Go to page 337. Look at table 10-2 titled Skill DCs by Level and Difficulty. That is an abomination, it is also very representative of a major problem with P2: adding your level to everything, especially when it is mostly unnecessary.
It is messy, and it bloats the game numerically having an out sized effect on your power level. Except, everything of your level has the exact same bonus rendering it meaningless when compared to your peers or comparable monsters. It also has a very nasty side effect of rendering monsters even a few levels lower than you obsolete extremely quickly. Those even four to six levels above or below are wholly inappropriate to be used against the party, ie getting hit or hitting on 2s etc. Lower level mooks are obsolete extremely quickly, and in my opinion, for no real reason. When playing the monsters levels will need to be within a couple of the party or they will either be completely irrelevant or way too powerful for the party to face. Look what it does to DCs... I mean just look at the DC by level and difficulty table. That is atrocious. That is a shame and it is unnecessary. Compare it to my listed table, which is a simple DC5 scaling. Those names will always mean something, they don't feel arbitrary and are lasting. With better abilities, better training, circumstantial bonuses, magic, characters will strive to on rare occasion accomplish the impossible. And do I need to say how much easier to memorize and use that table is? Do your DMs and players a favor, please.
I've already written a house rule document to correct this design flaw, and since this in the play testing phase I implore you, paizo, to make these changes.
By removing your level from everything you have zero impact against things of equal level to the party. That balance point is completely unchanged, all that needs to be adjusted are your recommendations for effective encounters for xp. Against weaker things you can keep them relevant a lot longer, while simultaneously allowing the party to riskily reach up against higher level enemies. Characters still get some kind of feat, ability, HP, etc at every level and will be getting stronger, but it won't be a faux strength, the numbers will be real and mean something. Another benefit is that it would support mixed strength parties far better than it currently does.
Here is what I already put up over at giantitp today. It includes a link to a prettier version of my the houserules too.
This is a simple houserule system for those who really liked the bounded accuracy system expierienced in D&D 5e, but also love the new Pathfinder edition.
## What do these changes do?
Put simply, these changes flatten the world out. We remove the level bonus from every calculation, so the world doesn't suffer from bigger numbers. What this accomplishes is keeping monsters relevent longer, widening the range of viable monsters to put against your party. You'll hit harder and be able to reach further up against monsters of a higher level, but monsters that are lower level stay scary or at least relevevant much longer. It also makes setting DCs for skills much easier.
Against a challange that is equal to your level, be it a monster or harzard or skill check, there is absolutely no difference in the check you make. You'll still succeed and fail at the same rate. The numbers just aren't inflated.
Monsters significantly weaker than you will still be viable, their ACs, Saves, DCs and To Hits will still be relevant.
### Player Character Changes
Remove the level bonus from all calculations. Essentially calculate your character sheet as if you are a level 0 character.
#### Exceptions
Determining Resonance Points
### Skill DC Changes
Remove the level of the challenge from the DC. For unknown DCs, use the following guidelines.
##### Skill DCs
| DC | Difficulty |
|:----:|:-------------|
| 5 | Trivial |
| 10 | Easy |
| 15 | Moderate |
| 20 | Difficult |
| 25 | Very Difficult |
| 30 | Impossible |
* Uncertain DCs? Whenever possible subtrace the level of the challenge from the DC, if unavailable, subtrace the level of the attempting character from the DC.
### Spells
For spells that specify an AC, to hit, or specific DC, etc. subtract the level a caster would be to first cast a spell of that level. For example, the 10th level Avatar spell specifies an attack modifier of +31. Since a spellcaster would have to be 20th level, theat it as a +11 attack modifier.
### Bestiary Changes
Remove the monter's level from all calculations that include it: Perception, Skills, AC, TAC, Saves, To Hit, and Save DCs.
This also applies to Hazards and Traps.
Example lvl 10 Fighter vs Lvl1 vs Lvl10 vs Lvl20 Enemies:
Ok, here is a little example using a standard lvl 10 Fighter, 20Str, 12 Dex, Expert with a Greatsword, Trained in Heavy Armor, +2 Full Plate, +2 Greatsword. We will be pitting him against a lvl 0 Orc Brute, a lvl 10 Barbed Devil, and a lvl 20 Balor.
Stock P2 lvl 10 Fighter
Fighter +19 attack modifier, AC 29
Orc Brute +5 attack modifier, AC 13
Barbed Devil +20 attack modifier, AC 27
Balor +35 attack modifier, AC 44
Stock P2 lvl 10 Fighter
vs Orc Brute hits on 2+/2+/3+ gets hit on 20+/20+/20+
vs Barbed Devil hits on 8+/13+/18+ gets hit on 9+/14+/19+
vs Balor hits on20+/20+/20+ gets hit on 2+/2+/4+
Bounded P2 lvl 10 Fighter
vs Orc Brute hits on 4+/9+/13+ gets hit on 14+/19+/20+
vs Barbed Devil hits on 8+/13+/18+ gets hit on 9+/14+/19+(Completely unchanged)
vs Balor hits on 15+/20+/20+ gets hit on 4+/9+/14+
As you can see the differences between he power level is narrowed. This has no effect on the damage dealt per attack, on hp, etc. These power levels are still vastly different for those factors alone. But the overt gap between the two has been narrowed and we're using smaller numbers in a semi bound system. Sure, P2 has expected magical bonuses to AC and attack modifier and especially damage baked in, but removing the level from calculations does not affect equal level conflicts which are balanced. It does open up the range of viable challenges for the party. Minions are more relevant, even at 10th level a fighter can't ignore a wave of orc brutes, they'll have to wade through them like a hero. Hell, a 20th level wizard who is out of spell slots will look at a rushing wave of basic orcs with a glimmer of fear. The other effect is that higher level enemies are somewhat weaker compared to the party.
I'm assuming you are suggesting doing this to ALL proficiency scores, not just skills. ie, attack rolls, armour class, and so on. If you don't then you are just creating a new set of inconsistencies. ie: that attack and AC rolls work differently from everything else.
There's two main consequences with doing what you suggest:
The perception of player progress is dramatically reduced.
For example, my level 1 monk might have a Will save of +2 (expert will, 14 wis), whilst the same monk at level 20 might have a Will save of +12 (legendary will +3, 18 wis +4, level 20 bracers of armor +5).
Pretty much all checks will work like that. Do we think that going from around the +2 to +5 range at level 1 up to about +12 is enough progress over 20 levels? Or will it feel very slow?
Monsters are much more similar in power to each other
Your same change applied to attack bonuses means that you get stats like this:
Goblin: level 0: +6 attack, AC 14.
Balor Demon: level 20: +14 attack, AC 24
That leaves us all very little space between one of the weakest creatures in the game, and one of the most powerful. Will we all be satisfied with every creature in Pathfinder having to be squeezed between +6 and +14 to attack and AC 14 to AC 24? I don't think so.
Those two examples illustrate how your suggestion is actually a more radical departure from PF 1 than PF 2 is. Or put another way: the numbers after your changes end up looking less like PF 1 numbers than the current playtest design.
I'm assuming you are suggesting doing this to ALL proficiency scores, not just skills. ie, attack rolls, armour class, and so on. If you don't then you are just creating a new set of inconsistencies. ie: that attack and AC rolls work differently from everything else.
There's two main consequences with doing what you suggest:
The perception of player progress is dramatically reduced.
For example, my level 1 monk might have a Will save of +2 (expert will, 14 wis), whilst the same monk at level 20 might have a Will save of +12 (legendary will +3, 18 wis +4, level 20 bracers of armor +5).
Pretty much all checks will work like that. Do we think that going from around the +2 to +5 range at level 1 up to about +12 is enough progress over 20 levels? Or will it feel very slow?
Monsters are much more similar in power to each other
Your same change applied to attack bonuses means that you get stats like this:
Goblin: level 0: +6 attack, AC 14.
Balor Demon: level 20: +14 attack, AC 24
That leaves us all very little space between one of the weakest creatures in the game, and one of the most powerful. Will we all be satisfied with every creature in Pathfinder having to be squeezed between +6 and +14 to attack and AC 14 to AC 24? I don't think so.
Those two examples illustrate how your suggestion is actually a more radical departure from PF 1 than PF 2 is. Or put another way: the numbers after your changes end up looking less like PF 1 numbers than the current playtest design.
So that could be a third issue with it.
I think I agree with pretty well everything you said there. The really scary stuff would be high level spells and high level abilities. I think HP could remain the same so at least the Balor would have a lot more hp then the goblin. I for sure don't want that to be the default but it could be fun to try once.
I'm assuming you are suggesting doing this to ALL proficiency scores, not just skills. ie, attack rolls, armour class, and so on. If you don't then you are just creating a new set of inconsistencies. ie: that attack and AC rolls work differently from everything else.
There's two main consequences with doing what you suggest:
The perception of player progress is dramatically reduced.
For example, my level 1 monk might have a Will save of +2 (expert will, 14 wis), whilst the same monk at level 20 might have a Will save of +12 (legendary will +3, 18 wis +4, level 20 bracers of armor +5).
