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First, how does second compare to first? What are the changes that make a big impact? Does it simplify? Make things more interesting? (I was always a fan of how much you could do with 1st edition and thats why I enjoyed PF more)
It will be very helpful if you think of PF2 as a different game from PF1. The changes simplify GMing and playing, but they also call for a different gaming style: PF2 is much more tactical and team oriented.
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Without starting an edition war...
PF2 is a game I don't care for and don't want to play having giving it a moderate go. The success rates for attacks (and everything else) leave me constantly feeling dissatisfied and like my character is inept.
PF2 feels like a completely different game, just with similar underpinnings of a d20 system.
If you intend to play it, it's best to forget everything you know about PF1 and start over. Even some lore (implicated or out right stated) has changed from PF1.
As for converting a PF1 adventure to PF2...it can be done. But no it's not going to be very straight forward. You will have to alter the stats of every single monster and then figure out how to convert special abilities.
Let me put it like this, if for an analogy we liken PF1 to D&D 1st edition, then PF2 is like 3rd Edition D&D, it terms of scope of change. Or at least that's how drastic it feels to me.
The name and underpinnings of a d20 system are really the only similarities.
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Oh wow. I really appreciate the honesty to this. I really love PF1 which is why looking at PF2 gave me some drawback to it as a system. Considering I own quite a few unplayed adventures from PF1, it really does help settle my choice. Thank you so much for being this upfront.
Without starting an edition war...
PF2 is a game I don't care for and don't want to play having giving it a moderate go. The success rates for attacks (and everything else) leave me constantly feeling dissatisfied and like my character is inept.
PF2 feels like a completely different game, just with similar underpinnings of a d20 system.
If you intend to play it, it's best to forget everything you know about PF1 and start over. Even some lore (implicated or out right stated) has changed from PF1.
As for converting a PF1 adventure to PF2...it can be done. But no it's not going to be very straight forward. You will have to alter the stats of every single monster and then figure out how to convert special abilities.
Let me put it like this, if for an analogy we liken PF1 to D&D 1st edition, then PF2 is like 3rd Edition D&D, it terms of scope of change. Or at least that's how drastic it feels to me.
The name and underpinnings of a d20 system are really the only similarities.
For what it’s worth as someone that’s played a lot of PF2 with a bunch of new and old players, I disagree heavily with their position.
The game is much more tactical, less ivory tower design (tower is basically gone), characters have a wider foundation and hyper specialization is capped so you don’t have trivial encounters.
Character building is vastly better as you have an assortment of options that weren’t even viable in previous 3rd edition adjacent systems.
Sure you’re not landing as many attacks, but you also have a million options on your turn and three actions which is a massive step up from “full attack five foot step every turn” of previous editions.
It may not be everyone’s beat, but it’s my personal favorite edition thus far (even compared to non DnD editions).
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Don't only take my feedback though.
I will admit my bias out of honesty.
There are some people who love the new system, and I am not one of them.
Listen to others too who a different opinion from me.
Heck, if you can find an opportunity it would definitely be good to sit down a play a few session before you make a decision.
I played about a dozen session before I grew too unhappy to continue playing, but I had kinda knew after 3 that it wasn't really my cup of tea. I kept playing just out of social obligation to my group....but eventually enough of us decided we weren't having fun and switched to Starfinder.
I've been much happier since.
PF2 fixed a lot of "problems" PF1 had. But in my opinion they over corrected, and now I don't enjoy the mechanics of the system at all.
Starfinder is kind of a magical sweet spot between them (for me) where many of the crazy overpowered things simply don't exist, but I still feel like my character is competent and contributing.
In PF1 where you could almost completely eliminate the d20 roll as a factor from success on the things you choose to be good at, you can't approach anywhere near that situation in PF2. With smart tactical play your average character will probably have about a 75% chance to hit (including some sort debuff to enemy AC or buff to hit).
RNG is always a relevant factor.
