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I played in beta, but haven't gotten a book yet, I've just been reading from the SRD to feel out the fully released system, so there is probably a lot of changes I've missed.
First I looked up a ranger (one of my favorites) and saw that they get 10 class feats (same as everyone else as far as I've seen). I was trying to design a typical 3.5 bow ranger, where I would have spent half my feats on bows, 1 on animal companion, and happily accepted the utility spells I got; still leaving some wiggle room for defensive feats or flavor feat or two.
So now if I want to get all the bow feats it'll use 10/10, if I want a decent companion it'll use 3-5/10, and having about the same spellcasting as PF1 would take 4/10. Obviously I can only take half of these. (Did anyone else notice that fighters get better Perception than rangers until level 15?)
Theoretical builds for druids were the same and alchemists even worse. Wizards and Fighters look like they might have a bit more wiggle room, but wizards sure look bland compared to a fighter that can inflict debuffs every round and never run out of swings per day.
Anyway....seems like multiclassing or even dual specing would really gimp the core class most of the time. Is this right? Did miss something?
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A ranger who spends all of their feats on using a bow will naturally be better at using a bow than a ranger who diversifies more into having an animal companion and spells. If you could fully spec into all of these things at once your feat choices would be meaningless.
So it's a choice - be a master at one thing, or be more versatile by being merely good at two things or okay at everything.
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(Did anyone else notice that fighters get better Perception than rangers until level 15?)
Both start with Expert Perception, both hit Master at 7th, ranger hits Legendary at 15th---so fighters are never better than rangers at general Perception.
Perhaps you're referring to the fighter 7th-level feature that gives them +2 circumstance to Perception for initiative only? Fighters being as fast or faster than rangers to react to combat seems right to me; they still won't notice the details on their opponents' clothing any better.
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Let me rephrase my question: In PF1 a ranger could use a great sword, a longbow, a companion, and spells at the same time well enough to keep up with everyone else.
If I try to diversify characters in PF2 will I just end up with a character that is awful at two or three things? Can I get away with spending 50% of my feats in one area or does it require 80-100% to be viable.
"Perhaps you're referring to the fighter 7th-level feature that gives them +2 circumstance to Perception for initiative only? Fighters being as fast or faster than rangers to react to combat seems right to me; they still won't notice the details on their opponents' clothing any better."
Being able to be just as good as a ranger, but better is being better.
Generally speaking, I think covering all those schticks is fine, the basic math takes care of itself OK.
One thing I would note is magic isn't a core part of Ranger, so doing that now involves Multiclass or other Archetype Feats.
Although I believe Paizo said they will do native Ranger magic options in the future, which I expect would be Focus based.
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You need all of ONE ranger feat to be good with a bow: Hunted Shot. Every other bow-related feat is a situational option.
- Hunter's Aim is worse overall damage than Hunted Shot + a Strike. But it's a good tool to have vs. enemies that are concealed.
- Far Shot is circumstantial, unless you do a lot of map-less combats at large distances.
- Snap Shot is for a narrow subset of builds
- Deadly Aim is for punching through Resistance, and otherwise largely DPR neutral.
- Distracting Shot and Greater Distrating Shot are debuffs for the unlikely chance than no one else in your party provides flatfooted and the melee don't have good flanking.
- Targeting Shot is debatably a key feat - it lets you upgrade most of your non-Hunted Shot strikes to avoid cover and concealment.
- Impossible Volley is AoE damage in a system where burning down individual targets is generally a safer strategy.
- Legendary Shot is of limited value unless you're fighting a lot out in open areas and starting far away from your prey.
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Let me rephrase my question: In PF1 a ranger could use a great sword, a longbow, a companion, and spells at the same time well enough to keep up with everyone else, even with a very wide range of skills.
If I try to diversify characters in PF2 will I just end up with a character that is awful at two or three things?
You won't be awful (it's harder to be awful in PF2 than in PF1 precisely because it's harder to be outstandingly better than everyone else unless you super-specialise - two sides of the same coin, really). But if you build a generalist, you'll be worse than any specialist in the things you're covering.
The scope of PC power in PF2 begins higher but caps out lower than in PF1, so there's a different feel in that respect, imo. In PF1 you would expect that by focussing in one area you would totally outshine everyone else, to the point of the much discussed: "don't bother trying to stealth along with me unless you're also a specialist". In PF2, the gap is tighter - that necessarily feels like you're not getting as much bang for your buck (although I think that's something of an illusion based on comparing one's PF2 character as if they were playing in a PF1 world).
