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Unicore wrote: But those 2 books are probably in the “just a very expensive editing pass” could get them ORC ready, so I don’t see a good reason to try to pull the mechanics from them to put in a new rules book. Each of them work just fine with the PC1 and their own content. Unicore, I will be direct here but please don't mistake it for disrespect or rudeness: Sometimes fandoms can get swept up in their own biases and think that their extensive knowledge and comfort with a thing means that others of similar or lesser interaction will understand and get the feel for how it works or how to learn it and I think that's probably part of what has been going on with your thought process.
If you don't see a good reason for making a PC3 with revised materials then either you're not listening or somehow you've failed to see the value proposition (for new and old players alike) of a PC3 that consolidates the actual rules that are used in the game from the various ORC supplements in a single hardcover made for the line of products explicitly made to be a one-stop shop for tables to choose new options for their games, the Player Core line.
A PC3 would provide more value in terms of time efficiency, cost to option ratio, and reduce new players from even having to think about, let alone research, what book to buy for what type of Character they want. On top of that, I am 110% confident that a PC3 would outsell (as well as generate more profit in general) as a single book the entirety of every OGL facelift book they COULD make that the premaster content came from. Shoot, and if they do that they can also make a newly revised Lost Omens book that contains all of the lore/setting info and regional info that is mostly flavor in a different larger hardcover to be sure nothing of value is lost and in the process it would be work creating two books instead of four or five which leaves a ton more room/time for the staff to make actual new content.
Somebody looking to get into PF2 will always opt to buy the core products first and if that can be made in a way to bring old content forward to the norms of the current iteration of PF2 it will also create less confusion for them since the vast majority of existing, let alone new users, who look at a physical book or own a PDF will never even know that errata exists, let alone if they do, they're going to have to wrack their brain trying to parse the (no offense tech and web-team) terribly organized FAQ and errata page.
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Themetricsystem wrote:
Unicore, I will be direct here but please don't mistake it for disrespect or rudeness: Sometimes fandoms can get swept up in their own biases and think that their extensive knowledge and comfort with a thing means that others of similar or lesser interaction will understand and get the feel for how it works or how to learn it and I think that's probably part of what has been going on with your thought process.
If you don't see a good reason for making a PC3 with revised materials then either you're not listening or somehow you've failed to see the value proposition (for new and old players alike) of a PC3 that consolidates the actual rules that are used in the game from the various ORC supplements in a single hardcover made for the line of products explicitly made to be a one-stop shop for tables to choose new options for their games, the Player Core line.
A PC3 would provide more value in terms of time efficiency, cost to option ratio, and reduce new players from even having to think about, let alone research, what book to buy for what type of Character they want. On top of that, I am 110% confident that a PC3 would outsell (as well as generate more profit in general) as a single book the entirety of every OGL facelift book they COULD make that the premaster content came from. Shoot, and if they do that they can also make a newly revised Lost Omens book that contains all of the lore/setting info and regional info that is mostly flavor in a different larger hardcover to be sure nothing of value is lost and in the process it would be work creating two books instead of four or five which leaves a ton more room/time for the staff to make actual new content.
Somebody looking to get into PF2 will always opt to buy the...
As someone who has bought and read all of the core books front to back, Legacy and Remaster, and currently processing Howl of the Wild. I would never "recommend" any book to my newer players beyond The Player Core 1, the Player Core 2, Gods and Magic (likely to soon be replaced by Divine Mysteries), and maybe the World Guide. And I feel I'd likely recommend a potential Player Core 3.
Anything beyond that I feel does not have enough use player side to justify an outright recommendation, especially when I want to maximize my player's bang for their buck when they are looking to me to tell them where they would be overspending.
I have many reasons to not recommend Dark Archives, Guns and Gears, and Secrets of Magic. A large swathe of Dark Archives is not even meant to be read by a player, or otherwise have little use to a player. Guns and Gears, in my experience, players always end up complaining about not liking the inventor in the end, and I've had consistent requests to change characters. The only thing I'd recommend it for is Gunslinger, but if that's the only value it has, you might as well stick with the Archives of Nethys. Secrets of Magic is going to mix more advanced classes with needing a GM cleanup, as the Errata did not cover things like name changes from Legacy to Remaster And I had to give my player's rewritten entries. And the main draw of Secrets of Magic, being explanations of how in-world magic works, is in a dubious state of being defunct due to the removal of the seven magic schools. Overall, the lore has little to no value to a player. And the only value it really provides is if your GM is taking you to an area covered by the lore. (These seasonings assume the GM already has such books, and can explain information from the books to the player.)
Some of the classes are disliked to the point that a balance patch is necessary. But even for the ones that are not, the PC2 taught us that upgrades to classes we didn't think "needed" a pass will still be appreciated as it will still apply a new Remaster quality base.
A PC3 I can recommend to everyone, fellow GM or player alike. The other books I can only really recommend to fellow GMs.
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Themetricsystem wrote: Unicore wrote: But those 2 books are probably in the “just a very expensive editing pass” could get them ORC ready, so I don’t see a good reason to try to pull the mechanics from them to put in a new rules book. Each of them work just fine with the PC1 and their own content. Unicore, I will be direct here but please don't mistake it for disrespect or rudeness: Sometimes fandoms can get swept up in their own biases and think that their extensive knowledge and comfort with a thing means that others of similar or lesser interaction will understand and get the feel for how it works or how to learn it and I think that's probably part of what has been going on with your thought process.
If you don't see a good reason for making a PC3 with revised materials then either you're not listening or somehow you've failed to see the value proposition (for new and old players alike) of a PC3 that consolidates the actual rules that are used in the game from the various ORC supplements in a single hardcover made for the line of products explicitly made to be a one-stop shop for tables to choose new options for their games, the Player Core line.
A PC3 would provide more value in terms of time efficiency, cost to option ratio, and reduce new players from even having to think about, let alone research, what book to buy for what type of Character they want. On top of that, I am 110% confident that a PC3 would outsell (as well as generate more profit in general) as a single book the entirety of every OGL facelift book they COULD make that the premaster content came from. Shoot, and if they do that they can also make a newly revised Lost Omens book that contains all of the lore/setting info and regional info that is mostly flavor in a different larger hardcover to be sure nothing of value is lost and in the process it would be work creating two books instead of four or five which leaves a ton more room/time for the staff to make actual new content.
Somebody looking to get into PF2 will always opt to buy the... I mean, it was the devs saying “a PC 3 is only something we’d do if people really want it.” If it was going to essentially be the existing material in those books about the gunslinger, inventor, summoner, magus, thaumaturge and psychic with only errata and an ORC editing pass, I would certainly not buy that book. The magus needs new spells to be viable. The changes to Dragons complicate things enough, I’d want to see some changes to Eidolons. Runelord archetype needs big changes. The elementalist is wasted space. Schools of magic is wasted space in Secrets of Magic. I don’t personally want a 3x bigger book at a higher price when almost all the Dark archive and Guns and Gears stuff is going to stay the same in order to get a significant update to secrets of magic.
