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Yeah I don't actually find it simpler in play, either. It doesn't help that "conditional" and "circumstance" both start with C, making them look similar.
With the number of things giving bonuses of only two types, it starts getting difficult to track of where you got a given bonus from, which things are still there but not in effect (because they might come into effect if the biggest one goes away), and such.
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I like the idea of the simplification of bonus types but I don't think it was done perfectly.
I think Item bonus is great. It is generally clear what things give an item bonus and you can more easily guess if things will stack.
The problem with Circumstance and Conditional Is that they sound too similar and it is not immediately obvious what the difference is.
If they had some other split like Spell and Ability bonus or Supernatural and Mundane bonus or something like that it would help.
Someone else suggested they should be called "stacking modifier" and "non-stacking modifier". While not very imaginative, that does make it really obvious which ones stack and which ones don't. Since they're also opposites of each other, they're easier to not mix up.
"Item" is a good one, I agree. It's got a clear meaning and you know what can grant it.
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I think something so core to a class as Inspire or Rage should be typeless, so you don't run into "oh, this huge swath of content sounds perfect for a Barbarian, but doesn't stack with them", and "bards shouldn't use buff spells, it doesn't stack with bard-stuff".
If they had some other split like Spell and Ability bonus or Supernatural and Mundane bonus or something like that it would help.That still wouldn't solve the problem. It'd solve the issue of Circumstance and Conditional sounding like synonyms, but you'd still only have two bonus types.
The problem is that when you have too few types, everything conflicts with each other, so you have to know things like "These are the bonuses I get from raging. These are the bonuses I get from inspire courage. And they don't stack, so these are the bonuses I get when both are active."
I disagree. I think having fewer bonus types that don't stack is a good thing. Having a bunch of little +1s froom different sources stack up was a problem in PF1 primarily because it overly rewarded system mastery.
I think having fewer bonus types that don't stack is a good thing. Having a bunch of little +1s froom different sources stack up was a problem in PF1 primarily because it overly rewarded system mastery.To an extent, sure. But to me, at least, saying things like "You only get the +1/+2/+3 from inspire courage to attack rolls and saves against fear, because your bonus to damage from rage is higher" seems counterintuitive, especially since you do suddenly get that bonus to damage as soon as you stop raging.
I agree it is counterintuitive that those don't stack. I just think that overall the problem of having too many little bonuses that do stack is a more important problem.
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I disagree. I think having fewer bonus types that don't stack is a good thing. Having a bunch of little +1s froom different sources stack up was a problem in PF1 primarily because it overly rewarded system mastery.
The flipside is that I couldn't cast most of my buffs as a Cleric because the Bard in the party was putting up similar, non stacking bonuses.
That's not "system mastery", that's basic class function not playing nice together.
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I think the biggest problem of this issue is that they're pushing for a lot of teamwork and toning down hyper-specialization... But at the same time, they completely removed any ability of the players to take abilities that could enhance each other and reward players that went for supportive abilities, buffs, etc.
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How about this:
Circumstance -> Incident
Conditional -> Status
Getting at least untyped back could be good.
Even adding back up to 3 bonus types, I think the multiple stacking little bonuses would be manageable. Stacking bonuses from multiple party members is the simplest way to express teamwork.
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How about this:
Circumstance -> Incident
Conditional -> StatusGetting at least untyped back could be good.
Even adding back up to 3 bonus types, I think the multiple stacking little bonuses would be manageable. Stacking bonuses from multiple party members is the simplest way to express teamwork.
Yeah, 1 more "untyped" one and renaming some of the others could already make a big difference. The untyped ones would stack with anything, but be extremely rare and/or have limitations, like "Rage" or Aid Another.
How some things don't stack currently kinda hurts. Aid another won't stack with any buff for example, when it would logically make sense to.
Maybe it is that magical buffs don't make sense as "Circumstance" or "Conditial" bonuses which are mostly mundane. If anything, they are thematically more like those alchemical Item bonuses (which probably should be something else because dont stack with your equipment and can lead to disappointing scenarios). So some things may need to be shuffled around a bit. Maybe a "Supernatural" category for both of these.
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My favorite solution is to make bonus types match what they come from. We already have item bonuses that come from items, so why not spell bonuses that come from spells, feat bonuses that come from feats, class features can be class bonuses.
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I guess trying to find a set of bonuses where there is a reasonable in fiction justification for why they don't stack would be ideal.
Item makes sense to me, you use the best tool for the job and you cannot use multiple tools at once effectively in general be it armor or actual tools or whatever.
Spells or Supernatural would make sense for a bonus from those types of effects as well as some magic items that don't provide item bonuses. It's not perfect but it makes some sense that when multiple magical effects try and affect the same thing you only get the best one. We are playing a bit of kalvin ball with how magic works anyways.
Maybe technique could work for a another category of mundane bonus. Like you can use your ancestral technique to get a +1 but later you get a class feat that gives you +2 you can only use one technique at a time or maybe it is assumed that any +1 technique tricks you may know are already part of the +2 technique. A lot of ancestry and class bonus abilities could be qualified as technique I think.
Basically I guess anything which would be a Mundane or Extraordinary ability in PF1 gives a technique bonus anything which would be a supernatural or spell-like ability in PF1 gives a spell/supernatural/magic bonus and anything which is item based where you are actually using the item to accomplish the task is item based. (so a magic sword has an item bonus and maybe boots of elven kind too but a mask of intimidation would have a spell bonus)
I do agree that untyped bonus which does stack is probably needed. Specifically for things that encourage teamwork like Aid and Assist.
