamental part of getting better at combat that BAB didn't reflect: dodging and partying attacks.

The other thing is that even if you have an NPC built with the PC rules (which probably won't be the basic assumption) then you still won't be fighting NPCs on a one to one ratio for numbers and level. If any given fight pitted you against your equal the party would die half the time. Enemy's are more likely to be lower but more numerous or higher level solo monsters.

I suspect this will encourage people to use the monster Gen rules more, so you can buff HP without buffing AC, for instance. I think either NPC creation will make it easier to fine tune challenge without piling on a huge pay day of gear.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
LuniasM wrote:
Plus even in PF1 it wasn't strictly necessary or even a good choice to prepare those spells, even at lower levels, because it's more difficult to raise AC than it is to raise Attack Bonus and other defenses were just more reliable (aka Mirror Image, Invisibility, Blur/Displacement, etc). And at low levels preparing those means not preparing other helpful spells.

Then the conundrum has solved itself. If it isn't really that obligatory, maybe not even a good idea, they are not going to be consuming any slots at all and all three slots of their level are still free for the taking for the actually important, interesting, useful and/or actually good spells.

In any case, if the problem with reducing spell slots is that we're not going to be able to prepare some spells that a) look like they're turning into cantrips (which auto-scale) and b) weren't really that necessary anyways, we're losing nothing other than unnecessary baggage and meaningless choices, so there's not really a problem.

But, to be clear: I do think that 3 spells/day per level is too few, but not because of how low-level stuff scales late into the campaign, actually.
With only 3 spells per day there's this feel that there's no point on learning most of your list when playing as a prepared caster since you end up preparing just the most universally useful stuff and won't be touching most of the other stuff.
For example: I'm currently playing an Alchemist in PF1 and my 4th level slots are pretty much just "Fluid Form uses per day", and I don't even use it on myself! I can (and do) leave slots open in case our party finds itself in a situation where another spell could come in handy (it almost never does) but it doesn't change the fact that every 4th level extract is competing for a slot with a very useful buff I want to prepare multiples of (and if I didn't want to prepare multiples, they would be competing with Stoneskin, so the "multiple of the same spell" thing isn't the point).
And as an Alchemist I can handle it because extracts are just part of what the class is about, and there's bombs and other stuff I can do. Still, most of the time I go "I could prepare this or that, but do I really want to not have Fluid Form for our fighter?" or "oh, I could learn this new cool spell, but will I use it before the level I get another level 4 slot?". I have little incentive to explore new spells or strategies because I feel very constrained by my daily extract count, and currently it is more than 3/day.
In PF2, leaving a slot open is already cutting 1/3rd of your slots for that level. For a class whose main focus is, well, casting spells, that's a lot. Imagine a fighter having to choose between full attacks or attacks of opportunity which might not even come up, for example.

Now, a solution for this, and the path the designers seem to be following, would be giving Wizards and other prepared casters stuff, magic-ish or spell-like in nature and effect, that doesn't cut into their daily spell allotment. Doing this properly should allow a wizard to still perform wizard stuff, but without having to completely rely on their spell slots to get anything and everything done.
I, for one, would like it if it worked out nicely in the end and could play a Wizard with less micromanaging of my spell slots because my cantrips and school powers can take care of general utility or damage dealing. I'm skeptical as to whether they're going to be able to pull it off, to be fair, but for now I'm mostly interested in seeing what they have done to Wizard itself and curious to see firsthand how Wizard and Cleric are going to play out.

(If what you like, however, is that the Wizard is basically the "Spells" section of the rulebook with legs, yeah, you're going to be disappointed one way or another)


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

One of the main things I'm still interested in, is that the devs seem to be expecting people to only progress proficiencies as the class gives them to you, rather than spending feats on them.

The dev comments on classes that give the heavier armors giving shields at the same rate, other comments about when clerics get various casting proficiency, etc. However they do still list that a wizard can buy into heavy armor. This feels like a place where there might be a developer mindset/blank spot in how people will use things. Definitely something for us to see how it plays out in playtests.

Curious if the class proficiencies are worded like "become Expert in X" or "Increase your proficiency in X by one step" Ie, if you spend a feat to accelerate, does it stay accelerated, or is it a wasted feat at some point.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Personally, I would say that the feat becomes redundant, especially given that retraining is supposed to be a straightforward process. But, I could see players simply retraining into the next proficiency, which makes me wonder if simply letting the acceleration stand would be simpler.

