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I was really happy when I first heard Warpriest gets Master Weapon Proficiency (nice)
It was a little dampened when I heard 'Deities Weapon only' (well...understandable)
But Hearing it was level 19 only...
That changes nothing for most campaigns
What is the Point of Master Profiecency and (if I heard that correctly) some Martial support feats if you are behind every other character half of the campaign anyway?
In that vein I don't exactly have high hopes for the Warrior Muse Bard either tbh
So here is my suggestion to deal with it:
Make Warpriests and Bards who follow the Warrior Muse Wave Casters
Warpriests are supposed to get more Martial support and they will retain their divine font, so they are certainly not without magic options
Bards stil have their composition spells
they both still have a lot to do when they have reduced spell slots, but they both will be able to make more out of their Newly found proficiency with this and enable some new playstyles which, so far, were only be possible with lots of archetype feat investment or dual class optional rule
I think this would redefine the subclasses identity and strenghten it, making them more unique and being able to do their own thing - which is strongly in line with what their name implies anyway
I dare say that making the eldritch trickster rogue also a wave caster would elevate it from being the imo (and I believe several other people agree) worst rogue racket to pick to its own thing, even if that would mean giving up on some stuff like additional skill feats/points
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The drawback people complained about for Warpriest was losing legendary casting and not getting anything in exchange that couldn't be acquired through feats. Legendary casting is 19th. Getting master weapon proficiency when the miss out on legendary casting makes plenty of sense to me.
A wave caster should just straight up be a different class because it needs different feats to support it. Cleric's pile of extra top-level Heal spells (or Harm in an undead campaign) seem like they more or less cancel out a big part of the wavecaster drawback. My point of comparison is Summoner needing a feat just to swap a top-level slot for two summoning spells for a measly three total, while a hypothetical wavecaster Warpriest would be walking around with six or seven at late levels.
Over to Bard, they're already basically only one point of accuracy down from a martial instead of two. They shouldn't be put one point ahead.
But, hey. It doesn't matter much if I think it's broken or not. We have the announcement on what Warpriest is, which is what a lot of people asked for.
(I think Eldritch Trickster is often placed ahead of Mastermind, because the latter relies on successful recall knowledge checks in combat.)
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I also don't think we know for sure it will be level 19. We know it is in Final Doctrine, which is currently level 19 but that could change. I think it likely will stay the same for parity with legendary casting, because that seems likely to remain unchanged across all casters.
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I also don't think we know for sure it will be level 19. We know it is in Final Doctrine, which is currently level 19 but that could change. I think it likely will stay the same for parity with legendary casting, because that seems likely to remain unchanged across all casters.The funny thing is when Clerics+ looked at doing the same thing during their playtest it was, by their accounts, highly divisive. Many folks said it it was way too late which is why they ended up on a class archetype that changes the class to a bounded caster with martial progression.
Turns out if you engage the community before sending stuff to print (e.g., via surveys, via playtests, etc.) you find that stuff out! The catchphrase of 'we have been playtesting for 4 years' is clearly inaccurate.
As it stands Paizo took a 'nearly meaningless' step in the right direction. A L19 feature is 'great' if all you do is high level one shots, but across all 20 level campaigns, its going to be like 6 sessions across 1-2 years? It is essentially a ribbon feature that only serves to muddy the waters because now we all have to say 'yes they get master, but too late for it to matter' and have that silly debate until we get PF3e.
As for 'if the doctrine changes level', there is no indication of that right now. Even still, unless it goes to the 13-15 level range its just a sliding scale of bad to meaningless.
If it was that much highly divisive, it just means there is no way to go that does not leave 50% of the potential customer base dissatisfied.
If so, it's better to go for the solution that entails less changes.
And, in any case, the Warpriest was, from the beginning, based on the Cleric of 3.5+. So, a full caster who could manage being on the frontline. Not a Divine gish.
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I was really happy when I first heard Warpriest gets Master Weapon Proficiency (nice)
It was a little dampened when I heard 'Deities Weapon only' (well...understandable)
But Hearing it was level 19 only...That changes nothing for most campaigns
What is the Point of Master Profiecency and (if I heard that correctly) some Martial support feats if you are behind every other character half of the campaign anyway?
...
