Regarding the "Coin Flip Problem"


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Greater rings kick in for Returning at 12th level.


@N N 9 59. For most of your post you're not saying anything different than what I'm saying in terms of the math. 5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

Firstly bringing up the second and third attacks is a bit weird since you can't even do that universally in P1 until late in the game while you can in P2 right from the start. That's a point in P2's favour, not P1.

Secondly you can't use the p1 +1 to crit confirm as a point in the p1 point's favour as crit confirms aren't even required in p2. To put it in P1 terms, in P2 the crit confirms always succeed and so the P2 +1 not only gets you more chances to crit, it guarantees a crit when it does. That is strictly better in two ways than the P1 +1 which cannot crit on +10 and is necessary to even have a chance to crit when rolling in a weapon's crit range.

You're right that the p2 +1 isn't going to have a chance to crit in every circumstance, so I'll amend my statement to 'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.

Finally aside from crit considerations bonuses ARE harder to come by in p2 than in p1. So they're inherently more valuable because of their rarity.


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neaven wrote:
Pramxnim wrote:


Remedies to the problem in actual play:

However, these chances, even for spells that require saves, can be improved.

Flat-footed is a common condition that gives a -2 penalty to enemy AC. For someone who used to hit 50% of the time, this ups their accuracy to 60%, or a 20% increase in accuracy.

There are also buff spells like Bluff and Heroism that increase your chance to hit, making even fights against equal level enemies much easier.

For Spells that require saves, a common condition in Frightened lowers the enemy's save, and can be applied judiciously...

The fact that situational buffs exist does not imply that a base 50% chance is good. Flat footed requires another person in the right position, which is not possible on all battlefields or with all parties. Buff spells require someone to be playing someone who hands out buff spells as well as them spending a limited resource to do it. And frightened only applies to enemies that can be frightened.

On top of that, all those "remedies" require the spending of actions in combat to use.

Catching enemies flat footed is actually quite easy in PF2 even at low levels. For example you can flat foot someone through

1) Flanking
2) Daze cantrip
3) Barbarians raging that crit with a sword
4) fighters specialized in swords that roll a crit
5) Color spray and invisibility spells

I am sure there are probably more ways but that is the list I can think of off the top of my head


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1) Flanking
> Can be impossible depending on battlefield/terrain.
2) Daze cantrip
> Caster spends 2 actions (basically their turn) for a 50-50 shot at this
3) Barbarians raging that crit with a sword
> So a 5% chance. Not even remotely reliable.
4) fighters specialized in swords that roll a crit
> Okay, since it's a fighter, I'll be optimistic and presume you hit on a 9. 10% chance. Still not reliable.
5) Color spray and invisibility spells
> Invisibility is a one-shot thing. Color Spray is actually decent here, except it's a 15ft cone. Basically flanking+, except even more issues lining it up.


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Azih wrote:
@N N 9 59. For most of your post you're not saying anything different than what I'm saying in terms of the math.

But you are. More importantly, you are conflating concepts.

Quote:
Finally aside from crit considerations bonuses ARE harder to come by in p2 than in p1. So they're inherently more valuable because of their rarity.

So here, you're conflating the concepts of something being effective with something benig rare/scarce. Rarity of a +1 doesn't improve its performance. By analogy, wooden tennis rackets were very common in the 1960's. Today, wooden tennis rackets are very rare. However, the rarity of wooden rackets does not make them any better for playing tennis today than they were back in 1960. The rarity of a stacking +1 for an attack in P2 doesn't mean its doing anything more than if it were common.

What is true is that things that give you a +1 may be more valuable, but that doesn't make the +1 do anymore than it did.

Quote:
5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

That's false. In P1, a +1 gives you a +1 on crit confirmation. So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%, assuming you can roll a 19 or lower to confirm.

Quote:
Firstly bringing up the second and third attacks is a bit weird since you can't even do that universally in P1 until late in the game while you can in P2 right from the start. That's a point in P2's favour, not P1.

First off, you can get a 2nd attack at 1st level with an offhand weapon or using Rapid Shot. Second, no, it's not a point in P2's favor. You're making an argument that a +1 does more fo you in P2 than it does in P1. The entirety of your argument is dependent on a +1's ability to grant extra crits, because the +1 isn't making you hit any more.