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Unicore wrote: I mean, it was the devs saying “a PC 3 is only something we’d do if people really want it.” If it was going to essentially be the existing material in those books about the gunslinger, inventor, summoner, magus, thaumaturge and psychic with only errata and an ORC editing pass, I would certainly not buy that book. The magus needs new spells to be viable. The changes to Dragons complicate things enough, I’d want to see some changes to Eidolons. Runelord archetype needs big changes. The elementalist is wasted space. Schools of magic is wasted space in Secrets of Magic. I don’t personally want a 3x bigger book at a higher price when almost all the Dark archive and Guns and Gears stuff is going to stay the same in order to get a significant update to secrets of magic. It would not be only errata. Player Core 2 does way more than the errata pass of the Core Rulebook and the Advanced Player's Guide did. It'd be an overhaul. If they did to the PC3 what they did to the PC2, ALL classes except for maybe 1 would get a larger change than the errata.
Additionally, 1 60 dollar book sounds like a better deal to me than a 55 dollar book, plus a 50 dollar book, plus a 50 dollar book, for a total of 155 dollars. So I'm not quite sure how a PC3 is not a better deal than the Dark Archives, the Secrets of Magic, and Guns and Gears when you're looking at it from the point of view of a player who has much less use for the lore content of the three books than the GMs that they outnumber.
Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber
It doesn’t sound to me like the developers have a lot that they want to change about any of the classes in these three books, even if I think the Magus and Summer need it. I don’t think we’d see much changes to gunslingers, inventors, psychics or thaumaturges if the developers are saying “we don’t see a reason to do more than errata with these books,” which is their current position on it. Maybe those changes would be part of convincing them otherwise, but I don’t see balance changes or even just additional content for them coming faster in a PC3 than in just continuing to make new books that might introduce thematically relevant content.
The development of new lore for Golarion is what is driving player content forward for Pathfinder right now. Situating new classes, spells, archetypes and items in the world is everything the rules team has been working on that hasn’t been the remaster incident, which was absolutely not undertaken as “the best and most viable business strategy.”
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Unicore wrote: It doesn’t sound to me like the developers have a lot that they want to change about any of the classes in these three books, even if I think the Magus and Summer need it. I don’t think we’d see much changes to gunslingers, inventors, psychics or thaumaturges if the developers are saying “we don’t see a reason to do more than errata with these books,” which is their current position on it. Maybe those changes would be part of convincing them otherwise, but I don’t see balance changes or even just additional content for them coming faster in a PC3 than in just continuing to make new books that might introduce thematically relevant content.
The development of new lore for Golarion is what is driving player content forward for Pathfinder right now. Situating new classes, spells, archetypes and items in the world is everything the rules team has been working on that hasn’t been the remaster incident, which was absolutely not undertaken as “the best and most viable business strategy.”
I think the Gunslinger and Thaumaturge are fine. I think the Inventor could greatly benefit from a change, so that makes 3. Psychic I'm on the fence on, as I don't have as much data on that specific class as far as personal player metrics.
Thematically relevent content is an option. But that'll become a nightmare for 3rd party devs to try to deal with a class that has a Legacy base, and Remaster expansions that cannot be mixed outside of a Paizo published book. A 3rd party adventure book would not be allowed to include these classes in an ORC adventure, and if they include the them in an OGL adventure, they would not be allowed to use the ORC expansion content.
Basically we'd be locked into a WotC tier Artificer situation where as the years go by,it'll become increasingly harder for anyone except Paizo to use these 6 classes. As when they design an adventure, they'll only be locked to either OGL content, or ORC content, but not both.
If I was to write an adventure book that takes place where players could use mythic archetypes. I would, for example, not be allowed to include an NPC that is a Magus commander, or a wacky old inventor, or a god-hunting thaumaturge enemy-rival. Licensing simply does not allow them to mix.
moosher12 wrote: Unicore wrote: It doesn’t sound to me like the developers have a lot that they want to change about any of the classes in these three books, even if I think the Magus and Summer need it. I don’t think we’d see much changes to gunslingers, inventors, psychics or thaumaturges if the developers are saying “we don’t see a reason to do more than errata with these books,” which is their current position on it. Maybe those changes would be part of convincing them otherwise, but I don’t see balance changes or even just additional content for them coming faster in a PC3 than in just continuing to make new books that might introduce thematically relevant content.
The development of new lore for Golarion is what is driving player content forward for Pathfinder right now. Situating new classes, spells, archetypes and items in the world is everything the rules team has been working on that hasn’t been the remaster incident, which was absolutely not undertaken as “the best and most viable business strategy.”
I think the Gunslinger and Thaumaturge are fine. I think the Inventor could greatly benefit from a change, so that makes 3. Psychic I'm on the fence on, as I don't have as much data on that specific class as far as personal player metrics.
Thematically relevent content is an option. But that'll become a nightmare for 3rd party devs to try to deal with a class that has a Legacy base, and Remaster expansions that cannot be mixed outside of a Paizo published book. A 3rd party adventure book would not be allowed to include these classes in an ORC adventure, and if they include the them in an OGL adventure, they would not be allowed to use the ORC expansion content.
Basically we'd be locked into a WotC tier Artificer situation where as the years go by,it'll become increasingly harder for anyone except Paizo to use these 6 classes. As when they design an adventure, they'll only be locked to either OGL content, or ORC content, but not both.
If I was to write an adventure book that takes place where... Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't you write these adventures on Pathfinder Infinite because of the unique Infinite license? They definitely seem locked out of a situation where you need to choose between OGL and ORC, and that is unfortunate, but I think one can still make them at the moment.
Arcaian wrote: Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't you write these adventures on Pathfinder Infinite because of the unique Infinite license? They definitely seem locked out of a situation where you need to choose between OGL and ORC, and that is unfortunate, but I think one can still make them at the moment. While this is true, it is probably not a good deal if you do not plan to use the Pathfinder or Starfinder settings in your book. You'd have to grant "Paizo and other Pathfinder Infinite (and Starfinder Infinite) authors a license to use your IP in their own works without compensation or royalty." per the Pathfinder Infinite Ownership and License Questions page.
While mechanics are one thing, this is quite a hefty thing to give away. As you are not signing over just mechanics. You are giving away "characters, events, locations, magic items, organizations, etc" even if the setting is completely original and is simply using the PF2E system as a mechanics source, anyone can take your setting and use it as they wish as long as they are within the Pathfinder Infinite umbrella. It's a fair deal if you want to utilize Golarion's world setting. But is it a good deal if you only want to include a gunslinger as an NPC?
And that's where problems end up. Want to use Remaster? Well, I hope you have no intention of using any steampunk themes or old-style firearms. But you can use them, if you grant Paizo the license to the world you've been developing.
If you were to build an adventure for your setting under that license, and were to say, create a character you were really proud of, who would become famous and iconic, someone can take them and go a completely different path, whether you like it or not. The only thing you'd be entitled to is credit for making the character they decided to build off of. Nothing else. Especially not if their product using your character by chance sells better than your product.
Part of why I don't like the idea of player core 3 is that not all the classes should be core. Heck, I don't think all the current core classes should be core. IMO there's a few key metrics when considering if a class should be core.
1. Does this class cover a unique character concept?Is that concept popular?
2. Does this class cover a unique mechanical niche? Is this niche popular?
3. Is this class a good fit for most campaigns?
4. Is this class simple enough to recommend fo first time players?
There's a fifth consideration around player expectations and legacy, but that seems much less important in a post-OGL Pathfinder.
All of the Advanced Player's Guide classes are too complex to be presented to new players as equally viable choices compared to the fighter or bard. Same for the summoner and the CRB alchemist. (Though the latter is supposed to be simplified in PC2, so maybe that's no longer a problem.)
