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Given the choice between classes like the PF2 core Alchemist and Monk or classes like the Kineticist, I'm taking the latter every day of the week.
EDIT: To be less snide - I don't think a dev team growing the confidence to try new things as we hit the five year point in a complex game's lifespan is a sign of the end times. My hope is that the Remaster helps everyone else feel as cool as the new options have been for the last little while, because it's been clear not everybody's at par for a long time now.
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Given the choice between classes like the PF2 core Alchemist and Monk or classes like the Kineticist, I'm taking the latter every day of the week.
EDIT: To be less snide - I don't think a dev team growing the confidence to try new things as we hit the five year point in a complex game's lifespan is a sign of the end times. My hope is that the Remaster helps everyone else feel as cool as the new options have been for the last little while, because it's been clear not everybody's at par for a long time now.
Can you expound upon that?
Why would you take the Kineticist over the Alchemist or Monk?
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I think the idea that new classes are dubbed weak because they lack the mature meta is a good insight that it would be good to keep in mind going forward. It's easy for people to draw conclusions about something based on white room math that isn't borne out in actual play.This is one of those things where patches and good data collection really make a difference in perception. Riot often releases new champions just a little too good and then slowly nerfs them as their win rates rise with mastery. They do this because nobody will invest time in a champion that releases and causes them to lose games for playing it.
Paizo probably can't do this because they don't have the data collection required and are already very tight on how many resources can be devoted to errata. However, that means if they miss low that class is probably going to stay weak for a very long time and may well never get needed adjustments to reach par.
On the flip side, Riot is making a game where just about everyone is playing directly to try and get the win condition of 'beating the enemy side'. If Oracle is theoretically a little weaker than Cleric, but still provides interesting gameplay and narrative differences from Cleric, you're still going to get a lot of people playing them in Pathfinder. Similarly, if (and I don't think it is true from the evidence provided) thaumaturge is a little ahead in damage, many people are still going to play a barbarian because they want to rage and smash things as a giant, or play a rogue because they want to sneak attack. Balance is still very important, doubly so for PF2 which is very finely tuned, but there's more wiggle room here than in a competitive online video game with no roleplaying or goal other than victory in a relatively short match.
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Given the choice between classes like the PF2 core Alchemist and Monk or classes like the Kineticist, I'm taking the latter every day of the week.
EDIT: To be less snide - I don't think a dev team growing the confidence to try new things as we hit the five year point in a complex game's lifespan is a sign of the end times. My hope is that the Remaster helps everyone else feel as cool as the new options have been for the last little while, because it's been clear not everybody's at par for a long time now.
I second this. PF2 is a good base but has issues with everybody feeling equally badass and getting their share of screen time. The new classes do a very good job of keeping classes balanced while making them feel amazing when using their unique tools. I hope that the team manages to squeeze in enough QoL changes that classes that just didn't pop before do so now.
I am not sure what their beef with monks are (though I suppose if you want to be a elemental monk kinetesist does it better)Given the choice between classes like the PF2 core Alchemist and Monk or classes like the Kineticist, I'm taking the latter every day of the week.
EDIT: To be less snide - I don't think a dev team growing the confidence to try new things as we hit the five year point in a complex game's lifespan is a sign of the end times. My hope is that the Remaster helps everyone else feel as cool as the new options have been for the last little while, because it's been clear not everybody's at par for a long time now.
Can you expound upon that?
Why would you take the Kineticist over the Alchemist or Monk?
Monk suffers from being 2 or 3 classes worth of ideas all mixed into one class, has poor damage post level 10, and can have their main damage booster poached by other classes. It isn't a terrible class but it could use a polish for sure.
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Given the choice between classes like the PF2 core Alchemist and Monk or classes like the Kineticist, I'm taking the latter every day of the week.
EDIT: To be less snide - I don't think a dev team growing the confidence to try new things as we hit the five year point in a complex game's lifespan is a sign of the end times. My hope is that the Remaster helps everyone else feel as cool as the new options have been for the last little while, because it's been clear not everybody's at par for a long time now.
Can you expound upon that?
Why would you take the Kineticist over the Alchemist or Monk?
The Alchemist is the only class in the game married to the item list, being a bomber is iffy, and I generally find it to be a much less fun martial or support experience than everyone else in the game.
Monk is actually great, but Monastic Weaponry is bad legacy design that doesn't have a place in PF2 - something new classes aren't generally doing.