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My favorite solution is to make bonus types match what they come from. We already have item bonuses that come from items, so why not spell bonuses that come from spells, feat bonuses that come from feats, class features can be class bonuses.
This is an elegant solution, I think. I agree with the OP in that it's frustrating that not a lot of things stack any more, and it makes it both easier and harder to keep track of. I also don't like how similar the words "conditional" and "circumstance" are.
My players built a debuffing team for Heroes of Undarin, using the Half-Elf Inspire Imitation feat, and creating a snowball effect with Athletics and Intimidate. They were pretty disappointed to find out that most conditions don't stack with each other.
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I agree, Conditional and Circumstance for Types are too conceptually overlapping since I'm inclined to consider them synonyms.
I'm almost inclined to suggest changing conditional to personal. I see how conditional seems kind of nice as many of the 'conditions' a person can have do impart 'conditional' penalties. However, the idea of circumstantial penalties and bonuses being so closely named (conditional and circumstance bonus/penalty) seems confusing.
Only thing I don't know if I like is if some object had to make some sort of a save, and it had a personal bonus/penalty it might seem like an odd wording for it.
Maybe instead it could be named an Effect bonus/penalty. Effect bonus/penalties can be caused by, Conditions imparted by any number of things happening to someone. They can be caused by being affected by a spell, or other abilities or auras, be they magical or non-magical.
Circumstance bonuses would be granted via individual instances of an event, generally tied to more specific criteria [you are fighting a giant/demon/goblin] for instance.
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I think the meat of the issue is that in the goal to tighten the math on the game, handing out stacking bonuses from multiple sources was counterproductive.
Most things in the game give at most a +3 bonus. The only exceptions are certain items and ability score modifiers. If you look at it this way, spells/powers fall right into that system as a single layer.
* Ability Score
* Proficiency
* Item (innate + quality/magic)
* Other Bonuses
When you realize that, it makes complete sense that these things conflict, because the goal here is reign in the amount you can stack bonuses to keep things in line with the current DC scaling.
Unfortunately, what this means is that players must choose very wisely what things they do and don't use, and often times they might be relegated to doing something their class isn't even meant to do because someone else in the party has made one of their primary class features useless (case in point demonstrated with Bard and Barbarian). It also has the added drawback of players thinking they can use things and then having to do a little homework to find they actually can't (whereas this wasn't super common in 1e outside of similar classes that shared toolsets, like Barbarian and the spell Rage for example). In 1e naming was typically good enough that you'd know something likely didn't stack.
So no players are punished for picking things sub-optimal (even if it fits their character) and if you want to be optimal your choices are reduced signficiantly (and thus the creativity of making a character). 2e has a lot of this, where choices often become requirements because even if something seems like a fun concept it just functionally cannot be combined with anything else. I think this is where a lot of people feel that despite the intent to open up the system to be more flexible it's really only surface deep.
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I agree, Conditional and Circumstance for Types are too conceptually overlapping since I'm inclined to consider them synonyms.Yes, like this revolutionary Expert and Master proficiency business.
Potentially others might get confused by those two, within the skill/quality scale steps. However, I would have to admit those two fall into the scale the way I would imagine them to and they don't start with the same letter.
Someone saying Extraordinary and Magical, would need to know that some Magic effects produce Circumstance bonuses, while others provide Conditional bonuses, so it would be hard to separate them in those two names without rewriting the chosen bonus, which I guess was done specifically to allow for a little bit of stacking, potentially throwing off some design balance on those spells.
Incident would certainly seem more temporary and specific, and Status more general. Doesn't give a a feeling screaming yes, but might be better than Conditional and Circumstance.
The Elder Scrolls Games have been using Expert -> Master for skills since at least Morrowind (2002). Also Skyrm (2011) and Diablo 3 (2012) use Expert -> Master in their difficulty ratings. So there is some precedent in the video game RPG world at least for Master being above Expert even if technically they are synonyms.
My favorite solution is to make bonus types match what they come from. We already have item bonuses that come from items, so why not spell bonuses that come from spells, feat bonuses that come from feats, class features can be class bonuses.
That's an awesome idea! It's clearly worded and easy to figure out which bonus goes where.
My favorite solution is to make bonus types match what they come from. We already have item bonuses that come from items, so why not spell bonuses that come from spells, feat bonuses that come from feats, class features can be class bonuses.This is an elegant solution, I think. I agree with the OP in that it's frustrating that not a lot of things stack any more, and it makes it both easier and harder to keep track of. I also don't like how similar the words "conditional" and "circumstance" are.
My players built a debuffing team for Heroes of Undarin, using the Half-Elf Inspire Imitation feat, and creating a snowball effect with Athletics and Intimidate. They were pretty disappointed to find out that most conditions don't stack with each other.
Yeah, conditional penalties are... weird. Like, different conditions SHOULD be stackable intuitively. Making Frightened 1 not stack with Enervated 1 not only makes it harder to make debuffers and utilize teamwork, it also lessens the sting when conditions last past the end of a combat on a PC. While I can see why players might not enjoy having their stats dumped into the toilet, conditions are one of the only ways to make combats have lasting consequences if hit points get healed to full after every fight.