As such, we have to look at actual benefit of +1 on crits, for all attack rolls.. If I get three attacks and I am unable to get +10 above AC on the 2nd and 3rd attacks, then the +1 in P2 may have less benefit than a +1 in P1. I'll explain this a little bit later.

Quote:
Secondly you can't use the p1 +1 to crit confirm as a point in the p1 point's favour as crit confirms aren't even required in p2. To put it in P1 terms, in P2 the crit confirms always succeed and so the P2 +1 not only gets you more chances to crit, it guarantees a crit when it does. That is strictly better in two ways than the P1 +1 which cannot crit on +10 and is necessary to even have a chance to crit when rolling in a weapon's crit range.

I think you're overlooking a subtle aspect of how this works the opposite of how you presenting it. Let's back up for a sec. You're making an assertion that a +1 in P2 is more valuable to the player than a +1 is in P1. That first part of that comparison is based on the value of a having a +1 versus not having a +1 in that system, not across systems.

In P1, if I have a +1, I am confirming more crits than I would without it, so long as I am not required to roll a natural 20. In P2, if I can't get +10 on a roll, then the +1 isn't helping me at all on a natural 20.

Quote:
You're right that the p2 +1 isn't going to have a chance to crit in every circumstance, so I'll amend my statement to 'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.

In order for that to be true, we'd have to look at the increase in damage. What is the increase in expected damage for a +2 in P1 versus a +1 in P2?


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N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

That's false. In P1, a +1 gives you a +1 on crit confirmation. So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%, assuming you can roll a 19 or lower to confirm.

You're wrong. To calculate crit chance you need to factor in the chance to threaten a crit in the first place. Here's an example to illustrate:

Example: In PF1, PC hits normally on a 10, crits on 20:

Crit chance = Chance to Crit x Chance to Crit confirm = 0.05 x 0.55 = 0.0275 = 2.75%

With a +1 to hit, the calculation becomes:

Crit chance = 0.05 x 0.60 = 0.03 = 3%

So that's NOT a +5% to crit with a +1 to hit, but rather a +0.25% chance to crit.

In PF2, you gain a +5% chance to crit with a +1 to hit as long as you already hit on a 10 or lower. When the conditions are right, a +1 in PF2 is 20 times as valuable as a +1 in PF1 when it comes to increasing crit chance.

In PF1, if your threat range increases, then the value of each +1 increase when it comes to increasing crit chance.
If you crit on 19-20, then each +1 gives you +0.5% chance to crit. If you crit on 18-20, then each +1 gives you +0.75% chance to crit.

But you never get to the point where each +1 in PF1 gives you +5% chance to crit.

N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
You're right that the p2 +1 isn't going to have a chance to crit in every circumstance, so I'll amend my statement to 'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.
In order for that to be true, we'd have to look at the increase in damage. What is the increase in expected damage for a +2 in P1 versus a +1 in P2?

Let's compare two characters, one from each system. For simplicity's sake, assume each attack they perform does the same average damage, call it X. Then let's assume they both hit on a 10 and both have normal threat range (crit on a 20 normally) and normal crit damage (double damage). To be fair to PF2, we will assume the conditions are right for a +1 to hit to translate to a 5% increased crit chance.

Expected damage for a PF1 character:

0.50 * X + 0.05 * 0.55 * 2X = 0.555 * X or 55.5% of X

A +2 to hit would give you a 65% accuracy, or:

0.60 * X + 0.05 * 0.65 * 2X = 0.61 * X or 66.5% of X

The PF1 character's expected damage has increased by 11% of X with a +2 to hit. Note that this increase is consistent No matter your initial accuracy. For reference, the expected damage increase with a +1 to hit is 5.5% of X. Each +1 gives you an increase equal to 5.5% of the average damage of 1 attack.

Now let's look at expected damage for a PF2 character:

0.50 * X + 0.05 * 0.55 * 2X = 0.555 * X or 55.5% of X

A +1 to hit would give you a 60% accuracy, or:

0.50 * X + 0.10 * 0.60 * 2X = 0.62 * X or 62% of X

The PF2 character's expected damage has increased by 6.5% of X with a +1 to hit. That's nowhere close to being equal to a +2 to hit in PF1. But note that this increase in expected damage depends on your initial accuracy. However, it's certainly better than a +1 increase in PF1.

