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Prestidigitation is concentration, so no more flavoring things for the whole party. You're also limited to ten minutes. Occult casters can't flavor stuff, but Primal casters get access to that now.
Unseen Servant lasts up to one minute, concentration. That really smarts. That and Prestidigitation were the two spells that let you be magical. You could wave your hand and have something brought over without having to make a scene by casting something. You could have an umbrella float over you as you walked out in the snow.
Suggestion is a level higher despite some sensible nerfs to suggestions that become unreasonable. The duration was cut and moved to crit-fail only on top of that. (I know it's got plenty of combat applications, but being able to make people do reasonable-sounding things is solidly "quality of life" too.)
Only somewhat related: Most polymorph spells are too short to carry out a social interaction with. (I'm glad to see two ten-minute options. Cutting things close, but a second casting with metamagic to hide it should cover most situations.) (Another note: Shapechange is really bad on a spontaneous caster, and useless on Aberrant Sorcerer.)
I know nobody likes to see their cheese moved, but spells that provide a comfortable living are a big part of the appeal to casters for me. A big part of the appeal to polymorph spells for me was being able to fake being something you weren't with a little judicious Extend Spell. Maybe we could have a fraudulent form spell?
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That said, they didn't go after all the utility/comfortable life spells:
Mage Hand starts out with about the same weight limit, and scales to double the old limit.
Magnificent Mansion is untouched.
The Illusory X spells have good durations and don't generally don't need to be babysat.
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Nerfs I can't complain about:
Yeah, Rope Trick was really low level for something that creates a pocket dimension.
Rope trick has actually been rather nicely nerfed. No view window, the Rope is actually much easier to mess up to collapse the dimensional space. And it takes 10 minutes to cast, so no chase castings of it while trying to escape pursuers.
ALso, you can still flavor stuff for friends and family, you'll just have to tell them to eat it quickly. I'm mostly okay with the changes but losing out on the lighter and air drawing aspects is kind of a bummer. I do like the different effects for other spell lists but only arcane gets all of them.
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Some of the spell nerfs I like, some went too far.
Entangle is an example of the latter, in my opinion. I quite agree that the PF1 version is overpowered when it comes up (it is quite situational, after all).
But raising the level, reducing the area, and making the effect only entangle (which is pretty much just hampering movement) is a couple of steps too far. Its certainly a spell that I'd never now take.
Paizo DOES deserve its reputation for over-nerfing things.
That said, I like a LOT of the nerfs. Magic did need significantly reducing in power.
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Magic did need significantly reducing in power.
I'm just not sure I agree with how they did it.
Seems like it's still Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard except that they put a "divide by 2" on the wizard (number of spells per day) and called it good."Wizards get fewer spells and weapons now get extra damage dice, that'll balance it!"
No, no it doesn't. The wizard is still quadratic, he just gets to do it half as often and the rest of the time he's stuck with cantrips (which do the same damage as a +1 weapon, tops).
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It looks like Rope Trick and Magnificent Mansion were both moved to uncommon as well, so Magnificent Mansion did get a nerf after all- it costs you a whopping 60% of your expected personal funds for that level to learn, if you can find it.
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Prestidigitation is concentration, so no more flavoring things for the whole party. You're also limited to ten minutes. Occult casters can't flavor stuff, but Primal casters get access to that now.
Unseen Servant lasts up to one minute, concentration. That really smarts. That and Prestidigitation were the two spells that let you be magical. You could wave your hand and have something brought over without having to make a scene by casting something. You could have an umbrella float over you as you walked out in the snow.
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Only somewhat related: Most polymorph spells are too short to carry out a social interaction with. (I'm glad to see two ten-minute options. Cutting things close, but a second casting with metamagic to hide it should cover most situations.) (Another note: Shapechange is really bad on a spontaneous caster, and useless on Aberrant Sorcerer.)
Big agree on all of this stuff. (Don't necessarily disagree on the rest, just not necessarily a snap-agree.) I don't even think you can use prestidigitation to clean yourself up anymore, by the present wording, which disappoints me. But I miss when the spell had an open-ended "this can do other cantrip stuff, ask your GM".
As for polymorph spells in particular... I dunno. I think it's too easy to forget that sometimes, the point is just to be someone or something else. Not about "how does this affect my DPS" or "which humanoid shape grants the most advantageous combination of senses, movement speeds, and natural attacks". And it'd be nice to see a polymorph option that took that into account, while still preserving their adventuring uses for when appropriate.
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What I want to know is why Paizo nerfed the quality of life spells. My guess is "genre considerations," i.e., trying to be more sword & sorcery. Never mind that today's demographic is likely going to think about at least cleanliness first thing...
So...what's your take on the matter, Paizo?
