A GM that treats gold spent learning spells like consumables is going to have to make sure that prepared casters are getting more gold than other players, just like they would be expected to if one player was buying and using lots of consumables (like scrolls).I've never seen anything like that. And I would find that unfair if another character gets more money than mine. Martials need a fully runed weapon, casters don't, should they get more money then? In my opinion, such a conversation about character monetary needs will just generate bad feelings. All the parties I've been in have separated gold equally (unless the loot gave a specifically good item to one character and then this character was having less gold than the others).
Also, if a character starts siphoning money, the others will certainly want to have a say about this character spendings. Chances are high that some of your spells will be considered low priority by the party and as such no one will pay for them.
There are a lot of different ways to handle treasure. I play with many of the same players over and over again and we even change it up from campaign to campaign, based upon the party.
Sometimes we will decide to group our gold to buy one PC an item that is going to make a massive difference for the whole party, sometimes we track everything by gold and then have people buy everything, even stuff we found in an adventure if it just makes more sense for even one of the characters to be that obsessed with making sure they are getting paid fairly. Then much of the time we don't even really pay attention, divide up what we find by who wants it and don't really care who is ahead or behind.
But none of that changes the fact that the GM Core gives explicit advice about monitoring your party's characters individually and making sure that no one is falling way behind everyone else on total wealth.
And it is really not uncommon at all for a character who uses consumables a lot to end up way behind a character that never does when wealth is being split exactly evenly. Additionally, there is no official way to really keep track of how much a spell book adds to a character's total wealth, so tables are going to handle this all differently, so a caster who is buying and using a lot of scrolls, and copying them to their spell book often could very quickly end up far, far behind everyone else in the party on overall wealth. As the player this happens to often, it doesn't really bother me, but it is a weak spot in the overall game design if wealth is meant to be closely monitored, but prepared casters who learn spells don't have a clean or consistent method of factoring that into discussions about character wealth.
In other words, of course players who regularly feel like they are getting punished for trying to add spells to their book (something the game seems to assume is a part of the class design) are going to skew away from playing those classes and reporting back that those classes are bad. I don't think most tables are super restrictive on it though as the wizard and witch remain very popular classes and PFS throws so much wealth at players that you don't tend to see big disparities or at least, they don't tend to last that long.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
So you don't support your party, then when everyone inevitably fails without it, you swoop in claiming to be the hero?
That's not an adventurer. That's a dead weight with hero syndrome.
How did you get there? I'm quite puzzled.
But none of that changes the fact that the GM Core gives explicit advice about monitoring your party's characters individually and making sure that no one is falling way behind everyone else on total wealth.
I don't read that the way you do. For me, it's an advice to ensure that everyone gets their fair share of loot. But if someone decides to buy tons of consumables it's their choice and they won't get a refund because of that.
In other words, of course players who regularly feel like they are getting punished for trying to add spells to their book (something the game seems to assume is a part of the class design) are going to skew away from playing those classes and reporting back that those classes are bad.
I'm not sure it's that much of a big deal. You can play your caster fine with a rather small spellbook. And there are no real directions on how many spells you're supposed to learn so even if it's a part of the class design you can't really know how much wealth it is supposed to take.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I wanted to make the point the size of a spell list is irrelevant to the power of a class or a spell list.
Even a level 20 sorcerer with 47 known spells with a flexible spell known is using about 10% of a spell list. The wizard has a smaller number of spells prepared than the sorcerer in their repertoire and even fewer if they have to double up on a spell.
Spell list size very unimportant variable. Spell quality far more important. Size does not necessarily mean more quality.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yes, that's the conclusion I ended up with with my Sorcerer. Fireball, Chain Lightning, Heal, Divine Smite and True Striked Searing Light composed 80% of his combat spells for most of his career (in the late game you have so much choice you start using more spells). Pure prepared casters (I put aside Magus, Spell Substitution and Universalist Wizard) are specialized casters in my opinion. When you try to be intelligent with your prepared spells you lose a lot of durability (as you end your adventuring days with mostly subpar spells).
I also think it has an impact on the party. The higher the number of spells you use and the harder it is to play with you as your fellow teammates don't know what you will do and as such can't help you doing it. When I play my casters, the other players quickly learn which are my bread and butter spells (in general Fireball or Lightning Bolt during the mid levels) and position themselves so I can maximize my areas.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Another factor that will strongly affect the way that you approach prepared casters vs spontaneous casters and their spell selection is how your party approaches adventures and encounters in the first place. I realized after reading several of the responses here that a large number of folks here are first learning about a dungeon, adventure, encounter by walking into it with the expectation to solve/resolve it immediately and then move on to the next.
