Please normalize Archetype / Feat-granted proficiency scaling


Pathfinder Second Edition General Discussion


4 people marked this as a favorite.

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:


  • General feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  • Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I completely Agree though i will point out that the general feats now do Scale (but explicitly at caster rates, rather than being based on the proficiency of your own class)


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Seconded. It's really awkward that there's options for building a character that scales with bows or two handed weapons but not with one handed weapons.

Dualist could have been along side archer and mauler to round out the options.

Liberty's Edge

Just a note that standard proficiencies each follow different increase rates according to their type and to the classes.

Not sure all proficiencies mentioned above should follow the model of Acrobatics with Acrobat for example.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
The Raven Black wrote:

Just a note that standard proficiencies each follow different increase rates according to their type and to the classes.

Not sure all proficiencies mentioned above should follow the model of Acrobatics with Acrobat for example.

I mean, so far all instances of Skill autoscaling in the game (with the sole exception of bardic lore) all follow the pattern of expert 2, master 7, legend 15, unlike weapon, armor, or spell proficiencies there is a pretty codified rate of advancement for skill proficiencies


Kekkres wrote:
The Raven Black wrote:

Just a note that standard proficiencies each follow different increase rates according to their type and to the classes.

Not sure all proficiencies mentioned above should follow the model of Acrobatics with Acrobat for example.

I mean, so far all instances of Skill autoscaling in the game (with the sole exception of bardic lore) all follow the pattern of expert 2, master 7, legend 15, unlike weapon, armor, or spell proficiencies there is a pretty codified rate of advancement for skill proficiencies

Inventor gets expert Crafting at level 3.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

well, I partially agree

I don't think every skill proficiency gained from whatever has to scale
it is nice and in some cases rather fitting

but I do agree that weapon/armor proficiency gained from feats should scale with the rate the class itself does

otherwise you have a dead feat to train out of after a while
if they enable you to widen your possibilities - why cant they stay good?

Liberty's Edge

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

It takes two Ancestry feats to accomplish that with a predefined, narrow range of weapons. Why should it take fewer General feats for a much broader range of weapons?

Shadow Lodge

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber
Paul Watson wrote:
It takes two Ancestry feats to accomplish that with a predefined, narrow range of weapons. Why should it take fewer General feats for a much broader range of weapons?

Not anymore. For the races in the Remaster book, all the weapon ancestry feats have been combined into one feat. You don't have to take additional feats to get scaling *or* critical specialization at 5th level -- they are included.

Remastered Elven Weapon Familiarity:
You favor bows and other elegant weapons. You gain access to all uncommon weapons with the elf trait. You have familiarity with weapons with the elf trait plus longbows, composite longbows, rapiers, shortbows, and composite shortbows—for the purposes of proficiency, you treat any of these that are martial weapons as simple weapons and any that are advanced weapons as martial weapons.
At 5th level, whenever you get a critical hit with one of these weapons, you get its critical specialization effect.

Liberty's Edge

Pathfinder Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

In which case, I withdraw my objection and agree the general feat should scale.

Radiant Oath

5 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber

This would literally solve 99% of my problems with 2e as it stands.

I just wanna be able to use an advanced weapon for style or thematic reasons that isn't tied to a specific ancestry without being a Fighter or a tengu. I don't care about the DAMAGE of the weapon or performing on par with a character who has those proficiencies right out of the box!

It just feels bad if I play a Human Bard with a falcata because he's from Taldor and was taught the traditional rondelero dueling style and have that falcata end up basically being only for show because his proficiency with it won't be able to keep up with the enemies advancing in power, and there's no "Cultural Weapon Familiarity" feat line to act as a band-aid!

It can be a full-on nerf, I'm USED to nerfing my character for style! I just don't want to be nerfed so hard it's effectively a punishment for "not playing the game optimally TM."


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Yeah, the ancestry feats have always had scaling proficiency since the original CRB - the level 5 feat was only to grab crit spec. They all just worked by lowering the tier you looked at, but it effectively meant certain martial weapons would use your simple proficiency (which every class has automatically scale now), and advanced could use martial (or simple, in the case of Tengu).