The point of the designers in these modifications was exactly what was explained in the Paizocon video, to make the warpriests no worse than a cloistered cleric with champion dedication (they talk about sentinel there, but in fact it would be the champion even already that sentinel provides no more than light armor for spellcasters untrained in any type of armor), or a battle oracle. But they have shown no intention of going any further than that.
In discord it was explained that Doctrine isn't exactly like a 5th edition subclass, it's something minor that isn't designed to make a huge difference in the chassis of a class to the point of putting 2 classes into one as it would end up being if it becomes a wavecaster (bounded caster) doctrine.
Perhaps in the future they plan to make a new class to meet this demand, but I believe they didn't want to do something as big as "creating" a wavecaster as a cleric variant in the corebooks. For now, for those who want a martial that heals, I suggest you consider a champion with cleric dedication (the new refocus rules will greatly benefit Lay on Hands which will help well in this type of build) or a summoner with divine/primal sorcerer dedication (depending on your preferred eidolon or tradition).
The drawback people complain about are in two camps as evidenced by OP and you. One group wanted a simple exchange of Legendary casting and Master Weapons (i.e. a 85% caster 15% martial split). One group wanted a divine wave caster with martial weapon proficiency (i.e., exert/master at L5/13 or a 50% caster 50% martial split).
Gotcha. Well, I'm not gonna worry about it too much. My personal divine wavecaster hopes are that Synthesist is still in the cards for PF2.
I also don't think we know for sure it will be level 19. We know it is in Final Doctrine, which is currently level 19 but that could change. I think it likely will stay the same for parity with legendary casting, because that seems likely to remain unchanged across all casters.The funny thing is when Clerics+ looked at doing the same thing during their playtest it was, by their accounts, highly divisive. Many folks said it it was way too late which is why they ended up on a class archetype that changes the class to a bounded caster with martial progression.
Turns out if you engage the community before sending stuff to print (e.g., via surveys, via playtests, etc.) you find that stuff out! The catchphrase of 'we have been playtesting for 4 years' is clearly inaccurate.
As it stands Paizo took a 'nearly meaningless' step in the right direction. A L19 feature is 'great' if all you do is high level one shots, but across all 20 level campaigns, its going to be like 6 sessions across 1-2 years? It is essentially a ribbon feature that only serves to muddy the waters because now we all have to say 'yes they get master, but too late for it to matter' and have that silly debate until we get PF3e.
As for 'if the doctrine changes level', there is no indication of that right now. Even still, unless it goes to the 13-15 level range its just a sliding scale of bad to meaningless.
If it was that much highly divisive, it just means there is no way to go that does not leave 50% of the potential customer base dissatisfied.
If so, it's better to go for the solution that entails less changes.
And, in any case, the Warpriest was, from the beginning, based on the Cleric of 3.5+. So, a full caster who could manage being on the frontline. Not a Divine gish.
I wouldn't call someone getting expert in offense and defense with 8 hp per level 'managing being on the front line'
they are slightly more durable then mages, but to really be on the frontline they need spells to buff themselves which costs them 2-4 actions setup (which could be used for support of allies or fighting enemies) +up to 2 spell slots to even out the disparity to martials and then still have lower hit points then mostthey are on average 10% easier to hit and to crit if they dont spend a turn and a spellslot to buff themselves and they are on average 10% worse at hitting the enemy without buffing themselves
honestly, martial characters could legit be insulted by warpriests trying to group themselves with them
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So, all I have is the benefit of my experience. I played a Warpriest in Extinction Curse, which we wrapped up a few weeks ago. So, I've played the doctrine for all 20 levels.
Some takeaways from that experience:
1) I usually didn't have time to cast a Buff Spell.
Combat moves pretty fast. Most times I ended up in the thick of it with no warning.
2) My accuracy was still fine.
Despite point #1 above, I usually did ok when it came to hitting things. I think it was because my role was usually being the Barbarian's flanking buddy, at least until he grabbed them (he was a Free Archetype Wrestler) and started all of that fun stuff and flanking didn't matter anymore.
3) Being on the front lines was the place to be.
There were times I had to play the healbot, and being close to everyone while being able to defend myself was great. When I didn't play the healbot, I was hitting a fair amount of times with a 2/3rd Runed Rapier (I like Ghost Touch, it came in really handy a lot) and little extras like Align Armament and, rarely, Divine Weapon. It added up. I had my share of foe-ending Strikes.
