Well, that was fun! I've never started a thread, joked that I was going to close it, but then had it closed for me...
...let me try a different tack.
Let's imagine you are one of the people that probably will not be changing to P2e. Now imagine that you still want to play at PFS tables. If Paizo won't be supporting PFS, perhaps this is an opportunity for changes to be implemented.
Are there any changes you'd like to make, either already part of the wider options (like item progression, automatic bonus progression, or even mythic), or your own ideas you'd like to add to P1e society play?
I'll start: I have really enjoyed using my own version of Swashbuckler hero point cards, where there is a geeky quote and a linked bonus. For example, "I am a leaf on the wind - watch how I soar." This card gives the player the ability to automatically take 20 on one physical skills check.
Each player gets 3 of these cards, each session. They could be played as a free action at any time, or handed in for a re-roll. I have 60 of these, laminated, with the backs decorated, a bit like playing cards. My present ones have parts of pictures from the Emerald Spire book, as that is what I've been running.
What would you add/change?
There are a number of things that I think could be incorporated into a PF1.5e. Here are a couple off the top of my head.
1) To address concerns about both high level characters being unable to do simple things such as not drown due to a shortage of skill points and the opposite problem of crazy high skill levels (someone mentioned a bard with +56 diplomacy), there could be a base for skills which don't require training and a cap to total skill modifiers for die rolls. Here I'm just making up numbers which would need to playtested. The base could be one quarter of level, so a level 20 character would always have a +5 for any skill which doesn't require training. The cap could be 10 or twice the character level, so the total skill modifier allowed for a 1-5th level character would be 10 and then it would be 12, 14, 16, ... as PCs level up.
2) The most important thing (and the reason that I support the general idea of a PF2e even if I dislike the current process and product) is a more disciplined and managed approach to the proliferation of classes, feats, and archetypes. To my mind, Paizo has released all sorts of material without clearly thinking through the way new material interacts with existing rules, particularly the options provided to players who carefully study everything and then produce what I would regard as game-breaking builds. The organized play team has made a valiant attempt to manage this will their additional resources and campaign clarifications, but even this effort has not been sufficient.
By a remarkable coincidence, just a couple of days ago I posted one of the ideas I have been toying with, here edited slightly to make it fit better into this thread:
I have been toying with an idea that goes part way but not all the way to Pathfinder Unchained Automatic Bonus Progression: Items that give Enhancement Bonuses (even if not doing anything else) would still exist, but Enhancement Bonuses would not qualify you for feats or extra skill ranks or for casting higher level spells, and would not give you extra spells per day (although they would still affect spell DC and the occasional other casting-stat-dependent spell effect, and still boost skill modifiers and Saving Throws and/or Hit Points when applicable). Then give somewhat higher point buy to compensate (20 point buy, since APs are balanced around 15 point buy), which would have the beneficial side effect of preferentially helping the more MAD builds. It would also have the beneficial side effect that if your Enhancement Bonus items are lost or disabled for more than 1 day, you wouldn't have to worry about suddenly losing feats, skill ranks, or spells (which itself has the beneficial side effect of somewhat simplifying bookkeeping). Another beneficial side effect: Caster-Martial Disparity would be somewhat lessened, since martials would still get most of the benefits they would get from Enhancement Bonus items according to Rules As Written, whereas casters would have to rely on their natural ability scores to do their casting.
Kirthfinder (not sure if this link still goes to the most up-to-date version) is a pretty good example of what somebody has already done in this department.
More later if people are still interested.
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You might want to look up Purple Duck Games on Patreon. It just so happens that they are in the early stages of working on a "Porphyra RPG", which is basically the same sort of update to Pathfinder 1st edition that Pathfinder 1st edition was to D&D 3.5. You might even be able to influence the development of this game, given that it is currently in a very incomplete state.
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^Other than your dislike of dipping, I'm with you. Now if you're saying you don't want people to need to dip so much, I could even be with you on that one as well.
Gah, radioactive waste! Burns! Stinks! Who do you suppose left all that radioactive waste down there? And why? Why? Now I'm radioactive! That can't be good! Why can't we find a way to safely dispose of radioactive waste and protect the environment? Even if I personally stop this alien invasion, what kind of planet will we be leaving to our children? And our children's children, and... oh the humanity! My big gun is out of bullets!
