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I believe the Shifter has a similar Class potential as the Swashbuckler did; and i feel most of the forum was just as surprised by how quickly it came out, as well as how solidly the concept was(or at least those are the comments i saw surrounding the PT).
I would start by wondering what role people feel it should/would fill if it was a class. Swashbuckler seemed to be built to fill the role of movement and debuffer; or a nice mix of Rogue and Monk that no class really filled as smoothly at the time.
My opinion is that a Shifter would fill an Unarmed Focused Maneuver Specialist. With at least a focus on feats similar to Brutal Bully, Thrash, Knockback, Furious Grab, Crushing Grab, Guarded Movement, and Shattering Strike.
Shifting should be a focus as well; it's kind of in the class's name. Some suggestions made so far makes me lean into a Main Battleform Flow-State, similar to how Rage or Panache works; and feats and focus spells could lean more into Chimeric Morphing, like freely adding wings, or changing unarmed damage types(S/P/B). Adding flat damage would also seem appropriate so the class could more easily be represented by many different shifting concepts. Precision Damage for animal shifters; Elemental Damage for elemental shifters; and so on.
Being able to use shifting prowess for utility is also a must imo. Weather it's the ability to stay in certain forms for 24 hours, like pest forms; or shifting parts of your limbs for a bonus in things like climbing or swimming.
An initial tie to Primal seems most suited, but you could also tie in Spell Traditions to Shifter Order(for lack of a better term). Animal and Elemental would make most sense as Primal; but Construct or Ooze would make just as much sense with Arcane and Occult.
As an aside, there's also the matter of action economy to consider. Look at Sudden Charge; it has restrictions, but you can do in two actions what would normally take an entire turn. Shifter could have things like that.
For example, say a feat that lets you quickly transform to gain a certain animals speed, then stride and strike? Or maybe striking with one form, then shifting and striking with another?
There's also things like using the environment, or gaining certain advantages for having certain features. Maybe a feat lets you climb while grappling someone so long as you have a climb speed, letting you lift them up and bat them around, then throw or just drop them. Then maybe another higher level feat lets you do as hawks do; swoop in, grab your prey, they drop it from on high.
And reactions. Maybe when you're about to be hit you can transform as a reaction, either using it to get a buffer from temp HP or a higher AC that might help you evade the blow. And then advance on that, like maybe a reaction lets you use your animalistic features to demoralize someone who's struck you.
And then additional feats, like maybe you increase the damage die with your unarmed strikes while shifted, or reduce the penalty for multiple attacks. Maybe using certain forms in certain situations gives you a bonus for certain skills. Like a bonus for intimidating enemies while you're shifted into a more imposing form, or having an easier time tumbling through spaces and slipping past enemies.
Hell if you want a good idea of the Shifter, just look at some of the crazy s#@& Zoans get up to in One Piece! It ultimately just comes down to a matter of being inventive with how you use the premise.
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The threshold is pretty much the opposite of your concern: is the concept broad enough to have anywhere between forty and sixty feats exploring it? I'm currently on the fence about whether or not the shifter concept has that much depth. It's possible that it does. But when I look at the wild druidic order and see about half of the functions of the shifter class already available, it does make me wonder.
Don't wonder. Count. Just counting the Wildshape feats in the druid class, you have 12 feats. You're going to be hard pressed to get even a majority of those all on the same character without that being the only thing you add onto the character. And that number doesn't include combat maneuver and exploration feats, which the druid class has little need for (since they have spells), nor standard feats like Focus recovery. You also can't just combine what are currently multiple druid feats into single archetype feats, because that makes a druid who takes the archetype suddenly more powerful than every other druid.
That's why I prefer my "can this be done 6 feats or less?", because that's about the limit in what a single character can safely take without stretching things passed the ridiculous. If you need 10 or more to really carry the concept, then you might want to consider a class where you'd get 4-8 of those for "free" as part of any class chassis. Once you commit to that, then making a couple dozen options that put a new spin on standard powers like multistrike, powerful strike, defense, and charge is fairly straightforward.
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I'm honestly surprised that someone would think Shifter doesn't reach the bar of having enough potential for a full class.
There are *so many* Shifter themed abilities that would find a home in the class. Like, if Swashbuckler made it in as it's own class it seems clear to me that Shifter should be no question.
