Combat Reflexes and the resulting ability to take lots of AoOs without iterative attack penalties, especially when combined with reach-stacking shenanigans.
I am very glad to see the 1 reaction cap in Starfinder and no combat reflexes equivalent in sight.
To be fair, it's based on DEX bonus, so if you want a ridiculous amount of AoO's you need big DEX. What's really crazy is Fortuitous weapon. I think multiple AoO's has a place, but perhaps with a cap. And maybe let characters break the cap through dual-wielding or other multiple-weapon situations. Fortuitous should have been a property that allowed a second AoO with a weapon that didn't make the first AoO.
Players.
Play CRPG's, problem solved. ;)
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I've never liked the static AC system. It feels like just standing there waiting to see if I get hit. I would much rather have opposed Attack vs. Defense rolls or something of the like that feels more like I am actively trying to defend myself.
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Another thing. I don't like how many item creation feats there are. Too many.
In DND, your average character wouldn't be able to get enough feats to nab them all. In Pathfinder, it will take up most of your feats.
What do you get when you select one such feat? The ability to make items of the type selected at a rate 1000 gp per day. If you get multiple item creation feats, it only adds items you can craft. It in no way improves your ability to craft items quickly or cheaply.
Money and time are factors that limit what you can do with item creation. Selecting multiple item creation does not give you more of either.
Magic item creation (through feats) is also completely disassociated from mundane item creation (through skills).
Looking at the skills chapter, you might think you want ranks in Craft (Alchemy) to make healing potions. Instead, it turns out you need no such ranks, but the ability to cast healing spells and the brew Potion feat. This often turns Craft skills into a trap for players new to the system.
Another thing.
I dislike the spell "Transformation". Its name gives little context. It should be renamed to something like "Martial Transformation". That way, it tells you it some combat-ish spell, not another polymorph spell.
I think that’s a srd thing. Can’t remember the original name but it was more flavorful.
Alignment.
Absurdly scaling prices for magic items. Related, the magic items which give straight combat number bonuses, especially if they give nothing else.
Sorcerers (and Oracles) being behind Wizards in new spells because Skip Williams irrationally hated them (something he has admitted) and how PF never bothered fixing it
Did he actually say this, or is this one of those things that everybody passes around but has never seen themselves? I've seen the "Skip William hates sorcerers" and "Skip Williams says the sorcerer isn't a proper spellcasting class" (which doesn't necessarily mean he hates them) mentioned a lot, but I've never seen a legitimate source for it. He wasn't even the sole designer for the 3rd edition PHB.
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Wizards getting their spells a level early wouldn’t be so bad if there weren’t so many ways to get bonus spells. In pathfinder, you get the bonus from a high ability score, but wizards can also get the bonus spell from specializing and the bonus spell from having a bonded item. With all of those bonus spells, the sorcerer doesn’t even get more spells per day of the next level when they catch up to the wizard.
The cleric/oracle feels a lot better with this, because the only class specific bonus spells the cleric gets are from domains and those spell lists tend to be very situational. And then the oracle gets much better class features than the sorcerer.
I agree with a fair number of things. One that hasn't been mentioned:
The d20.
I don't like it.
I agree with a fair number of things. One that hasn't been mentioned:
The d20.
I don't like it.
Really? With Take 10 and Take 20 being an option, I rather like the d20 as a basis for a system. Without those, it would be problematic but that is because of the absurd rules for things like perception where by Raw you can't see the moon because of the perception penalty.
A lot of people don't like the swingy nature of d20. They are people that would probably prefer to pay GURPS or Apocalypse.
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Really? With Take 10 and Take 20 being an option, I rather like the d20 as a basis for a system. Without those, it would be problematic but that is because of the absurd rules for things like perception where by Raw you can't see the moon because of the perception penalty.
2d10, 3d6 or even 3d10 would make for more 'average' rolls and allow for more critical hits and misses (without 'confirmation rolls) than 1d20 (which can't allow less than 5% chance of a specific result), but that ship has long passed.
d20 based systems have mostly kludged around it with confirmation rolls for critical hits and no critical failures at all, so it's just a legacy / artefact at this point, like the appendix or the vomeronasal organ.
That said, using 2d10 instead of 1d20 is not an uncommon house rule in Mutants and Masterminds (normally a d20 based system).
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I don't want to play a system where there are "average" rolls. It's why I dont like 5e's (dis)advantage system. There is just something about the finality of rolling a single die.
