So, when 3-Body-Problem keeps shutting down people who are trying to help them do that, they're (quite rudely) cutting themselves off from having a good time. There's a line between disappointment and self-sabotage, you know?
Why do you assume I'm having trouble with PF2? It's not that deep a game so it isn't that hard to solve what you should be doing round by round, what spells you should take, etc. The issue is once you know this it's hard to look at the classes/spells that struggle to meet these expectations and force yourself to take them. The tight math might be intended to limit how bad a bad option can be but in practice, it does little to make these bad options feel playable.
Let's look at how many spells exist at Rank 3 in the Arcane tradition. That works out to 66 no questions asked spells that are legal for PFS play so I'll limit myself to those. How many of them are actually worth scribing into a spellbook and memorizing? Being generous maybe 10 of them are actually good.
Who's taking any of the following as a standard daily loadout option: Aqueous Orb, Bind Undead, Blazing Dive, Bottomless Stomach, Bracing Tendrils, Clairaudience, Cozy Cabin, Crashing Wave, Cup of Dust, Curse of Lost Time, Distracting Chatter, Dividing Trench, Dream Message, Elemental Annihilation Wave, Enthrall, Familiar's Face, Feet to Fins, Firework Blast, Ghostly Weapon, Gravity Well, Hypnotic Pattern, Impending Doom, Levitate, Locate, Magnetic Acceleration, Meld into Stone, Mind Reading, Nondetection, Oneiric Mire, Ooze Form, Organsight, Paralyze, Percussive Impact, Persei's Precautions, Phantom Prison, Rally Point, Roaring Applause, Rouse Skeletons, Safe Passage, Sea of Thought, Secret Page, Shadow Projectile, Shifting Sand, Shrink Item, Sparkleskin, Temporal Twin, Time Jump, Wall of Virtue, Warding Aggression, and Web of Eyes.
There is a vast sea of NPC spells, spells that require perfect preparation to be useful, and spells that are simply never a good option as they don't do the job better than existing spells. Crashing Wave, Firework Blast, Elemental Annihilation Wave, and Rouse Skeletons are all just significantly worse than Fireball. Many disabling spells boil down to worse Slow or Slow with the incapacitation trait.
The issue I have is that casters have a vast illusion of choice but in reality, are better off taking certain spells regardless of theme.
Not every utility spell is going to be equal, there is never going to be perfect balance. And as far as blasting goes, I am definitely of the opinion that area blasting is fine. The game I play in I have a great time blasting. And as far as single target damage goes, that's a martials territory. I will never be in favour of casters outdoing them for single target damage consistently. I really hope paizo sticks to their guns on that.
Same thing with summons and animal companions, they're generally at the same attack as a martials second attack, which I think is very fair. You shouldn't get to spend feats or spell slots to have a second character that's close to as strong as another player.
One thing I've seen recently that would be easy to implement (I think) would be a martial that's more magic themed. Like they have martial progression but throw fireballs instead of fire arrows, maybe have some focus spells and a few spell slots like magus or summoner. I personally don't really see the appeal but I've seen it wished for enough that it might be a popular class.
I'll say that I've had the most trouble with running a Devotion Cathartic Mage Battle Oracle just because that's a huge balancing act of action economy and knowing when to switch from spellcasting to combat to healing to taking a hit or two. It was intense, but a fun character.
I'm guessing it wasn't that effective next to what you could have done as a Healing Font Cleric. You might be happy leaving efficiency on the table to make a themed build work but I'd rather not.
On the other hand, literally playing a brain-dead evoker has been incredibly easy without having to think about anything more than "Recall Knowledge -> Big Spell" or "Stride -> RK -> Force Bolt" or even "Warp Step -> Force Bolt" or "True Strike -> Big Spell."
Most of PF2 is easy because the math and terrible spell design mean that a list of 70+ spells at any given rank actually boils down to the 10 or so spells at any given level that don't require highly specific circumstances to be effective. There are just too many spells that are less efficient than the best spells at a given rank to make building a caster, especially an Arcane caster, feel interesting beyond recycling the greatest hits character after character encounter after encounter.