Here's the calculation for the expected damage in PF2 with 65% accuracy:

0.50 * X + 0.15 * 0.65 * 2X = 0.695 * X or 69.5% of X

Note that now a +1 represents an increase of 7.5% of X. The more accurate you are, the more valuable each +1 becomes. For a +1 in PF2 to be better than a +2 in PF1, given the same average damage dealt, your initial accuracy would have to be 80%, aka hitting on a 5 or lower.

Now, if we take into account average damage per hit being different between the two versions, then the comparison becomes even more skewed, as PF1 characters generally do more damage per hit than PF2 characters.

Conclusion: The claim that a +1 in PF1 and a +1 in PF2 have the same value when it comes to crit chance is FALSE

The claim that a +1 in PF2 is more valuable to a +2 in PF1 is FALSE.
Under the right circumstances, aka both characters normally hitting on a 5 or lower and having the same average damage per hit, a +1 in PF2 is more valuable than a +2 in PF1. However, average damage per hit in PF1 is almost always higher than in PF2.

Compare the benchmark level 10 Fighter to a level 10 Fighter in PF2 using a +2 Greatsword, you'll see that on a hit the PF1 Fighter does on average 26.5 damage, while the PF2 Fighter does 3d12+5 per hit, or on average 24.5 damage. The difference gets even higher at higher levels.

I hope I've helped clear up some misunderstandings with these calculations.


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I don't really like getting dragged into yet another debate here, but I feel the need to chime in with one observation that no one seems to have pointed out yet.

Suppose you're having one of those days where you just straight up never roll above a 10. Mathematically, there is nothing stopping a streak like this from happening with a d20.

How does the game keep you from feeling irrelevant? In PF1, with a bit of tactics and some help from the friendly wizard or bard, you can hit on a 5, and still have a 50-50 chance of succeeding. In contrast, PF2 is remarkably stingy with +1 (due to their value) so you hit on an 8 if you can stack all the +1's and conditions. Thus Bad Luck Brian is whiffing on 3/4ths of his initial rolls and has no chance with his second or third attacks.

Sure the average damage is roughly the same, but the miss chance is far higher in 2e. Hence the game feeling far more random.


Lyricanna wrote:

I don't really like getting dragged into yet another debate here, but I feel the need to chime in with one observation that no one seems to have pointed out yet.

Suppose you're having one of those days where you just straight up never roll above a 10. Mathematically, there is nothing stopping a streak like this from happening with a d20.

How does the game keep you from feeling irrelevant? In PF1, with a bit of tactics and some help from the friendly wizard or bard, you can hit on a 5, and still have a 50-50 chance of succeeding. In contrast, PF2 is remarkably stingy with +1 (due to their value) so you hit on an 8 if you can stack all the +1's and conditions. Thus Bad Luck Brian is whiffing on 3/4ths of his initial rolls and has no chance with his second or third attacks.

Sure the average damage is roughly the same, but the miss chance is far higher in 2e. Hence the game feeling far more random.

That's also a problem with the d20 and its uniform distribution. For those who fear bad roll streaks in any d20 system, I recommend trying out rolling 2d10s instead. You get a distribution of results that favour the average a lot more than extremes, leading to your bonuses being more relevant.

In 2e, there are various ways to get stacking bonuses and penalties as well. Flat-footed gives you an effective +2 to hit, Frightened, Sick, Enervated X on an enemy gives you a +X to hit (with the errata coming next Monday), and you can get a +1 to hit with Bless, Inspire Courage and the like.

Even something as simple as flanking and enemy and an ally succeeding on the Assist action grants you a +4 to hit (-2 penalty to enemy AC and +2 bonus to your attack roll), so getting to the point where you hit on a 5 is pretty reasonable to get.


I defer to Pramxmin!

And I'm seriously considering going to 2d10 with 2,3,4 being fumbles and 18,19,20 being crits.


Pramxnim wrote:
N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

That's false. In P1, a +1 gives you a +1 on crit confirmation. So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%, assuming you can roll a 19 or lower to confirm.