All of the uncommon or rare classes fit shouldn't be core because their flavor doesn't fit many campaigns. But neither does the Investigator, and to a lesser extent the ranger. Thaumaturge covers a lot of the same mechanical ground as both classes but works equally well in urban and wilderness campaigns.
Meanwhile, wizard, witch, and sorcerer have a lot of mechanical overlap. I'd drop one of them (probably witch as the most complicated) to make room for the kineticist. "I want to be a fire dude who only fires" is popular, and a specialist caster without resource pools to manage is an important mechanical niche.
Magus is more complicated than some classes, but true spell blades are popular and excelling equally at melee and magic is poorly supported by multiclass combinations.
Captain Morgan wrote: Part of why I don't like the idea of player core 3 is that not all the classes should be core. Heck, I don't think all the current core classes should be core. IMO there's a few key metrics when considering if a class should be core.
1. Does this class cover a unique character concept?Is that concept popular?
2. Does this class cover a unique mechanical niche? Is this niche popular?
3. Is this class a good fit for most campaigns?
4. Is this class simple enough to recommend fo first time players?
There's a fifth consideration around player expectations and legacy, but that seems much less important in a post-OGL Pathfinder.
All of the Advanced Player's Guide classes are too complex to be presented to new players as equally viable choices compared to the fighter or bard. Same for the summoner and the CRB alchemist. (Though the latter is supposed to be simplified in PC2, so maybe that's no longer a problem.)
All of the uncommon or rare classes fit shouldn't be core because their flavor doesn't fit many campaigns. But neither does the Investigator, and to a lesser extent the ranger. Thaumaturge covers a lot of the same mechanical ground as both classes but works equally well in urban and wilderness campaigns.
Meanwhile, wizard, witch, and sorcerer have a lot of mechanical overlap. I'd drop one of them (probably witch as the most complicated) to make room for the kineticist. "I want to be a fire dude who only fires" is popular, and a specialist caster without resource pools to manage is an important mechanical niche.
Magus is more complicated than some classes, but true spell blades are popular and excelling equally at melee and magic is poorly supported by multiclass combinations.
Wish I knew why Kineticist was licensed under OGL instead of ORC. If there's one class I can see never getting ported to the Remaster, it's Kineticist, because it was already designed with Remaster rules in mind as far as I could tell. It's book was even advertised as the first ORC Remaster formatted book. On top of that, it only came out last year, meaning Paizo probably won't want to reprint it in another book for several years at minimum.
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The other problem with including the Kineticist in a Core Rulebook is that it is a ton of page space that just doesn't really interact well with any of the basic rules of the game. It's abilities are technically spells, but don't really work with anything that works with spells, and their attacks are not strikes. Additionally, the equipment they want to use isn't really useful to any other class, so if you did want to introduce more item support, it would either just be generic items, or something no one else wants to look at. All of which is to say that it is a ton of book space for something that is both an entirely discrete system and probably still considered something that is not core to a lot of traditional fantasy.
I agree that it is a good introductory class for newer players and maybe should be core for that reason, but with standard rules, you pretty much need every class feat you ever get, and there has to be 6 elements worth of class feats at every level on top of general kineticist feats. It would probably push out 3 or 4 other classes from a "player core" book it was published in.
I don't think there's any chance of a "remastered kineticist" since the developer talk around when RoE was released was that this was the first ORC book since it was developed with the remaster rules in mind. Like it's the first paizo book to say things like reactive strike and off-guard instead of what those used to be called.
The issues with the kineticist is mostly stuff that is fixable with errata (like they left off the area for Roiling Mudslide, turns out it's a cone.)
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moosher12 wrote: Wish I knew why Kineticist was licensed under OGL instead of ORC. If there's one class I can see never getting ported to the Remaster, it's Kineticist, because it was already designed with Remaster rules in mind as far as I could tell. It's book was even advertised as the first ORC Remaster formatted book. On top of that, it only came out last year, meaning Paizo probably won't want to reprint it in another book for several years at minimum. ORC wasn't final when Rage of Elements had too get ready to go to the printer (and when they were writing it initially they were still on OGL). AFAIK that's about it for why that happened: timing.
I'm not an expert on legal issues, but wouldn't be as easy as put both licenses in your book if you want to publish content for both ORC and OGL content? I assume that isn't possible because it would otherwise been mentioned at this point.
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Unicore wrote: It doesn’t sound to me like the developers have a lot that they want to change about any of the classes in these three books, even if I think the Magus and Summer need it. I don’t think we’d see much changes to gunslingers, inventors, psychics or thaumaturges if the developers are saying “we don’t see a reason to do more than errata with these books,” which is their current position on it. Maybe those changes would be part of convincing them otherwise, but I don’t see balance changes or even just additional content for them coming faster in a PC3 than in just continuing to make new books that might introduce thematically relevant content. Hell, Secrets of Magic can't even get errata. The only errata it's gotten was the bare minimum required for the remaster and they threw in Arcane Cascade literally not working RAW since release at the same time. None of the other issues have been addressed. It's baffling how ignored that book has been compared to others.
Quote: The development of new lore for Golarion is what is driving player content forward for Pathfinder right now. Situating new classes, spells, archetypes and items in the world is everything the rules team has been working on that hasn’t been the remaster incident, which was absolutely not undertaken as “the best and most viable business strategy.” I'm sure it wasn't... but once the Remaster project started, "a good experience for new players coming in" SHOULD be a business priority. PC2 will address a lot of the current rough edges by saying "if you're using core stuff, everything you actually need for what you expect a core game to have is now there."
Releasing a PC3 has its issues, but it's also a way to say "here's all these other classes you can play with the problems that make them hard to use in the Remaster fixed and they're ready to go in a player-facing book." Is that worth it for them? I don't know.
Is it worth it as a GM that wants to be able to just take a player that wants to play a Magus/Summoner/Gunslinger/etc, hand them a single book, and say "everything you need is here"? 100%. Right now I can't do that because I need to give them a book, then also give them AoN, explain the difference between legacy/remaster, and how to work through the cases where something changed and there's now problems that need sorting out. And I'm perfectly fine with someone using CRB/legacy spells on things like Magus, but I also have the system mastery and understanding of what's going on to navigate that.
While all this is workable right now, it's not even close to ideal. I'm playing an Oracle right now and there's some real pain points that should go away once PC2 is out. It'd be great if things like Magus got the same treatment even if its an "advanced" class (though I'd argue its less advanced than Alchemist, where how much you get out of it is tied directly to your mastery of the Alchemy list and how many formulae you can collect.)
exequiel759 wrote: I'm not an expert on legal issues, but wouldn't be as easy as put both licenses in your book if you want to publish content for both ORC and OGL content? I assume that isn't possible because it would otherwise been mentioned at this point. What would be the reason to do this? Like the issues with the Magus and the remastered rules aren't about copyright they're about "the Magus cares about spell attack rolls, which have largely disappeared from cantrips". There are a bunch of monsters that have disappeared from the remastered bestiary for OGL reasons, but those monster stat blocks are more or less completely usable in a remaster game with a brief editing pass.
The purpose of the OGL is similar to the purpose of the ORC- in signing on to this license you gain access to use a bunch of material subject to certain rules including that anybody else who uses the license now gets access to a significant portion of what you just published. What license content gets published in is mostly of interest to copyright lawyers; it's not a compatibility thing a la "you can't play PC games on Linux".
