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From the PFS "[Official] Remaster Questions / Clarifications Thread":
A) How does holy/unholy sanctification work for classes that don't have it built into their class kit (i.e. non-clerics/champions)? Can a rogue, for example, choose to be sanctified? If so, is it simply a matter of deciding it to be true, or does it require some sort of mechanical choice to be made (presumably via selecting a feat of some sort)? And by the same token, are non-clerics/champions beholden to their chosen deity's sanctification guidelines, or is it optional for them? If said rogue was a follower of Iomedae, for example, can they choose to remain unsanctified or is holy sanctification mandatory just as it is for clerics?
B) Is the ability to "revere" a deity rather than worship them still an option in the wake of the remaster? If so, how does that option interact with deities listed as Restricted on the Availability list?
A) At present, only characters whose classes include a Sanctification entry (which is just clerics and champions) can be sanctified. That may change in future, but as of today, your rogue cannot be sanctified without a cleric or champion class archetype.
B) Yes. You still may not revere any Restricted deities.
Well, that answers that. As far as Asmodeus, the archdevils, and anything else on the Restricted list are concerned, characters of faith are completely off the table in PFS, cleric or otherwise.
didn't remember something similar to anarchic rune in core 1
hope it stay
Almost certainly not. It may be trivially easy to homebrew one back jnto the game, but at that point it would still do nothing (but bormal spirit damage) until you homebrew order/chaos sanctification in, too. On the plus, doing that now should be more functional than it was, premaster.
The fact that the anarchic rune is not in the Remaster rule books does not mean that it no longer exists on Golarion. However the fact that alignment is no longer a thing makes me wonder what one would do with it.
It's not like the holy and unholy runes are especially good at this point. They will deal less than an elemental rune rune unless they enemy is directly opposed.
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If you're allowing the anarchic rune in your game, you're going to also have to decide how it works. You can just continue to play with alignment, the rules for that are in the pre-remaster books. It's just that you're going to need to guess as to the alignments of things that are in the post-remaster books.
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I fell the very strong focus we see in the rules and how people debate those really bring the spotlight on Holy/Unholy to the detriment of everything else. Even anathema, to say nothing of edicts, feel less character-centric than Can you deal a damage type that hurts Fiends / Celestials.
I feel some elements of the setting make much less sense in view of the strengthened focus on Good (Holy) vs Evil (Unholy).
Why would a hater of Demons turn to Hell (another flavor of Unholy) to annihilate his enemies instead of turning to Heaven (regimented AND Holy) ? So, no founding of the Hellknights.
And how can the Order of the Godclaw even exist, worshipping exemplaries of Holy and Unholy in the same prayer ?
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I fell the very strong focus we see in the rules and how people debate those really bring the spotlight on Holy/Unholy to the detriment of everything else. Even anathema, to say nothing of edicts, feel less character-centric than Can you deal a damage type that hurts Fiends / Celestials.
I feel some elements of the setting make much less sense in view of the strengthened focus on Good (Holy) vs Evil (Unholy).
Why would a hater of Demons turn to Hell (another flavor of Unholy) to annihilate his enemies instead of turning to Heaven (regimented AND Holy) ? So, no founding of the Hellknights.
And how can the Order of the Godclaw even exist, worshipping exemplaries of Holy and Unholy in the same prayer ?
In fairness demons were never actually vulnerable to lawful damage. They took it, but they didn't take any extra.
As opposed to good damage, which they both took and were weak to.
So "why turn to hell and the godclaw" hasn't made sense since PF 2 came out. Heck, in PF 1 and DND 3.5 demons had DR/good and not DR/lawful. So it's really never been the case that hell was better than heaven for killing demons
Damage Reduction in PF1 (and I believe D&D 3.5e, but it's been a while) was primarily an issue for weapon users - it's a question of whether your weapon is properly enchanted to get past their DR. While a holy weapon was an issue for evil-aligned wielders, it caused no such problem for neutral ones, and with a high-enough enchantment bonus (+5) you can bypass alignment-based DR entirely even without an alignment enchanted weapon. There were also spells, weapon oils, etc. that allowed you to temporarily align your weaponry for the purposes of bypassing DR, which explicitly do not have the same negative consequences for oppositely aligned wielders that permanent alignment enchantments do.
By contrast, spells generally bypassed DR and those such as Holy Word/Dictum, Holy Smite/Order's Wrath, Protection from Evil/Chaos and so on, as well as abilities like a Paladin's Smite Evil and a Hellknight's Smite Chaos, were primarily keyed off of whether the target was of evil/chaotic alignment (or sometimes nongood/nonlawful, meaning it would also affect neutral targets) or whether they were an outsider with the evil/chaotic subtype, meaning such magic was equally effective against demons regardless of whether you came at it from the "Holy" angle or the "Lawful" angle.
So no, while it was admittedly more convoluted for weapon-users, there's no reason Hell (or Hellknights) couldn't be just as effective against demons as holy-types can in PF1e. Not necessarily more effective, but as effective, provided they are properly prepared and equipped.
PF2e changed that, and the remaster doubled down on it.
I don't think anyone is arguing that devils in general are supposed to be strong against demons.
If I want to kill a demon in 1e I use my Hellknight's Smite Chaos.
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I mean, if I want to kill a demon in 1e I use Smite Evil.