We'll have to see how it goes.

2Zak wrote:
(If what you like, however, is that the Wizard is basically the "Spells" section of the rulebook with legs, yeah, you're going to be disappointed one way or another)

That description delights me.

Silver Crusade

NielsenE wrote:

One of the main things I'm still interested in, is that the devs seem to be expecting people to only progress proficiencies as the class gives them to you, rather than spending feats on them.

The dev comments on classes that give the heavier armors giving shields at the same rate, other comments about when clerics get various casting proficiency, etc. However they do still list that a wizard can buy into heavy armor. This feels like a place where there might be a developer mindset/blank spot in how people will use things. Definitely something for us to see how it plays out in playtests.

Curious if the class proficiencies are worded like "become Expert in X" or "Increase your proficiency in X by one step" Ie, if you spend a feat to accelerate, does it stay accelerated, or is it a wasted feat at some point.

That's a great question. I hadn't considered how feats for proficiency would work. My first thought on hearing about lack of arcane spell failure was, oh well surely every wizard will grab light armor proficiency then. But I guess that'll depend on how the feats work and what armor-replacing options arcane casters get from spells etc.

Definitely very excited to see all the crazy builds people come up with in the playtest. I'm a sucker for crafting builds, looking forward to testing the possibilities of/trying to break the system.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Joe M. wrote:
Definitely very excited to see all the crazy builds people come up with in the playtest. I'm a sucker for crafting builds, looking forward to testing the possibilities of/trying to break the system.

Someone is DEFINETELY going to be making a warmage about 7 seconds after the playtest document drops.

Silver Crusade

AnimatedPaper wrote:
Joe M. wrote:
Definitely very excited to see all the crazy builds people come up with in the playtest. I'm a sucker for crafting builds, looking forward to testing the possibilities of/trying to break the system.
Someone is DEFINETELY going to be making a warmage about 7 seconds after the playtest document drops.

I need to remember to start a thread for "brainstorming concepts that you want to see built in the play test." Entirely free from mechanics or PF1, what are just pure thematic ideas you can come up with before we see the rules, so we can then see how the rules can handle them. (E.g., I want to build a Captain America shield brawler and a spear and shield Iliad hero for my first couple melee builds).


I'm going to continue in my quest to "make a 3.5 dragon shaman but remain too lazy to simply 'brew one."

Edit: actually, what I'll mostly be doing is mixing and matching various class options to see if I can approximate as many classes as can be had. Not just what Mark talked about once upon a time when he said you can make a decent warpriest out of core options, or the magus so many want to play. I'm going to go "If I took a monk, but gave them a claw cantrip/power instead of their unarmed attacks, and handed them the wildshape powers (assuming those are powers), do I have a shifter yet?"


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Joe M. wrote:

For reference, here are my notes on last night's Paizo Friday chat with Logan.

Cantrips & Heightening & Dispelling (45:52):
Question: how do non-damage-dealing cantrips heighten? Logan: depends on the cantrip. E.g., the sigil cantrip (replacing arcane mark) lasts longer; detect magic gives more information. There are a few that don’t really scale up, like prestidigitation—“there’s not really a lot of places for it to go.” One of the main things about spells is that the level matters more for dispelling, higher level dispels lower level. For categories of spells that auto-dispel each other, like light & darkness spells. So your light cantrip gets stronger, you can use it to dispel magical darkness just by casting light if the darkness is a lower level.

How about multiple simultaneous castings of Prestidigitation as it levels up?

Silver Crusade Contributor

1 person marked this as a favorite.
LuniasM wrote:
ChibiNyan wrote:
Now I wonder if those "property runes" are interchangeable between weapon and armor like Materia in Final Fantasy. WIll that flaming rune give me fire resistance if put on the armor? That'd be cool.
I don't know if that'll happen, as keeping them separated works better for organization purposes, but it would be pretty cool if they did. Of course, I suspect some runes would be specific to one list if that happened, as a Returning armor set would be... odd.

Maybe a returning rune would grant arrow attraction/deflection when applied to armor. ^_^

Designer

15 people marked this as a favorite.
NielsenE wrote:

One of the main things I'm still interested in, is that the devs seem to be expecting people to only progress proficiencies as the class gives them to you, rather than spending feats on them.

The dev comments on classes that give the heavier armors giving shields at the same rate, other comments about when clerics get various casting proficiency, etc. However they do still list that a wizard can buy into heavy armor. This feels like a place where there might be a developer mindset/blank spot in how people will use things. Definitely something for us to see how it plays out in playtests.