I said it because I saw some people mention 3pp publishers have a problem to do content for OGL and ORC stuff in the same book because of the license, that's why I asked if it was possible to put both licenses on a book.
exequiel759 wrote: I'm not an expert on legal issues, but wouldn't be as easy as put both licenses in your book if you want to publish content for both ORC and OGL content? I assume that isn't possible because it would otherwise been mentioned at this point. If you are the upstream dev like Paizo, it's possible I think. If you are a downstream dev, you cannot. Even then, on the ORC discord, I saw more people alluding to the idea of having a separate version of the document per license.
Even then, as Unicore said earlier, an errata pass to make the books ORC would still be expensive as it requires a legal comb.
In my opinion, if it's gonna be expensive anyway, might as well go for a Player Core 3.
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PossibleCabbage wrote:
What would be the reason to do this? Like the issues with the Magus and the remastered rules aren't about copyright they're about "the Magus cares about spell attack rolls, which have largely disappeared from cantrips". There are a bunch of monsters that have disappeared from the remastered bestiary for OGL reasons, but those monster stat blocks are more or less completely usable in a remaster game with a brief editing pass.
The purpose of the OGL is similar to the purpose of the ORC- in signing on to this license you gain access to use a bunch of material subject to certain rules including that anybody else who uses the license now gets access to a significant portion of what you just published. What license content gets published in is mostly of interest to copyright lawyers; it's not a compatibility thing a la "you can't play PC games on Linux".
It's less, you cannot play "PC games on Linux" and more, "Only Microsoft makes games for PC, because other companies find it too difficult." The issue is less that you the end user would have a problem doing personal kitbashes, the issue is more you'll have a harder time finding 3rd party content in the future that is comprehensive.
For example, I'll tell a little more about my shelved project. The concept was an Optional Rule for Pathfinder 2E, that overhauled all spellcasting to be a better fleshed out version of the Flexible Spellcasting archetype. The Optional Rule was designed to make Pathfinder 2E more friendly to Dungeons and Dragons 5E players. The document would have included various rule changes and some toggles to adjust different GM preferences for leniency of quality of life for spellcasting. It would have come with a rewritten spellcasting entry for every spellcaster, accomodating these various rule changes, and rewritten feats for all feats that were affected by the changes, allowing GM's and players alike to just drop in the new entry instead of using the vanilla entries. Additionally it would have come with various guides on how to further implement the changes elsewhere.
It was a 2-year long project to make my games more enjoyable for many of my players who came in from D&D 5E. My players adored it, and I thought other tables would love it too. But, licensing.
Look, I'm me, and Paizo has no obligation to help me, but I don't think I'm the only me. There are plenty of people out there who have an idea they think folk would want, and potentially buy. But quite frankly, a lot of these types of projects will not be published for customers to enjoy if increasingly fewer of the devs find the PF2E licenses situation too difficult to work with. For those customers who enjoy the open content, who want to expand their game with 3rd party works? There will be less to enjoy if material that should be a staple is deliberately left behind to never be worked on but within a single closed ecosystem.
This may not affect you personally, but there is an entire community of folk who enjoy the 3rd party scene, and frankly, this situation hurts it. Lawyers are not the only people who care about this sort of thing.
PossibleCabbage wrote: I don't think there's any chance of a "remastered kineticist" since the developer talk around when RoE was released was that this was the first ORC book since it was developed with the remaster rules in mind. Rage of Elements is on the Remaster council, but it was not granted the rank of ORC. Cue its sith arc.
Tridus wrote: ORC wasn't final when Rage of Elements had too get ready to go to the printer (and when they were writing it initially they were still on OGL). AFAIK that's about it for why that happened: timing. Guess my assumptions were accurate then, either way, that's unfortunate. I guess that explains why Roll for Combat decided to make their own Elemental Avatar class. Kineticist sounds like it'd have been tricky to try to incorporate in their setting.
Tridus wrote: Is it worth it as a GM that wants to be able to just take a player that wants to play a Magus/Summoner/Gunslinger/etc, hand them a single book, and say "everything you need is here"? 100%. Right now I can't do that because I need to give them a book, then also give them AoN, explain the difference between legacy/remaster, and how to work through the cases where something changed and there's now problems that need sorting out. And I'm perfectly fine with someone using CRB/legacy spells on things like Magus, but I also have the system mastery and understanding of what's going on to navigate that. I am doing just that with a group of 5E'ers looking to try the Menace Under Otari. Send help.
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moosher12 wrote: Look, I'm me, and Paizo has no obligation to help me, but I don't think I'm the only me. There are plenty of people out there who have an idea they think folk would want, and potentially buy. But quite frankly, a lot of these types of projects will not be published for customers to enjoy if increasingly fewer of the devs find the PF2E licenses situation too difficult to work with. I'm sure the devs want to produce both new content and remaster cleanups if they can. The issues are resources, pathfinder line priorities...and sales. A cleanup book has to be something that will sell very well for Paizo - not just create better 3PP opportunities - because it doesn't seem to be a line priority and they have limited development resources.
A PC3 doesn't create new Golarion environments like Tian Xia does, it's not an adventure path that PFS will use, it doesn't move the time frame forward the way War of Immortals does, etc., etc. So it's no surprise to me that it's not top of the list.
Having said that, I'm always in favor of more content. Hopefully Paizo makes loads of money over the next year so that they can pour their artistic talents into all the new content they want to produce AND remastering fan favorite legacy content like the 'outlier' classes.
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Easl wrote: I'm sure the devs want to produce both new content and remaster cleanups if they can. The issues are resources, pathfinder line priorities...and sales. A cleanup book has to be something that will sell very well for Paizo - not just create better 3PP opportunities - because it doesn't seem to be a line priority and they have limited development resources.
A PC3 doesn't create new Golarion environments like Tian Xia does, it's not an adventure path that PFS will use, it doesn't move the time frame forward the way War of Immortals does, etc., etc. So it's no surprise to me that it's not top of the list.
Having said that, I'm always in favor of more content. Hopefully Paizo makes loads of money over the next year so that they can pour their artistic talents into all the new content they want to produce AND remastering fan favorite legacy content like the 'outlier' classes.
One should note that not all Pathfinder campaigns are Lost Omens. Sure, I run Lost Omens. But Tian Xia lore or whether or not Gorum dies does not mean anything to the numerous tables who use the engine to build their own worlds. Among the GMs I know, it's a common practice to run custom worlds, or emulate other worlds and see how well the mechanics fit. I've been a player in quite a few of them. Even then, for those who DO run Lost Omens, when will you get to exercise your Tian Xia lore? I read the Tian Xia World Guide, it's a great book! But none of my players are gonna be visiting Tian Xia for several years, if ever.
But alike, realistically, I do hope they make the money for it to be feasible. Honestly, I think if they can afford to make an NPC Core, they can afford to make a Player Core 3, or whatever name it'd have. NPC Core definitely seems like an odd choice to me.
After seeing the wonderful changes in the BadLuckGamer Player Core 2 Preview, I'm hype for the book! But just as much, with so much unexpected yet amazing changes across the board, I'm also really excited to see what sort of magic Paizo will pull off in a Player Core 3 that we might not have even thought to ask for.