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For what it’s worth as someone that’s played a lot of PF2 with a bunch of new and old players, I disagree heavily with their position.The game is much more tactical, less ivory tower design (tower is basically gone), characters have a wider foundation and hyper specialization is capped so you don’t have trivial encounters.
Character building is vastly better as you have an assortment of options that weren’t even viable in previous 3rd edition adjacent systems.
Sure you’re not landing as many attacks, but you also have a million options on your turn and three actions which is a massive step up from “full attack five foot step every turn” of previous editions.
It may not be everyone’s beat, but it’s my personal favorite edition thus far (even compared to non DnD editions).
I agree the game is much more tactical. That turns out to be one of the things I hate about it.
If I want to play the wild raging barbarian I don't want to be tactical. But I'm forced to be. The system punishes you if you try to play PF2 like you played PF1. You have to be very tactical, finding ways to debuff your enemy and buff your party aren't simply rewarding options, they're downright required.
I'm not sure what you mean by wider foundation, but I agree you can't hyperspecialize into something. However, to me it's worse than that because I don't' feel like I can even specialize in something. About the only optimization you can really do for you character build, is simply making sure you have the highest ability scores you can in the stats you care about doing stuff with. Everything else is basically on rails progression. But yes, there aren't trivial encounters anymore. Unless they're like 2 levels below you.
Personal I don't see the character options as being more (or even close to equally) robust than what was available in PF1, but I think it's probably an unfair comparison considering length of time each system has been out.
So I agree with some of your observations. I used to think I wanted those things. Paizo gave me what I thought I used to want. Turns out I hated it.
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The wider foundation comes from the new funnels of power vs PF1.
Previously, everything was Feats in the same bucket. Because of that, options that focused on skills or flavorful additions to our of combat situations were competing with combat based options.
And there was a lot more famine aspects applied to martial classes, so you couldn’t really afford these ribbons/skill based feats.
Now, there are 3 major avenues of buckets (general feats, Ancestry, Class) that do not compete against each other, giving skills opportunities to thrive and even Ancestry the ability to be a firmer pillar in the character.
Skill feats, background, Ancestry heritage/feats, and Class Feats means you’re not just a Fighter, you’re a Intimidating Glare Woodland Elf barekeeper turned Fighter with a sword and board double strike build.
Because you are more than just a couple of general feats, your overall power is about even but your depth of character is spread across these 5 buckets. This creates a deeper character combination and stronger conceptual starting point. And all of those buckets continue to fill with more abilities as you level so the foundation of your character continues to widen instead of directly vertical increases (though you get those too).
As for the million options, the game is not tactically played with a specific subset of actions like previous editions (see previous comment on five foot step full attack). You can use skill actions, which are plentiful and generally strong, that weren’t really competing against attacks in combat.
Class feats open other actions and ancestries do as well. On top of all the new options, the clear action for “what to do” is much more nebulous in PF2. Most of the time the best way to fight and enemy depends entirely on the enemy abilities, your abilities, your allies abilities, and circumstances of the environment. This creates layers of difference that change the permutations for what you can actually do that will help and there’s a lot of different ways to contribute to a combat.
And with 3 actions per round with outcomes that change how you use your follow up actions, you have more total choices to make per round than previously.
Demoralize as an opening move means they are more likely to be crit/hit, Trip would mean no MAP to your trip, but a MAP on a follow up strike will have flatfooted (and action tax), tumble through might be good to get positioning if pinned and fish an AoO out of your opponent if they have it, taking their reaction from hitting the caster on their summon spell.
Now the “when do I use Trip, Demoralize, Feint, tumble, etc” is something you sort of learn. I find that new players adjust really quick because they simply do what their character would do instead of going to hard on what’s optimal. Some cool moments come from players just trying out different tactics and thanks to the robustness of skills, that’s supported well in the rules of the game. I can discern what skill they need to roll to do just about anything.