The tables I play with the most tend not to take that approach, and are pretty comfortable having a planning/investigating/infiltration/recon day (or even week) followed by an implementing the plan day. On the first kind of days, some combat back up plans are nice, but usually the plan is to run away and regroup before coming back. Not every book of every AP facilitates this, but it is a very common approach we take to dungeons/missions when we can. As a result, it is not uncommon to bring in a bunch of illusory disguises, ventriloquisms, pest forms, illusory objects, disguise magic, knock, lock, etc type spells on one day, and then none of those spells the "go day."
All of this revolves around having a shared understanding of player expectations and party composition. I play mostly with the same couple of groups. None of it is about what just one character can do on their own, it is about helping everyone have fun stuff to do through the whole process of information gathering, infiltration and then executing the plan. Utility spells in PF2 tend not to replace what characters can do with skills, but they can reduce the amount of overspecialization required from skill feat selection and skill increases by the party as a whole by a great margin. If your table is mostly choosing to engage encounters through combat (like 75+% of the time you spend playing) then a couple of scrolls in going to be enough to cover a lot of this stuff. If your party tends to do everything they can to avoid combat until it is absolutely necessary, then it is not uncommon for 75% of your play time to be out of combat problem solving. You are still going to want to be able to hit hard when those combats do break out, but you can accomplish that with a a couple of spells a day and some consumables just as easily as the other way around.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I also think it has an impact on the party. The higher the number of spells you use and the harder it is to play with you as your fellow teammates don't know what you will do and as such can't help you doing it. When I play my casters, the other players quickly learn which are my bread and butter spells (in general Fireball or Lightning Bolt during the mid levels) and position themselves so I can maximize my areas.
You point an interesting thing here. Usually the people tends to believe that due the higher versatility the casters need to adapt themselves to situation and to the martials strategies but what happens in practice many times are the opposite when you will try to use a large friend-fire AoE spell like a fireball (and many other spells with friend-fire effects or that requires that your allies stays in range) you usually needs the entire party collaboration to your spell works well. So try to use many unexpected actions that other party members are not well prepared to deal may give more trouble than solutions many times.
I have a party with 4 martial, a Thief Eldrith Archer and an occult sorcerer. The Eldrith Archer player usually expect that some martial (usally using Delay) puts a target off-guard in some way (because they love to Trip and Grab) to use its shots against this target getting the sneak attack bonuses easily to use with it eldritch shots.
This makes me thing that in this point probably a kineticist many times could have a better teamplay than a spellcaster because is easier to the both other players and kineticists to prepare teamplay tactics.
|
Mostly serious. Really almost no one almost never cares about actual group tactics around here. And as casters aren't seen as real damage dealers or valuable team members... who cares about them when there are real effective characters - melee damage dealers, of course? Oh, well, maybe sometimes ranged optimized magi. And the game mostly allows that.Hard to tell whether you're being serious or tongue in cheek, but I've played with a few Leeeeroy melee types. Who simply don't care that the casters want to use ranged AoE, they're going in. Can't imagine the sort of clusterbomb a game would be if you had that sort of "I do it my way and I don't flex" melee-focused player AND a "I do it my way and I don't flex" ranged AoE blaster player too. A recipe for tpk finger-pointing for sure. Every character optimizing their individual dpr choices /= optimized party. That's more like...everyone defecting in the prisoner's dilemma.
I play in PFS, sometimes with the same people, sometimes not. I often play a martial.
When, after 1 or 2 fights, I understand what a given caster's usual thing is, I adapt my tactics to give them the greatest opportunities possible. And I expect the same from them and from my other teammates.
I often saw casters berating martials for jumping into melee instead of delaying after the AoE spell. I almost never saw a caster explaining beforehand that their favorite tactic was a big fireball at the beginning of the fight and that they would prefer if martials delayed if possible.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think it works like that. They simply either help you or they never do (this here is true). Because almost all casters have one area spell or another, so it's almost always a good choice to ... ask and then give them a little space to use their area spells before you make a medley of enemies and allies. But who does that?! It's really unheard-of! So nobody, actually. Chop-chop-chop! Casters must get by as they can somehow.
Ah, yes. And flanking! Flanking! Flaaa-anking! FLANKING! Who cares if it's not always optimal or hinders casters?
It's not binary, it's a spectrum. When you tend to open fights with a Fireball/Lightning Bolt, most players quickly learn (these are not complex spells). And then, peer pressure serves you as you are no more the only one to disagree with Leroy Jenkins. Sometimes, it even ends up with the group agreeing on fireballing your ally, which is a good way to teach.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Repertoire casters IMO are the closest to those w/ "spell list paralysis" precisely because they don't have an easy time changing their selection once made.While Clerics have the full list to pick from each day, the fact that they can just freely pick the next day really does mean that it's kind of a nothing-burger to see a giant list.