Hopefully it'd be after Starfinder 2E comes out, the Starfinder 2E playtest I'd imagine would give a lot of valuable data on The Gunslinger/Inventor side of such a project.
Anyway, my apologies for bringing up Player Core 3 right before Player Core 2. No rush of course, but I just had to voice my optimistic excitement, before refocusing it back to looking forward Player Core 2 when it comes out.
moosher12 wrote: After seeing the wonderful changes in the BadLuckGamer Player Core 2 Preview, I'm hype for the book! But just as much, with so much unexpected yet amazing changes across the board, I'm also really excited to see what sort of magic Paizo will pull off in a Player Core 3 that we might not have even thought to ask for.
Hopefully it'd be after Starfinder 2E comes out, the Starfinder 2E playtest I'd imagine would give a lot of valuable data on The Gunslinger/Inventor side of such a project.
Anyway, my apologies for bringing up Player Core 3 right before Player Core 2. No rush of course, but I just had to voice my optimistic excitement, before refocusing it back to looking forward Player Core 2 when it comes out.
I have to reiterate, but if you're hanging your hat on a PC3 (or, IMO, more likely a SoM2) the Inventor/Gunslinger are the least likely class to make it in. They don't have any relationship to alignment or spell schools, require reprinting a dedicated set of uncommon tagged items (that have already received errata and also aren't affected by anything the remaster does) and don't thematically mesh with the other premaster classes. You can unironically play them off their AoN version and it works with no awkward dangling feats that do nothing.
As much as I want some sprucing up of the Magus, I don't think they should nor do I want them to waste time on a PC3. All I want for magus is spell combat, and arcane cascade to no longer require casting a spell first(and the damage to be dynamic changing each time you cast a damage spell). I also think it might be cool to have a magus with a telekinetic blade. Been REALLY thinking about his a lot every time I play Elden Ring and see the bell bearing hunter guy with the Marais Executioner's Sword where he swings that thing telekinetically with the red magic glow and everything. I would think this class could be Int KAS, can use int for attack rolls(but not damage) with finesse weapons or smthn, get to add the reach property and maybe get some bespoke attack with a lot of swords spells, but maybe is worse at recharging spell strike or smthn given it has much better spell DCs than other magus idk...
All the more reason, rather get totally new books and not more spruced up old content
Ryangwy wrote:
I have to reiterate, but if you're hanging your hat on a PC3 (or, IMO, more likely a SoM2) the Inventor/Gunslinger are the least likely class to make it in. They don't have any relationship to alignment or spell schools, require reprinting a dedicated set of uncommon tagged items (that have already received errata and also aren't affected by anything the remaster does) and don't thematically mesh with the other premaster classes. You can unironically play them off their AoN version and it works with no awkward dangling feats that do nothing.
They don't, yes. But, why go through the trouble of a Monk, a Barbarian, an Investigator, and a Sorcerer. None of them needed to be made. None of them were touched by the changes, and as far as I can tell, none of them had major calls for a rebalancing that were not counteracted by wider claims that the status they were in was fine as it was. The Swashbuckler can be fixed with just an errata pass to change the Disarm feat, for example.
They are perfectly playable in the Remaster without Player Core 2. Therefore, they should not be in Player Core 2. Player Core 2 is already superfluous. All we needed was a Player Core 1 with the Alchemist, Champion, Cleric, Bard, Oracle, and Wizard. Yet we have Player Core 2, a waste of time by these definitions. But in reality, these additions were made well, and appreciated, unless you'd rather Paizo have not made a Player Core 2, and retracted these additions. Then there is NPC Core. A book I would greatly appreciate, but it is certainly a book that is much less necessary than a Player Core 2, or a Player Core 3. Yet it is coming out, and I am looking forward to reading it.
I'm seeing changes in the PC2 that were being shot down in the forums by members with similar arguments people are using to shoot down any requests for in regards to PC3 content.
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moosher12 wrote:
They don't, yes. But, why go through the trouble of a Monk, a Barbarian, an Investigator, and a Sorcerer. None of them needed to be made. None of them were touched by the changes, and as far as I can tell, none of them had major calls for a rebalancing that were not counteracted by wider claims that the status they were in was fine as it was
Oh totally, the barbarian and sorcerer were absolutely a complete waste of time to remaster. I mean it's not like either of those classes had ties to alignments, or featured things like divine traits, or even things like entire class features that were tied around dragons. So absolutely a waste of time, why would Paizo even think to put time into remastering them?
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Also the fact that, y'know, Paizo explicitly said they'd do the core rulebook and APG as PC1&2 the moment remaster was announced, whereas no such statement has been made for the purely theoretical PC3.
There's a lot of advantages to focus on spell using (and, in the thaumaturge's case, spell adjacent) classes in a single book and leaving the tech classes out. You don't need to dedicate page space to explaining what all those guns are doing, for one - remember, the intent of these player focused books is that they should be usable with nothing other than the core books, so every new theme you add needs to explain to a potentially new player what it's doing in Golarion. You can spend more pages on spells that all the book classes can use. You can have extensive skill feats for the four spellcasting skills (arcane and nature sure need them) that those classes will pick up. You can put spell-related archetypes (Spell Trickster, Captivator and Hallowed Necromancer comes to mind) in the freed up space. You can sell new, splashy, multi page archetypes to entice players who already bought all the premaster books to buy again.
KyleS wrote:
Oh totally, the barbarian and sorcerer were absolutely a complete waste of time to remaster. I mean it's not like either of those classes had ties to alignments, or featured things like divine traits, or even things like entire class features that were tied around dragons. So absolutely a waste of time, why would Paizo even think to put time into remastering them?
So I'm not sure where you're going with this sarcasm bit? According to my Core Rulebook, The barbarian has no interaction with alignment in 2E, nor would the Sorcerer Bloodlines have any bearing on alignment, to the point there is even a side bar on page 194 that specifically states that it has no bearing on alignment (I'm also quite confident that the Remastered Sorcerer is not going to grant Sanctification, as it is not tied to worshipping a god). And adding a list of Monster Core Dragons is such a small change it takes up a a few square inches of page space, the other Dragon Instinct feats require no change to make that work, meaning that updating the Barbarian to Remaster only requires an errata compatibility pass that explains what Monster Core Dragons grant what damage type and whether it is a line or a cone.
And my point remains as I said above, it was superfluous, but the QoL changes are great. And we are appreciative of them. The same way we'll be appreciative of QoL changes for the remaining Legacy classes.
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Ryangwy wrote: Also the fact that, y'know, Paizo explicitly said they'd do the core rulebook and APG as PC1&2 the moment remaster was announced, whereas no such statement has been made for the purely theoretical PC3.
There's a lot of advantages to focus on spell using (and, in the thaumaturge's case, spell adjacent) classes in a single book and leaving the tech classes out. You don't need to dedicate page space to explaining what all those guns are doing, for one - remember, the intent of these player focused books is that they should be usable with nothing other than the core books, so every new theme you add needs to explain to a potentially new player what it's doing in Golarion. You can spend more pages on spells that all the book classes can use. You can have extensive skill feats for the four spellcasting skills (arcane and nature sure need them) that those classes will pick up. You can put spell-related archetypes (Spell Trickster, Captivator and Hallowed Necromancer comes to mind) in the freed up space. You can sell new, splashy, multi page archetypes to entice players who already bought all the premaster books to buy again.
They said they would do a Player Core 3 if there was sufficient demand.