I do think that just saying "whenever you get expert or better with simple weapons, this proficiency increases to match" is the best way to go in general. Martials get expert at 5, casters get it later, always at the same level they get it for anything else.


My only issue with scaling everything is that it would make the Fighter advanced weapons Feat lose almost all value, so it would need to be buffed in some way to compensate.

Edit: oh also you would need to make an exception for the Elf feat that makes you trained in everything, because THAT would not be balanced with full scaling.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Dubious Scholar wrote:
Yeah, the ancestry feats have always had scaling proficiency since the original CRB - the level 5 feat was only to grab crit spec. They all just worked by lowering the tier you looked at[...]

Actually, only the weapons with the Ancestry trait had scaling. So for instance, an Elf with pre-remaster Elven Weapon Familiarity would not treat Longbows as simple weapons.

Shadow Lodge

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Maps, Pathfinder Accessories Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Starfinder Superscriber
Archpaladin Zousha wrote:

This would literally solve 99% of my problems with 2e as it stands.

I just wanna be able to use an advanced weapon for style or thematic reasons that isn't tied to a specific ancestry without being a Fighter or a tengu. I don't care about the DAMAGE of the weapon or performing on par with a character who has those proficiencies right out of the box!

It just feels bad if I play a Human Bard with a falcata because he's from Taldor and was taught the traditional rondelero dueling style and have that falcata end up basically being only for show because his proficiency with it won't be able to keep up with the enemies advancing in power, and there's no "Cultural Weapon Familiarity" feat line to act as a band-aid!

It can be a full-on nerf, I'm USED to nerfing my character for style! I just don't want to be nerfed so hard it's effectively a punishment for "not playing the game optimally TM."

Yes, I agree. A Cultural Weapon Familiarity feat mirrored on the Ancestry feats (and limited by your place of origin but *not* by your Ancestry) is the fix for this. In a home game I would 100% put together a regional list for any player who wanted one. There are plenty of resources out there that give strong indications what those lists would be.


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

A Cultural Weapon Familiarity feat - this could be a general feat, or a general ancestry feat available to any ancestry. I feel some of the human feats are cultural feats and should be available to any ancestry.

I kind of feel like Ancestry and cultural feats should be treated separately with characters able to pick an ancestry or cultural feat.

I think there is a case for a lot of feats that are currently class feats (e.g. Advanced Weaponry) that could be opened to any class - combat impact is balanced around proficiency a Wizard with an advanced weapon is hardly more of balance issue for a feat if proficiency is capped at expert. None of the advanced weapons really seem unbalancing other than they are sometimes slightly better than a similar martial weapon.

I get why advanced weapon proficiency exists, I get why advanced weapons exist but the restrictions and accessing and using them seem over done. Why create a whole category of weapons that punish all but a few classes for using them. Give access with the right feat at full proficiency and move on. I still don't even see many druids or bards using advanced weapons but at least a feat would support those that choose to and I don't think it would break or unbalance the game.

The only reason I can think for not doing it is somehow advanced weapons are seen as part of the fighters class identity and giving access to other classes to make good use of it somehow infringes on that. That however would be contrary to the rest of the design and also a hell of a waste of printing space for all those weapons to only be good for 1 class.


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Cyder wrote:

I get why advanced weapon proficiency exists, I get why advanced weapons exist but the restrictions and accessing and using them seem over done. Why create a whole category of weapons that punish all but a few classes for using them. Give access with the right feat at full proficiency and move on. I still don't even see many druids or bards using advanced weapons but at least a feat would support those that choose to and I don't think it would break or unbalance the game.

The only reason I can think for not doing it is somehow advanced weapons are seen as part of the fighters class identity and giving access to other classes to make good use of it somehow infringes on that. That however would be contrary to the rest of the design and also a hell of a waste of printing space for all those weapons to only be good for 1 class.

