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I might be in the minority, but I'd rather spend my hero point to reroll a check that could have a major and heroic change on the adventure as a whole, and then later have my character die, than end the session alive but with a hero point in my pocket. However, that is very much an ongoing campaign perspective than a PFS perspective. You have to have a character level up if you ever want to be able play those higher level scenarios, and a lot of times losing out on one treasure bundle or rep point isn't really that big a deal, especially because the heroics of your run through the adventure rarely have that big an impact on the ongoing narrative of PFS.
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I wasn't asking what could have an interaction. That's easy.
I'm asking what people who think an interaction is needed think should.
I mean, I think that could kind of be Draco18s' point. Not that there's one specific thing that needs to be done, but that for some people the simple fact that it's as self contained as it is is the problem.
So it becomes less "the one thing hero points need" and more "any and all of the above" from that perspective.
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My first experience with 2E was a mob of civilians throwing trash at my character... that crit and nearly knocked him unconscious on the first round. He only stayed up because he was a dwarf with a 16 CON (rogue, so 21 HPs). They did knock him down on the second round.
That did not feel heroic (and more or less kept me from playing 2E for months after that). It gets better at later levels, but overall, the crit mechanic seems to work against the players more than for them, which often leaves me feeling very ineffective in a lot of fights.
Ah, I remember the trash tossing mob. I hosted that game for my players' first session. I can still hear their exclamation: "The bed pan did how much damage!?" LOL.
It got even funnier when they abandoned their weapons and started picking up the "high damage" bed pans to throw back at the mob!
The question was quickly repeated with equal incredulity when they realized they couldn't hit nearly as hard with their improvised weapons as the mob could.
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I wasn't asking what could have an interaction. That's easy.
I'm asking what people who think an interaction is needed think should.
I mean, I think that could kind of be Draco18s' point. Not that there's one specific thing that needs to be done, but that for some people the simple fact that it's as self contained as it is is the problem.
So it becomes less "the one thing hero points need" and more "any and all of the above" from that perspective.
Bingo. The system is so isolated from everything else the playtest rules suggested giving out hero points if someone brought cookies.
Like WTF.
The final version is better in that they removed it for the cookies and tweaked the cost to avoid death. I still think the cost of a reroll is too high (see aforementioned issues gaining points being tied to arbitrary bullshit) and the extra action cost is so high they may as well have not printed it.
Add in the fact that those are the only things you can do with hero points just makes it worse. Why can't I get a +2 bonus before I roll? What about spending one to recover focus points?
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I wasn't asking what could have an interaction. That's easy.
I'm asking what people who think an interaction is needed think should.
I mean, I think that could kind of be Draco18s' point. Not that there's one specific thing that needs to be done, but that for some people the simple fact that it's as self contained as it is is the problem.
So it becomes less "the one thing hero points need" and more "any and all of the above" from that perspective.
Bingo. The system is so isolated from everything else the playtest rules suggested giving out hero points if someone brought cookies.
Like WTF.
The final version is better in that they removed it for the cookies and tweaked the cost to avoid death. I still think the cost of a reroll is too high (see aforementioned issues gaining points being tied to arbitrary b&+$!%~*) and the extra action cost is so high they may as well have not printed it.
Add in the fact that those are the only things you can do with hero points just makes it worse. Why can't I get a +2 bonus before I roll? What about spending one to recover focus points?
Exactly, it's a meta currency with all the issues that brings.
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On side note on that, as someone who has always used hero points in 1e, my party did like the whole "they always reset to 1 at beginning of session" thing since they both felt it was fairer than stockpiling them for most of adventures just in case until they reached the max amount and then started using them :p
But yeah, I do think its probably somewhat intended that gm can choose how often they give them even if raw guidelines are kinda ambigious
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On side note on that, as someone who has always used hero points in 1e, my party did like the whole "they always reset to 1 at beginning of session" thing since they both felt it was fairer than stockpiling them for most of adventures just in case until they reached the max amount and then started using them :p
See, this is why players start with maximum edge in Shadowrun (as well as it being an attribute like all other attributes, starting at 1 (2 for humans) and can be increased just like any other attribute) and it only replenishes during downtime (significant periods, the "between jobs" sort of rest, rather than "at night"). Oh, and I'm speaking about SR4, here, SR6 took the idea of Edge and ruined it, along with a lot of other things (armor no longer prevents damage).
It also means that you can burn maximum edge on saving yourself from death, rather than "whatever unspent points you have."