Different class paths could include:
1. natural attack specialist who transforms their body but doesn't necessarily wildshape
2. form generalists who go fully into different animal forms for different purposes
3. form specialists who focus on a small number of different animal forms to be their "go-to" for combat and utility
The roles a Shifter can fill could include:
1. Premier scent based tracker
2. Problem solver alternative to rogue with their wide skill list, using varied forms
3. Animal based "tank" class
4. Upper limit on non-caster based movement type availability
You could fill out half the feat list just by poaching things from World of Warcraft feral druids.
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My opinion is that a Shifter would fill an Unarmed Focused Maneuver Specialist. With at least a focus on feats similar to Brutal Bully, Thrash, Knockback, Furious Grab, Crushing Grab, Guarded Movement, and Shattering Strike.
Shifting should be a focus as well; it's kind of in the class's name. Some suggestions made so far makes me lean into a Main Battleform Flow-State, similar to how Rage or Panache works; and feats and focus spells could lean more into Chimeric Morphing, like freely adding wings, or changing unarmed damage types(S/P/B). Adding flat damage would also seem appropriate so the class could more easily be represented by many different shifting concepts. Precision Damage for animal shifters; Elemental Damage for elemental shifters; and so on.
If we are going with that approach, I feel like EVERY feat (or at least feat line) should actually be its own transformation/pseudo transformation, where the shifter assumes a form/grows a part that does the action.
Grab feats would be growing tentacles. Shove feats would involve bull horns get traction on the target. Trip would be growing a tail and doing a sweep.
Going back to my 'imperfect wild shape' idea, most of these would just be a partial shift, and very temporary/unstable, lasting only for the extent of the action. More permanent shapeshifting (which would be the focus of utility actions like flight) should be the focus spells- you expend focus to maintain the shape without taking additional actions.
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I think the fact that a lot of people have distinct ideas of what a shifter is shows that there is plenty of conceptual room for a class. I'd like the rapid partial shifting style, but a big part of the appeal of the idea for me has always been being able to create various kinds of Weres. I'd like options that reward picking a main form and sticking with it. Kind of trading out utility for specialization.
I could easily see turning something like werewolf into it's own class (see the multiple entire WoD games built around them), but that would obviously be a bit too niche to create for a game like PF (though, an archetype could probably work). Shifters would be an important part of making that character concept viable to me, while also providing value to a broad range of other players. Instead of needing to create a wererat, wereboar, werewolf, wearbear ect. Just bundle them all in one and call it good.
I think the fact that a lot of people have distinct ideas of what a shifter is shows that there is plenty of conceptual room for a class. I'd like the rapid partial shifting style, but a big part of the appeal of the idea for me has always been being able to create various kinds of Weres. I'd like options that reward picking a main form and sticking with it. Kind of trading out utility for specialization.
I could easily see turning something like werewolf into it's own class (see the multiple entire WoD games built around them), but that would obviously be a bit too niche to create for a game like PF (though, an archetype could probably work). Shifters would be an important part of making that character concept viable to me, while also providing value to a broad range of other players. Instead of needing to create a wererat, wereboar, werewolf, wearbear ect. Just bundle them all in one and call it good.
The issue there might be that the class isn't well defined with its own unique flavor, and we are all going off on our own tangents based off of what comes to mind when we try to imagine a class with the same "shifter".
I specifically know that I am going that direction, aiming for something other than pf1e's 'druid, but with some less features'.
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I think the fact that a lot of people have distinct ideas of what a shifter is shows that there is plenty of conceptual room for a class. I'd like the rapid partial shifting style, but a big part of the appeal of the idea for me has always been being able to create various kinds of Weres. I'd like options that reward picking a main form and sticking with it. Kind of trading out utility for specialization.
I could easily see turning something like werewolf into it's own class (see the multiple entire WoD games built around them), but that would obviously be a bit too niche to create for a game like PF (though, an archetype could probably work). Shifters would be an important part of making that character concept viable to me, while also providing value to a broad range of other players. Instead of needing to create a wererat, wereboar, werewolf, wearbear ect. Just bundle them all in one and call it good.
The issue there might be that the class isn't well defined with its own unique flavor, and we are all going off on our own tangents based off of what comes to mind when we try to imagine a class with the same "shifter".
I specifically know that I am going that direction, aiming for something other than pf1e's 'druid, but with some less features'.
Or Shifter could be the first class to come bundled with class archetypes. It'd be a cool way to kind of champion the subsystem and show off what it can do.
