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I think it really comes down to bad luck: players are losing initiative, start far from the goblins, and goblins are criting often, taking them down. My suggestion would be to really use the exploration activities mentioned by other earlier to attempt getting a more advantageous beginning.
Also, I think the angelic sorcerer is being played ineffectively and needs to change tactics if (s)he wants to contribute to the group. Don't get me wrong; there is nothing wrong with buff/support, but standing so far away that (s)he isn't contributing at all for many rounds makes the character nothing more than dead weight at best and a leech at worst, especially if the sorcerer's share of the loot could be used to buy healing potions that will do the same job early level [hyperbole].
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The goblin encounters were always a problem with multiple low level groups i've played with.
Giving short bows to early level enemies is going to cause issues. Swapping out the short bows with crossbows or having them primarily use melee weapons solves the issue but for early level enemies goblins were much more feared than orcs and others.
The goblin encounters were always a problem with multiple low level groups i've played with.
Giving short bows to early level enemies is going to cause issues. Swapping out the short bows with crossbows or having them primarily use melee weapons solves the issue but for early level enemies goblins were much more feared than orcs and others.
IMO, just swap out bows for javelins: it drops range to 30', requires they be drawn to throw so it limits shots and it leaves less treasure to be picked up [crossbow/shortbow is 1.5 gp, arrows/bolts and javelins are 5 cp each].
Divine Sorcerers and Sorcerers in general really need to play into their strong points which includes intimidate/demorlize and spell versitality. I have a Divine sorc as one of my players and they felt a bit weak for the first level or two but now as we are about to hit 7 they are one of our stronger most versitlie characters. They need an offencive cantrip even if it's just Daze it is something at least. My player was a gnome so after a quick tweek she switched her racial trait to give her an extra cantrip which gave her electric arc and she was very happy.
My player was a gnome so after a quick tweek she switched her racial trait to give her an extra cantrip which gave her electric arc and she was very happy.
Yes, picking up an attack cantrip helps tremendously. A racial feat or a archetype/multiclass [bard/runescarred] devotion are easy enough.
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I asked him about cantrips and the crossbow, here is his reply:
"Second level feat will help with the cantrips, and <character> is currently carrying his light encumbrance limit."
Here's his current inventory. My gut instinct is he really doesn't need 60% of his bulk spent on an instrument and cookware.
https://i.imgur.com/t3fpfTF.png
So a couple of things.
A backpack ignores the first 2 bulk that is stored in it.
Even without storing any of his gear in the backpack, he only has 4.2 bulk of gear total, which rounds down to 4, not up to 5.
Putting 2 bulk worth of his gear in his backpack brings him down to 2.2. Plenty of extra room for a Crossbow.
Also, there is no reason for a Sorcerer to have a Material Component Pouch, an Instrument, or a Religious Symbol. Sorcerer's don't need Material Components at all, and can use their Blood as a Focus. They aren't Clerics who study and worship a god, they are literally related to Angels.
I mean if he wants to carry them for RP purposes, that's fine, but they provide no actual benefit.
I'm also not entirely sure the player is clear on what a Bedroll is. Think Sleeping Bag. That's going on the Backpack, not in a Belt Pouch.
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I asked him about cantrips and the crossbow, here is his reply:
"Second level feat will help with the cantrips, and <character> is currently carrying his light encumbrance limit."
Here's his current inventory. My gut instinct is he really doesn't need 60% of his bulk spent on an instrument and cookware.
https://i.imgur.com/t3fpfTF.png
I realize this probably isn't well advertised, but the developers acknowledged some issues with encumbrance and changed a few things with the first set of PF2 errata.
I point you at the paizo blog with link to pdf at the end in it:
https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo6sgzq?Core-Rulebook-Errata-Round-1
Specifically on page 3 of the errata, bottom right:
Page 287: In the Backpack description, add this
sentence: “The first 2 Bulk of items in your backpack
don’t count against your Bulk limits.”
He's should have 2.9 more bulk to play with (0.1 to 0.9 bulk rounds down, I count 2 + 1 + 0.1 x 11 = 4.1 bulk on that sheet). With the ignore 2 from the backpack, his current effective bulk is 2.1, rounds down to 2.