As a GM, I learned the system pretty fast all things considered, but it can be considered a rules heavy game. I’d call it less rules heavy than PF1, it’s just we all knew PF1 because of 3.0/3.5 so it seems like a lot (and it is more compared to 5E but for good measure).
Multiclassing and archetypes are also absolutely amazing. The character variation on concepts is massive. I just built a Inventor MCD Witch with a weapon innovation built in tools skill feat focus on medicine that basically plays like SCP 049 (plague Doctor) and in another edition that wouldn’t be even remotely possible (and it would likely have to suck for flavor). Not only is it good on paper, it’s flavorful as heck.
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I'm not against tactical, but I want people to have the option if they choose to be or not. Just be silly and have fun with the overall campaign involved.
Between PF1 and PF2, this is far more required of PF1. In PF1 if you didn’t know how to build a competent character you were dead in the water.
You can’t even build a bad PF2 character IMO unless you do it on purpose, you only get more versatile generally which means more options in combat.
I’ve seen way more action variation in 2 years of PF2 than nearly 10 years of play in PF1. And that’s honestly not an exaggeration.
First, how does second compare to first? What are the changes that make a big impact? Does it simplify? Make things more interesting? (I was always a fan of how much you could do with 1st edition and thats why I enjoyed PF more)
While the systems are both d20 based fantasy D&D derived systems, there have been quite a few changes. The most striking is that they've really overhauled combat, which ends up feeling distinct against most other TTRPGs I've played, despite still being all about hitting ACs with attack rolls to whittle down a creature's hit points.
There's a lot of simplification and unification under the hood. The game is a lot easier to GM and there's fewer fiddly rules (though there are still some). However, combat has a lot of depth this time around. Tactical play enthusiasts get a lot to chew on, though less tactically interested players still can manage well enough (based on my experience GMing for a tactically weak group).
Out of combat, it plays basically the same, or close enough that it doesn't matter.
Also can second edition be ran comfortably with 1st edition adventures? Like Rise of the Runelords, etc? Have a couple friends who are new and using it as a gateway since its a fun and mostly straightforward campaign to me.
You can run 1E adventures, though the GM needs to replace creatures in combat encounters with their counterparts from 2E bestiaries, and will sometimes need to build a monster from the ground up if its an unusual one or an NPC. The monster building rules in 2E are super easy and this isn't a problem.
Converting loot over from 1E to 2E ends up being much more difficult as they have fairly different approaches to loot.
Finally, you'd need to convert various DCs over to 2E standards (not too tricky, as there's some guidance for DCs in the CRB).
A bunch of people have already done conversions of RotRL, which you should be able to find with a bit of searching.
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Now that Midnighttoker explained what he meant by foundation, I agree with his assessment that it was nice of Paizo to separate option pools for skills, class abilities/feats, general feats, ancestry feats. It does mean you have a more options that don't compete.
Though I feel many options don't feel very impactful. And other that are incredibly impactful. But that exists across all feat "types".
However, I do still consider that PF1 had a much wider breadth of character options, however you couldn't really choose many of them without handicapping your combat capabilities.
With regard to "a million options", it's also true that PF2 doesn't have one set of actions that you should basically always execute.
You cannot have a "schtick". Because it will frequently not work. There are a lot of options, and their use really depends on the situation.
While this sounds good in theory, I honestly didn't like it either. It turns out I didn't want to put that much thought into it. I liked PF1 systems of "I didn't build for that so it's not even relevant". PF2 will require you to remember that you all sorts of various options available to you depending on the situation.
The biggest problem PF2 tackled was how imbalanced the players were against "level appropriate" content. When I GM I normally ran level +2/3 against the PCs of PF1 games because players were that strong.
In PF2, on level opponents are no pushover, and level +2 is actually a daunting boss fight. Someone will likely be knocked unconscious, bad RNG or bad decision can result in a PC death.
Many things that were done with PF2 were good. However, somehow the final product is something that I just don't like.
I think it's mostly has to do with the success rates of individual actions (for me). I feel like spent far too many turns going, "Well I rolled less than 10 for both attacks so I probably missed, who's next?"