I think it's one of those "abundance of caution" things. It's real easy to design an advanced weapon to just be a higher-damage version of some martial weapon, and if you could get full access to that via a general feat that would be a no-brainer for many builds (particularly since, at least in 2.0, there aren't all that many good general feats).

If I had my druthers, advanced weapons should be the ones who are actually complex in their usage. Hook swords, fire poi, and flickmaces, yes. Falcata, no-dachi, and broadspear, no. Those can just be local variations of regular martial weapons. And ideally, advanced weapons should have a fair amount of traits but generally non-exceptional damage. That way, they become specialized tools for those who can exploit those traits, rather than just "better" weapons.

Lantern Lodge

Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Archpaladin Zousha wrote:
It just feels bad if I play a Human Bard with a falcata because he's from Taldor and was taught the traditional rondelero dueling style and have that falcata end up basically being only for show because his proficiency with it won't be able to keep up with the enemies advancing in power, and there's no "Cultural Weapon Familiarity" feat line to act as a band-aid!

I would certainly allow Unconventional Weaponry to apply in such a situation, both the old version and the Remastered one (they're equivalent in this respect). It already says you can choose a weapon which is "common in another culture", although it's really not clear what this means. Another culture compared to... what? The "generic culture" defined by the typical availability and classification of weapons? Is this Absalom, or Cheliax, or what? In any case, I think it's clear that this is meant to cover cultural weapons such as the falcata, in addition to things like sawtooth sabres or katanas.


Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Staffan Johansson wrote:


I think it's one of those "abundance of caution" things. It's real easy to design an advanced weapon to just be a higher-damage version of some martial weapon, and if you could get full access to that via a general feat that would be a no-brainer for many builds (particularly since, at least in 2.0, there aren't all that many good general feats).

See I don't see spending a general feat to do this as a problem if it supports a character build or concept - people are going to do it if it supports their build/concept and they are a melee character. Is that an issue? Or is the issue we worry that people will feel compelled to take an advanced weapon for the idea its theoretically better?

I think even amongst martial weapons there are favourites or more common picks but no one is worried about that. Advanced weapons are not an advantage in all situations, in fact many of them have highly situational advantages which I think the cost of a general feat is fair to support. They don't universally do more damage, in many cases they have a situational trait.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Honestly, the whole concept of different weapon tiers feels like an unnecessary legacy thing, especially when so many "point and shoot" weapons have been placed in the martial or advanced tier. I get why reloading some of those would take special training, but I don't get why it is easier to use a sling than a gun. And is there a compelling reason why wizards need to use worse weapons when they are already worse with weapons? Why only clerics, champions, and exemplars can make a simple weapon compete with a martial one?

But we are pretty much stuck with the weapon tiers this edition. And simple vs martial at least has a clean divide where certain classes will use and certain classes will use the other. Advanced doesn't really have that, and weapons which were just more powerful like the falcatta would be too much of an auto pick if they were cheap to use. If you could spend a general feat to increase your damage dice by one or add deadly to it, why wouldn't you? Once you have toughness and fleet there's very little worth taking among general feats. There are some decent skill feats, but so many skill feats are campaign and build dependent. Extra damage would definitely become a default option.

Maybe PF3 will just let players choose from some very broad categories of weapons and add traits they find compelling. Then you let people flavor the weapon to fit the mechanics they chose. It would be tough to balance and make accessible. Paizo has made clear their "trait budget" balance tables aren't as simple as the player base assumes. But it would ultimately create a more flexible game.

Because I don't think the game really needs 307 distinct weapons to sift through, especially when the core books already published the easiest to use. Maybe Paizo think weapons are an essential part of their publishing model. They've certainly published a lot of them. But I feel like optimizers just care about the strong options, and non-optimizers prefer a simpler list from core. Who are all the other weapons for?


Captain Morgan wrote:
Who are all the other weapons for?

1. People who want their equipment to reflect their place of origin and/or backstory in a way that mechanically matters. E.g. "I'm from Osirion, so I should use a khopesh instead of a longsword."