You're wrong. To calculate crit chance you need to factor in the chance to threaten a crit in the first place. Here's an example to illustrate:

Example: In PF1, PC hits normally on a 10, crits on 20:

Crit chance = Chance to Crit x Chance to Crit confirm = 0.05 x 0.55 = 0.0275 = 2.75%

With a +1 to hit, the calculation becomes:

Crit chance = 0.05 x 0.60 = 0.03 = 3%

So that's NOT a +5% to crit with a +1 to hit, but rather a +0.25% chance to crit.

In PF2, you gain a +5% chance to crit with a +1 to hit as long as you already hit on a 10 or lower. When the conditions are right, a +1 in PF2 is 20 times as valuable as a +1 in PF1 when it comes to increasing crit chance.

In PF1, if your threat range increases, then the value of each +1 increase when it comes to increasing crit chance.
If you crit on 19-20, then each +1 gives you +0.5% chance to crit. If you crit on 18-20, then each +1 gives you +0.75% chance to crit.

But you never get to the point where each +1 in PF1 gives you +5% chance to crit.

N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
You're right that the p2 +1 isn't going to have a chance to crit in every circumstance, so I'll amend my statement to 'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.
In order for that to be true, we'd have to look at the increase in damage. What is the increase in expected damage for a +2 in P1 versus a +1 in P2?
Let's compare two characters, one from each system. For simplicity's sake, assume each attack they perform does the same average damage, call it X. Then let's assume they both hit on a 10...

Dude, we need to do another thread where we cover conditional boni for things like sword crits vs not sword crits, and also compare wasting an action on Feint to not using Feint and seeing how they all interact because it creates a lot of crazy graphs.

Scarab Sages

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Lyricanna wrote:

I don't really like getting dragged into yet another debate here, but I feel the need to chime in with one observation that no one seems to have pointed out yet.

Suppose you're having one of those days where you just straight up never roll above a 10. Mathematically, there is nothing stopping a streak like this from happening with a d20.

How does the game keep you from feeling irrelevant? In PF1, with a bit of tactics and some help from the friendly wizard or bard, you can hit on a 5, and still have a 50-50 chance of succeeding. In contrast, PF2 is remarkably stingy with +1 (due to their value) so you hit on an 8 if you can stack all the +1's and conditions. Thus Bad Luck Brian is whiffing on 3/4ths of his initial rolls and has no chance with his second or third attacks.

Sure the average damage is roughly the same, but the miss chance is far higher in 2e. Hence the game feeling far more random.

Despite using a d20 my girlfriend might as well roll a d4 for initiative with the numbers she gets. She looks like she'd have a bad day in second edition

Shadow Lodge

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If I make a character to be good at something, I want them to be RELIABLE at it, not have a 50/50 chance of it. They should only fail in extremely bad luck.


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Let me thank Prax for doing some analysis. However, there are some problems with your analysis. On the plus side, your treatment of the problem raises some interesting questions. But in this post, I'm going to address some of your oversights.

Pramxnim wrote:
N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

That's false. In P1, a +1 gives you a +1 on crit confirmation. So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%, assuming you can roll a 19 or lower to confirm.

You're wrong. To calculate crit chance you need to factor in the chance to threaten a crit in the first place.

No, I'm not wrong. In your rush to seize some apparently low hanging fruit, you didn't parse my statement correctly. Allow me to repeat it:

Quote:
So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%

Let me repeat it again:

Quote:
So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%

Emphasis added.

I'll assume the misunderstanding is my fault so let me rephrase the statement so others won't make the same mistake.

When rolling crit confirmation, every +1 increases your chance to confirm the crit by 5%.

Moving on...

Quote:

Now let's look at expected damage for a PF2 character:

0.50 * X + 0.05 * 0.55 * 2X = 0.555 * X or 55.5% of X

A +1 to hit would give you a 60% accuracy, or:

0.50 * X + 0.10 * 0.60 * 2X = 0.62 * X or 62% of X

I'm not following the math here. I get

.5 (% chance to roll a 10-19) * X + .05 (% chance to roll a 20) * 2X = 60% of X.

.5 (% chance to roll a 9-18) * X + .1 (chance of rolling a 20 or 19) * 2X = 70% of X. That's a change of 10%.