This has been somewhat the opposite of my experience. Repertoire casters spend some time considering spells, but not significantly moreso than anyone else and do it during what's usually downtime (i.e. leveling up) too.
Cleric and Druid style prepared casters on the other hand not only have a lot of overhead but are expected to sometimes make decisions mid session (because it happens every time they rest). While the individual decisions are more reversible, the volume and frequency are significant enough to make them problematic. To the point where a significant number of prepared casters I've had in my games simply abandon their own mechanics and play like a spontaneous caster (i.e. picking their spells once and rarely, if ever, changing them).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Repertoire casters IMO are the closest to those w/ "spell list paralysis" precisely because they don't have an easy time changing their selection once made.While Clerics have the full list to pick from each day, the fact that they can just freely pick the next day really does mean that it's kind of a nothing-burger to see a giant list.
This has been somewhat the opposite of my experience. Repertoire casters spend some time considering spells, but not significantly moreso than anyone else and do it during what's usually downtime (i.e. leveling up) too.
Cleric and Druid style prepared casters on the other hand not only have a lot of overhead but are expected to sometimes make decisions mid session (because it happens every time they rest). While the individual decisions are more reversible, the volume and frequency are significant enough to make them problematic. To the point where a significant number of prepared casters I've had in my games simply abandon their own mechanics and play like a spontaneous caster (i.e. picking their spells once and rarely, if ever, changing them).
This is my experience too. Most complex thing I've seen is a friend coming up with a few spell arrays to adjust for general situations and designating a few slots as flexible slots to adjust for particular stuff whenever it was possible. Most people just have 1 spell array, slot out the least important spells they have when needed and call it a day.
I also somewhat agree with SuperBidi with the fewer the easiest it is to play around thing, but I would want to add to it. TL; DR, I don't think it applies to all spells.
Spells can either be disruptive or non-disruptive. A Fireball is disruptive, as it friendly fires. So does most battlefield control spells. Those you want to minimize to a degree for the sake of being easy to play around you (you also should let your group know what your general plan is if you have one, but that I think is a general advice that also applies to martials). There are lots of spells that do not care about your party in the slightest and for those your party should not care much if you use them or not because they won't need to forsee you using them to capitalize on what you do, just react to it. If I buff a martial, they don't need to prepare for it, they just need to make it count afterwards. Yes, they can do stuff in advance to make the buff more impactful, but it is not that important as them letting you cast your Fireballs and Walls of Stone, not even close.
Even as a spontaneous caster, I like having a few niche spells as long as they are the kind of spell my party does not need to play around. As long as you have good signatures, it does not matter that a particular slot of yours you only use once in a while as long as it is impactful when it gets casted
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Can't say my experience or preference is the same as yours.This kinda makes me change my mind about the OP subject. If spells like Synthesia are driving caster PCs to not only repeat the same tactics and spell lists game-to-game but insist all the other non-caster players dance to their tune, removing such spells has shifted in my mind from 'unnecessary detrimental removal' to 'better in that it encourages a wider set of play styles and an exploration of a wider set of spell choices.'
Man imagine being a spellcaster and having a favorite spell or set of spells and being told you're not only objectively wrong for feeling that way but are actively making Pathfinder worse.
Like I get where you're coming from but the discourse can sometimes feel kind of dehumanizing, especially when the attitude is largely flipped in the inverse scenario upthread.
Repertoire casters IMO are the closest to those w/ "spell list paralysis" precisely because they don't have an easy time changing their selection once made.While Clerics have the full list to pick from each day, the fact that they can just freely pick the next day really does mean that it's kind of a nothing-burger to see a giant list.
This has been somewhat the opposite of my experience. Repertoire casters spend some time considering spells, but not significantly moreso than anyone else and do it during what's usually downtime (i.e. leveling up) too.
Cleric and Druid style prepared casters on the other hand not only have a lot of overhead but are expected to sometimes make decisions mid session (because it happens every time they rest). While the individual decisions are more reversible, the volume and frequency are significant enough to make them problematic. To the point where a significant number of prepared casters I've had in my games simply abandon their own mechanics and play like a spontaneous caster (i.e. picking their spells once and rarely, if ever, changing them).
I agree. But what's interesting is spontaneous casters have more options during combat, and that means their cognitive load is more likely to hit at a point it slows other players down.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I agree. But what's interesting is spontaneous casters have more options during combat, and that means their cognitive load is more likely to hit at a point it slows other players down.
Repertoire casters IMO are the closest to those w/ "spell list paralysis" precisely because they don't have an easy time changing their selection once made.While Clerics have the full list to pick from each day, the fact that they can just freely pick the next day really does mean that it's kind of a nothing-burger to see a giant list.