Pretty much all checks will work like that. Do we think that going from around the +2 to +5 range at level 1 up to about +12 is enough progress over 20 levels? Or will it feel very slow?
Monsters are much more similar in power to each other
Your same change applied to attack bonuses means that you get stats like this:
Goblin: level 0: +6 attack, AC 14.
Balor Demon: level 20: +14 attack, AC 24
That leaves us all very little space between one of the weakest creatures in the game, and one of the most powerful. Will we all be satisfied with every creature in Pathfinder having to be squeezed between +6 and +14 to attack and AC 14 to AC 24? I don't think so.
Those two examples illustrate how your suggestion is actually a more radical departure from PF 1 than PF 2 is. Or put another way: the numbers after your changes end up looking less like PF 1 numbers than the current playtest design.
So that could be a third issue with it.
Yes, from all proficiency rolls, and anywhere else the +1/level has been used.
Perception of power: Sure, except that it only looks that way from a bigger numbers perspective. While playing it won't take long to realize all those +1s are actually powerful. Look at normal P2, when you're rolling +30 who cares about setting up another +1? That is a power perception as well.
Sure, moving from +2 to +12 in Will saves is a ton. Think about skills, moving from that same +2 to a +12 achievable with an item that grants +4 and a 20 stat. That beginning character has less than a 50% chances to accomplish a moderate difficulty task, and needs to get really lucky, or stack up some modifiers to accomplish a difficult task. In contrast the last character scoffs at moderate difficulty, has a way better than 50% chance of accomplishing difficult task and stands a small chance to literally crack DC30, ie do the impossible. How badass do you feel when you finally crack the 30 threshold and do something thought impossible, or when you chritically succeed on a difficult task, those are the stories told about your heroes. The late level character will be critically succeeding on many many moderate to difficult tasks. That will feel powerful.
Getting +1/level to everything is an artificial feeling of power. You don't need bigger numbers to feel more powerful, if anything, being bound lets you know right where you are on that power scale. Seeing the transition to 5e, you'll still feel powerful.
Are you ok with a 10th level Wizard untrained in athletics with a 10 strength, ie +8 routinely beating a level 1 barbarian with 18 strength, +5 in an arm wrestling match? Are we ok with every single higher level character obsoleting the other specialists lower level accomplishments. Are we ok with a high level character being better at everything than any lower level specialist, often untrained?
Are bigger numbers the way to make people feel more powerful?
Monster Power level: Sure, and that is exactly how 5e works, and there is a real difference in power between your cr 1 and your cr20 monsters still.
Look at your example.
Goblin: level 0: +6 attack, AC 14, HP 6, DPStrike 1d6
Balor Demon: level 20: +14 attack, AC 24, HP 460, DPStrike 6d8+18, Aura of Flame, AtWill Dimension Door, powerful spells etc.
Ask your level 1 or level 5 or level 10 character how powerful each of those feel on the table. One huge benefit of my suggestion is that it makes it much easier to make a world that can be rationalized and makes more sense.
Your biggest complaint seems to be, 'but the numbers'. Those numbers are just artificially inflated and only matter when compared to something other than your own level. They warp your sense of the world and complicate DCs. They rapidly make you godlike to something even a handful of levels below you, and anything a couple levels above you feels just at outsized. The range of appropriate enemies is just very small.
I think I agree with pretty well everything you said there. The really scary stuff would be high level spells and high level abilities. I think HP could remain the same so at least the Balor would have a lot more hp then the goblin. I for sure don't want that to be the default but it could be fun to try once.
Yes, HP, Spells, and those smaller increases in AC, to hit, saves, etc all amount to a significant feeling of power.
Since the internal mechanical assumptons about damage from magic weapons and magical bonuses to saves and AC etc are built in those things need to be left alone. Some things are godly feeling just because of AC.
Think of it this way, you have a hero with 14str, AC15, 100HP swinging a +1 sword against wave after wave of 14str, Ac15, enemies without magical swords and 10HP each. That guy would "feel" like a hero, he'd go through man after man of equal skill, it would just be a magic weapon ie damage and his abstract HP that made him stand out despite having no other difference in his stats.
Think of it this way, you have a hero with 14str, AC15, 100HP swinging a +1 sword against wave after wave of 14str, Ac15, enemies without magical swords and 10HP each. That guy would "feel" like a hero, he'd go through man after man of equal skill, it would just be a magic weapon ie damage and his abstract HP that made him stand out despite having no other difference in his stats.
Except he would also be pretty easy to kill by that tidal wave of enemies. He can drop one enemy per swing, but the remaining 6 guys can drop him. And that's just assuming there's only 9 people in this combat and not another 10 standing 20 feet back shooting him with arrows or just waiting to step in and hit him or something. Like have you ever played Dynasty Warriors on higher difficulty modes? It's exactly that, you can potentially kill 1000 Chinese warriors in a mission, but get unlucky and a dozen of them will rip you to shreds before you can even CONSIDER pursuing Lu Bu.
Damage sponges aren't really the best form of game design. At least with "inflated" numbers it feels like you're standing at a different tier of power instead of wailing on someone who can arbitrarily soak more hits than you.
Think of it this way, you have a hero with 14str, AC15, 100HP swinging a +1 sword against wave after wave of 14str, Ac15, enemies without magical swords and 10HP each. That guy would "feel" like a hero, he'd go through man after man of equal skill, it would just be a magic weapon ie damage and his abstract HP that made him stand out despite having no other difference in his stats.
Except he would also be pretty easy to kill by that tidal wave of enemies. He can drop one enemy per swing, but the remaining 6 guys can drop him. And that's just assuming there's only 9 people in this combat and not another 10 standing 20 feet back shooting him with arrows or just waiting to step in and hit him or something. Like have you ever played Dynasty Warriors on higher difficulty modes? It's exactly that, you can potentially kill 1000 Chinese warriors in a mission, but get unlucky and a dozen of them will rip you to shreds before you can even CONSIDER pursuing Lu Bu.
Damage sponges aren't really the best form of game design. At least with "inflated" numbers it feels like you're standing at a different tier of power instead of wailing on someone who can arbitrarily soak more hits than you.
I should have been more precise in my example. I was kind of visualizing them coming at him in ones and twos.
And call me crazy, but I am perfectly ok with example of being surrounded 10to1 and going down, or the ten archers sitting in the wings taking you down.
What I was trying to illustrate is how much stronger your character is than the mooks that can come at him one after another that he'll strike down despite having the same abilities and armor. The magic weapon and heroic HP would separate them. The guy would feel like a hero.
My point was to illustrate that there are more things that separate power and heroic ability than purely bigger numbers. HP, Damage, Abilities, Proficiency, Spells, etc etc all separate power and capability. I abandoned 3.P for a reason and moved to 5e. This level treadmill is enough to guarantee I'll not switch to P2, or if I do, it will have to be house-ruled. I pulled enough people away from 3.P to 5e.
I can only speak from my personal point, but for me this is the difference between being P2's biggest cheerleader, or being actively hostile to it.
Yeah, the only problem being you have to modify the Bestiary. I'd be thrilled if the wrote the rulebook with either option, and released a bounded and unbounded Bestiary. Hell, they might even get a decent number of people to buy both!
I don't know. I kind of detest bounded accuracy in 5E. It's one of the (admittedly) few things I dislike about it. The changes in proficiency are too negligible for my taste. That said, I could support a 1/2 level added to everything, instead of the full level. Less than that, and... I'm not too interested.
And call me crazy, but I am perfectly ok with example of being surrounded 10to1 and going down, or the ten archers sitting in the wings taking you down.
What I was trying to illustrate is how much stronger your character is than the mooks that can come at him one after another that he'll strike down despite having the same abilities and armor. The magic weapon and heroic HP would separate them. The guy would feel like a hero.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, I wouldn't feel like a hero if I played a character at level 10 who dies to a bunch of 1st level fighters in a round, even if he could kill one of them with a swing. I'd feel like a hero if I could walk into a battle at level 10, lock eyes with the commander from across the field, and engage in (effectively) single combat with him in the center of the melee because everyone else knows better than to try and get in between us.
I don't know. I kind of detest bounded accuracy in 5E. It's one of the (admittedly) few things I dislike about it. The changes in proficiency are too negligible for my taste. That said, I could support a 1/2 level added to everything, instead of the full level. Less than that, and... I'm not too interested.
May I ask why? Is it the bigger numbers? Because compared to your party mates there is absolutely zero difference, you're just comparing bigger numbers. Same thing against equal level monsters. The only time there is a difference is against lower or higher level monsters, and it really narrows the difference in effective challenges.
For me, being put on a treadmill is an absolute nonstarter. I abhor it. It got to the point I simply refused to play 3.P, but when 5e came around it got me back in and got me spending money. Looking at a system that is on a treadmill means I'll spend $0.