Curious if the class proficiencies are worded like "become Expert in X" or "Increase your proficiency in X by one step" Ie, if you spend a feat to accelerate, does it stay accelerated, or is it a wasted feat at some point.

Generally, the higher the proficiency rank, the less generic the way you get it. So for instance, there's an easy way to grab trained for the wizard, but getting further gets trickier.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

No places for Prestidigitation to go? Really? XD Honestly I see stuff like Unseen Servant, Heat/Chill Metal, the old Cloud of Purification, and other such niche spells no one ever prepares as higher level versions of various Prestidigitation effects. Those could be options for a higher level version of the cantrip.

(EDIT: To handle this, break the description of what Prestidigitation can do into multiple small subsections. Each section lists the basic effect at 1st level, then has its own Heighten options. For example, under "chill or warm nonliving material" would be the Heighten for Chill/Heat Metal, and then an even higher heighten that works on ANY nonliving material. Unseen Servant falls under the bit where it can move an amount of material. etc)

If nothing else, it could help provide a scaling circumstance bonus to Profession and similar skill checks, by way of your helpful magic making the environment more favorable and improving the product of your efforts.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Fuzzypaws wrote:

If nothing else, it could help provide a scaling circumstance bonus to Profession and similar skill checks, by way of your helpful magic making the environment more favorable and improving the product of your efforts.

Honestly, I've never loved Guidance and things in that realm of Cantrips. Feels silly spamming it on any skill check you can make sans pressure. I know it doesn't actually invalidate the skill, but it does feel like the skills efforts are cheapened by it somehow .


Guidance is a little silly because you can apply it to pretty much anything at any time; if it keeps that in PF2 it'd be one of the best possible options you could pick. But when something like that is applied a little more narrowly, like applying to Profession and to places where thematically appropriate (impressing people while hosting a dinner, etc) it seems fine, at least to me.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Fuzzypaws wrote:
No places for Prestidigitation to go? Really? XD

I agree. You can easily increase the duration, range, area, number of effects usable at once, allow materials to be actually usable, bonuses to certain skills, ect.

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Kalindlara wrote:
LuniasM wrote:
ChibiNyan wrote:
Now I wonder if those "property runes" are interchangeable between weapon and armor like Materia in Final Fantasy. WIll that flaming rune give me fire resistance if put on the armor? That'd be cool.
I don't know if that'll happen, as keeping them separated works better for organization purposes, but it would be pretty cool if they did. Of course, I suspect some runes would be specific to one list if that happened, as a Returning armor set would be... odd.
Maybe a returning rune would grant arrow attraction/deflection when applied to armor. ^_^

If you put it on your shield you become Captain America ;)

Liberty's Edge

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Gregg Reece wrote:
Kalindlara wrote:
LuniasM wrote:
ChibiNyan wrote:
Now I wonder if those "property runes" are interchangeable between weapon and armor like Materia in Final Fantasy. WIll that flaming rune give me fire resistance if put on the armor? That'd be cool.
I don't know if that'll happen, as keeping them separated works better for organization purposes, but it would be pretty cool if they did. Of course, I suspect some runes would be specific to one list if that happened, as a Returning armor set would be... odd.
Maybe a returning rune would grant arrow attraction/deflection when applied to armor. ^_^
If you put it on your shield you become Captain America ;)

On your armor it might nicely allow for the trope of auto-equipping armor as seen in japanese anime and series but also in the Iron Man comics


2 people marked this as a favorite.

Old cranky guy here - I read this sort of thing, and I become less and less excited about PF2e. I still don't understand the overall rationale behind the quantity and degree of changes being introduced into the system. As I've written elsewhere, I'd greatly prefer a much more evolutionary PF1.5e rather than what it looks like we'll be getting. With PF2e, I get a sense of change for the sake of change.

Mind you, I'll playtest the thing with as an open a mind as is possible, but I'll be going into this process with more dread than enthusiasm.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

Late to the party but Thank You OP.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Mark Seifter wrote:
NielsenE wrote:

One of the main things I'm still interested in, is that the devs seem to be expecting people to only progress proficiencies as the class gives them to you, rather than spending feats on them.

The dev comments on classes that give the heavier armors giving shields at the same rate, other comments about when clerics get various casting proficiency, etc. However they do still list that a wizard can buy into heavy armor. This feels like a place where there might be a developer mindset/blank spot in how people will use things. Definitely something for us to see how it plays out in playtests.