EDIT: An interesting observation from this is that once you can hit on a 10, every +1 is essentially adding crit damage and that's it.

Each +1 after you can hit on a naural 10, increases your damage by X * the crit multiplier (which is usually, but not always, 2).

So suddenly it seems like Azih is right, every +1 in P2 is increasing damage by 5% in P2, but as little as .5% in P1. This raises the question, about what exactly are we comparing? What does this prove one way or the other? Whose +1 benefit works harder, whose +1 provides more comparative benefit to not having it, or whose +1 provides more absolute benefit? Either way, you correctly bold faced a critical assumption/precondition:

Quote:
as long as you already hit on a 10 or lower

And this statement is crucial in understanding the reality of the situation. Why? Because on 2nd and 3rd attacks, it may be impossible to get +10 on a hit and that means you're not getting any crit bonus from +1. That's also true anytime a P1 character can crit without rolling a 20. So in P1, as soon as a I can confirm without having to roll a natural 20, a +1 is is improving my chance at extra crit damage, including iteratives and two-weapon fighting attacks.

Quote:
Conclusion: The claim that a +1 in PF1 and a +1 in PF2 have the same value when it comes to crit chance is FALSE

I'm not aware that anyone in this thread has made that claim.


Azih wrote:
'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.

Azih, in doing my own analysis on this situation, an important question came up:

How does the accuracy of your statement impact the game for you? In other words, does it improve the game if what you said is accurate? Or, why does this matter?

My question is not rhetorical.


N N 959 wrote:

No, I'm not wrong. In your rush to seize some apparently low hanging fruit, you don't parse my statement correctly. Allow me to repeat it:

Quote:
So once you've scored a critical threat, each +1 increases your chance of criting by exactly 5%

I did parse your statement correctly. However, when you asserted that the original quote was false, you implied that a 5% crit chance increase exists in PF1. Here's the original quote for reference:

Azih wrote:
5% increase to hit exists in both p1 and p2 for a +1. 5% increase to crit chance exists only in p2.

Your statement, however, only applies to the chance to confirm a critical hit. That's completely different from a chance to actually land a critical hit.

In order to land a critical hit, you first need to roll a critical threat, then you need to confirm it. The probability of both events happening is equal to the product of the probability of each event happening individually.

To put it in other terms, and here I quote myself:

Quote:

Example: In PF1, PC hits normally on a 10, crits on 20:

Crit chance = Chance to Crit * Chance to Crit confirm = 0.05 x 0.55 = 0.0275 = 2.75%

Is that more clear? In PF1, if a PC hits normally on a 10 and threatens a crit on a 20, the actual crit chance is not 5%, but 2.75%. A +1 to hit may increase critical confirmation chance by 5%, but a 5% increase to critical chance itself does not exist in PF1.

N N 959 wrote:


.5 (% chance to roll a 10-19) * X + .05 (% chance to roll a 20) * 2X = 60% of X.

.5 (as above) * X + .1 (chance of rolling a 20 or 19) * 2X = 70% of X. That's a change of 10%.

Yeah that was my bad. I copied over the formula and forgot about the change to crits in PF2. As you can see, the formula still used PF1 assumptions. In my defense, it was late when I did the calculations :P

The correct calculations are in your quote. That means each +1 to hit in PF2 increases your expected damage by a flat 10% of X when you already hit on a 10 or lower, and a flat 5% of X when you already hit on a 11 or higher.

Compare that to PF1, where a +1 always increases your expected damage by a flat 5.5% of X.

N N 959 wrote:
Quote:
Conclusion: The claim that a +1 in PF1 and a +1 in PF2 have the same value when it comes to crit chance is FALSE

I'm not aware that anyone in this thread has made that claim.

True, but your critical confirm comment made it seem like that's the case, even though it is not. Do you see how that could create confusion? I'm just clearing up any misunderstandings that might occur to a casual observer. To be more accurate, I'll amend my statement to "Any hypothetical claim that..."

N N 959 wrote:
Because on 2nd and 3rd attacks, it may be impossible to get +10 on a hit and that means you're not getting any crit bonus from +1. Compare that to P1, where as long as soon as a +1 allows me to hit with a 19, then it's improving my crit damage on any attack, including iterative and two-weapon fighting attacks.