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Forgetting PF1e is some of the best advice for playing PF2e. I've only GM'd PF2e and overall I like it. Combat encounters are an improvement both in the action economy and that a team game requiring a greater degree of team play.
It makes martial characters much more interesting to play; gone are the days where just standing still making full attacks is the best/only course of action. Yes PF2e is more tactical than PF1e but the bar was very low.
I'll admit that magic doesn't feel as good in PF2e than it did in PF1e. But I'll also admit that magic was often brokenly overpowered in the first edition; your spellcasters are unlikely to be ending a combat encounter with a single spell. I do think that in an effort to reign in magic use Paizo may have overcorrected. Another significant change is yhe introduction of magic traditions, probably better in the long run though I do think spellcaster classes can end up lacking in identity. I miss the weird janky spell list of the witch and don't think the hex focus spells make up for it.
Regarding combat encounter, I find that individual turns take longer in PF2e but players do a lot more on them and the number of rounds is fewer. This will of course depend on your players.
I prefer the new system and evangelise when I can but I also believe that Claxon's position is perfectly agreeable and valid.
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Yeah, please don't take my criticism or dislike of the system to say that others shouldn't enjoy it if they do.
There are lots of good parts to the design of PF2 that I like on paper. Perhaps if PF1 was written in certain aspects to include those sorts of things, like separate feat pools for race/class/general/skill feats, it would be something I would be very happy about.
However, at the end of the day the way everything combined together left me with a gaming experience I resented because of how not fun it was for me.
This is why in my second post I suggested you try it before you make a decision one way or the other.
Personally I don't think there is a lot of middle ground with PF2 (if you're coming from PF1). You'll either love it or hate it.
I'm happy that individuals like Decimus Drake can enjoy the new system, and I'll occupy myself with more Starfinder (for now) and maybe a PF1 game after it ends.
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Oh, one thing that's a big change is that there are basically no number enhancers to choose from anywhere in the system (in terms of character options, not equipment).
Basically everything you select will widen your ability to do something, or sometimes give you a brand new ability to do something. But don't go looking for something that is going to drastically increase your damage or to hit. You're not going to find it.
What you will find is options that increase the variety of things you can do.
It's a huge change from PF1, probably one of the most striking ones. It's also the reason why, as Malk Content says, 95% of options work in PF2. They don't sacrifice any mechanical capability to get them, you're sacrificing one kind of versatility for another kind.
This was also something I thought I wanted. Turned out I wanted bigger numbers.
Honestly getting and playing PF2 taught me a lot about myself I didn't realize or know.
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One of the things that P2 did is it helped to flatten the curve as far as character ranges, and I see that as a good thing.
What I mean by that is, in P1 it was very common that by mid levels 7 or 8, there were many situations where a check was 100% automatic for some PCs (can only fail on a natural 1) while another PC at the same level in the same party needs a 15 or higher to succeed. This makes the game harder to run, because you can either challenge one PC or give the other a chance to succeed, but not both. It also makes the game no fun, because there is no challenge or not chance to succeed.
In P1, at level 10 a rogue with max Dex would have a reflex save of +14 . In the same party your starting 8 con elven wizard has a fort save of +4, and half of that is from the cloak of resistance +2. In P2, at level 10 regardless of build or class the lowest a save will be is +12, and the highest is +21, before item bonuses.
Skills are even more pronounced. A level 10 PC could easily have a +20 in a specialized skill, where their Fighter with his 2 points a level has a +4. In P2, if you are trained in a skill, at level 10 the biggest difference would be +9 (+12 vs +21), but even untrained can get the benefit of follow the expert, so you can have a location where the PCs need to stealth and the Armored Paladin can actually try instead of instant failing.
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Basically everything you select will widen your ability to do something, or sometimes give you a brand new ability to do something. But don't go looking for something that is going to drastically increase your damage or to hit. You're not going to find it.