Curious if the class proficiencies are worded like "become Expert in X" or "Increase your proficiency in X by one step" Ie, if you spend a feat to accelerate, does it stay accelerated, or is it a wasted feat at some point.

Generally, the higher the proficiency rank, the less generic the way you get it. So for instance, there's an easy way to grab trained for the wizard, but getting further gets trickier.

As a wild guess they are level locked feats for higher proficiency. Classes that grant these proficiency for free to so no later than folks could take it with General Feats and normally before. Thus the Fighter getting a Legendary weapon proficiency at 13 is a big deal because some one else investing a large portion of their feats might still be only able to get that at lvl 18. Meanwhile the less weapon focused Barbarian still gets Legendary for free, but only does so at 17/18.


Noir le Lotus wrote:

I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

Math:

Level 1 - With trained proficiency, a +1 Dex, and a +4 AC armor apparently has an AC of 5.

A level 1 attacker with +4 STR, who is trained in the weapon, needs to hit a 2, 7, or 12

-----

Level 5 - With Expert prof, an Expert crafted weapon, a +1 potency rune, and a +5 STR will have a +13 (+5 +1 +1 +1 +5)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, expert prof, expert armor, +1 potency rune, will have an AC of +18 (5 +1 +9 +1 +1 +1)

So 5, 10, 15.

-----

Level 10 - Master prof, master weapon, +2 rune, +5 STR will have +21 (+10 +2 +2 +2 +5)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, master prof, master armor, +2 rune, will have an AC of +26 (10 +1 +9 +2 +2 +2)

So 5, 10, 15

-----

Level 15 - Legendary prof, leg weapon, +3 rune, +6 STR will have +30 (+15 +3 +3 +3 +6)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, leg prof, leg armor, +3 rune will have AC +34 (15 +1 +9 +3 +3 +3)

So 4, 9, 14

-----

This is extrapolating from some mechanics in Starfinder (in stat raise speed without upgrades) and pf1 armor (hence +9 plate with a +1 Dex max) and is in no way 100% accurate. While this would make low levels a roflstomp vs low Dex characters it evens out over time.


No one mentioning the bug urgathoan feast thing? :[ I feel the goddess of excess wouldn't be happy being degraded to some Lamashtuian food options.

This cannot stand! >_< while I am quite certain that Urgathoans get a way to acces the Indulgence Domain (and maybe P2E version of Heroes' Feast).


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Planpanther wrote:
Hmm I like the vagueness and rulings over rules feel of anathema but im sure plenty wont.

It creates more work for the GM. Now they have to figure out the appropriate the consequences for various infractions themselves.

And when a PC loses his powers, its no longer because the rules state he does, but because the GM feels like he should, which will create a lot more resentment at tables.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
HWalsh wrote:
Noir le Lotus wrote:

I'm a little puzzled by the thing about AC ...

Did he really say that you take your level into account for your AC ?

Because then I hardly see ho the maths can work for the iterative attacks at -5 and -10 if when you had your level to attack, the target can also put her level to her AC ...

Math:

Level 1 - With trained proficiency, a +1 Dex, and a +4 AC armor apparently has an AC of 5.

A level 1 attacker with +4 STR, who is trained in the weapon, needs to hit a 2, 7, or 12

-----

Level 5 - With Expert prof, an Expert crafted weapon, a +1 potency rune, and a +5 STR will have a +13 (+5 +1 +1 +1 +5)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, expert prof, expert armor, +1 potency rune, will have an AC of +18 (5 +1 +9 +1 +1 +1)

So 5, 10, 15.

-----

Level 10 - Master prof, master weapon, +2 rune, +5 STR will have +21 (+10 +2 +2 +2 +5)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, master prof, master armor, +2 rune, will have an AC of +26 (10 +1 +9 +2 +2 +2)

So 5, 10, 15

-----

Level 15 - Legendary prof, leg weapon, +3 rune, +6 STR will have +30 (+15 +3 +3 +3 +6)

Vs +1 Dex, +9 armor, leg prof, leg armor, +3 rune will have AC +34 (15 +1 +9 +3 +3 +3)

So 4, 9, 14

-----

This is extrapolating from some mechanics in Starfinder (in stat raise speed without upgrades) and pf1 armor (hence +9 plate with a +1 Dex max) and is in no way 100% accurate. While this would make low levels a roflstomp vs low Dex characters it evens out over time.