I also absorbed my fair share of damage. Sometimes more than my fair share. I leaned into Shield Block (man, did I come to love Shield Block) and Replenishment of War also added a fair bit to my longevity (like I said, despite expectations, I still hit a lot.)
4) Eternal Blessing is a nice touch.
Permanent +1 Status Bonus to Strikes is a very nice thing. As I mentioned in point #1, I didn't have a chance to cast a Buff Spell that often. With Eternal Blessing I was only -1 behind a baseline Martial, with the added bonus that if they were in range it helped my buddies! Great Feat.
5) I would've really liked that Master Rapier Proficiency at L19.
(My chosen deity was Cayden Cailean. I like his style. :) ) The one time, late game, I was really feeling my lack of Master Proficiency was the final boss fight. That extra +2 would have been quite welcome in that fight.
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I've been consistently pretty impressed with the war priest myself. The one in our AV game essentially just prepared True Strikes, Heals, Harms, and Heroism, plus the occasional fairies fire. With maxed strength and charisma, he can Channel Smite like a mother flipper. He uses a great axe instead of a shield, but if he takes a bunch of damage he can use just two action heal it all away.
Beyond that, a Divine prepared caster is a pretty incredible boon for condition removal, despite the lower proficiency for counteract.
Warpriest was fine, and now gets a few extra perks on top of an already solid chassis. I really don't see what the problem is.
I must say, while I stand with my point it is fascinating how much the experiences can vary
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Warpriest was fine, and now gets a few extra perks on top of an already solid chassis. I really don't see what the problem is.
Their martial capability is worse compared to other martials simply because they get font plus full spellcasting, which isn't that strong when your save DC doesn't likewise scale (and you aren't incentivized to it); given that they are meant to be the "martial" Cleric, this is a really bad compromise. You don't have the defenses of other martials, and you don't have the offense of other martials (and no, Channel Smite + True Strike doesn't count).
Turning Warpriest into a Wave Caster (along with keeping the fonts), letting them select Strength or Dexterity as a key ability score (keeping Wisdom for Save DCs of course) while getting full Martial benefits would honestly leave a better taste in one's mouth for fulfilling the "martial" Cleric niche. Really, I think the only reason it wasn't designed this way from square 1 was because it wasn't really thought of to do at the time, compared to when Magus/Summoner were in development, and I'm pretty sure it's easy to design the Warpriest this way.
I think the same should be done for Warrior Muse Bard; make it Wave Caster, cap their spell proficiency to Master, change key ability score to Strength/Dexterity, and maybe let them make an attack roll not affected by (or affecting) MAP instead of a Performance check for things like Lingering Composition, Inspire Heroics, etc.
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But what about me and the other people on this thread who have played a warpriest and like it being a full caster with a little bit of martial? I've played it, its great. You still use spells all the time, it's just not offensive spells. Because the proficiency literally doesn't matter if you don't want to cast offensive spells. For half of your levels, you have -1 to hit with weapons, which is the same as the thaumaturge. For half of your levels, you have the same spell attack as other clerics...Warpriest was fine, and now gets a few extra perks on top of an already solid chassis. I really don't see what the problem is.Their martial capability is worse compared to other martials simply because they get font plus full spellcasting, which isn't that strong when your save DC doesn't likewise scale (and you aren't incentivized to it); given that they are meant to be the "martial" Cleric, this is a really bad compromise. You don't have the defenses of other martials, and you don't have the offense of other martials (and no, Channel Smite + True Strike doesn't count).
Turning Warpriest into a Wave Caster (along with keeping the fonts), letting them select Strength or Dexterity as a key ability score (keeping Wisdom for Save DCs of course) while getting full Martial benefits would honestly leave a better taste in one's mouth for fulfilling the "martial" Cleric niche. Really, I think the only reason it wasn't designed this way from square 1 was because it wasn't really thought of to do at the time, compared to when Magus/Summoner were in development, and I'm pretty sure it's easy to design the Warpriest this way.
I think the same should be done for Warrior Muse Bard; make it Wave Caster, cap their spell proficiency to Master, change key ability score to Strength/Dexterity, and maybe let them make an attack roll not affected by (or affecting) MAP instead of a Performance check for things like Lingering Composition, Inspire Heroics, etc.
