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So, I was in a conversation the other day where one of our fellow posters expressed a wistful desire for true specialist mages - mages who would use cantrips and slots and focus spells just like other casters, but who would have sharply restricted pools to draw those from, but would then have class features to make the spells they did have access to really shine.
On further thought, it occurred to me that there were some really serious similarities between these types of caster, to the point that with a bit of effort, you might be able to fit them all as paths on the same (perhaps mildly bloated) class. It might be a bit tricky to justify any one of them as a standalone class, in terms of the overall interest level and the effort involved, but all of them? If you could capture some efficiencies of scale, that seems like it could be quite doable.
So the basic idea is that you have someone who's really good at spellcasting, but starkly limited int eh spells they can cast. What do they get?
Overall
- Standard caster proficiencies
- a 4-slot-per-day progression, because why not?
- a pretty standard number of cantrips
- one starter focus point
Each path gets
- A really strong theme.
- A starter focus spell to go with their starter focus point, that sits right in the middle of their theme
- A deeply constrained set of slot spells in their school. Like... maybe four per level. Maybe five. Maybe three. On the bright side, all of your spells are signature spells.
- a seriosuly constrained set of cantrips. Like, you might get more options than you get cantrips in your career to pick them with. Might.
- some sort of serious boost to your ability to Do Things in your area of specialty.
...and then you find ways to give them feats that let them dial in on their specialty *further*, and/or let them reach outside of it in limited ways. Like... why *not* have a feat that can improve your abilities with a specific spell? Possibly at a cost to the size of your already-limited repetoire?
This gives you your slot-spell blasters. It gives you your true summoning specialists. It could easily be a place for your battle form specialists. It could be a way to run a version of the classic minion necro (in a limited way). There are people who want specialist mages. I'm not one of them, but I do know that they're out there.
/*******/
The trick, of course, is in the details. How do you make this all work? Well... how about a stance? Let each path get a stance as their built-in focus spell. Each stance gives one or more significant, themed bonuses to the spells that are in the school (though the bonuses in question might or might not apply to every available spell). It also drops instantly if you cast or sustain any spell not in the school.
Path of Gates: Summons, teleportation, and Interesting Dimensional Stuff. The stance gives you a small boost to teleportation distances, and a direct buff to the combat stats of your summons.
Path of Shaping: it's all about self-transformation. The stance gives you status bonuses to attack rolls and damage for attacks generated by school effects, and probably has further buffs for your battle forms. In general, if you're in a fight, and you're not in a battle form, then you're just not taking the fight all that seriously. Utility spells... well, there are totally self-transformation utility spells out there, right?
Path of Targeted Elimination: Divination and spell attacks vs AC. Look. There really *are* people out there who want to play glass cannon nova and rack up more damage on the boss monster than anyone else, and this one is for them. The divination spells are all spells tat could be useful in tracking down your targets or getting an advantage over them in a fight. The stance offers a meaningful bonus to attack and possibly also damage, when using spells to target AC. The spell list should probably have magic missile and maybe a few single-target spells that hit reflex, but the stance won't help them much.
Path of Widespread Devastation: This is where your area-effect blasters live. Lots of attacks vs reflex, probably a decent smattering vs fortitude... and maybe not any will or AC. Classic "Catch the enemy in fireball formation and make their HP go down." Probably has some stuff like prone and forced move and whatnot in there as secondary effects, but that's all secondary. Probably has some moderately useful elemental effects spiced in there for utility. Stance bonuses are things like bonus to magic DC, bonus to damage, and the ability to exclude individual squares from your area effect so that you can do the low-budget version of party-friendly.
/************/
In general, these are going to be a much simpler sort of caster to build and play, but for the people who really want That Thing There, it's designed to give it to them. For the people who want to dial in further, and make "Cast disintegrate" be their go-to answer for every fight because they just love disintegrating people that much, they have feats that will let them dial in further. Of course, you can also reach out into the wider world of spellcasting for some flexibility - archetypes are a thing, and you do have a standard full-caster level of magic proficiency - but it doesn't play well with the stance that really gives you all of your awesomeness. So there's a degree of tension between how much you reach out and how much you dial in.
