I want to preface this both by acknowledging that Player Core 2 is a long ways away, making this discussion entirely speculative, and also by politely begging everyone not to turn this into an Alignment debate.
What do we think Champion options will look like in the future?
As it stands right now, we have six options pegged to the former Good and Evil alignments. There’s long been concerns about the balance and party-friendliness of the Evil Champions (Antipaladin, Desecrator, Tyrant), while the Good options (Liberator, Paladin, Redeemer) are generally well-liked out of concerns that no longer exist in the Remaster. The most simple option would be to swap Tenets from Alignment to Sanctified (Holy/Unholy) and just let the Causes be subclasses… but given the overhauls to the Wizard, I expect something more interesting.
Swapping Antipaladin out for a straightforward Cause of battle could be fun, for Champions of all the many war deities. I could easily see Tyrant loosened up some from “conquer everyone and be a jerk” to a more Hellknight-y “enforce pitiless judgment.” The fandom has wanted an anti-Undead Cause for a long time, which could work well if they follow Wizards in having more specific flavor - and throw a bone to Neutral divinities.
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I really hope there will be something for Champions who are not aligned with Holy and Unholy.
And I would love to have all the current causes and their reactions open as a choice for all Champions.
With maybe the deities forbidding / requiring some causes.
But this feels too big for a single Remastered book that has to mostly fit with the other non-Remastered books.
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The Redeemer is in the perfect place right now. He has a unique ability and great Synergy. The Paladin is stronger, but not as unique. I don't expect much to change for either. Liberator is in a weak place, so I'm hoping for a buff to make its reaction more common.
All the evil champions are weak, even if you're in an undead party. I don't care to see them without a major rework.
I'd like a green faith-based champion, the Warden.
My personal assumption at the moment is that Champion will be the holy/unholy class, and that sanctifying to one of those will be part of the class. But that's also the easiest thing to imagine, and Paizo puts a lot more thought into these things than I do.
I'd like a green faith-based champion, the Warden.
As a child of 4e, I would devour this… but it feels more like a Class Archetype to me.
I would like to see three Tenets - Holy, Unholy, and neither (whatever word that is given). Then the Causes become the primary subclass and can be matched with any of the Tenets.
Various feats like Smite Evil can be prereq'ed to the appropriate Tenet, as can focus spells like Lay on Hands.
But that also leaves the option of having feats that either don't need a particular Tenet, or that require the null Tenet. This would allow for a Champion of balance, or nature, or Laws of Mortality.
And it also leaves the Champion with the right Tenet and feat set to be the Holy/Unholy class.
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VampByDay's March 2023 thread Top Ten things I'd like to see addressed in pathfinder 2023 had a discussion about Neutral-alignment cause for champions. I looked at the neutral gods and sorted them into three separate causes.
Perhaps neutrality on a champion could offer more than one cause:
The Conservator champion could serve nature gods such as Gozreh and Fandarra.
The Librarian champion could serve knowledge gods such as Nethys and Ng the Hooded.
The Spirit Guide champion could serve psychopomps and gods of death such as Pharasma or gods of change such as Aakriti.
Those causes sort the neutral champions by [url="https://2e.aonprd.com/Domains.aspx"domains:[/url] nature, knowledge, magic, soul, and change.
So as an experiement, I looked at twenty-one Chaotic Good gods to see what domains they have in common. Could liberator champions stick to a few domains such as freedom?
Cayden Cailean: cities, freedom, indulgence, might
Desna: dreams, luck, moon, travel, ALT star, void
Milani: change, destruction, freedom, zeal
Hathor: family, passion, sun, wealth
Selket: healing, magic, nature, protection
Findeladlara: cities, creation, family, star
Ketephys: darkness, moon, nature, secrecy
Ashava: darkness, moon, repose, soul
Black Butterfly: freedom, secrecy, star, void
Cernunnos: lightning, nature, passion, zeal
Pulura: cold, darkness, sorrow, star
Alglenweis: cold, creation, might, soul
Kofusachi: luck, passion, travel, wealth
Uvuko: change, creation, healing, wyrmkin, ALT air, cold
Dajermube: ambition, freedom, moon, sun, ALT cities, star, zeal
Immonhiel: creation, healing, nature, repose
Skode: ambition, confidence, protection, zeal
Jin Li: ambition, change, might, toil, ALT luck, water
Marishi: ambition, confidence, freedom, might, ALT indulgence, zeal
Picoperi: change, confidence, delirium, trickery
Thisamet: cities, delirium, indulgence, wealth, ALT family, fire
Next, count the CG gods for each domain, and compare it to the total gods associated with the domain.