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Generally speaking the 80/20 rule applies to most martial classes in PF2. Your pure throughput options are generally low level feats. Higher level feats are all about responding to unusual tactical situations.
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You need all of ONE ranger feat to be good with a bow: Hunted Shot. Every other bow-related feat is a situational option.
- Hunter's Aim is worse overall damage than Hunted Shot + a Strike. But it's a good tool to have vs. enemies that are concealed.
- Far Shot is circumstantial, unless you do a lot of map-less combats at large distances.
- Snap Shot is for a narrow subset of builds
- Deadly Aim is for punching through Resistance, and otherwise largely DPR neutral.
- Distracting Shot and Greater Distrating Shot are debuffs for the unlikely chance than no one else in your party provides flatfooted and the melee don't have good flanking.
- Targeting Shot is debatably a key feat - it lets you upgrade most of your non-Hunted Shot strikes to avoid cover and concealment.
- Impossible Volley is AoE damage in a system where burning down individual targets is generally a safer strategy.
- Legendary Shot is of limited value unless you're fighting a lot out in open areas and starting far away from your prey.
Yup. Similarly, you need no feats to be good with a two handed weapon and one feat to dual wield.
Animal Companions do soak up a decent amount of feats but if you focus on their Support Benefit they arguably don't need the upgrades.
Snares also only really need one feat to become a viable part of your build.
Thanks. Sounds like you can split feats in two areas and still be viable.
Also, speak with your GM about trying out a double class feat house rule.
We're using that rule, along with a few others, for a game that was originally using PF1 and it has enabled a smooth transition.
The sky has not fallen down yet. There has yet to be mass panic in the streets. Jackbooted Paizo thugs have yet to come arrest me.
Generally, what it does is enable concepts *much* faster. My Ranger could pick up druid dedication to get his spells back and still get fun ranger feats that map well to what he could do in PF1. All while doing so before level ~15.
I strongly recommend people who played the playtest like me and felt restricted look into this house rule. I'm hoping it comes up in the Gamemaster guide as an optional rule.
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I will simply say, I think the "bottleneck" is intentional for the reasons Tender Tendrils mentioned.
But there's also nothing stopping your GM from providing class feats at every level up.
I think doubling feats in the long run will just make characters way more samey
I'd love to hear more about what brings you to this conclusion.
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I think doubling feats in the long run will just make characters way more sameyI'd love to hear more about what brings you to this conclusion.
You'll have so many feats there wont be tough choices about what you want to specialize in.
Everyone can just get a grab bag of feats.
I think doubling feats in the long run will just make characters way more sameyI'd love to hear more about what brings you to this conclusion.The first time I heard it suggested was talking about the Ranger. Doubling the feats let them take everything they could ever want, which means instead of choosing from A and B in several instances you'd just choose both. You don't get one character focused on synergizing with their animal companion and another on their own martial prowess, you just get all characters with both.
EDIT: All my players have had to makes several difficult choices for their characters. With double feats this wouldn't exist they would just have both options. Same when I've been building villains, double feats would just make them all have 0 drawbacks.
Interesting.
How many of your players took multiclass archetypes?
Was this a game that was converted, or a new PF2 campaign?
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I think doubling feats in the long run will just make characters way more sameyI'd love to hear more about what brings you to this conclusion.You'll have so many feats there wont be tough choices about what you want to specialize in.
Everyone can just get a grab bag of feats.
To be clear, double class feats is a house rule I think people who feel restricted should look into.
Being able to grab a bag of feats, for those people, should be an improvement.
What I'm wondering is how it makes characters feel "samey".
Without multiclassing or taking archetypes, I will grant you that characters of one class will very much feel more "samey". That is, until more in-class feat choices are introduced. However, character concepts which require multiclassing (which is 100% of the characters in my game) will not at all feel "samey" unless I'm missing some source of that feeling.
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The multiclass characters are making the choice to give up some of their previous class identity. Double feats means you don't have to do that at all. The true multiclass player in my group thought long and hard about what they were giving up to come to their choice. Doubling feats would take that away, everyone would be a gish.
The characters that we're using were converted from PF1, and all have almost exactly the same capabilities as they had before with this house rule.