Paizo did not confirm an NPC Core when they announced the Remaster project, and I am not a salesman, but I get the idea that an NPC Core is a more risky investment than a Player Core 3, which gives me optimism that if they are willing to put work into a book that is only useful for some GMs, they'll probably be willing to put work into a book that is useful for most GMs and players.
If the goal to updating old content is to update them in a G&G2, a DA2, and a SoM2, I am not opposed, but frankly, that sounds more expensive on Paizo's treasury and an inefficient use of time to hold newer content behind 3 half-lore/rules sourcebooks that are retreading Legacy content rather than one pure rules sourcebook, especially when the lore that gives context already exists in books a given GM might already own. Paizo can publish the one book and move on. From there, the Uncommon trait already does its due work, and context really need not be more than a small side bar in practicality. Plus, I'd rather a G&G2, a DA2, and a SoM2 instead have new classes that fit their respective themes, and expand further on the principles taught in the books they are sequels to, rather than just be the same book you have to buy twice. At least the Player Core 3 would have its own worth as a bundled set that is dense with practical content and likely some new content to boot.
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moosher12 wrote:
Paizo did not confirm an NPC Core when they announced the Remaster project, and I am not a salesman, but I get the idea that an NPC Core is a more risky investment than a Player Core 3, which gives me optimism that if they are willing to put work into a book that is only useful for some GMs, they'll probably be willing to put work into a book that is useful for most GMs and players.
NPC Core is new content, though. Fundamentally, the problem with remastering is that it's useful but people with the old books aren't likely to rebuy and Paizo doesn't sustain itself on goodwill alone.
moosher12 wrote:
If the goal to updating old content is to update them in a G&G2, a DA2, and a SoM2, I am not opposed, but frankly, that sounds more expensive on Paizo's treasury and an inefficient use of time to hold newer content behind 3 half-lore/rules sourcebooks rather than one pure rules sourcebook, especially when the lore that gives context already exists in books a given GM might already own. From there, the...
Ah, but time isn't a concern for Paizo, especially for G&G. After all, it's still completely usable as is. The 'advantage' of a SoM2 (that also bundles DA and BotD) is that because it can all be fit under the theme of 'spells', they can make new lore content and new archetypes attached to that lore content, and sell that as the new thing worth buying the book for. Adding the unrelated GnG muddles that up.
I mean, that's assuming a purely remastered book is going to be made. For all I know, going forward, they're going to bundle one new class with one remastered class per class book.
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You do realize that dragons are no longer based on the type of color, and are now based on magical tradition, which entirely changes how a sorcerer spell lists works, as well as how barbarian resistances work, right? I mean in all of your boasting about how all your work was seemingly intentionally destroyed to the point that you could never ever possibly think about still making it work because you instead have to come up with college course style lectures before any player even touches a book that go on about things those players may not even care about in the first place, one would think that dragons being based on magical tradition instead of color would pop out as a "Hey, this is gonna have to be redone now". But hey, what do I obviously know, since I don't come up with third party material or make long winded college lectures about topics that may not even have relevancy to what the players wanna do.
Ryangwy wrote: I mean, that's assuming a purely remastered book is going to be made. For all I know, going forward, they're going to bundle one new class with one remastered class per class book. Frankly that'd be acceptable. As long as it gets done is what is important.
Ryangwy wrote: Ah, but time isn't a concern for Paizo, especially for G&G. After all, it's still completely usable as is. The 'advantage' of a SoM2 (that also bundles DA and BotD) is that because it can all be fit under the theme of 'spells', they can make new lore content and new archetypes attached to that lore content, and sell that as the new thing worth buying the book for. Adding the unrelated GnG muddles that up. It is a concern for some players. I have seen people say in this thread that they specifically do not want a Player Core 3 only because that'd delay other potential sourcebooks. So telling them their 2 entirely new classes will be locked behind 3 retread books instead of 1 does not exactly ring to me as something they'd want to hear.
Ryangwy wrote: NPC Core is new content, though. Fundamentally, the problem with remastering is that it's useful but people with the old books aren't likely to rebuy and Paizo doesn't sustain itself on goodwill alone. I don't think there's going to be a shortage of GMs that will say "I already have my GameMastery Guide, why do I need an NPC Core." As I said, I want to read it to see what changed with the ported GMG NPCs, and to see what's new, but for some GMs, they already have their GMG which will cover a lot of their use cases.
KyleS wrote: You do realize that dragons are no longer based on the type of color, and are now based on magical tradition, which entirely changes how a sorcerer spell lists works, as well as how barbarian resistances work, right? I mean in all of your boasting about how all your work was seemingly intentionally destroyed to the point that you could never ever possibly think about still making it work because you instead have to come up with college course style lectures before any player even touches a book that go on about things those players may not even care about in the first place, one would think that dragons being based on magical tradition instead of color would pop out as a "Hey, this is gonna have to be redone now". But hey, what do I obviously know, since I don't come up with third party material or make long winded college lectures about topics that may not even have relevancy to what the players wanna do. I am aware, but they were not necessary changes. Legacy Draconic Bloodline covered non-metallic and -chromatic dragons too. Primal Dragons, which would have casted Primal Spells, and Imperial Dragons, which would have cast Primal, Arcane, Divine, and Occult spells, would have been lumped into the Draconic Bloodline in Legacy. Non-Arcane dragons being sorcerers already existed in Legacy, and they were made Arcane (of course, GM fiat could easily modify this). Expanding the Magical Tradition to be context sensitive is simply a QoL change. Alike with Barbarian. Nice QoL changes, not necessary to make function in the Remastered system.
Also thanks for taking the time to study my comments. ^^
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moosher12 wrote: I am aware, but they were not necessary changes. You’re mistaken.
TheCowardlyLion wrote: moosher12 wrote: I am aware, but they were not necessary changes. You’re mistaken. No I'm quite confident in this one. The base kits work with minimal finesse.
Want to be a Conspirator Dragon Instinct Barbarian? Dragon Instinct Barbarian, then look at your Monster Core. A conspirator Dragon's breath weapon is a poison cone? You're set. Your Rage also gains the Arcane trait, whether you're Metallic, Chromatic, Primal, Imperial, or other. That simple. Not satisfied with this? Ask your GM to let you switch your trait to Occult as a house rule. There, a Legacy Conspirator Dragon Instinct Barbarian ready to play in Remaster.
Want to be an Adamantine Dragon Bloodline Sorcerer? Draconic Bloodline with the Arcane tradition. The Legacy kit only allows Arcane, whether you're Metallic, Chromatic, Primal, Imperial, or other. That simple. Not satisfied with that? Ask your GM to let you switch your tradition to Primal as a home rule. There, a Legacy Adamantine Dragon Bloodline Sorcerer ready to play in Remaster.
Both of these resolved in two short paragraphs.
I think people are confusing what I mean by necessary. When I say necessary, I mean that if a change is not made, the class is thoroughly broken without at minimum a moderate degree of GM fiat. I also think people are forgetting that my point is that I don't think these changes are necessary, but I want these changes. In fact, I want these quality-upgrades for all the Legacy classes. Because these changes are good ones.
People are quite willing to defend the changes to the Barbarian and the Sorcerer when I say it is not necessary, yet will also say that another class that is still in Legacy does not need any change, because it is also not necessary.