air 1/16 = 6%
ambition 4/24 = 16%
change 4/37 = 11%
cities 4/17 = 24%
cold 3/7 = 43%
confidence 3/32 = 9%
creation 4/33 = 12%
darkness 3/18 = 17%
delirium 2/10 = 20%
destruction 1/41 = 2%
dreams 1/4 = 25%
family 3/43 = 7%
fire 1/21 = 5%
freedom 6/27 = 22%
healing 3/24 = 12%
indulgence 2/18 = 11%
lightning 1/10 = 10%
luck 3/11 = 33%
magic 1/27 = 4%
might 4/50 = 8%
moon 4/11 = 44%
nature 4/41 = 10%
passion 3/23 = 13%
protection 2/51 = 4%
repose 2/14 = 14%
secrecy 2/18 = 11%
sorrow 1/15 = 7%
soul 2/10 = 20%
star 5/9 = 56%
sun 2/17 = 12%
toil 1/9 = 11%
travel 2/9 = 22%
trickery 1/36 = 3%
void 2/13 = 15%
water 1/20 = 5%
wealth 3/21 = 14%
wyrmkin 1/12 = 8%
zeal 5/42 = 2%
The domains most strongly associated to Chaotic Good gods are star (56%), moon (44%), cold (43%), and luck (33%). Those four domains cover 11 gods: Desna, Findeladlara, Ketephys, Ashava, Black Butterfly, Pulura, Alglenweis, Kofusachi, Uvuko, Dajermube, Jin Li--and leave out 10 gods: Cayden Cailean, Milani, Hathor, Selket, Cernunnos, Immonhiel, Skode, Marishi, Picoperi, and Thisamet. Leaving out almost half my sample is not good.
The next most strongly associated domains are dreams (25%), cities (24%), freedom (22%), travel (22%), delirium (20%), and soul (20%). Adding dreams domains would bring in no additional gods. Cities would bring in Cayden Cailean and Thisamet. Freedom would bring in Cayden Cailean, Milani, and Marishi. Travel would bring in no additional gods. Delirium would bring in Picoperi and Thisamet. Soul would bring in no additional gods.
Thus, a list of cold, delirium, freedom, luck, moon, and star would bring in 16 Chaotic God gods and leave out 5 Chaotic Good gods. The excluded gods are Hathor, Selket, Cernunnos, Immonhiel, and Skode, who lack any domains strongly associated with the Chaotic Good gods in general.
PF2 has 59 domains and split between 8 alignments means a list of 6 or 7 domains for each alignment, so adding more domains to the list would bring in more gods of the wrong alignment. I consider this experiment to be a failure, but I wanted to share the results.
I could imagine something like Liberator, Justiciar, Paladin, Redeem, Tyrant, and some-kind-of-snappy-name-for-Big-Warrior-Guy as the new core spread?
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Really hoping they take this as an opportunity to open up special features, having reactions tied to specific alignments was always a huge bummer and since we don't have alignments now I'm hoping for some sort of multiprong axis that lets you pick and choose more openly.
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Really hoping they take this as an opportunity to open up special features, having reactions tied to specific alignments was always a huge bummer and since we don't have alignments now I'm hoping for some sort of multiprong axis that lets you pick and choose more openly.
That is definitely the one good thing I could see coming out of the death of alignment.
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VampByDay's March 2023 thread Top Ten things I'd like to see addressed in pathfinder 2023 had a discussion about Neutral-alignment cause for champions. I looked at the neutral gods and sorted them into three separate causes.
Perhaps neutrality on a champion could offer more than one cause:
The Conservator champion could serve nature gods such as Gozreh and Fandarra.
The Librarian champion could serve knowledge gods such as Nethys and Ng the Hooded.
The Spirit Guide champion could serve psychopomps and gods of death such as Pharasma or gods of change such as Aakriti.Those causes sort the neutral champions by [url="https://2e.aonprd.com/Domains.aspx"domains:[/url] nature, knowledge, magic, soul, and change.
So as an experiement, I looked at twenty-one Chaotic Good gods to see what domains they have in common. Could liberator champions stick to a few domains such as freedom?
Cayden Cailean: cities, freedom, indulgence, might
Desna: dreams, luck, moon, travel, ALT star, void
Milani: change, destruction, freedom, zeal
Hathor: family, passion, sun, wealth
Selket: healing, magic, nature, protection
Findeladlara: cities, creation, family, star
Ketephys: darkness, moon, nature, secrecy
Ashava: darkness, moon, repose, soul
Black Butterfly: freedom, secrecy, star, void
Cernunnos: lightning, nature, passion, zeal
Pulura: cold, darkness, sorrow, star
Alglenweis: cold, creation, might, soul
Kofusachi: luck, passion, travel, wealth
Uvuko: change, creation, healing, wyrmkin, ALT air, cold
Dajermube: ambition, freedom, moon, sun, ALT cities, star, zeal
Immonhiel: creation, healing, nature, repose
Skode: ambition, confidence, protection, zeal
Jin Li: ambition, change, might, toil, ALT luck, water
Marishi: ambition, confidence, freedom, might, ALT indulgence, zeal
Picoperi: change, confidence, delirium, trickery
Thisamet: cities, delirium, indulgence, wealth, ALT family, fire...
I did a somewhat similar analysis of the domains/alignment mapping during the PF2 playtest. To see if some domains were available only to specific alignments. The results were definitely odd. Some domains were not open to all alignments even though they seemed alignment-neutral.
