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Looking at the new Bard Feats that grant focus spells (aka non-cantrip composition spells), it looks like none of them have the language that you get a focus point added to your pool. I was wondering if this was intentional, or a mistake?
Hymn of Healing
Ode to Ouroboros
Symphony of the Unfettered Heart
Pied Piping
The older focus spell feats (pre-APG), like Soothing Ballad and Inspire Heroics and fatal aria and song of the fallen, tend to have the "Must Have A Focus Pool" Prerequisite (which shouldn't be a problem as all bards start with a focus pool of 1) and add 1 focus point to the pool (which is capped at 3 so I don't see taking a lot of these spells getting out of hand power-wise).
Actually, I could be wrong, but I think my quick perusal of the bard feats indicate that ALL of the old feats that grant composition (non-cantrip) spells have a prerequisite of having a focus pool AND grant a focus point while ALL of the new feats that grant composition (non-cantrip) spells do not have the prerequisite and do not say they grant a focus point.
So: MISTAKE or NOT A MISTAKE?
And I apologize in advance if I'm just flat out reading this wrong (in which case I am going to be very embarrassed!).
So it looks like the CRB left room for this to be a possibility - but it certainly breaks the trend of how these feats had functioned in the CRB. If I had to guess, I'd say it was a mistake.Some abilities allow you to increase the Focus Points
in your pool beyond 1. Typically, these are feats that give
you a new focus spell and increase the number of points
in your pool by 1.
On that CRB wording, I read it as "some feats do [X], typically these feats do [Y] and [X]." I.e. X implies Y
The feats Captain Zoom is referring to are feats that do Y. And we do not have anything that says that Y implies X.
The opening left by the book by that "typically" is for feats that raise your maximum focus and do nothing else (or at least, don't provide a new focus power).
But I agree that Y should imply X in most cases. (There's an oddity that came up with regards to...cleric? druid? with accessing domain spells and taking a feat a second time, and I'm fine with the feat giving a focus point the first time and not the second, though having the language cleaned up a bit would be nice).
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FAQ candidate for sure but I have been running it with FAR simpler wording that has so far achieved the same results as the RAW until the APG though I'll need to take a closer look at these.
Any feature that grants you a Focus Spell increases your Focus Pool by 1 to a max of 3, unless otherwise noted, to me, that's what they were trying to communicate when they wrote "typically" in regard to how this functions.
So: MISTAKE or NOT A MISTAKE?
Its not limited to old and new bard feats. The differences exist in the core rule book. Even inside individual classes.
Too hard to tell.
Its not that bad to have two focus spell options but only have the pool to cast one. I mean you only recover one on a short rest till you take a level 12+ feat so that is your typical state in the adventuring day regardless of whether you start with 1 or 2.
There is a fundamental problem with the PF2 rules system. Lots of it is just vague. Intention is very hard to judge. No effort has been made to errata it. All in all its a very low quality effort from Paizo. Personally I get the impression that different Paizo writers interpret the rules differently.
The community is split between:
1) Just go with the simple 1 focus point for each ability max 3 - its clearly what the writers intended, and
2) The powers have clear differences some give a focus point some don't. Paizo often does this sort of thing for flavour and variety.
The rules clearly support the second point of view (the general rule only applies to your FIRST focus spell), but an example in the CRB goes the other way.
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In my own games I've gone to just giving someone a focus point every time, because the alternative leads to certain characters having more or less focus points depending on the order in which they select feats which is extremely high level of rules jank, imo.
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Yeah the box in the CRB explaining getting more focus points talks about multiple sources, which isn't very well defined. Although all the examples are about the sources being from different multiclasses/archetypes.
So one reading is that things inside the same class need to say they give another point, and things across classes give you the extra point.
The other one is that each new feat, feature etc. is a new source and gives a new focus point.
I think the first reading is correct because of how specific the examples are. But the question has been around for years with no designer answer.
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I still think this must mean something:
If you have multiple abilities that give you a focus pool, each one adds 1 Focus Point to your pool. For instance, if you were a cleric with the Domain Initiate feat, you would have a pool with 1 Focus Point. Let's say you then took the champion multiclass archetype and the Healing Touch feat. Normally, this feat would give you a focus pool. Since you already have one, it instead increases your existing pool's capacity by 1.As a reminder, Healing Touch does not have a wording like 'this gives you an additional focus point'.
It does. It means that multiple developers were writing the rules and didn't get everything consistent.
It does. It means that multiple developers were writing the rules and didn't get everything consistent.I still think this must mean something:
If you have multiple abilities that give you a focus pool, each one adds 1 Focus Point to your pool. For instance, if you were a cleric with the Domain Initiate feat, you would have a pool with 1 Focus Point. Let's say you then took the champion multiclass archetype and the Healing Touch feat. Normally, this feat would give you a focus pool. Since you already have one, it instead increases your existing pool's capacity by 1.As a reminder, Healing Touch does not have a wording like 'this gives you an additional focus point'.