Well yes obviously. The point is there was room for Law to perform comparably to Good when fighting Chaotic Evil.
It may be a matter of interpretation then. I include access to Dictum and Smite Chaos as results of turning to Hell, so despite devils not being good at demon hunting it actually works out fine for PCs.
If you want to see what happens when you rely on Hell to solve the Worldwound you can do that in the Wrath of the Righteous video game ^.^
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It's true, spellcasting wasn't really biased towards good/evil instead of law/chaos.
But seriously. I would never ever turn to Hell to kill demons. Here's why:
If I want to kill a demon in PF 1 or 3.5, and I summon a devil... the devil can't really help? Their attacks are aligned to evil and law, and the demon's damage reduction was bypassed by neither of those. The devil doesn't actually HAVE dictum or order's wrath. If we look at the pit fiend statblock, it has blasphemy. Which bounces right off the very evil demon while hitting any non-evil party members. It also has a permanent unholy aura, which literally buffs the demon against the rest of the party! And its fire spells ricochet off the demon's fire resistance.
In fact, I'd be better off summoning basically ANYTHING BUT a devil. In particular, I should summon an angel. Who DOES bypass the demon's damage reduction with its attacks (aligned good and lawful) and has holy word and holy smite.
I've always viewed spell-like ability lists as suggestions rather than mandates, but even so, I see no reason devils shouldn't have access to magic items and class levels that expand their capabilities, particularly those of the "named NPC" variety.
Regardless, I'm not saying the statblock of any random devil is somehow perfectly optimized for combating any random demon, I'm saying characters who have a reason to specialize at killing demons but come at it from different angles should be equally supported in their ability to do so.
A legion of Hellknights (LN/unsanctified) hunting demons because they're embodiments of chaos might not use the same tools as a legion of Paladins (LG/holy) hunting demons because they're embodiments of evil, but they should be able to be similarly as effective. Instead, in 2e the Hellknights are artificially hamstrung by not being holy.
More to the point, not everyone comes at it by first asking "I hate demons, so whom should I ally myself with in order to kill them best?" Some come at it from "I'm a devotee of X and, as it turns out, X has opinions and divine mandates regarding demons, so I've decided to make eradicating them my life's work". Some come at it from "I have an ideology/worldview that demons are antithetical to, and as such view their elimination as a matter of vital importance to furthering my cause".
For example, my character was an Asmodean Demon Hunter (a 1e religion trait), which has the baked in implications that the character has a strong connection to the faith of Asmodeus and that the faith of Asmodeus has strong opinions on demons and the eradication thereof - not exactly a foundation from which I can spontaneously decide that Iomedae, angels, and holy magic should be my tools of choice just because they're more mechanically advantageous. Unless that doctrine has been fully memory-holed and Asmodeus in 2e doesn't care about combating demons in the slightest, his servants and followers should have access to comparable tools to do the job. Right now, they don't.
The real treasure was the ocean of blood and tears we made along the way.
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I think the problem with the PF1 approach is demons were never REALLY embodiments of chaos. They were embodiments of evil-- literally the manifestation of human sin-- that just happened to be chaotic. They supplanted the former denizens of the Abyss that were embodiments of chaos, the Qlippoth. (Who were susceptible to lawful damage in both editions.) Being chaotic was always a secondary concern to demons.
Similarly, devils aren't actually embodiments of law, they are emodiments of evil that have a pretense of being lawful. Devils aren't actually honest. They are hierarchical and prefer to twist the letter of the law to their advantage, but that's not actually what an embodiment of law would do.
I think a lot of people started thinking of them as emodiments of law, including players and Paizo writers AND in world people like the Hellknights. That's where the whole LN worshipper of Asmodeus thing came from. But from comments James Jacobs made, I don't think that was ever intended for players and writers.
The Hell Knights have some facist overtones and qualifying them as LN overall always felt a little sus. They almost feel like a cautionary tale to me, but that's a Captain Morgan opinion, not necessarily one shared by Paizo staff.
In the beginning of PF2 there were 4 meta-factions laid out as important to the setting. 2 of them have had setting books devoted to them and one of them has had an entire AP devoted to them. The other one is the Hellknights.
So if there are "Hell-oriented specific tools for fighting demons" (or just people who threaten order in general) they're probably going to be in that book. It's just that the Hellknights got the spotlight last of the four probably because what they're about is less interesting to Paizo folks for whatever reason than the other three.
In the beginning of PF2 there were 4 meta-factions laid out as important to the setting. 2 of them have had setting books devoted to them and one of them has had an entire AP devoted to them. The other one is the Hellknights.
Which AP is that?
In the beginning of PF2 there were 4 meta-factions laid out as important to the setting. 2 of them have had setting books devoted to them and one of them has had an entire AP devoted to them. The other one is the Hellknights.Which AP is that?
Strength of Thousands.
Ah, of course.
Like PF2 could absolutely do a Magaambya book, it's just that between Strength of Thousands and the (really, really good) Mwangi Expanse book, they've already covered quite a bit of what they'd want to cover in that book.
The Knights of Lastwall got pushed to the front because "What's Tar Baphon gonna do" is one of the main metaplots of 2e. Then the Firebrands probably got more attention than the Hellknights because they're new and they're kind of more fun.