The Fighter/Rogue is a passable sword and board slayer, being able to sneak attack and push people around with their shield.
The Ranger/Druid is once again capable of limited casting, highly focused on bow use, and forsook the animal companion for better terrain mastery.
The Monk/Druid was a bit special, and used to have a custom curse that let them wildshape into a cow, now they can do it natively but it came online later. They also get casting similar to their prior ki spells, like barkskin.
The Wizard/Sorcerer/Bard still has a slew of low level spells, primarily used for utility stuff.
Do you feel that PF1 had too many abilities, too many gishes, or classes felt too samey?
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Agree.
The system is tough, and doubling the feats won't do anything but ruining it.
The only thing I could consider to deal with is the dedication class dc for non casting classes which has no way of progression.
Keep in mind, the *only* people who should use the double feat house rule are those who feel they are too restricted by the default system. For others like yourself, doubling feats could ruin your experience no question.
Without multiclassing or taking archetypes, I will grant you that characters of one class will very much feel more "samey". That is, until more in-class feat choices are introduced. However, character concepts which require multiclassing (which is 100% of the characters in my game) will not at all feel "samey" unless I'm missing some source of that feeling.
Actually, I don't think they'll feel samey even single-classing. I already theorycrafted a handful of characters with what I think are your house rules for feats in chargen---monk, barbarian, fighter, ranger, rogue. The fighter MCs rogue, the others are single-classed. Even with the extra feats I still had plenty of internal conflict and angst in building them, partially because most levels of most classes have (IMHO) more than two good feats. So I'm pretty sure I could easily build another single-classed monk, barbarian, ranger, and rogue and still have very distinctive class feat selections.
Certainly by higher levels you should never be lacking in feats to take because some of the past options you had to skip are still there.
I could see Fighters struggling with this a little because their feats tend to pretty geared towards particular combat styles. But even then getting a secondary style doesn't seem bad. Any melee character would appreciate having some decent archery for back up. One handed combat styles are nice for bastard swordsmen and shield maidens that have taken all the shield damage they can take.
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Oh yes absolutely it can be right for a group. Just wanted to offer a counter point to whether it is advisable or not. I don't feel it would be, as I'm of the strong opinion that correct amounts of restriction make choices flourish.
Yeah, I'm genuinely happy to get counter points and different perspectives. You're always one to contribute in a positive way!
There are a lot of things I'm struggling with, so it helps a lot to get different viewpoints.
Among the things to navigate:
1. Personal preference.
Obviously some people prefer heavy limitations, others like more freedom. I think some posters are of the opinion that everyone should like it their way, so they provide unnecessarily harsh criticism of house rules designed for people of a different mentality.
Another preference is level availability. Some people are fine with having to wait until mid-to-high levels to have somewhat mundane character build features come online, while I find that to be far to late for too many things.
If double feats could let people who want more freedom to have it, and solve "late bloomer" build problems, all without significantly impacting game balance, it'd be fantastic.
So it's important that I filter feedback based on the target audience for the house rule.
2. Actual power differences.
Based on my initial results, you almost can't tell the difference between a double feat character and a normal character until 3+ combats in a day. It's aggravating that I can't gather more data about this until more people try it out, but I have a sneaking suspicion that double feat characters will require little if any adjustments to encounter difficulty. Everything is capped by actions and feat situationality. These characters can effectively respond to a larger variety of situations, but is that a problem in most games?
3. Edge cases
Certain characters might want to play a single class, and find nothing compelling to spend their extra class feats on. I have yet to come across this, but it's a possibility. I worry that my narrow experience isn't taking into account other unforeseen problems. I LOVE feedback about edge case problems, since I'm kind of prone to glossing over those things.
4. Knee-jerk reactions
I've had many people respond to double feats, understandably, with the assumption that it *must* be overpowered. Or breaks some underlying design principle. Or would mean everyone is a spell-slinging-ninja-fighter monstrosity. It's difficult for me to tell when a response is knee-jerk and when it's duly considered. When pressed, a lot of it comes back to their personal preference.
5. Future-proofing
Right now, in my games, this house rule works pretty well, so far. Who knows what combinations might come down the road. It'd be nice if this house rule got included in the gamemaster guide so they could keep it in mind.