/***********/
Anyway, that's my thought on a rough chassis that might get the job done. It's lightweight enough to let Paizo hit a bunch of different options that people have wanted in the space of a single (maybe slightly bloated) class, it constrains options enough to let them free up some of the build budget for the raw power that people have been craving, and it's nice and clearly labeled, so that the people who walk in the door looking for this thing can probably find it. In particular, it makes a good first caster for players who know they want to play a full caster but who maybe aren't ready to engage with the whole system in the way that a full caster really wants to. "Welcome to first level. Your spell list is four entries long."
Still, as I've noted before, I am not the target audience here. I just like writing long and hopefully-helpful posts. For those who are the target audience... thoughts? Ideas? Do you have a way to do it better? Did I miss a Path that really should be on this list? (I admit, I thought about Minion Necro, but it felt a bit too similar to summoner.) Anyway, if you like this concept, this is the place to start trying to make it happen.
I really like the idea as presented here.
My idea for how to do it was:
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Level 1 Spellcaster Feat - Basic Pyromancy
Add an additional pair of focus points to the focus pool of your choice.
You may cast spells of any rank you may currently cast using that focus pool:
Burning Hands
Scorching Blast
Ash Cloud
Cauterize Wounds
Continual Flames
Fire Proof
Flaming Sphere
Heat Metal
Ignite Fireworks
Fireball
Firework Blast
Then higher-level versions of these feats would grant 4-6th rank spells, and 7-9th rank spells, with each specialization having a unique 10th level capstone.
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I would also probably add a cantrip or two to these in a fully realized design. If you went this route, you'd probably want to know you were doing it from the start to ensure that each theme gets a reasonable number of spells at each rank and that there isn't any massive power imbalance between themes.
Doing it this way you would get your spells feat by feat and the design team could, knowing this, offer feats to support multiple themes.
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I like this proposed framework, and do agree that any reduction to a caster's breadth would allow them to access focused power and better recovery that is not otherwise afforded to them. I would be careful with the themes, so that they have a flavor and not just a mechanical purpose (i.e. not just "Blaster: the Subclass"), but otherwise something like a stance or some other persistent benefit that grants otherwise inaccessible boons could definitely work if the benefits match the tradeoffs.
In terms of flavor, I do think it is absolutely possible to tie specialist casters together. I've worked on a homebrew specialist caster called the Paragon that attempts something similar by having extreme restrictions on spell lists in exchange for attrition-free casting: in that case, the theme was effectively themes, with the player getting to pick a Fire Paragon or a Shadow Paragon or the like. It's got a lot of room for improvement, but its broad model could also offer a different take on the above.
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So I'm just going to pose a few questions:
1A: Does this require we create and maintain new individual spell lists atop the four traditions and the six elemental ones?
1B: Does this class justify the work of this maintainence?
1C: What is the justification for this class using spell slots?
2A: Are we going to require the single target damage caster to be in melee range like the kineticist to get the most out of their damage, as the paradigm for damage at range is always less than melee?
2B: Does this class require armor and more hit points to be functional at this role as it will need to be in melee to do the best damage it can?
3: Why buff spells and not create at-will abilities? Casting a few slotted spells per combat seems to be against a few of the themes here
4A: What themes justify curated spell lists?
4B: Are these too narrow, too broad or just right?
4C: How much needs to be sacrificed to be this good at any of these specific themes?
5. Currently slotted spells are the most potent of any kind of singular action in game as they are 1/day style effects, so do we actually need to buff these for these concepts? Aren't we entering power creep by buffing them?
1A: Does this require we create and maintain new individual spell lists atop the four traditions and the six elemental ones?