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Okay, so the conversation has shifted again to... We need MORE spells to be better? I truly do not understand what you want. Less spells? I think you're oversimplifying things a lot to benefit your argument. Slow is a great spell! And we shouldn't say it isn't, but a spell being good doesn't mean that those are not. Is slow good against a single target as a level 3 spell? Absolutely! If it's PL+2 or 3? Still great! With a high Fort save? Getting rougher - definitely better options. Like I can see your argument being "there are spells that are good generalist spells to have on hand," but that doesn't mean they're just straight up better spells to have in all situations. The situations your describing are white room scenarios which... uh, well they aren't real. Don't get me wrong, I love a good slow, but my party composition also influences a lot of my spell choices. As do their actions in combat. As do my opponents. Like... you're just regurgitating information from a guide without critically thinking about it.
I mean, that you would list off Blazing Dive, Magnetic Acceleration, or Ooze Form as "typically not prepared" spells is wild to me as I see them all the time. Lord knows that several magus players screamed out in horror.
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I'll say that I've had the most trouble with running a Devotion Cathartic Mage Battle Oracle just because that's a huge balancing act of action economy and knowing when to switch from spellcasting to combat to healing to taking a hit or two. It was intense, but a fun character.I'm guessing it wasn't that effective next to what you could have done as a Healing Font Cleric. You might be happy leaving efficiency on the table to make a themed build work but I'd rather not.
Pretty insulting to think I made a Battle Oracle to be the healer. I made a character who could do it all and had a blast doing it. I was able to switch hit with a bastard sword and generally handle most problems with a quick pivot. It also fit my team of inventor, rogue, and wizard as the frontline healer.
On the other hand, literally playing a brain-dead evoker has been incredibly easy without having to think about anything more than "Recall Knowledge -> Big Spell" or "Stride -> RK -> Force Bolt" or even "Warp Step -> Force Bolt" or "True Strike -> Big Spell."Most of PF2 is easy because the math and terrible spell design mean that a list of 70+ spells at any given rank actually boils down to the 10 or so spells at any given level that don't require highly specific circumstances to be effective. There are just too many spells that are less efficient than the best spells at a given rank to make building a caster, especially an Arcane caster, feel interesting beyond recycling the greatest hits character after character encounter after encounter.
Wait, what is your ACTUAL complaint. Do you want more spells or less? Because it's obvious that you are exaggerating "look at all these useless spells" when you don't ever choose anything but what you consider to be the best spells. Like what is your spellcaster? What are you actually playing? Or is this all whiteroom based on guides?
EDIT: If you need a game, I can offer you a spot on my PbP server, but I think our slots are all full. Summer had a pretty huge rush of games. You might be able to catch us for the next round of PFS recruitment if you've got a level 3 - 6 PFS character.
Not every utility spell is going to be equal, there is never going to be perfect balance. And as far as blasting goes, I am definitely of the opinion that area blasting is fine. The game I play in I have a great time blasting. And as far as single target damage goes, that's a martials territory. I will never be in favour of casters outdoing them for single target damage consistently. I really hope paizo sticks to their guns on that.
Look at the 3rd Rank spells for AoE blasting and tell me why we can't have any of them compete with Fireball. Why do we have a 30ft. cone that gets no damage boost, no effect rider, or anything over Fireball? Why do we have Rouse Skeletons when no sane player will ever cast it?
In a game that prides itself on balance, why do we accept the state that spells are in?
Okay, so the conversation has shifted again to... We need MORE spells to be better? I truly do not understand what you want. Less spells? I think you're oversimplifying things a lot to benefit your argument. Slow is a great spell! And we shouldn't say it isn't, but a spell being good doesn't mean that those are not. Is slow good against a single target as a level 3 spell? Absolutely! If it's PL+2 or 3? Still great! With a high Fort save? Getting rougher - definitely better options. Like I can see your argument being "there are spells that are good generalist spells to have on hand," but that doesn't mean they're just straight up better spells to have in all situations. The situations your describing are white room scenarios which... uh, well they aren't real. Don't get me wrong, I love a good slow, but my party composition also influences a lot of my spell choices. As do their actions in combat. As do my opponents. Like... you're just regurgitating information from a guide without critically thinking about it.
