So I've gone over the book and I feel like this is a pretty glaring issue. Attack bonuses scale up way faster than AC. Your attack bonus is equivalent to your level, for everyone. But AC doesn't seem to go up in any meaningful way outside of runes and proficiency.
Legendary Full plate +5, heavy shield, Legendary Armor Proficiency, 18 Dex gives you an AC of 30. This is, as I understand it, the highest your AC can get (not counting temporary bonuses.) You'd need to be 15th level in order to get Legendary gear.
So a 15th level character, with a +5 legendary weapon, legendary proficiency and strength score of 22, would be swinging with a bonus of +34. And that's without any magic items to boost strength or any other ways to increase attack bonus that I may not have found yet.
So, unless I roll a 1, I will hit a similarly levelled player or NPC character, every single time. And hell, if I use all my actions to attack, I have two all but guaranteed hits and a third that hits on anything about five.
What am I missing here? There is no way that a group of professional game designers didn't notice this? Please tell me I'm just an idiot and missed some crucial bit of information.
All proficiency modifiers are Level + {-2,0,1,2,3} for {untrained, trained, expert, master, legendary}, including armor. Weapons, Armor, Skills, Spells, Saves, etc. all work the same way.
Your math looks to be about 15 off on the AC. +5 Full Plate is 6+5, a Heavy Shield is +2, Legendary Armor Proficiency at 15 is 3+15, 18 dex is +4 and AC starts at 10 for a total of 6+5+2+3+15+4+10 = 45. Did you forget that your Armor Proficiency bonus also scales with level?
Your math looks to be about 15 off on the AC. +5 Full Plate is 6+5, a Heavy Shield is +2, Legendary Armor Proficiency at 15 is 3+15, 18 dex is +4 and AC starts at 10 for a total of 6+5+2+3+15+4+10 = 45. Did you forget that your Armor Proficiency bonus also scales with level?
I could not find that written anywhere in the book. Where is that, out of curiosity?
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So I've gone over the book and I feel like this is a pretty glaring issue. Attack bonuses scale up way faster than AC. Your attack bonus is equivalent to your level, for everyone. But AC doesn't seem to go up in any meaningful way outside of runes and proficiency.
Legendary Full plate +5, heavy shield, Legendary Armor Proficiency, 18 Dex gives you an AC of 30. This is, as I understand it, the highest your AC can get (not counting temporary bonuses.) You'd need to be 15th level in order to get Legendary gear.
So a 15th level character, with a +5 legendary weapon, legendary proficiency and strength score of 22, would be swinging with a bonus of +34. And that's without any magic items to boost strength or any other ways to increase attack bonus that I may not have found yet.
So, unless I roll a 1, I will hit a similarly levelled player or NPC character, every single time. And hell, if I use all my actions to attack, I have two all but guaranteed hits and a third that hits on anything about five.
What am I missing here? There is no way that a group of professional game designers didn't notice this? Please tell me I'm just an idiot and missed some crucial bit of information.
Armor Class is a proficiency too so you add your level. The only thing to need to be aware of with AC is how shields interact:
When calculating AC while carrying a shield, apply the lower of your armor proficiency rank or your shield proficiency rank.
Your math looks to be about 15 off on the AC. +5 Full Plate is 6+5, a Heavy Shield is +2, Legendary Armor Proficiency at 15 is 3+15, 18 dex is +4 and AC starts at 10 for a total of 6+5+2+3+15+4+10 = 45. Did you forget that your Armor Proficiency bonus also scales with level?I could not find that written anywhere in the book. Where is that, out of curiosity?
Page 290/291 covers proficiency and proficiency modifiers.
I could not find that written anywhere in the book. Where is that, out of curiosity?
page 16, bottom right
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So a 15th level character, with a +5 legendary weapon, legendary proficiency and strength score of 22, would be swinging with a bonus of +34. And that's without any magic items to boost strength or any other ways to increase attack bonus that I may not have found yet.
Am I missing something in the to-hit calculations here? :) Attack bonus would be:
18 (proficiency, 15 level + 3 legendary) + 6 (strength) + 5 (item bonus from +5 potency rune) = +29, not +34? The +3 item bonus from the Legendary weapon shouldn't stack with the +5 item bonus from the potency rune, so not sure how it'd be above +29.
Against the corrected AC of 45, that's actually pretty bad - hitting on a 16 with your first attack, crit failing on a 6 on your first attack, and those only get worse with multiple attack penalties. And that's for a 15th level fighter using their main weapon that's fully upgraded! There's still the possibility for an item bonus to their strength (for a +30 to hit), but surely the fighter's to-hit should be more competitive in this situation?
Attack bonus would be:
18 (proficiency, 15 level + 3 legendary) + 6 (strength) + 5 (item bonus from +5 potency rune) = +29, not +34? The +3 item bonus from the Legendary weapon shouldn't stack with the +5 item bonus from the potency rune, so not sure how it'd be above +29.
Against the corrected AC of 45, that's actually pretty bad
Your numbers are right, but that's not bad its how it should be imho. Although i'm not sure which class could get legendary weapon proficiency as low as level 15?