No more costs for mundane ammo. Have it be like component pouches, if you have the quiver, you have the arrows. Martials having to pay for every single arrow is part of one of the biggest problems they have in a DnD bean counting economy, namely that they get easily bogged down in cost and logistics while spellcasters only ever have to worry about a select few spells that are usually utilitarian enough that they can justify having the whole party pitch in. And while we're on the subject...
At this particular moment in time, I don't think I have a healthier or more deeply-felt respect for any other object in the universe than this here Shotgun. Hey, Chaingun! The hell with respect!
Anyone remember Weapons of Legacy from 3.5? Hell, anyone remember the Oriental Adventures version of the Samurai? Remember how they let you create your own Excalibur, Durandal, or Gram? Of course not, because both DnD and Pathfinder assume you'll be upgrading swords (of for Monks and Brawlers, their Amulets of Mighty Fists) like you were playing Final Fantasy and those alternatives assumed that you'll need to cough up the equivalent cash as if your we're so there was little point in jumping through WoL's hoops or digging up old 3.0 books. It has been said time and time again, but if a class is predicated on having a certain piece of equipment (i. e. the Wizard's spellbook or the Fighter's weapon) give them that piece of equipment! What's more, each item need not be special nor unique as you could have players who wanted their sword to matter could have their Joyeuse like Charlemange and people who didn't could have their parade of lost lightsabers like Anakin, but both would functionally be "You always have a weapon of X value, you can change its qualities and remove the Broken status between adventures" and fluff it different ways. Currently, the only examples of this I can think of that are both Pathfinder and 1st Party are the Wizard's spellbook and the Bladebound Magus's Black Blade, both of which are for classes that are distinctly capable of spellcasting.
Been meaning to get that off of my chest for a while and I didn't feel I had enough talking points for a whole thread.
I am all over this last point! In my recent Emerald Spire campaign, the PCs (totally my own fault) were much higher level than the recommended for each floor, and they also had mythic and weapons/items that grew with them.
That just meant I could have the fun of upskilling/uplevelling/mutating/mythicing/or just plain replacing all the encounters to make them a least a bit of a challenge! Lots of different methods and reasons for those 'more developed' combatants; different causes of mythicness, etc. However, I always made sure that I was sticking to the reasoning behind, or purpose for, the encounter.
If I had to change a few things to Pathfinder 1st edition :
- only 1 bonus type given from spells, to simplify combat tracking
- automatic bonus progression (from Unchained) to reduce the number of magic items
- the 3-action combat rules (like in 2nd edition), for faster combat
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^Other than your dislike of dipping, I'm with you. Now if you're saying you don't want people to need to dip so much, I could even be with you on that one as well.It's isn't the idea of multiclassing that puts me off, it's the idea that in-game someone would apprentice as a Wizard, then immediately as a Bloodrager, a Cleric, a Cavalier, and a Kineticist. It's absurd. You would hand me whatever written rationale for switching over so many times and I would only laugh my head off. A player is 1st level, out on the first story arc with the party. Half-way through, the player levels up to 2nd and is suddenly announcing, "Okay, I need to go back to town train as a Bloodrager." And there are no Bloodragers in town because it's so small, which of course means the player must send the character off to the nearest city where there is one, who will, of course, accept the 2nd level Wizard as a student...
I really don't see a need to do this. If someone wants a Wizard/Bloodrager? Fine. But they'll wait until they can find one.
{. . .}
I've actually thought of this. Have them start out as Bloodrager, but they're already carrying around (and have even paid for) a copy of Wizarding for Dummies . . . Of course, this is easier to explain for inherent/spontaneous classes, where stuff just happens.
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Remove any and all items whose only effects are casting X spell Y times per day. Every magic item should have a unique effects and the generalized ruleset for making generic items that replicate spells can be used if you must insist on including boring items in your games.
Substantially increase the power of fight-exclusive feats and combat feats in general. They are meant to be the main selling point of the fighter class, they should be of equal power to a whole new level of spellcasting. Feats that require 15th level monk or fighter should be as powerful as 8th level spells.
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As to multiclassing, I recall the joy of playing a fighter/thief in ADnD, melding the two classes, yes being slightly behind everyone else, but never being left behind and never feeling useless.
Virtual multiclassing in P1 doesn't really fly for me, the addition of stuff from the other class is so slow, it's painful!
