| Kaluas |
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I thought I would provide my thoughts on part 1.
Our party was composed of a bard, rogue,cleric(me), barbarian, and sorcerer.
Encounter difficulty for the group:
Ooze, 1st room of goblins, Quasits all seemed quite simple to overcome. As a note had we been experts on the rules the Quasits would have been more difficult as we failed to note that invisibility gave them a 20 on the d20 stealth roll. Perhaps it should be mentioned in the detecting creature section under the invisible section that mentions sneak.
Centipedes were brutal dealing large amounts of damage with their poison. I spent this encounter unconscious after round 1.
Goblins cave: A good challenge. Had we spent more time thinking through our tactics before taking actions it would have gone smoother. I spent my time healing and doing minimal damage.
Skeletons: Dealt a lot of damage to me but was about right for an encounter. I spent my time taking hits and healing damage while the group killed the monsters.
Final battle: Drakus hit extremely hard and if not for magic missile we could have had a much harder time. I spent this fight unconscious after round 1.
I had an AC of 15 and had a shield that I used at times to improve AC.
I would consider this AC on the higher side for level 1 and yet looking at the monster statistics now I would be hit 50% (or more) on the first attack from each creature. Either my armor was made by an inferior blacksmith or the monsters are far more skill in combat then I believe they should be at level 1.
Drakus having a +10 to hit has a 25% chance of getting a critical vs. an ac 15 character vs less then 5% in the current pathfinder version.
I spent more time unconscious in this adventure then I have a year in the PFS with the current pathfinder version.
Magic:
Cantrips: I like the fact they appear more useful. I have not looked into wands yet for 2.0, but it seems casters are less dependent on wands with scaling cantrips.
Detect Magic: A huge downgrade from the old version. Once you discover what item is actually magical then you can spend an hour to identify magic with a skill. The best way I can figure out how to tell what item is magical is move to an area there is no magic. Cast detect magic as your party brings every item from the room out to you at which point you can give them the thumbs up or thumbs down. This process could take longer then identifying the item. I realize there is a cantrip read aura that takes 10 minutes per item. At heightened 3 and 4 this gets easier using the 2 cantrips above, and by heightened 6 its a non-issue as read aura lets you target any number of objects. I would vote to use the older version of detect magic.
At level 1 resonance point were a non-issue so I can not speak to that.
I did like critical successes and failures. Until we become more familiar with these it will require detailed print outs of spells.
Channel Energy (Uses heal spell): Appears unlikely to keep up with the damage dealt by monsters. I say this based on it appearing like they hit to often and deal far more damage then I could heal. I could heal 1 character fairly well but for healing a group within the aura for 4 hp each is pretty weak. The same with channeling to harm undead. 4 hp 2 on a save. As I grow in levels I realize my heal will get better but by then the monsters will hit easier and deal more damage. It seems like a lot more downtime is expected of the characters in future games.
Death and Dying:
Far more complicated then I enjoy. I saw someone suggest a flow chart which would be a good idea. A computer program or app would be even better(One for tracking poison stages would be nice as well). I see this as a step backward in handling character death.
Lock picking: I have seen people discussing it and from our experience it seem it could bog the game down. My thoughts are this. If you have a chance to beat the DC at some point you will it just matter of time. The rolling for X number of successes works well during combat, but out of combat if I was GM'ing I would just tell the character they succeed vs. having everyone wait while roll after roll after roll is made. Perhaps have a formula for how long it took. Maybe something like 1d6 minutes minus 1/2 their thievery in minutes(These numbers being made with minimal thought a much better formula could be devised)
Character Creation:
I prefer the old point buy system to the ability boost and flaw system which seems to provide very limited options for ability scores. I do like limiting the maximum to 18.