OR that they were not trying to be consistent. Read similar powers all in the one rule book, like say the druids batte forms. They are often not made cookie cutter style, they have real wording differences. They probably did come from the same writer, or at least two writers that were collaborating. Some of the differences are meaningful and deliberate.
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I still think this must mean something:
If you have multiple abilities that give you a focus pool, each one adds 1 Focus Point to your pool. For instance, if you were a cleric with the Domain Initiate feat, you would have a pool with 1 Focus Point. Let's say you then took the champion multiclass archetype and the Healing Touch feat. Normally, this feat would give you a focus pool. Since you already have one, it instead increases your existing pool's capacity by 1.As a reminder, Healing Touch does not have a wording like 'this gives you an additional focus point'.
Yes, that's the sidebar that it all comes down to, but I think the opening line to that sidebar is important:
[quote=CRB p. 302[FOCUS POINTS FROM MULTIPLE SOURCES
It’s possible, especially through archetypes, to gain focus
spells and Focus Points from more than one source.
And toward the end:
Having Focus Points from multiple
sources doesn’t change the tradition of
your spells; if you had both cleric domain
spells and druid order spells, your domain spells
would remain divine and the order spells primal.
Both examples given of "multiple sources" are archetypes. And that's said to be the most common reason for it happening. But quite a few of these classes have level 1-2 feats that give a first focus point, and you could easily take more than one of them. So if that was also a "multiple source" then why is the sidebar talking only about archetypes, and saying archetypes are the most likely reason?
---
Like I said, it's vague and has been for years.
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Like I said, it's vague and has been for years.
As this two year old thread demonstrates. :)
Looking at the new Bard Feats that grant focus spells (aka non-cantrip composition spells), it looks like none of them have the language that you get a focus point added to your pool. I was wondering if this was intentional, or a mistake?
Hymn of Healing
Ode to Ouroboros
Symphony of the Unfettered Heart
Pied PipingThe older focus spell feats (pre-APG), like Soothing Ballad and Inspire Heroics and fatal aria and song of the fallen, tend to have the "Must Have A Focus Pool" Prerequisite (which shouldn't be a problem as all bards start with a focus pool of 1) and add 1 focus point to the pool (which is capped at 3 so I don't see taking a lot of these spells getting out of hand power-wise).
Actually, I could be wrong, but I think my quick perusal of the bard feats indicate that ALL of the old feats that grant composition (non-cantrip) spells have a prerequisite of having a focus pool AND grant a focus point while ALL of the new feats that grant composition (non-cantrip) spells do not have the prerequisite and do not say they grant a focus point.
So: MISTAKE or NOT A MISTAKE?
And I apologize in advance if I'm just flat out reading this wrong (in which case I am going to be very embarrassed!).
There's no more Focus spell feats with prerequisites. These prerequisites was removed in 2º print and in the faq:
Pages 99-103: Various bard feats shouldn't have the "focus pool" prerequisite. If you somehow take them without a focus pool (typically via multiclassing), you gain a focus pool, as normal for taking your first feat that grants a focus spell.
And about focus feats that don't explicitly says that they give/increase your focus points. There are a very well accepted interpretation that says that all them increases the focus points. This videos describes well how it's works.
There's no more Focus spell feats with prerequisites.
Uhm... Monk and Ranger both have Focus spell feats that absolutely have prerequisites. They do not have the "focus pool" prerequisite, but they do have "Ki Spells" and "Warden Spells," respectively, as prerequisites.
There's no more Focus spell feats with prerequisites.Uhm... Monk and Ranger both have Focus spell feats that absolutely have prerequisites. They do not have the "focus pool" prerequisite, but they do have "Ki Spells" and "Warden Spells," respectively, as prerequisites.
I was referring about Bard that was the OP question. Include the faq quoted below is about Bard.
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Having the max of 3 is not the limiter so much as "how much can you regain by refocusing." Since the refocus activity requires you to have spent focus since the last time you refocused, you could give everybody a focus pool of 3 at level 1 and not a lot would change.
So I'm not inclined to be stingy about a feat that grants you a new focus spell to also not give you a pool size increase.
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There are a very well accepted interpretation that says that all them increases the focus points. This videos describes well how it's works.
I don't know how you would determine whether that's a "well accepted interpretation" beyond the video guy sounding like he's very convinced. But the argument in the video is not really original and not really strong. He takes sentences in isolation, ignoring the rest of the paragraph, and he likes some "RAW" rules but says others should be read loosely because they don't fit what he's already decided is the outcome. So it's all rather arbitrary.
