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I just finished running a series of 16 combats (with some repeats due to losses) for the Commander and Guardian. In total, we did this twice, the first time we overall didn't feel the Guardian fit with the party so we tried to make a party that would help the Guardian shine, then reran all 16 combats. In total we did 36 fights including the repeats.
The building rules tried to keep as close as what we know is in the remaster. This meant sources were limited to *Player Core* and *Rage of the Elements*. We didn't get *Howl of the Wild* until midway through the playtests. The *Advanced Player's Guide* was also added in because some APG content is in Player Core.
The party is all martial, deliberately so we could run each combat "in isolation" so to speak. Each combat is part of a single encounter day, the only daily resource is Battle Medicine on the Commmander which wasn't actually used that frequently, and Nephilim Wings on the melee party so they don't get cheesed by ranged flying enemies. All characters have 1 hero point per combat.
I'll just open with the closing thoughts on the two classes as the rest of this post will be detailing the builds, combats and efficacy of each class in each combat.
Commander
- Power wise, Targeting Strike + Strike Hard! or Piranha Assault + Targeting Strike + Aid/Strike is fine
- The issue is that this is pretty much all the Commander ever did in these playtests.
- The mobility tactics that use Steps *do not scale well* into later levels, when monsters start getting large reach, big aoes, etc. These micro-repositioning tools just do not do anything anymore, a single Step barely changes the map.
- Many other tactics are very specific, requiring 2 or more characters be invested in a particular thing (Reload, Raise Shield, etc.) to even be action positive, or can only work if you have an Athletics character *and* they're in position (All the athletics ones).
- Nothing really *competes* with Strike Hard because its the only one that's general enough to work regardless of party makeup, and usually regardless of enemy positioning.
My three suggestions are as follows
1) *Generalize* a few tactics, or make them apply to the Commander + 1 ally. The reload and raise shield ones could be combined into a single tactic that allows the use of one of these 1 action abilities, such as "Each Squadmate uses one of the following actions: Reload, Raise a Shield, Prepare to Aid or Seek". Another 1a tactic could be "One ally Steps, Strides or Escapes as a reaction". Another 1a tactic could enable an ally to use any 1a skill action.
2) *Increase* the breadth of what the commander does as a support class. Currently it only moves stuff around and enables strikes. If you don't need to move stuff, your only option is to hit Strike. The following support tools are missing from the commander's kit and they could use them as tactics: Anything that allows an escape or a reroll against a failed save, anything to help out against conditions, defensive benefits such as ac/save bonuses or thp grants.
3) *Remove* the limit of an ally only being able to respond to one tactic per round. This is just a really awkward limitation that I don't see the need for, and it causes rules questions on what responding to a tactic even means? Does it mean using an action granted by a tactic, or benefiting from a tactic at all?
Guardian
- I was originally going to type up a much more detailed post on its various issues, but I ultimately think it comes down to one thing: This class is far too constrained by "Martial Realism", and as such it's not only lacking *flashy* abilities, but it also starts running into various natural counters to its abilities that it can't do anything about.
- Hampering Sweeps did help out in some combats, but was a total blank in others.
- Yes, Taunt was used on enemies that are far away to get them to either move to the guardian or eat the penalty. Most of the time they didn't care.
- Really awkward that taunt's penalty doesn't stack with prone's penalty when you often want to trip.
My suggestions are as follows
1) If the class is trying to be an *annoying* defender, one that *can't* be ignored without significant action econ issues, then it needs to be better at that. Make shove and reposition scale properly with reach on monsters (+5 ft at expert athletics, another +5 at master and legendary). Other buffs to grab and trip so it can keep monsters locked up, if they want to hit your allies they have to spend extra actions. Let it pull enemies with its taunt.
2) If the class is trying to be a *punishing* defender, in the vein of champion, then it needs an actual punish. *Intercept Strike* is not a punish, it doesn't really impact the foe at all, it just shuffles damage around a bit. Ferocious Vengeance's benefits are far too small for enemies to care about, given Guardian is also behind on martial progression 50% of the time.
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Party 1 - Fighter (Halberd), Rogue (Ruffian), Commander, Guardian (Mitigate Harm)
These characters are level 10, with the level 10 starting wealth using the "midway through xth level" rule, so they have a 10th level item.
Both melees have Nephilim Wings to prevent getting cheesed by ranged flying enemies.
For both parties, the weapon rune choices are Frost and Astral. Guardian has only a +1 striking shield boss, chose a 10th level sturdy shield for their 10th level item.
Fighter's build
1 - Sudden Charge
2 - Blessed One Dedication
4 - Blessed Sacrifice (for the extra FP)
6 - Lunge
8 - Felling Strike
(9) - Sudden Leap
10 - Tactical Reflexes
Rogue's build (Longspear)
1 - Tumble Behind
2 - Blessed One Dedication
4 - Blessed Sacrifice
6 - Gang Up (this was hugely buffed with Player Core)
8 - Opportune Backstab
10 - Vicious Debilitations
Commander's Build (Piranha Assault, End It, Strike Hard, Pincer Attack, Form Up, Shortbow)
1 - Combat Medic
2 - Beastmaster Dedication
4 - Mature Beastmaster Companion
6 - Efficient Preparation
8 - Guiding Shot
10 - Targeting Strike
Guardian's Build (Mitigate Harm)
1 - Long-Distance Taunt
(1 Natural Ambition) - Larger than Life
2 - Shielding Taunt
4 - Blessed One Dedication
6 - Blessed Sacrifice
8 - Group Taunt
10 - Quick Intercept
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Party 2 - Fighter (Eldritch Archer), Fighter (Bow), Commander, Guardian
Why no Ranger? Fighter works better with Commander because their damage bonus (higher accuracy) applies to Strike Hard. Precision likely won't as its 1/round and flurry definitely won't.