This also updated on the Archive of Nethys site if you use that under backpack.
Unfortunately you shouldn't need to go to external PDFs or ask the forums to find this out, but its there.
I think the solution here, if your players aren't feeling heroic, is to explain to them that they aren't heroes at level one. They're adventurers, but they've done little to no actual fighting and they have no experience.I guess that seems to be conflict with some of the backgrounds like Bounty Hunter, Gladiator, and Warrior for example.
Unfortunately, for balance reasons, those backgrounds make you just as dangerous as someone with an Artist background.
Even starting with a 200 year old elf doesn't get you any more skills than a human despite having likely lived 10 times longer.
Another possible suggestion is if they're not having fun with 1st level characters, skip directly to 2nd or 3rd. That way they can have a Gladiator or Warrior background and have stats to back it up immediately. As it is, any "Warrior" type enemy like an Orc Warrior or Hobgoblin warrior is a CR 1 enemy and thus has decent odds of beating a player character 1 on 1, warrior background or no.
Unless this is some form of pre-designed adventure, bumping up levels by 1 or 2 shouldn't make the game too much more complicated while providing more of a hit point buffer. Level 1 just happens to be the most luck based level in my opinion. Luck still matters at higher levels, but it takes more of it to drop a player immediately.
"All I know is that I'm not having fun. It creeped on me on the last session where we scrapped by just barely, it happened again today within the first round. I know how childish this sounds, but I'm tired and I don't feel at all like a hero, let alone an adventurer. Is ending every single encounter with a dead person something that really inspires confidence?. Yeah, nobody died, but only because of that hero point thing and that only means that you just have to double tap us to end things instead of normally killing us."
Actually, it's more like a quadruple tap, plus get through the hero point, but yeah, I take their meaning. There's a reason hero points are in the game. To prevent you from dying to lucky criticals like this when no one can get to you. Hero points are integral to the game and it was balanced with them in mind.
When I hear "nobody died, but only because of that hero point thing", it sounds like "nobody died because of that armor class thing" to me. However, I can understand how other people might view the hero points as an arbitrary mechanic.
A player's fun is their own subjective perspective, and if they're not having fun, they're not having fun.
So yeah, change up the enemy tactics or change the enemies. Javelins was a good suggestion. If the players are more focused on the roleplay and feeling of how tough their characters are, play to that.
Alternatively, change the characters and jump immediately to 3rd level, where there's a larger hit point buffer and damage averages out more. At which point instead of using goblin warriors, you use goblin commandos. Identical ranged damage, identical numbers of enemies, identical experience, but your players will have twice the hit points or more.
It also sounds like the party made didn't realize what kind of adventure they were walking into if they built for melee and then the first 4 encounters in a row are all spread out in a forest with ranged enemies. Is that going to be a reoccurring theme? if so, the party should have the chance to retool/think about a party composition designed for handling longer distances. Long distance encounters are not the norm in many published adventures so it is easy to get the wrong idea if this is what the whole campaign is going to be.
As a GM you can also directly recommend to the players that they have some sort of ranged weapon option, directly telling them that in the first few combats they will encounter ranged combatants at moderate ranges. This doesn't help you at this point, but for other GMs it's not cheating to tell your players something to the effect, "Make sure you have a backup ranged weapon as you're going to encounter ranged attackers at distance and going to be at a serious disadvantage if you don't".
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It seems like there is just lack of teamwork play, which would help iron out individual players focus being askew of game reality. The concern is PCs dropping too much (if not actually dying). Apparently the Sorceror is major example of that... but nobody is doing much to protect him, apparently they are acting first but instead taking cover for themselves while leaving most vulnerable character exposed. How surprising the weakest character is then focus fired, who could have forseen that? Why isn't the PALADIN standing pround with Shield raised, who has HPs (and Resistance from Block) to take a Crit? Just keeping in front of vulnerable allies gives them benefit of soft cover, so why not delay until their turn so you can move towards enemy and have Sorceror immediately follow behind you, maintaining soft cover? (possibly casting Heal on you if you did take a hit or 2, i.e. working as a team) It sounds like there is lots of complaints and shattered illusions, but the reality is many other people are successfully playing the game. There's a learning curve OK, so they just need some perspective.
