A sibling thread initiated a discussion about (remaster) Cantrip balancing (Deeplink to what I believe was the beginning of that topic). It encompassed both the question of offensive Cantrip vs (other) offensive Cantrip, as well as Cantrip vs. Weapon.
This is a spin-off thread, dedicated to the topic.
Own Motivation: Recycling part of my comment from above thread:
I consider it an important topic - particularly for adventures with long adventuring days and scarce resources - so I'd like it to get the attention it IMHO deserves [...]
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Well, to get the obvious stuff out of the way first...
- Kineticists get more utility than standard martials, and much easier access to things like area effects and control powers. By extension, a martial with appropriately runed weapons should be more effective than a kineticist at single-target damage.
- Casters, in addition to having, if anything, more utility and flexibility, get a lot of their power budget in daily slot spells... and often get some nice stuff with their focus spells as well. By extension, a kineticist should be more effective overall than a caster who's limiting themselves to cantrips and focus cantrips.
If you have a long enough adventuring day that your caster has already spent all of their slots earlier in the day, then yeah, they're going to be a bit weaker now. That's kind of baked in. Similarly, if you're playing Strength of Thousands and a lot of your adventuring days are one encounter long... well, that AP has "You should play a wizard and/or druid" pretty much written right on it, and there's a reason for that.
Past that... well, you've told us that you want to spark discussion, and you've said why, but you haven't really given us a hook to start discussion with. Do you have a particular question to ask, or a particular position to assert, or a particular bit of analysis to present? "Here's a thread dedicated to the topic" doesn't really work in a vacuum unless other people are sufficiently motivated to want to set out initial positions themselves.
Sure, I could bring in one of the fundamental points that triggered debate already:
Are the cantrips as of Remaster (particularly Player Core 1, but could also name Rage of Elements with its "Preview Remaster"-state) generally too weak? Just right? Or too strong?
Or, more into details, has it been just the state of few outliers, which trigger more than usual criticism? Examples mentioned relatively frequently: Daze or notorious Electric Arc.
Personal Opinion: Playing casters relatively often - with mentioned high-attrition adventure days, little rest and sub-par gear - I am generally really happy for competitive cantrips. I particularly hoped for a bit more power to Daze.
Reason: Daze is one of only very, very few nonlethal Spells in the whole game. Maybe that was intended to be its Unique Selling Point and the low damage output its intended price. I personally found it a pretty high price...
Side-Note: When I checked last time (pre Remaster), when we badly needed nonlethal Spells for a law enforcement adventure, the following was all we had access to: Admonishing Ray, Agitate, Daze, Phantom Pain.
Apart from that there were only 3 other from Sources we didn't use plus 3 focus spells, which required additional feat investment.
Means, Daze was the only Cantrip available to cause damage without bloodshed. (I know that wizard metamagic, now spellhape, feat Nonlethal Spell could mitigate the issue.)
Addition (2023-11-24 15:40 UTC): I should add, that Phantom Pain wasn't on my spell list. Admonishing Ray OTOH was - and I totally liked the magic slap thematically - but spending a Spell Slot for a single Spell attack with 2d6 per Rank single target damage was an even higher price, IMHO, unfortunately.
I like to be corrected If I overlooked something.
Well, apparently it's divisive to say that casters greatly benefit from the investment to get a 1-action shortbow, and / or should be bonking w/ a staff.
I'd also like to give the Simple Alchemical Crossbow a shoutout for being 1d8 + 1d6, making it nearly as good as a shortbow in terms of dmg/action with a lot of *s and footnotes.
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With the changes in the remaster both toning down cantrip damage a bit, and granting full simple weapon access, why not start with that. How much do yall see yourselves making the occasional Strike now? Though, perhaps first I aught to ask how many of the casters here carry a runed weapon in hand?
This is actually a good chance to ask for clarity on a rule I've heard both ways on.
Supposedly, tripping with DEX via Finesse weapons is legit now?