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Or Shifter could be the first class to come bundled with class archetypes. It'd be a cool way to kind of champion the subsystem and show off what it can do.I think the fact that a lot of people have distinct ideas of what a shifter is shows that there is plenty of conceptual room for a class. I'd like the rapid partial shifting style, but a big part of the appeal of the idea for me has always been being able to create various kinds of Weres. I'd like options that reward picking a main form and sticking with it. Kind of trading out utility for specialization.
I could easily see turning something like werewolf into it's own class (see the multiple entire WoD games built around them), but that would obviously be a bit too niche to create for a game like PF (though, an archetype could probably work). Shifters would be an important part of making that character concept viable to me, while also providing value to a broad range of other players. Instead of needing to create a wererat, wereboar, werewolf, wearbear ect. Just bundle them all in one and call it good.
The issue there might be that the class isn't well defined with its own unique flavor, and we are all going off on our own tangents based off of what comes to mind when we try to imagine a class with the same "shifter".
I specifically know that I am going that direction, aiming for something other than pf1e's 'druid, but with some less features'.
It's definitely one of the few classes I can easily imagine archetypes for.
As for poorly defined flavor, we literally have a class called fighter that is reasonably distinct. I'm sure Paizo will manage.
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My opinion is that a Shifter would fill an Unarmed Focused Maneuver Specialist. With at least a focus on feats similar to Brutal Bully, Thrash, Knockback, Furious Grab, Crushing Grab, Guarded Movement, and Shattering Strike.
Shifting should be a focus as well; it's kind of in the class's name. Some suggestions made so far makes me lean into a Main Battleform Flow-State, similar to how Rage or Panache works; and feats and focus spells could lean more into Chimeric Morphing, like freely adding wings, or changing unarmed damage types(S/P/B). Adding flat damage would also seem appropriate so the class could more easily be represented by many different shifting concepts. Precision Damage for animal shifters; Elemental Damage for elemental shifters; and so on.
If we are going with that approach, I feel like EVERY feat (or at least feat line) should actually be its own transformation/pseudo transformation, where the shifter assumes a form/grows a part that does the action.
Grab feats would be growing tentacles. Shove feats would involve bull horns get traction on the target. Trip would be growing a tail and doing a sweep.
Some of that could easily be done with flavor text; but i agree that Thematic Feat-Lines would be more than welcome. The Chimera one, in my mind, would be for concepts like Suneater and Kevin Levin. Overall, partial shifting seems to be a popular choice, and was definitely supported in the base class and archetypes( even if the execution was less than stellar ). Leaning favorably into the Morph trait, and specializing in Polymorph, seems like the way to go IMO.
I like the ideas mentioned about role flexibility, akin to a Feral Druid, and mixing Morph traits to allow for a Nature themed problemsolver. It gives the class a little more breadth to it than just worrying about combat role.
Style Shifter was an Archetype that revolved around Partial Shifting. With how Stances work on Monk, what would some ideas be for that? Should they allow Morphed strikes to just merge with Stances; or give them class specific Stances that make use of Morph traits? The example they give in 1e is with a Style Shifter stacking Boar Style and Boar Aspect. I’m curious what people think.
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Reading through this thread it seems like most people want 3 main options.
1. Hybrid Were-Creature Shifter – Gains different bestial features, very combat focused
2. Beastboy Shifter – Can rapidly take different forms, very versatile in function and form
3. Mystique (X-Men) Shifter – Takes on different humanoid forms, very espionage focused
I like all of the options, however, the big question is can they all work under the same Shifter chassis? Being an optimist I like to think that they can, however, I have no idea how that would work. For example the Hybrid Shifter would benefit from being able to constantly maintain its shifted form (claws, horns, teeth, etc.) so they don’t suddenly loose them in the middle of combat, the Beastboy Shifter is the complete opposite and would benefit from being able to constantly change its form, and the Mystique Shifter is in the middle sometimes needing to maintain a form for a long time and sometimes needing to rapidly change forms.
Another thing I see a lot of in this thread is if the Shifter should stay connected to nature, or if they should move away from that aspect of the Class. I think it is okay to move away from the nature connection, but I would still like to see the option to lean into that idea.
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I want a shifter with plenty of narrative options.
Shapeshifting has such a broad scope of story and design space. There's plenty of ways a dedicated shapeshifting class could be built. There's plenty of different types of shapeshifting characters in fictions that you can build characters from.
