Howdy
So I can't speak to balancing one hand vs two hand and all that (though requiring implements "in hand" feels like it takes care of promoting 1handed weapons).
One of the weird things about antithesis is the fact that you either do 2+1/2 lv or youdo the weakness. Whichever is greater. This is occasionally pretty weird. As the Player states their "damage" but they have to add an adendum concerning the damage type based on the secret roll for Find Flaws. -and then the complte oddity of the failure or crit failure and the fake info situation. Where hte player functionally finds out if their choice of damage type to use works out. etc.
Which imo creates a lot of messy weirdness and table varience.
meanwhile we have Implement Empowerment that adds static damage. (with some hand juggling). and is quite boring. The flavor of the runes and symbols could easily be added to the Antithesis's base properties.
Is it terribly problematic to fuse the two? In effect. You always do the extra 2+1/2 level damage if you have Antithesis active. This is always "you know a weakness" and it goes off regardless of the false infomation quandry from find flaw. As it is "your thama's special ananthema"
Then, any weakness you trigger is just added to that as per a normal hit.
So you'd always get
Weapon damage + Antithesis + weakness. If you learned/guessed the weakness correctly (in case of failure. or no extra weakness on a crit fail).
There would be no implement empowerment as you would always have a scaling static bonus that is only a static points of damage difference.
i.e. implement empowerment is lv 1=2 lv3=4 lv11=6 lv19=8. While the antithesis is 2+1/2lv, lv 3=3 lv 11 = 7 lv 19=11 The damage isn't quite alingned the same, but it does "scale up" as you grow. Which feels like you are actually getting better.
All while functionally requiring the free hand or implement from Implement Empowerment (by virtue of the class wanting to have an implement in hand always. Though it does mean someone who didn't want them could use a two handed by ignoring class features)
Would that cause damage scaling issues? It feels a lot simplier. It also means you get to live some of the thematics of the class. For instance...
You identify this creature as being weak to silver, or silver like stuff (fail) or
You roll well enough you know that silver melted with fools gold burns their soul due to the history of the creature's being spawns from a curse of a debt involving silver and fake gold being used to trick something.
Either way you get the 2+1/2 level ofyour personal antithesis (ananthema). but in the latter case you get the 2+1/2lv and you get the extra weakness value on top of that. As you knew their esoteric history. It being static regardless of weakness (as you create or exploit one) means it also pushes the "magic of thamaturgist" flavor up as well.
This way the GM can have fun and play with the Recall KNowledge attempt, with its secret roll. THe player will have no clue if their guess or attempt is correct. They can even guess compmletely wrong if they're given a choice of three (as per dubious knowlege feat). They still get the damage like currently. But they may or may not get the weakness bonus on top.
It removes the metaknowledge, retains the damage boosts. and puts RP perspectives on both the GM and player to play with. It also removes the issue of "what if I already do the weakness" as it just functionally makes your "weakness weapon" even more precise on aspects.
