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Having played with the Magus a little bit including one playtest session, I have to wonder what happens when a scenario has the Magus as the boss.
With a boss fight, the opponent is going to be higher level than the party. That means they are going to get more criticals than players normally can. Already that has been a problem in some cases with bosses that are just big piles of hit points, it is going to be extremely dangerous with a Magus as the big boss.
The boss is going to get critical hits at least 10% of the time, likely much more. If they get that critical when delivering a spell, the spell is extremely likely to do something -- there are a lot of spells that have an effect even on a failure. More importantly, it will have a good chance of turning into a critical failure.
I am concerned that the Magus as an NPC enemy is going to be much more deadly than expected because of how critical hits work in PF2 and how they currently have it chain into the spell effect for Striking Spell. It seems like it will be even more spikes for damage than the class was in PF1, and in PF2 that boss will always have the edge in getting criticals.
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The limit on a magus boss is that they are single target specialists. Against a party, they very well may take one person down quickly, but they are really not nearly as dangerous as just a higher level spell caster that is likely to crit against more than 1 PC at a time.
Please make sure you include the massive damage rules when doing Magus as a boss. I think the boss will have a much higher chance of inflicting massive damage than other bosses.
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I am not really sure it's appropriate to use the PC version of their Abilities on an NPC since their base damage as an NPC is already going to FAR outstrip the damage they could deal in the hands of a PC. I also think that for an NPC ability the whole Spellstrike system is just WAY too complicated and long-winded to include in a Statblock like you would need for an Enemy NPC.
You're right though, if you have a Level+3 NPC built with PC rules and follow the NPC damage formula guidelines and allow them to use Spellstrike as written they wouldn't even need to critically hit to be deadly, a normal hit with both the Strike and Spell would effectively match the damage any other creature would deal when critically hitting, much less if the attacks DO critically hit in which case... you'd probably be dealing with an instant 100%-0% on anything other than a high Con tank PC.
Very interesting topic, following out of interest.
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The limit on a magus boss is that they are single target specialists. Against a party, they very well may take one person down quickly, but they are really not nearly as dangerous as just a higher level spell caster that is likely to crit against more than 1 PC at a time.
They are much more likely to double-crit.
Magus using Striking Spell with Vampiric Touch who crits on the weapon is going to do a lot of damage and heal at the same time. When they crit, the opponent can no longer get a critical success with their save and are likely in the position where their odds of critical failure are higher than the odds of success.
Wasn't there a Magus boss in a recent adventure path? From memory, it wasn't a magus as we recognise it, but a monster profile with quite a few PC rule breaking bonuses, like combining cast, Strike, and Spellstrike into two actions.
I agree that they might be more lethal to individual PCs, much like using an enemy with a save or die effect, but they are going to struggle mightily to handle a whole team, especially a team with anykind of AoO or other disrupting reaction.
I think they can be a fun boss, but they won't break the game, just make individual PCs sweat if/when they get targeted with the bosses fury. I just don't thinking the game is lacking monsters with similar threat levels.
For example, a 3rd level party facing a Hydra is in much more trouble, unless they are specifically prepared for facing it ahead of time, because it can lay out far more attacks at once.
A spell like slow, even on a successful save could be the end of the magus boss because of how much it needs all of its actions every round to be a threat. Grabbing and tripping are also brutal counters to a solo magus.
Thanks for mentioning Grabbing and Tripping. I hadn't noticed how the Magus Fort save didn't increase until what I consider very high level.
It starts at Expert, but doesn't get to Master until level 15. I was expecting it to increase sooner than that.
Barbarian becomes Master at Fort at 7th level, Champion and Fighter at 9th, Ranger at 11th. Seems a little slow on the Fort saves. On the other hand, MCD for Fighter doesn't improve the Fort save.
I expect that most Magus will have a bonus to Fort from Con, but it will lag behind their Str or Dex. At around level 7-9 they will be facing groups where it is likely one of them has Athletics at Master. That person is also likely to have focused on Strength, so they will probably will have an advantage over the Magus even with the couple of levels difference.
It isn't as much of a problem as it was in PF1 where the defense was based on BAB, but they will be more prone to it than other monsters.
When it does finally get to Master, as a boss they are likely to be going against people who are Legendary at Athletics.
As for AoO or other spells, it will depend quite a bit on the Magus build. If they have the Spell Parry line of class feats, they will have a good chance of saving against many spells. That only works for one handed weapon Magus, the Sustaining Steel magus wouldn't have those options.
I still think that as currently designed the Magus would have a higher chance of instant kill than many other bosses. It certainly wouldn't happen every time, but with the way Criticals are done in PF2 and the Striking Spell, I do think it could be a real problem.
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The boss doesn’t have to be alone. And you should absolutely expect to face pc classes as enemies. They don’t get thrown away as possible opponents.
Magus bosses in 1E were an issue as well. The first Magus used in a PFS scenario has an incredibly high kill rate compared to typical bosses.
Mr. Dalsine had perhaps the highest kill rate (though a rabid Halfling's axe crits were similarly notorious, though replayability amplified his successes), coming in pre-buffed and w/ smart tactics. TPKs weren't uncommon either, like dominoes.
And yes, Asethe, there was a Magus, quite high level in fact, though following different rules and with significantly higher hit points than a PC would have (if I recall). Not sure how parties have fared against her though.
This brings to mind one issue with the original playtest:
Be careful what you wish for.
Every power up you want on the PC side gets mirrored on the NPC side because that's how equivalent levels work nowadays. There's no imbalance toward PCs, and it arguably leans the other direction since monstrous foes tend to be at the peak of the curve.
Is the Magus (or Summoner while we're at it) as balanced an enemy as it is an ally? Does the 4-spell system overly favor an enemy going nova? Do the damage spikes spike too hard for a party to deal with? Will those spikes makes in-combat top-curve healing a must?
Wasn't there a Magus boss in a recent adventure path? From memory, it wasn't a magus as we recognise it, but a monster profile with quite a few PC rule breaking bonuses, like combining cast, Strike, and Spellstrike into two actions.
more reason to remove the critical effect in exchange for more consistency.
It seems like a Magus Boss would specialize in taking down one PC at a time, either via disabling effects or outright damage.
Either way, I find that bosses that target multiple PCs are easier to deal with than ones that focus on downing PCs one at a time, especially if they're smart enough to down the squishies first (as a Sliding Magus might be apt to do).
Same thing that happened with a Magus boss in PF1: one player dies in the first round, the rest gang up and kill the Magus, everyone is unhappy with the experience. I distinctly remember a PFS scenario where, after playing everything by the book for the entire story, the GM openly told us he was fudging numbers on the final boss because it was statistically improbable for someone to not lose their character in the first round if played as designed by the writer.
Edit: Looks like everyone else in this thread knows exactly who I'm talking about lol