I don't see this as any different than what is already done with class and archetype feats. What makes it so much harder in your opinion?
2A: Are we going to require the single target damage caster to be in melee range like the kineticist to get the most out of their damage, as the paradigm for damage at range is always less than melee?
I feel like this could be managed with tradeoffs like a feat that gives +2 damage per die but the caster takes 1 damage per die back.
3: Why buff spells and not create at-will abilities? Casting a few slotted spells per combat seems to be against a few of the themes here
To fill a niche in a way that people who don't like current casters and don't like the Kineticist are happy with.
5. Currently slotted spells are the most potent of any kind of singular action in game as they are 1/day style effects, so do we actually need to buff these for these concepts? Aren't we entering power creep by buffing them?
I think if you work carefully you can give thematic bonuses that have large enough drawbacks that they don't break the game.
For blasters, at least, you can use hueristics to restrict a spell list. Fir a warcaster archetyoe, it could be something like only cantrips that do a minimum of 2d4 damage baseline or 1d6 per spell rank for slotted spells, or thereabouts, with thw intent to permit some level of additional rider effects to still have sufficient spell variety, and them adjust from thete for wonkier spells that are obviously primarily damage but fail that heuristic.
You could then provide a list of spells that you have preconfirmed are OK using that heuristic (so players have an easiwr time browsing) and then say to use the hueristic for any new content.
Harder to do for fuzzier themes, which is probably why the new wizard schools are so wishy-washy with GM fiat.
I don't see this as any different than what is already done with class and archetype feats. What makes it so much harder in your opinion?
At minimum fewer feats than spells
You lose me at Spell Slots.
I want my specialist Mages to work like the Kineticist does.
I don't see this as any different than what is already done with class and archetype feats. What makes it so much harder in your opinion?At minimum fewer feats than spells
Those spells are already taking up room and development time. It doesn't take that much extra time to tag each spell with the classes that can use it.
Those spells are already taking up room and development time. It doesn't take that much extra time to tag each spell with the classes that can use it.I don't see this as any different than what is already done with class and archetype feats. What makes it so much harder in your opinion?At minimum fewer feats than spells
It does take more time though. It is asking that a whole list for each of these not only be made, but maintained. Creating a spell goes through the process of not only development of the spell, but then consideration for each list and how it fits. We've gone from the very simple four lists, to four plus the six elemental meaning ten, and this class would add at minimum another four going to 14 lists. It'll add more dev time to each spell and more places where the possibility of error comes up. It's better to not have to errata things. Regardless of the amount of time, it is more time and I think that requires a good justification. Why should a singular class be catered to as such? It's not that it couldn't or shouldn't be, it's that it needs a good reason
As someone who has in the past often wished they could make a mage with a tight theme, like a 'fire mage' etc, I love the idea of such a spellcaster, whose range is limited but whose capability in that field is greater because of it. I wager I've made a wizard or two where I was lowkey hoping to be completely limited to my one school of magic.
On the other hand, it's hard to see how it would work without making a new kineticist (may not be called a mage, but there is almost nothing I want out of a 'storm mage' that I can't just do with kineticist right out of the box) or without repeating the mistake of bespoke spell lists. Never again should I have to see a class's entire spell list written as a block of text at the end of their description.
Sanityfaerie may be on the right track with the extremely limited lists, though that creates its own problems and only narrowly avoids the issue of the bespoke class list.
As a random thought, a themed class that limits itself only to spells of a particular tag, probably also limited by tradition. For example, an Illusionist that can do mindblowing things just using the handful of spells that have the 'illusion' tag, or a new Mesmer/Mentalist who uses exclusively mental spells from the Occult school.
These options obviously run into the issue of specific immunities, but if a fire kineticist can punch the fire out of elementals and create freezing attacks by manipulating heat, surely the Mentalist could find a way to rewrite a mindless creature's AI to achieve their ends.
