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Continuing my playtest experience analisis level by level now in lvl 2.
Its still a speedrun playtest of Fall of Plaguestone because we already have all the things done and I want to test the Soldier too and because the soldier's playtest only goes up to level 5, we chose to play a low-level adventure.
I won't describe the full adventures here because its too much to be written and instead I will go directly to my impressions and observations.
This playtest will focus into animist only. For other classes I will post my impressions in their respective forums.
Party composition
A human Animist
A half-orc Exemplar
A half-elf Soldier (from SF2 Fieldtest)
A hobgoblin Alchemist
Build
My animist still an DPR focused blaster. Now I get Sustaining Dance as most obvious feat choice to allow my to keep some movement every round while I use all my actions casting and sustaining a also got Continual Recovery to make some healing comparisons with Garden of Healing.
Impressions
Little things changed from my level 1 impressions while some others was confirmed. Lets talk about them individually:
Apparition's Whirl is something cool to have but I rarely use it in a encounter because its more efficient to keep with Steward of Stone and Fire in entire combat specially after a reach the conclusion that use of Garden of Healing in battle doesn't worth all its "cost" and all others Apparition options (except the new Reveler in Lost Glee) are melee focused.
Channeler's Stance still doesn't worth its action cost. The reason about this is simple. This stances give an status damage bonus equal to spell rank but in most cases I'm already casting a cantrip (Eletric Arc) + Earth's Bile. So to enter in the stance I need to not cast one of them in one of my turns and the damage/healing bonus doesn't compensate that damage that wont give in this turn. The only situation in this low levels that worth to enter in this stance is when I need to use actions to move more than I can move using Sustaining Dance. Also I start almost every encounter with an allied Exemplar using Marathon Dash what means that very rarelly will need to use an action just to move giving some action free to enter into the stance. Probably this will change after level 4 when I get my 3rd focus point but for now I rarely use it.
Garden of Healing doesn't worth to use in an encounter. It's simply too "expensive". It not only costs you a focus point but also you need to stay in the right positioning, those who you want to heal need to stay closer, some [s]GMs[/b] enemies will try to disturb entering into your emanation, if an ally is dying everything turns way more complicated (your dying ally couldn't move to you so you need to move closer but usually enemies are closer to it too if possible you need to move more to a position where you won't heal the enemies but many times you don't get enough space for this or if the enemies are flanking the fallen ally its basically impossible to not heal enemies too. Also the healing is weak what means that your allie risks to fall again in the next turn increasing the risk of perma death. Its a tactical nightmare!). In practice the usage of this spell in combat simply doesn't worth.
Also I compared it with Continual Recovery + Ward Medic and being honest makes a little difference and in practice usually Continual Recovery is "faster" because isn't uncommon that I need 30 minutes to refocus and this enough time to recovery the entire party with medicine too. My conclusion until now its that Garden of Healing is still better because doesn't requires all the skill feat investment but in term of time economy the difference is minimal.
Now with more enemies with higher HP the Earth's Bile effectiveness it's no more so fantastic like it was in level 1. But still good and the combination of EA + Bile still competes with the Two-Handed d12 melee str based damage of the Exemplar (and my exemplar its life steal based not a damage focused one). This makes me thing that in next levels (3-4) its slow heightening will make it less effective until I reach level 5 making some kind of wave in the damage output with a high output when it up a rank but a lowering damage out until you reach the next heightening rank.
Yet the overwal action economy efficiency improved a lot with Sustaining Dance. Now I rarely don't use all my actions to cast/sustain making the class action economy pretty good. Also this really shows how this feat is a most have one. The experience after I take it really makes me consider that you will want to take it in level 2 ever even knowing that it competed with Embodiment of the Balance something that I also want to get once that I rarely use my apparition spellslot.
An interesting point about Sustaining Dance is that it not only moves about the half of your speed but also in a line. In some rare situations it may not enough to get into the positioning. Probably when I get my 3rd focus point and begin to sustain with all actions this movement could be more interesting. But now it inability to turn in middle of the movement limits it. You also need to consider that in air and water encounters you cannot use it at all.
And about spell slots... Well I use all my prepared ones to put heal and honestly I can't see another better usage for them. While I one use the apparition slot once with Interposing Earth this also makes the main problem of these template spells in lower levels. In practice you won't choose your spell list actively because almost always you will choose your apparition based only on its Vessel Spells and this makes you stay with no use for most of them that's why I want to take Embodiment of the Balance in level 4 to at last be able to use then with heal. But again this makes it another must have feat to compensate your choice limitation in apparition spells.