Oh, and it actually saves you from dying. The rules are pretty clear that if you suffer secondary consequences from whatever actually brought you to zero, and those secondary consequences would also kill you, you survive those too. Because the game isn't mean. You might be out of the scene, but you'll survive.
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I am surprised with the absolute ease monsters hit players, especially at the lower levels. This has really caused a drag in my low level campaign as players are frustrated at not being able to play the characters they want. This has especially been pronounced with my barbarian and great weapon fighter. My barbarian player has complained about being a glass cannon and he has even stopped raging as he is too afraid of being hit and the rage benefits at low level seem quite tame. You get 3-4 temp hit points which are gone in first hit, a -1 to AC and a +2 to damage. These benefits seem awfully weak compared to 1PF 1E barbarians. Both players complained how a shield seems a necessity and not an option for a front line character. (I kind of like shields being needed but that's just me :D )
I completely agree, it seems that 2e is written in the attempt to punish players. The monsters don't play by the same rules the PC's have to, they hit so much harder per hit than the PCs, their tactics make it almost futile at times to try to hit them, etc. It has gotten to the point where our group has come to the conclusion that rules don't apply to the NPCs and that is just how the game goes.
Having beefed up creature attacks is not fair because unless the GM rolls poorly, it is an almost regular occurrence for them to score critical hits on the PCs. It can definitely get disheartening as a player in this system.
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The system is so isolated from everything else the playtest rules suggested giving out hero points if someone brought cookies.
Let's not judge the game based on what was in the playtest. The whole point of a playtest is to ferret out what works and what doesn't.
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I think it has been tough for a lot of players to learn that an equal level enemy, one on one, is supposed to have a 50% chance of winning against you. It is just such a different ratio than recent past versions of the game that it is pretty jarring for a lot of players, and a bit of a throw back to the "old days" of surviving level 1 really being quite an accomplishment.
It is also has a lot of advantages on the adventure design side, that is still taking folks used to writing for previous versions of fantasy RPGs some time to get used to.
I am surprised with the absolute ease monsters hit players, especially at the lower levels. This has really caused a drag in my low level campaign as players are frustrated at not being able to play the characters they want. This has especially been pronounced with my barbarian and great weapon fighter. My barbarian player has complained about being a glass cannon and he has even stopped raging as he is too afraid of being hit and the rage benefits at low level seem quite tame. You get 3-4 temp hit points which are gone in first hit, a -1 to AC and a +2 to damage. These benefits seem awfully weak compared to 1PF 1E barbarians. Both players complained how a shield seems a necessity and not an option for a front line character. (I kind of like shields being needed but that's just me :D )I completely agree, it seems that 2e is written in the attempt to punish players. The monsters don't play by the same rules the PC's have to, they hit so much harder per hit than the PCs, their tactics make it almost futile at times to try to hit them, etc. It has gotten to the point where our group has come to the conclusion that rules don't apply to the NPCs and that is just how the game goes.
Having beefed up creature attacks is not fair because unless the GM rolls poorly, it is an almost regular occurrence for them to score critical hits on the PCs. It can definitely get disheartening as a player in this system.
I know what you're talking about, with monsters hitting really hard, but what do you mean by "their tactics make it almost futile at times to try to hit them, etc"?
Are you fighting a lot of flying hit and run enemies with a melee focused party? Or incorporeal creatures that run through walls as a regular occurence?
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It is also has a lot of advantages on the adventure design side, that is still taking folks used to writing for previous versions of fantasy RPGs some time to get used to.
That's certainly true. It feels like they're trying to kill us the first 2-3 encounters, but really they're just trying to beat the page count and get our characters to 2 as expeditiously as possible.
The system is so isolated from everything else the playtest rules suggested giving out hero points if someone brought cookies.Let's not judge the game based on what was in the playtest. The whole point of a playtest is to ferret out what works and what doesn't.
Cool. Read the next thing I said right after that.
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Well, how are you interpreting comments like this then?Well, when Ubertron says the game feels like a meat grinder, I'm assuming they mean... that the game feels like a meat grinder.
But just because someone finds the game slogging as is doesn't mean that what they're looking for is a game so easy it doesn't have any stakes. To insinuate as much is absurd.
Whoa there. I'm just pointing out that there is more than one meaning of 'heroic' characters. I'm not trying to say any of them is wrong.
Sometimes you just want to play a character with large thews. The game does support this. You just have to adjust the encounter levels to match the game you are trying to build. The published APs and the recommended encounter building rules don't do that though.