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Elemental Sorcerer already adds the spell level for both Focus and Bloodline spells using slots. For the last ones if you mix with Dangerous Sorcery you add twice the spell level to damage.
Maybe some tuning to add cold and allowing to modify a bit the Bloodline spells (i.e. I miss Cone of Cold).
And also there are feats to bypass resistances.
Then, that doesn't cut the access to other resources but is specialized in one element that probably you will prefer to use.
Currently for me the system allows to get specialization while preserving the balance, which can be lost easily with deep modifications for excessive specialization.
These options obviously run into the issue of specific immunities, but if a fire kineticist can punch the fire out of elementals and create freezing attacks by manipulating heat, surely the Mentalist could find a way to rewrite a mindless creature's AI to achieve their ends.
I do recall ways for the old mesmerist to be able to affect normaly-immune-to-mental creatures with mental effects, so it wouldn't be entirely unprecedented.
You could probably slap that on a Psychic subconcious mind, too. "You can only ever learn spells with the mental or mindshift traits" and then your psyche action allows you to target normally immune creatures with such spells.
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I feel that we are describing the Sorcerer, except that they get to access other spells on their lists through scrolls and wands ...
Maybe a Sorcerer Class archetype where they lose the ability to use scrolls, wands, spellhearts ... in exchange for a bonus to spell attacks or similar.
So I'm just going to pose a few questions:
1A: Does this require we create and maintain new individual spell lists atop the four traditions and the six elemental ones?
Create? Technically. Maintain? No. They get a strongly constrained spell list from the start (like I said, I'm thinking about 4 spells per rank is probably about right, but that's just gut estimate) and then it never changes. The spell lists aren't goign to add any new spells because the limitations on spell choice are a meaningful part of the limitations on the class itself.
1B: Does this class justify the work of this maintainence?
N/A, see above.
1C: What is the justification for this class using spell slots?
Because people want to play this as a legit full caster, so that's what we're giving them. Also, it plugs into the existing structures in a simple and straightforward way.
2A: Are we going to require the single target damage caster to be in melee range like the kineticist to get the most out of their damage, as the paradigm for damage at range is always less than melee?
2B: Does this class require armor and more hit points to be functional at this role as it will need to be in melee to do the best damage it can?
This class is going to be using the same spells as everyone else. I expect that mid-to-high-level followers of the single-target path will be using a fair amount of Disintegrate and Polar Ray. The transformation specialist is likely to see a fair amount of melee, but they'll be doing it in a stance-buffed battle form.
3: Why buff spells and not create at-will abilities? Casting a few slotted spells per combat seems to be against a few of the themes here
I'm not even sure what you're asking here. The entire point of this exercise is to give people a full caster that can really focus in on a small subset of the available spells trade in the broad utility and flexibility that most casters get, and thus get back a bunch of the simple, straightforward raw power that most casters give up in return for that flexibility.
4A: What themes justify curated spell lists?
Whichever ones have enough people who want to play them. I've made guesses, but I don't pretend to have final answers.
4B: Are these too narrow, too broad or just right?
I'm trying to lay out plausible frameworks for the highly skilled professionals at Paizo to tune. I do not pretend to have the subject matter expertise to say, exactly. Also, it depends. This is a class that is explicitly trading flexibility for power. Less flexibility means more power, and vice versa.
4C: How much needs to be sacrificed to be this good at any of these specific themes?
You're asking for precision here. We're not even close to the point where precision is called for, and if we were, I wouldn't be the one to give it to you.
5. Currently slotted spells are the most potent of any kind of singular action in game as they are 1/day style effects, so do we actually need to buff these for these concepts? Aren't we entering power creep by buffing them?
It seems like you have not been following the discussions on this topic. The short answer is that we have been repeatedly informed by paizo that slotted casters face certain power limitations specifically because they have strong flexibility advantages that they are expected to use, and if they had power buffs and flexibility, they'd be too strong under conditions of competent play. These concepts are basically all about handing back huge amount of that flexibility and asking what they can get in return.
