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Secrets of Magic brought us a new, fancy, and very useful spell called Quick Sort.
It seems like a critical spell that should be in every spellcaster repertoire. I vote we need more spells like these! We need Heapsort, Bubble Sort, and Radix sort. This is URGENT!
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On a slightly more serious note, can we please stop having these spells? I'm not even complaining that a better spell could've been added in its place, but just simply NOT having this spell would be improvement, since it just clogs the spell lists for no reason. Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.
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It's nice of you to look out for the new players, but also think of the tables that play a different style of PF2 than you.
One of the most recent threads has a player looking for housekeeping spells to help them fulfill a character concept they want to play. And I've seen others wonder what kind of everyday spells Golarion might have.
So there's at least some desire to see these odd spells.
And I could see carrying this on a scroll in PFS, maybe even prep it if planning to scour an ancient library (and of a level where 1st aren't used in combat). Could even help with dragon hoards to clear out the copper because some GMs don't handwave handling the loot; days of sifting could be reduced to the next day. Older adventures occasionally made a point of how retrieving the treasure was its own stage, perhaps with bandits, looters, rival monsters, etc.
Given that its name is straightforward, I doubt it's clogging up nearly as much as many other spells.
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I’m an Eberron nerd and this fits right in. I love it!
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Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.How are they a detriment for new players?
In the sense that if you're looking for not niche spells, this one makes it harder.
I'm not saying this is an awful spell, but its use is very niche. It's not the kind of thing you expect an adventurer to have and do.
It's okay for that to exist (IMO) but I can understand the argument that it makes it harder to find the spells that you would actually be interested in taking for a general adventurer character.
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On a slightly more serious note, can we please stop having these spells? I'm not even complaining that a better spell could've been added in its place, but just simply NOT having this spell would be improvement, since it just clogs the spell lists for no reason. Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.
I can't disagree with this more. Not every game plays the same and it's not my place to call out "Wrong Bad Fun," and a spell that makes someone feel like a magical man without hurling fire or lightning is absolutely fine. Is Create Water a bad spell? If a spell serves no combat purpose is it unnecessary? For some players (and some games), the answer is an easy yes. Others, not so much. I don't see any problem with the game catering to as many varying tables and style of play as possible.
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In the sense that if you're looking for not niche spells, this one makes it harder.Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.How are they a detriment for new players?
But what if a players IS in fact looking for niche spells like this one? Should we remove all non-niche spells for them? No more fireball or haste because they could cause someone to miss their precious niche spells? ;)
On a more serious note, I don't see this any different than any other spell. If they had printed another summoning spell instead, a player with a character specialized on blasting or healing wouldn't care for it either.
In the end, you have to look at all spells and decide if they are useful to you or not. Doesn't really matter what anyone else thinks of them.
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New players should have a fine time selecting spells from the CRB and maybe APG. The book is called "Secrets of Magic"; it seems like a good point to start including spells to support a broader range of playstyles.
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On a slightly more serious note, can we please stop having these spells? I'm not even complaining that a better spell could've been added in its place, but just simply NOT having this spell would be improvement, since it just clogs the spell lists for no reason. Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.
I'm going to go ahead and petition the opposite. More of these spells please!
Not only are they more useful than a fourth combat-only spell you probably wouldn't even have memorized during your downtime at, say, a magical school, but their presence in the game gets players thinking. Maaaybe there is more to the system than combat? Maaaaybe it'd be useful to be able to quickly sort through letters, books, or coins?
I know for a fact I'd consider this spell on a spy character.
There seems a lot of projecting and bad faith arguments here.
I never asked for more combat spells, or to only have combat spells. I love a lot of non-combat spells, and a lot of niche spells, and there is a place for them. But this one is so far beyond the line of "niche" utility it is just clogging the spell lists.
New players should have a fine time selecting spells from the CRB and maybe APG. The book is called "Secrets of Magic"; it seems like a good point to start including spells to support a broader range of playstyles.
Why are spells from "Advanced Players Guide" okay for new player but not "Secrets of Magic"?
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The main problem with these kinds of spells is, where do you draw the line? These kinds of spells are so specialized they should either be covered by one very generic spell, or GM should allow it on the fly. They do not need to be defined for a game.
Why can't we have a single house-keeping spell that covers all cleaning needs for your home or dungeon instead of having "Wash bathtub", "Clean shower stall", and "Scrub jacuzzi" spells?
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I'm not sure who "draws the line," but I feel like the person who does is the one with the job at Paizo and not the guy that most people just disagreed with in the first ten posts of their thread.
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There seems a lot of projecting and bad faith arguments here.