I don't want to play a system where there are "average" rolls. It's why I dont like 5e's (dis)advantage system. There is just something about the finality of rolling a single die.
You are playing a game with "average" rolls. d20 systems all have a flat distribution system.
For me though, nothing else in existence (except for man-made systems with strict limits, such as an icosahedron with an integer on each plane) has a flat distribution. Everything is either on a bell curve, Zipf's law, or some other uneven distribution.
Lastly, in any small sample set (like say the number of attack rolls a character makes at a given level... yes, 50-60, or even 100 attacks can feel like a lot, but statistically, it's a small sample set), small bonuses can often be irrelevant. Completely irrelevant.
PF2 does remedy this some with their increasing critical range, but it's still reliant on the d20.
Give me a naturally occurring curve over a flat line any day. Curves are sexy.
I'm fine with the d20 much of the time... except for Initiative rolls. I feel that Dex and Improved Initiative ought to make a bigger difference.
Curves are sexy.
1. Weight/Carrying Capacity - Adds a ton of needless tracking, and for most characters it doesn't even matter once you get a Bag of Holding or some other extradimensional storage space.
2. Full Attacks - Nothing is more boring in combat than "I stand still and attack a bunch." Actually, martial combat in general is pretty uninteresting IMO. Spheres of Might does a good job expanding that system.
3. Social skills - There really needs to be a better system than "Roll a skill check once to see if the NPC does what you want / likes you more." It needs to be something that doesn't require RP to accommodate different players, but it definitely needs more depth.
4. Armor Check Penalties - Even if STR-based characters do invest in Climb, Swim, or Athletics (for PF2) they'll still have a poor bonus if they're wearing Medium or Heavy armor (which they often require to offset lower DEX). Meanwhile DEX-based characters can afford to wear lighter armor and have lower penalties on their skills. This is especially an issue in PF2 where taking even a -3 is a severe penalty.
I have a ton of nitpicks, but those are the issues I reeeally dislike.
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The distinction between ability scores and ability modifiers. It just adds a level of complication to new players that I think could quite easily be removed.
Once upon a time, there was THAC0....
I don't want to play a system where there are "average" rolls. It's why I dont like 5e's (dis)advantage system. There is just something about the finality of rolling a single die.You are playing a game with "average" rolls. d20 systems all have a flat distribution system.Technically, a d20 does have an everage like any other distribution, but there is no way to actually roll it (since the average is 10.5 and there is no 10.5 on the die).
_
glass.
If you're going to say "Technically" you best have your facts straight.
The number you are describing is the mean of all possible results. it is neither the median, nor the mode.
What is the mode of all possible results? (hint: it's a flat distribution)
In other words, the problem with 1d20 - as opposed to rolling multiple dice and adding the results - is the standard deviation.
Well, the standard deviation is the square root of the variance, which is the total expected range that results can be different from their average value. So, if we take the mean average of 10.5, the difference +/- is 9.5, which is the variance. Then that gives us a standard deviation of 3.08. If we use the median average (10, 11), the variance is 9, which is a standard deviation of 3.
The standard deviation is not the issue I have.
I could be wrong on those specific elements of statistics, we're pretty much at the extent of my statistics expertise.
No, it's the flat line of the graph of the results that I don't like. There are deeper consequences to this flat plane, but their all the result of the flat plane.
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The variance of ndX is n(X^2-1)/12. So for 1d20 that's 33.25, and sd = 5.766.
For 3d6 it's 8.75, and sd = 2.958
The consequences of the flat plane, as compared to those of the curve, is just a matter of how the results are mapped to them. So while a 3d6 approximately-Gaussian distribution is arguably a better model for reality, that holds only if the results of that roll are correctly mapped. For example, if we consider that bonuses are typically orthogonal (because the same bonus type doesn't stack) and hence noncoherent, they should perhaps stack as the square root of the sum of squares (ie, a vector sum). So bonuses +3, +3 and +1 should perhaps add up to sqrt(9+9+1) = 4.4. Which is IMHO a better solution that the very limited bonuses available in PF2, though perhaps a bit cumbersome in play.
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Stop it! Stop that math right now!
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This gripe goes all the way back to when I first started playing in 1985. I never liked the static Armor Class or how it made you harder to hit rather than absorbing damage.
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I wish staves were viable.
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and seriously, they have far too few charges to be useful... gimme back the time when wands had 100 charges when full, and staves had 25.