Apologies for the double post.
You lose me at Spell Slots.
I want my specialist Mages to work like the Kineticist does.
Then this class is not for you. That's okay. You have Kineticist. Isn't it nice?
Also, I absolutely love Kineticist for myself, but that kind of thing is way more effort per specialization than this is. These paths are designed to be easy enough to knock out that you can fit, like, four of them into significantly less space than Kineticist took for one.
Never again should I have to see a class's entire spell list written as a block of text at the end of their description.
Sanityfaerie may be on the right track with the extremely limited lists, though that creates its own problems and only narrowly avoids the issue of the bespoke class list.
Okay. So... given that "here's your entire (very short) spell list" pretty much *is* the plan that I'm laying out here, what's the problem with it?
I feel that we are describing the Sorcerer, except that they get to access other spells on their lists through scrolls and wands ...
Maybe a Sorcerer Class archetype where they lose the ability to use scrolls, wands, spellhearts ... in exchange for a bonus to spell attacks or similar.
No, we're really not.
A Sorceror has access to an entire casting tradition. That gives a huge amount of flexibility. They can reliably expect to have access to both single-target and area-effect spells. They can reliably expect to have access to spells that target each of the four defenses. They can reliably expect to have attack spells, buffs, and utility powers... and they pay for it in limitations to the spells they get. Battle Forms fall well short of martials. Blaster DPR is way below martial DPR. Summons are frustratingly weak and fragile against any sort of real threat... all because all of them are designed to be separate tools in the toobox, with the expectation that the caster is going to pick and choose which tool is right for the moment.
Sorcerors have to select a limited number of spells to know for each rank, but those spells can be anything on the list. They can (And should) get spells that target each of the four defenses, and so forth.
This concept is explicitly not that thing. It is deliberately constrained to have a very limited toolbox to work from, composed of spells that are all within a strongly restricted theme. There's less to decide both in combat and in character building. Most specialist casters of a given type can be expected to play very similarly to every other specialist caster of that type... but some people like and want that.
Now... are there enough people who like and want that? Are there enough people who want to play a highly specialized slot caster? I can't really say. I've heard plenty of complaints, though, about how the Summoner isn't amazing at summon spells, and people want a caster who's actually good at summon spells. This is how you get that. I've heard complaints from people who really want to play a slot caster who's a highly competent blaster and don't want to have to juggle defense targeting and don't care about anything else. This is how you get that. I've seen at least a few in arguments about Shifters who want to play a class that's all about battle form spells, and this is a way to get that, too.
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Who wants True Specialist Mages?
TLDR: Not really it's of no interest. Just add some archetypes or feats that specialize your character.
I know they always talk about the way the Wizard or Arcane list are makes it hard to make Specialists like the Necromancer or Conjurer etc. How it needs a change to not make these concepts work or not feel bad for being limited when Arcane can do it just as well giving up less. I don't disagree but I also don't really care at all that is the case honestly.
I would rather they make some feats to make you a better Specialist that cross classes. You can be a Cleric or Wizard Necromancer whatever you like. We'll get an update to the Runelord eventually with its AD&D 2e like Specialist restrictions hopefully should be better than what we have.
The devs saying they can't make X specialist because of the Arcane list just feels like maybe they personally want to make a Specialist class. Seems more of a more dev frustration (mild annoyance?) than something I would care about. I get why they want to push for a change like this for the Arcane list because everyone wants development to be easier and more fun. Makes sense but I don't know how much it's even wanted from a consumer level. Surveys to poll the community about it at some point maybe?
I am not fussed about the fact that it can't be done or done well personally because that isn't the avenue I would want it done. I don't know the community at larges feelings on this line of thinking so maybe someone could inform me if there have been labyrinthian threads on this exact topic in the past and if this is just another rehash.