2. People who want just the right combination of traits for their build. E.g. "I want to trip my opponents and still deal decent amounts of damage, so I'll go with a khopesh."


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Staffan Johansson wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:
Who are all the other weapons for?

1. People who want their equipment to reflect their place of origin and/or backstory in a way that mechanically matters. E.g. "I'm from Osirion, so I should use a khopesh instead of a longsword."

2. People who want just the right combination of traits for their build. E.g. "I want to trip my opponents and still deal decent amounts of damage, so I'll go with a khopesh."

Fair, but it seems both groups would be better served by getting to pick the flavor and weapon of their traits, especially because the two can be mutually exclusive otherwise. What if I want to use a nodachu and trip people?


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Captain Morgan wrote:
Advanced doesn't really have that, and weapons which were just more powerful like the falcatta would be too much of an auto pick if they were cheap to use. If you could spend a general feat to increase your damage dice by one or add deadly to it, why wouldn't you? Once you have toughness and fleet there's very little worth taking among general feats.

I disagree with this. There are a lot of great general feats that are potentially stronger than +1 avg damage per die or adding deadly for a class that doesn't have fighter accuracy. It feels like you don't value the other feats and have assumed others don't. Prescient planner can be a god send when you need something and you don't have it. Uncanny acumen is great for classes with a low save that want to improve it, or getting better initiative. Just because you don't value other general and skill feats doesn't mean others don't. I was rather a better will save than +1 damage per die (average) since 4 extra damage at max level is less important than not making or crit failing a save. Having the right consumable can often be more impactful.

You value extra damage more, not everyone does. I have no issue with advanced weapons getting more use than the waste of space they are right now otherwise.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
Cyder wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:
Advanced doesn't really have that, and weapons which were just more powerful like the falcatta would be too much of an auto pick if they were cheap to use. If you could spend a general feat to increase your damage dice by one or add deadly to it, why wouldn't you? Once you have toughness and fleet there's very little worth taking among general feats.

I disagree with this. There are a lot of great general feats that are potentially stronger than +1 avg damage per die or adding deadly for a class that doesn't have fighter accuracy. It feels like you don't value the other feats and have assumed others don't. Prescient planner can be a god send when you need something and you don't have it. Uncanny acumen is great for classes with a low save that want to improve it, or getting better initiative. Just because you don't value other general and skill feats doesn't mean others don't. I was rather a better will save than +1 damage per die (average) since 4 extra damage at max level is less important than not making or crit failing a save. Having the right consumable can often be more impactful.

You value extra damage more, not everyone does. I have no issue with advanced weapons getting more use than the waste of space they are right now otherwise.

Prescient Planner is neat, but it is also made obsolete if you just have good planning. I will also admit I've seen a couple players take it but never use it. Given its limitations, it feels like you need to know the adventuring gear really well to utilize it, but if you know that you probably know what is worth packing anyway. How have you seen it used? (As a note, you need two feats, one at 7th level, to use it on Consumables, but that certainly opens up more options.)

Uncanny Acumen is a decent choice for casters, but so many martials already have expert in perception plus all 3 saves by level 3, and how you'll need to find time to retrain out of it eventually before retraining back into it... It's not my favorite.

I do think there are gems among skill feats, but they are highly dependent on both builds and the specific campaign to make them relevant in a way damage increases are not. I'm also not sure most "pure" martials need many. The go to skills of athletics and acrobatics don't have a lot of must picks, and the additional traits of an advanced weapon synergize with feats like Titan Wrestler of Combat Climber. Medicine, Crafting, and Intimidation have more important feats but martials will often struggle to get the mental stats high enough to be great at those skills anyway.


This would be nice...


In the case of armor it become useless once you improve your class armor proficiency. Looks like those feats was made with low-level adventures in mind.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Secret Wizard wrote:

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:


  • General feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  • Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Imagine if the herbalist actually got better at Herbalism innately compared to someone who just took additional lore skill feat.


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Corvo Spiritwind wrote:
Secret Wizard wrote:

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:


  • General feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  • Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Imagine if the herbalist actually got better at Herbalism innately compared to someone who just took additional lore skill feat.