This has been somewhat the opposite of my experience. Repertoire casters spend some time considering spells, but not significantly moreso than anyone else and do it during what's usually downtime (i.e. leveling up) too.
Cleric and Druid style prepared casters on the other hand not only have a lot of overhead but are expected to sometimes make decisions mid session (because it happens every time they rest). While the individual decisions are more reversible, the volume and frequency are significant enough to make them problematic. To the point where a significant number of prepared casters I've had in my games simply abandon their own mechanics and play like a spontaneous caster (i.e. picking their spells once and rarely, if ever, changing them).
Based only on my own personal experience, when I play a spontaneous caster with 4th rank spells, I tend to forget about the lower spells in my repertoire. Cognitive load is very light then.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Spells can either be disruptive or non-disruptive.
I somewhat disagree. Let's take the most classical "non-disruptive" spell: Heal. Heal has 30ft. of range and if you use the 3-action version you can't move. So despite being non-disruptive you need other characters to take it into account. Even debuffs generate changes in focus fire (there's no point in attacking the Slowed 2 enemy over those who succeeded at the save).
Most spells ask the party to adjust to them. It's just that buff/debuff/healing spells are positively welcome and as such martial players adjust more easily. Control spells on the other hand can generate a lot of issues.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Another factor that will strongly affect the way that you approach prepared casters vs spontaneous casters and their spell selection is how your party approaches adventures and encounters in the first place. I realized after reading several of the responses here that a large number of folks here are first learning about a dungeon, adventure, encounter by walking into it with the expectation to solve/resolve it immediately and then move on to the next.
It obviously depends. But even when you take the necessary time to recon the dungeon, I never see a party taking an entire day off for the prepared caster to review their spells. You rarely work on a time frame where losing an entire day is completely inconsequential.
So what you say only applies to Spell Substitution Wizard, which is not a Prepared caster per se.
Spells can either be disruptive or non-disruptive.I somewhat disagree. Let's take the most classical "non-disruptive" spell: Heal. Heal has 30ft. of range and if you use the 3-action version you can't move. So despite being non-disruptive you need other characters to take it into account. Even debuffs generate changes in focus fire (there's no point in attacking the Slowed 2 enemy over those who succeeded at the save).
Most spells ask the party to adjust to them. It's just that buff/debuff/healing spells are positively welcome and as such martial players adjust more easily. Control spells on the other hand can generate a lot of issues.
I may have oversimplified it a bit in my example above. Guess the idea would be better represented as a gradient. The more disruptive a spell is, the less you want other disruptive spells to not make strategy too hard to read.
Also, 3 action heal is not something I personally play around, either as a martial or the caster. If a good situation comes for it, I cast it, if not, I don't. Don't see a point in playing around it when the 2 action version is generally better.
Besides, since "stay close to your caster" is a strategy that applies to such a wide variety of spells, it is something that barely takes any effort to remember. Most people I've played with just do it instinctively.
You rarely work on a time frame where losing an entire day is completely inconsequential.
So what you say only applies to Spell Substitution Wizard, which is not a Prepared caster per se.
I think this is true for a fair number of tables, but it is almost always an arbitrary, self-imposed restriction. Which isn’t a good or bad thing inherently, it just changes a lot of expectations and assumptions about the game. A party spending the first day haphazardly pushing forward attacking encounters room by room can easily end up in a position where they have to leave to regroup enough to heal or buy resources they seriously lacked. Very few dungeons in APs expect you to be able to tackle them in one day anyway. You don’t lose a full day by having everyone focus on gathering information/recon or setting up an elaborate plan if it lets you deftly deal with major threats all at once the next day. The two times I have run abomination vaults the party often closed doors and ran away from threats only to come back the next day ready to roll them over. I don’t think such playstyles are all that rare. It is just a FM preference about whether to encourage it or punish it.
You rarely work on a time frame where losing an entire day is completely inconsequential.
So what you say only applies to Spell Substitution Wizard, which is not a Prepared caster per se.I think this is true for a fair number of tables, but it is almost always an arbitrary, self-imposed restriction. Which isn’t a good or bad thing inherently, it just changes a lot of expectations and assumptions about the game. A party spending the first day haphazardly pushing forward attacking encounters room by room can easily end up in a position where they have to leave to regroup enough to heal or buy resources they seriously lacked. Very few dungeons in APs expect you to be able to tackle them in one day anyway. You don’t lose a full day by having everyone focus on gathering information/recon or setting up an elaborate plan if it lets you deftly deal with major threats all at once the next day. The two times I have run abomination vaults the party often closed doors and ran away from threats only to come back the next day ready to roll them over. I don’t think such playstyles are all that rare. It is just a FM preference about whether to encourage it or punish it.
