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I certainly love the arcane tradition, and appreciate how its immense versatility in 2e is curbed by the need for prepared arcane casters to learn spells piecemeal through a spellbook or familiar, instead of having access to the entire spell list in one go. It's definitely the "bag of tricks" tradition, and in my opinion it has some of the most potential for rewarding planning and strategic thinking (Contingency is probably the best example of this, in my opinion). Within this tradition are a lot of iconic spells like Dimension Door/Translocate, Fireball, and Magic Missile/Force Barrage, so I think that within the arcane tradition is also a solid identity.
With all of that said, however, I do also think the arcane tradition is severely overloaded with spells that don't belong, chiefly necromancy spells. Behind the arcane tradition is the Wizard class, around whom the spell list is built, and since before 2e arcane spells had to be overloaded because of what the Wizard represented: historically, the Wizard's identity has always been that of the game's ur-caster, the magic-user who can do everything under the sun, except heal. If a character can cast magic in a manner that doesn't derive from worship, that character can very well be a Wizard, which makes for an extremely broad identity that could likely be broken down into many more specialist classes.
One of the smaller classes that specifically got called out is the Necromancer: Mark Seifter mentioned in the past that the arcane tradition has lots of necromancy spells because they're there to accommodate a necromancy Wizard, just as each spell school had to be filled out with lots of other spells just to accommodate Wizards of those other respective schools. Within the arcane list, there's probably enough to have a dedicated Necromancer or Mesmer class, probably more, but it's difficult to do that know because they're all subsumed under the vast umbrella of the Wizard.
In a hypothetical 3e, I'd be interested in seeing the arcane tradition done differently: I do think it's still worth having a Wizard class for those wanting a bag-of-tricks ultra-generalist, but I'd also like to see other arcane classes that are much more focused alongside them. I'd also like to see a proper necromancer class, and I don't feel the arcane tradition is necessarily the best fit for their kinds of abilities.
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Its always important to remember that part of what makes Occult and Primal so much better is that their focus spells tend to out perform other traditions.
Cleric easily has the most focus spells because of domain, but most of those are hit or miss. Arcane has the least and the worst focus spells. Primal has average amount and are okay, which mix well with the spell list. Finally, Occult has hands down the best focus spells, which really highlights how favored they are.
Seriously, no matter what angle you take Occult just gets more for seamingly no reason.
Focus spells belong to classes. Not to Traditions.
And rating Traditions depending on their classes seems to me an exercise in futility since any new class would require a reassessment of the Traditions even if there was no new spell.
When we get the Animist as a new class, what is important in assessing it is that it uses the Divine Tradition. Not what the Focus spells of the Cleric, Oracle or Divine Witch are.
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Its always important to remember that part of what makes Occult and Primal so much better is that their focus spells tend to out perform other traditions.
Cleric easily has the most focus spells because of domain, but most of those are hit or miss. Arcane has the least and the worst focus spells. Primal has average amount and are okay, which mix well with the spell list. Finally, Occult has hands down the best focus spells, which really highlights how favored they are.
Seriously, no matter what angle you take Occult just gets more for seamingly no reason.
Focus spells belong to classes. Not to Traditions.
And rating Traditions depending on their classes seems to me an exercise in futility since any new class would require a reassessment of the Traditions even if there was no new spell.
When we get the Animist as a new class, what is important in assessing it is that it uses the Divine Tradition. Not what the Focus spells of the Cleric, Oracle or Divine Witch are.
Doubly so now that we have universal spell proficiencies and they aren't tied to tradition anymore
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That Arcane and Necromancy are traditonaly connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handelt differently ^^
That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^
but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).
Its always important to remember that part of what makes Occult and Primal so much better is that their focus spells tend to out perform other traditions.
Cleric easily has the most focus spells because of domain, but most of those are hit or miss. Arcane has the least and the worst focus spells. Primal has average amount and are okay, which mix well with the spell list. Finally, Occult has hands down the best focus spells, which really highlights how favored they are.
Seriously, no matter what angle you take Occult just gets more for seamingly no reason.
This is very true. A large amount of Arcane-based focus spells are significantly weaker compared to their Occult, Primal, or even Divine counterparts. For Sorcerers, Dragon Claws and Genie's Veil are a joke compared to Elemental Toss or Jealous Hex. Heck, the Angelic Halo is decent, even if risky, since bonus healing that turns your heals from D8+8 into D8+10 per level is pretty bonkers, or even D8+2 for the touch/AoE version.
Cleric does suffer from a large amount of bad focus spells, but some of them are good enough to the point that it justifies certain MCD combinations. They're certainly better than a large amount of Arcane focus spells.
but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^
Secrets of magic calls out necromancy as being life essence and doesn't mention it anywhere else, so it should be exclusive to primal and divine. Animating undead is life essence as well even. Necromancy in the setting should not be available to wizards, apparently zero liches would be wizards. Which again, like the force spell thing, feels wrong. The other extremely wrong feeling implication is that these all should be available to druids. Figure that one out
And to clarify a little bit, it doesn't seem necromancy interacts with spirit essence much at all. It seems this is primarily the domain of what used to be enchantment spells, and to a lesser extent evocation with force spells. A spell like Heroism is spirit essence, same would be true for fear. Which is odd because it is assumed fear is a mind spell when a wizard casts it. The secrets of magic book also justifies haste being on the occult list by saying it "speeds up your mind" instead of... Your body? I always assumed haste created a relative time buddle center on you that sped up time. Not that it literally just made you go/think fast...
These essences do not match the spell lists super well
I was going to say that on Golarion most Necromancers are Wizards, Divine Necromancers exist but are way more rare from what i saw.
I was going to say that on Golarion most Necromancers are Wizards, Divine Necromancers exist but are way more rare from what i saw.
As one would assume! But the way they divvied essences, it should be flatly impossible for wizards to do any necromancy of any kind. I understand removing spells like Heroism fs, but a lot of what wizards should be able to do crosses into territories of these other traditions and often those things feel inappropriate for those traditions. I don't know for sure, but I think 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition D&D, and then by extension PF1, divine casters rarely if ever got force spells, but here we see a whole hell of a lot. If we had class spell lists again, and only one class could have the spells wall of force, force cage, force hand, magic missile etc, the class I would give it to is wizard and I assume other people would do the same? I'm just so extremely baffled by essences
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I think the best explanation for the split would be spells that manipulate life energies in 'natural' ways, ways that the maelstrom considered intended for life energies to be manipulated would be divine and primal in forms general. However, life energies can be manipulated by methods that could be considered unnatural, and so you might call them Pseudo-necromancy if you were to coin a new old-school school for it. Those more unnatural manipulations of the life energies would seem to feel like they fall into the Arcane tradition for whatever reason.