This is the strength of P2. A rogue spent almost every feat and rogue talent just trying to up that to hit just to be effective. There were entire trap classes. Feat taxes that you had to pay at level 1, that you never use, but you need for that level 8 feat. God forbid you didn't plan out your entire PC from level 1 to 20. Because the feat trees were so heavy that if you miss that one feat a level 3, you just put yourself back 6 levels in your build that didn't even function until level 9.
Don't you EVER even think about multiclassing. That never worked, except for munchkiny dipping to poach all the nice abilities.
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For me, builds can be so diverse I literally just start with a concept and then work backwards to make it work within the rules.
In PF1, it usually felt like I had to find an option that "felt good to focus" and then build around it, so its been a breath of fresh air to go instead "I wonder if I can make a trap-based ranger MCD Alcehmist work with long range bomb" and then mapping the build accordingly.
Even at level 1, you can have pretty rich builds, so I'd say it comes down to what you are trying to see come to life and then going from there.
Were there any concepts you felt weren't that good in PF1 but wanted for flavor purposes? Let's see if any of those concepts can be realized.
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Yes, after they released 2E, they've switched over to writing adventures for 2E.
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Fire up Pathbuilder and start generating characters. Super simple and easy to get started.
As for my opinion:
PF1 is ONLY good now if you have a dedicated, focused, veteran group of PF players that know the rules like the back of their hands. It still has those glorious moments when the build you theorycrafted comes online and all the moving parts mesh and you get to watch your character just sing. With system mastery, you can make characters that do tons of different things without being super OP, and it's best when everyone follows that philosophy.
PF2 is easier to learn, easier to teach, easier to GM, easier to focus on pure RP, and easier to homebrew. It's almost impossible to break the game and ruin the GM's hours and hours of work. PF2 allows for hardcore theorycrafters to play at the same table with rank amateurs without making people feel bad.
The only downsides versus PF1 in my opinion are: as default, characters can't do as much as they could in PF1, and the tight math means you can't typically steal the spotlight. The first is solved by Free Archetype rule, and the second is a good thing more often than it's bad.
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I guess for me the part of PF1 I like is getting to choose a set of things to say "I'm good at these" and that mean nearly always succeeding at that group of things. But it also meant that you basically failed at anything else.
In PF2 you have more things you can be good at, but now good means "I'm 15% better than the other guy". Yeah it's better...but for me it doesn't feel enough better. I don't feel like my character choices have enough effect. I don't feel like all my investment to be "a better swordsman" have "me a better swordsman" in the key way I'm looking for, which turned out to be cold hard numbers.
There are many people who feel as I do.
There are also many others who feel the way the majority of this thread have felt thus far.
The best thing really, is to try and play a few sessions, at different levels if possible, and see how you feel about it.
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It will depend, PF1 is great for people that love to make characters and like to try to find the combinations that work and make you strong, but you pretty much win the game at character creation.
PF2 the victory will be determined inside the battle and is easier to GM, but players might find character options weak because they usually don't increase your power but increase you options of what you can do.
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The Beginner Box has a starter adventure that is the best intro to 2E (and imho to tabletop RPGs).
A lot of work has already been done to convert Rise of the Runelords to Pathfinder 2e.
I am running RotRL using 2e, but personally I want it to scale up to Level 20. So I am going to diverge from that conversion eventually. (It still lines up with PF 1e through Book 2, but PF 1e leveling slows down after Book 3 I believe.)
Rebuilding encounters in PF 2e from an early AP is pretty straightforward, since that was before PF started to release more Bestiaries with more unique monsters. You just replace a monster with a comparable statblock from PF 2e. Between Archives of Nethys & EasyTools, there already are many statblocks of Bestiary monsters and unique monsters and NPCs from the Adventure Paths that are available. Making monsters and NPCs in PF 2e is much simpler than in 1e; they use the same "top-down" approach that they started using in Starfinder. You conceptualize a monster, than choose from an array of stats appropriate to your Concept/Level. Add abilities and feats (which are conveniently already assigned Levels in 2e) from there.