Guardian's build
- Only change is Quick Intercept -> Hampering Sweeps
Fighter (EA)'s build (Longbow)
1 - Point Blank Stance
2 - Cleric Dedication (Sarenrae)
4 - Basic Dedication (Domain Initiate - Fire)
6 - Advanced Dedication (Domain Initiate - Truth for the extra FP)
8 - Eldritch Archer Dedication
(9) - Blind-Fight
10 - Debilitating Shot
Fighter (No EA's) build (Longbow)
1 - Point Blank Stance
2 - Rogue Dedication
4 - Sneak Attacker
6 - Basic Trickery (Nimble Dodge)
8 - Felling Strike
(9) - Blind-Fight
10 - Debilitating Shot
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Encounters (Melee party)
Encounter 1 - 2x Jah-Tohl, 1x Nilith (Moderate)
Init - Fighter, Rogue, Jah-Tohl (bottom), Nilith, Jah-Tohl (Top), Commander, Guardian
Nilith starts invisible as it has at will level 4 invis
- Not very difficult, as expected from a moderate. Rogue dropped to ~1/3 and was healed up by Lay on Hands.
- Commander seemed pretty good with targetting strike + strike hard
- Mobility issues may be apparent with commander
- Guardian did nothing this fight.
Encounter 2 - 1x Paleohemoth
Init - Fighter, Rogue, Guardian, Paleohemoth, Commander
- Intercept Strike kind of useful here to shift fossilisation from more important targets to the guardian
- Being able to do it twice with Quick Intercept allowed them to take 2 hits, but fossil only triggers once a round, which was beneficial
- Commander's Piranha Strike added probably 30-40 damage, pretty good
Encounter 3 - 4x Cave Bear, 4x Smilodon (Moderate)
Init - Guardian, Rogue, Commander, Leftmost Bear, Fighter, middle-right bear, middle-right smilodon, rightmost smilodon, rightmost bear, middle-left bear, leftmost smilodon, middle-left smilodon
- Fighter armor gets broken, Intercept strike does nothing to prevent it
- Not really all that difficult as you'd expect from a bunch of -4s with no real special abilities. Grab changes hit hard.
- Predictably the guardian does very little in this fight, their taunt is terrible vs multiple enemies... but its also bad against a single large enemy.
Encounter 4 - 2x Mammoth
Init - Rogue, Guardian, Fighter, Commander, Bottom Mammoth, Top Mammoth
- Mammoth gets nuked before first turn
- Guardian... prevents a second dual tusk by doing an assurance trip and absorbs 24
Encounter 5 - 1x Lich, 4x Zombie Hulk (Severe)
Init - Fighter, Lich, Guardian, Rightmost Zombie, Rogue, Commander, other 3 zombies
- Rogue & Guardian both fail their frightful presence saves with HP reroll, Commander & Fighter CS
- Party gets 2 CF dominates and loses
- Guardian way better against the party bodyguarding the lich than for the party
Encounter 5 (try 2)
Init - Rogue, Fighter (HP reroll), Guardian, Commander, Lich, 4 zombies
- Party loses, Fighter got dominated, saved out, dominated again. Crit allies three times while dominated. Rogue and Guardian could not do enough damage to put lich into the ground.
- Commander very good showing with Piranha assault
- Guardian still not very useful
Encounter 6 - 4x Mummy Guardian, 1x Mummy Pharaoh, 1x Elite Mummy Pharaoh (Severe)
Init - Fighter, Rogue, Elite Mummy Pharaoh, Mummy Guardian (middle-left), Mummy Pharaoh, Mummy Guardian (middle-right), Mummy Guardian (Left), Guardian, Commander, Mummy Guardian (Right)
- Tiny map, plenty of chokepoints, guardian still finds it difficult to do anything
- Friendly fired with Sandstorm Wrath too much
- Not a very difficult encounter still, rogue and fighter are able to tumble past the frontline and kill the pharaohs.
Encounter 7 - 1x Iron Warden (Severe)
Init - Rogue, Iron Warden, Guardian, Commander, Fighter
- Piranha strike continues being very useful
- Taunt possibly did something by forcing the warden into Inexorable March instead of just hitting the fighter, which made it take an AoO. Probably a misplay and should have just hit fighter with the penalty.
Encounter 8 - 1x Gosreg, 1x Gongorinan (Severe)
Init - Commander, Fighter, Rogue, Gosreg, Guardian, Gongorinian
- Guardian Taunt kinda did something in making the Gongorinan's club attack vs the fighter a bit worse. Fighter still got disarmed and weapon stolen though, if gongo had better init this could have gone differently.
- Piranha still useful
Encounter 9 - 2x Roc, 2x Young Mirage Dragon (Severe)
Init - Rogue, Fighter, Guardian, Roc (Right), Commander, Roc (Left), 2 mirage dragons
Init (Try 2) - Mirage Dragon (Right), Commander, Fighter, Rogue, Roc (Left), Guardian, Mirage Dragon (Left), Roc (Right)
- Party lost the first time, won the second time. Bunch of flying enemies that outreach them, some Sudden Leap + Felling Strikes were used.
- We actually did discover an issue with the commander here - they’re entirely land bound. All their stuff is Step or Stride. Should definitely say Burrow, Climb, Fly or Swim if you have the appropriate speed. Unsure what to do about their Step tactics when flight becomes commonplace, maybe Step has descaled so much by then and you’re so high level that you’re spamming the level 15 tactic anyway.