I want spells to have the same balance as the rest of the game gets. I want there to be fewer obvious choices, I want to be able to pick an AoE damage spell that isn't Lightning Bolt of Fireball. I want Summons that don't feel like you've just wasted a full round casting them.
I want it to feel good to play a themed Wizard and not get told that the Evoker niche was taken by the Psychic and a class that isn't an actual spellcaster. I want there to actually be a depth to builds where you get rewarded for eschewing some parts of your kit to be better at what actually interests you.
That you can play a blandly effective caster isn't interesting to me compared to what a wildly suboptimal, but still balanced next to the rest of their party, caster could do in PF1.
I mean, that you would list off Blazing Dive, Magnetic Acceleration, or Ooze Form as "typically not prepared" spells is wild to me as I see them all the time. Lord knows that several magus players screamed out in horror.
I should have pointed out that I was doing that list from the perspective of a Wizard. Magus should have its own list of spells anyway, every class getting every spell of their tradition is lazy and further handcuffs how spells can be designed.
Pretty insulting to think I made a Battle Oracle to be the healer. I made a character who could do it all and had a blast doing it. I was able to switch hit with a bastard sword and generally handle most problems with a quick pivot. It also fit my team of inventor, rogue, and wizard as the frontline healer.
That's sure a party... I have a hard time divorcing myself from the math of the game enough to want to play something suboptimal so I can't help but look at that party and think it would be better with a Fighter, Druid, and Cleric replacing 3 of the 4 classes. It's why I tend to prefer GMing where my focus gets to be
Wait, what is your ACTUAL complaint. Do you want more spells or less? Because it's obvious that you are exaggerating "look at all these useless spells" when you don't ever choose anything but what you consider to be the best spells. Like what is your spellcaster? What are you actually playing? Or is this all whiteroom based on guides?
You say that as if I'd have more fun because I took the 30ft. cone of water instead of Fireball. I wouldn't. I'd know I was gimping myself below the rest of the party for theme and that wouldn't be fun.
I want there to be more spells that compete with the best generally good spells. If Crashing Wave could knock people down on a failure and flat-foot them on a success I might actually have a reason to consider it over slotting Fireball again. I won't sacrifice effectiveness for theme and that probably makes me a bad fit to be a player at a PF2 table.
EDIT: If you need a game, I can offer you a spot on my PbP server, but I think our slots are all full. Summer had a pretty huge rush of games. You might be able to catch us for the next round of PFS recruitment if you've got a level 3 - 6 PFS character.
I don't need a game. I run one every week and my experiences as a player in PF2 have been enough to know that while I can GM it I'd never have fun playing it.
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I mean, the thing is - all of these are balanced, just not around the same point. This means that spells that always feel effective tend to rise to the top. Like sure, a fireball hurled into a room is instantly more gratifying than Rouse Skeletons which allows your to spread that damage around over a longer period of time with a single action. It's easier to build with the idea of "I use this spell for this general scenario" - especially if you're a spontaneous spellcaster. I'm surprised you're using wizards as a baseline since they have so much more freedom to amass a collection of specific spells.
But, honestly, at the end of the day, it seems like you're wishing that PF2 would move more towards PF1 design and it just... like, it's not going to do that? And I'm sorry if that's what you want, but it's already a game that exists. And one that had these "meta spells" as well, jut more pronounced, in my opinion. You've said you want the designers to be aware, but I also don't know what you think it will accomplish. I don't see Erik Mona saying - "Y'know what? Scrap it. We had it right the first time. PF2 has been a commercial failure."
I mean, the thing is - all of these are balanced, just not around the same point. This means that spells that always feel effective tend to rise to the top. Like sure, a fireball hurled into a room is instantly more gratifying than Rouse Skeletons which allows your to spread that damage around over a longer period of time with a single action.
Fireball also has a longer range, the ability to hit flying foes, a better AoE, a damage type more likely to trigger weakness, and does as much damage in a single casting as Rouse Skeletons will do over 3 rounds assuming you don't drop it to sustain something more effective. In what situation is Rouse Skeletons ever the more effective choice?