Most importantly, Level actually gives an accurate idea of the strength of a monster in 2e, in contrast to what was often a crapshoot in 1e. This is the other side of "characters have predictable numbers"; the tight math makes it easy for GMs to pinpoint the challenge level they want even up to Level 20. To say that a character is better at something is "15% better" wouldn't be fair, either; a Fighter's effective +2 to attack can mean doubling their critical-hit range, for example. And our Level 8 fighter, who is a Master at his weapon, just hit a Level 7 creature yesterday with a 3 on his die roll; it was glorious.
I GMed 1e for 9 years and while it was a good run, I don't think I'm ever going back. The QoL improvements in 2e, the balanced math while still maintaining robust build choices for players, all while increasing the variance of actions (no longer are you falling into doing the same optimized routine every round), and the more-interesting monsters with evocative memorable abilities, all make 2e for me by far the easier and more enjoyable system to GM.
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I value Claxon’s input here and they are being super fair to both systems.however it is totally coming from the player side.
As a GM of both systems, I would never, ever go back to PF1. PF2 is built for GMs to make running the system on the fly so much easier. And, if you are the GM, and you don’t like the challenging nature of PF2 math you can just level your players up one level (or 2 if necessary) and pretty well accomplish the feel you are looking for without having to change anything else in the AP.
Steer clear of Age of Ashes though if you are worried about your players not responding well to getting beat up often. It features many encounters that will push those 50/50 odds of killing dead the party. Of course if your players like a challenge, it is wonderful, and with 2 extra levels the really difficult fights will be few and far between.
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I'd really suggest the Beginner Box adventure not just as an introduction for your players.
The Gamemaster's Guide is one of the best teaching tools I've ever seen for teaching new GMs. It's a two-level dungeon that walks you through all the stuff that might be different and brings tactics to your attention for running the monsters.
It clarifies a lot of what's new in PF2, and can be run in approximately 3-4 hours. It also leads into the next adventure: The Road From Otari
In PF2 you have more things you can be good at, but now good means "I'm 15% better than the other guy". Yeah it's better...but for me it doesn't feel enough better. I don't feel like my character choices have enough effect. I don't feel like all my investment to be "a better swordsman" have "me a better swordsman" in the key way I'm looking for, which turned out to be cold hard numbers.
The real problem that you are noticing is that PF2 automatically scales up your enemies as well as you, because the maths is very tight. So you never really get ahead.
Have a look at the Game Mastery Guide. Try the Proficiency without Level Option. It may seem like an odd recommendation as you are complaining about not feeling better than the other guy, or accomplished as a mid level swordsman.
But what it means is that lower level monsters are still a threat. So you can play against a broader list of enemies and still be effective. You can fight against normals and be challenged, as well as higher level enemies.
This may give you the story effect and feel that you want.
I'd really suggest the Beginner Box adventure not just as an introduction for your players.
The Gamemaster's Guide is one of the best teaching tools I've ever seen for teaching new GMs. It's a two-level dungeon that walks you through all the stuff that might be different and brings tactics to your attention for running the monsters.
It clarifies a lot of what's new in PF2, and can be run in approximately 3-4 hours. It also leads into the next adventure: The Road From Otari
Is there a way to do Beginner Box online? That may be a good way to start everyone off. Then switch to chosen made characters for RFO.
The GMs guide sounds useful too. Thanks!
The Beginner Box which has the adventure is not free online.
Are you using a Virtual Tabletop?
The PDF for the Beginner Box is $15. Some VTTs sell Paizo adventures/content where all the maps are prepared for you. Me, I use Foundry VTT and I converted the PDF maps to JPGs so I could use them in Foundry.
The Beginner Box PDF also includes everything that comes with the physical version: pregenerated characters, blank character sheets, reference cards, etc. When I introduced PF2 to new players, I let them choose from the Pathfinder Society Level 1 pregens which has a version for all the final classes; if you read the pregens in advance that should work, too. I did this because there were a couple players coming from PF1 who really valued character options.