- Taunt probably had its best showing here, and even then the net effect of it was still about neutral, preventing a couple hits on the party, but making the guardian take a couple hits. Also the wording on “hostile action that does not target the guardian” could stand to use some clarity on if its supposed to be whether the entire activity targets the guardian at all.
Encounter 10 - 3x Tyrannosaurus (Severe)
Init - Fighter, Guardian, Rogue, Tyrannosaurus (Middle), Tyrannosaurus (Left), Commander, Tyrannosaurus (Right)
- Speed ruling: Tyrannosauruses cannot interact to pick up items (Prevents fighter or rogue getting disarm cheesed)
- Some extremely poor rolls from the tyrannos on round 1, everything 5 or less
- Guardian's contribution is assurance trip, which is something they can do with Larger than Life. Not particularly stellar though
- Too easy, party wins
Encounter 11 - 4x Chimaera, 4x Desert Drake (Extreme)
Init - The party, everything else
- Didn't finish but likely a loss for the party. Flying enemies with an effectively ranged attack in their breath means the melees had to activate Divine Wings to get up there, losing a turn of tempo, or sit on the ground taking them out one at a time with felling strike sudden leap.
- Guardian more useful than Champion here.
Encounter 12 - 6x Zecui, 6x Choral, 4x Jungle Drake (Extreme)
Init - Rogue, Fighter, 1 Choral, 3 Drakes, 2 Zecui, Guardian, Drake, Commander, 5 Chorals and 4 Zecui
- Called approx midway through round one, probably a 50/50 win loss (maybe slightly enemy favoured). Verdict: Guardian useful here, uncertain whether better or equal to champion.
- Guardian slightly screwed by Counter Performance.
- Running theme: Guardian only useful on large maps with tons of enemies. Too few enemies and they just pass taunt saves, too small of a map and its easy to gang up on the guardian. Large maps allow you to taunt far away creatures for a consistent penalty.
Encounter 13 - 2x Deadly Mantis, 1x Tyrannosaurus (Extreme)
Init - Mantis (Right), Rogue, Mantis (Left), Tyranno, Rest of Party
- Party loses, not really all that close.
- Both Guardian and Champion would struggle with this encounter. Deadly Mantises are no joke. - Leaping Grab separates party members preventing focus fire. Also prevents intercept or champion reaction. Rending Mandibles cracks armor making the crits roll. Very hard to escape.
Ultimately Champion is likely slightly better if only because it forces a Leaping Grab on them to separate them from the party and turn off the reaction, rather than Taunt not really doing that.
- Tyranno swallows Commander, Commander completely unable to do anything while swallowed. Not a problem unique to the commander by any stretch. Rupture threshold too high for fighter to hit, rogue is grabbed by a mantis far away.
Encounter 14 - 4x Greater Hellhound, 1x Fire Giant (Extreme)
Init - Guardian, Hellhound (Left), Fighter, Commander, Fire Giant, Hellhounds (both right), Rogue, Hellhound (Middle-left)
- Guardian buys a round for the party by taunting the entire opfor, immediately gets thrown in the blender of hellfire breaths and flanking strikes. Survives only due to *supremely* poor damage rolls, and even then only barely.
- Still a win, triple frost runes against cold weak enemies.
Encounter 15 - 1x Weak Mukradi (Extreme)
Init - The party, weak mukradi
- Party critted (x2, nat 20s) and succeeded on mukradi breath. Very lucky.
- Guardian can't do anything in this combat. Single entity is their nightmare, Sweeps wouldn't help cos of 2 melee chars.
- Party wins.
Encounter 16 - 1x Snow Oni, 1x Adult Horned Dragon (Extreme+)
Init - Rogue, Fighter, Guardian, Snow Oni, Commander, Adult Horned Dragon
- Snow Oni died on round 1, spirit weakness 15 (+5 beans) against a party full of astral runes. Beans were thrown to frighten 2.
- Got cheesed by the Ancient Horned Dragon individually Impaling Horning on character, flying them hundreds of feet into the air and then death dropping them if they couldn't fly or just fighting them 1v1 (level 12 enemy vs level 10 PC).
- Guardian couldn't meaningfully assist, both enemies just passed their taunt saves.
- Champion would probably be better here, certainly better against the Snow Oni and will probably do more damage trying to 1v1 an Adult Horned Dragon.
- Party loses.
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Ranged Party's combats
All inits are identical for consistency, this party has the same init bonuses anyway.
Encounter 1 - 2x Jah-Tohl, 1x Nilith (starts invisible as it has at will invisibility)(Moderate)
- Map is a little narrow so I had to move a bit awkwardly to play around reach weapon hampering sweeps.
- Flicker somewhat counters Hampering Sweeps, though it needs to be sustained to do so, so its not a real counter.
- Pretty easy encounter overall. Guardian couldn't help against Visions of Death, but they're also the only party member without Forlorn so they were the target.
Encounter 2 - 1x Paleohemoth (Moderate)
- Pretty good showing for Sweeps here, keeping the Paleo focused on the guardian and unable to escape. A reach weapon means it has to succeed at 2 shoves (or crit a shove) to get out of Sweeps. Also the entire party has frost runes, so Piranha assault made quick work of this.
Encounter 3 - 4x Cave Bear, 4x Smilodon (Moderate)
- Taunt and Sweeps managed to keep a number of enemies focused on the Guardian, though they were incentivised to attack the Guardian anyway due to armor break.
Encounter 4 - 2x Mammoth (Moderate)
- Hampering Sweeps, and the Guardian, do nothing here due to Grabbing Trunk. It's trivial for a Mammoth to pick up the Guardian, move them in such a way that they can't Intercept Strike while still being in Dual Tusk range with another PC, and beat them up. Taunt does nothing either because Dual Tusk targets the guardian and someone else.