So there are things factors about Life that nature considers part of its realm, but life extends beyond just the primal and divine aspects.
With primal or divine you might be able to emit pure life energy, or void energy, or be able to call a spirt from beyond back to a freshly healed body. But causing a dead body to become tethered to a source of void energy to animate it may not be a 'natural' function void energy. It may be an academic exercise of causing void energy to unnaturally attach to a body in a way that it's opposing object life energy naturally behaves, but using the 'knowledge' of the details of the energy the arcanist manipulates the environment of the forces enough to enable the transformation of the dead into undead. But this isn't a natural construction, but an unnatural, artificial design. Undead being a void energy, biological construct, or in other words an 'academic extension' of natural elements to create an otherwise unnatural thing.
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I was going to say that on Golarion most Necromancers are Wizards, Divine Necromancers exist but are way more rare from what i saw.As one would assume! But the way they divvied essences, it should be flatly impossible for wizards to do any necromancy of any kind. I understand removing spells like Heroism fs, but a lot of what wizards should be able to do crosses into territories of these other traditions and often those things feel inappropriate for those traditions. I don't know for sure, but I think 1st, 2nd and 3rd edition D&D, and then by extension PF1, divine casters rarely if ever got force spells, but here we see a whole hell of a lot. If we had class spell lists again, and only one class could have the spells wall of force, force cage, force hand, magic missile etc, the class I would give it to is wizard and I assume other people would do the same? I'm just so extremely baffled by essences
Mhh...yeah i feel especialy with the lost of the different school of Magic,Something that was baked into the setting, they have reavulate how to handle it. Because Generalist was Not the Standart of Wizards (as bound arcane User) in the Setting. Characters we're defined by those specialisations.
And the Wizard list was used for them all, now it would be the Arcane Tradition.
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but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^This is why I said essences are a distraction and a hinderance. Necromancy fits perfectly to arcane, specially with the lore where necromancers were arcane casters.
It is only after you arbitratily add in essences (which where invented in PF2) that necromancy stops sounding like an arcane thing.
This is where we disagree. It doesn't fit the arcane list, it fits the D&D concept of what a wizard should be.
Ultimately the problem with the arcane list and occult list. is that are both marred by baggage being carried from the Dungeon and Dragons concepts of what wizards and bards should do instead of what the arcane and occult list being bases on the essences) .
the essences makes perfect sense, but the problem is there are designers who still want to play a D&D wizard or bard.
I do hope with the remaster that they lean into their own creation more, and pare down both the occult and arcane list to be in line with their own world structure instead of past ideas from a system they are trying to break free from.
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Arcane list has a bunch of fluff spells that do next to nothing on it or are for pure roleplay purposes.
Like what? Could you please name a few examples?
(Not disagreeing; just curious.)
I remember mark talking about how a lot of spells don't belong on the arcane list, but people kept adding spells that didn't really belong on it, because they wanted the wizard to have it.
Was it ever expounded upon which specific spells Mark might have been referring to?
but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^This is why I said essences are a distraction and a hinderance. Necromancy fits perfectly to arcane, specially with the lore where necromancers were arcane casters.
It is only after you arbitratily add in essences (which where invented in PF2) that necromancy stops sounding like an arcane thing.
This is where we disagree. It doesn't fit the arcane list, it fits the D&D concept of what a wizard should be.
Ultimately the problem with the arcane list and occult list. is that are both marred by baggage being carried from the Dungeon and Dragons concepts of what wizards and bards should do instead of what the arcane and occult list being bases on the essences) .
the essences makes perfect sense, but the problem is there are designers who still want to play a D&D wizard or bard.
I do hope with the remaster that they lean into their own creation more, and pare down both the occult and arcane list to be in line with their own world structure instead of past ideas from a system they are trying to break free from.
But that is not just DnD where the typical kind of wizard is the one who does Necromancy, one can argue that it is still influence by DnD but the culture inpact is not really escapable.
Golarion and its lore is very much shaped by those things originating in DnD and with that PF1. And we still have classes that very much mimic the DnD Classes you mentioned Bard or Wizard as example, not 1 to 1 but still close enough.
Magic and some other mechanics probably needs to be overhauled in the future and probably some Class Design aswell to completly cut the tie with DnD completly.
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but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^This is why I said essences are a distraction and a hinderance. Necromancy fits perfectly to arcane, specially with the lore where necromancers were arcane casters.
It is only after you arbitratily add in essences (which where invented in PF2) that necromancy stops sounding like an arcane thing.
This is where we disagree. It doesn't fit the arcane list, it fits the D&D concept of what a wizard should be.
Ultimately the problem with the arcane list and occult list. is that are both marred by baggage being carried from the Dungeon and Dragons concepts of what wizards and bards should do instead of what the arcane and occult list being bases on the essences) .
the essences makes perfect sense, but the problem is there are designers who still want to play a D&D wizard or bard.
I do hope with the remaster that they lean into their own creation more, and pare down both the occult and arcane list to be in line with their own world structure instead of past ideas from a system they are trying to break free from.
They cannot do this for the Remaster because of the impact on casters from other books.
I hope it will happen in PF3.
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but they shouldn't be connected in 2e though. most necromancy spells should be life/spirit (divine list).That Arcane and Necromancy are traditionally connected is not surprising considering the very iconic Lich is the result of Arcane Magic and research.
And from the Four tradition given Arcane still fits the best.
Maybe in a other Edition it will get handled differently ^^This is why I said essences are a distraction and a hinderance. Necromancy fits perfectly to arcane, specially with the lore where necromancers were arcane casters.
It is only after you arbitratily add in essences (which where invented in PF2) that necromancy stops sounding like an arcane thing.
This is where we disagree. It doesn't fit the arcane list, it fits the D&D concept of what a wizard should be.