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I can see Monk having some issues identity-wise, but gameplay-wise I find it a 10/10. Both Bo staff monk and Grappler + Whirling Throw have been among the best experiences I've had playing this game.
Monk [...] has poor damage post level 10
More like all your good damage feats can be used by Fighter. When compared to non-fighter classes it does more than fine.
Monk [...] has poor damage post level 10More like all your good damage feats can be used by Fighter. When compared to non-fighter classes it does more than fine.
Fair but that doesn't make it not an issue.
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The thing about meta maturity is I'm not sure how true it is.
The biggest swing in early vs late perceptions of class power that comes to my mind is the Swashbuckler, and that's a class people generally overestimated significantly originally and have slowly grown more unimpressed with.
I also feel like it's important to highlight that a lot of what's being discussed here isn't general power creep, it's extremely specific builds performing very well in specific scenarios, which is still something to talk about but fundamentally different than highlighting broader design trends.
To further what Squiggit has said:
A specific build being above the previous normal in any given area isn't generally something that should be called power creep. The Thaumaturge being very good at damage against level +2 enemies at levels higher than 14 isn't a concern. Nor is the new out-of-combat healing meta leaning towards 10 minutes or less to fully heal rather than 30.
These are areas Paizo has, likely, targeted as areas that can safely put power into without harming the overall health or power level of the game. And can and should be areas that Paizo explores with new classes.
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The thing about meta maturity is I'm not sure how true it is.
The biggest swing in early vs late perceptions of class power that comes to my mind is the Swashbuckler, and that's a class people generally overestimated significantly originally and have slowly grown more unimpressed with.
I also feel like it's important to highlight that a lot of what's being discussed here isn't general power creep, it's extremely specific builds performing very well in specific scenarios, which is still something to talk about but fundamentally different than highlighting broader design trends.
I think the issue with Swashbuckler was a mixture of APG releasing 4 classes at the same time so playerbase focus was more disperse and discussion about it being overcentralized by panache core design being really good (which numbers aside, I still think it is).
More than people overestimating its capabilities, class didn't get enough functional playtesting. Most people just assumed the final class was going to be fine with the official release and kept thinking like that until a year or so ago.
Take psychic, it's just another caster with all the normal caster saves and spell slots and stuff. It has its own 'one neat trick', but plays kinda like any other caster.Think of that missed opportunity. Why is it a caster at all? Why doesnt it have the power to influence minds, read thoughts? Be a debuffer by getting in enemy heads or mental damage dealer. Be a buffer for the whole party. In combat and out. Get rid of the spell casting and actually make interesting mechanics instead of just another caster chassis with a light coat of paint.
Bold added by me, because this was answered in the playtest and by the designers, and it was deliberate. The psychic is a spellcaster to differentiate it from other psychics in other media and from D&D's own psionics, which are still basically spells if you ask me. Everyone was onboard with the psychic being a spellcaster during the playtest, myself included. I like how the psychic turned out and it factually can do everything you said. Spells do all those things. The occult list in specific is the best at it. The psychic was, and is, an experimental version of a caster. It was the first forray into making a caster that shifted the balance away from slotted spells as much and into other stuff like focus spells. Before this the only thing that deviated was wave casting on the magus and summoner. I personally would not like the psychic to be like the kineticist or something of that nature. It's a more interesting psychic as a spellcaster
I do believe there is a bit of power creep, but I am not confident that it is occurring to a great degree in classes yet (and if it is, it is at a pretty hard to detect leel in actual play).
Where I have been seeing it lately is in items. Some items are just exceptionally good compared to core options, but this has been happening since launch and I feel like that is more paizo adjusting to core items not hitting the "feel goos" mark they wanted at the time.
I am concerned long term with design in a post Mark pf2e, especially with core rules in the remaster changing. But that is just because I aligned strongly with a restricted PF2e, and stuff like focus points and crafting being as they were were actually quite fine for me.
But, counter to that Paizo has alsos shown some smart choices recently with the change to Recall Knowledge (it is now exactly as I had been running it) and spell progression training.
I would have rathered attack cantrips have been 1-3 action variable cast spells with the flourish trait though.
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Calling the animist a 4 slot caster is making it sound way stronger than it really is. Firstly, you don’t get the extra slot for any rank before level 10, and then it only applies to spells 2 ranks lower than your top slot.