I never asked for more combat spells, or to only have combat spells. I love a lot of non-combat spells, and a lot of niche spells, and there is a place for them. But this one is so far beyond the line of "niche" utility it is just clogging the spell lists.
This is a really useful spell in-character, though. Sorting 200 pages in a minute? Tidying up an entire alchemical supply cabinet? Think how long that would take to do by hand.
Yes, it's not a very strong spell. But I want the sort of spells that wizards would actually create. It's not clogging up the spell list because it serves a purpose- it's an excellent characterization spell. You may not value that too highly, but other people do. Plus, it's cool having a spell do something computationally interesting! I imagine there are some interesting ways to use that side of it.
New players should have a fine time selecting spells from the CRB and maybe APG. The book is called "Secrets of Magic"; it seems like a good point to start including spells to support a broader range of playstyles.Why are spells from "Advanced Players Guide" okay for new player but not "Secrets of Magic"?
Because the CRB and APG are part of the base assumptions of the game. Books like Secrets of Magic are add-ons. Not to say they disregard new players entirely, but the game shouldn't keep everything newbie-optimal forever.
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There seems a lot of projecting and bad faith arguments here.
Where? I just see people disagreeing with you, which isn't the same thing.
Where? I just see people disagreeing with you, which isn't the same thing.There seems a lot of projecting and bad faith arguments here.
It's nice of you to look out for the new players, but also think of the tables that play a different style of PF2 than you.
One of the most recent threads has a player looking for housekeeping spells to help them fulfill a character concept they want to play. And I've seen others wonder what kind of everyday spells Golarion might have.
So there's at least some desire to see these odd spells.
Not every game plays the same and it's not my place to call out "Wrong Bad Fun," and a spell that makes someone feel like a magical man without hurling fire or lightning is absolutely fine.
Not only are they more useful than a fourth combat-only spell you probably wouldn't even have memorized during your downtime at, say, a magical school, but their presence in the game gets players thinking. Maaaybe there is more to the system than combat? Maaaaybe it'd be useful to be able to quickly sort through letters, books, or coins?
I never said I wanted combat only, or remove the "common utility" spells. But the spamming of single super-niche thing that a spell does is inane, tiring, and counterproductive. Give us Prestidigitation type spells that cover a topic/series of tasks. Penny pinching the itty bitty tiny tasks per spell just makes magic look limited and ridiculous, and plays into a very common complaint about Paizo systems that they tend to overload with these kinds of tiny, specialized segments which make no sense and just complicate play rather than expand it.
This type of spell should be something that GM allows you to research/learn if it would be useful, not something that needs to take up space in documents showing you how to play the game.
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On a slightly more serious note, can we please stop having these spells? I'm not even complaining that a better spell could've been added in its place, but just simply NOT having this spell would be improvement, since it just clogs the spell lists for no reason. Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.
I agree. I've never understood why Paizo was losing so much design space with useless spells and items.
It would have been way better to have a list of spells/items with name, level and just a quick description of their use. Like "Quick Sort (level 1): Sort hundreds of items in a timely manner."We could have a much bigger list to handle more situations without cluttering the spell list of all casters.
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Where? I just see people disagreeing with you, which isn't the same thing.There seems a lot of projecting and bad faith arguments here.
It's nice of you to look out for the new players, but also think of the tables that play a different style of PF2 than you.One of the most recent threads has a player looking for housekeeping spells to help them fulfill a character concept they want to play. And I've seen others wonder what kind of everyday spells Golarion might have.
So there's at least some desire to see these odd spells.Not every game plays the same and it's not my place to call out "Wrong Bad Fun," and a spell that makes someone feel like a magical man without hurling fire or lightning is absolutely fine.Not only are they more useful than a fourth combat-only spell you probably wouldn't even have memorized during your downtime at, say, a magical school, but their presence in the game gets players thinking. Maaaybe there is more to the system than combat? Maaaaybe it'd be useful to be able to quickly sort through letters, books, or coins?I never said I wanted combat only, or remove the "common utility" spells. But the spamming of single super-niche thing that a spell does is inane, tiring, and counterproductive. Give us Prestidigitation type spells that cover a topic/series of tasks. Penny pinching the itty bitty tiny tasks per spell just makes magic look limited and ridiculous, and plays into a very common complaint about Paizo systems that they tend to overload with these kinds of tiny, specialized segments which make no sense and just complicate play rather than expand it.
This type of spell should be something that GM allows you to research/learn if it would be useful, not something that needs to take up space in documents showing you how to play the game.
Still no examples of projecting nor bad faith arguments that I see, much less "a lot".