For me, bigger numbers are meaningless when the world moves on the treadmill with you. I want the numbers to mean something. I want to know a +10 to hit is good, not that it could be good or bad depending on where on the treadmill we are. I want my Str10 Wizard who is untrained in athletics to always be bad at running a race, I don't want him once he hits mid levels to be about to outrun every young and fit guy in an entire town just because of bigger numbers.
And call me crazy, but I am perfectly ok with example of being surrounded 10to1 and going down, or the ten archers sitting in the wings taking you down.
What I was trying to illustrate is how much stronger your character is than the mooks that can come at him one after another that he'll strike down despite having the same abilities and armor. The magic weapon and heroic HP would separate them. The guy would feel like a hero.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, I wouldn't feel like a hero if I played a character at level 10 who dies to a bunch of 1st level fighters in a round, even if he could kill one of them with a swing. I'd feel like a hero if I could walk into a battle at level 10, lock eyes with the commander from across the field, and engage in (effectively) single combat with him in the center of the melee because everyone else knows better than to try and get in between us.
What you just described is narrative. Locking eyes, being ignored, etc has no mechanical bearing.
And a level 10 will not die to 10 level 1s under my suggestions, not even close. He will on average have +4 to hit, deal 3 dice for damage, have an AC that is at least 2-3 higher, will have well over 100 hit points, and will kill 1-2 of them per turn.
I see walking through ten mooks and still having enough juice to challenge the commander as pretty damned heroic, I don't need bigger numbers for the sake of bigger numbers to get that.
And call me crazy, but I am perfectly ok with example of being surrounded 10to1 and going down, or the ten archers sitting in the wings taking you down.
What I was trying to illustrate is how much stronger your character is than the mooks that can come at him one after another that he'll strike down despite having the same abilities and armor. The magic weapon and heroic HP would separate them. The guy would feel like a hero.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, I wouldn't feel like a hero if I played a character at level 10 who dies to a bunch of 1st level fighters in a round, even if he could kill one of them with a swing. I'd feel like a hero if I could walk into a battle at level 10, lock eyes with the commander from across the field, and engage in (effectively) single combat with him in the center of the melee because everyone else knows better than to try and get in between us.
What you just described is narrative. Locking eyes, being ignored, etc has no mechanical bearing.
And a level 10 will not die to 10 level 1s under my suggestions, not even close. He will on average have +4 to hit, deal 3 dice for damage, have an AC that is at least 2-3 higher, will have well over 100 hit points, and will kill 1-2 of them per turn.
I see walking through ten mooks and still having enough juice to challenge the commander as pretty damned heroic, I don't need bigger numbers for the sake of bigger numbers to get that.
10 mooks, 3 of which die to the attacks, leaving 7. Each one does let's say 8 damage per attack, because they're fighting men who can use their weapons effectively. 8 damage per mook on a hit, 56-112 damage per round since you and the mooks have a fairly equal chance to hit each other in this situation. Even if you get lucky with the rolls and don't immediately die, you don't have enough juice left to fight the boss on even footing unless he's ALSO weaker than you.
And I didn't mean my example in a narrative sense, I meant it in a mechanical one. In this scenario you approach the enemy commander and die almost instantly when the army hits you, and the commander shrugs and mutters to himself about "stupid hero-types trying to make a name for themselves". In the other scenario, you're strong enough to ignore the weaker enemies almost entirely which leaves just the enemy commander.
I don't know. I kind of detest bounded accuracy in 5E. It's one of the (admittedly) few things I dislike about it. The changes in proficiency are too negligible for my taste. That said, I could support a 1/2 level added to everything, instead of the full level. Less than that, and... I'm not too interested.
May I ask why? Is it the bigger numbers? Because compared to your party mates there is absolutely zero difference, you're just comparing bigger numbers. Same thing against equal level monsters. The only time there is a difference is against lower or higher level monsters, and it really narrows the difference in effective challenges.
For me, being put on a treadmill is an absolute nonstarter. I abhor it. It got to the point I simply refused to play 3.P, but when 5e came around it got me back in and got me spending money. Looking at a system that is on a treadmill means I'll spend $0.
For me, bigger numbers are meaningless when the world moves on the treadmill with you. I want the numbers to mean something. I want to know a +10 to hit is good, not that it could be good or bad depending on where on the treadmill we are. I want my Str10 Wizard who is untrained in athletics to always be bad at running a race, I don't want him once he hits mid levels to be about to outrun every young and fit guy in an entire town just because of bigger numbers.
No, it's not the bigger numbers. Rather, it is exactly because of those lower and higher challenge level monsters, and the narrowed effective challenge that you mention, that I prefer. When I am (or my players are) level 10, I want to steamroll through a bunch of orcs, and have them simply fail to stand a chance. And, I want an Ancient Dragon to scare the pants off me and make me run the other way. I DM 5E, and challenging my players is more difficult (for me) than it was in Pathfinder 1st, and will be, I expect, in Pathfinder 2nd.
And call me crazy, but I am perfectly ok with example of being surrounded 10to1 and going down, or the ten archers sitting in the wings taking you down.
What I was trying to illustrate is how much stronger your character is than the mooks that can come at him one after another that he'll strike down despite having the same abilities and armor. The magic weapon and heroic HP would separate them. The guy would feel like a hero.
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree, I wouldn't feel like a hero if I played a character at level 10 who dies to a bunch of 1st level fighters in a round, even if he could kill one of them with a swing. I'd feel like a hero if I could walk into a battle at level 10, lock eyes with the commander from across the field, and engage in (effectively) single combat with him in the center of the melee because everyone else knows better than to try and get in between us.
What you just described is narrative. Locking eyes, being ignored, etc has no mechanical bearing.
And a level 10 will not die to 10 level 1s under my suggestions, not even close. He will on average have +4 to hit, deal 3 dice for damage, have an AC that is at least 2-3 higher, will have well over 100 hit points, and will kill 1-2 of them per turn.
I see walking through ten mooks and still having enough juice to challenge the commander as pretty damned heroic, I don't need bigger numbers for the sake of bigger numbers to get that.
10 mooks, 3 of which die to the attacks, leaving 7. Each one does let's say 8 damage per attack, because they're fighting men who can use their weapons effectively. 8 damage per mook on a hit, 56-112 damage per round since you and the mooks have a fairly equal chance to hit each other in this situation. Even if you get lucky with the rolls and don't immediately die, you don't have enough juice left to fight the boss on even footing unless he's ALSO weaker than you.
And I didn't mean my example in a...
Ok, level ten Fighter has a 20Str, a +2 Sword, +2 Full Plate, so he is at +9 for 3d12+5 with AC 19 and has 148 HP. Those Level Ones are at 20HP, +4 to hit for d12+3, AC 15.
Our lvl 10 hero hits on 6+/11+/16+, the lvl 1s hit on 15+/19+/20+. For argument's sake well assume the hero hits twice per round and they each hit him once.
He can get hit 14 times before dying, he'll get hit 4-5 times assuming we can keep it where there are only 3 engaging him on any one turn.
So, in this example our lvl 10 fighter walks through the three at a time lvl1 mooks and gets to the commander with ~100+ HP left, enough to take out a lvl ~8 commander on a coinflip.
No, if you want to assume perfect movement and all ten mooks can automatically surround and pummel our hero, well I don't think it ever plays out quite like that on the table.
Under stock P2 the fighter would have walked through the 10 mooks who needed 20s to hit him, it would have been a huge waste of time to have even run that combat. It would have been four rounds of combat and a good chance of never having hit the level 10 hero.
Personally, I don't find Godmode enjoyable. Might as well just have narratively skipped it.
I don't know. I kind of detest bounded accuracy in 5E. It's one of the (admittedly) few things I dislike about it. The changes in proficiency are too negligible for my taste. That said, I could support a 1/2 level added to everything, instead of the full level. Less than that, and... I'm not too interested.
May I ask why? Is it the bigger numbers? Because compared to your party mates there is absolutely zero difference, you're just comparing bigger numbers. Same thing against equal level monsters. The only time there is a difference is against lower or higher level monsters, and it really narrows the difference in effective challenges.
For me, being put on a treadmill is an absolute nonstarter. I abhor it. It got to the point I simply refused to play 3.P, but when 5e came around it got me back in and got me spending money. Looking at a system that is on a treadmill means I'll spend $0.
For me, bigger numbers are meaningless when the world moves on the treadmill with you. I want the numbers to mean something. I want to know a +10 to hit is good, not that it could be good or bad depending on where on the treadmill we are. I want my Str10 Wizard who is untrained in athletics to always be bad at running a race, I don't want him once he hits mid levels to be about to outrun every young and fit guy in an entire town just because of bigger numbers.
No, it's not the bigger numbers. Rather, it is exactly because of those lower and higher challenge level monsters, and the narrowed effective challenge that you mention, that I prefer. When I am (or my players are) level 10, I want to steamroll through a bunch of orcs, and have them simply fail to stand a chance. And, I want an Ancient Dragon to scare the pants off me and make me run the other way. I DM 5E, and challenging my players is more difficult (for me) than it was in Pathfinder 1st, and will be, I expect, in Pathfinder 2nd.
Interesting, thank you for responding.