Ok, I understand. In PF1, iterative attacks benefit more from a +1 to hit, because it also increases your critical confirm chance. Since iterative attacks in PF2 are not likely to hit on a 10 or below, a +1 benefits them less. I agree.


Pramxnim wrote:
However, when you asserted that the original quote was false, you implied that a 5% crit chance increase exists in PF1.

No, I didn't. You may have inferred that, but that was not, at all, what I implied.

My response was to refute Azih's blanket statement that there was no crit benefit to P1. I specifically qualified my statement as applying to threat confirmation because there is no debate about P2 bonuses allowing more crits. The question isn't about who gets more crits, The question i was addressing is who gets more out of having a +1 versus not having a +1 within the context of their own system.

The problem with this debate is that Azih's own assertions lacks sufficient specificity/context. In doing my own analysis, I repeated kept asking me, what is it that we are comparing? What comparison is actually informative?

EDIT: Again, thank you for posting/responding because the debate has helped me gain clarity on the topic.


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master_marshmallow wrote:

Dude, we need to do another thread where we cover conditional boni for things like sword crits vs not sword crits, and also compare wasting an action on Feint to not using Feint and seeing how they all interact because it creates a lot of crazy graphs.

Oh, I did the sword crit thing. I copied the tab used in my googlesheet calculator and set the enemy AC variable to be dependent on the same variable in the main tab. AKA I have a tab where enemy AC is A and another where the AC is (A-2), to represent flat-footed.

Then I applied the following formula, where X1 is the expected damage of the 1st Strike, X2 is the expected damage of the 2nd Strike, X2` is the expected damage of the 2nd Strike on a flat-footed enemy, and so on:

Two Strikes calculation:

Expected damage = X1 + (chance to not crit on 1st Strike) * X2 + (chance to crit on 1st Strike) * X2`

I don't want to type out the chance to not crit thing, so let's call C1 the chance to crit on the 1st Strike, C2 the chance to crit on the 2nd Strike and so on.

Three Strikes calculation:

ED = X1 + (1-C1) * (X2 + (1-C2) * X3 + C2 * X3`) + C1 * (X2` + X3`)

If you add more Strikes, just add 1 to each value after X and C, and then put X1 and C1 outside the whole thing.

4 Strikes calculation:

X1 + (1-C1) * (X2 + (1-C2) * (X3 + (1-C3) * X4 + C3 * X4`) + C2 * (X3` + X4`)) + C1 * (X2` + X3` + X4`)

Once you crit on a Strike, each future Strike uses the Flat-Footed damage calculations. My conclusion? The damage increase is pretty minimal.

For a level 20 Fighter using a Greatsword (avg dmg: 6d12+7 or 46) who normally hits on a 10, the expected damage went from 48.3 to 48.9785, or a 1.40% damage increase.

For reference, a Greatpick, whose critical specialization adds +1 damage per weapon die including dice from a critical hit (aka adding +13 damage on a crit with a +5 weapon) brings damage from 44.775 to 46.725, or a 4.36% damage increase.

As for the Feint thing, it's hard to say without calculating the expected accuracy of a Feint. I can calculate whether it's better to have a successful Feint followed by 2 attacks compared to just doing 3 attacks though. This is for a level 20 Fighter using a Greatsword, hitting on a 10 or above:

Feint Success + 2 Strikes damage: 52.9
Feint Crit + 2 Strikes damage: 57.5
3 Strikes damage: 48.3

There's a marked increase in damage If you succeed at Feinting. A Fighter who maxes out his Deception (by MCing Rogue to pick it up as signature skill, having 20 Cha and the Whisper of the First Lie item) has a +33 bonus vs. a Pit Fiend's 45 Perception DC. That's a 45% accuracy with Feint.

Plug in the numbers, and we now have:
Feint + 2 Strikes expected damage: 50.255

So Feinting is worth it even at such a low success rate.

Conclusion: It's worth it to forgo the 3rd Strike to render the opponent flat-footed, as long as you have a 45%+ chance of doing so.


Pramxnim wrote:
master_marshmallow wrote:

Dude, we need to do another thread where we cover conditional boni for things like sword crits vs not sword crits, and also compare wasting an action on Feint to not using Feint and seeing how they all interact because it creates a lot of crazy graphs.