Pathfinder 1 and Pathfinder 2 are so different and just hard to compare. I feel both games are great in the character customization part.
PF2 really is a tactical game and has a lot of choices in and out of combat. I actually prefer the character building in PF2.
The real benefits in PF2 is...
-Encounters are much more balanced.
-There is no mass buffing like in PF1. Do people like balancing encounters around characters having 10+ buffs?
-Characters dont have absurd power gaps.
-It really feels like most characters have a lot of choices on their turn.
-At the moment it is really hard to break the game and classes are somewhat balanced.
-For the most part it is tough to just win an encounter with one spell.
Other than that the games are just so much different and I enjoy both. Overall there is a lot more things I enjoy in PF2 than PF1
I love the tactical feel of the game and just enjoy the character options. You can really make some fun interesting characters. Only things I really dislike from PF2 are hit chances being lower than I would like, but honestly that isnt a big deal to me.
I also never understood the comment about people stating your "choices dont matter in PF2", I feel the feats are a lot more impactful and fun than PF1. I just love how feats offer different ways to attack and new abilities are a lot more than adding +x to hit/damage etc...
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First, how does second compare to first? What are the changes that make a big impact? Does it simplify? Make things more interesting? (I was always a fan of how much you could do with 1st edition and thats why I enjoyed PF more)
A lot has changed, but some fundamentals have also stayed the same.
I would say the biggest change is that they moved away from the 1E model where you could decide to be so good at something, you couldn't fail - and adventures assumed you were so good at things, if you failed anything, you'd be on a spiral to failing the adventure hard. 2E is much more about winning in the face of some setbacks. Although 2E characters fail checks more often, and get hit more often, they're also way more resilient and able to bounce back from adversity. I guess it's more about whether you like "snatch victory from the jaws of defeat" vs. "do a perfect run".
The biggest thing that stayed the same is that it's still a game focused on crunchy characters and lots of things to choose from while building them. They simplified the inner engine of the game and got rid of a lot of complexity that was just being complex, but they didn't get rid of the tasty complexity. Obviously there are fewer books with options, but you can see that it's built with room to grow.
Also can second edition be ran comfortably with 1st edition adventures? Like Rise of the Runelords, etc? Have a couple friends who are new and using it as a gateway since its a fun and mostly straightforward campaign to me.
Any help and explanation is appreciated. Thank you so much!
You couldn't just do a literal transposition - 1E statblocks aren't compatible with 2E statblocks. But if you're reading for example Runelords and you get the sense that "hey, this encounter is meant to be somewhat hard" then it's easy enough to look in the GM chapter and see how you build a somewhat hard encounter and look in the Bestiary for the same kind of monster and build an encounter that feels about as hard as you wanted it to be.
This edition is a LOT easier on the GM that wants to have some creative input. Estimating how hard things are is much, much easier. But it doesn't stop there. The base structure for building minigames like skill challenges is so dead simple that quite a few people managed to intuitively run games like that before it was even published in the GMG. One of the reasons this works so well is because attacks and AC, skills, saves and spells are all scaled in the same way so you can easily mix and match. This makes improvising anything as a GM so much easier.
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I value Claxon’s input here and they are being super fair to both systems.however it is totally coming from the player side.
As a GM of both systems, I would never, ever go back to PF1. PF2 is built for GMs to make running the system on the fly so much easier. And, if you are the GM, and you don’t like the challenging nature of PF2 math you can just level your players up one level (or 2 if necessary) and pretty well accomplish the feel you are looking for without having to change anything else in the AP.
Steer clear of Age of Ashes though if you are worried about your players not responding well to getting beat up often. It features many encounters that will push those 50/50 odds of killing dead the party. Of course if your players like a challenge, it is wonderful, and with 2 extra levels the really difficult fights will be few and far between.
Oh, from a GM perspective hands down PF2 is an easier game to run.