Ultimately the problem with the arcane list and occult list. is that are both marred by baggage being carried from the Dungeon and Dragons concepts of what wizards and bards should do instead of what the arcane and occult list being bases on the essences) .
the essences makes perfect sense, but the problem is there are designers who still want to play a D&D wizard or bard.
I do hope with the remaster that they lean into their own creation more, and pare down both the occult and arcane list to be in line with their own world structure instead of past ideas from a system they are trying to break free from.
Who cares about DnD? I am talking Pathfinder and just Pathfinder, so no its not "baggage from DnD" or any such BS. Its baggage from the fact that they had a setting and game exist for 10 years and then they decided "you know what, we are changing how this works arbitrarily". The 4 traditions do not need the essences at all. Those essences are tacked on extras that fail to describe what each list should be able to do.
If you want to make a system based around the essences then do it. Make 4 spell lists based on each of the essences and casters can pick 2. But PF2 uses the traditions and those really should not care if trapping a soul is dealing with the spirits because it is something that Arcane should be able to do.
This is why they are a distraction. Because we are talking about them, not about what the traditions should and can actually do.
Why should Arcane be able to trap a soul ?
I think the best explanation for the split would be spells that manipulate life energies in 'natural' ways, ways that the maelstrom considered intended for life energies to be manipulated would be divine and primal in forms general. However, life energies can be manipulated by methods that could be considered unnatural, and so you might call them Pseudo-necromancy if you were to coin a new old-school school for it. Those more unnatural manipulations of the life energies would seem to feel like they fall into the Arcane tradition for whatever reason.
So there are things factors about Life that nature considers part of its realm, but life extends beyond just the primal and divine aspects.
With primal or divine you might be able to emit pure life energy, or void energy, or be able to call a spirt from beyond back to a freshly healed body. But causing a dead body to become tethered to a source of void energy to animate it may not be a 'natural' function void energy. It may be an academic exercise of causing void energy to unnaturally attach to a body in a way that it's opposing object life energy naturally behaves, but using the 'knowledge' of the details of the energy the arcanist manipulates the environment of the forces enough to enable the transformation of the dead into undead. But this isn't a natural construction, but an unnatural, artificial design. Undead being a void energy, biological construct, or in other words an 'academic extension' of natural elements to create an otherwise unnatural thing.
Unfortunately this is directly addressed in the life section saying that the creation of undead is unnatural inherently and why undead are evil. Negative energy, void, naturally destroys, using it to create by creating undead causes them to become warped and hunger for destruction and death. Creating undead is within the divine domain fs, and is still identified as within the life essence. So this argument doesn't really work. The section also specifically says that arcane magic "can do this but from an arcane lens" which is deeply unsatisfying. The upside to this excerpt is that it's a cannon academic document within the setting but could be "wrong" or just "the best theory they have" but if we take it as the an explanation of the essences which is true and correct, then arcane and occult magic should never have any kind of necromancy under any circumstances without a pretty robust explanation for why it is possible
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When i read all this....i feel a remaster is not enough.
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When i read all this....i feel a remaster is not enough.
As of right now, I don't know. I would prefer PF3E stay at least five years out, maybe more. I think a real talk on what the wizard *is* needs to happen at Paizo, and I'm sure it has, but I want to suggest something more radical and say perhaps the wizards should not be thought of as *the arcane caster*. It's kind of difficult to parse where the baggage from d&d is warranted or unwarranted to use here
So wizards used to be the only real practitioner of magic in the first and second edition of d&d. There were other classes with magic, but the game was set up with a role for "fighting man" "cleric" and "magic user". The role of the magic user was a lot of what rogues do now plus other cool stuff. It's why there are spells like knock, spells to find hidden doors, and invisibility on the wizard lists all the way through the tradition of these d20 games. So we are dealing with a several decade old concept of wizards being the end all be all of spellcasters, and also the baggage of the thief, now rogue, having a hard time fulfilling a role that is/was better suited to the wizard. Paizo wants to narrow down and rein in what the wizard is and what the role it has is from being the singular magic guy, to being one of many magic guys. You get people complaining about the wizard usually because it's no longer the magic guy, except the arcane spell list and what not still kind of try to pretend the wizard is still the magic guy
This has lead to weirdness where if wizards are never supposed to do necromancy, especially raising the dead... Idk, I feel like perhaps it's not a wizard? The name is a horrible thing to get hung up on, but I never imagine a lich is a cleric, sorcerer, bard, or a druid. They're wizards. I never imagine the guy raising a skeleton army is a sorcerer or a druid, I assume they're probably a wizard, or "oh yeah I guess clerics should be really good at that too"
The essences probably need a revision, the division between occult and arcane is thematically and mechanically weak, which makes sense occult and arcane is just the old arcane magic split into two
Or perhaps wizards should be less "I'm the arcane guy" and more the "I use arcane as a lens through which I explore magic" guy and should get feats and abilities similar mechanically to crossblooded evolution and the halcyon speaker (which is now largely defunked given the way spell proficiencies work now). If you can use arcane magic to transgress boundaries and create undead, I think maybe this shouldn't be an arcane list thing but a wizard thing? I have a feeling that if they doubled down and were true to the letter of the essences wizard would stop being my favorite class. I'm not sure what would be my favorite, probably something that uses occult but not charisma based (bards are aesthetically awful) and ideally prepared...
I have more thoughts, but I'll not write a whole paragraph
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Arcane list has a bunch of fluff spells that do next to nothing on it or are for pure roleplay purposes.Like what? Could you please name a few examples?
(Not disagreeing; just curious.)
I remember mark talking about how a lot of spells don't belong on the arcane list, but people kept adding spells that didn't really belong on it, because they wanted the wizard to have it.Was it ever expounded upon which specific spells Mark might have been referring to?
Magic Mailbox
Message RuneMagic Aura
Nudge the Odds
Quick Sort
Synchronize
Befitting Attire
Empathic Link
Falsify Heat
Spy's Mark
Ok. I'll stop there. Three's a lot of fluff that will rarely get used on the Arcane list. On top of the subpar spells that you are never likely to use.