I agree with you generally, but I think Super played PFS which has very particular assumptions and structures to get through a self contained story in one night.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I agree with you generally, but I think Super played PFS which has very particular assumptions and structures to get through a self contained story in one night.
I play PFS, APs and adventures. So Paizo content.
You don’t lose a full day by having everyone focus on gathering information/recon or setting up an elaborate plan
No, you lose a full day when, after having done all of that, your Wizard tells you they need a day to prepare their spells again. Grabbing info and making a plan takes an hour or 2 in game time, not a day (or at least very rarely). And many groups will refuse the day off, mostly because it doesn't make much sense to completely stop the adventure for just a few spells.
Besides, since "stay close to your caster" is a strategy that applies to such a wide variety of spells
Same for: Avoid getting in the middle of the enemies when you have casters in your party. Overall, it's a question of teaching the others what you do (as carrying assumptions from one caster to another may lead to errors).
I almost never saw a caster explaining beforehand that their favorite tactic was a big fireball at the beginning of the fight and that they would prefer if martials delayed if possible.
We casters tend to stop doing that after the first few times our pre-battle advice got ignored.
Let the silly martial glory seekers dig their own hole.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Another factor that will strongly affect the way that you approach prepared casters vs spontaneous casters and their spell selection is how your party approaches adventures and encounters in the first place. I realized after reading several of the responses here that a large number of folks here are first learning about a dungeon, adventure, encounter by walking into it with the expectation to solve/resolve it immediately and then move on to the next.
The tables I play with the most tend not to take that approach, and are pretty comfortable having a planning/investigating/infiltration/recon day (or even week) followed by an implementing the plan day. On the first kind of days, some combat back up plans are nice, but usually the plan is to run away and regroup before coming back. Not every book of every AP facilitates this, but it is a very common approach we take to dungeons/missions when we can. As a result, it is not uncommon to bring in a bunch of illusory disguises, ventriloquisms, pest forms, illusory objects, disguise magic, knock, lock, etc type spells on one day, and then none of those spells the "go day."
All of this revolves around having a shared understanding of player expectations and party composition. I play mostly with the same couple of groups. None of it is about what just one character can do on their own, it is about helping everyone have fun stuff to do through the whole process of information gathering, infiltration and then executing the plan. Utility spells in PF2 tend not to replace what characters can do with skills, but they can reduce the amount of overspecialization required from skill feat selection and skill increases by the party as a whole by a great margin. If your table is mostly choosing to engage encounters through combat (like 75+% of the time you spend playing) then a couple of scrolls in going to be enough to cover a lot of this stuff. If your party tends to do everything they can to avoid combat until it is absolutely necessary, then it is not uncommon for 75% of...
This does matter.
My players don't like to spend time changing up if they know the can just drive a sword through the enemy to win. They like the most direct and easy to execute route.
If we had a wizard trying to change out spells for most encounters, it would start to irritate my group, especially if it wasn't necessary. They don't mind planning for an infiltration or some special encounter, but they are built to rip apart most encounters and don't want to spend time trying to come up with strategy when the go in and kill them strategy works just fine.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I’m going to echo Unicore and say that I am absolutely enjoying this thread as it is explaining a lot about perception of casters and how people play them in different groups. Unicore’s groups “dungeon delve as a Heist” vs. Deriven’s “We are a combinatron Steamroller” styles definitely mean the casters are going to be both perceived and played differently. And depending on the need for utility, the spell list is either going to be 90% ignored, or completely full of interesting options for creative casters to cleanse cuisine.
As a mostly martial player, I don’t really empathise with “creative casting” (most “creative” spell uses seem to be a variation on “Prestidigitation*”) but I do occasionally enjoy the “explore, define, trick, retreat” heist approach to bases/dungeons.
* I think the game would benefit from a Focus Spell for all casters that is a generic utility spell (akin to Prestidigitation) that “does (physical/temperature/gravitational/sound/waves/tele-/movement/you know etc) stuff”. It would streamline the list and remove the dross of 90% of the spell list. ;) It would of course, be powered by excessive amounts of handwavium. And because we have a worldwide shortage of handwavium (also known as GM/Player compact) we get a bazillion spells like “Thread Laces” and “Boop Snoots”.
I almost never saw a caster explaining beforehand that their favorite tactic was a big fireball at the beginning of the fight and that they would prefer if martials delayed if possible.We casters tend to stop doing that after the first few times our pre-battle advice got ignored.
Let the silly martial glory seekers dig their own hole.