- Party still wins but takes significantly more damage than the other party doing so.
Encounter 5 - 1x Lich, 4x Zombie Hulk (Severe)
- The all ranged party and debilitating shot prevents a Stride->Dominate (or straight Dominate) on the first turn, unfortunately 2x DC36 Chain Lightning destroys the party instead.
- The Guardian does nothing in this encounter. Hampering Sweeps cannot help against an enemy with casting or range.
- Piranha Assault is the only thing making this vaguely doable but even then it would need a lot of luck. The melee party probably just needed good init and to pass 1 dominate save, the ranged party needed a lot more.
Encounter 6 - 1x Elite Mummy Pharaoh, 1x Mummy Pharaoh, 4x Mummy Guardian (Severe)
- Bad map for ranged party, really small, tight chokepoints and cover issues.
- Hampering Sweeps does help keep the Mummy Pharaohs away from the ranged chars, preventing reach AoOs from messing up their days.
- High will enemies, bad for Taunt.
- Party still wins but needed a bit of in combat healing.
Encounter 7 - 1x Iron Warden (Severe)
- Sweeps stops it dead, though Inexorable March is something of a counter.
- Highly mobile ranged characters + debilitating shot = this enemy can't do much.
- Didn't really need the Guardian.
Encounter 8 - 1x Gosreg, 1x Gongorinan (Severe)
- Party just severely lacking in damage to actually kill these enemies before the save or sucks start coming. Commander CFs against Calamity, but saves out of it. Eldritch archer passes vs Petrify, fails vs Baleful Polymorph, spends the rest of the fight unable to pass the will save.
- Guardian cannot help against save or sucks, not can it help against broadcasted Mind Bolt.
Sweeps does help lock the Gongorinan in place so it can't fly over to the fighters, knock their bows out of their hands with Reject Tools, pick them up and fly away.
Encounter 9 - 2x Roc, 2x Young Mirage Dragon (Severe)
- Significantly easier for this party than for the melee party, can naturally hit the flying monsters they want with ranged attacks. No one except the Guardian really cares about the Rocs dragging them around.
- Guardian does some stuff with Taunt and moving away from the enemies to provide a penalty, Hampering Sweeps predictably not useful in this encounter. Champion would likely be better than Guardian here as the mirages need to go melee once their breaths are expended.
Encounter 10 - 3x Tyrannosaurus (Severe)
- First time Form Up has been used, getting the party away from the Tyrannos while the guardian stalls them with assurance trips. The combo of Debilitating Shot, Form Up and Assurance Trip prevents swallow on any of the three ranged characters. Larger Than Life prevents the Tyrannos swallowing the guardian because their swallow size limit is medium.
- Form Up replaced End It!, which was also attempted but was ultimately just not a good idea in this combat. Form Up was a guaranteed win, End It! gave a check.
Encounter 11 - 4x Desert Drake, 4x Chimaera (Extreme)
- The all ranged nature of this party meant they were able to split up a lot better than the melee one, making it so the breaths could only hit 1 character.
- Guardian taunted most of the enemies, so they all focus fired the guardian with their breaths. Guardian bought about a round and a half worth of enemy damage before going down, party lacked the damage to actually kill enough enemies in this time though, so the remaining enemies killed them.
Encounter 12 - 6x Zecui, 6x Choral, 4x Jungle Drake (Extreme)
- Party doesn't have the damage output to beat enough of these enemies before they get beaten into the floor
- Hampering Sweeps not useful here, taunt minorly useful but 2 of the enemies nat 20'd it.
- Choral's pure sonic damage on their ranged attack bad feels for Intercept Strike. They didn't use divine decree or noise blast because of the triple high fort juggernauts against dc23.
Encounter 13 - 2x Deadly Mantis, 1x Tyrannosaurus (Extreme)
- Party does better here than the melee party, similar to the rocs encounter getting grabbed and forced moved away from each other doesn't impact their damage capabilities all that much, they can still just hit whoever they want.
- (Arguably a bit skewed, the entire party is master acrobatics with cat fall, and I ruled that the bow crit spec can pin a tyrannosaur when i think most GMs will rule it can't under the remaster addition to that crit spec. Would have been a fair bit harder if either of these weren't true)
- Forced movement grabs countered intercept strike, though the Guardian did themselves become a target of the forced movement grab to prevent this. Armor break was bad for them though. Maybe mission successful?
- Still lost but could have been a win with better rolls.
- Commander has no escape tactic
Encounter 14 - 4x Greater Hellhound, 1x Fire Giant (Extreme)
- Guardian stops the entire OpFor dead with taunt + hampering sweeps, proceeds to get beaten to the floor on round 1.
- Does an unconscious creature still have reach? I thought yes, so the guardian's unconscious body kept Hampering the enemies. Enemies killed the guardian to stop that nonsense.
- Guardian did, however, buy enough time for the party to win here.
- End It! Sealed a victory when it was 1 hellhound + fire giant left.
Encounter 15 - 1x Weak Mukradi (Extreme)
- Form Up used for mobility and to split the party so they wouldn't all get breath weaponed.
- Guardian tries to buy time for the party by walking behind the Mukradi and Hampering it.
- Mukradi is a Mukradi and crits a lot of times, Guardian hits 0 on its first turn.
- Party lacks damage to kill Mukradi before it systematically annihilates them.
- Probably would have been closer if the Mukradi rolled some normal hits instead of crits.