But, honestly, at the end of the day, it seems like you're wishing that PF2 would move more towards PF1 design and it just... like, it's not going to do that? And I'm sorry if that's what you want, but it's already a game that exists. And one that had these "meta spells" as well, jut more pronounced, in my opinion. You've said you want the designers to be aware, but I also don't know what you think it will accomplish. I don't see Erik Mona saying - "Y'know what? Scrap it. We had it right the first time. PF2 has been a commercial failure."
I know they won't do that. They seem to actively show contempt for PF1 these days with all the retcons to lore (beyond what has been forced on the by the OGL) and the general idea that formerly supported playstyles that worked at launch in PF1 are fine to completely ignore for years.
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Oh, you're one of those people. You were never going to engage in this topic in good faith. Later, this thread is done.
When you need difficult terrain? I feel like you are primarily casting it for that in the 1st place.I mean, the thing is - all of these are balanced, just not around the same point. This means that spells that always feel effective tend to rise to the top. Like sure, a fireball hurled into a room is instantly more gratifying than Rouse Skeletons which allows your to spread that damage around over a longer period of time with a single action.Fireball also has a longer range, the ability to hit flying foes, a better AoE, a damage type more likely to trigger weakness, and does as much damage in a single casting as Rouse Skeletons will do over 3 rounds assuming you don't drop it to sustain something more effective. In what situation is Rouse Skeletons ever the more effective choice?
Wall of Wind does that, forces ranged enemies to come to you, can't be bypassed by flight/climbing, and doesn't need to be sustained.
Who's taking any of the following as a standard daily loadout option: Aqueous Orb, Bind Undead, Blazing Dive, Bottomless Stomach, Bracing Tendrils, Clairaudience, Cozy Cabin, Crashing Wave, Cup of Dust, Curse of Lost Time, Distracting Chatter, Dividing Trench, Dream Message, Elemental Annihilation Wave, Enthrall, Familiar's Face, Feet to Fins, Firework Blast, Ghostly Weapon, Gravity Well, Hypnotic Pattern, Impending Doom, Levitate, Locate, Magnetic Acceleration, Meld into Stone, Mind Reading, Nondetection, Oneiric Mire, Ooze Form, Organsight, Paralyze, Percussive Impact, Persei's Precautions, Phantom Prison, Rally Point, Roaring Applause, Rouse Skeletons, Safe Passage, Sea of Thought, Secret Page, Shadow Projectile, Shifting Sand, Shrink Item, Sparkleskin, Temporal Twin, Time Jump, Wall of Virtue, Warding Aggression, and Web of Eyes.
Hi, thank you for finally replying to me! Sorry if I was uncharitable earlier. But, given this list of spells that you've just labeled as "useless," I really do think you're unfairly limiting yourself.
EDIT: OH GOD FUMBLED THE POST BUTTON
Anyway, I've seen Bind Undead, Cozy Cabin, Blazing Dive, and Clairaudience all used to great effect, both in my own campaigns and other people's. And that's just the B's and C's! Maybe we should zoom in on what makes a spell "useful" to you.
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I know they won't do that. They seem to actively show contempt for PF1 these days with all the retcons to lore (beyond what has been forced on the by the OGL) and the general idea that formerly supported playstyles that worked at launch in PF1 are fine to completely ignore for years.
So there are two kinds of lore changes they've made for PF2:
- Ones they wanted to.- Ones they were forced into doing with the whole OGL debacle.
I'm not sure which kind you're taking exception to.
Plus "this thing worked fine in the previous edition, but I can't do it anymore" is just a normal thing for "a new edition of a game." There are going to be builds for concepts that work just fine in PF2 that you really can't do in PF3. There will be things you can make in PF3 that you can't make in PF4. Likewise there will be things you could do in PF4 that you couldn't do in PF3, and things in PF3 that you can't do in PF2, just like there are things you can do in PF2 that you couldn't do in PF1. It's just the nature of the thing.
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So there are two kinds of lore changes they've made for PF2:
- Ones they wanted to.
- Ones they were forced into doing with the whole OGL debacle.I'm not sure which kind you're taking exception to.