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I wish they would use encounter mode for the current duration's and have longer duration's for exploration mode.
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What I want to know is why Paizo nerfed the quality of life spells. My guess is "genre considerations," i.e., trying to be more sword & sorcery. Never mind that today's demographic is likely going to think about at least cleanliness first thing...
So...what's your take on the matter, Paizo?
Even if using genre considerations and trying to be more 'sword & sorcery' they still got it wrong. Aragorn, Conan, and most others CLEANED UP, including a bath, before going to meet people. It was usually one of the first things they did on reaching a new town or village. Using this spell to speed that up for the party and myself was part of the fun, nerfing it the way it was makes it less so. Still useful, just not as magical feeling.
I do note that, the way it is worded, the character with this spell can become the alchemist's best friend by supplying an unlimited number of alchemical vials for bombs. The vial isn't the weapon, the concoction inside is, and the fragility of the vial makes it good for this purpose.
I wish they would use encounter mode for the current duration's and have longer duration's for exploration mode.
An elegant solution for allowing them to be used for convenience and flavor but preventing them for being OP in combat. You could hand wave it with a little line of fluff like 'but the additional stress of a dangerous encounter can dramatically shorten the duration of certain spells.'
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Agreed. The greatly shortened durations in general bugs me - yes, I believe that mage armor should last all day for a 10th level wizard, so sue me - but it makes no sense at all for these non-combat utility spells. One minute for unseen servant means that it is useless for sweeping up a room or pitching a tent when you get to the campsite, so what good is it?
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The utility and quality of life stuff also doesn't scale in any meaningful way. There was an opportunity to do stuff like Sorcerer's Apprentice shenanigans, or a high level purify spell being the old Brand 2E cloud of Purification, but nope, can't have anything fun...
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overland flight is nowhere to be found. the closest thing is heightening fly to 7th level for an hour of flight. So yucky. I didn't want to break the game. I just wanted to be able to fly around all day and feel all awesome. Now it will take all my 7th level slots for 3 hours of flight. It honestly makes me want to cry.
I mean come on, there's nothing like flying, pterodactyls fly, superman flies, Thanos flies(in a helicopter, but still...) batman flies(sort of) and most relevantly powerful wizards fly. How can you be a high level wizard if you can't fly whenever you want? it's like not having a staff or a wand, or at least a magic ring. It's iconic. the moment any of my wizards or sorcerers in pf1 could cast overland flight that was when I envisioned them as having truly made it as a spellcaster.
I am so happy they nerfed it.
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Yeah, the overnerfing of spells and spellcasters is killing this playtest for me. There are other factors, of course (the level bonus which kills all semblance of real-life verisimilitude at high levels, the big sign which says "Yes, you *must* have a Cleric!", the resulting very short adventuring days if you don't follow that last maxime), but more and more I notice that just looking at the spells and caster classes makes me hate the playtest rules.
Which is, of course, why I am embarking on a project over this weekend, where I will go through the entire arcane spell list, spell by spell, to suss out what arcane casters are even supposed to do with themselves in this edition. I already did six hours of statistical work to get the average saves vs. the really-not-very-flexible DC an arcane caster will produce every level, as well as average AC and attack bonus numbers for the monsters of each CR in the bestiary vs. the expected AC and attack bonus numbers of Barbarians, Monks, Fighters and Paladins. Hint: Don't expect to play the first two classes and not get hit two out of three attacks from a same-level opponent.
The thing is, damage is right out for arcane casters. You can't optimize for it anymore, same-level monsters save about 50% of the time, with a 5% higher chance to fail their save for each CR you are above them (with the notable exception of proficiency bumps). Hence, unless you are fighting mooks don't expect to see many spell crits.
Save or suck spells fall under the same problem, where it's mostly a straight 50% to fail at doing anything of note and it gets worse at higher levels, too.
So what are casters supposed to do now? Be the busboy for the Fighters and give them a buff spell every now and then? I intend to find out.
To bring it back to the original topic, at least it would be nice to have our comfort spells back.
Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard specifically refers to the way wizards in 3e both get more spells per day, and their old spells become more powerful because they scale with caster level. To use an extremely simplified example: a 5th level evoker can cast three 5d6 fireballs per day (with high Int) for a total of 5d6 damage. At 10th level, he can instead cast ten 10d6 fireballs (using both 3rd and 4th level slots) plus four 10d6 cones of cold.
Except that at 10th level, most things they'd be hurling fireballs at are going to make the reflex save DC (because that is fixed).
So your ten 10d6 fireballs are more like ten 5d6 fireballs. I mean, sure, that's still 175 damage (but it's not 350).
One of the things I like about PF2 is that spell save DC is now a single number. Doesn't matter what spell I use and what slot I cast it in, I can be reasonably sure that whatever I'm throwing it at doesn't have a high probability of resisting.