If so, tripping w/ a Sickle seems to be some heavy competition / a great companion for Needle Darts. Especially w/ the rule that you can drop a trip weapon to avoid the crit fail, how often is that option going to be prioritized over cantrip damage?
It kinda looks like EA is still going to be king, so that aside, what changes in your cantrip use do you already have an eye on?
Well, apparently it's divisive to say that casters greatly benefit from the investment to get a 1-action shortbow, and / or should be bonking w/ a staff.
[...]
Trip.H, I don't call it divisive. And guess what, I once made a move towards Elven Weapon Familiarity, which I found rather bold with a squishy cloistered cleric at the time... But part of my motivation, besides some really atmospheric roleplaying opportunity, was the option for shortbow 3rd actions, indeed. (In cases where it's clear that the fight will be lethal anyways ... ;-))
Off-Topic Side challenge: If someone knows effective ways to use a shortbow nonlethally, I'll award extra kudos. :-) But just as side note. (Hope I don't derail my own thread with that ;-)).
[...]
It kinda looks like EA is still going to be king, so that aside, what changes in your cantrip use do you already have an eye on?
Haven't played remaster as player, yet. But I particularly look forward to effective offensive cantrips for divine. Which means when dealing with other opponents than fiends or undead. (Before RoE and Remaster, the few options like Disrupt Undead or Disrupt Undead were so narrow that I barely prepared them at all.) Now I have an eye on that new Divine Lance, as well as Needle Darts from RoE, when lethal fights are appropriate. Those two could actually make a divine difference.
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Are the cantrips as of Remaster (particularly Player Core 1, but could also name Rage of Elements with its "Preview Remaster"-state) generally too weak? Just right? Or too strong?
My take on this question, which was part of the debate in the other thread, is that cantrips post-remaster are generally just right. In my opinion, Daze is still too weak (likely due to an oversight) and Electric Arc is still too strong despite its large nerf (mainly because the cantrip is structured in a way that's tough to balance properly), but overall damage cantrips do what they're supposed to, which is to give casters consistent damage at early levels that is a bit under ranged martial classes in the damage they deal. I would also say that the big winners of the remaster are the utility cantrips that got buffed or merged, which suggests to me that the truly weak cantrips of the game pre-remaster were those that did no damage -- but virtually no-one talks about that, which to me suggests that the people complaining about cantrips being too weak don't actually care about cantrips overall, so much as just dealing consistent damage to match that of martial classes. I don't think that ever needs to happen, and we have many tabletop gaming examples of what happens when we allow casters to encroach on the power of martial classes without the latter being able to do the same in return.
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Pre-remaster, all my casters were using Electric Arc. Outside some niche situations the other cantrips were under my bare minimum of efficiency.
With the remaster, Electric Arc has been strongly hit, especially at low level. At level 1-2, Needle Darts deals roughly pre remaster Electric Arc damage on a single target but with a longer range. So in my opinion, it will replace Electric Arc at level 1-2 (it's available to all traditions, so easy to grab).
At level 4 (at the latest), I'll move to offensive Focus Spells as they are now usable multiple times per fight.
Cantrips are now a trap option to me. I don't see myself relying on them anymore.
@Teridax: The discussion is about offensive cantrips, hence why we don't talk about non-offensive ones.
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Are you saying that pre-remaster, having access to both, you chose cantrips over offensive focus spells?
If yes, that was obviously a balance problem.
If no, then the real change was focus spells becoming more usable, not any rebalancing of cantrips.
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If only all the focus spells were actually combat focused or good then the change to focus points would matter. Wizard still has issues with their focus spells being mostly terrible with a few exceptions. Like if they were trying to make focus spells the go to before cantrips then why not make sure all classes have an equal number of them (Besides Psychic) Because it still feels weird that the rules seem all over the place.
So if you get a focus spell your total Focus Point Pool increases by +1 to a max of 3, okay but if an ability grants you +1 Focus points, do you also gain an extra +1 for having the focus spell, giving you +2 focus points?
