| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
1 extra stat in exchange of 1 skill, 1 lore, 1 skill feat.
One stat of the DM'S choice, so yeah, it's pretty balance. Your dwarf druid might find they gets a boost in Cha...
As for feral child, It seems a little underpower but I am totally fine with it, and I like the theme ( especially at low levels).
1 fixed stat for an extra trained skill, low-light vision (or upgrade to darkvision) and imprecise scent. So a skill and the equivalent of one level 1 ancestry feats/heritage ability and a heritage ability . Seems fine. It's basically getting you 2 free level 1 ancestry feats [Elf Atavism gives a heritage] and a free trained skill for your fixed stat: you just have to have use for those abilities.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
My opinion on rare backgrounds is that they're rare for a reason that has nothing to do with power levels (which are fine). If your character is an amnesiac, the expectation is that at some point in the campaign the character is going to figure out who they used to be and that's supposed to be a dramatic reveal. If the GM isn't really interested in working that into the story, they should kibosh it. A GM who genuinely thinks you're honestly just angling for a power boost is free to give your character a bonus to a stat that doesn't help much (generally Int, Str, or Cha).
But the rare backgrounds are balanced to the point that while they might be a little more or less powerful than standard backgrounds, the main reason to ask the GM to take them is that they strongly reflect the character you're interested in playing.
But in my opinion it's probably always better than a skill and a skill feat
Don't really agree: if you get +2 to a stat you where going to let an 08, is a 10 better than a skill and a skill feat? Not to me. Now if I, the player, get to pick then it becomes harder to balance out. For instance, a bonus in a save stat is almost always useful. It's really going to be DM dependent IMO, so it's as balanced as the DM makes it.
Remember that some ancestries already have darkvision, so it might be from 1 to 2 ancestry feats.
It's pretty much the same as the variable heritages: you just get more for some ancestries. Taking this means an elf gets to take another heritage instead of cavern elf if they want darkvision. I'm fine with feral kobold tiefling losing out because I myself went out of my way to take 2 options that weren't going to help me.
Str means no males with AC and melee damage, as well as more hauling capacity.
I've had characters with an 8 str I wasn't planning on boosting. Casters and rogues can manage without it. A back pack gives more bulk carry than that str boost and you can get backgrounds with Hefty Hauler for +2 bulk instead of +2 for the str boost.
And I'm not sure what you have against males... :P
Dex/wis/con gives you saving throws and other stuff.
With a heavy armor user, you don't need much dex: now it might not be for an 8 but if you start with a 10 and you're planning on plate it's not of much use. So I see this as an exception: I did point out that save boosts are a good thing in general.
Int gives you 1 extra skill point, so you won't lose the one from the bg. It also will give you +1 in many skill and eventualy allow you ( if we consider from 10 to 12 ) to take extra skills as skill feat.
Yes, but it's no different than getting 2 boosts and a feat then just like before, with a language instead of a lore... Seems like a lateral move at best.
So in at least 4 it can be at best lateral moves and worse.
Myself I'm a BIG fan of Deep Backgrounds: it's a pity that's it's most likely never going to be updated with new material
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Amnesiac leaves a bad taste in my mouth because it's like the prelude of something bad waiting to happen.
common/uncommon/rare shouldn't be based on strength, and most certainly a "rare" background shouldn't break the standard Character creation guidelines in something as major as stat distribution.
I know that i wont ever agree to that background for any of my players, if they want to play an amnesiac they can, without any sort of stat boosts from that.
I'm not sure I agree. From my perspective, taking amnesiac is asking the GM "I want you to surprise me with something interesting" (which is probably not a positive thing). For me the extra stat boost is buying me rope to justify setting up something uncomfortable for the character (if it was just a flavor thing, equal to other backgrounds, I wouldn't single someone out like this).
Since the extra stat boost going to Str, Cha, or Int (depending on the rest of the character) isn't going to be a huge power boost, and signing up for the background activates the "you do not need to be nice if something else is more interesting" mode as a GM.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like it'd be pretty boring if every single background Paizo ever printed followed the exact same model. Them experimenting with other options is good.
From my perspective, taking amnesiac is asking the GM "I want you to surprise me with something interesting" (which is probably not a positive thing).
Amnesiac is great for that player that really never fleshes out a character for whatever reason: the DM gets to entangle them in whatever plot they want and the player can just bypass the part they never really worked on.