The hybrid route is fantastic, in my experience...playing a slayer really brings back memories of the above. There perhaps could still be more options (mage/rogue, I'm trying to engineer right now), but I can look to the fanbase for that, if my DM allows it!
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Y'know, I don't think there is anything I actually change in PF1E. I'm sure there are some things I avoid unconsciously with my playstyle, but I don't really make any conscious changes beyond typical variables like point buy and treasure drops.
I love PF. I wouldn’t change much if any about version 1.0. I’m going to be checking on Purple Duck Games to see what they can do with trying to stay loyal to the 1.0 system. I’m not ready for 2.0 and the changes.
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#1 Multiclasing like that is one way to min max. Fix it, and minmaxer will find the next way. Spellcasting purists could find a level 20 sorcerer build that would make that guy look like a chump.
#2 every core rulebook and most other small races also have penalty to strength, so you have that to overcome too. Carrying capacity, reach, and CMD are negatively affected by being small. Dex to damage (a late in the development of the game event) is what really makes the smalls dangerous.
2a) Tell that to Amiri. 3d6 vs 2d6 may not seem like much to you, but add in vital strike, enlarge person, or any other method of stepping it up even further, and larger weapons are crazy damage multipliers. Add in monkey grip or whatever equivelant you can find, and the penalties are offset eazsily enough.
3) don't disagree per say, but the ability to be perfect in a skill you focus in should be rewarded instead of penalized. There are spells that do those things without much investment at all, and they're all low level spells, coming on board way before 12th level. In my experience, the only reasons wizards don't go around with those spells memorized or on scrolls id because the skill monkeys are capable of doing those things without tying up resources.
4) disagree
5) agree, but that's the nature of splatbooks. Things get through, the gm has to be able to say "sorry, but that breaks the game" to any number of different things. I once told a player "That's cool, but I don't think the rest of the players want to be your sidekicks, let's do something more enjoyable for everyone, roght?"
6) agree
7) agree
8) why the #$#$# would a giant or dragon- both of whom have reach get/stay within the fighter's arm's length when he is prone? They still get an aoo if he stands, no penalty to attack him, and are effectively immune to his ability to strike them at all from 10' away. Sometimes it makes sense to stay down, other times your opponents should be forcing a choice... get up & get attacked or stay down and play dead.
The one thing that has always bothered me the most is the disconnection between the different books in an adventure path. Often the books don t contribute to the whole plot, which is a pity.
^I'm sure somebody would complain, but still looks good to me.
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Alright I already switch a lots of things for my games so here comes the list:
- Automatic Bonus Progression
- Reduce Feat Taxe, Power Attack and the like are optional ways of attacking, not feats.
- Consumables stacks with characters and levels, like staffs. But they are more expensive and rarer.
- Change craft, make it simpler for non magical items, and harder for magical items. With pie ces that you have to hunt on monsters, and formulas that can be looted.
- No AoO for maneuvers. For more versatility in combat.
- Scaling cantrips. Because a Wizard should spam Ray of Frost, not crossbow.
- Rarer magical items, that increase as you level up and follow the story, with stronger bonuses and rules, not just increasing maths. Like really magical.
- More Hps at lower levels, and no resurrection unless unique event/story/loot/divine intervention later in the game. Death should be permanent in my opinion, but less frequent at low levels.
- Less skills, and stronger things to do with it. And less specific rules that sucks like unsheathe à weapons, or very specific rules entry like « on snow... », or « when stealthy and.... ». Give the man who has 15 ranks in climbing a climbing speed please. For example.
Yes I want a lots of things from 5E, but with the complexity and tactical superiority of Pathfinder. And the diversity in builds.
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the 2 big things are
Automatic bonus progression
3 act system with 1 swift action and ? free actions a turn.
A
Wands, 10 charges
Rods, 20 charges
Staves, 30 chargesB
I would make feats sort the same way as spells, with improved, greater, and so on after the feat name.
C
Fix old and stop new horribly named feats.
Spell Focus doesn't focus on a spell, it focuses on a school. If I want a feat that focuses on a spell, do I call it School Focus and just hope everyone understands? A feat that focuses on a school should be called School Focus, plain and simple.
Combat Expertise should have been called Extra Opportunities.
