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All of them. Some of what inspired the wizard was like certain Eastern Orthodox priests and Kabbalah stuff. A lot of religious writing is in books, and a lot of academic institutions in the west were originally set up by the religious. Much fo the clergy in the real world were learned and spending time studying. I also need to stress in 1e if you lose your bonded item you lost the ability to cast spells. Wizards learn about magic, they don't have magic as part of their being in anyways, but the ability to actually use magic must comes from somewhere and while it is poorly explained for the wizard, the arcane bond in 1e gave us some insightYes, they all study practically, but tell me who among the classes you mentioned who do you picture with their nose buried in their book as other people are praying, tuning their instruments and making rituals to their patron?
Also, the bonded object is an object is which the wizard put their magic, they can switch it as easy as the undies. It has nothing to do with the source of their power. They source of their power is knowledge.
Ok, now i don't understand if you are being voluntarily obtuse or i'm incapable of explaining myself. Which is the class that has a literal book as a class feature? Not a holy symbol, not a musical instrument, not a magical animal, a book? What is traditionally a symbol of knowledge: a musical instrument, a holy symbol, a magical animal or a book?
Also, in 1e if you had a familiar you had 0 need for a bonded item, and losing the bonded item gave you a penalty to cast, but you could still do anything you could before. So, no, the bonded item has never been the source of a wizard magic.
Then again, i'm not arguing for or against giving wizard more skills, but saying the wizard is not the iconic book knowledge class is flatly untrue.
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I think it's safe to say that nearly every caster class can be said to have studied their magic at least in part -- the Bard's probably read tons of poems, songs, and stories, the Cleric likely knows their deity's scripture like the back of their hand, and the Druid's almost certainly memorized hours upon hours of oral tradition passed down since their order's beginning. That's what these classes' magic tradition skill is generally supposed to reflect.
However, if there is one caster class known for being bookish, for locking themselves in ivory towers and spending hours of research in dusty libraries, it's the Wizard. Of all the classes who study, the Wizard is perhaps the most studious -- that is in fact how they became able to cast spells in the first place, so they're probably quite good at it. The inspiration for the Wizard class definitely comes from extremely varied characters who probably wouldn't be called Wizards in Pathfinder, but the general theme of the Pathfinder Wizard has nonetheless coalesced into "student of magic". That their class features don't really build all that much on this so much as mostly make them a fairly generic prepared arcane caster is something that likely ought to be changed in favor of what makes them unique, not what makes them more generic.
I also don't think being good at spells, even arcane spells, ought to preclude a class from being good at non-spell stuff to some reasonable degree -- Sorcerers are good at social skills, Witches are great at Crafting potions, and Bards are skill monkeys on top of everything else they do, with the ability to use a universal Lore skill and blend Charisma skills into their spellcasting. It really wouldn't be too much of a stretch to give Wizards more feats allowing them to do more stuff around Lore or Recalling Knowledge, especially as they could certainly up their feat count -- of the Player Core casters, the Bard has 90 feats, the Cleric has 90 feats, the Druid has 97 feats... and the Wizard has 58. Granted, it's still only slightly better than the Witch's paltry 57, but the fact remains that you could give the class 30 more feats and still have less than the others. If a Wizard really wants to be good with Lore, and is ready to spend class feats on that, I'd say let them.
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Yes, they all study practically, but tell me who among the classes you mentioned who do you picture with their nose buried in their book as other people are praying, tuning their instruments and making rituals to their patron?....All of them. Some of what inspired the wizard was like certain Eastern Orthodox priests and Kabbalah stuff. A lot of religious writing is in books, and a lot of academic institutions in the west were originally set up by the religious. Much fo the clergy in the real world were learned and spending time studying. I also need to stress in 1e if you lose your bonded item you lost the ability to cast spells. Wizards learn about magic, they don't have magic as part of their being in anyways, but the ability to actually use magic must comes from somewhere and while it is poorly explained for the wizard, the arcane bond in 1e gave us some insightOk, now i don't understand if you are being voluntarily obtuse or i'm incapable of explaining myself. Which is the class that has a literal book as a class feature? Not a holy symbol, not a musical instrument, not a magical animal, a book? What is traditionally a symbol of knowledge: a musical instrument, a holy symbol, a magical animal or a book?
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Then again, i'm not arguing for or against giving wizard more skills, but saying the wizard is not the iconic book knowledge class is flatly untrue.