Additionally, almost all of your really cool feats only work with your apparition spells and focus spells, meaning you only have 1 top rank slot and 1 top rank -1 spell per day that you can really get your full class abilities out of. And you are pretty limited on what the lower rank apparition spells can be, so you don’t get to just fill them up with the big hitters like slow or haste, like other classes do. Probably a lot of them will just end up being used as heal spells, but only if you spend a feat to let you do that.
If any aspect of the animist is pushing power creep, it is the focus spells you can just rotate through daily, but we don’t really have a good grasp of what every class is getting out of their remastered focus spells yet.
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Think of that missed opportunity. Why is it a caster at all? Why doesnt it have the power to influence minds, read thoughts? Be a debuffer by getting in enemy heads or mental damage dealer. Be a buffer for the whole party. In combat and out. Get rid of the spell casting and actually make interesting mechanics instead of just another caster chassis with a light coat of paint.
Functionally, Psychic is a caster because its remit is too broad to be anything else and still be balanced. There are so many things that fit into the Psychic bucket, that to give access to them all, they needed to make it a casting class.
Now, at some point we may get something along those themes that's built out of class features and feats (like the kineticist) rather than spell slots, cantrips, and focus powers (like the current psychic) That could be cool. It's going to be a while, though.
There is questionable power creep in that non-core classes have been getting better. But that it closer to "classes are finally being as good as core classes". Casters being the obvious exception because outside of bard they usually draw the short end of the stick.
Cleric has been the best healer in the game this entire time. Druid has been really quite solid as a class as well, especially for those that keep a strong wild shape for combat (and thus get to save all of their slots for other things). Witches and Wizards...? Well, we can be hopeful for the remaster anyway, right?
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I think I mostly agree with SuperBidi. The classes are beginning stronger now. It's the slow start of the descent into power creep. The one that feels so good and nice and "finally they got it right and we can finally feel great about new classes".
And the old classes feel bland because the whole game is ascending to a new stage.
And then what ?
Either future classes stay within the limits of this new stage and people will be less enthusiastic.
Or they go even further beyond that. Hence slow (or not so slow) power creep.
We shall see.
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If power creep means the Magus not having a 1 damage class feature, then call me a fan of power creep.
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The thing that most irks me with the Psychic is its MC Dedication. And the change to refocus will make things even worse in Remastered.
I built a PFS Summoner with Psychic dedication from 1st level thanks to Ancient Elf.
The Dedication brings so much that I am now hard-pressed not to make all my future casters Ancient Elves just to get it by first level.
I am even beginning to try and find ways to add it to my martial builds, also as Ancient Elves.
Not that fabulous for the diversity of PC builds.
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Oh it's a fabulous diversity. You are literally choosing to go that route. The game is in no way forcing you too.The thing that most irks me with the Psychic is its MC Dedication. And the change to refocus will make things even worse in Remastered.
I built a PFS Summoner with Psychic dedication from 1st level thanks to Ancient Elf.
The Dedication brings so much that I am now hard-pressed not to make all my future casters Ancient Elves just to get it by first level.
I am even beginning to try and find ways to add it to my martial builds, also as Ancient Elves.
Not that fabulous for the diversity of PC builds.
When an option is definitely more powerful than the rest, is there really a choice left ?
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And the old classes feel bland
Okay, but feeling bland isn't a power thing. Fighters are both the most generic and one of the strongest classes in the game. You're confusing theme with power, when often the opposite relationship is true.
When an option is definitely more powerful than the rest, is there really a choice left ?
It's not especially though. You've found something that works well for what you want and that's cool, but there's nothing really special there.
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I'mma not gonna get super into mechanics theory in this thread, I'mma just wanna point out that as Mark has said many times, Inventor first opened up new design space for PF2e classes by adding the scaling skill profiency to cast. That in turn enabled something else for thaumaturge. In a way it made it bummer that some of core classes didn't have scaling skill profiency despite some of them having main class features reliant on specific skills.
Basically, its just something i see as natural part of class design, that sometimes devs will get better ideas or do more bold things than they did with previous classes. Remastered is nice in that its opportunity to update old classes to have some of those benefits without doing new edition or "unchained book".
