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I was thinking, it would be nice if the encounter tables for dungeon masters scaled all the way down to a single player character, to allow easy roleplay with just your partner alone.
Pathfinder is pretty specifically a party game; no one player is supposed to be able to fulfill every role, so it would be very difficult to make encounters that can be dumbed down to a solo experience while also being interesting for a standard 4-player party.
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My recommendation for this kind of game would be to invoke the old 3.x Gestalt rules. If you're not familiar, those were that you actually leveled up in two classes simultaneously, taking the best features (hit points, skills, BAB, etc) of each. It makes more powerful, survivable characters in games with a tiny party size.
On top of that though, if it is only ONE player, they should probably control two characters. There's just too many situations where a character can be disabled, paralyzed or etc, and without an ally to back them up that just automatically means game over. The GM should still limit their use of such enemies and effects when running for only two or three characters, but with only a single character all it takes is one slipup to end the campaign.
It's not impossible though, of course. The GM just has to be really on the ball, has to throw weaker enemies and less dangerous challenges at you for much longer, and generally has to structure the game more like Legend of Zelda rather than traditional D&D / Pathfinder.
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I usually rp with my gf just fine. I add at least one major npc as my own character/her sidekick and then she has the possibility to gather other npcs who can join her now and then on different quests
(Basically main character, main npcs and exchangable npcs)
THat is of course not an optimal solution for every playstyle but it CAN work really well
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Michael Allen and I have been creating a series of adventures for Legendary Games called One Player Adventures for a GM and a single player.
I find that a 1-on-1 adventure can help a new or younger player feel a lot more comfortable about getting used to mechanics and roleplaying without having to worry about what the other players think. They can be really useful for PC side quests where the other PCs would only be in the way, such as a druid seeking a new animal companion, etc. I also have noticed that such sessions run a whole lot quicker than a group session, a lone PC can easily level up in around 1-2 sessions - assuming they survive.
We intend to bring out more One Player titles and convert all of these to PF2 when it comes out.
I usually rp with my gf just fine. I add at least one major npc as my own character/her sidekick and then she has the possibility to gather other npcs who can join her now and then on different quests
(Basically main character, main npcs and exchangable npcs)THat is of course not an optimal solution for every playstyle but it CAN work really well
This is exactly how we do it. We ended up with a lot of time on our hands while renovating our home and decided to run all the APs we never got a chance to do in larger groups (we're only two in, right now.) Rules are one free NPC, a few extra recruitable ones depending on circumstances, or if you want to go truly solo you can go mythic. Different ideal solutions in each campaign I have found.
I would say this is actually a pretty easy play style to support at the end of the day, though, at least in a homebrew. After all, you can just balance encounters around any number of players if you're willing to put in the work- be it one or two. While I doubt PF2 is going to accommodate solo play to any significant degree (as much as I enjoy it that really isn't the focus of the game) I do hope it incorporates more guidelines on smaller or larger groups as I find in my own life at least that four person balanced parties are pretty rare and I ended up balancing around a party of three rogues or what have you.