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Which is weird to me. Unsure why the creature half as strong is exactly equal on ranged weapons there. Very glass cannon/spike damage issue.
This is because of a couple of reasons, the first is that the Goblin Warrior is a much more offensively oriented monster, the second is that the Goblin Commando is a melee primary monster, while the Goblin Warrior is not. The Commando's melee attack is more than twice as damaging as their ranged one.
I mean, they have an archer ranger, a wizard, and a sorcerer as literally half the party.
The Sorcerer has a range limit of 30 feet on a two action attack, or a sling he's legitimately bad with. Calling him a ranged combatant is overly generous.
From all that, it really sounds like the main issue here with the goblins is just bad stinking luck. Nothing can save you if you can't hit the foe and they all roll 20s to hit you.
That can happen in any one fight, but it sounds like this has been going on for longer than that. How many fights with goblins are we talking here?
It is a bit of bad luck, but you have done the maths. The chances of them dropping two characters before they act is quite reasonable. Then consider some newish players who quite righlty are playing what they want, not the mechanically best options.
Level one is a bit fragile and dangerous in particular. It stabilises after that.
PF2 can have some combats that swing wildly based on a few rolls. Is that really a bad thing?
80ft is 4 actions worth of movement, which is a massive problem for a party with 2 people that can shoot at that range.
Again that doesn't mean it is a horrible unfair encounter, but it is one that plays into all of the strengths of the 4 goblins and should be treated like a harder encounter than you might have realized setting it up. The PCs won despite the entire situation stacked against them, and almost no published PF2 encounters I know of set up a similar level of environmental factors leaning exclusively in the enemies favor.
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Even without storing any of his gear in the backpack, he only has 4.2 bulk of gear total, which rounds down to 4, not up to 5.Cookware and instrument alone are 3. 6 units of rations and 4 waterskins are another 1 bulk (so 4). Then it looks like he has another 10 items of 0.1 bulk, so 5. Can you explain your numbers?
Apparently, neither I nor Aratorin looked at the left side of the sheet. My guess is we're both used to listing the total weight on the right rather than a per unit basis, which makes it easier when summing up just by looking down 1 column.
So we only counted 1 week worth of rations and 1 water skin. And I only counted 1 set of sling bullets. I take it this is some kind of deep wilderness adventure? A month and a half is a pretty long adventure away from civilization.
So with that correction, I agree I see 20 light items, which is 2 bulk plus the 3 from the instrument and cookware.
Interestingly, as soon as he eats 1 week worth of rations, it will drop to 4 Bulk and 9 light items, and thus round down to 4 bulk.
So if he traded a crossbow and and 20 bolts for his sling and 20 sling stones, he'd be at 2.7 + 1 + 0.2 = 3.9. Leaving him a 2 full bulk under his 5 bulk (and up to 9 light item) limit. So even without the backpack rule he could pull it off.
Sorcerer's don't need Material Components at all, and can use their Blood as a Focus. They aren't Clerics who study and worship a god, they are literally related to Angels.Mentioned the blood bit and not needing the pouch and he said "I still think it is good to have for various foci."
Just to clarify, a material component pouch only provides material components. Any spell foci still has to be acquired and paid for separately. Foci can also be pulled out, used, and put back as part of casting the spell, even without a material component pouch.
It is fine if he wants to have it on him, and use it to make others think he's a wizard or cleric instead of a sorcerer, or some other RP purpose, but it is not actually usable for foci.
At which point instead of using goblin warriors, you use goblin commandos. Identical ranged damageWhich is weird to me. Unsure why the creature half as strong is exactly equal on ranged weapons there. Very glass cannon/spike damage issue.
Triple the hit points and a melee attack which does roughly twice as much damage on average. As noted elsewhere, goblin commandos are more balanced in their attacks, while goblin warriors are primarily ranged with a really high stealth for their level.