Now before I leave, I wanted to comment on last post: our bard in our edgewatch campaign is in the melee all the time wearing full plate. Dem champion multiclass
On the flip side, Riot is making a game where just about everyone is playing directly to try and get the win condition of 'beating the enemy side'. If Oracle is theoretically a little weaker than Cleric, but still provides interesting gameplay and narrative differences from Cleric, you're still going to get a lot of people playing them in Pathfinder. Similarly, if (and I don't think it is true from the evidence provided) thaumaturge is a little ahead in damage, many people are still going to play a barbarian because they want to rage and smash things as a giant, or play a rogue because they want to sneak attack. Balance is still very important, doubly so for PF2 which is very finely tuned, but there's more wiggle room here than in a competitive online video game with no roleplaying or goal other than victory in a relatively short match.
Sorry, I missed this the first time around.
This is absolutely how people play League as well. Some will focus on a small handful of champions and play them through thick and thin. Others might only play characters with a visual design that speaks to them. What is good also changes by what ELO you're in with some champions that seem weak or busted at low-tier even out at mid tiers of play.
There are stronger champions that aren't popular and weaker ones that will always see tons of play.
None of this changes their design philosophy and how they try to balance the game. What they aim for in balance is:
1) Fun. Sometimes a champion needs to be below 50% win-rate because having it any higher is unfun. The inverse is also true where non-disruptive champions get to sit above 50% to counter balance those un-fun champions.
2) Win-rate. They try to aim to keep champions within certain bounds across all ELOs. If a champion crosses a line they try to buff/nerf it in a way that impacts the desired ELOs and not the other levels where it may be fine.
3) Pro Play. They will buff and nerf things for the professional game and sometimes champions that would otherwise be safe to buff can't be or they would destroy that meta.
4) Play-rate. They tend to aim a touch high with new champions who don't yet have an established player base so they can get established and generate data.
Obviously, Paizo isn't Riot and a TTRPG is different from a MOBA but I feel like they could do more with errata and could address obvious outliers better than they do currently. This would also allow them to be bolder in what they release as everything would have the expectation of being subject to change if it falls outside of established boundaries.
The thing that most irks me with the Psychic is its MC Dedication. And the change to refocus will make things even worse in Remastered.
I built a PFS Summoner with Psychic dedication from 1st level thanks to Ancient Elf.
The Dedication brings so much that I am now hard-pressed not to make all my future casters Ancient Elves just to get it by first level.
I am even beginning to try and find ways to add it to my martial builds, also as Ancient Elves.
Not that fabulous for the diversity of PC builds.
Are all the characters you're inspired to make partially psychic or are you building characters around mechanics? Honestly the only mixing of psychic I've wanted to do since it dropped is some combination of psychic and monk, otherwise the only psychic for me is a straight class. I've never felt compelled to get an amp for other characters I've made bc if you treat dedications to your class as narrative injections as well as mechanical ones you won't be able to justify it for half as many characters
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I don't think most people are dumping the modestly-less-powerful subclasses if they still like the thematics. I mean really, rogue may be the single most damaging class in the game, and is probably straight-up BETTER than almost anything else...but if a person likes the flavor of a monk or a magus, they generally play that instead.
What is good also changes by what ELO you're in with some champions that seem weak or busted at low-tier even out at mid tiers of play.
I agree that people aren't ditching weaker classes if they like the theme strongly enough, but there are a lot of rarely-picked feats and rarely-used spells out there that could use some love. On the flip side, there are diversity-crushing all-stars like Slow and Synesthesia that could use a tap downward.
I agree that people aren't ditching weaker classes if they like the theme strongly enough, but there are a lot of rarely-picked feats and rarely-used spells out there that could use some love. On the flip side, there are diversity-crushing all-stars like Slow and Synesthesia that could use a tap downward.I don't think most people are dumping the modestly-less-powerful subclasses if they still like the thematics. I mean really, rogue may be the single most damaging class in the game, and is probably straight-up BETTER than almost anything else...but if a person likes the flavor of a monk or a magus, they generally play that instead.
What is good also changes by what ELO you're in with some champions that seem weak or busted at low-tier even out at mid tiers of play.
Both of which, let's be clear, are CRB spells. It's notable that nothing published after those spells has eclipsed them, and it does somewhat undermine the argument towards power creep. Likewise, fireball, cone of cold, chain lightning, meteor swarm, and cataclysm remain the highest damage spells of their level 4 years later - all from core.