When i read all this....i feel a remaster is not enough.As of right now, I don't know. I would prefer PF3E stay at least five years out, maybe more. I think a real talk on what the wizard *is* needs to happen at Paizo, and I'm sure it has, but I want to suggest something more radical and say perhaps the wizards should not be thought of as *the arcane caster*. It's kind of difficult to parse where the baggage from d&d is warranted or unwarranted to use here
So wizards used to be the only real practitioner of magic in the first and second edition of d&d. There were other classes with magic, but the game was set up with a role for "fighting man" "cleric" and "magic user". The role of the magic user was a lot of what rogues do now plus other cool stuff. It's why there are spells like knock, spells to find hidden doors, and invisibility on the wizard lists all the way through the tradition of these d20 games. So we are dealing with a several decade old concept of wizards being the end all be all of spellcasters, and also the baggage of the thief, now rogue, having a hard time fulfilling a role that is/was better suited to the wizard. Paizo wants to narrow down and rein in what the wizard is and what the role it has is from being the singular magic guy, to being one of many magic guys. You get people complaining about the wizard usually because it's no longer the magic guy, except the arcane spell list and what not still kind of try to pretend the wizard is still the magic guy
This has lead to weirdness where if wizards are never supposed to do necromancy, especially raising the dead... Idk, I feel like perhaps it's not a wizard? The name is a horrible thing to get hung up on, but I never imagine a lich is a cleric, sorcerer, bard, or a druid. They're wizards. I never imagine the guy raising a skeleton army is a sorcerer or a druid, I assume they're probably a wizard, or "oh yeah I guess clerics should be really good at that too"
The essences probably need a revision,...
I don't know much about the essences. I did not read that deeply.
Wizard is the guy that uses magic to take care of things. All kinds of magic. Only real limitation on his magic was healing magic was the purview of the gods and thus divine magic. This was back before primal when druid magic was from the gods of nature or the natural divine energies in the world.
The arcane list is... ok? I don't think the lists or the essences are really the problems, they are just means to an end.
The larger questions are do the spell lists meet the design goals? Are they balanced?
Could some spells or concepts be trimmed to reduce bloat and focus on balance.
I think arcane still has a bunch of largely redundant spells (especially now skills have been massively improved). I think a lot of the old situational 'utility' spells lile Knock, Featherfall and others could become feats or daily consumeables for different thesis for the wizard. I am not sure unless I dpecifically knew there was a locked door I needed to open before my daily preparations that we didn't have a party member skilled in Thievery (which would lead to many other problems) I would ever bother to prepare Knock. Certainly never before level 9 when rank 2 spells rarely have great uses and after that we have probably solved the lack of thievery within the party.
A lot of people are only ever likely to use Knock from a scroll so why not have it and other bloat spells made cheap consumeables? Featherfall works better as a talisman.
Regarding necromancy... its a perversion of essences and more of a concept of corruption. I think removing necromancy spells from the arcane list and then bringing them back as an archetype is probably they way to go.
I would much rather lower level utility spells were made consumeables and removed from the list. I woukd prefer all lists were trimmed and the spells more flexible or a focus on spells that are good picks for 70% of encounters. This would help players that struggle to have satisfying experiences with caster reach the play level Michael Sayre says casters are balanced around.
For wizards thesis (and subsequent feat support for them) could be a crafting thesis (your wizard did the magic equivalent of shop/craft/tech class) and can make a certain number of consumeabkes each day to replace utility spells. Another thesis could work of arcane to improve recall knowledge and maybe get bonuses on success, another could work of spell attack rolls. That is probably too much and too late for remaster but maybe for pf3 they can use thesis to change up wizard playstyle more than 'bonus meta magic feat' or a bonus high level spell at the cost of 1 spell slot per level (spell blending).
Magic Mailbox
Message Rune
Magic Aura
Nudge the Odds
Quick Sort
Synchronize
Befitting Attire
Empathic Link
Falsify Heat
Spy's MarkOk. I'll stop there. Three's a lot of fluff that will rarely get used on the Arcane list. On top of the subpar spells that you are never likely to use.
Thanks!
Personally, my characters use magic aura all the time (when GMs allow) to great effect.
I must admit though that Befitting Attire, Quick Sort, and Synchronize made me do a negative double take when I first saw them.
Magic mailbox would have been amazing if not for the myriad of limitations, not the least of which are the long casting time and short duration making it almost unusable.
I'm not too familiar with the others.
Magic Mailbox
Message Rune
Magic Aura
Nudge the Odds
Quick Sort
Synchronize
Befitting Attire
Empathic Link
Falsify Heat
Spy's MarkOk. I'll stop there. Three's a lot of fluff that will rarely get used on the Arcane list. On top of the subpar spells that you are never likely to use.
Thanks!
Personally, my characters use magic aura all the time (when GMs allow) to great effect.
I must admit though that Befitting Attire, Quick Sort, and Synchronize made me do a negative double take when I first saw them.
Magic mailbox would have been amazing if not for the myriad of limitations, not the least of which are the long casting time and short duration making it almost unusable.
I'm not too familiar with the others.
There is a ton of fluff stuff on the arcane list or redundant blasting spells or some combat spell they thought up and tossed on the Arcane list that isn't worth taking.
I like magic mailbox as an RP spell. I used this spell in Kingmaker to set up communication networks, but it wasn't particularly helpful for combat. It was more of a cool roleplay effect that made the players feel their kingdom was a little cooler for having this communication method. That has value as well, but I don't think such things should be part of any class budget for combat as some imply.
Thus I don't value the arcane list like some others do. It's not the old Sorc/Wizard list that truly was the best list in the game. It lacks a lot of role versatility and lacks quite a few high impact spells the Sorc/Wiz list used to have.
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I don't know much about the essences. I did not read that deeply.
Wizard is the guy that uses magic to take care of things. All kinds of magic. Only real limitation on his magic was healing magic was the purview of the gods and thus divine magic. This was back before primal when druid magic was from the gods of nature or the natural divine energies in the world.