Its the kind of the same reason the Ogre warrior has a +12 1d10+7 melee attack, but only a +6 1d6+7 30 foot ranged attack. The goblin commmandos and goblin warriors have a higher to hit than the Ogre in terms of ranged attacks, yet are lower level.
Also, they weren't all spread out in a forest, some were in a cave. There's a mix. And even the "long range" encounter started about 80ish feet away I think, well within range of Ray of Frost and the first range increment of crossbows/longbows.
Although, now that I think about it, goblin warriors only have a stealth of +5. I suddenly find myself wondering how you settled on 80ish feet away? That sounds pretty optimal for short bows. Just far enough to prevent a first turn move, move, strike, but close enough to only suffer a -2 ranged attack penalty. The players have a ranger and rogue in the party, which means minimum perception DC is 15 for at least two characters in the party, if not higher with wisdom.
Are they making 4 stealth rolls against the player's best perception DC each time to get that optimal range?
If they were detected at say a 200 foot range (-6 range penalty for shot, the 2nd attack wouldn't be able to get a critical against AC 18 even with a natural 20 (potentially the paladin or monk has this AC or better), and the 3rd wouldn't critical against AC 13 (which is basically trained unarmored AC and no bonuses). Alternatively, if they move up and then shoot, that is 4 or 8 fewer arrows on the 1st round. Giving the players more time to prepare before weathering 12 attacks looking for 20s.
At that point, weathering 40 total arrows isn't actually so bad if the characters have cover due to terrain. Alternatively, start them at 25 feet or less away from one of the melee (especially if they fail to notice a rogue using Avoiding Notice). At 6 hit points, a 16 strength gauntlet wielding rogue could deal 1d6+1d6+3 in a single strike on the 1st turn before the goblins act and take 1 or 2 out.
Starting ranged enemies at exactly their optimal range is like starting melee enemies already in melee. Its a force bonus.
In the cave situation, I'm guessing lighting is an issue giving away their presence, as I doubt the entire party has darkvision (awesome if they do though). Although there's the possibility of hearing the goblins walking around the corner out of LOS, allowing a start to the combat without players being able to be shot instantly.
So other options to tweak encounters are to change the environment and tactical situation, to make it easier or harder. Start the players in cover or concealment relative to the enemies, or have the encounter start at non-optimal range for the enemies. Start enemies in a non-combat stance, without their weapons in hand and far from each other. Or string them out, like having the goblins out at 85, 130, 185 and 200 feet for example.
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The Sorcerer has a range limit of 30 feet on a two action attack, or a sling he's legitimately bad with. Calling him a ranged combatant is overly generous.Maybe I'm extrapolating too much from the wizard who has Ray of Frost up to 120 feet, Electric Arc/Telekenetic Projectile up to 30 feet, and Reach Spell metamagic.
... does the Sorcerer have any of that?
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Even without storing any of his gear in the backpack, he only has 4.2 bulk of gear total, which rounds down to 4, not up to 5.Cookware and instrument alone are 3. 6 units of rations and 4 waterskins are another 1 bulk (so 4). Then it looks like he has another 10 items of 0.1 bulk, so 5. Can you explain your numbers?Apparently, neither I nor Aratorin looked at the left side of the sheet. My guess is we're both used to listing the total weight on the right rather than a per unit basis, which makes it easier when summing up just by looking down 1 column.
So we only counted 1 week worth of rations and 1 water skin. And I only counted 1 set of sling bullets. I take it this is some kind of deep wilderness adventure? A month and a half is a pretty long adventure away from civilization.
So with that correction, I agree I see 20 light items, which is 2 bulk plus the 3 from the instrument and cookware.
Interestingly, as soon as he eats 1 week worth of rations, it will drop to 4 Bulk and 9 light items, and thus round down to 4 bulk.
So if he traded a crossbow and and 20 bolts for his sling and 20 sling stones, he'd be at 2.7 + 1 + 0.2 = 3.9. Leaving him a 2 full bulk under his 5 bulk (and up to 9 light item) limit. So even without the backpack rule he could pull it off.