KyleS wrote: moosher12 wrote:
They don't, yes. But, why go through the trouble of a Monk, a Barbarian, an Investigator, and a Sorcerer. None of them needed to be made. None of them were touched by the changes, and as far as I can tell, none of them had major calls for a rebalancing that were not counteracted by wider claims that the status they were in was fine as it was.
Oh totally, the barbarian and sorcerer were absolutely a complete waste of time to remaster. I mean it's not like either of those classes had ties to alignments, or featured things like divine traits, or even things like entire class features that were tied around dragons. So absolutely a waste of time, why would Paizo even think to put time into remastering them? Because Player Core 1 and 2 are supposed to be the new Core books, which encompass all the Core options, including Barbarian, Sorcerer, Monk, and Investigator, even if they're not changed much. On top of that, Investigator was buffed very substantially from what I've seen around as the most common interpretation (free action DaS being quite a rare occurrence). And Superstition + Fury barbarians also needed some changes, which they did get.
Also moosher12 saying that no-one was asking for Investigator rebalances and it was working fine is pretty wild to me, short of alchemist is was probably the class I saw the most consistent frustration with from a balance perspective.
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moosher12 wrote:
It is a concern for some players. I have seen people say in this thread that they specifically do not want a Player Core 3 only because that'd delay other potential sourcebooks. So telling them their 2 entirely new classes will be locked behind 3 retread books instead of 1 does not exactly ring to me as something they'd want to hear.
See, the thing is that although they go to great efforts to make it look that way, Paizo does not actually publish books on a fixed schedule. They have a fixed amount of manpower that goes into doing class things, then they parcel things out such that they can print class books at regular intervals. That's why kineticist is the only class in RoE, why PC1&2 borked their entire schedule, and why putting all the remastered classes in 1 book doesn't save that much time over splitting them. The 2 new classes are stuck behind remastering 6 old classes, the number of books don't change that. Which is why they're likely to pick some of those classes to do soon and some to hold off for latter... and GnG is probably going to be the latter, for reasons I've listed.
moosher12 wrote:
I don't think there's going to be a shortage of GMs that will say "I already have my GameMastery Guide, why do I need an NPC Core." As I said, I want to read it to see what changed with the ported GMG NPCs, and to see what's new, but for some GMs, they already have their GMG which will cover a lot of their use cases.
Have you seen how the NPC gallery looks like in Gamemastery Guide? The only way NPC Core has less new content than your hypothetical 6 classes PC3 is if it's 60 pages. It doesn't even have anything with 2 digit levels!
Ryangwy wrote: Have you seen how the NPC gallery looks like in Gamemastery Guide? The only way NPC Core has less new content than your hypothetical 6 classes PC3 is if it's 60 pages. It doesn't even have anything with 2 digit levels! Specifically, no NPCs in that guide go above level 8. It's also entirely possible that, on top of having an NPC gallery at least twice as long as previously--likely more given how higher-level creatures have a greater number of, and more complicated, abilities--we might be seeing some other options in the book as well. Thematic items and character options for defeating said NPCs jump immediately to mind, such as PF1E's Monster Codex and Villain Codex.
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A big part of why people want pc3 is because paizo has done such a good job not only with adapting classes for the remaster, but touching up classes to make them more enjoyable to play. In my mind, that is why people want pc3. Lots of people have their favorite class not in the core/core 2 list, and the idea that the issues they have with their class could possibly be fixed (or they just straight up get new toys) is a big reason to want them updated.
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Ryangwy wrote: moosher12 wrote:
Paizo did not confirm an NPC Core when they announced the Remaster project, and I am not a salesman, but I get the idea that an NPC Core is a more risky investment than a Player Core 3, which gives me optimism that if they are willing to put work into a book that is only useful for some GMs, they'll probably be willing to put work into a book that is useful for most GMs and players.
NPC Core is new content, though. Fundamentally, the problem with remastering is that it's useful but people with the old books aren't likely to rebuy and Paizo doesn't sustain itself on goodwill alone. I can't speak to its riskyness or sales appeal, but a book like NPC Core is more like building necessary infrastructure. Sales are absolutely important, but its also about reducing costs for other projects.
A book of NPC statblocks sees tremendous use as a reference for a whole lot of products -- many Adventures (standalone or AP; Paizo or 3rd party) will just reference content there instead of burning wordcount on them. It is just as important as Monster Core for that purpose.
Players and GMs might be able to use the ones in the GMG, but the writers can't, because that is still under the OGL.
Once you've got one, whether or not you get a 2nd will depend on sales etc. But that first one is absolutely necessary.
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pH unbalanced wrote:
I can't speak to its riskyness or sales appeal, but a book like NPC Core is more like building necessary infrastructure. Sales are absolutely important, but its also about reducing costs for other projects.
A book of NPC statblocks sees tremendous use as a reference for a whole lot of products -- many Adventures (standalone or AP; Paizo or 3rd party) will just reference content there instead of burning wordcount on them. It is just as important as Monster Core for that purpose.
Players and GMs might be able to use the ones in the GMG, but the writers can't, because that is still under the OGL.
Once you've got one, whether or not you get a 2nd will depend on sales etc. But that first one is absolutely necessary.
To preface, I'm largely in agreement with you. I just have one thing to correct. Paizo writers and Pathfinder Infinite writers do not necessarily need an NPC Codex as much as unaffiliated 3rd party writers would. Both ORC books published by Paizo and Pathfinder Infinite books can simply reference OGL Pathfinder books if they wish. The NPC Codex is only necessary for Paizo and Pathfinder Infinite Writers for the purpose of using new NPCs, but any NPC that's covered by the GameMastery Guide is someting they can already use. The only people that absolutely need an NPC Codex for functionality are 3rd party writers whose project is not currently affiliated with Paizo.
Otherwise, yes. This is precisely the reason I am looking forward to this book, despite feeling its sales would likely not be great, because I agree the book is important, and would like to be able to use its content in an ORC project rather than having to create NPCs from scratch from the GM Core.
Perpdepog wrote: Ryangwy wrote: Have you seen how the NPC gallery looks like in Gamemastery Guide? The only way NPC Core has less new content than your hypothetical 6 classes PC3 is if it's 60 pages. It doesn't even have anything with 2 digit levels! Specifically, no NPCs in that guide go above level 8. It's also entirely possible that, on top of having an NPC gallery at least twice as long as previously--likely more given how higher-level creatures have a greater number of, and more complicated, abilities--we might be seeing some other options in the book as well. Thematic items and character options for defeating said NPCs jump immediately to mind, such as PF1E's Monster Codex and Villain Codex. You two don't have to sell it to me I'm already going to get the book. Yes I have seen the chapter and I stand by my impression that I think the GameMastery Guide has plenty to work with. The book has a fairly decent net of themes covered in its scope, I've read through it, and I do use it. More versatile options of course, would be great. That's why I want it, and a few higher level options would be neat, though I'd personally rather see more specific lower level options to encompass a wider range of potential townsfolk NPCs and humanoid henchmen that were not covered in the GameMastery Guide, as well as fun modifiers to switch up and modify NPCs from their basic statblocks.
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Oh I'm not trying to sell it; I'm just excited for it. I'm usually a player, so don't typically need to use NPC books, but I get loads of enjoyment out of reading them and I've lifted stuff from them before when I am GMing.
PF2E's ability benchmarks are a lot easier for me to groc so I'm expecting this book to be even handier in this regard.