Consider: a level 20 Balor demon has AC 44, so AC 45 is very high! A level 15 character should have a hard time hitting a Balor demon. A 25% chance to hit (d20+29 v AC 45) is pretty good considering. And that's before circumstance / conditional bonuses.
The quality of a weapon gives an item bonus and so does a rune, so they don't stack. Which is interesting to compare to armour runes: since armour quality doesn't give an AC bonus (it only lowers the Check penalty).
Your math looks to be about 15 off on the AC. +5 Full Plate is 6+5, a Heavy Shield is +2, Legendary Armor Proficiency at 15 is 3+15, 18 dex is +4 and AC starts at 10 for a total of 6+5+2+3+15+4+10 = 45. Did you forget that your Armor Proficiency bonus also scales with level?
How're they getting their full +4 Dex while wearing Full Plate?
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Attack bonus would be:
18 (proficiency, 15 level + 3 legendary) + 6 (strength) + 5 (item bonus from +5 potency rune) = +29, not +34? The +3 item bonus from the Legendary weapon shouldn't stack with the +5 item bonus from the potency rune, so not sure how it'd be above +29.
Against the corrected AC of 45, that's actually pretty bad
Your numbers are right, but that's not bad its how it should be imho. Although i'm not sure which class could get legendary weapon proficiency as low as level 15?
Consider: a level 20 Balor demon has AC 44, so AC 45 is very high! A level 15 character should have a hard time hitting a Balor demon. A 25% chance to hit (d20+29 v AC 45) is pretty good considering. And that's before circumstance / conditional bonuses.
The quality of a weapon gives an item bonus and so does a rune, so they don't stack. Which is interesting to compare to armour runes: since armour quality doesn't give an AC bonus (it only lowers the Check penalty).
Fighters are the only class which gets Legendary Weapon Proficiency by level 15 :)
I hadn't looked at the Bestiary, so hadn't realised that PC's AC would be so much higher than a monster's. It's just strange that a PC focused on attack does so poorly versus a PC focused on defence - the 2nd and 3rd attacks are essentially useless without circumstance/conditional bonuses. I agree that a 15th level fighter having a tough time with a Balor is fair, though it's worth noting that a 40% chance to hit (15% on 2nd attack) for an 18th level fighter versus a Balor does seem a little low still.
For AC lets use a 15th level Paladin as an example. At level 15 they have heavy armour + shield mastery.
Let's give him a +4 potency rune on his armour (max allowed on master quality).
Base : 10
Heavy armour proficiency: +17 (level + master proficiency)
Full plate: +6 AC
Dex: +1 (max for full plate).
Potency rune: +4
Total = 38 AC.
A heavy shield could take that to 40AC.
Seems ok to me. Any issues?
I agree that a 15th level fighter having a tough time with a Balor is fair, though it's worth noting that a 40% chance to hit (15% on 2nd attack) for an 18th level fighter versus a Balor does seem a little low still.
Yes those iterative attack penalties will hurt, especially since the Balor has 460 hit points!
I'm assuming the condition and circumstance bonuses are going to matter a lot. Flanking, Bless, Inspire Courage etc. And tactics to make enemies flat footed and so on. Even more important than in PF 1.
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For AC lets use a 15th level Paladin as an example. At level 15 they have heavy armour + shield mastery.
Let's give him a +4 potency rune on his armour (max allowed on master quality).Base : 10
Heavy armour proficiency: +17 (level + master proficiency)
Full plate: +6 AC
Dex: +1 (max for full plate).
Potency rune: +4Total = 38 AC.
Seems ok to me. Any issues?
+29 vs AC 38 is mostly fine (though worth noting we've got a legendary weapon and +5 potency rune for the Fighter, so closer to +28 vs AC 38), but that's a paladin not using a shield. Shield (and, admittedly, actively raising it) bumps that to +28 vs AC 40 for a 40% chance to hit, going to a 15% chance on your 2nd attack. Just seems strange that even the 2nd attack is such a low to-hit, though the paladin has invested very heavily in defence I'll admit :)
On a side note, that makes me very sketchy about the monk class as-is. They are generally supposed to be unarmored but no longer receive a secondary bonus to their AC from Wisdom. Suddenly, a monk played the way they are generally conceived to be played will always have the worst AC in the party. Not good design for a primarily melee class.
Monks get Unarmed Defence proficiency up to legendary, which helps. And then can wear bracers of armour, which (at level 20) goes up to +6AC, +5 saves. So they should be fine. Assuming i've not missed something!
' Who wants to play a class that is completely dependent on a specific magic item in order to keep pace with the rest of the party defensively?
That's a fair point: having one way to achieve an effective result isn't good. Seems like wands of mage armor are no longer a thing in PF2 so that's a change.
What am I missing here? There is no way that a group of professional game designers didn't notice this? Please tell me I'm just an idiot and missed some crucial bit of information.
I'm pretty sure you're going to get hit a lot more often and consistently now, unless you are completely invested in defense.
This is going to be a problem with healing being so scarce.
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Yeah, it needs to be spelled out more clearly and more often that you add your level to your proficiency rank to get the proficiency modifier. The only place I could find it was page 291, top left, in a tiny chart. Since I've been following the playtest discussions since February, I already knew, but it should be plainly laid out in the character creation rules at the front of the book.