Oh seems like they fixed it in the Remastered to just be +1 Focus Point per spell to a max of 3, at least they did that.
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[...] I would also say that the big winners of the remaster are the utility cantrips that got buffed or merged, which suggests to me that the truly weak cantrips of the game pre-remaster were those that did no damage -- [...]
For the records a small interjection: I love utility cantrips. Having them on hand at-will is one of the key factors that allowed me to actually feel as a Caster. Knowing that even in dire circumstances, even if everything ran out, I (or better: the whole group) could still rely on some of my favorite magic effects, is absolutely vital to me. (Multiclass Bard and new Figment - here we are! Yes!)
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@Teridax: The discussion is about offensive cantrips, hence why we don't talk about non-offensive ones.
As per my comment, the remark is directed towards the general discourse around cantrips and spellcasters in general, which I’m sure you’ll agree predates this thread. There are a whole heap of requests to buff damage cantrips, but very few to buff the pre-remaster utility cantrips, which as the remaster suggests were the truly weak ones of the bunch. The point I’m making is that a lot of players seem to pick casters with the intent of outputting at-will DPR on par with, or at least comparable to that of martial classes, ignoring all of the other advantages casters possess. Paizo did well not to listen to those requests for the remaster.
Not all classes have easy access to offensive focus spells though, and not all subclasses, etc.
That's why I speak about level 4 as I consider grabbing them through Dedications. Psychic being the easiest one.
Are you saying that pre-remaster, having access to both, you chose cantrips over offensive focus spells?
What do you mean by "having access"?
I'm speaking of paying feats to grab the Focus spell through a Dedication. So, yes, preremaster I was prefering grabbing Electric Arc with an Ancestry feat instead. Post remaster, I'll certainly go for the offensive Focus Spell.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Come to think of it, I think part of the issue is that spells in general, and cantrips in particular, are no longer part of a particular class's abilities. That means you can no longer balance a crappy class chassis (hp, armor, etc) with a good spell list, because that spell list can be used by other classes as well, and there are many ways to poach cantrips in particular.
So I think the solution to "cantrips are bad" should be some kind of buff to those classes that have a bad core, primarily sorcerers and wizards (and maybe witches), not to cantrips themselves. That, or make sure those classes have awesome focus spells.
Making the focus spells too awesome is a bit of a problem too, though, since basically all of those are also poachable.
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It feels like summoners, psychics and to a lesser degree magi are the classes that are now missing something with the changes to cantrips. Again, the monster core will make it a lot more clear what the scope of the issue is, but classes that use a lot of cantrips have more stakes in the weakness game and how difficult it will be to play it.
Superbidi will be able to determine how badly the Summoner is reduced without electric arc.
I want to know how badly the Magus is hammered after the cantrip changes. They look like they may have been neutered hard.
The Magus in my party keeps rending things apart with both regular and amped TKP, and even though they invested into INT they don't seem to particularly mind the changes. It's a lot of dice now so it's swingier for sure, but we always valued the B/P/S coverage higher than a few points of damage anyway. If anything, my uneducated guess would be that Magi that didn't invest heavily into INT might be a bit better off now.
So the change had no effect on the magus? What cantrips and spells are the magus using now?
I would imagine if limited to remaster stuff the magus just keeps using telekinetic projectile, gouging claw and/or ignition (and probably that d8 psychic cantrip with multiclass), there was all that cheering on these forums that the magus can further ignore its spellcasting stat after all
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Gouging claw got a side buff...So it's now he Magus's favorite weapon outside Imaginary weapon amped or TKP Amped.
My lvl 11 Starlit Span Magus who normally uses a longbow and telekenetic projectile barely notices the difference.
2d8+4+1d6+(6d6+4) becomes 2d8+4+1d6+(7d6)
41.5 average damage on a cantrip spellstrike hit becomes 41 damage. Or about a 1% reduction in damage.
My lvl 3 Fire obsessed low (14) int goblin magus is a little more complicated.