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I agree with Gaulin: although a Player Core 3 wouldn't be strictly necessary, I wouldn't underestimate the benefits the existing Player Cores have brought to existing classes way beyond the strictly necessary. The Fighter, for instance, was a class in PC1 that needed essentially no changes, but got a ton of improvements to their feats and general quality of life. The Champion, a PC2 class that basically just needed to be adjusted for the removal of alignments, is getting a huge amounts of feats compressed, moved down to earlier levels, or just straight-up buffed, giving them significantly improved character options. Think of what years of developer hindsight and evolved standards could bring to a class like the Magus, let alone the Gunslinger or Inventor.
It's not just classes, either: over the years, Pathfinder has given us lots of new mechanics and subsystems that could easily do with more fleshing out. Pretty much all of the tech in Guns & Gears, while cool, is still a bit underdeveloped, and there's a ton of untapped potential to subsystems like spellhearts, tattoos, grimoires, aftermath feats, artifact archetypes, and bottled monstrosities. I can't speak for anyone else, but I would absolutely pay money for an extra Player Core book that tied up all of the remaining loose ends from before the remaster, and breathed new life into them as well.
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Besides the benefits of upgrading these classes to reflect with the remaster classes and those after and have those classes in a single book, I also like the idea of the artwork we could get with the iconics. Would be neat to see the different iconics adventuring together in the artwork.
Gaulin wrote: A big part of why people want pc3 is because paizo has done such a good job not only with adapting classes for the remaster, but touching up classes to make them more enjoyable to play. In my mind, that is why people want pc3. Lots of people have their favorite class not in the core/core 2 list, and the idea that the issues they have with their class could possibly be fixed (or they just straight up get new toys) is a big reason to want them updated. It's not like it has been universal improvements though. Some things were mostly left alone (fighter, ranger). Some things got worse (wizard schools battle oracle). And the subclass balance isn't great.
I'd maybe rather they didn't remaster thaumaturge now, for example.
Captain Morgan wrote: It's not like it has been universal improvements though. Some things were mostly left alone (fighter, ranger). Some things got worse (wizard schools battle oracle). And the subclass balance isn't great. My apologies for the aside, but I feel the Remastered Wizard is made or broken by how a GM interprets this clause:
Player Core page 198 wrote: Your GM might allow you to swap or add other spells to your curriculum if they strongly fit the theme. If a GM allows every spell that still fits the overall theme, even if it's not on the spell school list and within the Player Core, I think it's a major improvement over the old school system, because a single universally good spell can appear in multiple curriculums if a good justification is made.
If, however, the list is interpreted by a GM to be extremely restrictive and focused to a number very close to the original list, I'd agree and consider it a downgrade.
For personal games, I prefer the former interpretation for my players. For example, I simply tell my players: Any spell that fits the theme, is considered a curriculum spell unless I veto its exclusion on the grounds I don't think the justification is strong enough. (this includes legacy spells, and unlisted spells in the player core)
TLDR: I think the wizard is an upgrade, but only if its clause to add spells to a curriculum is utilized. And I have no counter arguments toward Battle Oracle, but I have not gotten to read the full class, so it would not be my place to talk for or against it.
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Pathfinder Lost Omens Subscriber
moosher12 wrote: Captain Morgan wrote: It's not like it has been universal improvements though. Some things were mostly left alone (fighter, ranger). Some things got worse (wizard schools battle oracle). And the subclass balance isn't great. My apologies for the aside, but I feel the Remastered Wizard is made or broken by how a GM interprets this clause:
Player Core page 198 wrote: Your GM might allow you to swap or add other spells to your curriculum if they strongly fit the theme. If a GM allows every spell that still fits the overall theme, even if it's not on the spell school list and within the Player Core, I think it's a major improvement over the old school system, because a single universally good spell can appear in multiple curriculums if a good justification is made.
If, however, the list is interpreted by a GM to be extremely restrictive and focused to a number very close to the original list, I'd agree and consider it a downgrade.
For personal games, I prefer the former interpretation for my players. For example, I simply tell my players: Any spell that fits the theme, is considered a curriculum spell unless I veto its exclusion on the grounds I don't think the justification is strong enough. (this includes legacy spells, and unlisted spells in the player core)
TLDR: I think the wizard is an upgrade, but only if its clause to add spells to a curriculum is utilized. And I have no counter arguments toward Battle Oracle, but I have not gotten to read the full class, so it would not be my place to talk for or against it. The Wizard school is a complete downgrade.
The thing is, you and your GM have always been free to make changes to what you can do with class options like that. Its not a feature of a particular mechanic, its a general function of a game like Pathfinder.
If you made an argument that Fireball was a conjuration spell and your GM agreed with the rationale, then that would be fine as well.
So nothing new has been gained with that school change. It was always on the table.
Difference was that you generally has a much vasted array of options to fill your school slot with, so there was generally always something useful you wanted to take.
Now with the heavily restricted options, asking your GM feels more required, because your overall options are reduced.
All the Wizard did was lose choice and functionality with the school change.
moosher12 wrote:
For personal games, I prefer the former interpretation for my players. For example, I simply tell my players: Any spell that fits the theme, is considered a curriculum spell unless I veto its exclusion on the grounds I don't think the justification is strong enough. (this includes legacy spells, and unlisted spells in the player core)
I think this is an exceedingly generous take on the ability which will not be commonly found.
But even then, the gulf of table variance this changed introduced in the core playability of the Wizard is crazy.
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Old_Man_Robot wrote: moosher12 wrote:
If a GM allows every spell that still fits the overall theme, even if it's not on the spell school list and within the Player Core, I think it's a major improvement over the old school system, because a single universally good spell can appear in multiple curriculums if a good justification is made.
The Wizard school is a complete downgrade.
The thing is, you and your GM have always been free to make changes to what you can do with class options like that. Its not a feature of a particular mechanic, its a general function of a game like Pathfinder.
Agreed that school spell lists are a downgrade. In particular, it widens the gap between the mechanically optimal wizard player who knows exactly what spells to argue for and the fluffy thematic wizard player who won't even think of doing so. The wizard already had the problem that pushing your GM to permit certain things was more impactful than for other classes and now it's even codified.
Old_Man_Robot wrote: ... This is overall mostly true. As I said before, the only way I can see a neutral feel to the new wizard is a generous take toward the aforementioned clause. Any much less, and I do agree that's far too restricting. And you are right on the table variance being problematic
The only minor thing I have to add is there is much more allowance to add a spell to a curriculum than to a spellschool. Adding a spell to a curriculum feels like an optional rule, except more allowed than a normal optional rule would be with the way it's phrased, while adding a spell to a spellschool is pure homebrew territory. At the very least, with the new version, it tells a GM that adding a spell is fine, whereas good luck getting a GM to mess with the spell schools if the GM is home rules light.
Still, I wish the default lists were bigger, and I wonder what the actual dev intent toward the lists was. I made my call with my players on the assumption that page count limitations kept them from putting in as much spells as they might have intended, mixed with the interpretation that if a whole spell school was balanced for a wizard, a curriculum can be of a similar size and remain equally balanced.
I would hope that a future errata pass would change the clause to emphasize that the curriculum schools can and should be expanded on, and that it is not intended to only be limited to the minimum list of spells, at the very least to encourage the GMs to let their players have more satisfying curricula on average.
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