The shifter in 1e was disappointing because it was boring. Thematically, you were just a druid that can't cast spells. Mechanically, you were just a monk that replaced all your class features with claws and a less versatile wild shape. And the options to be anything else were extremely limited.
Whatever form the Shifter takes in 2E I am hoping for a Skin-Warper Archetype (think Venom, Carnage and the other Spider-Man Symbiots). Something that can warp it's flesh into deadly weapons while also causing fear and terror in peoples minds.
The possible spotting of the iconic shifter in Mwagni Expanse has renewed interest in this topic, so I thought I'd revive this thread to keep the discussion in one place.
The possible spotting of the iconic shifter in Mwagni Expanse has renewed interest in this topic, so I thought I'd revive this thread to keep the discussion in one place.
I honestly don't hold a lot hope out for a PF2 shifter. The PF1 version was real bad, and if they do anything similar to it's structure, it's not going to be what I'd want from a Shifter. A druids Wild Shape is now a short term combat spell only and I'd expect a shifter to be built in a similar way [that's if it doesn't steal/borrow the spell outright]. They COULD surprise me with a pile of non-combat options and/or combat options that do not require focus: bonus points for something to stay shape-changed longer than a few minutes.
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To my mind, a Shifter requires 10 HP/lvl, Expert Proficiency in Unarmed Attacks at lvl 5, Expert in Unarmored Defense. I'm not sure I'd go the full Wild Shape route, as that makes the Shifter too much like the Wild Order Druid.
Rather than Wild Shape, I'd provide feats that give the Shifter animal-like abilities: natural attacks, fly speed, swim speed, climb speed, improved leaping ability, poison, webs, etc.
Just my .02.
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The possible spotting of the iconic shifter in Mwagni Expanse has renewed interest in this topic, so I thought I'd revive this thread to keep the discussion in one place.I honestly don't hold a lot hope out for a PF2 shifter. The PF1 version was real bad, and if they do anything similar to it's structure, it's not going to be what I'd want from a Shifter. A druids Wild Shape is now a short term combat spell only and I'd expect a shifter to be built in a similar way [that's if it doesn't steal/borrow the spell outright]. They COULD surprise me with a pile of non-combat options and/or combat options that do not require focus: bonus points for something to stay shape-changed longer than a few minutes.
I feel like the Synthecist Summoner from the playtest is a more likely route for them to take. Wildshape and the other polymorph spells are balanced around being, well, spells. As in accessible by a character that also has access to a host of other spells. The shifter's abilities will by necessity be narrower and so possibly more powerful.
The MC shifter ability will likely be no more powerful than what an MC druid can access though. Maybe a bit better, maybe even all the way up to Wildshape itself. Which would annoy druids, but they could stand to be annoyed.
We'll have to see.
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Rather than Wild Shape, I'd provide feats that give the Shifter animal-like abilities: natural attacks, fly speed, swim speed, climb speed, improved leaping ability, poison, webs, etc.
I feel like the Synthecist Summoner from the playtest is a more likely route for them to take.
I'd be happy to see these: I just worry that whoever thought the PF1 shifter would be mostly fine by slapping wildshape on it and moving on might do the same here. :p
On the surface, I want a heavy focus on partial shifting. Grow claws, jaws, horns, tentacles, what have you, but don't usually fully shift.
I definitely agree that it needs good unarmed attack proficiency progression, good unarmored defense progression, and good HP.
Mechanically, I want it to be a Monk/Druid Hybrid.
Some focus spells, but shifting effects that are non-spell effects. Shifting being some combination of Stance or a mechanic like Rage.
No spell slots.
Sounds good. Myself, My I think the way I'd like to see it would be like the PF1 Kineticist, with all day bread and butter abilities with a selection of limited abilities. I'd be ok if the all day abilities where spell-like [like bard cantrips] and full on shifting being focus stance, rage, or some other recharge mechanic.
I imagine a druidic version of the magus. Primal wave spellcaster with master/master scaling and focus spells and feats for those focus spells focused on varied fully scaling battleform spells that benefit from handwraps (tuned to accommodate the extra accuracy). And additional flavorful shifter feats. Just my gut reaction answer for the paper person's question.
I kind of feel you can create a decent shifter concept by going martial class - MCD wild order druid. Its not 100% the same but its a decent start.
Monk animal stances could also easily be reflavoured into actual physical shifts with MCD druid wild order being picked up as you can to expand on it.