Sorcerer's don't need Material Components at all, and can use their Blood as a Focus. They aren't Clerics who study and worship a god, they are literally related to Angels.Mentioned the blood bit and not needing the pouch and he said "I still think it is good to have for various foci."Just to clarify, a material component pouch only provides material components. Any spell foci still has to be acquired and paid for separately. Foci can also be pulled out, used, and put back as part of casting the spell, even without a material component pouch.
It is fine if he wants to have it on him, and use it to make others...
Yeah, that's a weird inventory sheet. I did not see the quantities. Why does anyone need 6 weeks of rations and 4 waterskins? Are you playing The Hunger Games in a desert?
Taking into account the quantities, yes, it's 5 bulk, but only 3 once you take into account the Backpack.
I suddenly find myself wondering how you settled on 80ish feet away?Perhaps a bit ironically: to help the ranger.
The second encounter of the campaign (vs some deserters turned bandit, level 1 fighters with bad gear) started like 20-30 feet away after some discussion failed. One of the bandits immediately got in the face of the ranger, who then felt very ineffective because A, the volley trait on his longbow was hindering him and B, he didn't want to provoke for firing. In fact, after the battle he decided to switch to a shortbow but still felt like maybe he should just go melee so he got a strength bonus to his attacks (even getting a composite bow only gives half strength).
Yes, unfortunately, Longbows are bad. However, with a Shortbow, there is absolutely no downside to firing while in Melee. A Shortbow has Reload 0, so it takes 0 Interact Actions to Reload. Not only does it not provoke AoO from the few enemies that actually have it, but you get to take advantage of Flanking.
A Shortbow is literally just a better Spear.
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Yes, unfortunately, Longbows are bad. However, with a Shortbow, there is absolutely no downside to firing while in Melee. A Shortbow has Reload 0, so it takes 0 Interact Actions to Reload. Not only does it not provoke AoO from the few enemies that actually have it, but you get to take advantage of Flanking.
A Shortbow is literally just a better Spear.
That is wrong, it will still provoke AoO if the creature have it, because doing a Ranged Attack is one of the triggers of AoO, a shortbow being a ranged weapon considers all their attacks as ranged attacks even at melee range.
The Sorcerer has a range limit of 30 feet on a two action attack, or a sling he's legitimately bad with. Calling him a ranged combatant is overly generous.Maybe I'm extrapolating too much from the wizard who has Ray of Frost up to 120 feet, Electric Arc/Telekenetic Projectile up to 30 feet, and Reach Spell metamagic.
Unfortunately yeah. With a 10 in strength, a 12 in Dex, only simple weapon proficiency, and only the divine list to pull from, a level 1 Angelic Sorcerer's only effective attack options are chill touch (melee range), Daze (60 foot but sub-par damage, and doesn't work on mindless enemies), and Disrupt Undead (30 foot, which is highly restrictive in its targeting).
Unlike a Universalist Wizard (the only caster who gets a class feat at 1st, even specialists don't after the errata), Reach spell isn't an option unless you're a human/half-elf/half-orc who took Natural Ambition. And to be honest, a human divine Sorcerer should prioritize Adapted Cantrip if they want to have a real ranged attack like Ray of Frost, and take the Reach metamagic at level 2.
Being able to use Divine Lance (still only 30 feet, and also highly restrictive targeting - only works against 1 alignment) for a Divine Sorcerer is only possible if the GM says its OK. Sorcerers don't have a deity in the same sense a cleric or champion does. A cleric literally has a class feature called "Deity". Worshiping a deity is arguably not the same thing as having it in the cleric sense, so its not generally true Sorcerers can use it in all campaigns. Depends on how you, the GM, choose to handle it.
So this particular character, while potentially providing great roleplaying for the player, is going to have severely limited offensive success in combat. The choices made in creating it look to be all the least offensive ones. Which is normally fine if that is what the player was aiming for.