I don't agree with RD's tone but I definitely agree with the conclusion: Lots of players don't want to speak about strategies. It doesn't mean that they can't adapt to strategies, just that it will have to come through experience and not pre-battle discussions. Obviously, there are also players who will never learn, but they are in the minority from my experience.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't agree with RD's tone but I definitely agree with the conclusion: Lots of players don't want to speak about strategies. It doesn't mean that they can't adapt to strategies, just that it will have to come through experience and not pre-battle discussions. Obviously, there are also players who will never learn, but they are in the minority from my experience.
A lot of the time you only really need three strategies per party. One for cruising through fights that don't matter, one for dealing with higher level enemies and one for dealing with large groups. Once your party knows what they're doing in these situations, there's rarely any need to adjust your overall combat strategy.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
A lot of the time you only really need three strategies per party. One for cruising through fights that don't matter, one for dealing with higher level enemies and one for dealing with large groups. Once your party knows what they're doing in these situations, there's rarely any need to adjust your overall combat strategy.
The game is complex enough to support much more strategies. Flying enemies, spellcasters, bruisers, archers, difficult terrain, visibility issues, swarm of enemies, solo boss, easy encounters, tough encounters, combined encounters, etc... so many combinations that can lead to so many strategies.
I don't agree with RD's tone but I definitely agree with the conclusion: Lots of players don't want to speak about strategies. It doesn't mean that they can't adapt to strategies, just that it will have to come through experience and not pre-battle discussions. Obviously, there are also players who will never learn, but they are in the minority from my experience.I almost never saw a caster explaining beforehand that their favorite tactic was a big fireball at the beginning of the fight and that they would prefer if martials delayed if possible.We casters tend to stop doing that after the first few times our pre-battle advice got ignored.
Let the silly martial glory seekers dig their own hole.
One legitimate concern I've heard is that reconnaissance attempts can make things far worse for the party when they fail--and not just in terms of the martial chargers' enjoyment either.
For example, I personally experienced one scenario in which my sorcerer/wizard used prying eye to scout out a mine full of enemies. The idea was that it would give us an idea of the layout, numbers and types of enemies, and give us advanced Recall Knowledge checks and Seek checks for traps. No downsides, right?
That is until an enemy with see invisibility noticed the eye in the first corridor, dispelled it, and put the whole mine on high alert.
Not only was our reconnaissance very limited as a result, we lost all element of surprise, and every encounter became much more challenging.
In that scenario, it could be argued that it would have been better to charge in blind. At least then we would have had the element of surprise.
The game is complex enough to support much more strategies. Flying enemies, spellcasters, bruisers, archers, difficult terrain, visibility issues, swarm of enemies, solo boss, easy encounters, tough encounters, combined encounters, etc... so many combinations that can lead to so many strategies.
Dealing with flying enemies, visibility and difficult terrain are handled by basic itemization or fly, a spell just about every caster takes. I wouldn't say buying an astral rune to deal with ghosts, or a wand of see the unseen are part of battle strategy, for example.
Easy, tough (swarm) and tough (solo) are what I outlined, though I'd say higher level rather than solo because you can still end up with a +3 with a few mooks. Combined encounters are just swarms, typically made easier by the delay.
That leaves adjustments for enemy type. For example, silence 4, wand of choking mist, slow, trip, grapple, etc are all tools you can use to make an enemy caster's life miserable through action denial and action taxes. Big brute? Slow, trip, reach stacking, difficult terrain, striding away, etc. All tools to make their life miserable through action denial and action taxes. Same strategy, slightly different implementation.
Is this an oversimplification? Of course. Action denial alone isn't going to win a fight and is typically only one component of the larger battle plan. My point is that groups tend to settle on an overall strategy and apply that strategy to all fights of a given type. Which they typically need to do so they can fit the tools to handle the other type of tough encounter.
What I'm not saying, is that there are only one or two strategies in the game. There are a lot of different ways parties can go about the business of killing the opposition. Just that they'll typically do it the same couple of ways every time, barring the rare circumstance where they can't.
I agree. But what's interesting is spontaneous casters have more options during combat, and that means their cognitive load is more likely to hit at a point it slows other players down.
Repertoire casters IMO are the closest to those w/ "spell list paralysis" precisely because they don't have an easy time changing their selection once made.While Clerics have the full list to pick from each day, the fact that they can just freely pick the next day really does mean that it's kind of a nothing-burger to see a giant list.
This has been somewhat the opposite of my experience. Repertoire casters spend some time considering spells, but not significantly moreso than anyone else and do it during what's usually downtime (i.e. leveling up) too.
Cleric and Druid style prepared casters on the other hand not only have a lot of overhead but are expected to sometimes make decisions mid session (because it happens every time they rest). While the individual decisions are more reversible, the volume and frequency are significant enough to make them problematic. To the point where a significant number of prepared casters I've had in my games simply abandon their own mechanics and play like a spontaneous caster (i.e. picking their spells once and rarely, if ever, changing them).