A lot of the problems with spells could be fixed by just increasing how long they last. The one minute limit does not make sense. I understand why they did it from a balance stand point, but I think they hit the spell casters one too many times with the nerf bat.
In PF1 I played a martial/caster. Magus 8/weapon master 3/Elditch Knight 9. I thought the casters where over the top, and the martials needed a boost. I wish they had boost the martial a bit more instead of nerfing the casters so hard.
If you could increase how long a spell lasted by casting it in a higher level slot that would help a lot.
Example: Fly
4th level: last a minute
6th level: last a hour
8th level: last a day or 8 hours
Example: Unseen Servant
1st level: concentration, up to a minute
3rd level: concentration, up to a hour
5th level: concentration, up to 8 hours
7th level: concentration, up to a day
The spells last longer by using a higher level spell slot. A feat that would let you increase duration by heightening the spell would help a lot.
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I understand why they did it from a balance stand point, but I think they hit the spell casters one too many times with the nerf bat.
Let us count the ways:
1. Durations don't scale with caster level
1a. Durations cut in general
2. Damage doesn't scale with caster level unless heightened
3. Number of targets doesn't scale with level (for some spells, like Haste, this was probably needed) unless heightened
4. Range doesn't scale with level for most spells, though it does for a few if heightened
4a. Ranges cut in general
5. New restrictions imposed on classic utility spells spells (e.g. Prestidigitation, Dimension Door, Teleport, Scrying...)
6. SoD and SoS only on critical fail (though this was needed)
7. Spell slots essentially cut in half
8. No bonus spells based on attribute
9. 50% chance of wizards failing when learning new spells
10. If failing on #9, can't try again until next level unless you take a feat (making it effectively a required feat/feat tax)
11. Spell DC doesn't change with attribute
12. Wizards require a feat to take a familiar
13. Clerics are all but forced into the healing role.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. (Sorry, don't know the other caster classes all that well yet)
I am sure there are more. In exchange for all of this we get:
1. Scaling cantrips so casters can play murder-hobo by spamming combat
2. Familiars are modular (though they are also amorphous blobs, as it doesn't matter what kind of animal you choose unless it's a bird 'cause then one of your modular options is fixed, permanently). Actually I don't know if this is a + or a -.
3. Wizards get a level-scaling pearl of power equivalent
4. No penalty for Wizard specializing in a school
Some of these nerfs were needed (e.g. isolated spells like Haste, Slow, Blessing of Fervor, etc. and SoS/SoD spells). Some combination of these would have been fine. But all of these together? Pretty unappealing.
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Some of these nerfs were needed (e.g. isolated spells like Haste, Slow, Blessing of Fervor, etc. and SoS/SoD spells). Some combination of these would have been fine. But all of these together? Pretty unappealing.
Yep. I'm half way through with my arcane spell list evaluation and so far the best you can hope for is playing a save or suck playstyle, where against same level opponents you have about a 50% chance of success. If you want to do a bit of damage, Electric Arc and Ray of Frost/Telekinetic Strike are probably your best options, because you can spam them without having to give up actual spell slots. Those are filled with a few buff spells for the Fighter (all other melee classes suck compared to him) and debuffs which have a decent effect on even a successful save by the enemy.
Sorcerers are, frankly, screwed. It's Wizards all the way now, baby. They are more flexible due to Quick Preparation, they have access to vastly more spells known, they get more class feats instead of often useless bloodline abilities. Due to the level bonus they even are charming negotiators. It's seriously depressing, given that Sorcerers are my PF1E favorite class of all time.
Oh, and another thing, future AP's are very likely going to be incompatible with playing PF1E, even if you convert the monsters. The problem is that many of the useful spells have changed to a higher level and still have a nerfed effect (duration, affected targets, etc). So, unless you are at level 13 or more, flying your party up a mountain is right out. But I guess since everyone is a pocket Reinhold Messner now, people are expected to just scale up that mountain by hand.
In any case, since non-combat magic has now about 85% a very short duration of one minute AND is available much later in many cases, a prospective GM would have to rewrite large portions of a published adventure's story just to deal with writing assumptions made just out of the new magic paradigm. At which point I have to ask myself "Why again am I not writing my own stuff, instead of spending 50% of the time I'd need for that just rewriting this commercial adventure?".
In 3.5 / PF 1 a prepared caster got to make real strategic choices about how spells they memorized for non-combat uses vs ones geared to battle.
If they got it right you had a good chance of avoiding fights or serious attrition from hazards / environment. But if they got it wrong they still have to face the same number of encounters with a lot less combar resources.
Making that choice was one of the coolest things about being a wizard - if you wanted to be a total pacifist or an insane pyromanic you could be.