I am speaking as someone who has adventured with a Warpriest character from 1 to 20, as well as someone who has adventured with a Maestro Muse Bard with Fighter dedication from 1 to 20 (which was made before Warrior Muse came to existence). There have been times where the Warpriest was struggling to be able to contribute to combat, and there have been times where the Bard was so versatile that they could literally do anything like a Druid is known to do. Melee combat, spellcasting, skills, buffs/debuffs...you name it, they could do it.
And to be clear, I don't think the Warpriest player was dissatisfied with his character, but that's largely because he enjoyed the non-combat aspect of his character more than anything, and he knew of his proficiency deficiencies as he played around those instead of sticking with what he was doing since 1st level. Problem is, to an inexperienced/unaware player, this becomes a trap later down the line, and the whole point is to not have these trap options exist, especially since such a character could quite literally substitute a lot of the problematic parts with a few feats, while still retaining the most of their spellcasting.
Just as well, this is a Remaster, and I don't think it's fair that the Warpriest isn't given the same design feel as the Magus does, since the Warpriest is basically a Divine-tradition Magus at heart (Channel Smite = Spellstrike), and in my opinion, the biggest reason why that didn't come to pass is because they didn't put forth that kind of effort for the Warpriest, because they felt like they didn't need to. With the legwork done for them and the opportunity presenting itself, I don't see why they don't do this.
**EDIT** The Bard doesn't really need the Warrior Muse because it doesn't do much for them to begin with; it needs to do more than what it does, since proficiency in all Martial weapons isn't doing much for what's already functional for them anyway. Heck, instead of Fighter dedication, our Bard could have taken Mauler dedication for free scaling and still performed just as good with a Reach D10 weapon.
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All I can do is reiterate: I never felt my combat contribution was lacking. Not even Levels 13-14, which, to be blunt, were the worst. My biggest issue was remembering to add my temporary HP after a successful Strike (alas, Foundry has not automated Replenishment of War. At least, not yet.)
I wouldn't want wave casting, because I was always using all my slots. I usually dedicated one of my top ones to Vital Beacon, to add some flexibility in the healing department. (Vital Beacon works well when you're in the thick of it, in my experience.) Energy Aegis was another go-to. Blink Charge... man, did I love Blink Charge. I'd reject wave casting for that Spell alone... I always had my 5th level slots loaded up with Blink Charge. Fantastic positioning with a dash of extra damage. Lovely.
At one point in the AP I was using all my lower slots to help keep a town in food and water.
I understand that the doctrine doesn't suit the fantasy that some folks have in mind. However, it fit what I had in mind splendidly.
What is a wave caster?
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All I can do is reiterate: I never felt my combat contribution was lacking. Not even Levels 13-14, which, to be blunt, were the worst. My biggest issue was remembering to add my temporary HP after a successful Strike (alas, Foundry has not automated Replenishment of War. At least, not yet.)
I wouldn't want wave casting, because I was always using all my slots. I usually dedicated one of my top ones to Vital Beacon, to add some flexibility in the healing department. (Vital Beacon works well when you're in the thick of it, in my experience.) Energy Aegis was another go-to. Blink Charge... man, did I love Blink Charge. I'd reject wave casting for that Spell alone... I always had my 5th level slots loaded up with Blink Charge. Fantastic positioning with a dash of extra damage. Lovely.
At one point in the AP I was using all my lower slots to help keep a town in food and water.
I understand that the doctrine doesn't suit the fantasy that some folks have in mind. However, it fit what I had in mind splendidly.
I agree no wave casting.
But my reasoning is that wave casting is the literal worse and I still cannot believe anyone got sold on it. It makes absolute 0 sense that a Fighter can cast more spells than a Magus or a "Summoner". People asking to turn any and all hybrid classes into wavecasters are strange in my eyes because they are asking for the worst of both worlds. Not quite good enough as a martial, but much worse than an actual caster.
saying it like that feels like you compare the magus to the fighter (one of only two classes with legendary attack) or the summoner (not the eidolon) to a regular martial character
magus feels very well done to me
they have the full martial package and upgrade it with their unique integration of cantrips and some big spells to go nova on the really tough nuts
they are not really 'worst of both worlds' and only really fall behind in white room scenarios
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What is a wave caster?
right now magus and summoner
classes whose magical proficency goes up to master, who got full cantrips and whose spell slots are alwas 2 of their 2 highest ranks, but they 'lose' the lower spell levels again
so their spell slots are wanderng through the levels like wave
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The thing I dislike most about the status quo being presented here is the odd asymmetry of it.
