[i]"An associated mechanic is one which has a connection to the game world. A dissociated mechanic is one which is disconnected from the game world.
This is interesting, as the whole spell slot system essentially has no narrative rooted in the setting, especially the Arcane traditions in PF1 terms, or am I missing something?
For a Cleric, I could see the justification of a Gods just saying "Hey, you've had enough for one day, slow down", but for other cases, that doesn't really fit. Have we accepted that running out of spells is necessary disconnected mechanic to balance spells and limit resources?
Though I will not the long running common complaint of "It makes no sense that I forget how to cast fireball. If I know it I should just know it."
So for some subset of players, even old school D&D spellcasting is dissociated.
Often it's fluff framing device that leads to most players finding a mechanic dissociated or not. PF1 is full of limited use mechanics with varying (or in some cases no) justification. Point pools, once per round, x/day, once a day, etc.
I just took Improved Iron Will in one game. That leads to exactly the “I better not try to catch this ball one-handed, because if I do I won’t be able to make any more one-handed catches today” situation. And there's no real attempt at any justification for it.
4E did do it more and did it more generically - making most of the powers work that way, which made it more obvious.
The exception for spells (much less fireball) being the fact that any system of magic is, by definition, arbitrary. The rules of magic can be determined to be literally anything we want it to be - and thus be very convenient for a game. The rules of achieving a particularly spectacular attack result? The disconnect is more strongly felt.
And I agree that as PF developed, it picked up more fiddly bits that tended to be dissociative. It may have a lot to do with why I don't like later developed classes as much as earlier ones.
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[i]"An associated mechanic is one which has a connection to the game world. A dissociated mechanic is one which is disconnected from the game world.This is interesting, as the whole spell slot system essentially has no narrative rooted in the setting, especially the Arcane traditions in PF1 terms, or am I missing something?
For a Cleric, I could see the justification of a Gods just saying "Hey, you've had enough for one day, slow down", but for other cases, that doesn't really fit. Have we accepted that running out of spells is necessary disconnected mechanic to balance spells and limit resources?
You should note that it's easier to come up with complex in-world rules for magic because magic doesn't exist in the real world. It's also why there are Vancian and Spontaneous casters so people can choose their preferred explanation.
For prepared casters, it was pretty trivial for me to imagine the character's spending an hour in the morning to put together the really complex spell rituals and pre-cast 98% of the spell leaving the rest to trigger the spell quickly in combat.
For sorcerers, running out of magic juice is a super common and easy to conceptualize paradigm.
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"An associated mechanic is one which has a connection to the game world. A dissociated mechanic is one which is disconnected from the game world.This is interesting, as the whole spell slot system essentially has no narrative rooted in the setting, especially the Arcane traditions in PF1 terms, or am I missing something?
For a Cleric, I could see the justification of a Gods just saying "Hey, you've had enough for one day, slow down", but for other cases, that doesn't really fit. Have we accepted that running out of spells is necessary disconnected mechanic to balance spells and limit resources?
The spell casting tradition of DND comes from Jack Vance's Dying Earth fiction series. Gary Gygax was a huge fan. The mechanics of the magic system in Dying Earth has since been named "Vancian Magic". As per the wikipedia article on Dying Earth:
"Magic in the Dying Earth is performed by memorizing syllables, and the human brain can only accommodate a certain amount at once. When a spell is used, the syllables vanish from the caster's mind."
In essence, the act of casting the spell steals memories from your brain, and you must re-memorize them.
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This is interesting, as the whole spell slot system essentially has no narrative rooted in the setting, especially the Arcane traditions in PF1 terms, or am I missing something?
For a Cleric, I could see the justification of a Gods just saying "Hey, you've had enough for one day, slow down", but for other cases, that doesn't really fit. Have we accepted that running out of spells is necessary disconnected mechanic to balance spells and limit resources?
You're missing something.
Specifically, magic working that way in-universe. A person can only channel so much magic (or hold so many half-completed spells in their mind, or whatever other explanation you wish), before they run out. The better they are at magic, the more they can hold and channel.
That's actually pretty intuitive, and easy to write into the fiction. The Pathfinder Tales novels all have such magic in them, with all its limitations, and it in no way breaks one out of the story. Sword tricks working the same way absolutely does break one out of the story, even in fiction based directly on the game.
Which is a big difference.
The spell casting tradition of DND comes from Jack Vance's Dying Earth fiction series. Gary Gygax was a huge fan. The mechanics of the magic system in Dying Earth has since been named "Vancian Magic". As per the wikipedia article on Dying Earth:
"Magic in the Dying Earth is performed by memorizing syllables, and the human brain can only accommodate a certain amount at once. When a spell is used, the syllables vanish from the caster's mind."
In essence, the act of casting the spell steals memories from your brain, and you must re-memorize them.
That's all well and good, but the setting never takes that step to establish that connection. You might as well say that depleting resources is very Dark Sun and thus Golarion emulates that.
I guess, what I'm trying to say, is that I hope that PF2 creates a much more robust system for magic in the setting of Golarion because I found that part always a bit bland. Splitting the Spell lists is a good first step, now I hope we see more archetypes and ways to differentiate the different schools and forms of magic. Having an archetype for Runelords or rather Rune Mage would be great for example, because so far, a Runelord is just a powerful Wizard, while they could be so much more.