I think that AestheticDialectic cannot see the difference between the spell traditions and the class styles. After all, AestheticDialectic also said,
Bards definitely study their magic and even are within the lore learned. They perform and do art as part of the casting of spells, but they learn these spells and they study the occult among other things. Clerics do this for divine magic, and they are granted the ability cast spells through their god, but that God doesn't cast them for them. They have to learn and practice this still. Druids also learn their magic. Witches are granted the ability to perform magic with a patron, but they still have to learn the magic and study it. Wizards also have a power source like the patron, god, nature, or what have you. It's the bonded item. Wizards and Bards are actually so thematically similar that without looking at character sheets and stats, you'd assume they were two different approaches to the academic pursuit of magic. I would fully support an int bard it's perfectly thematically appropriate
There is a reason to some degree the designers feel the d20 wizard is a defunct and archaic concept
When the traditions look the same and the stylistic class features are overlooked, then the bard, oracle, psychic, and sorcerer are just primary spontaneous casters, and the cleric, druid, witch, and wizard are just primary prepared casters. Why have more than two primary-caster clesses. Hm, even ignoring this much detail, the bard still does not look like a wizard. Let me throw in a picture for clarity: THe Order of the Stick #127: New Wizard in Town.
The style matters for us players who love class flavor in our roleplaying. A bard makes music. I was delighted in my Iron Gods campaign when the skald (bard-barbarian hybrid) held a concert. Later she purchased a local gambling hall and turned it into a dance hall. She cared about music and dance. If a wizard did that, then we would think of the wizard as non-typically loving art more than most wizards. In my current Strength of Thousands campaign, I explained to the players that the Magaambya Academy does charge students for learning spells; in fact, the Archhorn Library provides students with the special inks for transcribing spells for free. In response, the wizard Idris took the Magical Shorthand feat and disappeared into the library for two hours every evening. Idris learned 50 spells that semester. That sound like a wizard, doesn't it?
Nevertheless, we fanatic roleplayers prefer that the class mechanics support the style and theme. The bard has Courageous Anthem/Inspire Courage which has to be cast every round. We can easily pretend that the bard is singing during combat by casting the anthem. The cleric has a divine font for healing, representing tending their congregation (I have a lot of Christian imagery in my imagination). The druid communes with nature such as by adopting an animal companion or transforming into an animal. The druid in my Ironfang Invasion campaign started out with the more-weather-than-nature Stormborn Order, but she eventual took Order Explorer feat and adopted an animal companion. The witch is dedicated to a mysterious patron and the patron assigned them a familiar as a physical representative of their bond.
The wizard carries a spellbook to represent that their arcane magic was learned from books, which is a very weak mechanic and a very weak symbol. The Arcane Thesis abilities are often metamagical, which represents abstract arcane knowledge. On the other hand, the Arcane Bond works against the book-learning theme and so do the focus spells granted by the Arcane School. The wizard is not defunct; rather, the wizard is underdeveloped in style and theme.
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Also unrelated, Theridax, i like your homebrew a lot, can i ask you a couple question about it? I've been coming back to PF after a very long hiatus (haven't played since 1e advanced class guide) and i like your wizard much more than the official, so i wanted to integrate as an option in a game i wanto to run.
Also unrelated, Theridax, i like your homebrew a lot, can i ask you a couple question about it? I've been coming back to PF after a very long hiatus (haven't played since 1e advanced class guide) and i like your wizard much more than the official, so i wanted to integrate as an option in a game i wanto to run.
Thank you very much for the kind words, and absolutely, yes! I'll be happy to answer any questions you or anyone else may have about my brew, and would be more than glad to help integrate it into your game.
The PF2 magic system is not skill dependent and the magical (not fantastical, there are lots of fantastical skill feats) things you can do with skills is incredibly limited.
You can identify magic and magic items, you can learn spells, and maybe you can craft magical items. The skill feats that do grant things like cantrip abilities are generally worse than having cantrips memorized, as they probably should be. Recalling knowledge is a skill feature that spells can’t really do (although some make it easier). At the same time, the game is pretty loaded at this point with ways to get better at recalling knowledge if your character wants to focus on that. If it is something that is going to be skill feat or class feat related, it really doesn’t need to wizard only, because wizards don’t have a class feature activity that they use all that often to connect it to.