I am not saying there can't/shouldn't be a shifter class or archetype that is more specialised in it more that is currently possible to capture a fair amount of what a shifter does already if you aren't expecting full blown martial power + shifting at level 1.
A wild order druid if you are less concerned with straight martial proficient and math superiority straight up achieves most of what the shifter did.
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I imagine a druidic version of the magus. Primal wave spellcaster
I hope not that doesn't happen: not a fan of wave casting at all.
A wild order druid if you are less concerned with straight martial proficient and math superiority straight up achieves most of what the shifter did.
I'd rather the PF1 version isn't setting the bar for the PF2 version: I'd rather we upgrade a bit past a wildshape copy/paste again. I think a lot of us want more versatility, utility and breadth of options than the generic combat buff that wildshape is. IMO, wildshape only touches a very small part of the potential of a shifter class.
Rather than Wild Shape, I'd provide feats that give the Shifter animal-like abilities: natural attacks, fly speed, swim speed, climb speed, improved leaping ability, poison, webs, etc.I feel like the Synthecist Summoner from the playtest is a more likely route for them to take.I'd be happy to see these: I just worry that whoever thought the PF1 shifter would be mostly fine by slapping wildshape on it and moving on might do the same here. :p
Now that wildshape has been reduced in scope to be a mostly balanced mechanic, I think that’s not going to be their choice. I do worry that the barbarian is going to be used as a springboard though. Or it becomes a class archetype that can be applied to any martial class.
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Now that wildshape has been reduced in scope to be a mostly balanced mechanic, I think that’s not going to be their choice.Rather than Wild Shape, I'd provide feats that give the Shifter animal-like abilities: natural attacks, fly speed, swim speed, climb speed, improved leaping ability, poison, webs, etc.I feel like the Synthecist Summoner from the playtest is a more likely route for them to take.I'd be happy to see these: I just worry that whoever thought the PF1 shifter would be mostly fine by slapping wildshape on it and moving on might do the same here. :p
Well, I hope they don't but it wouldn't surprise me. Myself, I see the various ancestries with things like change shape with feats for various shapes and abilities as a pretty good template for something much better than a bog standard copy/paste wildshape.
For instance, at 1st a kitsune can be a fox all day long. At 5th you can hybrid or a non-illusion illusory disguise for 1 hour. Beastkin have hybrid form and critter shape at 1st level, Dire Form at 13th and Animal Shape [aerial form, animal form, dinosaur form or pest form] at 17th. These things might not be as powerful as early the short term wildshape, but that last as long as you want and that's the kind of thing I'd like to see: more targeted abilities that aren't on a combat timer. That's not to say there isn't room for combat duration abilities but I don't want those to be the only things available.
There's would just be something unsatisfying about a master of changing shapes being inherently unable to change into an inoffensive form for more than 10 min at 20th level when some races can do so at 1st as long as they want...
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All I want is some abberant shifting options so I can just Tetsuo all over enemies.
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I could see a druid archetype working if it changes HP as well as proficiencies. Polymorph spells backed up by a martial chassis are pretty great, except for their duration and frequency.
They could get wave casting, then turn those slots into more polymorphs, or get a focus point discount or recharge ability to allow them to polymorph more frequently or indefinitely. That by itself could lay the foundation for a decent class.
Then you can add on abilities like borrowing attacks from previous forms as you shift parts of your body selectively, or bonuses for shifting between different forms, or temp HP boosts for going into beefy forms, and things like that.
I think the design space for a Shifter is wide open. There are so many ways to achieve it now, I have high hopes.
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I could see a druid archetype working if it changes HP as well as proficiencies. Polymorph spells backed up by a martial chassis are pretty great, except for their duration and frequency.Polymorph spells are actually barely better on martials than casters (to hit wise). They're even pretty much every odd level, and generally only 1 behind on odd levels. At least if you use level appropriate spells. It's basically just one more bumped save with the success = critical success and 2/lvl more HP you're getting from being martial.
A polymorph focused character who switches between a multitude of forms, as a Shifter should definitely be able to do, will appreciate always being able to use one attack bonus and AC.
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Oh, I so want a shifter class that could fully use bestiary entries. XD
Things I'd imagine my perfect shifter to be :
- You can stay shifted basically all the time if it's a form somewhat lower than your level (no super strong constant abilities).
- Turning into your strongest forms is a focus power.