(Assuming Spell hearts work nicely with spell striking)
They're favorite thing is to spellstrike with produce flame for
1d8+4+2d4+2+1+1d4 (2H staff + Strength + Produce Flame + Burn it! + Flaming Star) for 19 average damage on a hit.
If we just swap Produce Flame's 2 int into a d4 that's another half damage 19.5
If we swap to Ignition we lose the d4 from the spellheart but (I think
we...) can turn the damage into d6s that's 1d8+4+3d6+1 or 20
The magus now can’t do cold damage, electricity damage or acid damage with remastered spells. It is all just physical damage any more.
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I want to know how badly the Magus is hammered after the cantrip changes. They look like they may have been neutered hard.
Magus should be better than ever with the new Gouging Claw, Ignition and the focus spell changes. Only issue is they have less damage types to choose from and less slotted spells to use with spellstrike, but that goes away if the GM allows pre-remaster content too. They also rely less on INT so STR based magus need Sentinel a bit less than before.
Like, you can now do amped Imaginary Weapon Spellstrikes three times per combat at level 6, don't see how they could be considered weaker now.
Magus is such a nicely designed class. I'm playing a Starlit Span magus. It feels dirty playing. I had a 156 point imaginary weapon crit at level 12. Just destroyed what we were fighting. Their feats are so nice like choosing your rune according to the battle. Recharge with Conflux spells that are good. 3 focus points. Good weapon and armor choices. Now you can dump intel. Slots for quality utility spells like 4th level invis for ranged flat-footed attacks.
Such a power class in PF2.
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I liked using divine lance on a magus to switch on good damage vs. fiends, I don't think that's possible now anymore. You'd be doing spirit damage, not sure you can also use arcane cascade to grab the secondary traits of the damage like holy. (Also, now you need a cleric dedication, instead of an adopted cantrip feat.)
Overall I think for magus it's a very small debuff. An extra damage die instead of ability bonus to damage is not so impactful, since intelligence wasn't your key stat. It makes poaching spells from other spell lists with ancestry cantrips and such actually slightly better.
But having fewer spell attack spells means relying more on expansive spellstrike. I feel like that feat should maybe be folded into the base class chassis at this point, unless they're going to write new spell attack cantrips.
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Superbidi will be able to determine how badly the Summoner is reduced without electric arc.
The Summoner continues with Electric Arc. It's only at low level that it's really annoying. At higher level, the change shouldn't be felt too hard.
Still annoying, but not crippling.
Psychic... hmm. It only impacts some of the conscious minds. I think Oscillating Wave is better (Reflex save on amped Frostbite improves expected damage a lot), the other d4 cantrips are basically the same damage as before anyways, so Distant Step is unaffected. Imaginary Weapon was already hard to use, so I'm not sure how much Tangible Dream cares (Astral Rain is slightly better on average now).
Electric Arc was excellent on the Psychic, even better than some amped cantrips when Unleashed (both due to the save for half and double targets).
The magus now can’t do cold damage, electricity damage or acid damage with remastered spells. It is all just physical damage any more.
This may be a bit off topic, but is it normal for GMs to allow complete flavor reskins that do not change the numerical values of spells/ect to be more fitting to the character?
Swapping out a damage type is technically not cosmetic, but getting the element / SFX of a spell to be on-brand with a spellcaster seems to be the most common reason to want a flavor re-skin.
Would there be any expected pushback from a Magus that wanted to rebrand TkP into "Eject Elecroball" or some other type substitution?
It's an interesting "technically grey" zone, a limit testing of that "flavor is free" phrase.
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Through Ancestral Mind? Seems the only way to use Unleash on it.Electric Arc was excellent on the Psychic, even better than some amped cantrips when Unleashed (both due to the save for half and double targets).Psychic... hmm. It only impacts some of the conscious minds. I think Oscillating Wave is better (Reflex save on amped Frostbite improves expected damage a lot), the other d4 cantrips are basically the same damage as before anyways, so Distant Step is unaffected. Imaginary Weapon was already hard to use, so I'm not sure how much Tangible Dream cares (Astral Rain is slightly better on average now).