Part of that is that they're focused on doing one thing: action denial in the case of slow, massive defensive debuff for synesthesia, and AOE damage for fireball and co. Fireball doesn't also frighten, slow doesn't also reduce its target's Will saves, so the entire "power budget" designing them can go into one effect. As opposed to spells from secrets of magic like burning blossoms, which deals damage AND fascinates people. But I do think it's worth repeating that all those spells remain top tier even after all the "power creep".
Not that I disagree with your perspective at all - I really love the oddball spells and want to see them get more love too! But thought I'd take the opportunity to make a point about power creep and why those spells are such autopicks.
I was drifting off topic into errata in general. I have no issues with the new stuff being good - even dare I say too good - but I do hope the remaster touches up a few pain points that have been found in older content over the years.
I am not seeing the power creep. I teresting flavourful mechanics and theme creep sure. Newer classes being situatiommaly better than a core class at 1 thing sometime... maybe but that isn't power creep. No newer class has made an older class obsolete or out shines one in 80% or more of what the other class can do.
Newer classes being more versatile is a huge positive. If newer classes can't be as good or better at some things and older class can do why make them?
Fighter is still king of combat, still the most reliable damage dealer. I am more worried about the idea nothing new can infringe or be as good at or occasionally better at some situations than an older class (hello neutered mechanically weaker APG classes that people are frustrated with). Cool so the OP found a higher convoluted and possibly MAD combo that can with some pre roll successes and ideal circumstances do slightly more damage than a fighter does reliably with less work most rounds. Sorry its a huge stretch argument and without comparing builds and attribute and feat choices in full its a limited 1 dimensional argument with no merit.
Also has worse defences than a baseline fighter with less combat versatility so I think its balanced with a lot of set up it can for 1 round slightly out damage the fighter sometimes while locking you into a lot more feat choices.
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The Thaumaturge does look pretty harsh. I can see it doing a lot of damage once it gets all its tricks going. Not sure that is power creep. I'll have to make a Thaumaturge and see what that looks like.
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Are all the characters you're inspired to make partially psychic or are you building characters around mechanics? Honestly the only mixing of psychic I've wanted to do since it dropped is some combination of psychic and monk, otherwise the only psychic for me is a straight class. I've never felt compelled to get an amp for other characters I've made bc if you treat dedications to your class as narrative injections as well as mechanical ones you won't be able to justify it for half as many charactersThe thing that most irks me with the Psychic is its MC Dedication. And the change to refocus will make things even worse in Remastered.
I built a PFS Summoner with Psychic dedication from 1st level thanks to Ancient Elf.
The Dedication brings so much that I am now hard-pressed not to make all my future casters Ancient Elves just to get it by first level.
I am even beginning to try and find ways to add it to my martial builds, also as Ancient Elves.
Not that fabulous for the diversity of PC builds.
I am pretty good at designing enticing background stories that mesh with the mechanical choices I make for my builds.
Since I play almost only PFS, I take advantage of its structure and fast pace to create PCs according to different mechanical concepts I want to try.
I definitely did not want to even try the Psychic MC Dedication because the class itself does not interest me much. In particular, it provides almost no inspiration to my story creating instincts.
But when I recently tried my hand at building a caster Summoner, I saw how high SuperBidi rates the Psychic dedication and I decided to give it a try. To see what all the fuss was about.
And OMG does it live up to its reputation. For any role you want on a caster, Psychic MC Dedication makes you definitely better. And the new refocus rules will only amplify this.
I find it OP the point that Ancient Elf becomes a strong combo with it.
It now takes me a definite effort to pursue different paths for my casters' building, which is thankfully helped by most PFS scenarios being on the easy side so that even several non-optimized build choices do not make my PCs feeling irrelevant.
But, much like Champion or Fighter dedication for martials, and in fact even more, Psychic dedication is becoming IMO the goto class feat for casters.
The psychic cantrips are pretty nice. Much better focus spells than anything the witch or wizard have innately.
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True, I admit I was referring to your play experience earlier with it. Since I assume you weren't using the remaster rules back then lolPast level 7 aren't there some major issues with psychic dedication for non occult casters? Namely, you miss a lot because your proficiency with the cantrips doesn't increase?Remastered has seen to this.
And buff cantrips do not care already.
I very recently created it. Given I alternate PCs when playing PFS, Remastered will likely be there before my caster Summoner MC Psychic hits level 7.