There may be some undo extrapolation, but when you go out of your way to write such a snarky post against a utility spell, a reader might presume you dislike utility spells (and hence like combat spells). When the only reasoning you share is that it "clogs the spell list", it's a compliment to you that readers thought "there must be more to this than that, right?"
Also you explicitly said you have no replacement spell to improve the situation so it feels a bit off when you suggest a replacement spell to improve the situation and act as if readers should have understood that as an option you'd be content with. How would they know?
"Very common complaint about Paizo systems": citation needed.
"Spamming..."? Citation needed. Have posters been addressing all this spam and I've been missing it?
I'm not being flip, I seriously don't see either. And are you suggesting Starfinder too? And more than other non-Paizo d20 systems? I kind of doubt you have the market knowledge to assert such.
And as noted by another, we're past the "showing you how to play the game" phase of the CRB & APG though I do recall early D&D having similar spells. Heck, Prestidigitation groups a dozen-ish separate mini-spells from earlier editions. (I forget what they were labeled back then, but the caster had to convert a 1st level slot into 4 slots for these.)
Lastly, yes, I agree a Prestidigitation-type spell would be nice for higher levels/larger tasks. Can't say how I'd go about it though, and while avoiding shenanigans above the spell's level(s).
You might have wanted to lead with this solution.
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Patiently waiting for the bogo sort spell.
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Patiently waiting for the bogo sort spell.
Any sufficiently strong wind spell is a bogo sort spell.
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Quick Sort is a horrendous abomination!
It obviously should have been a Conjuration spell titled Summon Jamaican Bureaucrat (And Requisition Him A Beat...)
On a more serious note, I've gotta agree with the OP that this spell does little more than clutter up the spell list and is an oddly specific spell for anyone to ever actually research/develop: This would have been much better as part of a general 'clean up / organize' spell of some sort (cleans the area, sorts items, refill ink wells or other mundane consumables, maybe does minor repairs, etc) which I could actually imagine someone using...
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Before the SoM add this spell I always think that such things are part of Prestidigitation cantrip.
But I agree with OP and others. Add such spells only pollutes the spell list increasing the difficult for players to find good spells combinations and wastes books space.
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Personally, I love these types of spells for flavor and also just the types of adventures I go on with my table. My group doea a lot of delving through libraries for a specific book or steal the shady org's ledger type of quests, often with time limits and being able to wave my hand to sort over and find the info I want is not only helpful, but also an exciting and fun trick.
Also, if wizards are magical scientists, I can assure you as a chemist that while fireballs are cool, if you can invent a spell that will save you potentially hours of labor, you'll find yourself using it way more than Burning Hands or Fear or what have you.
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Personally, I love these types of spells for flavor and also just the types of adventures I go on with my table. My group doea a lot of delving through libraries for a specific book or steal the shady org's ledger type of quests, often with time limits and being able to wave my hand to sort over and find the info I want is not only helpful, but also an exciting and fun trick.
Also, if wizards are magical scientists, I can assure you as a chemist that while fireballs are cool, if you can invent a spell that will save you potentially hours of labor, you'll find yourself using it way more than Burning Hands or Fear or what have you.
Yeah, but this spell almost certainly isn't going to help you much as it is dependent on 'obvious' information like titles and page numbers: It's great for when a 'loose leaf' manuscript is scattered around the room, but otherwise it will probably just save you a few minutes of looking at book titles and even then it could be misleading if the actual title isn't quite what you are expecting...
Also, this spell specifically puts everything into stacks, which means you probably need to manually re-shelve them afterwards (We may be murder-hobos, but leaving all those books piled on the library floor is just plain rude), which will almost certainly cost you more time than you saved searching...
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Secrets of Magic brought us a new, fancy, and very useful spell called Quick Sort.
It seems like a critical spell that should be in every spellcaster repertoire. I vote we need more spells like these! We need Heapsort, Bubble Sort, and Radix sort. This is URGENT!
=========================
On a slightly more serious note, can we please stop having these spells? I'm not even complaining that a better spell could've been added in its place, but just simply NOT having this spell would be improvement, since it just clogs the spell lists for no reason. Especially if you're trying to introduce new people, this type of spells are actually a detriment.
I love the reference to actual mathematical sorting algorithms. I remember using a pocket sort (cruder version of the radix sort) to sort math exams by student name after I graded them.
These spells have a place in our fantasy folklore, best seen in Disney movies. In the 1963 cartoon Sword in the Stone Merlin uses magic to clean his room and pack up for a trip. In the 1964 live-action movie Mary Poppins Mary uses magic to tidy up the children's room.
In a Pathfinder game, some arcane players would love a spell that lets them pack up their camp in a minute, either for convenience in the morning or for a hasty evacuation after discovery by hostiles.
