| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm suspecting a disconnect due to preconceptions from Pathfinder1e. When I think of the various Champion characters that I have played along side of in PF2, I don't think of high damage dealers. I hear rumors that they were DPS characters in PF1. The PF2 concept is more that 'no one dies while fighting shoulder to shoulder with a Champion'.
Another PF2 concept that has changed is that PF2 characters can't and shouldn't try to focus all of their build power into one trick and then take that one hammer to treat every problem like a nail.
Technically, yes - the changes to Smite Evil and such are strictly a downgrade. They no longer work against evil aligned highway robbers and bandits and such. But 4 points extra damage per hit at level 6 is a pretty small amount of extra damage. I don't think it was ever intended to noticeably change the Champions 'rounds to kill' rating against such enemies. Primarily the purpose was to trigger weaknesses of fiends and undead that have a weakness to good damage. And the change to Sanctified Spirit damage, it still does that.
That said, it still may be a better choice to pick something other than Smite Evil if the campaign doesn't feature many Unholy enemies.
But there are so many other things in the Champion kit that are available, I don't think that you will really miss Smite Evil.
Some examples of what I mean that characters don't one-trick:
I have a swashbuckler character. The big flashy feature of swashbuckler is panache and finisher attacks that do really high amounts of damage if they hit - but they are unreliable in getting them to hit. And it is only one part of the full kit of the character. There have been a couple of recent combats where I actually got more mileage out of Dueling Parry than I did from any attacks that I was doing. One was against three enemies that were mindless and immune to precision damage. I stood like Gandalf in a 5 foot wide hallway and walled off one of them while the rest of the team dealt with the other two. I wasn't doing much damage to that enemy, but it couldn't do much damage to me either - and it couldn't get past me to attack someone easier to hit. Another battle we were up against an enemy that had 10 foot reach, Reactive Strike, and a high enough attack bonus that he could hit most of the party on a 4 and crit on a 14. Against me, he needed a 7 to hit and a 17 to crit. I also have a bit more HP than any of the other characters in the party, and quite a bit more than some of the squishier ones like the Magus. So my main job wasn't to go and deal a bunch of damage with a finisher, it was to bait out Reactive Strike so that the rest of the party could do their job without as much risk.
The changes to Vengeful Oath are probably fine as a houserule.
Probably the more important thing is to have a session 0 discussion about this with the player. Make sure that they know that the campaign doesn't feature a lot of Unholy enemies.
Also, just as a personal opinion type of thing, I rank Paladin as the least powerful of the three Good Champion types. Of the three, it is the only one whose additional benefit can miss - and then you get nothing but the damage reduction. Of the other two, Liberator is powerful, but tricky to use. May not be suitable for people new to the system and don't realize how powerful attacking an enemy's actions is. Redeemer is more straightforward and reliable. Fully negate the enemy's best attack, or cripple their attack stats for future attacks. Simple; effective; reliable.
Errata changes out of context of what the rules say as a whole can definitely make changes appear worse.
I've played two champion characters prior to remaster and the only major impact of the errata on either one is getting a little more mileage out of Divine Smite and holy strikes. The replacement of evil with unholy made a couple of feats (like Smite Evil) less appealing, and I hope Player Core 2 finds a way to improve on them. But you can also just take Attack of Opportunity instead or the other 6th level feats.
I think its also worth talking to your player about what specifically is appealing about champion for them. The appeal of my shisk redeemer was being able to negate damage to the party with the redeemer reaction, and if the enemy came for me instead I'm a heavily armored porcupine person who can damage them with quills. The appeal of my shoony paladin of Erastil was being a good boi and the paladin reaction. Errata barely touched the champion reaction and doesn't affect their armor proficiency progression.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Unless you're planning to marathon things, Player Core 2 will likely drop before your campaign reaches sixth level. In the mean time, the base champion is generally solid enough that your player will have fun.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
There are many vocal people who complain about the power ceiling in Pathfinder2e. But one of my favorite aspects of PF2 is that it also has a very solid power floor as a result. It is hard to build a character that isn't powerful enough to be fun to play.
I appreciate the input, but in case it wasn't clear- *I'm* the GM. I'm actually looking for advice on how to run this. I'm just trying to make sure my player that likes the idea of a Champion character has a good experience with it.
My initial thought for a reasonable way to house-rule it until we get the official remaster of the class is to suggest the Champion player take the Vengeful Oath feat, and allow them to treat people who have specifically committed crimes against their kingdom as Unholy.
Well, as the GM you can always add sanctified/unholy to specific NPCs if you want the Champion's smite to work on them. That doesn't require any structural change to the rules set you're using, or major change in the overall AP, and doesn't require the player to take any specific feat for their character. If you want the champion character to be able to smite Bob the evil cackling henchman, then just make Bob the evil cackling henchman sanctified to Asmodeus. It's not like "..and secretly a cultist of a dark god" is a rare backstory in a fantasy setting. Add it where necessary. Add it to whole towns if you feel like it...that seems to happen quite a lot in the genre lol. Or heck, just add it for flavor even when it's not necessary ;)
This occured to me as well but I forgot to mention it. Substituting minuons can be pretty easy, too. There are 157 feinds of various levels on Archives of Nethys and 344 undead , so finding something to swap out for the written in enemies of the same level should be straightforward.