See, taking away the treadmill widens that sweetspot, but not that drastically. We're talking from about a 3 level range to about a 6 level range. A moderate level character is still going to steamroll a bunch of orcs, its just the Orcs will land the occasional blow that wasn't on a 20. It might take resources for the heroes. Maybe they'll consider easier ways to bypass them etc. Do Gandalf and Aragon scoff at a hundred orcs, no, they run. But, they have no problem steamrolling through them a handful at a time.
Do you find it rewarding to put level 0 Orcs in a mod on the table against level 10 characters, knowing that you're rolling 2+ for the characters and needing 20s for the mooks. Is that fun, or does it feel like a waste of time.
I can rarely say I've felt like in 5e my character who was ~6 levels stronger than the opposition didn't feel like they were steamrolling them. If feel like 5e stands to to show that taking away the treadmill can work. And if you take away P2's treadmill, it does it better than 5e does.
With the unified skill system removing the +lvl would mean that certain things always have a risk of failure. Like climbing a basic wall or identifying a low level spell. With scaling the PCs basically auto succeed at low level tasks.
Removing the +lvl also has odd world building implications since it makes the PCs a lot less necessary. The Queen doesn't need to hire heroes to go slay a dragon a few hundred lvl one archers can do it with minimal losses. (In 5e that number is ~221 lvl 1 archers can on average kill one ancient red dragon per round)
Hmm. Some good points, which I'll have to consider. Part of the issue is that I haven't DM'd much for higher levels, so everything is usually still a challenge for my players. Also, as much as I love LOTR, those characters are not really as powerful as higher level Pathfinder/D&D characters, especially not casters of these games.
And this may seem like nitpicking, but while 3 levels is a bit short of a range, 6 seems like too much to me.
My main experiences with CR in 5E can be summed up with this story:
I often run hard or deadly encounters for my players, because Medium ones are too much of a cakewalk. So, in one Deadly encounter (of several), the main monster was able to kill a character. The Wizard. By getting a critical hit. And the party was split up almost a hundred feet away from each other. That's what it took to kill a PC. Now, I wasn't trying to kill my player's character, you understand. But it took a split party, the lowest health character, and a critical hit from a monster in a DEADLY encounter to result in a death. Which is the flip side of Bounded Accuracy, and the part I really dislike. The scary stuff needs to be so far ahead to actually be scary for the party.
With the unified skill system removing the +lvl would mean that certain things always have a risk of failure. Like climbing a basic wall or identifying a low level spell. With scaling the PCs basically auto succeed at low level tasks.
Removing the +lvl also has odd world building implications since it makes the PCs a lot less necessary. The Queen doesn't need to hire heroes to go slay a dragon a few hundred lvl one archers can do it with minimal losses. (In 5e that number is ~221 lvl 1 archers can on average kill one ancient red dragon per round)
Climbing a basic wall, if it poses no consequences it is an auto success. If there is a risk of failure or time sensitive etc that DC5 check is pretty much automatic for anyone with a reasonable strength score who is trained in athletics. The characters who are not trained in athletics, or have very low strength scores, sure maybe they'll fail, but none of them will critically fail. So how bad is that failure? Their move action stops and they have to waste another action? Not sure falling prone is appropriate, that seems like a critical failure result. Thats it, they just don't climb it and have to try again? What the worst that happens, a brusied ego?
Compare that to the world building implications. My seventy year old wizard with a 10str who is untrained in athletics gets his rocks off by going into a new town and challenging the fittest looking young farm hand around. He challenges them to an arm wrestling competition, a hundred yard dash. Hell, he challenges him to literally any task ever that the farm hand is trained in and the wizard obviously isn't. And the fat old out of shape wizard wins every single time.
Yes, in bounded accuracy you could have 100 archers take out an ancient red dragon. Yes, that could happen. I guess the dragon doesn't move into their short range and use is presence. When they have disadvantage they are going to only hit like once every other round. That much fear something that low level would break and run for the hills. If they didn't they'd have to spread out to avoid getting crushed by the fire breath. Lets not forget about terrain, etc. Dragon could fly at them with the sun at his back, give them disadvantage. Or maybe IDK, wait until it is night out to attack them.
Just because you can make up a scenario that shows some flaws of bounded accuracy doesn't mean that the default scenario is bad. Things like this only work when argued to ridiculousness. Where do they find hundreds of trained archers at the drop of a hat? How did they know where the dragon was going to strike. How did their archers get into position? How did they avoid being so scared they ran for their lives. How did they all draw line of sight? Did the dragon use any tactics at all?
Why would they need a hero? Because we are playing a game where a hero is required and we are playing hereos.
Hmm. Some good points, which I'll have to consider. Part of the issue is that I haven't DM'd much for higher levels, so everything is usually still a challenge for my players. Also, as much as I love LOTR, those characters are not really as powerful as higher level Pathfinder/D&D characters, especially not casters of these games.
And this may seem like nitpicking, but while 3 levels is a bit short of a range, 6 seems like too much to me.
My main experiences with CR in 5E can be summed up with this story:
I often run hard or deadly encounters for my players, because Medium ones are too much of a cakewalk. So, in one Deadly encounter (of several), the main monster was able to kill a character. The Wizard. By getting a critical hit. And the party was split up almost a hundred feet away from each other. That's what it took to kill a PC. Now, I wasn't trying to kill my player's character, you understand. But it took a split party, the lowest health character, and a critical hit from a monster in a DEADLY encounter to result in a death. Which is the flip side of Bounded Accuracy, and the part I really dislike. The scary stuff needs to be so far ahead to actually be scary for the party.
Sure, and with my changes you could push the envelope a bit higher for single monster threats etc. Once you get to mid levels, how to you rationalize the world. I do not challenge that this treadmill will work just fine for the first half dozen levels before my concerns start to become more noticeable.
Ok, 5e isn't perfect. Not by a longshot. In fact, I believe that without the level treadmill P2 is better. It definitely had some balance issues, one major one being what they considered a "deadly" encounter wasn't very deadly. And their definition of "deadly" was basically, if this goes really really wrong someone could die, maybe, if you were super unlucky in a single encounter. At double or triple deadly you say real threat of death in single encounter battles. But, 5e was often misunderstood, their internal assumptions about how many encounters a party had to face per day and the short/long rest assumptions deadly was pretty deadly. Even if no one died, you used enough resources to increase the likelihood of one of the hard, moderate, or easy encounters could take someone out. It was deadly as part of a whole day, not a single encounter. As I said, not perfect at all.
And DM for 5e I know pretty much pushed these boundaries, especially with competent or optimized players when dealing with novo single encounters where characters really blew threw resources. I've also seen a half dozen moderate to easy encounters wear a party down to nothing that that deadly encounter meant they turned tail and ran. There was a lot of resource management and intended conservation to the 5e day, an aspect that most people neglected.
There were also other balance problems in 5e too. Yes, scary stuff needed to be really far ahead to cause that kind of "I am at your mercy" kind of fear.
Ok, level ten Fighter has a 20Str, a +2 Sword, +2 Full Plate, so he is at +9 for 3d12+5 with AC 19 and has 148 HP. Those Level Ones are at 20HP, +4 to hit for d12+3, AC 15.
Our lvl 10 hero hits on 6+/11+/16+, the lvl 1s hit on 15+/19+/20+. For argument's sake well assume the hero hits twice per round and they each hit him once.
He can get hit 14 times before dying, he'll get hit 4-5 times assuming we can keep it where there are only 3 engaging him on any one turn.
So, in this example our lvl 10 fighter walks through the three at a time lvl1 mooks and gets to the commander with ~100+ HP left, enough to take out a lvl ~8 commander on a coinflip.
Alright, since we're changing numbers around and the Fighter's only killing two mooks at a time, that's going to start adding up. 3 mooks come at a time and get one attack off, 2 die and one remains. 3 more mooks come, 2 die, 2 remain. 3 more mooks come, 2 die, 3 remain. The last mook shows up late to the party, 2 die, 2 remain. Finally, the last 2 mooks die. Assuming each mook within range takes 1 attack per round, you're taking 18 attacks. Even assuming only one attack lands per mook over the entire combat, that's still 10 hits which is quite close to your safety zone of 14.
Zman0 wrote:
No, if you want to assume perfect movement and all ten mooks can automatically surround and pummel our hero, well I don't think it ever plays out quite like that on the table.
It also doesn't usually play out with enemies coming in groups of 3 and seemingly not attacking with their second or third action in a round.
Zman0 wrote:
Under stock P2 the fighter would have walked through the 10 mooks who needed 20s to hit him, it would have been a huge waste of time to have even run that combat. It would have been four rounds of combat and a good chance of never having hit the level 10 hero.
Personally, I don't find Godmode enjoyable. Might as well just have narratively skipped it.