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There are a very well accepted interpretation that says that all them increases the focus points. This videos describes well how it's works.I don't know how you would determine whether that's a "well accepted interpretation" beyond the video guy sounding like he's very convinced. But the argument in the video is not really original and not really strong. He takes sentences in isolation, ignoring the rest of the paragraph, and he likes some "RAW" rules but says others should be read loosely because they don't fit what he's already decided is the outcome. So it's all rather arbitrary.
I concur, I don't really think this comes close enough to being "settled" to say it's well accepted given the vagueness in the text, the variety of different wording choices in the many Focus Feats/Abilities, and the utter silence from errata and the FAQ on the topic.
I do still very much believe the intent was to try to indicate that any time a Focus Spell is added that it should increase the Focus Pool resource up to the universal max of 3, no matter what the text says it does (with the exception being an ability worded to EXPLICITLY state that it does NOT increase an existing Focus Pool, none of which have ever been made AFAIK) with regard to adding a Focus Pool or not. It just makes the most sense, it's the easiest for actually understand, and frankly, even if it meant there are a few ways to get 3 Focus Points at level 1 or 2, that's really not in any way that I've seen even CLOSE to being exploitative or game breaking.
From what I can tell, level 1 and 2 feats are only supposed to give you access to focus points, not increase your pool, which actually seems consistent. Before level 4, any class that doesn't start with 2 points isn't supposed to have more than 1. Focus spell feats (not including focus cantrips) from level 4 and up are supposed to increase the pool, no matter what the actual text says.
That is the only even halfway consistent reading I can get from this.
Every class can take blessed one at second and "gain a pool" and doing that get them another point and if they take or get a focus spell at 1st then that throws your assumption of no points for 1st and 2nd. Bard has feats like Lingering Composition that specifically say "Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1" so that throws out 1st level too. I can't see how an explicit "Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1" isn't meant to allow an increase in the pool.
IMO the "halfway consistent reading" would be to just increase your pool by one for each focus spell you get: trying to parse several various 'flourishes' of 'you gain a pool' or 'gain a focus point' seems a distraction on what is seemingly a simple process gaining a focus spell also increasing your focus points. Adding tiers of points by level or trying to intuit 'sources' [I still recall tiered sources from PF1] doesn bring any added benefit IMO.
Every class can take blessed one at second and "gain a pool" and doing that get them another point and if they take or get a focus spell at 1st then that throws your assumption of no points for 1st and 2nd. Bard has feats like Lingering Composition that specifically say "Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1" so that throws out 1st level too. I can't see how an explicit "Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1" isn't meant to allow an increase in the pool.
IMO the "halfway consistent reading" would be to just increase your pool by one for each focus spell you get: trying to parse several various 'flourishes' of 'you gain a pool' or 'gain a focus point' seems a distraction on what is seemingly a simple process gaining a focus spell also increasing your focus points. Adding tiers of points by level or trying to intuit 'sources' [I still recall tiered sources from PF1] doesn bring any added benefit IMO.
Blessed One doesn't grant an additional focus point. It explicitly grants you a pool with 1 focus point, which is not the same thing.
And yes, I did miss Lingering Composition, but it is a notable exception. For level 1 at least. The rest I've looked at - monk ki feats, duid order spells, ranger warden spells, champion's Deity's Domain and so on - do not grant an additional focus point. They only add the focus spell and give you (except for champion and cleric for some reason) the pool of 1 focus point.
But now I've discovered Magic Hide, Snare Hopping and Force Fang. And those grant an additional focus point. So my assumption for level 2 is likely wrong. I say likely, because all 2nd level archetype dedications that grant a focus spell (Blessed One, Shadowcaster, Hallowed Necromancer and Student of Perfection) have the same language as the first level class feats, meaning they don't increase your focus pool beyond 1. Which seems kinda arbitrary to me, maybe it's to prevent getting 3 points by level 2?
Anyway, seeing as 2nd level is apparently not intended to be a barrier either, I have a hard time seeing why level 1 should be - they cost the same slot anyway via multiclass archetypes anyway - so I have to revise my point and agree on that front - feats should probably always increase the pool by 1.
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Blessed One doesn't grant an additional focus point. It explicitly grants you a pool with 1 focus point, which is not the same thing.
You're aware that abilities that give you a pool give you a focus point instead if you already have a pool, right?
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Blessed One doesn't grant an additional focus point. It explicitly grants you a pool with 1 focus point, which is not the same thing.
In fact they are:
Focus Points from Multiple Sources, Core Rulebook pg. 300
"If you have multiple abilities that give you a focus pool, each one adds 1 Focus Point to your pool. For instance, if you were a cleric with the Domain Initiate feat, you would have a pool with 1 Focus Point. Let's say you then took the champion multiclass archetype and the Healing Touch feat. Normally, this feat would give you a focus pool. Since you already have one, it instead increases your existing pool's capacity by 1."