Another option is for those games where EVERY character is amnesiac: this is good for a quick start game, where you make a character fast or just get a character sheet.
Either was it's a way to make a character without background baggage.
If a player of mine wants me to surpise him, he can ask me to do so without having a direct mechanical benefit that threatens to disrupt the table.
Well, it's a replacement of benefits as you would normally get a skill, skill feat and a lore so it's more accurate to say you get a DIFFERENT mechanical benefit for it. As to power boosting or useless, there is a lot of ground between the two when balanced with what you could have gotten instead.
If anything, i would think that a player that genuinely wants a surpise would prefer something more like a short arc based on him rather than on a "+2 to a score"
It doesn't have to be a binary choice: there is literally nothing stopping you from giving a "+2 to a score" AND "a short arc based on him". I don't think the player would protest and say 'No, no just give me the arc. I don't want the +2...'.
This has one of the 2 outcomes: The GM puts the extra boost into something beneficiary, and then it becomes powerboosting. OR GM puts the boost into something useless and that points to a GM vs Player mentality.
Neither of those options are something that i like.
If a player of mine wants me to surpise him, he can ask me to do so without having a direct mechanical benefit that threatens to disrupt the table.
If anything, i would think that a player that genuinely wants a surpise would prefer something more like a short arc based on him rather than on a "+2 to a score"
Well, my side of the conversation where a player who wants to be an amnesiac would sort of go like this-
"So, in basically every story where someone has amnesia, this is a Chekhov's gun situation where eventually they're going to find out about their previous life, and in most dramatic contexts it's not like an incredibly happy occurrence, it usually creates complications are at best inconvenient (e.g. in a romance story, the amnesiac realizes they're already married to someone else).
So what are you looking for as a reason to play an amnesiac? How inconvenient do you think the complications that come to light should be?"
Then we talk about expectations and goals and come to an understanding. It's not like Pathfinder didn't already do stuff like this with the amnesiac characters in Strange Aeons- when the PCs get to a place where they're recognized, they have people who want them dead, people who think the PCs owe them money, etc. So we can talk about examples from the past to figure something out.
If someone says "I'm straight up looking for the power boost, this character is super MAD" I'm going to make sure that they're okay with how this could potentially go before I sign off. If they say something like "I just want the roleplaying challenge, and not having to think of a backstory is relief" I'm going to be a lot gentler.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
What i'm saying is that ability modifiers in PF2 are very very strictly regulated. You dont get Apex items till like level 15-16, everyone gets the same increases, everyone starts with more or less similar arrays, and etc. I find a background somehow redefining the starting ability arrays disruptive.
I think you are overreacting, a small bonus to a tertiary stat. No game is balanced that finely.
Heck I still prefer to roll stats, just to get variety and to avoid bland.
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, a +2 in a stat of the GM's choice is often just not as good as a Skill, Lore, and Skill Feat.
I mean, as others note, trading all three of those for a Skill, a language, and +1 on Int checks is often not worth it, trading all three for +1 to Cha checks is mediocre at best for most characters, and trading all three for Str on a non-Str character is trading all that for half a Skill Feat (Hefty Hauler, specifically) and a +1 on Athletics.
Those all sound...really bad, actually.
A Save stat, meanwhile, is maybe a leg up, but not a very large one, especially at high levels when it will probably equate to no bonus at all to any Save once everybody hits 18 in said stat, and if Dex on a Heavy Armor user may not even be that good.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Eh, you are still restricted by the level maximums, so at best it means you end up with one extra minor stat at +1 as your major stats will be where they were going to be anyway.
I also would be choosing a skill, skillfeat and lore most of the time too, it would be closer if I was the one choosing the ability score increase but as it is I would only choose the amnesiac background for plot reasons not power reasons.
An always on benefit that I didn't personally choose is rarely going to be as useful as a feat or skill that I knew I wanted.
If a player invested some time and effort into their character concept/description with a little "background" on how they woke one day with no memories of their past I'd 100% consider letting them take this feat and even let them pick all 3 stats. As ppl have already said +2 to a stat is still not really worth a skill a lore and a feat. The way this system is set up you can't even really power game with it as it still gives you a max of 18 at first lvl in just one stat this just gives the opportunity to help with a little of the MADness of some concepts like Warpreist or Monk or some of the rogue builds.