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I’ve been semi-active on the forums since the playtest dropped it’s been several weeks since the playtest started and I just wanted to share my overall thoughts in a hopefully non rant format and simply state my thoughts, I REPEAT THEY’RE MY THOUGHTS, if you disagree with anything in this post it’s not a slight against anyone just how I feel.
1)Character creation: Lets start with the good, the new character generation makes it so you can for the most part have the numbers you want it’s a touch counter intuitive to PF1 players but not a hard sell, backgrounds are ok but lack depth, ancestries are unfortunatey rather shallow deciding starting health and move speed with not much else.
2)Martial Classes: This is honestly a mixed bag on the one hand I think the fighter having the highest to hit bonus with weapons and being the most flexible in combat is fine the martials are a real mixed bag, for starters the Ranger is a mess with hunt Target just being painfully mediocre they also lost double slice after the last errata and got two knew feats, so they failed to understand that hunt target is bad and got rid of a perfectly good feat and replaced it with 2 new feats that only work with hunt target, additionally snares are a cool concept but are very hard to use effectively and just don’t really seem to be worth the hassle, moving from the ranger we reach the Paladin who unfortunately is still alignment locked in the playtest, they also have their code and deities edicts unfortunately this results in the same problem of them not meshing with so many adventure groups, however despite me not liking them in 1st edition due to their strict code they at least had power as a trade off, the paladin is more of a defender in the playtest which would be fine if it weren’t for the fact that a lot of their feats are mediocre and their role as defenders is undermined by the simple fact that breaking shields and running past the frontline has never been easier, right now the paladin seems to be suffering an identity crisis it doesn’t know what it wants, the monk has honestly had little exposure at my table but I’m happy they can as of the latest errata use more than just fists, finally the barbarian my playgroup always found the 1st edition barb to be a little too good so we typically avoided it unless we wanted to min max, however in the playtest we ran into the opposite problem, barbarians retain their poor ac while raging but lose a large chunk of the damage and extra to hit they used to have, this has left them feeling like an aggressive frontline who doesn’t have the power to back up their own hype, that being said the totems are interesting and give a nice touch of flavor.
3)Specialist classes the Rogue and Alchemist: Hoo boy not gonna lie I was excited for the Alchemist but after reading resonance rules my interest quickly died they have since lessened the amount of resonance they use however the class itself still feels weak when compared to other utility options like the bard or cleric, moving on to my favourite class the rogue I can honestly say I’m not impressed, the once unparalleled skill monkeys of first edition are a pale shadow of their former selves with monsters and npcs often being just as good as they are sometimes even better, unfortunately it doesn’t get better the rogue has always gained the majority of their damage from sneak attack in pathfinder however many creatures had immunity to this type of damage, unfortunately the playtest didn’t change this for most of the monsters and also reduced the damage making it even less appealing to put yourself in harms way, while rogues have easily the most mobility it’s made into a bittersweet affair when you realise your damage output is even less than it was in first edition.
4)The casters: let me be clear I have never been a fan of how casters overshadowed marshals at high levels, however I’d always hoped martials would receive improvements however it appears paizo decided the best fix was to instead gut casters and punish them rather than improve martials, with the exception of the Cleric I dunno what’s going on at paizo but someone loves clerics, they’re pretty much a mandatory choice if you want to have a longer adventuring day, while sorcerers and druids gain healing and buffs as well the cleric does it better and does it more, unfortunately this makes them easily the best caster class since damage spells were unfortunately rendered pale imitations of their former selves, I haven’t seen the bard in action but have been told they’re ok, the sorcerer and Wizard need help I honestly never thought I’d see the day where I’d be more scared of an enemy with a dagger than fireball.
5) Resonance) If you want to keep it in let it be a measure of how much magic GEAR you can own, don’t make magic itrms and consumables use resonance I already paid gold or crafted the items it’s ridiculous that I have to use another resource to make my MAGIC items work, pathfinder has always been a high fantasy game it’s part of why I love it but the playtest has constantly reinforced the idea that magic and magic items aren’t allowed to be fun, it also feels like half the problems paizo talks about with things like cure light wands and such aren’t really problems, it’s a FANTASY game why wouldn’t I heal with magic if magic healing is unrealistic you may as well take out everything that isn’t human or that doesn’t exist in the real world.
6) Magic gear) The new sytem has given everything an item level this is a little hit and miss on the ond hand the GM slways knows how strong you SHOULD be, however on the otherhand it feels very video gamey like when you find an axe and the game says you don't have enough strength to wield it, a lot of items require that you invest resonance in them each day just so they function and then ask for more resonance to use their special abilities, again the game seems to be telling us that this is not a high fantasy game and that if you came expecting one it won’t be found here.