But trying to have a conversation about this without even realizing that there is more than one way to be a hero is just going to cause unneeded arguments.
And even what constitutes as being a hero changes over time. Just imagine James Bond being portrayed by Roger Moore versus the more recent Daniel Craig. While at its core playing one and the same character the former is near always on top of everything the plot throws at him while the later has to overcome massive (personal) challenges to eventually succeed. Or 80's action flicks versus more grim settings like Nolan's Dark Knight triology.
However and coming back to topic at hand a literal out-game remark that players of my group coined when facing the tougher fights of early AoA and learning the NPC attack and defensive stats was: "Looks like we are not the heros here, just some random underdogs clinging to dear life and fighting for our very survival!"
Note that this is of cause all about individual expectations and perceptions, however when your player/character focus shifts from common noble goals like bringing justice, extracting revenge or the likes (aka fighting to win) to simple survival (fighting not to lose), this is hardly what I personally would call heroic because it can easily be perceived as putting the player characters in a rather passive than active role.
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Two Points
First I find that my expectations going into P2 was severely skewed do to my experience with P1. In P1 a single on level foe is a complete cakewalk for a decent build party. You had to have multiple on level foes just to be a challenge, and it got even harder once you hit mid levels. By level 7 your melee combatants would only miss on a 5 or worse and you wizard's save DC was nearly impossible to make. A PC that focused on AC would be almost unhittable.
This is because the system's underlying math was so loose that the monsters had to be balanced around the lease effective PC.
In P2 because the system is better designed from the ground up this is no longer a problem. Even a "poorly" build PC (not that I think there is such a thing) has a minimum AC of 12+level, but a "maxized" PC has a max AC of 19+level until mid to high levels.
We assume that on level monsters should be weak. But there is nothing written in stone to require that.
Second When designing a dungeon, it should mostly be a series of Trivial to Low fights with maybe a moderate or sever boss fight. That's kind of the idea of the dungeon crawl, it's not one or two super hard fights, but an endurance test, how much or your resources can you preserve before hitting the (not so) big boss. Three trivials are worth the same exp as one severe, but the amount of resources needed (particularly after fight healing) should be less.
I think the main problem with dungeons in published material, as stated above is the matter of page count.
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Second When designing a dungeon, it should mostly be a series of Trivial to Low fights with maybe a moderate or sever boss fight. That's kind of the idea of the dungeon crawl, it's not one or two super hard fights, but an endurance test, how much or your resources can you preserve before hitting the (not so) big boss. Three trivials are worth the same exp as one severe, but the amount of resources needed (particularly after fight healing) should be less.
I think the main problem with dungeons in published material, as stated above is the matter of page count.
That's kind of the old assumption (a PF1 CR=APL fight is pretty easy, and just intended to wear down the party a little bit), but I find it really doesn't work that well.
There's a certain overhead involved with combats - making stat blocks, putting pawns on deck, getting people into initiative - and when you do all that, you want the resulting fight to last at least longer than it took to set up. An occasional easy fight is good to calibrate in that we're still heroes. But too much of them is not really fulfilling.
That's kind of the old assumption (a PF1 CR=APL fight is pretty easy, and just intended to wear down the party a little bit), but I find it really doesn't work that well.
There's a certain overhead involved with combats - making stat blocks, putting pawns on deck, getting people into initiative - and when you do all that, you want the resulting fight to last at least longer than it took to set up. An occasional easy fight is good to calibrate in that we're still heroes. But too much of them is not really fulfilling.
While I appreciate that, the flip side is that your party has to use al their resources just to finish the earlier fights, so once they get to the big boss, what is supposed to be a severe fight feels like an extreme one because you are completely tapped out.
The game assumes you are using fireballs and lightning bolts to fight the level 8 boss at level 5. That's a much harder fight when all you have left are level 1 magic missiles and your cantrips.
That's kind of the old assumption (a PF1 CR=APL fight is pretty easy, and just intended to wear down the party a little bit), but I find it really doesn't work that well.
There's a certain overhead involved with combats - making stat blocks, putting pawns on deck, getting people into initiative - and when you do all that, you want the resulting fight to last at least longer than it took to set up. An occasional easy fight is good to calibrate in that we're still heroes. But too much of them is not really fulfilling.
While I appreciate that, the flip side is that your party has to use al their resources just to finish the earlier fights, so once they get to the big boss, what is supposed to be a severe fight feels like an extreme one because you are completely tapped out.