This depends heavily on spell selection.
As a sorcerer I will pick 1 spell i plan to use in combat per spell rank, everything else is more situational like charm or fly. I generally know what im throwing at enemies because i only play a sorcerer to cast those particular spells.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Dealing with flying enemies, visibility and difficult terrain are handled by basic itemization or fly, a spell just about every caster takes.
I never take Fly (even if I always have a Scroll in case of), I consider that everyone is supposed to handle basic fights by themselves. That's why I say the party needs to think about these situations because there are no real assumptions you should make as everyone plays differently.
Combined encounters are just swarms, typically made easier by the delay.
Easier? I think we don't have the same definition of "combined encounters".
My point is that groups tend to settle on an overall strategy and apply that strategy to all fights of a given type.
It depends on the tactical acument of said groups. Groups of tactical players who are used to play together can settle on a whole bunch of strategies.
I never take Fly (even if I always have a Scroll in case of), I consider that everyone is supposed to handle basic fights by themselves. That's why I say the party needs to think about these situations because there are no real assumptions you should make as everyone plays differently.
I fully agree. Everyone should have their own flight by level 9 when the tattoo becomes available. But sure, if the local mage isn't taking fly to cover 7-8 then you itemize for it with a backup bow or extending rune. It's trivial in any case.
Easier? I think we don't have the same definition of "combined encounters".
What's yours? I assumed multiple consecutive discrete groups of enemies with at minimum a round or two delay between reinforcements.
It depends on the tactical acument of said groups. Groups of tactical players who are used to play together can settle on a whole bunch of strategies.
Enlighten me then. What are two or three different ways that a single one of your groups use to handle the same type of severe or harder encounters?
I think the game would benefit from a Focus Spell for all casters that is a generic utility spell (akin to Prestidigitation) that “does (physical/temperature/gravitational/sound/waves/tele-/movement/you know etc) stuff”. It would streamline the list and remove the dross of 90% of the spell list. ;) It would of course, be powered by excessive amounts of handwavium. And because we have a worldwide shortage of handwavium (also known as GM/Player compact) we get a bazillion spells like “Thread Laces” and “Boop Snoots”.Hmm. I don't understand the idea. What's wrong with exactly Prestidigitation for that? And why should it be Focus? And how would it replace a whole 90% of the spell list?
Well, if Prestidigitation is fine for most utility options, then you don’t need a lot of the other non-combat “moves/alters/cleans/obscures/heats/cools/shatters/mends etc” spells.
So perhaps not 90% of spells but a large portion of “utility spells” that are to a greater and lesser extent merely a variation on Prestidigitation. A Focus version would be for larger effects, that any caster can do, that is/are magic, whether Occult/Primal/Divine/Arcane. But like I said, as this is powered by handwavium, its very generality needs a lot of mutual buy in from player and GM.
My overall point is that there are endless tiny spells across PF1/PF2/PF2R that each do one particular thing that seem kinda pointless 99.9% of the time, and are super specific. I get it. Many publishers create acres of trees worth of spells. Casters seem to love them. But mostly they seem like either variations on a well-trodden theme, super specific so as to be pointless in most games or…occasionally, interesting and possibly effective in or out of combat.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
What's yours? I assumed multiple consecutive discrete groups of enemies with at minimum a round or two delay between reinforcements.
Multiple encounters triggered simultaneously. Like when an enemy sets the alarm off in the middle of a dungeon and you now have to face half of it. It's close to what you say but you were stating that combined encounters were "easier" which is the exact opposite of what they are: deadly.
Enlighten me then. What are two or three different ways that a single one of your groups use to handle the same type of severe or harder encounters?
Not the same type of encounters, different types of encounters and situations (obviously, why changing strategy if you face the same type of encounter). As for my "groups", they change a lot. I never play with the same players so none of them managed to have a high number of strategies.
But overall, I could speak about strategies in PF2 for quite some time. There are really lots of things to adjust to, from number of enemies to terrain to enemy types to external factors to PC's goal, etc...
|
|
What's yours? I assumed multiple consecutive discrete groups of enemies with at minimum a round or two delay between reinforcements.Multiple encounters triggered simultaneously. Like when an enemy sets the alarm off in the middle of a dungeon and you now have to face half of it. It's close to what you say but you were stating that combined encounters were "easier" which is the exact opposite of what they are: deadly.
I have the same definition as SuperBidi : several discrete encounters of standard difficulty that are somehow merged together.
I feel gesalt's definition is of what I call a waves encounter : an encounter of standard difficulty but organized as several waves of enemies.