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Oh yes absolutely it can be right for a group. Just wanted to offer a counter point to whether it is advisable or not. I don't feel it would be, as I'm of the strong opinion that correct amounts of restriction make choices flourish.Yeah, I'm genuinely happy to get counter points and different perspectives. You're always one to contribute in a positive way!
There are a lot of things I'm struggling with, so it helps a lot to get different viewpoints.
Well, then, here's my viewpoint:
I think a lot of the debate boils down to peoples' reasons for playing. Think about it this way: if you create a character that sucks (whatever your definition of sucks is), what happens to you?
For some people, it's soul crushing. They're stuck playing a sucky character (which may be a fine character but just not fine tuned like the rest of the party) and it ruins their experience.
For others, they will laugh at their gimped character and have a blast anyway.
I'm way closer to the second type. I used the word "icosahedral" at work and a bunch of us found out we had played RPGs when younger. We played D&D 5e because our first GM knew that system best, and then PF1 because our first GM wanted to play and our second GM knew PF1. I picked alchemist because there was no D&D alchemist. So it's all kind of whatever to me, if PF2 alchemist sucks then it sucks, if I can't take a feat because I didn't plan ahead then maybe my next character. It's unreasonable for me to expect to play through more than 2-3 characters before PF3 comes out, so I'm never going to see the difference between a storm druid and a leshy druid anyway.
I totally understand if people who play way more, or with groups way more serious, want to fine tune their characters. They're the race car drivers that look at fuel-air ratios and restore '65 Mustangs and whatnot. I'm the idiot who brings my car in for an oil change every 20,000 miles.
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So as someone that was basically one of the doomsayer's of the customization bottle neck issue:
It's not as bad as I feared.
The only major drawback is that level 1 you're less "your class" and more your character. Which I'm not sure I'd necessarily call it a drawback as much as I'd call it a design decision with reasonable backup for change.
But, when you compare level 1 to level 1, you'll notice that it's not that far off due to Backgrounds, Ancestry, and Skills in terms of "things people can do", so even though you lost some combat prowess it's more "full" as a concept.
From level 2 on, I have been surprisingly happy with not feeling hampered. The biggest reason is two fold:
Athletics allowing most combat maneuvers opens up a lot of dynamic combat choices.
Weapon choice and usage is now a lot more dynamic and combat integrated. (Seriously, the weapon system is on point. Super well done, traits ALL matter.)
Weapons have gone from "pick the best vehicle for abusing damage/reach/etc." to "pick carefully, each weapon is distinctly good in the right situation".
So while I would say there is a bottleneck, the whole bottle got a lot wider, so the hole by comparison looks small but in practice is actually close to the same size as what we had before. (not sure if this metaphor carries, but eh).
And the best part? This system seems to flourish as more options get introduced (though the concern for powercreep/rules bloat might be valid).
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But there's also nothing stopping your GM from providing class feats at every level up.
The one thing I'm interested in exploring is offering bonus feats as a narrative reward. Like if you were to help out an organization and they repay you by making you members (granting the dedication as a bonus feat), or the old hermit teaches you to make snares for helping him out of a jam, or after putting down the blight-corrupted wolf you can adopt the surviving puppy as an animal companion, etc.
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But there's also nothing stopping your GM from providing class feats at every level up.The one thing I'm interested in exploring is offering bonus feats as a narrative reward. Like if you were to help out an organization and they repay you by making you members (granting the dedication as a bonus feat), or the old hermit teaches you to make snares for helping him out of a jam, or after putting down the blight-corrupted wolf you can adopt the surviving puppy as an animal companion, etc.
I think my only concern there would be unbalancing that person with respect to their peers in the party.
I could see it being part of a "everyone gets a sidequest" session, or everyone's progressing a side story on their own which eventually pays out.
While all of your examples are pretty meaningful rewards, I think if it were me I'd feel compelled to give other members without a feat something to compensate (if not immediately eventually) and in a way that feels more "forced" than the original natural implementations you have above.
It would be cool if we got rules on how to do that type of thing, but it might be a bit late for the GMG.
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You're not missing anything. Paizo decided they liked the bottlenecks I guess.
Malk_Content has the best solution here. Don't go into the game expecting to play out a certain idea. Just pick a class and then pick feats that sound nice as you level up. It's mostly when you walk in with a plan to try to build a specific idea that it becomes frustrating.