- You pick specific forms straight from bestiaries and gain their senses, base movement speeds, attacks and vulnerabilities (weakness or special vulnerability).
- To avoid people being able to turn into everything and solve every problem, you are limited to a few forms. When leveling up, you choose forms much like a spontaneous caster picks spells.
- There might also be a "sub-class" that you pick at the beginning which dictates what type of creature you can become, with feats allowing you to grab extra types of creatures. These sub-classes would also give you specific benefits from the start, so you might get better unarmed proficiencies if you select animal, a spell-casting proficiency or ability to cast cantrips if you pick fairies, etc. Initial publishing would include animal, plant, fairy, ooze and elemental sub-classes, with others like dragon, celestial and fiend coming in further books.
- You would use your own stats for proficiencies and bonus damage. That way, you keep your own skills, not the ones for whatever creature you picked, and you can build for a more caster-like shifter with shapes that grant spells or build for a more martial-like shifter with high strength and so on. This would make the class very versatile without making every shifter a perfect jack-of-all-trades that outshines everyone by just picking the right shape.
- Some feats give you extra focus powers or better regeneration.
- Some feats give you bonuses when interacting with creatures of a similar type.
- Some feats make you better at Recall Knowledge about creatures of your type (maybe you always get one extra info?).
- Some feats grant you access to turning into creatures other than your main type.
- Some feats grant you access to your creature's more special abilities, such as spell-casting, auras, unique actions, resistances and immunities, etc.
I'm probably expecting too much, but that would be amazing.
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Big things I'd want from a Shifter are utility-focused shapeshifting and viable strategies that involve frequently changing shape in-battle. Turning into small or inconspicuous animals to sneak around and turning into larger creatures several times in a fight for different reasons.
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As long as it is a full martial and has nothing to do whatsoever with the druid and wild shape, I'll be pretty happy. The 1E shifter is not particularly interesting and far too narrow in scope.
As for ideas - your "shifter form" could be anything from a partial to a full transformation depending on level and player choice. I don't see a good reason to restrict this base ability too much, especially not with an arbitrary time limit. A shifter should be able to stay shifted indefinitely. Resource use should be reserved for extemely powerful abilities, which is an eccelent opportunity for the focus point system.
Your shifter form should be determined by a class path. This cannot be too granular, simply because it would take too much space, but I think what the summoner has going on might be viable. It also shouldn't just be limited to monster families, things like "humanoid shifter" (the classic "turn into other people" shifter) or a shifter that just shifts its base form around are paths that could be included.
To spice the class up one could include some metamagic-esk abilities. Something along the lines of the Fleshwarp's Mutate Weapon. Maybe even longer-lasting effects via the use of focus points or a new system?
Fingers crossed that this class will be in the next playtest :D
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So... for me? I'd like to see the following:
- Pure martial. No daily spells of any kind. Abilities should be generally at-will, with some focus powers. If you want something that has spellcasting, just mod a druid.
- Decent martial character, balanced against other martial characters. Gear applies in the standard ways. You can go buy handwraps at the monk store. Transformations don't affect your core stats much.
- A decent shifting library by default. The Barbarian pretty much already has the "I'm a martial that turns into one thing, and I do it well" covered. It's got giant, dragon, and beast, and if we want another one, it's much easier to create another barbarian instinct than to implement it as a shifter. By extension, shifters need to lean a bit more on the utility side of things, and even the most focused shifter needs options.
- Something interesting. Perhaps... bodypart shifting? Like, you have a shift slot for your legs, you have a shift slot for your hands, you have a shift slot for your back, and so forth.
So the basic structure might go like this. You have a library of bodypart morphs available at various levels. As you level up, you gain more of them, and you can retrain the ones you have into higher-level morphs. You wind up with maybe as many as five slots to fill (arms/legs/head/body/back?), with maybe a total of 12-15 known morphs to put in them. Each morph gives you one or more useful/interesting features, generally at-will. Each slot can hold only one morph at a time. Morphs stick around as long as you might like them to, but it normally takes enough time to shift that if you get into a fight, you're wearing what you have on. There are feat-purchasable options that let you switch morphs more quickly - everything from a relatively low-level focus spell to a near-capstone feat that just lets you choose which morphs you want every round as a free action. You can spend feats to get more morphs known, to get specific particularly cool morphs added to your list, and to upgrade certain morphs to be that much better in various ways. There are also feats that give you special maneuvers that require that you have certain morphs on to use them.