It's not godmode, it's advancement. You've advanced beyond the need to fight the level 1 mooks and move straight to the commander. I will agree that Paizo does have a problem with this in the published APs, where in the final dungeon a troupe of goblins or similarly mob-tier enemies will rush the party and fight to the death for... no logical discernible reason beyond wasting everyone's time, but that's usually fixed narratively by having them see the first attacker turn into a fine red paste, then running away to alert the rest of the dungeon into a more difficult challenge and becoming hindrances more than real enemies. Making enemies threatening at every level makes combat more of a slog since you HAVE to fight the troupe of goblin clowns while the world is ending around you, and while you're doing it your die rolls seem to be almost the same as they were 10 levels ago.
But again, that's my opinion. We can disagree, but I personally don't think PF will be better off in the long-term by making the mountain peak of your character's advancement into a molehill.
Haven't read all posts. One of the stated design goals of Pathfinder was for lower level enemies to quickly become a non-threat. They wanted the lv10 wizard to be basically invincible to lv1 people opposed to 5E where I hear that the enemies you fight at lv1 are still worth throwing against max level.
Compare that to the world building implications. My seventy year old wizard with a 10str who is untrained in athletics gets his rocks off by going into a new town and challenging the fittest looking young farm hand around. He challenges them to an arm wrestling competition, a hundred yard dash. Hell, he challenges him to literally any task ever that the farm hand is trained in and the wizard obviously isn't. And the fat old out of shape wizard wins every single time.
Just because you can make up a scenario that shows some flaws of lvl scaling doesn't mean that the default scenario is bad. Things like this only work when argued to ridiculousness.
Also Monarchs have armies, that goes with the territory. At the Battle of Agincourt the English had 7000 trained longbowmen. Personally it doesn't bother me that a high level character can beat a low level character at something they aren't trained in. It's no more ridiculous than the fact that that 70 year old wizard can walk up to the young man and let him stab him in the stomach ten times before being in any risk of dying.
On a more serious note I'm arguing that as you progress in levels things that were difficult to start should become easier to the point of being an auto success, in fact I am arguing that the bonus should become larger than the die. That way something that was impossible or nearly impossible for a level one character (say a DC 25 check) can become easier and easier at they level up to the point of a high level character being very good at it.
So a DC 25 check is hard for a level one character, possible for a level 5 character and trivial for a lvl 10 character. You don't get that level of scaling with bounded accuracy.
Ok, level ten Fighter has a 20Str, a +2 Sword, +2 Full Plate, so he is at +9 for 3d12+5 with AC 19 and has 148 HP. Those Level Ones are at 20HP, +4 to hit for d12+3, AC 15.
Our lvl 10 hero hits on 6+/11+/16+, the lvl 1s hit on 15+/19+/20+. For argument's sake well assume the hero hits twice per round and they each hit him once.
He can get hit 14 times before dying, he'll get hit 4-5 times assuming we can keep it where there are only 3 engaging him on any one turn.
So, in this example our lvl 10 fighter walks through the three at a time lvl1 mooks and gets to the commander with ~100+ HP left, enough to take out a lvl ~8 commander on a coinflip.
Alright, since we're changing numbers around and the Fighter's only killing two mooks at a time, that's going to start adding up. 3 mooks come at a time and get one attack off, 2 die and one remains. 3 more mooks come, 2 die, 2 remain. 3 more mooks come, 2 die, 3 remain. The last mook shows up late to the party, 2 die, 2 remain. Finally, the last 2 mooks die. Assuming each mook within range takes 1 attack per round, you're taking 18 attacks. Even assuming only one attack lands per mook over the entire combat, that's still 10 hits which is quite close to your safety zone of 14.
Zman0 wrote:
No, if you want to assume perfect movement and all ten mooks can automatically surround and pummel our hero, well I don't think it ever plays out quite like that on the table.
It also doesn't usually play out with enemies coming in groups of 3 and seemingly not attacking with their second or third action in a round.
Zman0 wrote:
Under stock P2 the fighter would have walked through the 10 mooks who needed 20s to hit him, it would have been a huge waste of time to have even run that combat. It would have been four rounds of combat and a good chance of never having hit the level 10 hero.
Personally, I don't find Godmode enjoyable. Might as well just have narratively skipped it.
It's not godmode, it's advancement....
18 attacks, that's about 5 hits. So, it plays out before as I said. ~100hp left to go tackle the lvl 8 commander.
We're using assumptions. I'm assuming a there wasn't ten mooks standing adjacent to each other and that it would take a couple of rounds of maneuvering to gang up on a hero. That isn't a terribly bad assumption, think of rooms, terrain, etc. And this is a white room example, one the real table you don't walk into a room and the next turn have 10 people surrounding you all able to attack.
See, now you're handwaving away the problem as it appears in the APs. They intended those mooks to be something, ask yourself under which way to they serve a purpose.
The characters still advance, they deal more damage, they already have backed in additional +1s to hit at levels 4/8/12/16/20 from magic weapons. Their Ac has similar baked in increases. Fighter types gain proficiency etc. Not to mention all the feat increases and capability increases in maneuvers etc.
So, there is built in advancement, what I suggest is taking away the arbitrary treadmill. Under what I suggest there is a significant difference between a level 1 and level 10 character. Sure, a level 10 doesn't kill 8-10, he only kill 4-5 in waves of 1v1. And if you look at bigger levels the difference in power is absolutely huge.
Haven't read all posts. One of the stated design goals of Pathfinder was for lower level enemies to quickly become a non-threat. They wanted the lv10 wizard to be basically invincible to lv1 people opposed to 5E where I hear that the enemies you fight at lv1 are still worth throwing against max level.
Compare that to the world building implications. My seventy year old wizard with a 10str who is untrained in athletics gets his rocks off by going into a new town and challenging the fittest looking young farm hand around. He challenges them to an arm wrestling competition, a hundred yard dash. Hell, he challenges him to literally any task ever that the farm hand is trained in and the wizard obviously isn't. And the fat old out of shape wizard wins every single time.
Just because you can make up a scenario that shows some flaws of lvl scaling doesn't mean that the default scenario is bad. Things like this only work when argued to ridiculousness.
Also Monarchs have armies, that goes with the territory. At the Battle of Agincourt the English had 7000 trained longbowmen. Personally it doesn't bother me that a high level character can beat a low level character at something they aren't trained in. It's no more ridiculous than the fact that that 70 year old wizard can walk up to the young man and let him stab him in the stomach ten times before being in any risk of dying.
On a more serious note I'm arguing that as you progress in levels things that were difficult to start should become easier to the point of being an auto success, in fact I am arguing that the bonus should become larger than the die. That way something that was impossible or nearly impossible for a level one character (say a DC 25 check) can become easier and easier at they level up to the point of a high level character being very good at it.
So a DC 25 check is hard for a level one character, possible for a level 5 character and trivial for a lvl 10 character. You don't get that level of scaling with bounded accuracy.
Sure, if they get a chance to prepare for a battle. And in the real world, how many would flee than auto die. Armies have morale problems and break etc. etc. etc. And those 7,000 troops... just got attacked at night by the dragon as they approached, he burned and razed their camp, set it afire, they couldn't really see so they couldn't kill it.
The real answer why the monarch just doensn't hire an army is simply, because that isn't how the story involving hereos goes.
Stab in the stomach 10 times? HP are abstract, so being a hero those "stabs" that hit aren't generally considered physical stabs. Then its just an incredulous than any character gets stabbed 10 times and remains standing.
On a more serious not we do get that as far as skills are concerned with proficiences, ability increases etc.
You don't think its ridiculous that the 70 year old wizard could outrun and outwork all the farm hands?
Why do heroes have to get better at everything automatically?
I have two large critics about level=proficiency designing.
First is the DCs inflations, where you don't really reward your character for having more bonuses, you simply hinders it's tests. Ex: if a 1st lvl guy tries to climb a wall and have a +5 the GM would probally put DC 15 to the test, and if a 20th lvl guy tries to climb the same wall with a +25 GMs would probally put a DC 35 or 40, just to give a challenge to his life, of course there are more challanges than climbing a damm wall, but you got the point
Secondly it just despise the expert, master and legendary skills, to increase a skill to legendary, you need at least 15th, and with a bonus of +17 (counting the expert and master bonus) to a test, a +1 is useless, i mean, of course a +1 always help, but it's worthier become trained in a skills than giving a +1 to a test you're already awesome
You don't think its ridiculous that the 70 year old wizard could outrun and outwork all the farm hands?
Why do heroes have to get better at everything automatically?
I didn't say it wasn't ridiculous. I said it is no more ridiculous than the HP discrepancy. And I disagree with your super abstractionist view of HP and super literal view of skill checks. Taking HP damage is actually taking the hit, there are all sorts of attack riding effects that demonstrate this the most obvious of which is poison. You take HP damage you get poisoned so you were really hit it is not some abstraction of vigor and luck and avoidance its how many times you can get stabbed.
I'm not arguing that adding lvl scaling make the game a better reality simulator. It's not a reality simulator and wouldn't be fun if it was. I'm saying that the scaling allows large progression relative to static DCs which I think is a good thing.
I will acknowledge that high level PCs beating low level PCs in things they are untrained in is silly but high level play is inherently a bit silly. A high level wizard can bind demons, shoot fireballs, walk on water, and fly. Giving them the ability to beat farmhands isn't something that bothers me at that point.
baptestone wrote:
I have two large critics about level=proficiency designing.