To give a tl;Dr based on what I read there are many iconic spells you associate with wizards which arguably cannot be considered arcane anymore and thus should be inaccessible. For starters all of necromancy from healing, to revival, to animating and creating undead fall under the purview of the life essence. All spells with the force tag appear to be under the purview of spirit. So magic missile, wall of force, the pathfinder equivalent of the bigby hand spells, the telekinesis spells etc all are outside the scope of arcane magic. For force spells I want to put emphasis on *appear*, as what "force" is really is not solidly defined. The word force does appear in the spirit entry in a way that sounds like it is the same thing as the force aspect of spells with the force tag. Many force spells have a spirit flavoring as well. So we'd have wizards without magic missile if this was adhered to strictly. It is arguable that all emotion based mental spells, which includes fear, are spirit and not mind and therefore also outside the purview of arcane. Particularly the way they describe the difference between spirit and mind is more or less logos for mind and pathos or ethos for spirit making anything but illusions, paralysis, mind control and hallucinations outside the realm of arcane magic
I've tried Arcane multiple times. Every time I try arcane, I wish I was occult. When I'm an occult sorcerer, I pick up a blaster spell with Crossblood Evolution. You don't need them that often.
Primal has slow for bosses. They have lots of blasting power and some cool summons. I use more summons from primal than other lists. They have banishment. I haven't felt lacking using primal. The primal list has lots of interesting ways to use it.
I find with the PF2 combat paradigm, Arcane doesn't stand out. My group kills very fast. Duration spells that aren't buffs don't mean much. Even boss battles are usually 3 to 5 rounds of kill or be killed. Hit them hard and fast, heal as needed.
It's been 3 plus years of PF2 being out. Arcane list is a known quantity at this point. It's tied for 2nd or 3rd best list with primal and slightly behind primal if you want a secondary healer that can do other things.
When constructing a group, primal and occult casters are easier to build around. Any time you can get healing and just about everything else in one list, you have more role versatility and group build flexibility.
This looks more like a matter of preference and less finding it weak (Arcane has most strong spells in both Arcane and Primal afterall). Which is fine, just sad you don't get to enjoy Imperial Sorcerers as much as I do.
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they could just make Necromancer an archetype. and with the new spell proficiency rules, it wouldn't matter if most of the spells were on either the primal or divine list, since a wizard with a necromancer archetype would get to legendary proficiency with those spells just the same.
This looks more like a matter of preference and less finding it weak (Arcane has most strong spells in both Arcane and Primal afterall). Which is fine, just sad you don't get to enjoy Imperial Sorcerers as much as I do.I've tried Arcane multiple times. Every time I try arcane, I wish I was occult. When I'm an occult sorcerer, I pick up a blaster spell with Crossblood Evolution. You don't need them that often.
Primal has slow for bosses. They have lots of blasting power and some cool summons. I use more summons from primal than other lists. They have banishment. I haven't felt lacking using primal. The primal list has lots of interesting ways to use it.
I find with the PF2 combat paradigm, Arcane doesn't stand out. My group kills very fast. Duration spells that aren't buffs don't mean much. Even boss battles are usually 3 to 5 rounds of kill or be killed. Hit them hard and fast, heal as needed.
It's been 3 plus years of PF2 being out. Arcane list is a known quantity at this point. It's tied for 2nd or 3rd best list with primal and slightly behind primal if you want a secondary healer that can do other things.
When constructing a group, primal and occult casters are easier to build around. Any time you can get healing and just about everything else in one list, you have more role versatility and group build flexibility.
I don't think Arcane is weak, just not clearly number one like some claim. Occult is clearly number one.
It's 2nd or 3rd depending on what you need in the group trading places with Primal.
3/5th of our group prefers playing martials. So we have two slots for a caster or caster hybrid. One of those at least needs to be a healer with medic abilities. We've found primal and occult casters work better for that hybrid sort of role as it takes the pressure off a single PC having to play a healer.
Even though some want to separate the discussion, there is no real way to do this: classes and ability scores associated with primal and occult provide more bang for the buck. Intelligence isn't a very interesting statistic in PF2 due to crafting being bad and Recall Knowledge skills focused on Arcana and Occultism as well as requiring an action just to know something useful.
Everyone in my group has been playing this game game for four decades. They have to pretend their characters don't know something because they all know it. They know there are only a handful of creatures where recall knowledge is very useful where as charisma skills are very helpful and Wisdom is a great main caster stat.
Old grizzled gamers want impact in their classes. Roleplaying the need for a Recall Knowledge check is something the DM has to let them know they have to do because they all know every monster like they were remembering breathing.
Imperial sorcerer is a good choice for Arcane. I like that bloodline. The focus spells are useful. The bonus spells mostly good. I find it makes for a better wizard simulation than the wizard.
I do think you over value in combat healing, and I'm wondering why that is. I think that right there is a massive component as you bring it up every time. Other than healing, I'm wondering what you find missing in arcane? Nearly every good battlefield control spell on the occult list is on the arcane list as well. I also like that grease is a spell that gives a circumstance penalty making it stack with a lot more stuff like the frightened conditions which is a status penalty. Grease is also on the primal list, but you don't get grease and fear on the same list unless you're arcane. Which is what I think is the strength of arcane. As of now you get a little bit of everything, except healing, which is something I don't find as important as you do
I do think you over value in combat healing, and I'm wondering why that is. I think that right there is a massive component as you bring it up every time. Other than healing, I'm wondering what you find missing in arcane? Nearly every good battlefield control spell on the occult list is on the arcane list as well. I also like that grease is a spell that gives a circumstance penalty making it stack with a lot more stuff like the frightened conditions which is a status penalty. Grease is also on the primal list, but you don't get grease and fear on the same list unless you're arcane. Which is what I think is the strength of arcane. As of now you get a little bit of everything, except healing, which is something I don't find as important as you do
I listed what I find missing:
Combat healingBest buff heroism
Best debuff synesthesia
Shares every other quality spell with occult like phantasmal killer, magic missile, true strike, true target, wall of force, slow. Still can do Aoe Damage. Condition removal which as I stated we don't like walking around with the drained condition much.
And the big one not discussed, better class chassis associated with the other lists. Classes with better focus abilities, better feats, and all around a better play experience.
Wizard class chassis used to be very, very good within the PF1 framework. Wizard is the main arcane caster and they have a poor class chassis. Arcane Sorc not bad. Witch as an overall class is no fun to the player that liked witches.
We value combat healing correctly for our style of play. Game isn't fun unless someone's coming close to dying. You don't get them back up unless you have combat healing. You aren't surviving our adventures unless you use combat healing. That is just how we play.
I can sort of explain it:
If we get attacked by a group of 8 creatures, four or more of them will focus fire one target with all attacks or abilities. They will hit that target on the ground to finish them.