Assuming Master at level 19 via final doctrine, this version of the Warpriest will have martial-tier weapon proficiency for 12 out of 20 levels (even the current warpriest gets martial proficiency for 10 out of 20).
... And like, it's hard for me to come up with a good reason for why those particular 8 levels need to be the way they are... It's also kind of weird that Expert is 2 levels late but Master will presumably be 6 levels late.
While it's not the end of the world, these gaps feel kind of arbitrary. It probably won't happen, but it'd be nice to see some designer insight into why a Warpriest at exactly level 6 needs to have worse proficiency but not at level 7.
It makes absolute 0 sense that a Fighter can cast more spells than a Magus or a "Summoner".
Factually incorrect. The fighter chassis grants 0 spells.
I was one of the supporters of the "warpriest" wavecaster idea in the past and I'm still not against it. But after the news we got of the remasters my emphasis on this idea waned.
First let's define what would more or less be the chassis concept of a "warpriest" wavecaster. It would be basically a Magus, with Divine Font in place of Spellstrike, with divine tradition in place of arcana, and a good deal of cleric feats.
This concept made sense in the past because the current warpriest doesn't have access to heavy armor by default, and is always at -1, -2 and even -3 base hit and AC depending on the level when compared to a standard martial (I I know that some consider things to bless, banish as a way to compensate for this, but I don't include status bonuses in the calculation because they are things that can be obtained by other party members regardless of proficiency) and to have access to heavy armor I also needed to spend a feat of dedication, locking access to other archetypes for a while.
But as I said before, by giving the warpriest access to heavy armor, most likely with a feat of lvl 1 or 2, and martial proficiency, probably at level 19, but mainly by changing the refocus rules, greatly increasing the efficiency of the focus spells, I don't know if a champion/ranger with a cleric/druid archetype would not already fulfill this role of making a martial healer, maybe not as efficient in healing, but martially much more skilled. Because I don't know if you've noticed, but for example, the champion is unable to recover 3 focus points today, due to the lack of a wellspring focus feat in the class, something that will most likely be automatically resolved in the new refocus rules.
As for the fighter with MC cleric idea, it's an option, but the initial 3-level hole in spells without having any in class healing makes their effectiveness much more restricted, even in the new rules. The classes above fulfill this role better.
I still think a wavecaster healer would still be welcome. But Paizo with just a few tweaks has already made my desire for something like this wane a lot.
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well, regartless of what they "should have done", if the Warpriest is a wave caster in the remaster, then Paizo is for some reason trying to hide it, as that is a huge change, and we have heard nothing about it. So unless they are trying to not drum up free promotion by telling us about a change many want, then it's not happening. Again, there should be a divine wave caster, it should just be its own class and leave the warpriest as the 80% caster 20% martial class, as compared to a wave casters 50/50 or a caster with an architypes 90/10. And I think that with the warpriest changes that we know are in the remaster, 80/20 is reasonable, if not 75/25 or maybe 70/30.
Paizo can easily decide not to do that, but in my opinion, making the Warpriest have to wait until 19th level for Master in weapon proficiency is a weird design choice when every other martial class (like the Magus and Summoner) gets Master in weapon proficiency by 13th level. At best, you can argue that it's because classes like Magus and Summoner are more like "Martial, but with spellcasting sprinkled in," but then the question becomes "Why isn't the Warpriest designed like this?" And if we say "Well, Warpriest doesn't need Master proficiency because they get full spell slots," the question becomes "Does that class type really need those lower level spell slots as part of its class identity?"
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Yes, a fighter with wizard MC is better than a magus with no feats. However, the magus can also take the wizard MC, and will then have more spells than the fighter.
Even then, the Fighter MC Wizard would not be able to Spellstrike.
Before we got the Magus, it was obvious warning on the boards to anyone wanting to play a 50/50 casting martial that they would not get it and had to choose the 80/20 that best fit their concept.