I'm gonna personally disagree on background lore automatically scaling proficiency. It's better off as something minor by default, with the option to scale it with the Additional Lore feat. Then you can play a former herbalist, or take a background because the skill feat is important to the character without winding up with Underworld Lore as one of your best skills despite the thematic discrepancy. I don't really want to run into a bunch of once-bitten wizards because scaling Undead Lore beats any magic-related skill feats on an Int class.


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Adventure, Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
QuidEst wrote:


I'm gonna personally disagree on background lore automatically scaling proficiency. It's better off as something minor by default, with the option to scale it with the Additional Lore feat. Then you can play a former herbalist, or take a background because the skill feat is important to the character without winding up with Underworld Lore as one of your best skills despite the thematic discrepancy. I don't really want to run into a bunch of once-bitten wizards because scaling Undead Lore beats any magic-related skill feats on an Int class.

And I am going to disagree with you there. Having your background feat continue to improve and remain one of your best skills because thematically even though you may have 'left that life' the skills, knowledge and interests never leave you. Its like I no longer work in several kinds of industries but whenever I hear news or come across articles about subjects in those industries I feel compelled to read and know.

For underworld lore you may have left the thug life, but the thug life never leaves you, your old associates etc are still around, the game is still in your blood and even though you want to leave you know you need to keep up in case old contacts come into your life again and want to end you.

Undead Lore from once bitten, I can imagine if I had a harrowing experience before I started adventuring like being bitten by undead I would keep my knowledge of undead up out of fear that I want to be prepared or know what I am up against next time.

Undead Lore being super good (campaign dependent) leading wizards to taking that background is a lore balance problem... or not. Maybe being good at something that is valuable in a campaign is a positive.

Honestly I feel like backgrounds are a great idea but need to be reworked to either matter other than 'I picked this background for mechanical reasons' or I didn't pick this background because the skills it grants or the attribute bonuses are irrelevant - if background forces a boost for 1 of 2 stats I am not interested in (say Int or Cha for most fighters) then picking that background is a bad choice even if the story of it suits my concept.

I would rather fewer more generic backgrounds with more depth and more advancement options that the massive monte haul of rarely picked backgrounds we have now.


QuidEst wrote:
Corvo Spiritwind wrote:
Secret Wizard wrote:

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:


  • General feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  • Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Imagine if the herbalist actually got better at Herbalism innately compared to someone who just took additional lore skill feat.
I'm gonna personally disagree on background lore automatically scaling proficiency. It's better off as something minor by default, with the option to scale it with the Additional Lore feat. Then you can play a former herbalist, or take a background because the skill feat is important to the character without winding up with Underworld Lore as one of your best skills despite the thematic discrepancy. I don't really want to run into a bunch of once-bitten wizards because scaling Undead Lore beats any magic-related skill feats on an Int class.

If your tables have issues of players min-maxing so hard that background lore skills become an issue, I think you have bigger troubles than scaling backgrounds, especially since said players can already get scaling version at level 2 for a skill feat.

Could always run less undead.
Generally concerning when the reason in this scenaro that a herbalist can't be better at picking herbs overtime is because a few people might gang up on a specific background for a specific campaign :(


The Herbalist can be better, though - it just means taking a feat for it. Additional Lore works with background lores in the remaster.

This isn't something I'm bringing up from a balance concern, more an annoyance one. There frequently isn't a background that fits well, and having the lore scale makes the problem matter. Groups have a spread of four or five background granted lores, and scaling the background lore takes "Hey GM, can I use (slightly off-topic lore)?" from an occasional thing to a regular occurrence. Realistically , my annoyance with the Undead Lore thing would be a bunch of people online pushing it as a way better background, so it's a minor consideration next to the things I expect would change for tables I play in. I much prefer the situation where if someone has a scaling lore, it's because they took something for it.