Boss isn't wasting time spreading their attacks, they are hammering one person until they're dead, even hitting them when they're unconscious to kill them.
Enemies are run intelligently preparing for an attack. If big boss boy knows the PCs are coming for him, he doesn't leave his minions and lieutenants sitting in their rooms waiting to die room by room. He sets them all up for a merciless ambush even if that means pulling every room associated with that boss together.
I don't know how many people play this way. My players are experienced enough to handle this type of encounter construction. Our DMs experienced enough to not make it a TPK.
But as one of the DMs, I guarantee a group will need combat healing, probably multiple times, in the encounters I'm going to run you through. If it is a major encounter in the adventure or AP, I'm going to hurt you and make you feel like you could die, people will drop, pain will be felt, you will be pushed to the very brink of death.
If you're not playing that way, then maybe you won't value combat healing as much and you'll find the Arcane list more valuable.
I speak on combat healing because over the years, we like a style of play that really pushes us to the brink of death or we don't feel like the game was much of a challenge. We built optimized combat healers in PF1 and 3E. Always had a cleric in previous editions.
Pf2 is probably the game requiring the least combat healing optimization. All you need is heal or soothe and the ability to cast it as a signature type spell and you can do the job with Medicine for downtime.
The way I see it heal, heroism and condition removal are in the same list usually. So that character can take up that role, leaving room for an arcane caster. I can see why you'd like occult+primal because it covers basically all bases like divine+arcane would. You just have double the healing sources. I think there is a degree to which your enemies metagame, but it seems to provide verisimilitude for your group so it must seem like a realistic tactic. My position is that healing is an emergency tool and the best healing is avoiding damage. Which is frankly harder in this edition I'll admit, but I prefer ways to minimize that as much as possible. Proper spacing, wasting enemy actions etc
It seems clear why you feel the way you do. Who cares that wizards functionally get more spells slots than anyone else when at every second you have to emergency heal. It sounds like your groups are forced into a reactive play style
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The way I see it heal, heroism and condition removal are in the same list usually. So that character can take up that role, leaving room for an arcane caster. I can see why you'd like occult+primal because it covers basically all bases like divine+arcane would. You just have double the healing sources. I think there is a degree to which your enemies metagame, but it seems to provide verisimilitude for your group so it must seem like a realistic tactic. My position is that healing is an emergency tool and the best healing is avoiding damage. Which is frankly harder in this edition I'll admit, but I prefer ways to minimize that as much as possible. Proper spacing, wasting enemy actions etc
It seems clear why you feel the way you do. Who cares that wizards functionally get more spells slots than anyone else when at every second you have to emergency heal. It sounds like your groups are forced into a reactive play style
Spell slots are only as meaningful as the spells in them and the number of times you can use them.
A good focus spell is like having a max level spell slots multiple times per day. When I build my tempest surge druid as an example, I use that spell 3 to 5 times or more a day as I level up and get focus points. So I have 3 max level slots, then this really good single target max level damage spell that also debuffs I can use 1 to 3 times per encounter.
When I make an elemental wizard, I have a fireball equivalent I can use multiple times per encounter as well. Or a single target 1 action attack damage dealer I can use with a save spell.
Good focus spells are every bit as valuable as slots to me. I find them just as useful and I don't feel bad at all when they fail because I know I get them back with 10 minutes rest.
So whenever I hear about the wizard having the most spell slots, I just shrug. Sure, they have the most spell slots. A good focus spell is every bit as good as a spell slot in my experience. And I can do it all day with a 10 minute rest per use.
PF2 magic is not PF1 magic where having all those spell slots a wizard had really meant something. Enervate is just an ok spell now.
In PF1 Enervate as a level 4 spell that inflicted 1d4 negative levels against touch AC with no save. You ever hit something with a quickened enervate then some spell like baleful polymorph or phantasmal killer heightened with a maxed out spell DC as a wizard? Encounter over, boss monster all done. That was the PF1 wizard.
PF2 wizard can spend time changing out spells all day and won't be able to do that. At best they might activate some extra damage on a weakness or target a weak save. That isn't enough of a reason to make one or consider them all that interesting because of more spell slots.
I'd rather have fun focus spells I can use all day never feeling a bit of badness if they fail to work because I can recover them with 10 minutes or rest and interesting class features like turning into all types of battle forms also for 10 minutes of rest.
The only spell combination I've read on these forums that makes wizards remotely interesting to me is mega-disintegrate. That's probably the closest someone has come to the PF1 power of wizards. At level 20 you can do some crazy Mega-disintegrate with some other quickened spell on some boss and then see what happens. Should be real nice even if they roll middle of the road saves.
Barring mega-disintegrate, I can't think of anything I look forward to as a wizard like I did in PF1. No Spell Perfection. No tons of effective metamagic feats. No craft wondrous item equivalent to make it cheap to make lots of powerful magic items. No spell focus or greater spell focus. No level 20 school abilities that are awesome. Nothing to look forward to at all. Just standard casting limited to the Arcane list with so so to bad focus spells.
The wizard is just some class in PF2. A pale shadow of what it was in PF1. No one fears them. They're a utility caster with some blasting ability there to make the martials look better while not doing a great deal interesting themselves.
They are the primary class associated with the arcane list, which has been greatly neutered.
I forgot to add they lost the ability to summon outsiders with cool spell-like abilities. Divine list does that now with Summon Fey on Occult and Primal list as poor man's second choice.
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I like magic mailbox as an RP spell. I used this spell in Kingmaker to set up communication networks, but it wasn't particularly helpful for combat. It was more of a cool roleplay effect that made the players feel their kingdom was a little cooler for having this communication method. That has value as well, but I don't think such things should be part of any class budget for combat as some imply.
How could you set up any kind of network when it takes 1 hour to cast, and the duration only lasts a day?
Are you going to cast it on two chests and have a porter carry one of them to yonder town three days away? Even if you could get it there in time, it defeats the purpose as you literally just delivered the package, making the spell almost entirely moot.
Spell slots are only as meaningful as the spells in them and the number of times you can use them.
A good focus spell is like having a max level spell slots multiple times per day. When I build my tempest surge druid as an example, I use that spell 3 to 5 times or more a day as I level up and get focus points. So I have 3 max level slots, then this really good single target max level damage spell that also debuffs I can use 1 to 3 times per encounter.