For proficiencies, You're an unarmed fighter by default. One of the initial type options lets you have standard proficiency progression for martial weapons and leave one hand untransformed if they prefer, for those who want to play sword-and-claw and pretend to be Lion-o, or run around as an archer with rabbit legs or something. Armor proficiencies are light or unarmored. Prime stat is dex or str.
- What is this class's Cool Thing? Two things, really. First, the shifter has easy access to all of those special-case features. Need someone with a climb speed? A swim speed? Water breathing? tunneling? A shifter has much easier access to that stuff than any other martial (as long as they have a bit of time to shift into form). Now a caster with the right spells known can achieve any of these things too, and a number of others besides, but the shifter isn't burning spell slots to do it. The second is the combat side of adjusting to the situation. The shifter fights like a martial, but the shifting library means that they can adjust which martial they fight like between battles, to complement their allies or thwart expected foes. A shifter can walk into a PUG, look around the table, and be able to adjust, to a degree, to the needs of their fellow party members on the fly. Even in a more stable group, being able to choose between things like off-tank, tripper/grappler, and high-mobility damage dealer depending on what's needed can be quite useful.
- What is this class not as good at: Compared to other martials, it pays for its versatility and utility with somewhat lower total damage. So, when morphed for grappling, you might be as good at the actual grappling part as a fighter-based or barbarian-based grappler, but you're never going to rack up the level of additional damage on the side that they get to inflict *while* grappling. Defenses are likewise moderate. Like, their defenses aren't terrible or anything. It's still an entirely viable melee class... but there are martial classes that are particularly good at defense, and this isn't one of them.
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A Shifter would have heavy overlap with existing subclasses (Animal Barb and Wild Druid), so I would prefer it as an Archetype to be honest.
If we get it as a class for some reason, I would prefer it to have the same type of spellcasting as Magus and Summoner will have.
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I'd prefer a Shifter to have no spells, or spells locked to shifting.
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A Shifter would have heavy overlap with existing subclasses (Animal Barb and Wild Druid)
I'd honestly prefer if they didn't have a "heavy overlap"... There is a LOT more to shapechanging than a combat buff.
Reading this thread makes me wonder how well reflavoring a monk's abilities would work as a shapeshifter. You could make it so the stances actually morph your body into what they are mimicking when you use them. And reflavor feats like crushing grab to lobster claw, dancing leaf to skin flaps, and wall run into spider legs.
When I think of a shifter class, I think of a summoner's ediolon ability, but transforms instead of summoning. It would be very customizable, can grow larger as they level, and the eventual Kaiju form, similar to the Druids, but with many more options.
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A Shifter would have heavy overlap with existing subclasses (Animal Barb and Wild Druid), so I would prefer it as an Archetype to be honest.
If we get it as a class for some reason, I would prefer it to have the same type of spellcasting as Magus and Summoner will have.
On the one side you say it would overlap too heavily with druid to be worth having as a class. On the other side, you say that you want it to have spellcasting. Isn't "drop the spellcasting" the easiest, most obvious way to distinguish it from the druid? For that matter, what is it about the concept of "shifter" that calls for spells at all?
The barbarian-based transformations are relatively short duration transformations into a specific combat form. The obvious way to avoid overlapping with those is to lean into having a bunch of different forms to change into, make sure that you've got a decent number of utility/noncombat forms available, and allow indefinite-duration transformations.
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The barbarian-based transformations are relatively short duration transformations into a specific combat form. The obvious way to avoid overlapping with those is to lean into having a bunch of different forms to change into, make sure that you've got a decent number of utility/noncombat forms available, and allow indefinite-duration transformations.
Do we even need to avoid overlap that much? I think it is perfectly fine for different classes to have overlap and be able to fill the same conceptual niche to various degrees. Look at the rogue, investigator and swashbuckler. The rogue shares quite a few feats with both classes. The mastermind racket is basically an investigator. Same with the scoundrel and the swashbuckler. And everything has worked out well so far, at least in my experience. Plus, as you pointed out, the animal barbarian's (poly)morph abilities are very limited in their uptime, which is already plenty different for me.
I, personally, would be totally fine with my shifter only having two forms, his "normal" ancestry form and whatever he transforms into. I wouldn't mind additional options for more forms, but I doubt I'd take them. This should be 100% a case for player choice, not stuff just piled on to make it sufficiently different.
I like the idea of shifter's 'sub-class' being tied to a creature type.