Angelic Sorcerers at low levels basically use their 1st level spell slots to heal, buff, and debuff, and that is about it unless you use your stats and racial choices to fill the gaps. If you happen to be fighting demons, devils or undead, then their attack cantrips can shine, but otherwise, they're sub-par direct combatants.
Versatile Humans with Adapted Cantrip would be a huge boost, as that provides an option like Ray of Frost (120 foot range) or Electric Arc (two targets). At which point the 2nd level class feat could be used for Reach metamagic, allowing for hitting 2 targets out to 60 feet for 3 actions or maybe 1 out to 150 feet.
An Elf might have started with 16 Dexterity and 18 charisma (10 Str /16 Dex/10 Con/12 Int/10 Wis/18 Cha), and grab the Elven racial feat for sword and bow proficiency. +6 to hit at 100 feet isn't bad, plus 16 AC.
A 16 Str/18 Cha stat line can go towards Champion archetype at 2nd level to become a heavy armor Sorcerer with a shield to become much harder to hurt. At which point they can hit stuff in melee as well with a strength bonus. Plus more carrying capacity for backup ranged weapons and that heavy armor.
At 9th they start to get access to slightly decent attacks like Flamestrike. At 8th, Crossblooded evolution can get them access to an attack spell from another list, and then make it a signature spell. However, its a long slog to get there from level 1 if you're just relying on Daze and Divine Lance.
If its really true that you'd almost consider the party a 5 member party instead of 6, my guess is the Sorcerer player is also really frustrated. Its sounds like it from at least one of the quotes you provided, assuming that was the sorcerer's player.
If the sorcerer player is the one having the least amount of fun (or its actively not fun), they need to figure out, in addition to the RP out of combat elements, what would they find fun and satisfying to do in combat. And then they need to change the character so that they can do that. And it should be possible while still retaining the RP elements I presume drew them to the class (perhaps with a bit of reskinning), or maybe the limited spells per day put a damper on the heal/buff/debuff plan they envisioned.
Edit: Just realized the party composition, and the Angelic Sorcerer could be imagined to fill the "healer" role, which isn't strictly necessary. The player wasn't forced into that role, were they? That is always a recipe for disaster for player satisfaction in a party.
That is wrong, it will still provoke AoO if the creature have it, because doing a Ranged Attack is one of the triggers of AoO, a shortbow being a ranged weapon considers all their attacks as ranged attacks even at melee range.Yes, unfortunately, Longbows are bad. However, with a Shortbow, there is absolutely no downside to firing while in Melee. A Shortbow has Reload 0, so it takes 0 Interact Actions to Reload. Not only does it not provoke AoO from the few enemies that actually have it, but you get to take advantage of Flanking.
A Shortbow is literally just a better Spear.
Ah, you're right. I missed that. There are so few enemies that have it that it hasn't come up yet in any campaigns I've played.
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The second encounter of the campaign (vs some deserters turned bandit, level 1 fighters with bad gear) started like 20-30 feet away after some discussion failed. One of the bandits immediately got in the face of the ranger, who then felt very ineffective because A, the volley trait on his longbow was hindering him and B, he didn't want to provoke for firing. In fact, after the battle he decided to switch to a shortbow but still felt like maybe he should just go melee so he got a strength bonus to his attacks (even getting a composite bow only gives half strength).
Just to comment on this, I'll note switch hitting rangers are a classic build.
A Ranger has no reason not to have both a short sword and a composite longbow. They have identical to-hit bonuses, assuming their Dexterity is their highest stat. Both can use Dex for their to-hit bonus and benefit from strength for damage (bow to a lesser extent), and both benefit from Hunt Prey + Flurry.
I'd recommend the Quick Draw feat at level 2 in that case. That way at ranges 30 feet to 0, they use the short sword, and at longer ranges they use the longbow, and reduce action costs to switch.
Keep in mind, a shortsword can be used even with 1 hand on the longbow, so no need to stow it or drop it. The only inefficiency comes when you want to go back from melee to ranged by stowing the shortsword, but that is no different than using a move action to get back into melee with the next target.
... does the Sorcerer have any of that?Turns out no, I just assumed the Wizard and Sorcerer were very similar.