I have not redone this analysis since then though.
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My personal assumption at the moment is that Champion will be the holy/unholy class, and that sanctifying to one of those will be part of the class. But that's also the easiest thing to imagine, and Paizo puts a lot more thought into these things than I do.
TBH the Champion being forced to align with Holy/Unholy is my greatest nightmare about what could become of the class in Remastered.
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Despite disagreeing with Raven Black on seemingly every other aspect of remastered alignment in the Chaos and Law thread, I'm very much in the same place regarding Champions here. I've been wanting better Champion options for neutral deities, and I would be most disappointed if neutral champion codes were permanently taken off the table just at the same time as Champions were locked into caring only about being really good or really bad.
Maybe I no longer have to make a Champion of Gozreh or Nethys be exclusively a Redeemer or Desecrator anymore, but I still want the option for one who also doesn't have to care about either good or evil. A knife-wielding warrior of Pharasma who only cares about the orderliness of life and death is a valid concept in the lore, only waiting on a cause that Pharasma will support.
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Despite disagreeing with Raven Black on seemingly every other aspect of remastered alignment in the Chaos and Law thread, I'm very much in the same place regarding Champions here. I've been wanting better Champion options for neutral deities, and I would be most disappointed if neutral champion codes were permanently taken off the table just at the same time as Champions were locked into caring only about being really good or really bad.
Maybe I no longer have to make a Champion of Gozreh or Nethys be exclusively a Redeemer or Desecrator anymore, but I still want the option for one who also doesn't have to care about either good or evil. A knife-wielding warrior of Pharasma who only cares about the orderliness of life and death is a valid concept in the lore, only waiting on a cause that Pharasma will support.
I always found it exceptionally awkward that if you were a Good Champion who fell a little to Neutral, you lost everything, whereas if you fell a lot, you regained it. Doubly so for Champions of Neutral deities such as Abadar.
And that you could play a CN Cleric of Gorum but not a CN Champion. Whereas CE Champion of CN Gorum was available (except in PFS).
Not to mention deities who could have neither Good nor Evil Clerics/Champions.
I think the way they'll handle Clerics will tell us how Champions are handled. We know that some deities will require sanctification, and others won't. I don't see this being different for Champions. Those deities that require sanctification for Clerics will require it for Champions, and the ones that offer Clerics the choice will do the same for Champions. We might get two subclasses that require sanctification (one Holy, one Unholy), but I doubt it.
...that said, if they only made one subclass that requires sanctification and didn't care about which way the sanctification went... canonical Paladins of Asmodeus could be back on the menu!
I really don't see Paizo restricting themselves to an holy/unholy-only champion. It is pretty clear that nobody is happy with the current dilemma, so creating an even more restrictive version 2.0 is a terrible idea.
I'm with Evan insofar as sanctification will be deity-dependent not a forced class feature. When you are sanctified, then and only then will you be required to take the Tenets of Good/Evil. Probably renamed to Holiness/Unholiness or something. This shouldn't be a problem, as you have chosen to adhere to them anyway when you picked your deity or when you voluntarily sanctified yourself. I'd be pretty weird if you were holy and then just lied, cheated and generally murderhobo'd yourself through life. For anyone who isn't sanctified, these tenets will almost certainly not matter.
Now, will the current causes change substantially? I'm uncertain.
There is a pretty good argument to be made to keep it simple. Just link them to holy/unholy or the respective tenets, so you have 3 to choose from. Whether the chosen cause makes sense will depend on your deity, as Raven Black suggested. Maybe Paladin and Antipaladin will be renamed - for possible OGL issues - and a slight rebalance here and there, but that's about it. No need to reinvent the wheel, a more open version of the current system would address most concerns that aren't inherent to playing a literally dedicated evil person.
Or they could do something completely wild. I think the cause tenets are a very important of the RP side of things, but I'm pretty sure it would be possible to add alternative "versions" of at least some cause tenets so they aren't strictly holy/unholy. For example, the redeemer could just be a very potent defender (without the morality aspect) or even incredibly evil. Instead of Glimpse of Redemption, you could have the Glimpse of Vengeance and they see the terrible things you will do when they "inevitably" fail to kill you. However, something like this would be incredibly complicated, as the flavor and mechanics are deeply connected. So they'd probably have to do something entirely new, which I'm not sure is necessary.
In any case, other causes, including non-sanctified ones, could easily be added later, as they no longer have to have anything to do with alignment. A "Nature's Warden" cause, where you have sworn to protect nature, for example.
The Redeemer is in the perfect place right now. He has a unique ability and great Synergy. The Paladin is stronger, but not as unique. I don't expect much to change for either. Liberator is in a weak place, so I'm hoping for a buff to make its reaction more common.
All the evil champions are weak, even if you're in an undead party. I don't care to see them without a major rework.
I'd like a green faith-based champion, the Warden.
Why do you think the Liberator reaction is less common? You realize it can trigger both the resistance and the free step whenever an ally takes damage, and the step allows the ally to get away from further attacks or move into flanking, right?