Once in the D&D module Hollow's Last Hope the party tried negotiating with a warg for access to some medicinal mushrooms necessary to cure sick people in Fallon's Hollow. The warg chose to attack instead. When his minions were dead and he faced defeat, he ran to the mushrooms and savaged and soiled them to deny the party their prize. The spellcaster in the party cleaned them with Prestidigitation, problem solved.
The problem with Quick Sort is that it is a tidy-up spell with only one purpose: sorting objects into categories. It does not clean them nor pack them. If a wizard spilled his material components and had to sort them, then Quick Sort would put them into piles rather than back into his spell component pouch. Unseen Servant would perform the job better though more slowly. The spell is too specialized. It ought to be more versatile.
Tidy Up Spell 1
Evocation
Source Homebrew by Mathmuse
Traditions arcane, divine, occult, primal
Cast [Three Actions] material, somatic, verbal
Range 10 feet; Targets up to 10 bulk of unattended objects in range.
Duration One round per 1 bulk targeted, up to a minute
You magically sort a group of objects into containers or into neat stacks or piles. You sort them by their features or by an established method of packing them into containers. For example, Tidy Up could sort books onto shelves by topic or author, or take down a tent and store its cloth, ropes, and pegs neatly in a backpack. Tidy Up can also clean the objects if desired. Tidy Up does not repair objects.
Heightened (2nd) The spell can clean and sort up to 20 bulk in a minute at 2 bulk per round.
Heightened (3rd) The spell can clean and sort up to 40 bulk in a minute at 4 bulk per round.
Yeah, but this spell almost certainly isn't going to help you much as it is dependent on 'obvious' information like titles and page numbers: It's great for when a 'loose leaf' manuscript is scattered around the room, but otherwise it will probably just save you a few minutes of looking at book titles and even then it could be misleading if the actual title isn't quite what you are expecting...
Also, this spell specifically puts everything into stacks, which means you probably need to manually re-shelve them afterwards (We may be murder-hobos, but leaving all those books piled on the library floor is just plain rude), which will almost certainly cost you more time than you saved searching...
Why do I gaf about reshelving books in an ancient library if I'm on a time crunch?
This spell is so hilariously bad and niche that I'm actually a fan. It's like the poisoned egg of 2e spells.
Now Befitting Attire on the other hand... weren't there already other spells (and magic items) that do this exact thing?
Befitting Attire has the benefit of having a wardrobe malfunction when the magic goes down.
Also no one will argue when you try to sell the wand of Befitting Attire that you found.
Yeah I really don't get these spells but they suit some games. So yeah Ok let people have their fun.
There is a part of me that is saying this is a detail that they can trim from the game. But one of the primary reasons I like PF2 is the sheer volume of good options. I'll take a few more like that if they can add some new good ones as well.
To me its not the mundane spells that are the issue, its more the narrow spells like say Phantom Crowd technically its useful, but I'd never take it because I can almost do exactly the same thing with Illusionary Creature, as well as so many other things.
It's still better than Approximate Why can't the spell just give me an accurate count?
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It's still better than Approximate Why can't the spell just give me an accurate count?
Because that's annoying for a lot of GMs, presumably. Or to prevent being brokenly good at "how many jellybeans in the jar" contests.
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Secrets of Magic, unlike something like the CRB or even the APG, is an expansion book - it's not even that the stuff in it is that much more complex than what's in the core rules, but you likely wouldn't put it in front of a new player as part of their PF2 rules-learning homework.
It also doesn't take being a veteran of 10 years of playing RPGs that, yes, this spell is niche - very niche, even. You definitely wouldn't pick this as a sorcerer signature spell, but it's a nice thing to keep around in a spellbook or on a scroll, and it enriches the game by showing you that, hey, people do things with magic other than blasting trolls with fireball and teleporting around.
Those 'worldbuilding spells' are actually some of my favorite, being a big fan of Eberron and generally anything that acknowledges magic as a tool. Is Quick Sort the best use of page space, even in the worldbuilding/flavorful and niche spell category? Maybe, maybe not, but it's also what, a fraction of a page in a non-essential 256-page book? It's fine. If you don't like it or don't see a use for it, you gloss over it and move on.
As for new players and clogging up spell lists...Iunno, I don't think a few flavorful spells thrown in will seriously impact the cognitive load it has on tbem, let alone everyone else. If the amount of such spells gets overwhelming in the long term, sure, maybe, but that'll take a lot more than the handful of such spells that SoM introduced. After all, that's what Paizo has design managers and directors for, to ensure a healthy mix and a balanced ecosystem of rules, and I trust that they'll maintain it moving forward.