Encounter 16 - 1x Snow Oni, 1x Adult Horned Dragon (Extreme+)
- Unlike the melee party, this ranged party managed to beat this one. Bow Felling Strike prevented a majority of the cheese, but also just being able to hit the dragon while its trying to cheese someone.
- Hampering Sweeps could have been useful if the dragon failed its shove check. Guardian otherwise did nothing.
- Snow Oni went down easily, even with Icy Deflection, against this ranged party. Beans + spirit weakness 15 (increased to 20 via beans) against 3x astral runes made quick work of its HP.
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Extra info
- Although Rage of Elements was allowed, no material from it was used.
- For the purpose of Get Behind Me! combined with Incercept Foe, I ruled it could not retroactively cancel a melee attack by moving the ally out of range.
- Pincer Attack was used only a single time, on the Guardian, and it wasn't particularly stellar then.
- On the long list of issues with Taunt as it currently is, it feels weird that if an AoE attack targets you and an ally, that attack has no penalty against the ally but still has a bonus against you.
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Thanks for the write up.
I like most of your suggestions. Yes it would be good to see some options for Commander not just the one tactic (Strike Hard!) every round.
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Yeah, that vulnerability to AoEs after a Taunt feels egregious.
Paizo gave lots of enemies attack options (yay!) that Taunt doesn't address (boo!) or actually exacerbates (aah!). So Guardian, in a heroic high fantasy setting, needs to address far more than Strikes & warfare.
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The Guardian in my tests Taunted a dragon and crit failed the breath weapon as a result...
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The Guardian in my tests Taunted a dragon and crit failed the breath weapon as a result...
Dragons, as iconic as they are, were what I'd specifically been considering until it dawned on me how large a percentage of PF2 critters had AoE options, from spells to trample to exploding upon death to yep, breath weapons. Doesn't help that Taunt's comparably dangerous against nearby bosses (though perhaps safer than skipping one's AC altogether to Intercept!).
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Thank you for the detailed information on your playtest.
Taunt along with threat technique look like they are not defining the class in a positive way.
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Thank you for the detailed information on your playtest.
Taunt along with threat technique look like they are not defining the class in a positive way.
In theory these two abilities can work, it just really needs to pick a direction on what they are meant to do in the context of a defender's role.
A defender needs two things to function
1) A punishment for enemies attacking you (Harder to hit, damage resist, damage reflect, etc.). Anything that makes an enemy not want to hit you suffices.
2) A punishment for enemies attacking your allies (You attack them, you debuff them, it costs more actions for them to get around you to your allies, etc.). Anything that makes it so an enemy must consider whether to attack your ally instead of you works.
Ideally at the end of this, the enemy is left with two bad options.
The tenets of good champion answers both halves of the defender equation
1) It has higher AC, and, if you went for it, Shield support which makes it take less damage if it is the target of the attack.
2) Not only do you reduce the damage an enemy does to your ally, but you also apply another punishment - a Strike or a debuff.
The Guardian... doesn't quite get there.
1) Applies as it has higher AC (from level 5 onwards at least) than other characters. It also has some native shield support with Raising Taunt, and I'd imagine the shield feats aren't there because this is a playtest and they're a known quantity already. Threat Technique: Mitigate Harm also falls in this category as a way to lean into 1) more than 2). Except you lose the higher AC benefit against enemies you Taunt, so they're not really punished for hitting you then unless they need to move over to you.
2) Is where it really struggles. None of its punishments, are quite strong enough for enemies to reconsider attacking your allies.
Ferocious Vengeance is just too small of a damage bonus considering the class is also behind on martial progression. Even if it was at baseline martial progression, +2/4/6 is only about half the benefit that a normal martial with their damage bonus (+2 to hit, rage, edge, etc.) has (should be +2/4/8).
Intercept Strike is not a real punishment tool as it doesn't actually apply any punishment to your enemy, it just moves the damage around. While this can be arguably a bonus (dealing 50 to 2 characters is worse than dealing 100 to 1), it never really makes the enemy reconsider hitting your ally unless the Guardian themself is already low.
Hampering Sweeps isn't a punishment either, because it's a pretty binary tool, either they can get around Hampering Sweeps with an easy non-shove forced movement, ranged attack, spell, massive size and reach, whatever or they're forced to attack you. Shoving the Guardian usually isn't worth it due to their high fort, anything with high enough athletics to succeed this probably has a better MAPless attack. There's no consideration, it's a yes/no.
Their last method of punishing enemies for going after your allies is athletics maneuvers. Anyone can do this. Grapple an enemy and now they have to escape before moving and attacking your ally, or they just just attack you. Trip an enemy and they have to stand (theoretically) before moving and hitting your ally, or they can just stand and hit you. It wastes action econ on the enemy, which is a punishment, but these tend to fold to the same things Hampering Sweeps doesn't work against - with the exception of large space/reach enemies who might still be affected by grapple/trip and not Sweeps.
Remember that giving your enemy a choice between A and B is just worse than always having A or B, so any class relying on a punishment mechanic like this has to have both halves feel a little overtuned in order for it to be right.
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I do think focusing in on the athletics maneuvers, and general annoyingness, would be an interesting way to have the class function in the context of a defender. The ability to pull enemies next to you, taunt far away enemies (ofc remove the bonus they get to hit you), and make it difficult to attack your allies by the sheer action economy detriments you'd provide to enemies trying to do so.
The problem is all of that stuff works at low levels where enemies are mostly melee with 5ft space and reach, but it would need ways to scale into higher levels, defending allies against the multitude of angles of attack enemies can have at this level, or it will still suffer the same issues the Guardian does now.
Making it more directly punishment based like the Champion is probably a lot easier to have work.
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You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.