Mostly that they set themselves up as a company that wasn't afraid to tackle more mature themes than the competition and built a lot of their fanbase on those darker stories and have since abandoned those themes almost entirely. Rather than take the time to tackle those themes with more sensitivity than they did in the past they've chosen not to use many of the themes that got them popular at all.
It's a thing companies tend to do as they gain market share. They abandon a lot of the themes that got them there in favor of what appeals to the broadest subset of possible players. I get why it happens but I don't have to like it.
Plus "this thing worked fine in the previous edition, but I can't do it anymore" is just a normal thing for "a new edition of a game." There are going to be builds for concepts that work just fine in PF2 that you really can't do in PF3. There will be things you can make in PF3 that you can't make in PF4. Likewise there will be things you could do in PF4 that you couldn't do in PF3, and things in PF3 that you can't do in PF2, just like there are things you can do in PF2 that you couldn't do in PF1. It's just the nature of the thing.
Is it though? AD&D to 3rd you could do the same things and almost all themes got increased levels of support. 3rd to PF1 tamped down on some of the excesses of 3.5 but generally also expanded what could be done without taking anything off the table. Most other games like Traveller, Cyberpunk, Eclipse Phase, etc. also haven't tended to remove options between editions.
This seems to be a recent thing with 4th and 5th edition D&D and PF2, though I wouldn't be shocked if it was just a d20 Class based systems thing and my general avoidance of such has insulated me from seeing it happen.
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I mean, the thing is - all of these are balanced, just not around the same point. This means that spells that always feel effective tend to rise to the top. Like sure, a fireball hurled into a room is instantly more gratifying than Rouse Skeletons which allows your to spread that damage around over a longer period of time with a single action.Fireball also has a longer range, the ability to hit flying foes, a better AoE, a damage type more likely to trigger weakness, and does as much damage in a single casting as Rouse Skeletons will do over 3 rounds assuming you don't drop it to sustain something more effective. In what situation is Rouse Skeletons ever the more effective choice?
When you are in a room filled with gunpowder or oil, and you're not a Charhide Goblin. I know because my wife's side of the family is Charhide Goblins, and my side is Iron Gut Goblins. Bottomless Stomach, If I could swallow and then throw up items on demand, now there's a spell that would make my mother proud. (I'm soo taking that spell when I level up enough.)
Even if a fireball did a billion 6d damage, Why would a necromancer choose Fireball over Rouse Skeletons?
If you're only willing to use spells with the most effectiveness, then yes, your selection is going to be limited. If you build your character around flavor, then all the options are on the menu. Paizo or anyone else is not forcing you to play either way. It's a choice you make for yourself.
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Even if a fireball did a billion 6d damage, Why would a necromancer choose Fireball over Rouse Skeletons?
Rouse Skeletons is more or less okay, but part of the problem I think comes when you don't have a strong thematic option that also helps cover your bases. Rouse vs Fireball is also not a great example because they both target the same save.
The friction I think some people have is when they're put in that position when they're expected to (per Paizo's own words) prepare a wide variety of options to cover a bunch of bases, but not everyone necessarily has the tools to do that within a desired conceptual space.
Which is why having tools (feats, class features, items) that help specialize spellcasters (in the same way many other characters can) would feel good, I think, and enable some of these limited thematic spaces to feel better without necessarily breaking open other parts of the game.
The problem is when someone builds their character around flavor, has issues, and the best advice anyone can give them is to tell them to stop. That's bad.
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The problem is when someone builds their character around flavor, has issues, and the best advice anyone can give them is to tell them to stop. That's bad.
I feel like it's possible to have a theme that's too narrow, and when you run into problems, and people tell you "your theme is too narrow" that's neither disrespectful nor unhelpful.
Like if you decide "I'm going to be the fire guy" and you have no ways short of "using a weapon" to do damage that's not fire damage, when you run into a devil and you have a hard time then "get a second damage type" is not actually bad advice.
Like we expect martials to carry backup weapons for when you're fighting a monster immune to your main type, and a ranged weapon for when you can't reach whatever it is that you want to fight. Your theme shouldn't stand totally in the way of "planning for contingencies."
I mean, pf2 does bill itself as a more difficult, more tactical combat game. If you choose to build for flavor instead of for what works, you pay the penalty.