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Given how many people who dislike 4th do like PF2 or happily have switched over from PF1, you're in the minority, Cory. Maybe you make that comparison out of a similar sense of betrayal? I see you've GMed tons of PF1, so likely have such deep attachment that it's hard to shift over. Sorry about that, but I'm not sure what you hope to achieve by venting here other than spreading sorrow. I'd think there'd be Reddit threads about this where you might find similarly minded folk to gripe with. Maybe 3rd parties (with Paizo people even) still create 3.X/PF1 material (though PF2 should be easy to adapt, much easier than 4th would be).
I found 4th a major hiccup which discarded much of my accumulated DnD savvy, something I do not experience with PF2. Having DMed/GMed 100+ games of 3.X/PF1 I find PF2 superior to PF1 and a natural extrapolation of the game's origins when factoring in modern understanding of game theory. Some of that overlaps with choices made by 4th ed developers, but as Paizo's noted (maybe in this thread even), the changes in PF2 that resemble ones in 4th were developed before 4th existed. And oh my gosh PF2's higher levels are so, so much easier to balance, adapt, and run than PF1's (and 4th's balance was lopsided throughout). So yeah, have to disagree with you; I'm still loving Paizo's choices.
Good luck to you in finding a gaming home.
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I just think it’s ridiculous and moronic that Paizos success came from presenting an alternative to the worst d&d edition ever published, and then they decided to give a big middle finger to all the fans of the game by making their 2nd edition essentially a clone of 4e. You exist because of how bad 4e was, and you did a 180 and made your own version of it.
I would have called it a masterstroke of marketing myself. I mean the fact that it's what 7ish years later and still going strong indicates going this route was not a mistake (and I say this as someone who prefers first and does think pf2e was at least heavily influenced by 4e.)
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Holy thread necro Batman!
Haven't read the entire thread, just the necro part, but I can certainly see some parts of D&D4e in PF2e (mainly the focus points essentially mimicking encounter powers). But they are parts of the system worth salvaging IMHO. 2e isn't a clone, but inspired by, just like all systems and ideas are inspired by a collection of different ideas. Shoulders of giants, and so on.
As Castilliano mentioned, I guess you feel betrayed by Paizo heading in a different direction, and that's a valid feeling. It sucks that the system you love is no longer actively supported, but no one is taking away your old books. You might not like the new system, but you can still play the system you know and love.
Just so I can understand you better, why revive a 6-year old thread?
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I just think it’s ridiculous and moronic that Paizos success came from presenting an alternative to the worst d&d edition ever published, and then they decided to give a big middle finger to all the fans of the game by making their 2nd edition essentially a clone of 4e. You exist because of how bad 4e was, and you did a 180 and made your own version of it.
As was mentioned way back on page 1 six years ago: both games are trying to solve the same problems from 3.5/PF1. It's not surprising they came to similar solutions.
Besides, the market shifted substantially after PF1 came out. Particularly after 5e came out. The market for games like PF1 shrank considerably, so making another game with all its same issues wasn't really going to fly commercially. That game already exists for folks that want it.
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I believe some of the lead developers(designers?) of PF2E quite literally worked on 4e. That's why we got the commander and the guardian. Which are 4e classes with new names
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I get really confused how folks necro 6 year old forums and try to continue a conversation that ended years ago as if no time has passed.
Do they stumble across the thread in a google search? Look for the closest thread to the topic they want to vent about? Is checking the time on a post not what everybody does when they read a thread?
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I believe some of the lead developers(designers?) of PF2E quite literally worked on 4e. That's why we got the commander and the guardian. Which are 4e classes with new names
And I'm glad we did because Commander is awesome. My favorite class added to the game in quite a while.
I feel like Guardian would have happened even if 4e never existed though, simply because "I want to play an all defending class like Champion but without all the divine stuff" was a recurring request since PF2 came out.
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Although D&D 4e was a very unpopular edition for a number of reasons (including some not related to the game itself, like the GSL fiasco that foreshadowed events to come), I think it was also ahead of its time in many ways that came to prove themselves in PF2e's design, among others. I think only 2e's developers can confirm how much was inspired by that system, but I think the two different perspectives mentioned above are correct: some developers worked on both games, so there's likely to be some direct inspiration, but also 2e was bound to have some similarities with D&D 4e when both systems tried to address many of the same problems with the same original system.
I will say, though, one of the crucial ways in which 2e succeeded where D&D 4e failed is in its flavor: D&D 4e took a very gameplay-first approach where mechanics came first and theming second, which among other factors led to the edition being perceived as very video game-y. Some of this was attributed to the standardization of many mechanics, especially powers, but PF2e also standardized a lot of mechanics and still ended up faring a lot better. Rather, while 2e did very much aim to deliver solid mechanics, it still used flavor and theming to inform them, and then backed those with robust balance and comprehensive rules. This I think is why 2e gets accused much less of being video game-y, and now that 2e is well-established, I think it's pushed the envelope on rules-heavy TTRPG game design enough that a potential 3e could go even further, and attempt even more systemic changes that would have been rejected in 1e's heyday.
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I get really confused how folks necro 6 year old forums and try to continue a conversation that ended years ago as if no time has passed.
Spambot Necromancers. The spam gets removed, but the thread remains revived and others reply to it.
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Spambot Necromancers. The spam gets removed, but the thread remains revived and others reply to it.
Normally that's true, but this was a genuine post complaining about PF2. I assume they woke up from a 6 year sleeping curse of some kind and had the page open before it was inflicted on them.
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Necromancer hasn't come out yet. Stop using it to rez these threads.