But there's also nothing stopping your GM from providing class feats at every level up.The one thing I'm interested in exploring is offering bonus feats as a narrative reward. Like if you were to help out an organization and they repay you by making you members (granting the dedication as a bonus feat), or the old hermit teaches you to make snares for helping him out of a jam, or after putting down the blight-corrupted wolf you can adopt the surviving puppy as an animal companion, etc.
These types of feats already exist in the Age of Ashes AP. Not as bonus feats, but as accessible feats if the party hits certain story beats. Even if you do grant them for free the character sheet already has space for this.
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I quite like the idea but would probably go for a 'everybody gets only one' cap
I think the thing that makes it safe to give out "free feats" somewhat liberally is that feats are now essentially "versatility enhancers" and not "math enhancers". Like if you were to give a character every single fighter feat, they wouldn't be better at archery than a fighter who just took all the archery feats; they'd just be able to pick up a polearm or two kukris, or a flickmace and a shield and do better than the archer could.
Thanks. Sounds like you can split feats in two areas and still be viable.
You can be viable without taking any feats.
Most bow feats just let you move around more. Which works well if you want an extra action to command your animal.
The only one that boost damage is distracting / greater distracting shot. Which might be worth +1 to hit. Though an ally can also add flat-footed fairly easily as well, so it might not do anything.
You're not missing anything. Paizo decided they liked the bottlenecks I guess.
Malk_Content has the best solution here. Don't go into the game expecting to play out a certain idea. Just pick a class and then pick feats that sound nice as you level up. It's mostly when you walk in with a plan to try to build a specific idea that it becomes frustrating.
While I definitely agree that adopting that mentality has helped me make characters, I don't know that I've felt particularly frustrated thus far.
Out of curiosity which concepts do you find the most arduous to pursue right now? Would you say these are due to the bottleneck or just simply lack of mechanics (or both, due to design decisions like the General Feats for Proficiency)?
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Besides some that were deliberately removed like war priests that were just as good at melee combat as fighters and disarm specialists I think mostly reflecting the more versatile classes from First Edition like Rangers and Paladins can be difficult to realize.
On the flip side any concept that is more skill dependent seems easier to model. You can build a strong Assassin or Knight off the Fighter chassis with a lot less work. You can build a very thief like Illusionist without multi-classing. Also multi-classing into a caster feels way better to me.
As a reminder, playing with more feats is going to be one of the supported variants in the game mastery guide. So Paizo is going to be giving us guidance on how to make stuff like what Waterleshe proposed official, and what if any balance concerns there are.
I'd also wager that asking on what to expect on that front would be a great question for Pathfinder Friday or Arcane Mark, assuming they aren't done talking about the Game Mastery Guide yet. Someone should pose the question in the appropriate threads and chats and we can hear what the team has to day
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Out of curiosity which concepts do you find the most arduous to pursue right now? Would you say these are due to the bottleneck or just simply lack of mechanics (or both, due to design decisions like the General Feats for Proficiency)?
It's a bit of both. I'm sure stuff will come out to better support certain concepts in the future, but I also don't like having to be in that position all that much when the tools already exist but we're just bottlenecked.
Caster-gishes are an obvious one that feel frustrating to bring together.
Not my issue, but I remember a while back someone trying to build a 1e style Ranger in PF2 and they got frustrated that getting all the basic stuff a level 4 ranger required much longer to accomplish in 2e.
But I think to sort of illustrate the heart of my frustration:
A hellknight signifer wizard can take the archetype at its expected level of 6... but to do so has their ancestry, heritage, first level ancestry feat, third level general feat, fourth level class feat and sixth level class feat all dedicated just to fulfilling that idea. Even the hellknight order they join is limited to a single choice with this build.
It's not that the build can't be done, but that by the time you enable it you're left with a very... generic character for the concept and don't get much room to really customize it until the middle of a campaign or later.
For those of you trying the double class feat approach, how is it holding up as more options are released? Are people wanting triple feats to fit in more archetypes/etc or is double still feeling comfortable?
For those of you trying the double class feat approach, how is it holding up as more options are released? Are people wanting triple feats to fit in more archetypes/etc or is double still feeling comfortable?
The real problem is that we haven't had enough people trying it out to say. Even I have only had a couple sessions, and lots of discussions with my group.
I'm not worried about players begging for more feats. That sort of thing is decided at the start of a campaign, not willy nilly.
A couple of the downsides of double feats are that it requires a new character sheet, and it's more intimidating for new players.