Its not an unreasonable assumption if you've played PF1 or D&D. This is the first edition where sorcerers can have a spell list radically different from a wizard.
A divine Sorcerer plays like a cloistered cleric without the extra heal spells, favored weapon proficiency, and fewer hit points, in exchange for spontaneous casting and not needing to follow a deity at all.
A 1st level cleric (who is forced to the Divine list) with 18 Wis and 16 Charisma can get 4 heal spells and 2 prepared spells per day, compared to the Sorcerer's 3 total spontaneous spells, for example. With the same hit points if their Con is 10 instead of 14.
A Draconic bloodline Sorcerer, with Arcane spell list, for example, does play a lot like a wizard though. Perhaps a little bit better in the blasting department with Dangerous Sorcerery.
Depends on how you, the GM, choose to handle it.It does say "deity" in lower case which makes it look like not a keyword. I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt here.
Its sounds like it from at least one of the quotes you provided, assuming that was the sorcerer's player.From the monk, actually.
Just realized the party composition, and the Angelic Sorcerer could be imagined to fill the "healer" role, which isn't strictly necessary. The player wasn't forced into that role, were they?Definitely not.
None of those were my posts. ;-)
Here is what I’m hearing:
“Somebody does each combat, that sucks.”
“We are all new and learning the game.”
Addressing the 2nd point first, every group I have played PF2 with has had a few levels worth of settling in. This is a different game entirely than PF1 or D&D. The math is different, the tactics and options are different. There has been some good tactical advice in this thread, but most importantly, give it TIME. I highly recommend a short learning adventure. Maybe a few levels worth. Let people feel out the options. So many ways to excel, but so many ways to do poorly in this edition. Only time will teach.
Now the first point. Your player is like several of my players in that they equate gaining the dying condition with “I died.” I’m not sure why that is. Poor reading of the rules? Frustration with not getting to do cool stuff on their turn? Too much video game thinking, like you die then respawn? Could be anything. I try to get across that the moments when a PC gains the dying condition are the exciting moments from action movies when the hero gets their bell rung and their friends are in danger and everything has gone off the rails and the heroes are scrambling to try to get the situation back under control. Rather than simply “I died, this blows, I’ll go get a new drink and be mad until I get an actual turn again.”
Maybe it is just perspective. Nobody tells stories of those fights when everything goes like clockwork. But my group still talks about that one time the Lich was slowly TPKing us and the rogue chose to sunder the bag of holding that had the Lich's phylactery in it rather than go down swinging, because then at least the Lich wouldn’t get a hold of its phylactery. That was tense and gripping and the stakes were so high and people died, but it was memorable. I suspect that in time your players may look back on tough fights fondly. But sometimes it takes time and perspective for that to kick in.
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Given that spiritual weapon is on the occult list and lists having a deity as a requirement, I think it's safe to say that the intent is that you should be a worshiper of a deity, not necessarily that you need to have the Deity class feature.
Honestly, I don't think there was intent here at all: it seems more that divine sorcerers where an afterthought tacked on after a cleric spell list was already custom made just for them. So more "clerics are intended to have deities so theirs spells assume that and divine sorcerers are unlucky enough to have those spells'.
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That reasoning works for things like Divine Lance or Divine Wrath. But making Spiritual Weapon an Occult spell, with the requirement to have a deity, seems more deliberate.Given that spiritual weapon is on the occult list and lists having a deity as a requirement, I think it's safe to say that the intent is that you should be a worshiper of a deity, not necessarily that you need to have the Deity class feature.Honestly, I don't think there was intent here at all: it seems more that divine sorcerers where an afterthought tacked on after a cleric spell list was already custom made just for them. So more "clerics are intended to have deities so theirs spells assume that and divine sorcerers are unlucky enough to have those spells'.
IMO, I think it's a similar thing: they made the spell for the divine list and someone came alone latter and said 'this could fit in this list' as opposed to 'lets add a spell to the occult list that requires a deity'. To me it seem odd to intentionally doing it and not making a note for occult users [even it it's JUST to say you still need a deity].