First is the DCs inflations, where you don't really reward your character for having more bonuses, you simply hinders it's tests. Ex: if a 1st lvl guy tries to climb a wall and have a +5 the GM would probally put DC 15 to the test, and if a 20th lvl guy tries to climb the same wall with a +25 GMs would probally put a DC 35 or 40, just to give a challenge to his life, of course there are more challanges than climbing a damm wall, but you got the point
That is just plain bad GMing. You could have a GM ignore the book and set an inappropriate DC regardless of how the system scales.
You don't think its ridiculous that the 70 year old wizard could outrun and outwork all the farm hands?
Why do heroes have to get better at everything automatically?
I didn't say it wasn't ridiculous. I said it is no more ridiculous than the HP discrepancy. And I disagree with your super abstractionist view of HP and super literal view of skill checks. Taking HP damage is actually taking the hit, there are all sorts of attack riding effects that demonstrate this the most obvious of which is poison. You take HP damage you get poisoned so you were really hit it is not some abstraction of vigor and luck and avoidance its how many times you can get stabbed.
I'm not arguing that adding lvl scaling make the game a better reality simulator. It's not a reality simulator and wouldn't be fun if it was. I'm saying that the scaling allows large progression relative to static DCs which I think is a good thing.
I will acknowledge that high level PCs beating low level PCs in things they are untrained in is silly but high level play is inherently a bit silly. A high level wizard can bind demons, shoot fireballs, walk on water, and fly. Giving them the ability to beat farmhands isn't something that bothers me at that point.
baptestone wrote:
I have two large critics about level=proficiency designing.
First is the DCs inflations, where you don't really reward your character for having more bonuses, you simply hinders it's tests. Ex: if a 1st lvl guy tries to climb a wall and have a +5 the GM would probally put DC 15 to the test, and if a 20th lvl guy tries to climb the same wall with a +25 GMs would probally put a DC 35 or 40, just to give a challenge to his life, of course there are more challanges than climbing a damm wall, but you got the point
That is just plain bad GMing. You could have a GM ignore the book and set an inappropriate DC regardless of how the system scales.
Please read the entry on Hit Points. The represent your physical health, wherewithal, and heroic drive. They are abstract, except when they’re not. When hit with a poisoned dagger they become respresnwative of physical health, other times they are very abstract. There is nothing to say that they’d represent getting stabbed in the stomach ten times. You’d generally describe those as heroic drive abstractions etc.
Have you seen the 10-2 table on of 337? That has very much dcs that are not static and scaled to level.
I’m saying does high level play have to be that silly. My answer is no, and I give a solid remedy. One that is no where near as bound as 5e, ergo better for the above complaints than 5e at least as far as combat is concerned.
Is it ununreasonable to ask that a hero gaining experience fighting monsters doesn’t inherently become better than everyone else at everything(barring specialized heroes).
Saying HP are abstract except when they are not doesn't do anything for arguing that it is not reductions.
If you are so comfortable arguing for heroic drive abstractions for HP why not for skills?
I have seen the skill DC table. If you read the rest of the chapter it is clear that the level in that table is the level of the challenge not the level of the player. In the next page it calls out examples like climbing up a tree is always a level 0 task. So the DC for that challenge is static. If you only ever encounter leveled challenges that is bad GMing which can happen regardless of system scaling.
I think removing lvl scaling from everything would be a loss for the game. I get your point about lvl scaling on things your untrained in, it's silly but I am comfortable with that. We delt with HP or if you don't like that BAB going up with level for characters who never lifted a sword before in PF 1.
Due to the fact it's a game I am willing to put up with a lot of unrealistic silly things if it makes the game more fun. I think level scaling does. I'm not saying you are wrong universaly if you want to mod the game more power to you, but I think lvl scaling is an important part of Pathfinder particularly in contrast to 5e and I think it should be standard in the game.
Saying HP are abstract except when they are not doesn't do anything for arguing that it is not reductions.
If you are so comfortable arguing for heroic drive abstractions for HP why not for skills?
I have seen the skill DC table. If you read the rest of the chapter it is clear that the level in that table is the level of the challenge not the level of the player. In the next page it calls out examples like climbing up a tree is always a level 0 task. So the DC for that challenge is static. If you only ever encounter leveled challenges that is bad GMing which can happen regardless of system scaling.
I think removing lvl scaling from everything would be a loss for the game. I get your point about lvl scaling on things your untrained in, it's silly but I am comfortable with that. We delt with HP or if you don't like that BAB going up with level for characters who never lifted a sword before in PF 1.
Due to the fact it's a game I am willing to put up with a lot of unrealistic silly things if it makes the game more fun. I think level scaling does. I'm not saying you are wrong universaly if you want to mod the game more power to you, but I think lvl scaling is an important part of Pathfinder particularly in contrast to 5e and I think it should be standard in the game.
Well, stills are a little easier to see in a non abstract way. HP necessitates abstraction. It is easy to envision what an easy, moderate, or difficult task is.
That skill table is a nightmare. Sure, it is for the level of the challenge.... which is what exactly? See, it added a layer of complexity. Now we have the level of the challenge, and its difficulty.
Hmm.... doing X sounds very difficult... but is it level 10 severe, or is it level, or is it a high difficult level 14 task. Is that an ordinary task or something leveled....
I find the I get better than the world at every ordinary task ever to just be a bridge too far.
You ask about P1. Well, let me tell you a story. BAB and the treadmill and bloat of bigger numbers drove me away from 3.P. To the point I was spending $0. Then 5e happened, and I came back. I spent hundreds of dollars, and you know what else, I started a group. I started stealing P1 and 3.5 players, I started pointing out how busted the underlying system was and how much better being bounded was. I've spent two years pulling people away from Pathfinder.
I've always hated BAB, and modded 3.5 and 2E Star Wars to minimize it.
I am using me as an example. I loathe, with a deep burning passion, level scaling. I think P2 does semi bounded much much better than 5e would, and the level scaled treadmill is functionally completely unnecessary. I want P2 to be better than 5e. If people want to play on a treadmill let them go and play 4e... oh wait, that busted. P1 already has the 3.5 crowd that likes playing on a treadmill, compete and steal 5e's crowd with a better product that still has more appeal to the 3.P crowd than 5e does.
I've played 5e as well and found it to be a boring system. Mostly that was due to the relatively shallow character customization but a part of it was the lack of scaling too. Putting the entire load of lvl scaling on HP just heightens how silly it is.
The level treadmill is a result of GMs misinterpreting the rules but if those rules are commonly misinterpreted it is still a problem. Would a more extensive list of example DCs help? And/or removing level from untrained checks? I think there are other ways that could make the game more palatable to folks like you than throwing away the whole lvl scaling which interacts with the critical system in an interesting way that I think is good for the game and provides a sense of advancement when faced with lower level foes and challenges and a sense of challenge vs higher level foes.
PF2 isn't going to do better than 5e that is pretty much a forgone conclusion 5e is a rules light system which makes it very friendly to new gamers and it is the name brand. The PF2 can reasonably hope for is to be a popular second game for a lot of those 5e players, I think to that end it should position itself differently from 5e and the selling points I think are character customization and scaling.
The problem with 4e was not the level scaling it was the homogenization of classes so bringing up 4e doesn't seem relevant here.
I've played 5e as well and found it to be a boring system. Mostly that was due to the relatively shallow character customization but a part of it was the lack of scaling too. Putting the entire load of lvl scaling on HP just heightens how silly it is.
The level treadmill is a result of GMs misinterpreting the rules but if those rules are commonly misinterpreted it is still a problem. Would a more extensive list of example DCs help? And/or removing level from untrained checks? I think there are other ways that could make the game more palatable to folks like you than throwing away the whole lvl scaling which interacts with the critical system in an interesting way that I think is good for the game and provides a sense of advancement when faced with lower level foes and challenges and a sense of challenge vs higher level foes.
PF2 isn't going to do better than 5e that is pretty much a forgone conclusion 5e is a rules light system which makes it very friendly to new gamers and it is the name brand. The PF2 can reasonably hope for is to be a popular second game for a lot of those 5e players, I think to that end it should position itself differently from 5e and the selling points I think are character customization and scaling.
The problem with 4e was not the level scaling it was the homogenization of classes so bringing up 4e doesn't seem relevant here.
I'd argue that in the base PHB, 5e had more character options and customization than say stock 3.5 or PF1. I did not find lack of scaling to be an issue at all, I even opted to run a form of E10 for it with more class options a host of added feats. With the expanded subclasses from XGtE 5e was creating a fair amount of options. 5e really needed a feat balance and expansion of feats. It was doing ok as far as rate of subclass expansion.
Having an untrained skill list of set DC would help, but it does not fix having high level character literally capable of just about everything that used to be challenging. That just strikes me as wrong on a fundamental level. They need to do a better job of explaining leveled challenged, because as written its a mess. Though the table is about th eonly way to set crafting DCs.
