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I have been jazzed to dig into update 1.3 since the twitch preview, and I was not disappointed. Combined with the upcoming changes to resonance, my list of things to be house ruled has been reset. Here's what I love:
Treat Wounds - Spend 10 minutes to heal the party with natural techniques.
* Not only is this a great mechanic, Paizo scores double points with a throwback to my Basic set days of 1980 where all combats took 1 Turn, and a Turn equaled 10 minutes. Why? Because it was assumed you cleaned up, looted, tightened the straps on your armor, sharpened dings in your blade, and patched up your wounds. How long would all that take? Eh, let's call it a Turn (10 minutes) and move on. Even back then I wished there was some way to translate that mechanic into some restored hit points. Now we have it! Natural healing techniques have been a successful mechanic of games for decades. It's great to finally have one in PF2. Actual problem solved.
Identification and Repair - Another shortening to 10 minutes.
* Much better, a fine tuning in the right direction towards fun. Activity times of 1 hour were the equivalent of saying, you can't do this in a dungeon. 10 minutes (the ancient Turn) is a great activity duration that says, "No, you can't do this in battle or on the move, but if you do take a moment to rest, it's fine, and it won't take too long."
Ranger Feats - Fun improvements to archery and two weapon fighting that elevate the ranger in their chosen style.
* Hunt Target works as before but adds in free Recall Knowledge about your target if you have the Monster Hunting feat. Hunt target needed work for it to be a tactical benefit for the cost of an action (unless you can do it in the moment before you ambush someone, so it's free). Personally I'm not sure the Monster Hunting feat is tempting enough to spend a feat just to get some info, but the feats below make Hunt Target clearly worth using.
* Hunted Shot - 1/round on a Hunted Target you can spend a mere single action to fire two arrows (normal multi-attack penalties) and combine damage on a hit? Wow, yes! This is a differentiator for the class. The ranger can truly excel here. Increased action economy and versatility once a target is Hunted.
* Twin Takedown - The same rules as Hunted Shot but able to work for two weapon fighting. Again, increased action economy differentiating the ranger as a lethal two weapon fighter against their Hunted targets.
Rogue's Technique - Three distinct combat styles for rogues offer cool and fun options so rogues aren't all finesse fighter carbon copies.
* Finesse Striker - The old dex to damage trick for those who like using agility and accuracy to inflict extra damage.
* Brute Attack - Really digging the idea of the bruiser who beats you down with a club. Not all Muscle have to be fighters. Nice!
* Scoundrel's Feint - Another cool style option to integrate Feint into your sneak attack style that truly rounds out the choices available to the rogue.
Dying - Gain the dying condition, get healed back to consciousness, and now you have the Wounded condition. This is cool. It has verisimilitude. It feels realistic and affects your decisions after being grievously wounded enough to almost die. This is a rare change that adds in roleplaying opportunities to combat! I was a fan of the "die at negative hp = to con," but this is a cool improvement to dying. It's not just up and down and back up again anymore which was ridiculous.
Shield Blocking and Dents - A Shield Block is no longer capable of giving your shield more than 1 dent and will not cause your shield to break.
* Yes! Now, I can't say this is a "good" change, because the old rules were obviously broken not only in realism but in the name of fun. Breaking your shield after a single, average damage hit or within a round or two was not a fun concept for a character built around using shields. This is especially so considering how fun the options for using shields are in PF2. They have lots of cool tactical options. This is, however, an awesome and much needed correction.
More Archetypes - Yay! We knew they were coming, but I was pleasantly surprised to receive them during the playtest! I love the archetype system of multi-classing, so getting to see so many new options is fun! Archetyping is a cool system to allow you to expand your abilities without impinging on your main class' ability progression by sacrificing class feats instead of levels. This is a big leap forward for fun in multi-classing.
Early critics claiming Paizo was not listening, not handling the playtest well, and losing players should take comfort from Update 1.3 and take a second look. Not only are the rules being improved, more options are being released already.
A mention to the upcoming Resonance revamp. After two read-throughs of the rules on Resonance, I put it on my list of rules to House Rule away. With it now looking like a slot replacement system instead of an overall consumption limiter, I'm planning to use it. Another move in the right direction.
Thanks, and keep up the good work!
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I'm very happy about 1.3. Makes me even more excited to get my playtest converted Dragon's Demand game on the go.
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Yes, 1.3 looks like a step in the right direction so far. There is still work to be done to make it a good system, but the update indicates it is heading there
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Yeah, I like the changes on paper. I'll see how it turns out in play on Saturday.
I have a complaint though: If you change a system more than once, eliminate the previous changes and only keep the most relevant ones.
In the Update document is the new death/dying system and parts of the 1.1 death/dying system with 'gain slowed'. There are two mentionings of skill points being changed: a player with an alchemist noticed that he gains either 3+Int Skill points or 4+Int+crafting.
I know that these Updates come out very fast compared to the usual publishing cycle, I know and get why the Playtest Rulebook isn't updated directly.
Still, there is improvement of the system and improvement with the updates: the way 1.3 marks new items in the list is wonderful!