The game assumes you are using fireballs and lightning bolts to fight the level 8 boss at level 5. That's a much harder fight when all you have left are level 1 magic missiles and your cantrips.
I don't think the two are actually exclusive or incompatible.
Yeah, the time and effort it takes to create a combat encounter doesn't change much between a difficult challenge and an easy one. They both require quite a bit of preparation. Spending the time to set up a combat just to have the encounter be a pushover and end in a round or three without any notable impact to the plot seems like a waste of energy to the GM.
On the other side, creating a final battle at the end of a dungeon that is balanced for fresh characters isn't going to go so well for exhausted characters. That does need to be taken into account when designing things.
One thing that will help with that is to remember the renewable resources during character build. Martial characters should be able to keep going for the full dungeon. Maybe have some problems with being temporarily immune to Battle Medicine or the like. But casters shouldn't end up with nothing but low level spells and cantrips. Players of caster characters might want to remember to pick up a focus spell or two and some consumables or the like. But that is something that players need to adjust for themselves as an adaptation to the new edition and its quirks.
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I'm sorry, are you really trying to convince me that your standard party of 4 level 20s has a 50% chance of beating Treerazer?
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I'm sorry, are you really trying to convince me that your standard party of 4 level 20s has a 50% chance of beating Treerazer?
I'd honestly say your party of 4 standard level 20s has a >50% chance of beating treerazer and I'm willing to put my avatar on it.
Put together a fighter, rogue, cleric, wizard team comp and have them fight treerazer - he's really not that threatening at all.
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This is one of my favourite things about the new edition.
The system is easy to adjust difficulty on-the-fly anyway (love that 'creature numbers' table on the advanced GM screen), so a GM has plenty of tools to adjust overall combat difficulty to suit their table.
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I don't see what's different;
High-level parties have vastly more options to manipulate battlefield conditions and math than low-level ones. That's a pretty big deal.
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High level parties are very different from low level. I don't agree with Zapp that the things were supposed to be the same across all levels. I think the math tells a very different story. Unless he has a game designer quote stating what the thinks to be true, then we have to use the game math to indicate what happens across levels.
As I see it with the game math as it is the game becomes progressively easier as you level. It never becomes as easy as PF1 was at high level, but it does become easier as your players gain more abilities that shift the math, damage, and survivability more in their favor.
I feel this is a design intent. Your characters are supposed to become stronger as you level and they do. It's expected that a lvl 20 character should be vastly stronger than a lvl 1 character. And they are.
I think you have tiers of progression with cut points where you become a great deal stronger. Certain ones that are obvious at lower level are lvl 5, lvl 7, your first striking weapon, lvl 11, and lvl 13. Those points seem to demarcate subtle increases in power that start to shift the math in the favor of the players and the game starts to feel a bit easier and your characters start to feel stronger in comparison to the enemies.
I believe this was intentional design myself. Things weren't supposed to be the same across all levels. I believe your characters are supposed to become incrementally more powerful as you get closer to 20. But not as powerful as they were in PF1 where they were unplayable. Lvl 20 characters are playable and can be challenged, yet they are far more powerful than lvl 1 characters compared to what they fight.
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I've thrown multiple moderate and severe encounters at my level 2 party of three people of an oracle, bard, and rogue. In the most recent day, without really resting, they took on two Severe encounters (one of which was a level 2 creature and two level 1s), and at least two Moderate encounters.
I've also thrown creatures of their level at them without killing them.
Apparently my players must be incredibly skilled.
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I don't see what's different; both parties are hosed if they don't have the right preparation, abilities, and tactical choices, plus luck on their side.The encounter guidelines suggest that a level 5 monster is a severe encounter for a level 1 party, while a level 24 encounter is a severe encounter for a level 20 party. That is, about the same.
At level 15, level 15 monsters are nearly trivial to kill. At level 2, level 2 monsters are near-TPKs in waiting. (just to pick two examples)
Yes, if you read the guidelines on page 488 of the rulebook (or the corresponding section of the GMG) you would be forgiven if your take away was "a monster X levels above your own level is about the same relative challenge at level 1 as at level 20".
Because nothing in those rules suggest otherwise.
This is what I can with confidence establish as far too coarse.
I would say, roughly speaking, that the encounter guidelines are appropriate for about the middle game. Levels 7 to 14 or thereabouts.
But for the lowest levels, they result in a relentlessly unforgiving experience, which Paizo itself has begun to realize.