That said, everything I'm saying is just my balance of preferences. None of it diminishes that yours are valid, and probably common. Some people do care more about the lore, and plenty of characters would make more sense with a scaling lore. As a way to make that work under the current system, I'd love to see something like the Pillar common background, granting Additional Lore, but with the more broadly useful flavor of "you are someone who continues to pursue your craft even as you adventure". It's something that could be added in PC2 or a later book, even with the remaster keeping background lores at trained.


Corvo Spiritwind wrote:
Secret Wizard wrote:

Hi team!

I think the Remastered is a great chance to address one of the salient aspects of PF2E that seems to be irregular across the board: proficiency scaling that's not granted by a Class.

Right now, we have:


  • General feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that do not scale.
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class (like Butterfly Blade with butterfly swords.)
  • Archetype feats that provide scaling that's parallel to a Class, but capped (like Sentinel with armor).
  • Archetype feats that scale with level (like Acrobat with Acrobatics.)

Feels like, just like casting, this should be normalized somehow across the board because it creates needless complexity.

And background!

Imagine if the herbalist actually got better at Herbalism innately compared to someone who just took additional lore skill feat.

What I do is if get training from Background and other source (Ancestry, class) you get expert at level 1.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

The thing about scaling for advanced weapons, is that every class has a 3 feat option to peg any advanced weapon to martial: Fighter Dedication, Basic Maneuver (for whatever), and Advanced Maneuver (at 12th, for Advanced Weapon Training.) There are many good 1st and 2nd level fighter feats, so you have to take Basic Maneuver isn't a tremendous onus, and 12th level is before you would outpace the general feat anyway (martials usually gain master prof at 13th.)

This is workable, except that the fighter dedication feat is pretty terrible, and that for specific advanced weapons you can peg your proficiency to martial with one feat (Unconventional Weaponry, [Ancestry] Weapon Familiarity, specific dedications like the Aldori one.)

The gulf of "cost" between "one feat, it could be an ancestry feat" and "three class feats, including a level 12 class feat" is enormous. It's not clear that there are advanced weapons that merit the second cost.


Cyder wrote:
And I am going to disagree with you there. Having your background feat continue to improve and remain one of your best skills because thematically even though you may have 'left that life' the skills, knowledge and interests never leave you. Its like I no longer work in several kinds of industries but whenever I hear news or come across articles about subjects in those industries I feel compelled to read and know.

See, if skill DCs were reasonable at higher levels (i.e. not assuming you keep increasing the skill, stat, and having item boosts) keeping a background skill at trained would still make it relevant at higher levels, and higher proficiency levels would reflect someone actively seeking to become great at that thing and actually being able to do really hard things with it.


Staffan Johansson wrote:
Cyder wrote:
And I am going to disagree with you there. Having your background feat continue to improve and remain one of your best skills because thematically even though you may have 'left that life' the skills, knowledge and interests never leave you. Its like I no longer work in several kinds of industries but whenever I hear news or come across articles about subjects in those industries I feel compelled to read and know.
See, if skill DCs were reasonable at higher levels (i.e. not assuming you keep increasing the skill, stat, and having item boosts) keeping a background skill at trained would still make it relevant at higher levels, and higher proficiency levels would reflect someone actively seeking to become great at that thing and actually being able to do really hard things with it.

Another reason why PWL (Proficiency Without Level) is so good, based only on proficiencies. DC for level 1 is 14 and for level 20 is 20, that is from trained to legendary.

Not so level dependant which I cannot see the meaning. Why if you want to jump X distance at level 1 trained in Athletics with Str +2 (total bonus +5) is different than exactly the same but you at level 10 (total bonus +14!), the level itself overlaps completely your training!


PossibleCabbage wrote:

The thing about scaling for advanced weapons, is that every class has a 3 feat option to peg any advanced weapon to martial: Fighter Dedication, Basic Maneuver (for whatever), and Advanced Maneuver (at 12th, for Advanced Weapon Training.) There are many good 1st and 2nd level fighter feats, so you have to take Basic Maneuver isn't a tremendous onus, and 12th level is before you would outpace the general feat anyway (martials usually gain master prof at 13th.)