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Paizo has implemented the Summoner for summoning and the Kineticist for blasting (a bit more than that but a lot of elemental blasting still). I think it's the best path to follow: Take a theme (enchanter, transmuter, necromancer) and release a class that encompasses what it is to be such a character. With interesting mechanics, I'm sure the class will be a success. When I see how the Thaumaturge, despite a very specific theme, became a success through its mechanics, I'm pretty sure Paizo can do something as interesting with specialized casters.
I understand that the path you follow aim at covering much more themes, but the blandness of the mechanics is a shot in the foot in my opinion.
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So I'm just going to pose a few questions:
1A: Does this require we create and maintain new individual spell lists atop the four traditions and the six elemental ones?
Create? Technically. Maintain? No. They get a strongly constrained spell list from the start (like I said, I'm thinking about 4 spells per rank is probably about right, but that's just gut estimate) and then it never changes. The spell lists aren't goign to add any new spells because the limitations on spell choice are a meaningful part of the limitations on the class itself.
I REALLY think this part is what kills the concept.
Because I feel people who want to play full casters will not accept that they cannot have new spells that fit their theme. Especially if the new spells are a better fit than the ones they had on their list before.
So I'm just going to pose a few questions:
1A: Does this require we create and maintain new individual spell lists atop the four traditions and the six elemental ones?
Create? Technically. Maintain? No. They get a strongly constrained spell list from the start (like I said, I'm thinking about 4 spells per rank is probably about right, but that's just gut estimate) and then it never changes. The spell lists aren't goign to add any new spells because the limitations on spell choice are a meaningful part of the limitations on the class itself.
I REALLY think this part is what kills the concept.
Because I feel people who want to play full casters will not accept that they cannot have new spells that fit their theme. Especially if the new spells are a better fit than the ones they had on their list before.
Paizo is fine telling Wizard players to ask their GM to change spells in spell schools. I don't think that's ideal but it could be the solution here.
would rather see a class that reflects a magical theme and uses new mechanics to do so like the mentioned Necromancer, or a Conjurer type class that expands on using temporary summoned minions or pacts with demons or something, tons of possibilities and new classes are fun
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Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.
Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.
The Elementalist archetype just doesn't get the job done. It's too narrow for too little reward and doesn't feel well-designed.
Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.
Two reasons. First, this whole idea needs more boost than "access to a tailored set of feats" can reasonably give it... and it's giving up waaay more than the Elementalist gives up in order to get it.
Second, Class Archetypes tend to be lousy. I don't think we've yet seen one in PF2 that people really liked a lot. At best they're kind of meh. Until and unless Paizo manages to come up with at least one or two class archetypes that are worth legit getting excited about, I'm going to build my suggestions as class concepts. Classes are things that Paizo is actually really good at.
When it was asked if this was more or less making the sorcerer, I think they meant thematically. This feels like it would or could be a new evolution of the sorcerer. Highly limited spells, but potentially more added potency
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I had a similar thought that the Wizard and his direction probably could be split up into a few classes. Depending on the flavor of these classes one would still need to adjust the Setting considering Necromancers, Conjurer were wizards in Golarion, even if they took on the Profession Name of said specialists.
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Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.The Elementalist archetype just doesn't get the job done. It's too narrow for too little reward and doesn't feel well-designed.
It's very well designed and delivers on the flavor
Issue is it's not more powerful and that shows what people really want
To my mind a specialist mage is fine. But you do need to drastically reduce their versatility and that means limiting what spells they know, Wich then further limits the future proofing potential of the class.
So it would need to be the size of the kineticist practically or be just generally extremely limiting Wich will make some people upset regardless.
Damage specialist, issue, lots of spells do damage on top of incredible effect riders... So, remove the riders in exchange for a damage or DC or accuracy bump?
Maybe a meta magic?, "I just want to do damage" you expend a spell slot, you do bludgeoning damage as you distill the spells potential into raw damage. .