For the higher levels, it's likely too lenient, but that is much less of a problem, as I'm sure you can imagine. Still you can easily add the 160 XP of an Extreme-threat budget and still call the encounter Moderate to Severe at levels 17-18 and above. You simply do not need to tread carefully any longer, the way you needed to far up the single-digit levels.
Paizo has already started to design their encounters as if the advice they give is to be lenient at lower levels. Significantly lenient, that is, roughly amounting to one full challenge category.
It is an oversight that I predict will be errataed eventually.
I have followed the relative-level encounter design rules from page 488 and 489 in the PF2 Core Rulebook and they worked for me.
First level was weird, because I had altered the beginning of Trail of the Hunted from battling isolated groups of Ironfang recruits (CR 1/2) to slipping away from organized groups of Hobgoblin Soldiers, creature 1. Nevertheless, they had to defend villagers against a group of 4 Hobgoblin Soldiers and a 2nd-level Ironfang Trooper. They defeated the hobgoblins. I had sent a 2nd-level NPC fighter against those 5 hobgoblins while the PCs were still herding the villagers toward safety and that NPC died in one round.
Facing a threat that is 2-3 levels higher is a serious encounter. As players level up, get more tools, and become better at teamwork they might be able to face even higher level opponents. In general you can increase the level of what is considered a severe encounter at levels 5, 10, 15, and 20.
That might explain my players. They had mastered teamwork in Pathfinder 1st Edition and other roleplaying games, so they brought teamwork to PF2 immediately. They saw the possibilites in the basic actions and skills and took to using a variety of actions quickly. They were shooting from hiding and demoralizing the 1st-level hobgoblins to overcome them.
High level parties are very different from low level. I don't agree with Zapp that the things were supposed to be the same across all levels. I think the math tells a very different story. Unless he has a game designer quote stating what the thinks to be true, then we have to use the game math to indicate what happens across levels.
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I believe this was intentional design myself. Things weren't supposed to be the same across all levels. I believe your characters are supposed to become incrementally more powerful as you get closer to 20. But not as powerful as they were in PF1 where they were unplayable. Lvl 20 characters are playable and can be challenged, yet they are far more powerful than lvl 1 characters compared to what they fight.
Just to avoid misunderstandings:
I am not saying things were supposed to be the (relative) same across levels. I fully agree the trend towards PC power over NPCs as level increases is intentional.
What I am talking about is instead the encounter building guidelines! These do not even with a word hint at this trend. This is likely the reason why low-level play is so very hard (so hard PF2 has gotten a reputation for killing characters).
I can understand if you read me as stating essentially the opposite, but that is as I have explained not the case.
You could say it this way: the core math team forgot to explain to the encounter advice guys to nuance the instructions, to tell GMs (and AP adventure writers) to ease off at low level, to basically use only 80 XP when you want a "severe" encounter to illustrate just one use case.
Once the party reaches about 7th level (give or take) you can stop taking this special care.
And once the party reaches high level (I suggest level 15) you can really pull out the stops, and take listed AP encounters and freely spice them with extra encounter budget XP.
Cheers
That makes more sense. I can agree with that.
Yeah a lot of people don't realize how good teamwork can be in any edition. While few games requiring so much strategy outside wargames and tactical RPGs. It all combines to make low level fights in PF2 really deadly for unsuspecting people.
Also remember that what an advanced group does or thinks is not the same as what a new group might do or think. It sometimes can be better to side with the "lets make things slightly easier" group and let the advanced players customize the game to make it harder. cough no level to proficiency cough
One of my players in my above mentioned group has literally never touched a TTRPG before, one has only ever played 5e, and one has played a decent amount of PF1. I ran them through the beginner box for level 1.
I don't think that counts as an advanced group in any way.
Yeah a lot of people don't realize how good teamwork can be in any edition. While few games requiring so much strategy outside wargames and tactical RPGs. It all combines to make low level fights in PF2 really deadly for unsuspecting people.
Also remember that what an advanced group does or thinks is not the same as what a new group might do or think. It sometimes can be better to side with the "lets make things slightly easier" group and let the advanced players customize the game to make it harder. cough no level to proficiency cough
One of my players in my above mentioned group has literally never touched a TTRPG before, one has only ever played 5e, and one has played a decent amount of PF1. I ran them through the beginner box for level 1.
I don't think that counts as an advanced group in any way.
Having more experience can be worse, actually; just ran my group through a fight with a lamia matriarch and had to bash them over the head with "HER FORT IS BAD YOU CAN GRAPPLE HER" because they were so used to combat maneuvers being terrible from PF1 experience even though two of them were expert in Athletics.