This is workable, except that the fighter dedication feat is pretty terrible, and that for specific advanced weapons you can peg your proficiency to martial with one feat (Unconventional Weaponry, [Ancestry] Weapon Familiarity, specific dedications like the Aldori one.)

The gulf of "cost" between "one feat, it could be an ancestry feat" and "three class feats, including a level 12 class feat" is enormous. It's not clear that there are advanced weapons that merit the second cost.

Right now the problem is certainly opportunity costs. General feats are so forgettable that you cannot adequately price Advanced Weapon proficiency.

If they make General Feats something you are excited for, then you could certainly have 1 General Feat for an Advanced Proficiency.


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Secret Wizard wrote:
PossibleCabbage wrote:

The thing about scaling for advanced weapons, is that every class has a 3 feat option to peg any advanced weapon to martial: Fighter Dedication, Basic Maneuver (for whatever), and Advanced Maneuver (at 12th, for Advanced Weapon Training.) There are many good 1st and 2nd level fighter feats, so you have to take Basic Maneuver isn't a tremendous onus, and 12th level is before you would outpace the general feat anyway (martials usually gain master prof at 13th.)

This is workable, except that the fighter dedication feat is pretty terrible, and that for specific advanced weapons you can peg your proficiency to martial with one feat (Unconventional Weaponry, [Ancestry] Weapon Familiarity, specific dedications like the Aldori one.)

The gulf of "cost" between "one feat, it could be an ancestry feat" and "three class feats, including a level 12 class feat" is enormous. It's not clear that there are advanced weapons that merit the second cost.

Right now the problem is certainly opportunity costs. General feats are so forgettable that you cannot adequately price Advanced Weapon proficiency.

If they make General Feats something you are excited for, then you could certainly have 1 General Feat for an Advanced Proficiency.

I somewhat agree that general feats have been mostly kind of meh in PF2.

IMO, general feats can be broken into 3 categories of usefulness:
1) General feats that pretty much every character takes- Fleet, Incredible Initiative, and Toughness; they aren't "exciting," but they are mechanically good across a very wide range of situations; you can probably also add Canny Acumen for most characters as a 15th or 19th level feat to bump up one save from Expert to Master (at 17th+)
2) General feats that are extremely useful for specific characters- Adopted Ancestry, Shield Block, Ancestral Paragon, Incredible Investiture, and True Perception; possibly Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency as well, although these tend to lose relevance at higher levels
3) General feats that can be nice to have, but not much more- pretty much the rest of the options

Just adding scaling proficiency to Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency to match the class advancements in similar categories would probably be a good step.


Maybe allowing to get the feat multiple times?

Prerequisite to have the same proficiency in ALL lower types.

I think both the armor and weapon feats should be to allow a character to scale one step in their proficiencies for the type.

So for armor an unarmored character can get once to get trained in light armor, when get expert for unarmored get again to get expert in light armor. Notice that you could get it 4 times to get expert in medium armor, with the last one at level 19 for a caster, that gets unarmored expert at level 13, then at level 15 get the feat for light armor and at 19 for medium.

The same for weapons, with the Wizard being able to get the full simple weapons with the feat, those with full simple getting martial weapons, and those with martial weapons getting one advanced.


In addition as option could allow characters to compromise in advance the next general feat in exchange to get proficiency level as soon as it gets it from class. The same than when you get Flexible Spellcasting compromising in advance your level 2 class feat to get the dedication.

With this we avoid the weird situation of having some levels with the characters unequipping the armor until reach the level to get the corresponding general feat.


Staffan Johansson wrote:
Captain Morgan wrote:
Who are all the other weapons for?

1. People who want their equipment to reflect their place of origin and/or backstory in a way that mechanically matters. E.g. "I'm from Osirion, so I should use a khopesh instead of a longsword."

2. People who want just the right combination of traits for their build. E.g. "I want to trip my opponents and still deal decent amounts of damage, so I'll go with a khopesh."

Also people who think a certain weapon is really cool and want to have stats specifically for it.