As for ways to make it more palatable. I'd be more ok with 1/2 level, I'd even more ok with 1/4 level. Being limited to your level +/- 4 for viable monster threats is so limiting. My suggestion pushes that more towards +/- 6-8. Lower level monsters are still made effectively obsolete and trivial, it just happens slower and characters can reach a bit higher. Something like 1/4th level, ie getting a +1 to everything at 5th, another +1 at say 10th, and another at 15th, and another at 20th would work, but we kind of already have that for combat as far as to hit ie magic weapons go and Ac in the form of magic armor. We have some change in proficiency for an additional range. 5e balanced bounded without magical weapons or armor assumptions, and that was problematic for it.
4e had a lot of problems. One of them was homogenization, and another was level scaling. All the classes were the same, all the bonuses were the same, everything was the same.
What I have been trying to say is that P2 could be better than 5e as far as a bounded system goes. Not that it will "do better" in any kind of sales sense. P2 is also closer to the 3.P roots which has a host of its own appeal. Paizo really had a strong hold on the the old 3.P crowd, they aren't losing them to 5e any faster, but they could challenge those 5e players as a second system, one that scratches the bound itch, as well as the more crunch and rules heavy system. Maybe I'm just part of a small minority, one who hates level scaling, but find 5e too rules light. P2 without the level scaling hits a sweet spot that I find really appealing.
As to depth of character customization comparing 5e to stock PF1 my gut tells me to disagree but I don't have the will to go check for myself so I'll leave that be, especially since it is an aside.
From what I understand you have four major issues with the +lvl scaling. Please correct me if I am wrong I don't want to misrepresent your argument.
1. The Treadmill
This is a result of GMs not using the rules as intended but if it is a common problem it is still a problem. I think that a more explicit table of challenges would be useful. The DC vs level table is probably too vague judging just from the people arguing it is a treadmill on this forum. If the people dedicated enough to ttrpgs to post on a forum like this are getting confused it's not well described.
2. The Athletic Wizard
I don't really have an argument for this one. I don't mind it, but I don't particularly care if this gets removed from the game. I think it is important for the game mechanics that wizards still get the same scaling to AC and saves since those are directly combat related but skills isn't a big issue for me. I see why they did it, it gives the benefits of bounded accuracy that the untraind person can make an attempt and try and contribute on group challenges but I wouldn't really miss it if it got removed int eh CRB.
3. The High level PC trivializing low level challenges
I think this is a major point of disagreement. I think having high level characters succeed at everything that used to be challenging is an important part of the game which represents character growth.
4. Lack of available monsters
I think you can add lvl difference just as easily as you can remove it. So say my party of lvl 8 PCs just slaughtered a bunch of lvl 4 owlbears, I could present them with a real challenge of the owlbear broodmother by just taking the owlbear book and adding 5 or 6 to everything. I can make young owlbears by taking the stats and subtracting 2 from everything. The lvl scaling gives a lot of flexibility as a GM.
1. Yes, it is poorly defined. It will be misused. And they did an exceptionally poor job describing static DCs. For instance, if they described what a DC20 Athletic check looked like. Maybe that was scaling a horizonal cliff face with just your fingertips and no leg support. Maybe that is a 25. Maybe critically succeeding is doing it one handed.
2. Yes. And with a list of static DCs it is only a matter of time before my 70 year old dottering fat old man can somehow not at late level succeed on that horizontal cliff face climb, and he'll have chances of critically succeeding on that check. No magic involved, he is just not that good despite being untrained in Athletics and having a 10 Str. Gaining a to total of +20 means our characters are going to completely pass the static DC table by, and that is wrong to me. If they want to pass those challenges, they have magic and other means to do it.
When the low level Rogue manages to scale the near sheer castle wall. A year later the dottering old man wizard looks at that wall, "Hey remember when you saved the day and climbed that, before I learned to fly." Then the old man proceeds to give it a climb just for fun, despite having no rational reason to have that natural athletic ability.
3. Suceed at everything, just because they are a high level... why? Why does a dottering old Wizard need to be able to scale a sheer cliff face because he is a higher level. That smack verisimilitude squarely across the face. If he wants to trivialize that encounter, he just casts fly!
4. They already get more proficient and trained in skills, their abilities go up, the have access to magic, they have access to magic weapons and armor etc. They are getting better, enough to trivialize lower level encounters. I suggested widening this range, in no way does it make a level 1 a threat to a level 20. What it does is instead of a realistically viable +/- 4 level range for opponent, that range becomes =/- 6-8.
Sure, there is that flexibility. Just like you could add some HP, or bump its Str or Dex or Con or let it deal an additional weapon die. Simply adding a couple levels and some HP is easier. That is a plus of the current system.
Of course. I honestly do want to try and find a solution that we would both like. I don't know if it is possible and I kind of doubt it is since we seem to have different ideas on how the game should scale but I still think it is worth the discussion. I don't fault you for having different preferences than I do.
1. I think including the standard DCs for various challenges just like they did in PF1 could help prevent the treadmill effect. For comparison the scaling in PF1 for skills was about the same, I think there are fewer miscellaneous bonuses in PF1 so its probably a little smaller but for the most part it is Lvl +3 +Str.
In PF1 Climb Skill DCs
DC 0 A slope that is too steep to walk up
DC 5 A knotted rope
DC 10 A ships rigging
DC 15 A very rough natural wall
DC 20 A typical dungeon wall
DC 25 A high quality brick wall
DC 30 An overhang or ceiling with only handholds
I think this is a near ideal example of why I like the scaling. There is always the 1-20 swing of the die but as you level up things that at first reequipped a good amount of luck say a high quality brick wall eventually become things you can do 95% of the time even in combat. I think they should include a common DC table for every skill in addition to the general table and not doing so will lead to the treadmill effect being more common.
2. Perhaps a more severely restricted set of things you can do untrained would help. Or maybe a set of things where if you are untrained you don't get to add your bonus.
For example in Athletics it is kind of important for the rest of the game the Wizards get to add +Lvl when attempting to escape a grapple and it doesn't make sense that things like climbing a wall would be trained only.
What if when untrained you added your lvl only to certain checks and didn't on other checks. Something like adventure skill uses or something.
Untrained in Athletics you use Str-2 for Long Jump, High Jump, Swim, Grapple, etc.
But you add Lvl +Str -2 to escape a grapple.
I'm not quite sure how this would work but it's an idea.
EDIT: I looked through the skill list and it's really just Escape a Grapple that needs to scale to prevent player death. If they just made a reflex saving throw an option for getting out they could remove the lvl scaling for untrained skills with minimal problems. They would probably want to make sure the Grab Edge, Maintain Balance, and Administer First Aid skill uses had a pretty low DC though.
3. I think you misunderstood me I won't argue that a high level wizard should win at athletics untrained but rather that if they invested enough to become trained, so clearly they put some effort into it, then they deserve, through virtue of being high level, to succeed at low level tasks. So a wizard who decided to become trained in athletics, and then got to level 20 should have no problem climbing a tree or some other low level task.
This reaches a bit of point of breaking verisimilitude when a low level Expert is bested by a high level trained person but I think that is a lot less jarring than a low level expert being bested by a high level untrained person.
Haven't read all posts. One of the stated design goals of Pathfinder was for lower level enemies to quickly become a non-threat. They wanted the lv10 wizard to be basically invincible to lv1 people opposed to 5E where I hear that the enemies you fight at lv1 are still worth throwing against max level.
Where is this design goal explicitly stated?
I remember seeing it in one of the blog posts in the comments. They commented that there's kinda two viewpoints. One with bounded accuracy where the lv1 skeleton you fought can still do something to you as you reach high levels or like PF2 where high levels mean superpower, taking on 10 guys at once easily. Sorry I'm having issues finding the quote since I remember my take away more than the actual text.
While I could have fun in a bound system, I do think that overall I like the idea that higher level characters significantly outclass lower challenges. There is certainly more verisimilitude to the lowbie monsters actually being a minor threat, but I think I want a bit more goofy fantasy at my gaming tables. I used to be more gritty, drawing my motivations and style from Tolkien, but now I want to watch Xena leap 30 feet and run up a tree. Age is melting my brain, perhaps also I started watching too much weird anime due to my children.
That said, I think untrained skills should not gain the level bonus at all. Untrained skills should be based solely on the stat, i.e. natural talent. That eliminates the 70 year old fat man who never trained in Athletics from being good at it (but if he did train in it, then he would would outclass the lowly farmhand, by virtue of his experience and practice).
Of course. I honestly do want to try and find a solution that we would both like. I don't know if it is possible and I kind of doubt it is since we seem to have different ideas on how the game should scale but I still think it is worth the discussion. I don't fault you for having different preferences than I do.
1. I think including the standard DCs for various challenges just like they did in PF1 could help prevent the treadmill effect. For comparison the scaling in PF1 for skills was about the same, I think there are fewer miscellaneous bonuses in PF1 so its probably a little smaller but for the most part it is Lvl +3 +Str.
