Free Archetype


Gatewalkers


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I'm hoping James sees this, and this may be best asked after the 1st book releases. However, with the APs use of Deviant abities, would something akin to the free archetype work? If every 4 levels I allowed the players to select a new deviant feat in addition to their class feat, would the players become too powerful? What kind of rebalancing might need to be considered?


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Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

Note the deviant ability rules in Dark Archive mostly cover this under Background Deviant Abilities:

Dark Archive wrote:
When using background deviant abilities, the player should get to decide what type of deviation they want and build their power. As the player grows, they should be able to improve their deviant ability, whether through special training, seeking out objects of power, or self-improvement, represented as taking additional deviant ability feats. If everyone in your party wishes to make deviant abilities a part of their character, or for a setting where these abilities are more common, consider using a variant similar to the free archetype variant rule to grant each character an extra class feat at 2nd level and every even-numbered level thereafter that they can use only to take deviant feats. In most cases, they can gain every possible deviant ability feat by 16th level in this fashion, so there's no need to grant extra feats after that.

If you want to use this for Gatewalkers, I would recommend using a similar ruling for class archetypes: The "free" deviant ability gained from the Gatewalkers background is gained at 1st level, but takes the place of the 2nd level free archetype feat. Potentially, at 2nd level you could reduce the flat check for backlash when using the "signature" deviant ability gained by the background to DC 4 (and increase each check by 4; similar to the agile weapon property) if you want to give them "something" in place of the 2nd level free archetype feat.


The player's guide suggests the story will cause the deviant ability to grow in power. "Your GM will let youklnow when these points occur..." and also call it a 'scripted Deviant Power Upgrade'

The feats are class feats so a player can choose them if they want to fully explore the mechanic as part of their personal advancement. The player guide says take an appropriate feat if the scripted upgrade is something the player has already taken.

So it looks like there are two ways to advance the powers, and a free archetype adds a third method. I know this does not quite answer your question about free archetype overpowering the game, but I suspect at that point it is going to be up to the individual tables. With some of my friends it would be too much, but others--not so much. I may change my mind-like you said-after reading book 1.

So if it works for you and the rest of the group, go for it. :)

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