If you want flavor to matter more than actual strategic and tactical value there are other game systems better designed for that, or you find a gm who won't field combats above moderate difficulty.
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Who's taking any of the following as a standard daily loadout option: Aqueous Orb, Bind Undead, Blazing Dive, Bottomless Stomach, Bracing Tendrils, Clairaudience, Cozy Cabin, Crashing Wave, Cup of Dust, Curse of Lost Time, Distracting Chatter, Dividing Trench, Dream Message, Elemental Annihilation Wave, Enthrall, Familiar's Face, Feet to Fins, Firework Blast, Ghostly Weapon, Gravity Well, Hypnotic Pattern, Impending Doom, Levitate, Locate, Magnetic Acceleration, Meld into Stone, Mind Reading, Nondetection, Oneiric Mire, Ooze Form, Organsight, Paralyze, Percussive Impact, Persei's Precautions, Phantom Prison, Rally Point, Roaring Applause, Rouse Skeletons, Safe Passage, Sea of Thought, Secret Page, Shadow Projectile, Shifting Sand, Shrink Item, Sparkleskin, Temporal Twin, Time Jump, Wall of Virtue, Warding Aggression, and Web of Eyes.
Now here's a good game! Everyone tag yourself.
Clairaudience and Locate were on my investigator's caster multiclass picks.
My wizard has a spellbook specifically to boost the effects of Cozy Cabin as a centerpiece of their characterization, and would absolutely take Nondetection if it weren't uncommon.
The Blood Lords game I'm in had Safe Passage win an encounter for us in a big way, so both it and Rouse Skeletons are always prepared by the group.
Shrink Item is fantastic, and part of making an arcane caster for me is figuring out what object they keep on their person in permanently shrunk form for emergencies.
And Cup of Dust is just a personal favorite from my PF1 days. Daily prep might be a stretch, but it's one of the best non-combat curses, especially with the built-in ability to dismiss it. Excellent leverage spell for evil characters.
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The problem is when someone builds their character around flavor, has issues, and the best advice anyone can give them is to tell them to stop. That's bad.I feel like it's possible to have a theme that's too narrow, and when you run into problems, and people tell you "your theme is too narrow" that's neither disrespectful nor unhelpful.
Oh it's neither, but I do think there's room for Paizo to give players more options to help support a theme because right now there just isn't a lot of room in general. It's not just narrow characters, it's just a general systemic design that encourages a degree of homogenization for magic users.
Like if you decide "I'm going to be the fire guy" and you have no ways short of "using a weapon" to do damage that's not fire damage, when you run into a devil and you have a hard time then "get a second damage type" is not actually bad advice.
Agreed, for the most part. I just think in some cases the status quo is too narrow and pushes players too much to heavily generalize.
Across several APs in several different groups I've had bards, psychics, occult witches, and sorcerers and I just can't help but notice that they all tend to gravitate toward similar spell loadouts. Not identical, but the broad strokes and highlights end up being very repetitive in a way that's slightly disappointing given the variety of backstories and themes these characters have and the general promises of PF2 as a system.
Some of them are optimizers, but some of them aren't. It's just something I see naturally happen a lot because there's no reason not to. There's no hook for specialization, no way to define your spellcasting on your own terms.
It would be cool if there was more of that in the Remaster.
Like we expect martials to carry backup weapons for when you're fighting a monster immune to your main type, and a ranged weapon for when you can't reach whatever it is that you want to fight. Your theme shouldn't stand totally in the way of "planning for contingencies."
I don't like this example though because for the most part Paizo has avoided designing encounters this way for martials. It's extremely rare for a low level character to run into enemies that are designed to be unhittable by melee attacks because of flight or immune to physical attacks.
Playing through several pathfinder APs, our local barbarian enthusiast has almost never been put in a position where her core gimmick (athletics checks and hitting someone with a big weapon) has been impossible. I only even say 'almost' because I can't be sure but no scenario comes to mind.
And while it may be prudent to carry a backup bow, they don't also need a backup axe and a backup crossbow and a backup hammer and a backup sword and a backup halberd too. The paradigms here are very different.