When a taunted enemy strikes you, gain temp HP equal to half your level.
At higher levels this ability expands the kinds of hostile actions that grant the temp hp?
When a taunted enemy within your reach deals damage to you apply the effects of hampering sweeps.
When a taunted enemy strikes an ally if that ally is within your stride distance you may stride to an adjacent space to that ally and intercept strike triggers.
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You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.
Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
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You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial class, with no magic. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.
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Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
Agreed. If lower accuracy is a must have for this class to compensate the beefier defenses, the it's better to switch up its main stat from STR to CON.
@Exocist: I’d really like it, if you had time to expand on this:
I was originally going to type up a much more detailed post on its various issues, but I ultimately think it comes down to one thing: This class is far too constrained by "Martial Realism", and as such it's not only lacking *flashy* abilities, but it also starts running into various natural counters to its abilities that it can't do anything about.
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@Exocist: I’d really like it, if you had time to expand on this:
I was originally going to type up a much more detailed post on its various issues, but I ultimately think it comes down to one thing: This class is far too constrained by "Martial Realism", and as such it's not only lacking *flashy* abilities, but it also starts running into various natural counters to its abilities that it can't do anything about.
I'll start with one thing for context that isn't covered in that statement - the Guardian's lacking martial proficiencies. I already said it wasn't strictly necessary and that is true if they get other abilities, but it does matter in the context of playtest Guardian. Why? Fallback options.
Standard martial proficiency with no damage booster isn't stellar damage by any means, but it's an option that is always applicable. Every monster (if you can get in range to do so) can be hit for damage, and so if your actual class abilities don't work for whatever reason, you can resort to hitting for damage. Every other martial can do this.
Swashbuckler? If your panache action fails, or the enemy is precision immune, you can still do regular strikes at regular martial accuracy.
Rogue? If the enemy is precision immune, you still do regular strikes for regular (unboosted) damage.
Magus? If it's your recharge turn and you have no FP, or if you can't spellstrike for whatever reason (AoO threat, got slowed and needed to move, etc.) you can still do regular strikes for regular damage.
Fighter? Well that's a special case because there's no way to actually turn their damage booster off, short of disarming them which cripples everyone.
Then we get to Guardian. If it's main things aren't working, it doesn't have regular martial accuracy for regular martial damage for 1/2 its levels. Losing weapon spec doesn't matter as much as losing the accuracy, so you can say it's more 6/20 levels than 10/20, but it still does sting a little bit.
Furthermore, your damage is going to be further reduced by the fact that you either want a shield (in which case the best you're doing is a d8 weapon), or you're using Raise Haft, which doesn't work with Shielding Taunt, can't block, and if you want the +2 AC it's limited to d8 weapons anyway.
Keep all of this in mind when discussing Guardian's feats and features, it's another reason why the Guardian struggled so much in my playtests.
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Okay so what do I mean by "Martial Realism"? It's constrained by things that "make sense" or "should be possible" because it's flavoured as an entirely mundane character. The Champion can defend an ally from 15ft away because they're a divine character using divine magic to do so. The Guardian, they have to be adjacent, because you can only shove your ally out of the way to take the hit if you're right next to them.
They don't get anything remotely fantastical for a long time (except for Hampering Sweeps) - they can't shield block spell attacks until level 18 for instance, a feat that power wise should be 1st level and wouldn't even be very good at 1st level, but is put at level 18 because a shield blocking magic seems fantastical. Never! is another such example, the power level of it is basically 1st level because of how niche it is, but the idea of a mundane character overcoming mind control through sheer willpower is too fantastical.
You don't really get anything with SFX budget - your enhancement to Shove just adds a tiny bit of damage, or a tiny bit of distance at level 12. Stuff like Whirling Throw or Explosive Death Drop on the Monk would be the kind of things that would fit well on the Guardian given their athletics focus, and are extremely cool, yet they have nothing like that. A suplex maneuver? The ability to grab something and drag it to you? Maybe at higher levels fully swapping places with your ally from a distance using Intercept Strike? Not thinking of balance here, just things that would work with what the class does, while being very cool.
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Once we get to mid-levels, monsters start having various forms of attack that you have to deal with. These include
1) Swallow Whole, a skill-check based attack that can absolutely cripple a character for the rest of combat.
2) Any AoE attack, spell, breath or otherwise. These tend to get very large - 30ft cone/20ft burst, then 60ft cone, then 120ft cone/60ft burst.
3) Any spell that causes a disable - Dominate for instance, but also Feeblemind, Petrify, Baleful Polymorph, Confuse. Many of these are incapacitation spells, but when you run into a monster casting them at the correct level they're kinda nasty.
4) Forced movement effects such as the "drag" effect found on Mammoths, Rocs, Horned Dragons and Jungle Drakes. These split up the party and can prevent focus fire combined with the inherent grab of these.
5) Other anti-melee abilities - reactions such as Wing Rebuff or Twisting Tail. Auras that just suck to be in. Things like that.
Probably a few examples I'm forgetting but that's a broad view of stuff.
Then we look at the Guardian's two "defender" mechanics - Taunt and Intercept Strikes. I'll throw in Sweeps for free and compare that too.
1) These mechanics start becoming at odds with each other the moment any AoE is introduced. The Guardian wants to be right next to its entire team for intercept, but this also means your entire team is getting collected by any AoE ability. Which the Guardian usually can't do anything about because their reaction only works on physical damage. Not that it would help much if they could use their reaction in this scenario - if you're playing to Intercept Strike you can't split the party, and if you do someone is unprotected by you.
Woe is you if you decided to Taunt the thing with AoE, now it has +2 to DC against you and no penalty vs the rest of your party.