The only way they would be is if you're trying to argue that blessed archetype and a class are the same source and I don't see how you'd intend to prove that point.
You're aware that abilities that give you a pool give you a focus point instead if you already have a pool, right?
Blessed One doesn't grant an additional focus point. It explicitly grants you a pool with 1 focus point, which is not the same thing.
If I was capable of reading basic information, I would be, sorry XD
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(...)
I concur, I don't really think this comes close enough to being "settled" to say it's well accepted given the vagueness in the text, the variety of different wording choices in the many Focus Feats/Abilities, and the utter silence from errata and the FAQ on the topic.
I do still very much believe the intent was to try to indicate that any time a Focus Spell is added that it should increase the Focus Pool resource up to the universal max of 3, no matter what the text says it does (with the exception being an ability worded to EXPLICITLY state that it does NOT increase an existing Focus Pool, none of which have ever been made AFAIK) with regard to adding a Focus Pool or not. It just makes the most sense, it's the easiest for actually understand, and frankly, even if it meant there are a few ways to get 3 Focus Points at level 1 or 2, that's really not in any way that I've seen even CLOSE to being exploitative or game breaking.
I think the best explanation is that the design intent drifted from what they had in mind with only the CRB, to where we are now. I think they started out as Karmagator suggests, with the idea that level 1-2 feats only give you an initial pool, and that you only start increasing the pool by level 4.
That might have been the plan in the beginning but it just turned out to be hard to maintain. From the outset, they baked in getting extra focus points from the low-level stuff from multiclassing. Perhaps because with CRB-only multiclassing, I don't think you can take any feats through archetypes that would give you a new focus spell before level 4; none of the level 2 archetypes from the CRB give you a focus spell. So that would actually give them to you at a consistent level with getting focus points from in-class options.
I think that was the plan, because if the intent really was that each focus spell increases your pool to a max of 3, they could have saved a lot of word count in many classes, skipped the sidebar, and written things much simpler.
But if that was the plan, they didn't really explain it well enough to players, and in later books didn't really follow it (Blessed One, Force Fang feat for magi, Oracles in general)
By now I think it would just be plain simpler and less hassle to just give a focus point each time you get a focus spell, to the usual max of 3.
I have the same felling. That in CRB they had a more complex idea of how to increment the focus pool. But after APG and CRB 2º print when they removed the "focus pool" prerequisite from Bard focus spells, they changed their mind to something more simple, focusing only in restrict how many focus points you recover when refocus due the currently high requirements of it than limiting of how hard will be to adquire a better refocus ability (usually at level 12 and 18 feats. But some classes can receive focus points but refocus differently, like champion that can take Devoted Focus at lvl 10 instead of the default lvl 12 but don't have a wellspring feat so it's unable to refocus 3 points, bards also don't have wellspring feat, wizards is the worse that can take refocus 2 feat at lvl 14 and no wellspring while oracles gain stronger refocus abilities from it's class chassis at lvl 11 and 17 don't requiring to use a feat).
The only exception is the not yet release psichic class that's begin with 2 focus points and can full recover it with refocus since the beginning but have an exception that's if the char uses a non-psychic focus spell in that day it's refocus can no more recover the 2º focus point only 1.
In general the currently felling I have currently is that "OK, you can easily gain more focus points with focus feats but still never be cheap to recover all them with refocus".
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A Human Witch can have 3 focus points by level 2 without any archetypes.
you start with a focus pool of 1 Focus Point.
You learn the phase familiar hex, which you can cast as a reaction to protect your familiar from harm.
You learn the cackle hex. Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1.
Choose a basic lesson. You gain its associated hex, and your familiar learns the associated spell. Increase the number of Focus Points in your focus pool by 1.
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I think that was the plan, because if the intent really was that each focus spell increases your pool to a max of 3, they could have saved a lot of word count in many classes, skipped the sidebar, and written...
Wouldn't be the first time a designer (and I by no means limit this to Paizo) had a great idea that turned out to be a lot more complicated on paper than in their head, or that a rule gets overtaken by a similar but much simpler alternative. Heck, wouldn't even be the first time in PF2, as we saw with all the resonance iterations.
Although the example that comes to my mind was when I tried to design a status that was basically haste, but only for Reactions. I tried to convert Boundless Reprisals and Divine Reflexes as sort of proof of concept, but wound up with so many caveats and extra words that in the end the converted feats had longer text than their CRB versions. It's something I've kept in mind ever since.
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Wouldn't be the first time a designer (and I by no means limit this to Paizo) had a great idea that turned out to be a lot more complicated on paper than in their head
As a software designer, I totally agree with this. Nothing is ever as simple as it seems to be in my head once I try to actually write it out in code.