Oh, I did the sword crit thing. I copied the tab used in my googlesheet calculator and set the enemy AC variable to be dependent on the same variable in the main tab. AKA I have a tab where enemy AC is A and another where the AC is (A-2), to represent flat-footed.

Then I applied the following formula, where X1 is the expected damage of the 1st Strike, X2 is the expected damage of the 2nd Strike, X2` is the expected damage of the 2nd Strike on a flat-footed enemy, and so on:

Two Strikes calculation:

Expected damage = X1 + (chance to not crit on 1st Strike) * X2 + (chance to crit on 1st Strike) * X2`

I don't want to type out the chance to not crit thing, so let's call C1 the chance to crit on the 1st Strike, C2 the chance to crit on the 2nd Strike and so on.

Three Strikes calculation:

ED = X1 + (1-C1) * (X2 + (1-C2) * X3 + C2 * X3`) + C1 * (X2` + X3`)

If you add more Strikes, just add 1 to each value after X and C, and then put X1 and C1 outside the whole thing.

4 Strikes calculation:

X1 + (1-C1) * (X2 + (1-C2) * (X3 + (1-C3) * X4 + C3 * X4`) + C2 * (X3` + X4`)) + C1 * (X2` + X3` + X4`)

Once you crit on a Strike, each future Strike uses the Flat-Footed damage calculations. My conclusion? The damage increase is pretty minimal.

For a level 20 Fighter using a Greatsword (avg dmg: 6d12+7 or 46) who normally hits on a 10, the expected damage went from 48.3 to 48.9785, or a 1.40% damage increase.

For reference, a Greatpick, whose critical specialization adds +1 damage per weapon die including dice from a critical hit (aka adding +13 damage on a crit with a +5 weapon) brings damage from 44.775 to 46.725, or a 4.36% damage increase.

As for the Feint thing, it's...

Rogue dedication also includes feats to enhance Demoralize, which can also deal out the Flat-Footed condition, opening those options up even more.

My conclusion is that spending the action to feint/demoralize/reposition for flanking is a much better use of the [3rd] action (though performed first) and it more or less confirmed my suspicions about trading actions for attack boni.

How does it work with Double Slice/Hunt Target/Agile Grace?
the -0/-1/-1 seems appealing to me, though weapon damage may be a factor given the requirement for two agile weapons (looking at the Sawtooth Saber).


N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
'Every point of difference in 2e is equivalent to ALMOST two points in 1e.' That's still better.

Azih, in doing my own analysis on this situation, an important question came up:

How does the accuracy of your statement impact the game for you? In other words, does it improve the game if what you said is accurate? Or, why does this matter?

My question is not rhetorical.

The value of a point being 'doubled' between 1e and 2e wasn't a claim that I made with any real amount of rigour. It is based on a less precise conviction that a point in 2e is not equivalent to a point in 1e and is overall more valuable and so the seemingly small spread of 6 between Untrained and Legendary shouldn't be seen through the lens of 1e where a 6 point spread isn't very impressive.

And I do stand by that conviction. Points are harder to come by in 2e since 1e's point stacking has been taken away, and the points do allow a new way to crit in 2e that 1e lacks. There's way too many variables to compare them directly to each other but I like both of those aspects of the 2e design.


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Pramxnim wrote:
Lyricanna wrote:

I don't really like getting dragged into yet another debate here, but I feel the need to chime in with one observation that no one seems to have pointed out yet.

Suppose you're having one of those days where you just straight up never roll above a 10. Mathematically, there is nothing stopping a streak like this from happening with a d20.

How does the game keep you from feeling irrelevant? In PF1, with a bit of tactics and some help from the friendly wizard or bard, you can hit on a 5, and still have a 50-50 chance of succeeding. In contrast, PF2 is remarkably stingy with +1 (due to their value) so you hit on an 8 if you can stack all the +1's and conditions. Thus Bad Luck Brian is whiffing on 3/4ths of his initial rolls and has no chance with his second or third attacks.

Sure the average damage is roughly the same, but the miss chance is far higher in 2e. Hence the game feeling far more random.