D
I'm not sure how this would be done, but any step toward stopping "dips" into various classes for features X, Y, and Z would be greatly appreciated. Players creating ClassA 1/ClassB 1/ClassC 1/ClassD 1, ClassE 1 is so completely ridiculous that it's difficult to overstate. They don't care that they'll never get to the upper reaches of a class because for the most part, parties never actually get into the high teens.
E
Experience progression. With the exception of getting out of 1st and into 2nd level, even the slow column is much too fast as far as I am concerned. Rise of the Runelords catapults players from 1 to 20. Game over. The rise through the teens and upper teens should, IMO, should be a lengthy challenge. No outing for a set of encounters (one story arc), and, "Hey, we picked up another level."
I'm not sure how popular this one would be, though. I think a lot of players might get bored without getting hit by rapid-fire level increases.
F
I want Epic rules, not Mythic rules. The 3.5 epic rules on magic would be abandoned. I can't say what would replace it, but that whole made little to no sense and gave me the impression it had undergone no meaningful playtesting. Equal consideration would be given to both offense and defense, as opposed to the Mythic rules 99% concentration on offense causing playing to annihilate everything in their path starting around tier 3
G
Take careful aim at problem spells and nerf them. Obviously, this....
A) I'd do the exact revers :
- wands 100 charges- Rods with charges : 50 charges
- staves : 25 charges
B+C)
Feats, I don't know if I'd follow your idea (a feat tree is some form of feat tax) but I'd definitely pare down the existing feat least to make the feats something you can master, not flounder through endless lists in I don't know how many volumes.
D
I'd certainly discourage dips, by strictly enforcing the preferred class rules, dip, and you lose the bonuses for that level, and you definitely roll the hit die in front of me. and of course, loss of capstones is its own punishment.
E
I'm not sure about that, I've not mastered enough to really judge theXP progression table, especially since, the XP rules being a kerfuffle, I tended to tell the characters to level up when I felt the time was right.
F
I don't even know how to adapt D&D3 Epic rules to PF. Yeah, the idea of playing beyond lvl20 is appealong, but those rules are a mess I could never really grasp
G
Magic has been nerfed far too much already since 3.0 srarted the trend. I'd leave it as is, or maybe remove certain caps. If matials complain, I would study solutions with them.
- Incorporate support for things appearing in latter rulebooks. E.g. magic items from core rule and UE don't have any support for psychic magic.
- Clear up ambiguities in existing rules. Many FAQs are the result of ambiguous rules.
- Incorporate blogs clarifying core rules into the core rulebook. Stealth, lighting, weapon damage progression, etc.
- A glossary of standardized terms. Define things so we now what you mean.
- Get rid of the Ninja and Samurai and alt classes. Make them archetypes or core classes.
- Revisions can change page numbers. Since it is a new edition, you don't have to maintain page numbers as a reference point for earlier content.
- Unchained classes can become core.
I could go on. None of the changes would break backward compatibility, some would actually improve it.
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My brain keeps insisting the thread is named "What would you change about Pie" and so now I want pie.
You guys are lucky tomorrow is Thanksgiving.
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A) I'd do the exact revers :
- wands 100 charges
- Rods with charges : 50 charges
- staves : 25 charges
{. . .}
Echoes of AD&D 1st Edition . . . .
most definitely, nerfing those items makes staves next to useless, since there are so few ways to recharge them (of course, it was even worse in 3.xx where you had to literally remake the staff to recharge it).
@Omnimage: you could adopt the 5ed rule that a mage/arcane caster can freely cast when wearing armor in which he's proficient. That means dipping into an armor able class, but it kemains more or less logical.
Oh, and I've already said I'd pare down the feat list, similarly, I'd do away with traits altogether, too dispersed all over the place (unless you happen to own UCampaign) and exploitable by munchkins.
Playing around with a few ideas. Mostly more skills for some classes so Fighter isn't pigeoned holed into taking a trait or feat to keep up. That varies from table to table but bringing fighter up to 4 skills seems to work(Really any class that has 2 skills should be brought up).
But the latest thing I'm messing around with besides the Stamina rules is "Evolving Stance Feats". It's an idea a friend passed me.
You only take the Basic Stance and get the other 2 for free once you meet the requirements. No having to take like 2-4 feats plus 1-2 more. I like the stance system a lot actually but whooo boy does it need a bit of work.
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I would love to consolidate all the things that augmented the fighter over the years. Stamina Combat, Armor and Weapon Training, etc... to create an Unchained fighter class.