When I make an elemental wizard, I have a fireball equivalent I can use multiple times per encounter as well. Or a single target 1 action attack damage dealer I can use with a save spell.
Good focus spells are every bit as valuable as slots to me. I find them just as useful and I don't feel bad at all when they fail because I know I get them back with 10 minutes rest.
I don't value focus spells nearly as much as slotted spells. They are designed to be weaker than slotted spells and if I was to choose class features for a class like the wizard I would want to put their weight and power budget into slotted spells, not focus spells. Which is what I believe the designers did. I don't think this is the right call for every class. I do think perhaps maybe it makes more sense that the sorcerer has good focus spells but less interaction with slots, same for witch as that class also feels as though thematically and mechanically it should care about focus spells
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When i read all this....i feel a remaster is not enough.As of right now, I don't know. I would prefer PF3E stay at least five years out, maybe more. I think a real talk on what the wizard *is* needs to happen at Paizo, and I'm sure it has, but I want to suggest something more radical and say perhaps the wizards should not be thought of as *the arcane caster*. It's kind of difficult to parse where the baggage from d&d is warranted or unwarranted to use here
So wizards used to be the only real practitioner of magic in the first and second edition of d&d. There were other classes with magic, but the game was set up with a role for "fighting man" "cleric" and "magic user". The role of the magic user was a lot of what rogues do now plus other cool stuff. It's why there are spells like knock, spells to find hidden doors, and invisibility on the wizard lists all the way through the tradition of these d20 games. So we are dealing with a several decade old concept of wizards being the end all be all of spellcasters, and also the baggage of the thief, now rogue, having a hard time fulfilling a role that is/was better suited to the wizard. Paizo wants to narrow down and rein in what the wizard is and what the role it has is from being the singular magic guy, to being one of many magic guys. You get people complaining about the wizard usually because it's no longer the magic guy, except the arcane spell list and what not still kind of try to pretend the wizard is still the magic guy
This has lead to weirdness where if wizards are never supposed to do necromancy, especially raising the dead... Idk, I feel like perhaps it's not a wizard? The name is a horrible thing to get hung up on, but I never imagine a lich is a cleric, sorcerer, bard, or a druid. They're wizards. I never imagine the guy raising a skeleton army is a sorcerer or a druid, I assume they're probably a wizard, or "oh yeah I guess clerics should be really good at that too"
The essences probably need a revision, the division between occult and arcane is thematically and mechanically weak, which makes sense occult and arcane is just the old arcane magic split into two
Or perhaps wizards should be less "I'm the arcane guy" and more the "I use arcane as a lens through which I explore magic" guy and should get feats and abilities similar mechanically to crossblooded evolution and the halcyon speaker (which is now largely defunked given the way spell proficiencies work now). If you can use arcane magic to transgress boundaries and create undead, I think maybe this shouldn't be an arcane list thing but a wizard thing? I have a feeling that if they doubled down and were true to the letter of the essences wizard would stop being my favorite class. I'm not sure what would be my favorite, probably something that uses occult but not charisma based (bards are aesthetically awful) and ideally prepared...
I have more thoughts, but I'll not write a whole paragraph
I will tackle several points here.
1. Gandalf is the root for the DnD Wizard you described above. The guy finds hidden doors, open doors that were locked and flings fire at enemies.
2. Why is there this strange thing on Wizard doing Necromancy ?
Except for the very specific Lich case, which requires a very specific ritual and that no Wizard creates just by using a spell slot, I do not remember undead coming from Wizardry.
Do Wizards create Vampires ? Or mummies ? Or ghouls ?
IIRC those come mostly from things tied to the divine (divine curses, improper burials ...).
For Wizard, AFAIK there is only the Lich. An undead they become BTW. Not one they create.
3. Yes, PF2 Arcane and Occult both come from PF1 Arcane.
Just like PF2 Divine and Primal both come from PF1 Divine.
It's the same, yet people find the former awkward and the latter obvious.
4. The Essences.
I have not read Secrets of Magic, so I do not know what take is there on the Essences.
I remember what was in the PF2 playtest and later :
- 2 Essences to classify what you are affecting with your magic : Material for what belongs to the tangible (basically the Material plane and the Inner planes) and Spiritual for what belongs to the intangible (including the Outer planes).
- 2 Essences to categorize how you access your magic : Mental for the reasoned, studied path and Vital for the faith / belief / guts-feeling way.
It seems this classification was somewhat different in SoM for what the Essences meant. Way I see it, as an effort to justify why this or that spell belong to Tradition A and B but not C.
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Why is there this strange thing on Wizard doing Necromancy ?
Except for the very specific Lich case, which requires a very specific ritual and that no Wizard creates just by using a spell slot, I do not remember undead coming from Wizardry.
Do Wizards create Vampires ? Or mummies ? Or ghouls ?
IIRC those come mostly from things tied to the divine (divine curses, improper burials ...).
For Wizard, AFAIK there is only the Lich. An undead they become BTW. Not one they create.
Probably because wizards do necromancy a lot of the time in fiction. If you've ever read Clark Ashton Smith, his wizzies are loaded up to the gills with mummy servants and shambling hordes of the dead ("The Double Shadow" and unsurprisingly "Empire of the Necromancers" are two examples). "The Charnel God" has a necromancer trying to bring back a young woman he wants to date.
Same for Lovecraft - "The thing on the doorstep" and "The mysterious case of Charles Dexter Ward" contain scholars delving into necromancy.
If you read Robert Howard's Conan stories you can find other examples. "The people of the black circle" has a necromancer cabal, and "hour of the dragon" has people resurrecting an ancient sorcerer king.
I could cite other things like Malazan Book of the Fallen but that's literally based on the GURPS rules, which came after D&D
You obviously know far more than I do. I thought Conan's necromancer foes were servants of dark deities, but I concede.
Maybe we could have a Wizard using a more focused Arcane list as a matter of fact, with specialized Wizard schools giving access to spells from other lists that match their specialty.
I think it would fit the image of the Wizard who pores over dusty tomes and devises theories of magic to access powers that should be beyond them.