I think all those AC values should have a +10 added in there?

I also suspect that the “bare” armor contribution will be about half of what it was before, given the numbers we’ve seen (e.g., chain shirts giving +2 to AC instead of +4).

If that’s right, that would net increase your lvl 1 AC values by around +8, and the other AC values by about +5, putting them in line with each other with respect to how hard they are to hit.

EDIT: Just to be clear, I know you know about the different armor values (from your last comment). Just making it explicit for those who haven’t been following the play test blogs and dev posts closely!


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
pjrogers wrote:

Old cranky guy here - I read this sort of thing, and I become less and less excited about PF2e. I still don't understand the overall rationale behind the quantity and degree of changes being introduced into the system. As I've written elsewhere, I'd greatly prefer a much more evolutionary PF1.5e rather than what it looks like we'll be getting. With PF2e, I get a sense of change for the sake of change.

Mind you, I'll playtest the thing with as an open a mind as is possible, but I'll be going into this process with more dread than enthusiasm.

If you are actually interested in understanding the rationale behind mod rod these choices, then you shouldn't just be reading recaps and blog posts. Go watch these streams, or listen to the Know Direction interview, or go read the Game Informer interview with Buhlman. Or go to Mark's profile and look through his posts, and do the same for Logan and a couple others. Paizo has been really up front about their thought process. They can't go into that level of depth in a blog post, but even actually listening to this twitch stream linked here gives them a venue to do it.

If what you want to do instead is just express discontent that the game is changing, that's also your right.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

"Pull bombs"? I thought he said "pull bongs". That makes much more sense.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Captain Morgan wrote:
If you are actually interested in understanding the rationale behind mod rod these choices, then you shouldn't just be reading recaps and blog posts.

Actually, I have read/listened/watched a number of resources you mention (though not the latest referenced in this thread). I've seen lots of small rationales - "wands of cure light wounds are bad," "goblins are fun," "the current game system is old," etc. However, I have yet to read/hear/see a convincing overarching logic for the degree of change that appears to be associated with PF2e.

I don't have access to the sales numbers, market research, etc which I assume is, at least in part, guiding the PF2e development process. However, it seems to me that they're taking a mighty big gamble that PF2e will attract new gamers in the face of strong competition from D&D5e while not alienating the PF player base.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
pjrogers wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:
If you are actually interested in understanding the rationale behind mod rod these choices, then you shouldn't just be reading recaps and blog posts.

Actually, I have read/listened/watched a number of resources you mention (though not the latest referenced in this thread). I've seen lots of small rationales - "wands of cure light wounds are bad," "goblins are fun," "the current game system is old," etc. However, I have yet to read/hear/see a convincing overarching logic for the degree of change that appears to be associated with PF2e.

I don't have access to the sales numbers, market research, etc which I assume is, at least in part, guiding the PF2e development process. However, it seems to me that they're taking a mighty big gamble that PF2e will attract new gamers in the face of strong competition from D&D5e while not alienating the PF player base.

Hmm, fair enough then. I feel like I have heard a lot of explanation behind these decisions. But a lot of these are addressing problems I personally had with the old system, so it is possible I am projecting what I want to hear.

Are there specific examples of changes you haven't seen an explanation for? Because I could start listing off things I've heard but shooting in the dark doesn't seem productive.


Captain Morgan wrote:

Hmm, fair enough then. I feel like I have heard a lot of explanation behind these decisions. But a lot of these are addressing problems I personally had with the old system, so it is possible I am projecting what I want to hear.

Are there specific examples of changes you haven't seen an explanation for? Because I could start listing off things I've heard but shooting in the dark doesn't seem productive.

They're not talking about "x specific thing doesn't have an explaination", they're asking about an overarching theme behind how the game will be played differently, but it seems like the idea behind 2e is "Pathfinder, but we changed various things to try and make it better" without a defining core to the intent of the new edition.


5 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

They have, several times, stated some of the core intent of the new edition. Mainly trying to reduce complexity while keeping depth, to make learning the system easy and intuitive and build a better framework going forward. Increase base line tactical options without relying on PF1's exception based gameplay. They also want their game to be more manageable at higher levels and to have ALL characters at those higher levels feel like the legends they rightly are.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Milo v3 wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:

Hmm, fair enough then. I feel like I have heard a lot of explanation behind these decisions. But a lot of these are addressing problems I personally had with the old system, so it is possible I am projecting what I want to hear.