I admit when I realized that PF 1 had stats for urumi and fire poi I got giddy. Despite both them being so-so in terms of optimization.

That's what sort of rubs me the wrong way about race-locking certain weapons (but humans can just take them with Unconventional Weaponry because, uh, sure they can). It prevents dwarf PCs from easily grabbing gnome flickmaces if they think they're awesome.

General feats already allow people to get bonus hit points and save proficiencies. They're already the min-maxer munchkin feats. Frankly I'd love to see more competitive general feats so that toughness, canny acumen, and such become less of an autopick.


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Dark_Schneider wrote:

Maybe allowing to get the feat multiple times?

Prerequisite to have the same proficiency in ALL lower types.

Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency already have that:

Armor Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time, you become trained in the next type of armor above [light, medium, heavy].
Weapon Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time you do, you become trained in additional weapons as appropriate, following the above progression [all simple, all martial, one advanced].


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Calliope5431 wrote:
I admit when I realized that PF 1 had stats for urumi and fire poi I got giddy. Despite both them being so-so in terms of optimization.

The PF1 urumi is actually pretty good for optimization: one-handed, 1d8 damage, 18-20/x2 critical, distracting (for feinting). It's essentially the same as a katana, except with a +2 on Bluff checks to feint instead of a +4 damage to calculate the Fort DC on coup de grace, and technically better than a rhoka sword (which lacks any special).


Dragonchess Player wrote:
Calliope5431 wrote:
I admit when I realized that PF 1 had stats for urumi and fire poi I got giddy. Despite both them being so-so in terms of optimization.
The PF1 urumi is actually pretty good for optimization: one-handed, 1d8 damage, 18-20/x2 critical, distracting (for feinting). It's essentially the same as a katana, except with a +2 on Bluff checks to feint instead of a +4 damage to calculate the Fort DC on coup de grace, and technically better than a rhoka sword (which lacks any special).

Fair enough, but you take my point I hope.


Dragonchess Player wrote:
Dark_Schneider wrote:

Maybe allowing to get the feat multiple times?

Prerequisite to have the same proficiency in ALL lower types.

Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency already have that:

Armor Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time, you become trained in the next type of armor above [light, medium, heavy].
Weapon Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time you do, you become trained in additional weapons as appropriate, following the above progression [all simple, all martial, one advanced].

Yes but only to get trained proficiency. I mean for scaling to your class proficiency.


Adventure Path Charter Subscriber; Pathfinder Rulebook, Starfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Roleplaying Game, Starfinder Society Subscriber
Dark_Schneider wrote:
Dragonchess Player wrote:
Dark_Schneider wrote:

Maybe allowing to get the feat multiple times?

Prerequisite to have the same proficiency in ALL lower types.

Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency already have that:

Armor Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time, you become trained in the next type of armor above [light, medium, heavy].
Weapon Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time you do, you become trained in additional weapons as appropriate, following the above progression [all simple, all martial, one advanced].
Yes but only to get trained proficiency. I mean for scaling to your class proficiency.

Which was noted:

Dragonchess Player wrote:
Just adding scaling proficiency to Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency to match the class advancements in similar categories would probably be a good step.


Dragonchess Player wrote:
Dark_Schneider wrote:
Dragonchess Player wrote:
Dark_Schneider wrote:

Maybe allowing to get the feat multiple times?

Prerequisite to have the same proficiency in ALL lower types.

Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency already have that:

Armor Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time, you become trained in the next type of armor above [light, medium, heavy].
Weapon Proficiency wrote:
Special You can select this feat more than once. Each time you do, you become trained in additional weapons as appropriate, following the above progression [all simple, all martial, one advanced].
Yes but only to get trained proficiency. I mean for scaling to your class proficiency.

Which was noted:

Dragonchess Player wrote:
Just adding scaling proficiency to Armor Proficiency and Weapon Proficiency to match the class advancements in similar categories would probably be a good step.

I know, and was just why I put my solution to the issue.

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder Second Edition / General Discussion / Please normalize Archetype / Feat-granted proficiency scaling All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.