This isn't just spells and breath weapons, any sort of multiattack like Draconic Frenzy can also blank Taunt if the Guardian is too close to their ally by spending the third (unlikely to hit) attack on the Guardian.
2) These mechanics mostly only protect against melee, physical, strikes. Hampering Sweeps does absolutely nothing if your opponent's angle of attack is anything from 2-5. Depending on their reach and swallow size limit it might not do anything against 1 either. You sit next to them, activate Hampering Sweeps and... they just cast a spell on the rest of your party anyway. Or just breath attack the rest of your party anyway. Or if your opponent uses a ranged attack. Intercept also tends to fail on anything 1-5, and Taunt is a bit of a gamble on most of them as well. While you can taunt the enemy to Dominate (or whatever) you instead of a party member, do you really want to be saving against a +2 DC save or suck?
That's the long and short of the natural counters - its defensive mechanics have a rather narrow set of attacks they actually apply to, so anything outside of that purview is a natural counter.
But where a regular martial could just say "ok I suck for this encounter but at least I can do regular strikes" the Guardian... can't a third-half the time. Also that's a lot of encounters for your main features to be blanked in.
Agreed. If lower accuracy is a must have for this class to compensate the beefier defenses, the it's better to switch up its main stat from STR to CON.Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
How does that follow? If people are upset that it has accuracy problems, making it even less accurate and giving it a dead key stat feels like the opposite of making anything better.
Thanks for the breakdown Exocist - you make some really telling points.
I hadn’t considered the peril of Taunting something with AoE, or even perhaps Taunting something with say a splash bomb - you then become the easy to hit magnet surrounded by your friends who are then all invited to a splash party.
And your central concern about not having “standard martial accuracy” is definitely a worry.
Again, it seems like there just isn’t enough breadth to the class and the breadth it does have becomes less…impactful as you level up.
I’d definitely like to see more athletics-conversant ideas, but I also don’t want them baked in - more subclass variation for differing themes - some that emphasise “offense as defense” and others that offer pure defense, of both the guardian and their allies.
Can’t wait to stop that magic spell attack at level 18!
How does that follow? If people are upset that it has accuracy problems, making it even less accurate and giving it a dead key stat feels like the opposite of making anything better.Agreed. If lower accuracy is a must have for this class to compensate the beefier defenses, the it's better to switch up its main stat from STR to CON.Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
Because in exchange the Guardian would get normal martial proficiency levels for attacks same as Rangers, Champions, etc.
How does that follow? If people are upset that it has accuracy problems, making it even less accurate and giving it a dead key stat feels like the opposite of making anything better.Agreed. If lower accuracy is a must have for this class to compensate the beefier defenses, the it's better to switch up its main stat from STR to CON.Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
Honestly, in practice, people don't even care much about it. Taunt and Interpose Strike put so much pressure on the Guardian that attacking becomes secondary to his own need to survive. Furthermore, since Ferocious Vengeance is a meme it only works if the target of your Taunt ignores you, which ends up being counterintuitive.
So in practice, no one in my tests really cared if the Guardian hit and criticized his attacks or not, and interestingly, he often hit without any problems, even though he had 2 fewer hits. But his contribution to the overall damage the party caused was minimal, and honestly it continued to be minimal at levels where his proficiency was equal to that of other martials.
Perhaps the experience of Exocist and others may have been different, but this was what I had, in the end, as the class has no offensive focus and has so many problems of its own to deal with, that the damage you cause ends up seeming secondary in practice.
Instead, what I felt most about Guardian was a strangeness in the action economy. At low levels it is put under a lot of pressure by Rise, Shield and Taunt, then it becomes OK when you get Shielding Taunt, but then you realize that there is no other use for it (besides using Strike of course) and this becomes very clear if If you get Paragon's Guard (and you've given up using Taunt frequently because you learned that it's suicide), I practically started using my third action with a Fortress Shield because it was the best use I gave it.
I hadn’t considered the peril of Taunting something with AoE, or even perhaps Taunting something with say a splash bomb - you then become the easy to hit magnet surrounded by your friends who are then all invited to a splash party.
This specifically happened in my playtest a few times. As we started with Plaguestone, which is an adventure that I already have everything ready for and I usually use it in playtests because it is an adventure that puts a lot of pressure on the classes due to its difficulty and I couldn't have chosen a better adventure to demonstrate the class's flaws (and it wasn't on purpose). Because it is an adventure with a large number of alchemical opponents that cause AoE or Splash Damage, and this basically nullified any mechanical usefulness of Taunt, after all Splash is still considered a hostile action and as well pointed out, as the Guardian needs to be adjacent to allies to protect them with Intercept Strike, which means the enemy can use AoE at will against their allies which will still be a hostile action against the Guardian as well.
Even outside of Plaguestone, one thing that you easily notice when playing with the guardian is the number of enemies that have some AoE in the game is very large. Taunt often ends up working just as a punishment for the guardian, making him spend an action to just make it easier to be hit by effects, whether damaging or not!
How does that follow? If people are upset that it has accuracy problems, making it even less accurate and giving it a dead key stat feels like the opposite of making anything better.Agreed. If lower accuracy is a must have for this class to compensate the beefier defenses, the it's better to switch up its main stat from STR to CON.Guardian is a martial weapon and heavy armor wearing martial. No way should it be stuck with the same weapon proficiency advancement as an Alchemist.You gave me some new ideas for threat techniques. These ideas make taunt more worth wile and create some interaction between guardian abilities but don't address the accuracy issues with the class.Strike accuracy issues don't need to be addressed if hitting things for damage isn't the point of the class.
I would still prefer that they are addressed and the Guardian has the same weapon progression as a Champion, but it's not strictly necessary.