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I am not sure I am against necromancy being entirely stripped from the arcane list, just that a necromancer in the sense of raising zombies and skeletons, as well as someone who make flesh golems, in my mind would be some kind of wizard. Perhaps the "but we can do these non-arcane things through an arcane lens" should be the wizard's domain, and not an arcane thing. We can really cut the arcane list back to what it should describe and then allow a class like the wizard to add wizard-y spells from other lists depending on some kind of specialization. Then other arcane casters have a real limit that allows them to get more class features. I think this satisfies two wants. The wizard is the studier of magic guy who has a basis in arcane, the wizard is still a spell slots focused caster and their specialization is in creating a big semi custom spell list, and we can have other arcane casters who aren't forced to give up cool class abilities and focus spells because the arcane list is so big and covers so much ground. Perhaps bringing arcane in line with the description would let a class like the magus get more power in other areas. Just a thought
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I am not sure I am against necromancy being entirely stripped from the arcane list, just that a necromancer in the sense of raising zombies and skeletons, as well as someone who make flesh golems, in my mind would be some kind of wizard. Perhaps the "but we can do these non-arcane things through an arcane lens" should be the wizard's domain, and not an arcane thing. We can really cut the arcane list back to what it should describe and then allow a class like the wizard to add wizard-y spells from other lists depending on some kind of specialization. Then other arcane casters have a real limit that allows them to get more class features. I think this satisfies two wants. The wizard is the studier of magic guy who has a basis in arcane, the wizard is still a spell slots focused caster and their specialization is in creating a big semi custom spell list, and we can have other arcane casters who aren't forced to give up cool class abilities and focus spells because the arcane list is so big and covers so much ground. Perhaps bringing arcane in line with the description would let a class like the magus get more power in other areas. Just a thought
This just makes you wonder why they even split the list at all. Divine and Primal were already well defined as separate things in PF1 as by default Druids and Clerics didn't have many overlapping spells. Arcane had no such split. This desire to have Occult and Arcane as two distinct things has led to a messy situation where neither list is well defined and the 'rules' for what even defines each as separate from the other seem to be broken as often as they're followed.
I am not sure I am against necromancy being entirely stripped from the arcane list, just that a necromancer in the sense of raising zombies and skeletons, as well as someone who make flesh golems, in my mind would be some kind of wizard. Perhaps the "but we can do these non-arcane things through an arcane lens" should be the wizard's domain, and not an arcane thing. We can really cut the arcane list back to what it should describe and then allow a class like the wizard to add wizard-y spells from other lists depending on some kind of specialization. Then other arcane casters have a real limit that allows them to get more class features. I think this satisfies two wants. The wizard is the studier of magic guy who has a basis in arcane, the wizard is still a spell slots focused caster and their specialization is in creating a big semi custom spell list, and we can have other arcane casters who aren't forced to give up cool class abilities and focus spells because the arcane list is so big and covers so much ground. Perhaps bringing arcane in line with the description would let a class like the magus get more power in other areas. Just a thoughtThe issue with magus is not the spell list. Its the fact that martial and caster power distribution is so lopsided; Along with focusing on Wavecasting + Spellstrike for nova instead of low level spells + action economy for versatile magical martial.
Also just to make sure. If you trim down arcane then what does it have left? Elemental blasts and area control is already done better by primal. Healing is already done better by Divine. Buffs and Debuffs is already done better by Occult. So arcane gets what that makes it stand out? Or is your plan to buff all the arcane spell and give them more really good arcane only spells and focus spells?
I want to be clear, the magus doesn't have any "issues" as far as I am concerned. I'm playing one now and it works perfectly well. Spellstrike is a perfect gish ability and I've felt it was since PF1. It's probably around number 3 or 4 of my favorite classes after wizard and champion. I just think maybe it could get 10 HP, and maybe feats for heavy armor and a few more low level slots for minor stuff. Which is merely quality of life stuff
Arcane being trimmed also means occult gets trimmed for one. That list over steps it's bounds a lot. Primal and divine probably have some fat too. It is just I focus on arcane because this is the topic of the thread. Arcane without stuff that falls into life and spirit still does a hell of a lot of stuff. Every transmutation, conjuration, evocation(minus force spells), illusion, abjuration and most enchantment effects are still arcane. You still have access to nearly every damage type and spells that target every save and you still get a lot of them. You also have access to most utility spells, and if someone ever clarifies from the design team it's possible my understanding of force being a spirit thing is very wrong and they still get to keep those. A massive number of spells would still qualify as arcane
This just makes you wonder why they even split the list at all. Divine and Primal were already well defined as separate things in PF1 as by default Druids and Clerics didn't have many overlapping spells. Arcane had no such split. This desire to have Occult and Arcane as two distinct things has led to a messy situation where neither list is well defined and the 'rules' for what even defines each as separate from the other seem to be broken as often as they're followed.
Occult and arcane being combined however would still make necromancy off limits. Necromancy would be a primal and divine thing. I will say druids being divine made a lot of sense still, but we have weirdness like this in arcane too. The Witch was an arcane caster with healing, condition removal etc in its spell list
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Maybe traditions should be erased completly and Classes get access to spells of certain traits. Which basicly would be a indirect "class spelllist" when i think about it.
But thats just a thought i had right now.
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Maybe traditions should be erased completly and Classes get access to spells of certain traits. Which basicly would be a indirect "class spelllist" when i think about it.
But thats just a thought i had right now.
They would have to make more traits, and it puts a lot of work on players to comb through spells looking for traits. The four lists is a fairly elegant solution. I think if a class needs more than one list provides we give them a way to access those spells instead. Then we can more easily make the lists as narrow as they should be. Then the four traditions are a baseline and some classes where it is appropriate can expand from there
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I kind of wanna add with my idea here is something not wizard related, but still arcane related for this thread, which is a Cleric of Nethys should probably get arcane spells and perhaps even more. Something about clerics I always found disappointing is that the divine list, and in 1e the cleric list, is such a narrow range of spells that doesn't particularly fit most dieties or rather doesn't give enough. I think it would be cool if a cleric of Nethys could do something like the imperial sorcerer where you get a little spell book and in that can be spells from the arcane or perhaps any tradition. Whatever the limit should be. I think it would be pretty neat
[I]t puts a lot of work on players to comb through spells looking for traits.
That would be an issue for dead tree users but not for PDF and AoN users. I think we need to move away from designs tied to the limitations of books and start embracing what newer methods allow us to do.