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I would love to consolidate all the things that augmented the fighter over the years. Stamina Combat, Armor and Weapon Training, etc... to create an Unchained fighter class.
An evolutionary PF2e that's strongly based in the current PF1e could easily do this sort of thing. This only one of the many reasons that I'm so disappointed in the approach the PF2e design team has decided to take.
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^Exactly! Like I said elsewhere, just as Pathfinder was effectively D&D 3.75, I wanted Pathfinder 2nd Edition to be effectively D&D 3.875, Pathfinder 3rd Edition to be effectively D&D 3.9375, and Pathfinder 4th Edition to be effectively D&D 3.96875(*), etc. . . . unless Paizo and Green Ronin come to a deal that lets the next Pathfinder be an unholy hybrid of D&D + Mutants and Masterminds.
(*)Do NOT go to 4.00000. That is the equivalent of going over 21 in Blackjack.
Oh where to begin...
1. Remove iterative attack penalties
2. Allow all attacks on a standard action, full-attack action adds one additional attack.
3. Reduce the Skills to 17
4. Give Martials more skill points
5. Stop Meta-magic stacking
6. Wizards pick 1 school, cast all spells outside that school at 1/2 CL.
7. Special Mounts are a spell, not class feature for Paladins.
8. Remove hard-lined alignment requirements. Make DMs own up to their convictions and force it themselves.
9. Cut down on the types of modifiers. More than 10 is ridiculous.
10. Make it easier to perform combat maneuvers.
11. Couple Feats together, make them bigger and actually worth their investment.
12. Remove most Stat requirements for Feats.
13. Stop excessive number scaling for the sake of scaling. It basically has no meaning after a certain level.
14. Ability modifiers dont give you extra spells.
15. Less higher level spell slots (1 or 2 less at 9th level)
16. Dex to damage with specific weapons.
17. Limit multiclassing. Honestly the GURPS-style of plug-in-play class/feature PF espouses is really annoying.
18. Remove prestige classes, treat them as extensions of the main character - sort of like a template.
19. Add in non-magical healing
20. 5-ft. step causes an AoO if it leaves a threatened area into a non-threatened area.
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I would have been happy if they combined the core rulebook, the advanced player's guide, dumped the summoner, and used the unchained versions of the rogue, monk, barbarian.
I don't like Summoners because their eidolon tends to take the place of the party warrior, and it allows them to cast spells besides handle physical combat. Never screw over a PC role.
I'm strongly in disagreement here. The way to address CMD is to make martials more awesome, not to nerf casters. (People who object to martials being too unrealistic/anime can always play E6 in a system that makes martials awesome at higher levels.)5. Stop Meta-magic stacking
6. Wizards pick 1 school, cast all spells outside that school at 1/2 CL.
While I'm not in total disagreement here, HOW do you achieve that? 4e did a great job but people didn't like that approach. The only other way is to give Fighters amazing deadly or imposing critical hit effects and increase how often they trigger. For example DCC does this and on a crit you could make someone deaf permanently or limb loss or decapitate people at later levels. Unless people are willing to accept amazing effects of a weapon-user the CMD will always be a thing where Martialss will never compete with the likes of Wish or Miracle or Gate.
8. Remove hard-lined alignment requirements. Make DMs own up to their convictions and force it themselves.
Oh heck no. The last thing you want involved in alignment is the DM's own convictions.
Something along the lines of "Here are some common issues that come up with alignment. For game purposes, A, B and C are defined as Good, X, Y and Z are defined as Evil, 1, 2 and 3 are defined as Lawful and 7, 8 and 9 are defined as Chaotic. Good, Evil, Lawful and Chaotic are game-specific technical terms, their purpose is to be consistent and coherent and allow for quick judgements to keep a game moving. Any resemblance to any real-world morality, living or dead, is entirely accidental. Also, Paladins can only ever be Exalted Good, So There."[/I]
Alignment requirements and mechanisms are mostly an old-guard notion that really needs to die in a burning fire. Either everyone gets one or no one gets them. LG only paladins are largely dead (thankfully) and if a DM wants to really keep them then make him the one that enforces it. There's literally zero balancing reason they exist anymore.
The bigger your numbers, the more granularity you have, and this strikes me as a plus. I want to see lvl 20 Fighters with effective Str of 40 once all the relevant buffs are counted.313. Stop excessive number scaling for the sake of scaling. It basically has no meaning after a certain level.