My point is that if the Guardian has to pay for their extra defenses with less offense, then normal martial progression and KAS as CON would be a more elegant solution than the current proposition. It would trade a "bit" of accuracy, for unparalleled CON, which the class needs.
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Honestly, in practice, people don't even care much about it. Taunt and Interpose Strike put so much pressure on the Guardian that attacking becomes secondary to his own need to survive. Furthermore, since Ferocious Vengeance is a meme it only works if the target of your Taunt ignores you, which ends up being counterintuitive.So in practice, no one in my tests really cared if the Guardian hit and criticized his attacks or not, and interestingly, he often hit without any problems, even though he had 2 fewer hits. But his contribution to the overall damage the party caused was minimal, and honestly it continued to be minimal at levels where his proficiency was equal to that of other martials.
Perhaps the experience of Exocist and others may have been different, but this was what I had, in the end, as the class has no offensive focus and has so many problems of its own to deal with, that the damage you cause ends up seeming secondary in practice.
Instead, what I felt most about Guardian was a strangeness in the action economy. At low levels it is put under a lot of pressure by Rise, Shield and Taunt, then it becomes OK when you get Shielding Taunt, but then you realize that there is no other use for it (besides using Strike of course) and this becomes very clear if If you get Paragon's Guard (and you've given up using Taunt frequently because you learned that it's suicide), I practically started using my third action with a Fortress Shield because it was the best use I gave it.
In this instance the player didn't have elemental runes so their damage was a measly 2d6+4, though talking with them about it, they probably could have opted for a level 7 sturdy shield, a temple sword (it's not like they used any maneuver that wasn't trip) and runed up that sword with frost astral for a 2d8+2d6+4 attack (missing only the 2 from weapon spec). They opted for a whip for reach trips and reach for hampering sweeps.
You can hit with the -2 attack, but your crit rate is really bad even with flanking. A standard martial hits an on level monster 60% of the time, fighter 70%. With -2 to attack, you hit 50% of the time, meaning you do about 20% less damage than a normal martial's unboosted attack (.55 x WD vs .7 x WD). With flanking that boosts to .7 x WD on your side vs .9 x WD on theirs, still about 20% less.
The weird action econ is also something that was felt. A lot of times of "what does the guardian do here" when they were already in position, didn't want to taunt the enemies because it would just be a penalty, so they shield raised and tripped. Then... did pretty much nothing with their third action.
Compared to other times where they spent their entire turn needing to move away from enemies and taunt, no room for any sort of attack.
It's really just about having the option to do some damage at the end of the day. Enemy low on health and it's your turn before theirs? You can finish them. Enemy doesn't care about your maneuvers, or is already grabbed and tripped? You can hit them for damage. Enemy you don't want to taunt? You have the capability to hit them for some damage.
I don't have any low level guardian play experience, but if Taunt is this mediocre when you can do it as part of raising a shield, do it to three enemies and do it from 120ft away, I struggle to see how it'd be relevant at all when you're spending an entire action to do it to 1 enemy.
As an aside, we did play Shielding Taunt as interacting with Group Taunt, by RAW I'm not actually sure that's how it works.
Player's perspective
This is some great feedback I can only hope manages to get in front of the devs in some form.
Not sure how many game systems can post playtests and get participants to draft such a polished document. To the point of drawing out visual aids.
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Player's perspective
Wow. Such dedication from your player is to be commended, not only in the write-up but in detailing the various assumptions/caveats made. Please thank them on behalf of the entire community. Well, me at least.
I have to agree completely re: the tension between defensive adjacency and wanting to actually contribute in combat; and the tension between Taunt and…wanting to actually contribute in combat.
The idea of a “long range taunt” seems so incredibly counter to the burly side-by-each valiant defending Guardian. Like I get that you want to debuff from afar so that you aren’t affected by the penalty, but maybe the penalty shouldn’t exist so as to make it a thing in the first place. Yes, you can still be next to your allies and just happen to debuff a faraway foe, but for what? Who are they targeting? Clearly not your adjacent ally. Perhaps an enemy menacing another of your allies, in a galaxy far, far away. It doesn’t seem like that much of a useful use of your Actions however, given you might/should be using them to you know, actually guard someone. Unless they *are* targeting your ally from afar, then you better hope against hope it isn’t an AoE attack, a fairly major issue identified across multiple reports. I found Taunt to be a dangerous proposition.
I admit I’m completely biased, and don’t like the *idea* of Taunt. But it really seems to be working mechanically against the guarding. If it actually contributed in some way I’d at least be amenable to reflavoring it somehow to something palatable.
And yes, the lack…s of Intercept Strike seem to be many - in our playtest, I Intercepted a Grab, took the damage and then we were all left wondering who, if anyone, was restrained. Not to mention the fact that I was the *only* person of my (admittedly small) group who thought Threat Techniques were chosen and baked in at 1st level, and not chosen round by round. I did ask about both (Intercept Strike and Threat Techniques) and even researched the former (across multiple threads and sites) but couldn’t find consensus on “un- or official answers”.
As for the Athletics maneuvers and plausibility of improving these instead of weapon skill - I’m really not a fan personally, but it is an interesting idea. I’m just not…really into whip-tripping elegantly in my 3,000 tons of heavy armor. It feels ridiculous. Much in the way your player cleverly got around the Commander’s action/mobility lack by…being Small, and purchasing feats in Dinotopia: The Game. All very ingenious, but kinda niche, at least thematically.
@Exocist - did your player have any granular data or general feelings about the utility of Mitigate Harm? I see they mentioned it with regard to armor choices but beyond that I…may have missed it.