I've not GM'd it, but GM'ing level 10+ content in PF1 could easily be a nightmare depending on your players.
The rules of PF2 make everything much easier for the GM.
Honestly, I could see PF2 GMing probably being more fun (for someone like me) than PF1 because monsters are incredibly effective.
@Gortle, you hit the nail on the head when you say I have the feeling of never getting ahead. That's exactly my issue. And it made me absolutely f@!*ing miserable. For me, that feeling of never getting better to the enemies I was currently facing makes me feel like an absolute failure. It was the definition of not fun for me.
It's felt exceedingly pointless and arbitrary to level up because my enemy was also getting stronger right along with me, at everything. They don't have to pick and choose which things they get better at. Everything gets better as they level up, just like you.
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I think a big part of the "never getting ahead" feeling is really an adventure design issue. You don't feel like you're better off against even level enemies because "even level" actually means providing the same amount of difficulty, the way it theoretically should. (Still not perfectly, of course, but very tightly compared to 1E, where the CR system was disastrously inaccurate as an estimation of challenge, if you didn't have the GM experience to estimate more accurately than what the system told you).
The escape valve here is that encounters made with groups of lower level enemies and hazards actually work in PF2, and there is no reason for every skill challenge to be scaled exactly "at level". PF2 really does call for continuing to use enemies that lag a few levels behind the PCs, and provides the opportunity for players to feel the progression while still adding up to a real threat. Unfortunately, I think some adventure writing habits haven't totally caught up to best practices for the new system (especially in the first content that was produced for the system).
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Claxon's critiques feel bizarre to me because I cannot imagine being disappointed that enemies continue to be dangerous. It's not like it's the same sewer goblin that you fought at level one that continues to be a threat, you leveling up means you can match more dangerous foes - things that would've mopped the floor with you a couple levels earlier.
I guess I'm coming from the perspective of being a huge fan of famously difficult RPG's. Different strokes and all.
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Yup the whole never getting ahead feeling is definitely true in Adventure Paths. Two of our players felt that way.
Oddly I find this to such a strange thing to complain about since mostly coming from video games I kind of expect monsters to scale the same as me otherwise it just isnt fun.
I dont have huge experience in PF1 but from my limited experience from level 1-17 in Iron Gods it just felt like the monsters kept getting easier and easier.
Monsters tend to only hit on a near 20s and players can hit on like a 2 against most monsters.
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My group came from PF1.
PF2 is like a breath of fresh air for us.
On the GM side of things it is easy to run which makes my job fun again (perma GM). 3 action system works well for both GM's and Players alike and its easy to challenge my players again without having to adjust things on the fly like I use to in PF1.
On the players side. My players are having a lot of fun due to the 3 action system and the 4 degrees of success. They enjoy tactical game play and all the options they have at their finger tips.
One thing I can't speak on is the Adventure Paths. I run a fully home brew world and adventures.
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Another bit of advice that runs counter to what you might hear otherwise, is that, even if you run an AP, I recommend throwing in some extra encounters for your players, combat and non-combat, especially at lower levels. Use a big battle map for the combat encounter and start the party far away from the enemy. Add some different kinds of terrain and environmental features for both combat and non-combat encounters. Turn the party's first big shopping opportunity after getting some loot into a social encounter where future discounts can be earned. Doing these kinds of things can help players see the bigger picture of why the added versatility and utility of PF2 is more valuable than just being able to hyper specialize, like back in PF1.
It will help your players feel like PF2 is a more flexible and robust system.
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The single best investment you can make is the $15 on the pdf of the Beginner Box.
Learn the player rules (Heroes Handbook) and the gamemaster rules (Gamemaster's Guide). They are the foundation for running and playing PF2.
That package also gives you the maps and pawns you need to run that first 4-hour adventure on Roll20.
Once you have mastered those, get the Player's Handbook, the first Bestiary, and the Game Mastery Guide.
And then you can start branching out with different advanced rule books, adventures, Adventure Paths, and so on.