Not only. Adapted Cantrip allows to get EA (or any other cantrip) instead of one of your class tradition cantrip and put in your psychic repertoire (it isn't an innate cantrip it really switch a cantrip to another cantrip from any tradition).
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If you're multiclassing Psychic to get Imaginary Weapon you just flat out deserve to feel dirty, truthfully it's ACTUALLY worse than the insanely prevlent Gnome Flickmace abuse in both scale of what it means for the setting (Most Gish and Spellcasters just to HAPPEN to also by Psychic out of literally nowhere) and how unbalanced the whole Psychic MCA is by itself.
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If you're multiclassing Psychic to get Imaginary Weapon you just flat out deserve to feel dirty, truthfully it's ACTUALLY worse than the insanely prevlent Gnome Flickmace abuse in both scale of what it means for the setting (Most Gish and Spellcasters just to HAPPEN to also by Psychic out of literally nowhere) and how unbalanced the whole Psychic MCA is by itself.
And all for a couple points of damage. It never felt worth delaying the extra slots you could get from witch/wizard (14 extra utility slots on a magus makes you a magic swiss army knife on top of hitting like a truck) or getting fluffy magus feats
Most of the time I do not see Magus players go into Witch/Wizard Multiclass, just Psychic for that sweet, sweet imaginary weapon which is dumb. Then again do you really need any other cantrip outside Gouging Claw, Telekinetic Projectile and Ignition? Hell you only need Ignition and Gouging Claw, to be viable. The changes to cantrips just made iNT less worthwhile if you only cast "Attack" cantrips, so maybe that is why I haven't seen FA into Witch or Wizard or if I have it tends to be higher level past 2, so they can get a bunch of slots already.
Why Phasebolt is 3d4 is beyond me, it as someone pointed out earlier the real winner of the cantrip world.
Today after remaster this Imaginary Weapon build for Magus worth even less due the Gouging Claw buff. So it probably goes to the forgetfulness.
2d6+4 (assuming the persistent ticks twice) with 1d6+2 scaling vs 2d8 with 2d8 scaling.
At rank 4
5d6+10 = 27.5
8d8 = 36
At rank 5
6d6+12 = 33
10d8 = 45
It's one thing to be down 9 or 12 points of damage on one attack, quite another to be down 27 or 36 by the time that 3rd spellstrike goes off and the gap only gets larger as you level up. If you hit on consecutive turns, you don't get full gouging claw damage either since you can't stack the bleed (you essentially lose the +x if you aren't applying the bleed).
Like it or not, at the end of the day there's every incentive to pick up amp TKP or IW to maximize your damage while freeing up your magus slots for good utility or support spells. Psychic archetype slots aren't exactly bad either since there are plenty of good occult spells and you can always signature true strike in those slots if necessary to really bring the pain.
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You doing a thing that I usually don't recomend with magus that's using a focus spell from other class (in this case an AMP) instead of use a Conflux spell. The reason is simple. The conflux spells gives an extra Strike while compress you action economy of the recharge so:
I made a comparison graph using PF2Calculator helping to show that even AMPed Imaginary Weapon isn't more effective than a Conflux Focus Spell.
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Eh, you do have to consider that you're also shorting yourself on the benefits of conflux focus spells. It's clearly better than not using a focus point (as it should be), but you do also have to give up a level 2 and 6 feat, in addition to the opportunity cost of other archetypes and a focus point.
That said, it does get insane if you maximize its power with things like Spell Swipe.
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You doing a thing that I usually don't recomend with magus that's using a focus spell from other class (in this case an AMP) instead of use a Conflux spell. The reason is simple. The conflux spells gives an extra Strike while compress you action economy of the recharge so:
Dimensional Assault: Teleport (move without risk a reaction like [s]Attack of Oportunity[/b] Reactive Strike) + Strike + Recharge the SpelStrike in same action.