If I wanted superheroes I'd play a superhero game. By the late portions of 3e/PF (and to a similar extent - 4E) PCs started looking like God's. Yeah no thanks. I don't want 3/4 of the Monster Manual / Beastiary completely useless because the PCs aren't challenged by them. It just forces the video-game mentality further.
Why not ?14. Ability modifiers dont give you extra spells.
Why do casters need 8 spells of each level from basically 1st thru 5th to feel relevant? At a certain point (limited spells and resource management) is a sham of any argument and pointless. It becomes wildly unbalanced as all their spells level AND they get more of them they'd probably ever cast in a single day.
17. Limit multiclassing. Honestly the GURPS-style of plug-in-play class/feature PF espouses is really annoying.
18. Remove prestige classes, treat them as extensions of the main character - sort of like a template.
I'm strongly in agreement here. GURPS is a great game if you want to play GURPS, but what I want from PF or any other D&D-type game is well-defined classes with a distinct feel to them as they progress from newbie to legend.
I'd go so far as; no multi-classing. No prestige classes. No archetypes. Give me forty well-tested base classes with solid progressions that fit forty worthwhile character concepts, or fifty, or seventy, rather than hundreds of feats and skills and whatnot where it is not humanly possible to test all possible interactions for trap options or game breakers.
(Also, I would like something front and centre that says "Here are the basic axioms about how the game and the game world work. Any combination of interactions between game rules that causes these axioms to break is automatically not valid.")
Less feats that do more is certainly something I'd like to see (a la 5e) and the same goes for Skills (as per my paird down list) and overall less granular minute of options. The whole concept of Exclusion Mechanics (practically what 3e is based on) is dumb. If you wanna trip someone just try. No half-dozen caveats with "fixer" feats to not suck as described action that is the whole Improved [insert CMB trick here] feat.
I definitely agree about reducing the number of feats needed to use various maneuvers, like dirty trick, item tricks, wrestling, unarmed combat etc. Honestly, all those booklets with additional combat options that are only useful if you blow a few feats on them seems silly. Everyone should be able to do them somewhat effectively.
I have no problems with alignments or ability modifiers granting more spells.
You do know that Wish and Miracle etc are not only expensive to cast, but the GM is encouraged to mess with whatever the PC asks for, right? It's like that movie Wishmaster. Those superpowered spells are a last resort, and a trap for munchkins/powergamers/"optimizers".
I definitely agree about reducing the number of feats needed to use various maneuvers, like dirty trick, item tricks, wrestling, unarmed combat etc. Honestly, all those booklets with additional combat options that are only useful if you blow a few feats on them seems silly. Everyone should be able to do them somewhat effectively.
Exactly! Looking at most forms of medieval combat, the notion is that a shield IS a weapon and often effective at being one too. A Fighter, for instance, shouldn't have to burn precious resource commodity (feats) on using a weapon he's already proficient with in the first place. Hitting someone with a sword - shield bash combo was an extremely effective tactic and this goes back waay before medieval Europe.
As my group and I sit down to discuss how to "Fix" various issues with 3.5/PF one of the points I'm going to bring up is either A) eliminating the "cool tricks" Feat Tax and just make combat manevuer simply non-penalizing (no provoke AoO's, no chance to disarm on failed attempts, etc.) and just make maybe one feat that incorporates ALL specific forms of combat maneuvers, granting you a bonus to all the checks at once. And the effects would naturally scale with level (probably +4 from 1-5; +6 from 6-10; +8 from 11-15; +10 from 16-20).
Other aspects, such as Two-Weapon Fighting would also be simplified too. It's simply off-hand needs to be light with -2/-2 to all attacks. If you want to wield two one-handed weapons, grab the Dual-Wielder feat (grants bonus to AC, removes the penalty, and allows you to use a one-handed weapon in your off-hand). This whole "it's -8/-10 with this condition, -6/-6 with this condition...blah blah" is too convoluted and almost never ever used at the table because NO player I've ever encountered was like "yeah, I'll grab two weapons and incur penalties so darn steep that it makes me less effective that simply punching with my bare fist!".
I have no problems with alignments or ability modifiers granting more spells.