That's also a problem with the d20 and its uniform distribution. For those who fear bad roll streaks in any d20 system, I recommend trying out rolling 2d10s instead. You get a distribution of results that favour the average a lot more than extremes, leading to your bonuses being more relevant.

In 2e, there are various ways to get stacking bonuses and penalties as well. Flat-footed gives you an effective +2 to hit, Frightened, Sick, Enervated X on an enemy gives you a +X to hit (with the errata coming next Monday), and you can get a +1 to hit with Bless, Inspire Courage and the like.

Even something as simple as flanking and enemy and an ally succeeding on the Assist action grants you a +4 to hit (-2 penalty to enemy AC and +2 bonus to your attack roll), so getting to the point where you hit on a 5 is pretty reasonable to get.

Here's the thing, the d20 system itself is decently self-correcting about this. A fighter or barbarian on an unlucky streak can quite effectively stack their to-hit till they hit on a 3 or even a 2. This seems like a bad thing, with them only being able to fail on a nat 1, but its intentionally a way of mitigating the effects of bad streaks.

In contrast, PF2 practically mandates rolling 2d10 instead of 1d20 due to the increased crit and fail ranges making streaks deadly.


Not rolling that d20 to smack something, would definitely be a time where I am unsure if I feel like I am DMing/playing D&D/PF.

This has nothing to do with Maths, or Logic, or Balance, or Gameplay, or what-have-you, just what it is.


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I understand the new philosophy but the more exposure I have to it the more negatives I see.

As a player I don't really care for low level pathfinder. You miss a lot. You get hit a lot and you fail at skills a lot. Once my character gets to around 5 or so I'm generally successful in areas I wish to be good at and by level 10 I rarely fail.

We have not test played 2e at higher levels yet but it looks like 2e will always play like low level 1E. The good news is that high level play (15+) will actually be feasible but I'm not sure I'd want to play it.

I like making builds that involve hunting lots of bonus to get really good at something and unless something changes drastically with 2E I don't see that happening.


Azih wrote:
so the seemingly small spread of 6 between Untrained and Legendary shouldn't be seen through the lens of 1e where a 6 point spread isn't very impressive.

So for you, it's important that there is a big difference between Untrained and Legendary and that is preserved for you by subscribing to the theory that 1 point in 2e is equal to 2 points in 1e?

Quote:
and the points do allow a new way to crit in 2e that 1e lacks.

Conversely, 2e lacks the crit options of 1e.

Quote:
There's way too many variables to compare them directly to each other but I like both of those aspects of the 2e design.

So would it be accurate to say that you're really focusing on the seemingly higher crit rate that a +1 in P2 gives you versus P1? (expressed by the notion you get more for +1's in 2e)

From my playtest experience, the crit rate feels higher in 2e. But I'd say it's far, far, far higher for monsters than it is for PCs.


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N N 959 wrote:
Azih wrote:
so the seemingly small spread of 6 between Untrained and Legendary shouldn't be seen through the lens of 1e where a 6 point spread isn't very impressive.
So for you, it's important that there is a big difference between Untrained and Legendary and that is preserved for you by subscribing to the theory that 1 point in 2e is equal to 2 points in 1e?

It's not that important to me honestly, but I think 2e points are definitely more valuable than 1e and that should factor into analyzing the 6 point spread between Untrained and Legendary.

I've already backed away from the assertion that they 2e points are '2x' more valuable than 1e points as now I think there's too many basic differences between the game to come to an exact numerical quantification.

Just the fact that points are rarer in 2e and they stack far less than in 1e is enough to make them more precious in my eyes. And that's a good thing for me.

Further the differentiation between the proficiency levels goes beyond the +6 point spread. The different training levels gate additional abilities and feats and that's important too in analyzing them.

Quote:
So would it be accurate to say that you're really focusing on the seemingly higher crit rate that a +1 in P2 gives you versus P1? (expressed by the notion you get more for +1's in 2e)

No, there's entire crit fisher builds in 1e that won't even exist in 2e because of the lack of crit ranges and keen and whatever, and that's a bit sad as that's a fun thing to do in 1e (Falchions, Kukris, and Scimitars take a bow!).

The +10 crit is just a really fun aspect of 2e that ties into a part of the value that 2e points have.

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