4th Ed lost this, with set amounts of daily / encounter / utility powers.
With the reductions to durations I fear most PF2 spells are no use outside of encounters and we're going down the same path
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I feel like in general a more flavorful game that leaves as many reasonable possibilities open for creative play--not just for magic, but for anything characters might think to do--makes for a more satisfying game from where I sit. I don't sweat the numerical nerfs. That's stuff that I feel doesn't overly affect my enjoyment of the game--it's when things get tightened down so you can't use them in clever ways that I get frustrated.
Like Floating Disk; which I've never seen used as intended (as a magical porter to carry your stuff). I've only ever seen it used so that folks can do their cool Doctor Strange thing and float around while sitting crosslegged on it, or when they needed a stepstool to get up somewhere (like float up so they can stare a large creature in the eye or grab books off a top shelf). Once my players cleverly used it to evacuate a fallen PC from a fight they were in. I liked that.
The current version has this kicker, which feels designed for no reason other than to ruin people's fun:
The disk is dismissed if a creature tries to ride atop it, if anyone tries to lift or force the disk higher above the ground, or if you move more than 30 feet away from the disk (such as by Flying or Climbing above the ground)
Things like that just make me grumpy.
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Unseen Servant being concentration and lasting such a short time is pretty underwhelming. Especially since concentration spells are fatiguing in exploration mode if you decide you want to prepare a bunch of unseen servants to carry your bags, bring you tea etc.
Unseen Servant is a style spell, a flavorful choice that occasionally allowed for creative utility, but rarely proved too useful due to its limited ability to interact with the world and innate fragility.
I think Unseen Servant should be changed to a cantrip at the very least so you can call out servants all day.
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The spell casting issue is my main concern with the play test.
I have just made my Imperial Sorcerer for our first play test game, which will take place next week. I really enjoyed the new character creation system, using the various building blocks to make your character, although a number of the blocks themselves were pretty mediocre.
However, looking over the arcane spell list, there is nothing I am looking forward to. In our Pathfinder one campaign, I have a level 14 witch, and there are at least 10 level 8 spells I cannot wait to try out. With my sorcerer's current spell list, literally nothing excites me. It all seems just so lifeless, dull and limited.
I'm hoping game play will be great. But, if spell casting remains in its current form, I won't be buying into the new edition.
How many of those ten 8th level spells were printed in the PF1 core rulebook?
I liked that they decreased the number of spell slots available to casters per day, and made all their spells scale with their Class DC. I also liked that they removed level-based duration and bonus dice, instead tying the spell's strength to the spell slot used.
However, I agree that the spells themselves have been nerfed a bit too much. I've really only looked at the big names so far, but I'm not impressed.
If you don't heighten fireball, it's damage starts to become trivial (especially with more HP going around). However, constantly heightening spells means you'll run out of those slots. This leads to an issue where blast spells only feel impactful when heightened, while lower level slots go unused because 6d6 fire damage at 11th level just isn't cutting it. If you're going to design it so casters have fewer spell slots, they should have options that provide value at every spell level they can cast (more on this below!).
The spell nerf that stands out to me is Dimension Door. It only teleports you 60 feet, and uses 2 actions to do so. An elf wizard can walk that distance with as many actions! And you can't bring anyone with you anymore either. Sad times for a classic favorite.
What I'd like to see is integrating both heightening and actions into many of the spells, similar to what they did for Heal.
For example, with Dimension Door: casting with 1 action teleports you 60 feet; 2 actions increases it to 600 feet and you can bring one ally; 3 actions increases the number of allies you can bring up to your casting modifier. For blast spells like Fireball and Lightning Bolt, make it so adding a casting action leads to an increase in the damage, or some other effect. Using 3 actions to make a 3rd level Fireball deal ~8d6 fire damage or increase its AOE adds value to those lower level spell slots. And this ties into other turn considerations, such as maintaining concentration and moving ("I'd like to add an action to fireball, but I have to GTFO from the Barbarian in my face", or "I'd like to add an action to fireball, but I have to keep my concentration on X spell").
Again, I like the nerf to the number of spell slots and class DC. In theory, it means a caster has to be more careful and intelligent with when and how they use their spells while keeping all their spells relevant. The spell system just needs more heightening and action-adding options baked into each spell.
How many of those ten 8th level spells were printed in the PF1 core rulebook?
Clone, Maze, Mind Blank, Moment of Prescience Prying Eyes (Greater) and Trap the Soul.
Anyway, I don't see that as relevant to my problem at hand, which is that none of the spells on the entire Arcane list excite me in their current iterations. This may well be due to being spoilt by original Pathfinder, but still, it doesn't inspire me to run out and buy a slew of new books. In fact, I cancelled my order for the play test hardcover after reading the free PDF.