Less a mechanic and more a design decision, but it always irked me that Pathfinder mundanes aren't allowed to do extraordinary things to compare to the supernatural things the casters are doing. Even 3.5 was better about that.
This gripe goes all the way back to when I first started playing in 1985. I never liked the static Armor Class or how it made you harder to hit rather than absorbing damage.
I guess the games which embraced armor-as-soak offended you in other ways then?
what's wrong with old school Rune Quest?
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I wish staves were viable.
Ooh, definitely. I grew up reading a lot of fantasy, and a wizard like Gandalf seemed to use their staff more like a force multiplier than a box of extra spells they can use a few times and then throw away. (I had a similar issue with Vancian magic, which was unlike anything I'd read about in Tolkien or the Witch World or similar fantasy series.)
Same with spears, as weapons. I understand that swords are the end-all, be-all of medieval melee weapon technology (with spears, axes, hammers and daggers being adapted tools serving as weapons), but making spears at least somewhat sexier shouldn't be *that* hard...
I'm aware of the irony that other systems, like GURPS, pretty much handle all of this. Armor as DR? Competitive spears usable one-handed? Non-Vancian magic? Staves that increase a wizards range (and can mount a magic stone that gives him more power to use)? 3d6 instead of 1d20? All there. But GURPS has it's own warts and this isn't the 'what game systems other than PF/D&D do you also like to kvetch about' thread. :)
well, for the staff as a force multiplier and whatnot, the game to play was Rolemaster... if you could actually stand playing at Tablemaster.
Adding to the "list of weapons I wish were different" is the quarterstaff.
Why doesn't it have reach? I've trained a bit using a quarterstaff and they 100% have reach over a sword. Sure you CAN hold them in the middle and go "bap, bap" with both ends. However, you can also hold it mostly near the end and that gives you considerable range.
and seriously, they have far too few charges to be useful... gimme back the time when wands had 100 charges when full, and staves had 25.
Only if wands and staves can no longer serve as cheap per charge utility items for spellcasters by allowing virtually any spell. Wands may have held a lot of charges in 1e, but there were relatively few applications available. 3e opened the door WAY too wide for wands and allowed spellcasters to make other classes and their niches feel useless.
My pet peeves as mechanics:
1) Too many ways to avoid hard, trade-off choices in stats, and this means there are too many means for players to focus all of their build around one or two stats. I'm a proponent of MORE multi-attribute dependency, not less.
2) Shifting tumbling to avoid AoO to the CMD mechanic. I've seen too many cases of a character good at acrobatics get hosed by the CMD of big/strong brutes. Being able to move around without provoking an AoO should require moderate investment, not monomaniacal focus.
3) The proliferation of too many fiddly bits. I may have liked shifting raging from times/day to rounds/day and the addition of rage powers, but Pandora's box really opened up as PF has developed and too many classes are bogged down in fiddly bit abilities that I, as GM, have trouble keeping up with. The brawler's Martial Flexibility particularly irritates me when it's probably no game-breaker to give them a more constant ability to do well with combat maneuvers.
The variance of ndX is n(X^2-1)/12. So for 1d20 that's 33.25, and sd = 5.766.
For 3d6 it's 8.75, and sd = 2.958
Thank you for sparing me the trouble of doing the math myself.
This gripe goes all the way back to when I first started playing in 1985. I never liked the static Armor Class or how it made you harder to hit rather than absorbing damage.I guess the games which embraced armor-as-soak offended you in other ways then?
No, not really.
The variance of ndX is n(X^2-1)/12. So for 1d20 that's 33.25, and sd = 5.766.
For 3d6 it's 8.75, and sd = 2.958The consequences of the flat plane, as compared to those of the curve, is just a matter of how the results are mapped to them. So while a 3d6 approximately-Gaussian distribution is arguably a better model for reality, that holds only if the results of that roll are correctly mapped. For example, if we consider that bonuses are typically orthogonal (because the same bonus type doesn't stack) and hence noncoherent, they should perhaps stack as the square root of the sum of squares (ie, a vector sum). So bonuses +3, +3 and +1 should perhaps add up to sqrt(9+9+1) = 4.4. Which is IMHO a better solution that the very limited bonuses available in PF2, though perhaps a bit cumbersome in play.
Figured I had that part wrong. Regardless, the "standard deviation" is not the problem I have with the d20.
I've tried mapping a better results matrix to the d20, but it never works as well, or has verisimilitude, to a model of realistic probability for me. The problem is always the flat plane.