You now can make unholy champions way more easier now too. Once they aren't no more necessarily bad but egoists.
Unholy champions are only restricted now to "commit an entirely altruistic act, such as giving something away in charity". So while you staying doing the things by your self, unholy champions, specially the desecrators are perfectly playable now.
|
You now can make unholy champions way more easier now too. Once they aren't no more necessarily bad but egoists.
Unholy champions are only restricted now to "commit an entirely altruistic act, such as giving something away in charity". So while you staying doing the things by your self, unholy champions, specially the desecrators are perfectly playable now.
"The holy trait indicates a powerful devotion to altruism, helping others, and battling against unholy forces like fiends and undead. The unholy trait, in turn, shows devotion to victimizing others, inflicting harm, and battling celestial powers."
(From the Remaster Core Preview).
Yet this isn't an anathema. There's no rules about not being pure evil or pure good due the holy/unholy trait.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
There are many vocal people who complain about the power ceiling in Pathfinder2e. But one of my favorite aspects of PF2 is that it also has a very solid power floor as a result. It is hard to build a character that isn't powerful enough to be fun to play.
This completely.
The player should create the PC they most want to play and then enjoy it.
Minmaxing can be fun to some players, which is perfectly fine, but it is not required from everyone.
You will find some good generic advice on building and playing a functioning PF2 character in many threads on the Advice forum.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
One of my players played a PF2 Champion from 3rd level to 20th level and her 9th-level Divine Smite ability to deal persistent good damage almost never mattered. The less common Unholy trait replacing evil as the requirement will make it matter less.
Most of the Champion's abilities against specifically evil creatures come from feats, such as Fiendsbane Oath or Shining Oath. My campaign involved fighting against hobgoblin armies, so we saw few fiends or undead besides an occasional barghest. The goblin champion Tikti never took those specialized Oath feats. That did leave the player disappointed in the remaining lackluster feats, such as taking Divine Health as filler at 4th level. She really wanted more feats to improve her animal companion.
I have a description of Tikti at How does a Liberator Champion Deal with Slavers? comment #45. Tikti was a strong character because she good use of her Champion's Reaction and Shield Block. Divine Smite and Oath feats were not necessary for the character.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Don't run Age of Ashes as your first campaign. Paizo has acknowledged the balance was off because the rules were being written at the same time as the adventure and no one was experienced with them yet. You risk demoralizing your players with unfair encounters which they won't know how to handle, nor will you know how to subtley lower that difficulty, though liberal application of the weak template to enemies or giving the PCs a level above the suggested progression can get you pretty far.
Abomination Vaults is probably the easiest campaign to GM and seems to be the most popular AP. It can still get pretty spicy, but many of the worst encounters feel are deliberate choices to get that sandbox vibe of running into things which out level you that force you to run, then come back for vengeance later. Quest for the Frozen Flame is cool but really specific and really benefits from a GM who can sprinkle in additional weapon runes and interesting content not found in the book. Strength of Thousands is also cool but really specific. Vaults is a more classic dungeon crawl which hits familiar tropes but executes them well without much extra creative effort from the GM.
AV also has plenty of unholy enemies, including those with weakness to unholy. Buuuuut champions are fraught because the most interesting way to play requires some moral flexibility to parlay with evil creatures who don't necessarily oppose you. I'd advise a god that favors mercy or a live and let live approach. Holy avenger types feel bad here.
I agree with others the champion will probably be fine thanks to its strong chassis, but there are two really easy solutions if you feel concerned.
1. Advise the player to skip these overly narrow feats.
2. Broaden them to just deal unrestricted spirit damage, which IMO is what should have happened in the first place. Just gives champion the same spirit damage buff as casters.
I appreciate the input, but in case it wasn't clear- *I'm* the GM. I'm actually looking for advice on how to run this. I'm just trying to make sure my player that likes the idea of a Champion character has a good experience with it.
My initial thought for a reasonable way to house-rule it until we get the official remaster of the class is to suggest the Champion player take the Vengeful Oath feat, and allow them to treat people who have specifically committed crimes against their kingdom as Unholy.
Well, as the GM you can always add sanctified/unholy to specific NPCs if you want the Champion's smite to work on them. That doesn't require any structural change to the rules set you're using, or major change in the overall AP, and doesn't require the player to take any specific feat for their character. If you want the champion character to be able to smite Bob the evil cackling henchman, then just make Bob the evil cackling henchman sanctified to Asmodeus. It's not like "..and secretly a cultist of a dark god" is a rare backstory in a fantasy setting. Add it where necessary. Add it to whole towns if you feel like it...that seems to happen quite a lot in the genre lol. Or heck, just add it for flavor even when it's not necessary ;)
This is an option, but a harder one than what I suggested. It also doesn't jive with the current data on sanctified humanoids. You need to be getting powers from Asmodeus to get the unholy trait, not just worship him. While I don't like this design choice and you can obviously ignore it, my read on the OP is they'd prefer to avoid changes as much as possible.