Beast shifters building for bonus precision damage.
Elemental or Dragon shifters building for burst and area damage.
Ooze shifters building for passive and persistent damage.
Construct shifters building for defense and resistance.Also, here's a wacky idea. What if you gave a class without base spell casting the Basic, Expert, and Master spellcasting feats as class feats?
If you had a Dragon Shifter subclass, it might make sense for them to be able to develop spell casting ability while a Beast Shifter doesn't.
14 spell slots seems like a whole lot for free if it's a hybrid class. I'd go for a focus class or a wave caster if you wanted any magic on a shifter. Other people either have to be a full caster or pay 5 feats (4 for Eldritch trickster). Just getting 14 spell slots would have to nerf the martial aspect in some way.
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A Shifter would have heavy overlap with existing subclasses (Animal Barb and Wild Druid), so I would prefer it as an Archetype to be honest.
If we get it as a class for some reason, I would prefer it to have the same type of spellcasting as Magus and Summoner will have.
Both druids and barbarians only turn into one thing at a time, I'm looking for a shifter that shapeshifts more frequently. Druids and Barbarians shapeshift and then fight, I want someone who shapeshifts while they fight, and actively leverages a fluidity of form to gain an edge. Maybe it completely changes form every turn, goes from a boar charging into the fray into a bear to grab and hold people and then a turtle to protect themself from incoming attacks. Or maybe it's a mild morph effect, they can spend an action to graft an aspect of a different creature onto their current battle form like starting as a bear but growing a tortoise shell for a defensive boost or sprouting horns for a powerful charge. Either way, I want a shapeshifter who changes an aspect of their form several times in a fight with a mechanical consequence.
I don't care about spellcasting. If that fits the class best, then fine but it feels secondary to the concepts I want to explore via shapeshifter.
Do we even need to avoid overlap that much? I think it is perfectly fine for different classes to have overlap and be able to fill the same conceptual niche to various degrees. Look at the rogue, investigator and swashbuckler. The rogue shares quite a few feats with both classes. The mastermind racket is basically an investigator. Same with the scoundrel and the swashbuckler. And everything has worked out well so far, at least in my experience. Plus, as you pointed out, the animal barbarian's (poly)morph abilities are very limited in their uptime, which is already plenty different for me.
I, personally, would be totally fine with my shifter only having two forms, his "normal" ancestry form and whatever he transforms into. I wouldn't mind additional options for more forms, but I doubt I'd take them. This should be 100% a case for player choice, not stuff just piled on to make it sufficiently different.
Okay. I can see the *conceptual* space for a single-form shifter - someone who's learned how to adjust their body, and who is tweaking and refining it as they go, as their path to power. The question is, what's the tactical space? If you've only got one form, and you can stay in it as long as you like, then the shapeshifting itself isn't really part of your tactics, since you're always in the same shape as far as combat is concerned - it's just that that shape is "battle form" rather than the "ancestry form" that most other folks use. The investigator gets the whole "devise a strategem"/"pursue a lead"/"strategic strike" thing, plus a focus on out-of-combat utility and some interesting stuff about recalling knowledge. Rogue gets sneak attack, a bunch of ways to make someone flat-footed, and a big pile of proficiencies. The swashbuckler gets panache and finishers. What does the shifter get, if it's not the shifting?
Okay. I can see the *conceptual* space for a single-form shifter - someone who's learned how to adjust their body, and who is tweaking and refining it as they go, as their path to power. The question is, what's the tactical space? If you've only got one form, and you can stay in it as long as you like, then the shapeshifting itself isn't really part of your tactics, since you're always in the same shape as far as combat is concerned - it's just that that shape is "battle form" rather than the "ancestry form" that most other folks use. The investigator gets the whole "devise a strategem"/"pursue a lead"/"strategic strike" thing, plus a focus on out-of-combat utility and some interesting stuff about recalling knowledge. Rogue gets sneak attack, a bunch of ways to make someone flat-footed, and a big pile of proficiencies. The swashbuckler gets panache and finishers. What does the shifter get, if it's not the shifting?
Assuming that the shifter in question is using battle forms as-we-generally-understand-them, you could empower them to be able to get extra mileage out of the forms. Use different kinds of actions. Longer durations. Something like "sudden mutation" to get surprise reach on your bite or something.
As a full class, I could see shifters getting subclasses for: many forms, single form, humanoid-but-monsterous-features form.