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I feel like some of "everybody prepares the same spells" is that people independently realize "huh, the DC of the spell scales automatically even if I don't heighten it, but the damage doesn't." So people go hunting for things like "low level spells that target a DC and do something useful." And heck, Slow is on three lists and you can get it from a couple of deities.
My goblin cleric coordinated an international freedom fighting network across 2 continents with dream messages in our Age of Ashes campaign. Non-detection is absolutely vital for narrative adventure writing purposes and is a very well-written version of this spell for PF2. I enjoy getting it for free with my magic warrior wizard in PFS.
Have you even read ooze form? It feels like that is a list of spells you haven’t even fully read, you just don’t like the sound of what they do.
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The problem is when someone builds their character around flavor, has issues, and the best advice anyone can give them is to tell them to stop. That's bad.I feel like it's possible to have a theme that's too narrow, and when you run into problems, and people tell you "your theme is too narrow" that's neither disrespectful nor unhelpful.
Like if you decide "I'm going to be the fire guy" and you have no ways short of "using a weapon" to do damage that's not fire damage, when you run into a devil and you have a hard time then "get a second damage type" is not actually bad advice.
Like we expect martials to carry backup weapons for when you're fighting a monster immune to your main type, and a ranged weapon for when you can't reach whatever it is that you want to fight. Your theme shouldn't stand totally in the way of "planning for contingencies."
I think too narrow is more of a problem than flavor, it really depends on the flavor too. If you pick a single rule to spell type as a flavor, that might be too narrow to do much with. As a goblin merchant, merchant isn't really built into the rules other than as a background so there's lots of room to play around with to make it work. My class is sorcerer, and I started with zero combat useful spells. I don't see why a merchant would have a problem using a simple weapon to defend themselves so mostly at first level used a sling to good effect. Merchants need something to sell so I always have a backpack filled with consumables for every situation (strategic shopping). At 2nd level, I took the alchemist archetype to make throwing bombs more effective. As a merchant, I have no problem filling in my shortcoming with materialistic things like magic items.
Flavor characters tend to make good support characters, I generally won't play my goblin merchant unless the party has 2 martials and a healer, if the party dosen't I have an optimized fighter or healer I play instead.
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Illusionist is a very well supported theme for a wizard, it just involves a choice many players don’t like making, which is treating charisma as a high valued secondary stat. My Gnoll illusionist in outlaws of Alkenstar was an absolute blast to play and conceal spell, silent spell and convincing illusion are all you really need to make it work amazingly well. It and evoker were the only two old schools of magic that really worked and both will pretty much come over to the remastery just fin the mentalist is probably better at it than the pf2 illusionist . Here’s hoping the new schools can actually get support by feeling interesting and unique enough to Golarion to be worth building on.
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Yes its possible to have a theme that is too narrow, like say for example: A person who only uses butterflies.
But saying "I only use fire spells"? That is not at all narrow. Nor is saying you only use illusion spells or any other school (which I still disagree with the removal). When you decide "I will only use X element" you know that things that counter said element will be problematic. The issue, is the person build for them will fail against random opponents and then be told they are playing wrong because they picked a theme.
A martial decides "I will be a two-weapon user" the game provides them with most of the tools to pull it off. Nobody is going around telling them they are playing wrong because they didn't take a feat for archery.
That there is the issue. A martial character can build whatever they want and the game devs bend over backwards to make sure they get it without having to suffer for it. But as soon as the caster says "I want to do something else" they are told "well okay, but you have to suffer for all of this because this is not meant for you".
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Also, planning for contingencies is much different from "you have prepare these spells that go against your theme or else you are playing wrong".
A martial who did not optimize for archery will feel rather bad against ranged opponents.
Have you ever tried playing an Animal Barbarian, for example ?
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Not every character has to be good at everything, that's what parties are for.
At least in my local PFS group, all of our near TPKs haven't been from not having optimized characters it's been because all of our martials were reduced to zero HP in the first round of combat before any of them even got a turn. This happened to our Barbarian so many times that he started hiding behind the casters and throwing javelins.
Anytime we have failed to complete the entire mission objectives it's not been from combat it's been from martial characters getting multiple crit failures on social skill checks. Just about every thread about optimizing characters or improving a class I've seen is centered around combat.