One of my players played a PF2 Champion from 3rd level to 20th level and her 9th-level Divine Smite ability to deal persistent good damage almost never mattered. The less common Unholy trait replacing evil as the requirement will make it matter less.
Divine Smite is actually a case where errata didn't make unholy a requirement, it simply replaced good damage with spirit damage with the holy trait. I certainly agree with you about its overall importance to the champion arsenal though.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I've run a couple of champions as a DM to level 17 plus and they are super annoying even without doing much damage. Their AC gets so nutty and their ability to block damage multiple times per round is super annoying as a GM. They are the class you have to plan around because a party moving around a shield using champion makes it that much harder to do much to them.
A champion doing a bunch of damage on top of their nutty AC would be too much, yet they do do fairly good damage just by virtue of striking and energy runes which become the majority of your damage at higher level.
If your player decides to not play a champion to high level in your campaign because their damage feels week, you'll probably be happier as a DM because your party will be easier to challenge. If your PC keeps playing a champion to high level, prepare to be annoyed as they tank their way through the game.
Yes if there's something in this game that looks like OP from a GM view point this the champion!
Their high defensive power (AC) + multiple reactions (2 shield blocks with Quick Shield Block + 2 champion reactions with Divine Reflexes) and able to even merge both reactions completely changes the game dynamics.
I have a champion player that doesn't feel that this wasn't enough and also put Protector Sphere to diminish the damage when he's out of reactions. In practice it's like that 70-90% of the melee monsters dmg output was gone when a champion is in the party! Many non-spell dmg focused encounters easily becomes trivial when the party has a champion in game. Not even a full healing cleric does so much diference into game challenge rate as the champions does.
|
|
Yes if there's something in this game that looks like OP from a GM view point this the champion!
Their high defensive power (AC) + multiple reactions (2 shield blocks with Quick Shield Block + 2 champion reactions with Divine Reflexes) and able to even merge both reactions completely changes the game dynamics.
I have a champion player that doesn't feel that this wasn't enough and also put Protector Sphere to diminish the damage when he's out of reactions. In practice it's like that 70-90% of the melee monsters dmg output was gone when a champion is in the party! Many non-spell dmg focused encounters easily becomes trivial when the party has a champion in game. Not even a full healing cleric does so much diference into game challenge rate as the champions does.
This makes me want to create a Champion MC Kineticist (Wood) for Timber Sentinel in addition to what you mentioned above.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
This makes me want to create a Champion MC Kineticist (Wood) for Timber Sentinel in addition to what you mentioned above.Yes if there's something in this game that looks like OP from a GM view point this the champion!
Their high defensive power (AC) + multiple reactions (2 shield blocks with Quick Shield Block + 2 champion reactions with Divine Reflexes) and able to even merge both reactions completely changes the game dynamics.
I have a champion player that doesn't feel that this wasn't enough and also put Protector Sphere to diminish the damage when he's out of reactions. In practice it's like that 70-90% of the melee monsters dmg output was gone when a champion is in the party! Many non-spell dmg focused encounters easily becomes trivial when the party has a champion in game. Not even a full healing cleric does so much diference into game challenge rate as the champions does.
Oh god!
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm going to be starting my first Pathfinder 2e campaign sometime next month, and I was looking for some input/advice from people more familiar with pf2e than I am. I'm heavily leaning toward the Kingmaker AP right now (though I haven't made a final decision) but I think my question would apply to a lot of APs.
Specifically, one of my players wants to run a Champion character. I'm concerned how well that will work with the current state of the champion in the Remaster rules- while I don't have the Kingmaker material to read though yet, my understanding from what I have read online is that it doesn't really have a lot of Unholy enemies. (I know we're getting the remastered champion in July, but that's well after the campaign is going to start, so we're stuck with it as-is for now)
So good on you for trying to handle trouble ahead of time.
As you've seen in other responses, there's a lot to the champion that should work fine in a campaign without many unholy enemies. Of course you'd want to warn the player that "super specializing in fighting demons isn't gonna do that much in this storyline". But champions have some other mechanical options to take that work fine with fairly neutralish enemies.
With all that in mind, you could also agree that once the remaster lands, some rebuilding is on the table for everyone. And you don't necessarily have to do it exactly according to the downtime rules or such. You could just say "hey, we've had time to read the new book, next week I want to switch over the rules, so let's see if there's things you would want different in your character based on that".
I've found that campaigns can run a lot smoother if you allow some "under the hood" rebuilding from time to time. The essential theme of the character might be "I punish bad people". You could do that as a paladin, but also as a fighter who just happens to single out those people that deserve it. So if the new champion rules turn out to be a big disappointment for the player, maybe retroactively they've been a fighter all along?