Are there specific examples of changes you haven't seen an explanation for? Because I could start listing off things I've heard but shooting in the dark doesn't seem productive.

They're not talking about "x specific thing doesn't have an explaination", they're asking about an overarching theme behind how the game will be played differently, but it seems like the idea behind 2e is "Pathfinder, but we changed various things to try and make it better" without a defining core to the intent of the new edition.

Yes, more and more PF2e seems to be a collection of changes and new rules that taken together represent a significant and "revolutionary" (ie. non-evolutionary) departure from PF1e. While each specific change or new rule might have a specific rationale, I've seen less about the overall logic or philosophy guiding the project.

Personally, I don't want, nor do I see a demand for a new PF2e. I don't want to learn what looks more and more to be an entirely new game system with increasingly limited links to PF1 and the versions of D&D that preceded that. One of the things that attracted me to PF was the way in which it clearly was an evolutionary development of D&D, and I'm not sure that I'll be able to say the same for PF2e.

Finally, with such a large number of changes, both large and small, assessing their cumulative impact becomes a very difficult and complex process. Changing so many things at once makes it very difficult to understand which changes are having what sorts of effects.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Milo v3 wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:

Hmm, fair enough then. I feel like I have heard a lot of explanation behind these decisions. But a lot of these are addressing problems I personally had with the old system, so it is possible I am projecting what I want to hear.

Are there specific examples of changes you haven't seen an explanation for? Because I could start listing off things I've heard but shooting in the dark doesn't seem productive.

They're not talking about "x specific thing doesn't have an explaination", they're asking about an overarching theme behind how the game will be played differently, but it seems like the idea behind 2e is "Pathfinder, but we changed various things to try and make it better" without a defining core to the intent of the new edition.

Well, that's something that seems to have been answered. I think the major goals seem to be:

--Make it more intuitive to learn by removing needless complexity and making terminology more universal. (Ex: Ability scores can't have odd values using default stat creation.)

--Keep enough brand identity to make it still look and feel like Pathfinder, and by unspoken extension feel like D&D. (Ex: Keeping ability scores at all and not just using modifiers.)

--Cut down on "false choices" that are too good not to take. (Ex: Big 6 being mostly turned into big 2 + larger ability score growth.)

--Make it so min maxing is less rewarded and characters can be well rounded without compromising their core role. (Ex: No reward for dumping a stat below 8, everyone gets skill feats.)

--Make high level characters feel like fantasy super heroes. (Ex: Higher ability scores and AC sans gear, references to Beowulf level skill examples.)

--Keep Pathfinder as "the system of choice." Make sure there are lots of decisions to make and ways to customize your character.

--Make combat even more tactical. (Ex: Power Attack going from a mathematical certainty to a situational but potent choice.)

I tried to relate as many of the principles as I could think of back to a single aspect of the game, but couldn't quite manage it across the board.

Tl;dr: The core intent of second edition is to provide a game where it is easier to jump in and start playing, but still has crazy amounts of depth and decision making. You should be able to eventually execute almost any fantasy concept you can think of. Make higher level more accessible so that characters get to feel like full blown heroes of legend, and it is harder to feel like dead weight. Especially for martials.


Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Mark Seifter wrote:
NielsenE wrote:

One of the main things I'm still interested in, is that the devs seem to be expecting people to only progress proficiencies as the class gives them to you, rather than spending feats on them.

The dev comments on classes that give the heavier armors giving shields at the same rate, other comments about when clerics get various casting proficiency, etc. However they do still list that a wizard can buy into heavy armor. This feels like a place where there might be a developer mindset/blank spot in how people will use things. Definitely something for us to see how it plays out in playtests.

Curious if the class proficiencies are worded like "become Expert in X" or "Increase your proficiency in X by one step" Ie, if you spend a feat to accelerate, does it stay accelerated, or is it a wasted feat at some point.

Generally, the higher the proficiency rank, the less generic the way you get it. So for instance, there's an easy way to grab trained for the wizard, but getting further gets trickier.

Thanks for the answer. (Not sure I can interpret it until more details are revealed, but that's part of the process :) )

1 to 50 of 65 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | next > last >>
Community / Forums / Archive / Pathfinder / Playtests & Prerelease Discussions / Pathfinder Playtest / Pathfinder Playtest Prerelease Discussion / Paizo Friday 05-04 with Logan Bonner All Messageboards