If 10 numbers are success, and 10 numbers are failure, you could assign which numbers on the d20 were which randomly. Obviously, this would be cumbersome and annoying, but the statistical results would be the same. If the active agent gets a +1 to the roll, just randomly select one of the failure numbers to move into the success column. Statistically the results will bear out.
You can't do that with a 3d6 roll though. Adjusting a 3d6 model you would have to be cognizant of the relative value of each individual number. You would only assign numbers nonsequentially if you were trying to achieve a peevish level of granularity (ie, the smallest bonus would be adding the 3 or 18 from failure to success, while the largest bonus would move 10, 11, or whatever number was closest to them).
PbtA's 2d6+stat model works pretty well. Absolute success and failure occupy the outer thirds of the bell curve, while success with a cost/partial success occupies the middle third. I've played around with a similar method on the d20, and it just doesn't work out. The uniform distribution and relatively small sample size (it was a subsystem used for traveling long distances, so only got rolled about two dozen times in the course of our campaign) meant that large sections of the system never got interacted with.
My pet peeves as mechanics:
1) Too many ways to avoid hard, trade-off choices in stats, and this means there are too many means for players to focus all of their build around one or two stats. I'm a proponent of MORE multi-attribute dependency, not less.
2) Shifting tumbling to avoid AoO to the CMD mechanic. I've seen too many cases of a character good at acrobatics get hosed by the CMD of big/strong brutes. Being able to move around without provoking an AoO should require moderate investment, not monomaniacal focus.
3) The proliferation of too many fiddly bits. I may have liked shifting raging from times/day to rounds/day and the addition of rage powers, but Pandora's box really opened up as PF has developed and too many classes are bogged down in fiddly bit abilities that I, as GM, have trouble keeping up with. The brawler's Martial Flexibility particularly irritates me when it's probably no game-breaker to give them a more constant ability to do well with combat maneuvers.
Wands are cheap, staves are not
I think my least favorite game mechanic from D&D was level caps on non-human races. I mean why? If you expected a game to be long running you pretty much had to be a human or else you just stopped leveling after awhile.
As for pathfinder, the way spell resistance is implemented has always annoyed me. Some people like to equate it to AC but it's not the same as AC for a number of reasons. To start with unlike AC you don't get to add your casting stat to the roll, meaning that there are very limited ways to increase your ability to overcome SR. There are only a few feats that help with it and even if you take all of them you only get a marginal bonus. Even worse, it's not like you get multiple attempts at it per round. You get one roll and if you fail to beat the SR your spell just fizzles regardless if it was a cantrip or a 9th level spell. It also rarely seems to fall in a range where I have a 50% chance of bypassing it. Usually the SR is either so high or so low that I could ignore the fact it a creature has SR or the creature might as well just be immune to magic.
I have no problem with the idea that a creature might be resistant to magic or for there to be a mechanic in place that curtails the power of a spellcaster but this one feels very poorly implemented. Especially when you get limited spells per day.
I think my least favorite game mechanic from D&D was level caps on non-human races. I mean why? If you expected a game to be long running you pretty much had to be a human or else you just stopped leveling after awhile.
Oh heck, if we're going to start talking about past editions, that's going to open the floodgates. Like having to train every level. That was a time-wasting gold sink and it could lead to a boring mini-quest each time once you had to start finding a higher level person to train you. The weapons were not balanced at all in early editions; there were weapons that were never chosen since they were inferior in ever respect to a certain short list of weapons.
I was going to complain about certain class abilities that shouldn't have been limited to only a specific class, but that's similar to gripes pertaining to today's editions. (Nobody should have to spend a feat to know how to hit someone harder [power attack].)
I understand why the OSR games exist, but even they don't try to recreate every old school rule.
I have no problem with the idea that a creature might be resistant to magic or for there to be a mechanic in place that curtails the power of a spellcaster but this one feels very poorly implemented. Especially when you get limited spells per day. (emphasis mine)
This is a key reason I don't mind the way spell resistance works - it may make spell casters think twice about spending one of their daily resources and can/should be part of the balance between casters and non-casters.
Back in the 1e days, when a spell caster had very limited ways of increasing the difficulty of passing a save, save or die spells were something of a crap shoot. As levels rose and monsters got tougher, the chances of taking a monster out in one casting decreased because they got better at their saves. The 3e model which based the save DC on a factor the PC could exert some control over undermined this aspect of balancing the two types of character. The fact that a caster might get squeamish about blowing a spell and having it fail is a good thing.