Force Fang: Recharge the SpellStrike and does an auto 1d4+1 every 2 ranks in same action.
Shielding Strike: Recharge + Strike + Rise a Shiel/Cast a Shield Cantrip in same action.
Shooting Star: Rechage + Ranged Strike + Ignore concealment and cover of the target for you and anyone against your target until the start of your next turn.
Spinning Staff: Recharge + Strike vs 2 different targets in your melee range.
Thunderous Strike: Recharge + Strike + a fort basic to do an additional 2 vs all creatures in a 15 ft cone that includes your target. If some creature critical fails this check it also falls prone. I made a comparison graph using PF2Calculator helping to show that even AMPed Imaginary Weapon isn't more effective than a Conflux Focus Spell.
I tend to agree with this. I don't use amped Imaginary Weapon unless I can combine it with a true strike as a finishing blow. Conflux Spell recharge is great action economy.
I use Runic Weapon and Force Fang mostly. It's basically a recharge action with a damage action for a focus point. The rune can take advantage of weaknesses and lasts for a minute. Force Fang with Starlit Span is free damage for recharging your spellstrike.
Magus action economy is damn good.
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I forget to add Force Fang to the Graph. But this changed the DPR output too much but still useful to give another focus point and to use vs strong AC opponents. I also changed the graph to only show the levels when is possible to get access to them.
Full DPR graph with Force Fang too
Also the full DPR graph become too polluted with so many option so I made some splited graphs to make easier to understand and compare.
Only melee d12 weapons
Only melee d8 weapons
Only melee d6 agile weapons
Only Shortbows
Only Longbows
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First I want to apologize because I made a mistake in my graphs. I used MAP-5 instead of MAP-10. So the results was stronger than they really are. That said I fixed it and tried to use Conflux (Strike) + SpellStrike and curiously its worse than just SpellStrike than Strike with MAP-10 in the most cases.
I'm not multiple round cycles because I'm counting that in most encounters you can reach a target with only one action (usually the encounters uses small maps or start from a distance where a character can cover with only one action specially if it is using Longstrider and or have some speed improvement feat. Something pretty common for melee characters. So I expect that you are able to at last do a move + spellstrike or move + 1-action spell (usually shield) + arcane cascade.
That said I'm not considering arcane cascade or making a comparison between melee vs ranged here. My idea is just compare AMPed Imaginary Weapon vs Conflux Spells.
Follow the fixed graphs and added the comparison between SpellStrike without MAP + Conflux MAP-10 and Conflux no MAP + SpellStrike MAP-5. I also no more add everything in single graph because it becomes to confuse and this way also avoids the comparison between melee and ranged that isn't the point here.
Only melee d12 weapons
Only melee d8 weapons
Only melee d6 agile weapons
Only Shortbows
Only Longbows
Now Force Fang becomes stronger in most melee cases while Imaginary keeping being a best option for ranged :P
First I want to apologize because I made a mistake in my graphs. I used MAP-5 instead of MAP-10. So the results was stronger than they really are. That said I fixed it and tried to use Conflux (Strike) + SpellStrike and curiously its worse than just SpellStrike than Strike with MAP-10 in the most cases.
[...]
So, takeaway from this would be: Wherever possible, do a Spellstrike at full attack bonus (don't Spellstrike with MAP)?
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That's pretty plain, yeah. Spellstrike is a humongous amount of extra damage on a big chunky activity you need to spend some 3rd action to recharge, so you generally want to keep its accuracy as high as is feasible when you use it since so much output rides on it. :o
That said, I agree that you shouldn't entirely miss out on conflux spells if you can help it, with Shielding Strike and Dimensional Assault having 3rd-action utility (Thunderous Smite is a cheap way to trigger swarm/troop weakness!), and Force Fang offering extra damage when you need to recharge as a first action for back-to-back spellstrikes. Using an opportunistic mix of conflux spells and archetype focus spells seems like the best bet to me, especially if you end up with 3 focus points. ~★