I understand how The Raven Black and Superbidi see "wave" encounters, but I play more like gesalt
As I see it combined encounters are turned into wave encounters by controlling how quickly they can organize and move to attack. Our group will often do combined encounters meaning they roll initiative at the same time start to act, but we control where they move to and what we consider the "kill zone." We funnel the monsters into the kill zone to die as fast as we can kill them focus firing the targets.
We often use spells in a strategic fashion to divide the fight. Walls are especially good at turning combined encounters into waves.
The one concern my players always have is ensuring they do not engage in an area where they can be surrounded. They are very cognizant of allowing the enemy to pull them into an area where their numbers can overwhelm them. Numbers are only good if they can bring their numerical superiority to bear. So the strategy is to ensure that does not happen by creating the kill/control zone using spells, positioning, and terrain.
Our group needs combined encounters to be challenged at all, otherwise we will just steamroll most encounters with minimal resource use.
Our strategic decisions are already made during the character building phase. I know many players don't have this luxury where the group builds the strategy within the party's capabilities from the ground up.
I know SuperBidiplays in a lot of different groups and he is often the most strategic in his group. So he's built his strategy to operate in that environment where he ensures his character has strategic options and if the party or some of the party want to work with him, he adapts as needed.
Whereas gesalt sounds like he plays in a group similar to mine where the strategy is built within the group at the point of character creation and becomes better as you level more.
I think that different strategies often end up being necessary when you're in a group where SuperBidi is focused on strategy and Fighter Joe is deciding to Sudden Charge into battle without worrying a great deal about what the other party members are doing.
My group does not do this with rare exception. We use delay actions often. Rogues are often delaying until the more durable martials engage to set up flank for sneak attack. We have a marching order with hard martials at the strong. Rogue or high perception class checks the door or room, falls back for the tank martial to enter first. We do this as we crawl through dungeons or forts or in practically any battle. They communicate clearly who to kill first starting with casters focusing ranged firepower on casters.
This is all accounted for during character creation.
I imagine it must really get wild in PF2 when the party is operating as sort of separate entities only loosely working together. Hard to group strategize in that environment.
The pois if "wave" encounters will be more deadly or not in practice depends of how the players have control and knowledge about it.
This is the difference between use a fireball or a wall of stone in the door or save some slots to use healing spells once that they know that they won't have time to refocus and to off-encounter healing.
But I need to point that this difference usually not only depends from the GM but many times from the players own decisions. Things like scout ahead, use magic to get more info and even try to spare some enemies to intimidate them to provide more info can turn many wave encounters way more trivial. That's why the gameplay experience can greatly differ from table to table.
The pois if "wave" encounters will be more deadly or not in practice depends of how the players have control and knowledge about it.
If the players know that new enemies will enter into the encounter after some rounds they had chance to prepare themselves to better positioning, to save and select the right resources to use and so on.
If the players don't know that new enemies are coming their decisions probably will be way more immediate and focused into defeat the current enemies without worry about to save resources to the immediate enemies coming in next rounds.
In my opinion, the first one is a description of a wave encounter: When a single encounter is built with multiple waves of enemies giving a proper challenge with quite some knowledge on the player side.
The second describes a combined encounter, when crap hits the fan and you suddenly end up in a messy situations with enemies coming potentially from everywhere at any time.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Calliope5431 said it much better than I could. The problem seems to be built into the game - either you have “ironclad specificity” over a multitude of possibilities, or you have a stylistic agreement as to what works how and what doesn’t. The former definitely seems to be a race to the bottom with lessening returns, while the latter seems to hinge on “don’t be a dick”. I kinda prefer the dickless option. Saves on paper, and dicks.
|
|
The pois if "wave" encounters will be more deadly or not in practice depends of how the players have control and knowledge about it.
If the players know that new enemies will enter into the encounter after some rounds they had chance to prepare themselves to better positioning, to save and select the right resources to use and so on.
If the players don't know that new enemies are coming their decisions probably will be way more immediate and focused into defeat the current enemies without worry about to save resources to the immediate enemies coming in next rounds. In my opinion, the first one is a description of a wave encounter: When a single encounter is built with multiple waves of enemies giving a proper challenge with quite some knowledge on the player side.
The second describes a combined encounter, when crap hits the fan and you suddenly end up in a messy situations with enemies coming potentially from everywhere at any time.
To be clearer on my own definitions :
Sum up the encounter budget for all the opponents the PCs are facing without the opportunity to heal back to full.
If the budget is still in the encounters budget table, it's a waves encounter.
If it is definitely above the max of the budget table, it's a combined encounter (aka TPK).
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
... we get a bazillion spells like “Thread Laces” and “Boop Snoots”.
Ooh, sorry, which book is Boop Snoots in? Is it on the Divine list? AoN doesn't seem to have it yet and like, my kitsune's dating a kobold and a ysoki and there's a bunch of pets around, it's a very target-rich environment.