In PF1 Climb Skill DCs
DC 0 A slope that is too steep to walk up
DC 5 A knotted rope
DC 10 A ships rigging
DC 15 A very rough natural wall
DC 20 A typical dungeon wall
DC 25 A high quality brick wall
DC 30 An overhang or ceiling with only handholds
I think this is a near ideal example of why I like the scaling. There is always the 1-20 swing of the die but as you level up things that at first reequipped a good amount of luck say a high quality brick wall eventually become things you can do 95% of the time even in combat. I think they should include a common DC table for every skill in addition to the general table and not doing so will lead to the treadmill effect being more common.
2. Perhaps a more severely restricted set of things you can do untrained would help. Or maybe a set of things where if you are untrained you don't get to add your bonus.
For example in Athletics it is kind of important for the rest of the game the Wizards get to add +Lvl when attempting to escape a grapple and it doesn't make sense that things like climbing a wall would be trained only.
What if when untrained you added your lvl only to certain checks and didn't on other checks. Something like adventure skill uses or something.
Untrained in Athletics you use Str-2 for Long Jump, High Jump, Swim, Grapple, etc.
But you add Lvl +Str -2 to escape a grapple.
I'm not quite...
Sure, there is a compromise. Paizo puts out two Bestiaries, one for bound one for unbound and writes the two ways to factor proficiency etc into the main rules. Problem solved, two different games, minimal work! Simple... haha.
1. Yes, having listed set example DCs would be great, especially as a starting point. We need them for effectively all ranges. I want to know what is a DC40 check reflective of. How about the nearly impossible DC50.
Ok, so you've got a wall you need to get lucky to scale at low levels, but should every character, including those untrained for the task, have the expected success rates. I just don't see my old and fat wizard pulling off scaling a well constructed wall.
I have some problems with that table. DC30, the horizontal ledge I talked about earlier. I was assigning effectively a 5e style DC to it going with 20ish. So, the first level fighter, who is very strong and trained in athletics, can't pull that off. He has a +5, hell he is going to critically fail that check 70% of the time. Even if we lowered that DC to 25, he'd be failing it 95% of the time and critically failing it 45% of the time. A 20, well he'd succeed 30% of the time and critically fail only 20% of the time. Now, that seems like a risk/reward challenge for the burly fit character to attempt and maybe toss a rope or something to lower the DC for the rest of the party. Make it a success to get across, a failure lets you hang there and require you to try again, a critical failure is a fall.
Now, a little IRL, doing a horizontal ledge like that is tough, but it isn't impossible for most fit trained people.
Now, late game I have trouble believe that my fat old weak untrained wizard can just do this with no chance of falling. None what so ever.
2. I am all for gating trained, expert, master, and legendary aspects of skills. I like that idea.
Now, some characters getting not just +level, but getting +level +2 seems to create a massive disparity. And now we're talking about changing mechanics from athletics checks, or from acrobatic checks, drawing lines between trained untrained etc.
Ok, change escaping a grapple to a save. Now, you're requiring certain skill DCs be kept low, so a trained character will never have to worry about balance, or catching a ledge, will alawys critically succeed after mid levels etc. Not sure about you, but that doesn't strike me as a good solution.
Compare that to what I suggested, we have static DCs. People vary from a -2 for untrained with a 10 in the ability to Legendary with a 20 +8, +12 when someone snags a skill magic item. They can set up circumstance bonuses when needed. Only the most skilled and equipped character would have a chance of pulling of the DC30 impossible, and that would be equivalent to the DC50 or so check possible otherwise. They'd have almost no chance of failing a moderate check and would routinely be critically succeeding on them. The untrained character would struggle and need to find other ways to to overcome the obstacle.
So, my old fat wizard will need to prep some kind of movement spell to get around the obstacle, because he just isn't strong or athletic. Good thing he is a freaking wizard.
DCs would always mean something. Heroes would get better at the things they invest in, the things they don't would remain relatively static, unless they tossed a couple ability increases its way, or picked up a magic item to bandaid the weakness. If a wizard wants to bypass the movement obstacles, they can rely on their whole host of viable spell repertoire to do just that. That seems pretty heroic way to do it, there is a big dangerous chasm the wizard is fighting around, so he casts fly and avoids it.
3. Ok, so just investing in trained should be enough to suceed at low level tasks. I'm with you there. But, you're defining low level tasks differently than me. I'm talking about DC 5-15 with minimal chance of failure or critical failure. Adding level to it means were talking the same chances of passing DC 20-30. Given the rock example above being a 20 or so, that doesn't pass the smell test for our old fat wizard.
My personal ideal would be 1/2 level, but I'd vastly prefer sticking with +1/level to removing level bonuses. I don't want level 20 characters to be stymied by the same challenges as level 1 characters, and I don't want the only reason level 1 (or level 0) monsters aren't a problem to level 20 characters being their quantity. To me 1/2 level solves that best, but if the choice is +1/level or no scaling, I would choose +1/level in a heartbeat.
While I could have fun in a bound system, I do think that overall I like the idea that higher level characters significantly outclass lower challenges. There is certainly more verisimilitude to the lowbie monsters actually being a minor threat, but I think I want a bit more goofy fantasy at my gaming tables. I used to be more gritty, drawing my motivations and style from Tolkien, but now I want to watch Xena leap 30 feet and run up a tree. Age is melting my brain, perhaps also I started watching too much weird anime due to my children.
That said, I think untrained skills should not gain the level bonus at all. Untrained skills should be based solely on the stat, i.e. natural talent. That eliminates the 70 year old fat man who never trained in Athletics from being good at it (but if he did train in it, then he would would outclass the lowly farmhand, by virtue of his experience and practice).
Under those bound changes, higher level characters still significantly outclass lower level threats. I have no desire to set out an encounter where the monsters need 20s to hit, and the heroes only need 2s. I have no desire to run that.
I definitely fall on the grittier end of the spectrum myself. IDK, if you want to see someone run up a tree or leap 30', how about the Jump spell haha.
See, making untrained skill have no level bonus creates its own sets of problems with setting DCs like we talked about above. In that example, should basic training in athletics overpower raw ability. What about experience gives you athletic ability?
My personal ideal would be 1/2 level, but I'd vastly prefer sticking with +1/level to removing level bonuses. I don't want level 20 characters to be stymied by the same challenges as level 1 characters, and I don't want the only reason level 1 (or level 0) monsters aren't a problem to level 20 characters being their quantity. To me 1/2 level solves that best, but if the choice is +1/level or no scaling, I would choose +1/level in a heartbeat.
I see 1/2 level as a vast improvement. I see no level as best, but could get on board with 1/2.
What I think Paizo needs to do is just release two Bestiaries. One Bound and one Unbound. Then present the two ways of calculating character stats in the rule books. Presto change, they can sell more Bestiaries and cater to a much wider group of players. They create two games for the effort of one.
1. Okay I don't see any specific problem with adjusting DCs a bit and yes the DCs should progress to show the whole range of reachable bonuses.
2. Medicine DC is kept low at DC 15 already. So yes I am all about keeping things that you want to be easy at low DCs. Grapple is already a save as are all combat maneuvers. It would actually make more sense if you got out of it as a save. As is it's a save to avoid getting grappled but once your in its a skill check to get out.
3. Now you are making being good at skills to hard. You should be able to do some cool stuff by virtue of being lvl 20 even if you are only trained. I'll give you it's odd to be able to do it untrained. But yes I am saying that a 150 year old wizard with 4 str who is lvl 20 and trained in athletics should be able to climb something that would be difficult for a Str 18 trained lvl one character.
1. Okay I don't see any specific problem with adjusting DCs a bit and yes the DCs should progress to show the whole range of reachable bonuses.
2. Medicine DC is kept low at DC 15 already. So yes I am all about keeping things that you want to be easy at low DCs. Grapple is already a save as are all combat maneuvers. It would actually make more sense if you got out of it as a save. As is it's a save to avoid getting grappled but once your in its a skill check to get out.
3. Now you are making being good at skills to hard. You should be able to do some cool stuff by virtue of being lvl 20 even if you are only trained. I'll give you it's odd to be able to do it untrained. But yes I am saying that a 150 year old wizard with 4 str who is lvl 20 and trained in athletics should be able to climb something that would be difficult for a Str 18 trained lvl one character.
It really boils down to wanting to play two different games.
My ideal scenario is that paizo releases two bestiaries, one bound and one unbound. And in the rulebook they include the two different ways to calculate proficiency. Paizo would appeal to a wider audience, would sell more books, and would only upset some people who said they were double dipping.
That is my ideal solution. I'd get a better bound system than 5e, and players like you would get your ie bound and unbound 3.P heroic itch scratched in a new system. Now, we just need to sell paizo on the idea.
P2, is at its core a great bound system tacked onto level scaling.
Wow a lot has accumulated since my last post. I don't feel like reading all of that but let me just say no one side is right or wrong its just a preference for the feel of the game. I prefer the scaling of power while others don't. Its cool but I think I've heard developers say that they will be going with the option that makes higher level character significantly more powerful.