7) Proficiencies and skills: Honestly skills are a joke in the playtest you are always competing with NPC’s and creatures who typically have better numbers than you making things like stealh more trouble than they’re worth, the errata has since made untrained skills worse but specialists still gain little and often feel on par with NPC’s at best and flat out inferior the rest of the time, I get they want you to always have a chance of failing but it honestly just feels like your characters are side characters in someone else’s show.
8) Monsters: are honestly ridiculous half the fun things that were taken off of players are still readily available to monsters making them tactically better but they also have superior numbers on average leading to slogs with players doing nothing while the monster of the week tears into the party with little resistance, in short monster felt like they were designed with the soul intention of giving GM’s the ability to bully their players easily.
My final thoughts on the system are that the new action system is nice, it’s also nice that barbarians were given more flavor, sorcerers having different spells based on bloodline was a very nice choice too, however with these great diamonds in the rough we had to dig through a lot of mud, I honestly hope second edition turns out well but in it’s current state I doubt myself and the rest of my group will ever recognise the new game as pathfinder but instead see it as a pale imitation trying to garner popularity from its predecessors name to gain easy attention, this doesn’t feel like it was made for pathfinder fans but rather for people who dislike pathfinder, I truly hope the data paizo recieves is listened to and it turns out great but those have just been my thoughts overall, if you like the new system it’s perfectly OK power to you and thank you for taking the time to tespond in these forums I don’t always agree with everyone but the variety of opinions and different views makes for a good read please comment your own thoughts.
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Didn't read it all but had to comment on your Rogue opinion. Are you comparing it to unchained rogue in 1e? Because the Rogue in the playtest absolutely destroys the core rogue in pf1e. It's not even close.
Dex to damage, Access to skill increases every level. They even gave them Debilitating Strike. Just a straight upgrade. They also have some of the best class feats in the game like nimble dodge, and dread striker.
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Didn't read it all but had to comment on your Rogue opinion. Are you comparing it to unchained rogue in 1e? Because the Rogue in the playtest absolutely destroys the core rogue in pf1e. It's not even close.
Dex to damage, Access to skill increases every level. They even gave them Debilitating Strike. Just a straight upgrade. They also have some of the best class feats in the game like nimble dodge, and dread striker.
I used an unchained rogue last time, however my biggest gripe with them is skills I didn’t play a rogue to be ok at skills I chose them to be AWESOME at skills, I agree that dread striker is really good but found nimble dodge to be a wasted feat with how high monsters to hit bonuses become, I also don’t see why they reduced sneak attack damage but left a lot of creatures with immunity to it, people can beat the ‘realism’ horse all day I don’t buy it, in a world where people can gain flight by being angry realism is a pretty poor argument.
I used an unchained rogue last time, however my biggest gripe with them is skills I didn’t play a rogue to be ok at skills I chose them to be AWESOME at skills, I agree that dread striker is really good but found nimble dodge to be a wasted feat with how high monsters to hit bonuses become, I also don’t see why they reduced sneak attack damage but left a lot of creatures with immunity to it, people can beat the ‘realism’ horse all day I don’t buy it, in a world where people can gain flight by being angry realism is a pretty poor argument.Didn't read it all but had to comment on your Rogue opinion. Are you comparing it to unchained rogue in 1e? Because the Rogue in the playtest absolutely destroys the core rogue in pf1e. It's not even close.
Dex to damage, Access to skill increases every level. They even gave them Debilitating Strike. Just a straight upgrade. They also have some of the best class feats in the game like nimble dodge, and dread striker.
As a retort to the sneak attack damage argument, they also made it so that you can double sneak attack damage on a crit. They also made weapon damage in general much higher and much easier to achieve with the new potency runes.
As a retort to the sneak attack damage argument, they also made it so that you can double sneak attack damage on a crit.That's a tad too swingy/spikey for my tastes; 5th Ed does the same thing (and smite, etc), to my chagrin.
Agreed especially when you look at monster AC, rogues are rarely going to beat a creatures ac by 10 so getting comparable sneak attack to the old rogue on crits alone with dex to damage which I had in first addition is not exactly thrilling to me personally.
Afain though the danage is more of a secondary concern I’m honestly more bothered by the fact that skills the main thing for rogues just feel weak.
As a retort to the sneak attack damage argument, they also made it so that you can double sneak attack damage on a crit. They also made weapon damage in general much higher and much easier to achieve with the new potency runes.I used an unchained rogue last time, however my biggest gripe with them is skills I didn’t play a rogue to be ok at skills I chose them to be AWESOME at skills, I agree that dread striker is really good but found nimble dodge to be a wasted feat with how high monsters to hit bonuses become, I also don’t see why they reduced sneak attack damage but left a lot of creatures with immunity to it, people can beat the ‘realism’ horse all day I don’t buy it, in a world where people can gain flight by being angry realism is a pretty poor argument.Didn't read it all but had to comment on your Rogue opinion. Are you comparing it to unchained rogue in 1e? Because the Rogue in the playtest absolutely destroys the core rogue in pf1e. It's not even close.