My issue is I struggle to imagine it see a satisfactory way to introduce such a specialization that
1- people generally like
2- isn't a massive power increase
And taking damage for power is never a good design
Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.The Elementalist archetype just doesn't get the job done. It's too narrow for too little reward and doesn't feel well-designed.It's very well designed and delivers on the flavor
Issue is it's not more powerful and that shows what people really want
It seems you're in the minority on this one. Most people seem to feel that restricting themselves and getting little but flavor back means the design has failed.
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It seems you're in the minority on this one. Most people seem to feel that restricting themselves and getting little but flavor back means the design has failed.Why not just implement it in the same way as the Elementalist archetype, where it narrows the pool of spells you can cast in exchange for giving you more feats directly tailored to your thematic caster idea? Making a class with its own spell list just seems like the same thing, but with more paperwork.The Elementalist archetype just doesn't get the job done. It's too narrow for too little reward and doesn't feel well-designed.It's very well designed and delivers on the flavor
Issue is it's not more powerful and that shows what people really want
I don't really subscribe to Reddit
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I had a long thing written but it got lost with how long it took me to write it. Long story short, it's the spell lists that kill this for me. There's no way to futureproof them so you are stuck in a snapshot of time with none of the new material to interact with.
Unless I am mistaken, the whole idea of this class is that you have an exceedingly small list of spells, SanityFaerie said 4, per rank and limited slots with which to cast them. So that would be 4 Cantrips taken from a snapshot of whatever is available at the time of writing or worse, developing 4 brand new Cantrips that only interact with a single subclass of a single class. Any new material printed for the rest of PF2's life would not change, improve, or interact with the established themes, the best that players would get is maybe a new theme that they could build a new character for.
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To be fair. The Huge Manjority of People and there opinion we will never know. Considering only a few small percentage goes piblic with there opinions and discuss about it here or on reddit.
Most people probably will just play on there table local or online and talk with there friends about it.
But in general if i speak with people, yea Specialist and Thematic Magic is the desired thing in Roleplay. Maybe its because it became the norm in media.
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I think there's a world of difference between "being in favor of the idea of specialist casters" and "being in favor of a specific kind of specialist caster."
Like I don't think the idea is necessarily a bad one, but I'm a hard no on "Necromancer" as a class.
Btw the whole "pick from a select list" is literally just the Occultist. Which got around the issue by letting you pick the spells you wanted from the chosen school(s) of magic.
I only played 1e once really but from your brief description that sounds rather broken to have completely unrestricted cherry picking from all the spell traditions
I think there's a world of difference between "being in favor of the idea of specialist casters" and "being in favor of a specific kind of specialist caster."
Like I don't think the idea is necessarily a bad one, but I'm a hard no on "Necromancer" as a class.
Necromancer as a class should be uncommon at minimum and probably rare anyways. So I don't care. I can easily tell a player no
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One of the "evolutions" of language in ttrpgs which has always annoyed me is "necromancer". Literally, the word means "someone who seeks knowledge by speaking to the dead". Or at least it used to mean that. Now it means something like "someone who has magical power over life and death", which is something quite different.
Nothing I can do about that, but I will say that I wouldn't mind a "necromancer" who is basically a diviner who does his thing by speaking to the dead.
Yeah, it's that "-mancy" suffix, which means "divination by a specified means".
I would call somebody who slings fireballs around a pyromaniac. :-)
One of the "evolutions" of language in ttrpgs which has always annoyed me is "necromancer". Literally, the word means "someone who seeks knowledge by speaking to the dead". Or at least it used to mean that. Now it means something like "someone who has magical power over life and death", which is something quite different.
Nothing I can do about that, but I will say that I wouldn't mind a "necromancer" who is basically a diviner who does his thing by speaking to the dead.
mancy=prophecy, necro=dead, basically divination via speaking with the dead. As it goes. This has always been how language works. It means what it is commonly understood to mean, and in time "necromancy" will mean something else again