I had a buddy wanting to join our long-running 3.5 game (we're finishing up the Cormyr, Shadowdale, Anauroch adventures) and he wanted to make a Dread Necromancer. Said DN character had 8 castings of his 5th and 4th level spell slots (the campaign is at 16th level). With these, he augmented the Enervation spell to a point where he could cast a Split Ray empowered fell drained quickened Enervation using a 5th level spell slot and a split ray empowered fell drained enervation using a 4th level slot. That's 4 rays a turn that dropped targets on average 7 to 10 level per ray. He had 16 castings of this a day. More if he used higher level slots to cast them (which he did). There was nothing in the campaign that was ever going to withstand that and I honestly didn't want to have to re-write the whole thing so everyone had Deathward cast on them 24-7.
Even with my "nerf" of no-modifier to extra spells he was getting 6 spell slots from 1st through 6th level. That's 36 spell castings (not including five 7th level and three 8th level slots). I mean, again at what point does the notion of resource management even become an issue in D&D/PF? Everyone always exclaims "well martial get to use their stuff all day long with no chance of tiring...." I don't know about you but at that point, I don't think I've ever witnessed a PC burn through 44 spells in a single adventuring day. Even with more conservative numbers such as from the Wizard, that's still 32 casting of spells from 0 thru 8th level by the time they're 16th.
As for alignment, I don't have a problem with them being elements in a game. Certainly continuing the trend of L/C - G/E axis is something I'd like to see, but it's the forcing of this forced behavior that I really don't think adds to the game, especially when it's often used as a cudgel to enforce Catch-22 scenarios or simply make it all the more difficult on a party of varying people's ethos. For example, if I paladin were to say he's going to torture a captured demon with holy water and religious relics to obtain information, I'd probably say "OK". I believe that such creature is the embodiment of evil and immortal, thus no quarter or mercy is applicable. Some DM's would out-right rule that as a violation of a Paladin's code. Who's right? Who's wrong?
This is why I don't think hard-lined alignment mechanics really do much for the betterment of the gaming system. If a DM feels really strongly about such aspect, make them put them in the game, thus holding strong to their convictions, don't let them justify their decisions because they point to the rule book and say "well it IS the rules *shrugs*".
You do know that Wish and Miracle etc are not only expensive to cast, but the GM is encouraged to mess with whatever the PC asks for, right? It's like that movie Wishmaster. Those superpowered spells are a last resort, and a trap for munchkins/powergamers/"optimizers".
At the point they can cast these spells, the assumed WBL is so astronomical that the cost is negligible for the most part. And I never really got the whole "Gotcha" aspect DMs did with these spells? Like, it's just not really what I like doing to my players.
As for your necromancer, I would simply applaud the player, and state that if he continues, he's gonna get bored fast. Eventually he will give up on the idea, because its no fun for him or for anyone else.
I have no problem with paladins, but yes, being LG is kinda what you are supposed to do. Think of Superman, and replace all his superpowers with paladin powers. Act like that. Would Superman torture a inherently evil creature? I doubt it. He'd rather convert it.
You should read up on Pathfinder's text on those spells. They are pretty specific as to the costs. I don't mind doing "gotcha" if the player gets greedy or destructive.
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Honestly, I'm pretty satisfied with Pathfinder as it stands.
I'd bump the characters with 2+int skills up to 4+int, with the exception of Wizard and Witch.
Give sorcerers new spell levels at the same rate as wizards.
That's about it, really. Great system.
With these, he augmented the Enervation spell to a point where he could cast a Split Ray empowered fell drained quickened Enervation using a 5th level spell slot and a split ray empowered fell drained enervation using a 4th level slot. That's 4 rays a turn that dropped targets on average 7 to 10 level per ray.I am confused by this situation as all of the metamagics which are added to these castings make the spells above 9th level slots. Enervation by itself starts at level four, quickened adds +3, split ray, +2, empowered, +2, fell drained another +2. By my math, the character needs a 13th level spell slot he does not even have access to. Maybe he is using a metamagic wand, that still gives him 10th level spell slots to memorize the rest. Am I missing something else here (I realize it is 3.5, but I also checked those as well)?
Practical Metamagic (quicken spell) -1 to spell adjustment
Arcane Thesis (enervation) -1 to any Metamagic feat used for the spell.
Slaymate (Libris Mortis) -1 to Metamagic spell adjustment for all Necromancy spells.
So split, empowered, and fell drain are all now at 0 and quickened is now 1.