Dex to damage, Access to skill increases every level. They even gave them Debilitating Strike. Just a straight upgrade. They also have some of the best class feats in the game like nimble dodge, and dread striker.
Potency runes aren’t really an argument since everyone can get them, a +2 potency greatsword is still better than a rapier of the same potency, the playtest book advertises the rogue as a burst damage dealer, but when used in practice it rarely lived up to the hype, the rogue was one of the weaker classes in first edition and half the problems they had before are still there, it worries me that it’s going to be a repeat of first edition where I wait for a Slayer to be released
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De-tuning the monsters a bit would solve a lot of problems, IMHO.
I"ll note that my bard in Doomsday Dawn part 2 casts Inspire Courage and smacks creatures with a 2-handed bastard sword (and wears full plate). Fighter Dedication FTW (admittedly, multi-classing may be too good).
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I also have a huge problem with how monsters were created better in every way than the PCs. It's pretty f*cked up when a mook Goblin scavenger has a higher to hit bonus than a max-stat heroic Fighter. The entire Monster Manual needs a complete overhaul to be more in-line with actual game mechanics.
I also have a huge problem with how monsters were created better in every way than the PCs. It's pretty f*cked up when a mook Goblin scavenger has a higher to hit bonus than a max-stat heroic Fighter. The entire Monster Manual needs a complete overhaul to be more in-line with actual game mechanics.
Monsters got higher to hit and lower AC, it seems to be the way to balance in the playtest.
I appreciate all the coments I’ve gotten on this post last post I made like this received a lot of heat but the arguments on this one have been nice and constructive and I agree with the sentiments about monsters needing a severe overhaul or a toning down at least
De-tuning the monsters a bit would solve a lot of problems, IMHO.
I"ll note that my bard in Doomsday Dawn part 2 casts Inspire Courage and smacks creatures with a 2-handed bastard sword (and wears full plate). Fighter Dedication FTW (admittedly, multi-classing may be too good).
Yep fighters are good no surprise that just about anything multi-class + fighter works. So far that has been the only way I have seen Bards be super good is they put a bunch into strength and take the fighter level 2 multi class feat. Which limits races to Goblin and Human and does make Inspire Courage worth it since now you are not sacrificing another fighter slot while simultaneously providing buffs for all the rest of the martial classes and cleric in your group, but the fact that this seems like the only good path for bards shows the inherent problem with the base bard in my opinion.
To be clear not saying this shouldn't be an option it definitely should, but it should also be perfectly acceptable to never cross class and get access to better skills or spell casting ability through bard feats.
Fighter dedication gives a lot even when compared to the other dedication feats
Fighter dedication gives a lot even when compared to the other dedication featsDe-tuning the monsters a bit would solve a lot of problems, IMHO.
I"ll note that my bard in Doomsday Dawn part 2 casts Inspire Courage and smacks creatures with a 2-handed bastard sword (and wears full plate). Fighter Dedication FTW (admittedly, multi-classing may be too good).
Yep fighters are good no surprise that just about anything multi-class + fighter works. So far that has been the only way I have seen Bards be super good is they put a bunch into strength and take the fighter level 2 multi class feat. Which limits races to Goblin and Human and does make Inspire Courage worth it since now you are not sacrificing another fighter slot while simultaneously providing buffs for all the rest of the martial classes and cleric in your group, but the fact that this seems like the only good path for bards shows the inherent problem with the base bard in my opinion.
To be clear not saying this shouldn't be an option it definitely should, but it should also be perfectly acceptable to never cross class and get access to better skills or spell casting ability through bard feats.
Post 1.3 or before 1.3, cause before 1.3 i would agree completely but now i juzt feel like paladin is the best archetype.
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I also have a huge problem with how monsters were created better in every way than the PCs. It's pretty f*cked up when a mook Goblin scavenger has a higher to hit bonus than a max-stat heroic Fighter. The entire Monster Manual needs a complete overhaul to be more in-line with actual game mechanics.
Same thing happened in Starfinder. This is a feature and not a bug. Remember: Monsters and NPCs are created completely arbitrarily compared with PCs. I wouldn't hold my breath on this getting changed.
I also have a huge problem with how monsters were created better in every way than the PCs. It's pretty f*cked up when a mook Goblin scavenger has a higher to hit bonus than a max-stat heroic Fighter. The entire Monster Manual needs a complete overhaul to be more in-line with actual game mechanics.Monsters got higher to hit and lower AC, it seems to be the way to balance in the playtest.
Since HPs are turned up to 11, higher hit chance is prefered.
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If the monsters have lower AC, then the PCs get a higher hit chance.
But players notice the actual to-hit number more than the abstracted-by-simple-layer-of-calculation 'hit chance'. If you want something the same as the current math that feels good, lower player's AC by 2 (start at 8, not 10) and monster's to-hit by 2. Same final result, and goblins don't feel more effective than players.