Like the bounty hunter archetype gives a lot of very ranger abilities, and the archetypical bounty hunter probably is a ranger, but the ranger class doesn’t need all the bounty hunter stuff saddling down the base class. Same with the snare crafter. I kind of think the lore master wizard is the same way. A wizard makes a very good remaster, probably the iconic one, but a lore master doesnt need to be a wizard and a wizard doesn’t need to be a lore master.
The way you show you have become more powerful and better at magic in PF2 is by casting more and higher rank spells.that is what wizards spend their careers trying to do.
The PF2 magic system is not skill dependent and the magical (not fantastical, there are lots of fantastical skill feats) things you can do with skills is incredibly limited.
You can identify magic and magic items, you can learn spells, and maybe you can craft magical items. The skill feats that do grant things like cantrip abilities are generally worse than having cantrips memorized, as they probably should be. Recalling knowledge is a skill feature that spells can’t really do (although some make it easier). At the same time, the game is pretty loaded at this point with ways to get better at recalling knowledge if your character wants to focus on that. If it is something that is going to be skill feat or class feat related, it really doesn’t need to wizard only, because wizards don’t have a class feature activity that they use all that often to connect it to.
Like the bounty hunter archetype gives a lot of very ranger abilities, and the archetypical bounty hunter probably is a ranger, but the ranger class doesn’t need all the bounty hunter stuff saddling down the base class. Same with the snare crafter. I kind of think the lore master wizard is the same way. A wizard makes a very good remaster, probably the iconic one, but a lore master doesnt need to be a wizard and a wizard doesn’t need to be a lore master.
The way you show you have become more powerful and better at magic in PF2 is by casting more and higher rank spells.that is what wizards spend their careers trying to do.
We largely agree here, but I think that the system that is independent of skills is the combat system. Since a primary spellcaster fights with magic, the magic counts as part of the combat system, so it has to be independent of skills, too.
On the other hand, we have hazards, obstacles, and puzzles that can be solved by skills and Perception. They are not combat, so a skill, such as Athletics to swim a river obstacle or Thievery to disable a trap hazard, can solve the problem. The Knock spell I used as an example earlier is not used in combat; instead, it overcomes a locked door obstacle, so the developers could make it dependent on the Thievery skill.
In my game session Tuesday, a character was buried alive under dirt and had six rounds before suffocation (description at Strength of Thousands spoiler). The character could escape with Escape DC 22. The Escape action uses an unarmed attack check, an Acrobatics check, or an Athletics check, so skill could matter. She rolled Acrobatics. For extra teamwork, I told the other players that their characters could make Athletics or Crafting checks DC 20 to help dig the victim out. The victim was freed in two rounds. This is victory through skills.
Combat is independent of skills because skills vary too much. PF2's tight math requires more predictability. Some skill actions, such as Trip or Feint or Demoralize, matter during combat, but they come at an action cost and merely aid combat, so they do not destabilize the tight math.
Hazards, in contrast, do not require tight math. If a trap is harder than expected, then typically one PC is knocked to unconscious and dying but the rest of the party can pull the victim back, heal them up, and proceed more carefully. Only complex hazards, which greatly resemble creatures, could lead to Total Party Kills if the GM messes up the encounter calculations. Thus, hazards can be subject to the looser math of skill checks.
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I think a lot of parties don't pay that much attention to how difficult certain skill activities are when there is not much narrative tension around them.
Knock is one of the largest bonuses a spell can give to an activity and is really great for combining with an effective lock pick, because locks tend to have very hard DCs and players will experience a lot of failures trying to pick locks. The thing is, that doesn't matter to many parties, as failure usually just means "try again." So with little at stake beyond don't crit fail too often, Knock ends up looking like a bad spell to many parties.
My wizard ends up casting knock and lock a fair bit. Lock is a lot of fun if your GM tends to collapse encounters on you a lot, especially with lots of lower level enemies. They can end up struggling to get doors open for several rounds and that can give you time to deal with rooms at a gentler pace.
I just don't see any way in PF2 to replace "just cast a spell" as the way a wizard should contribute to difficult challenges (Combat or non-combat) without either undermining the value of spells, or it being so bad an option that it is just not worth doing.
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The PF2 magic system is not skill dependent and the magical (not fantastical, there are lots of fantastical skill feats) things you can do with skills is incredibly limited.
You can identify magic and magic items, you can learn spells, and maybe you can craft magical items. The skill feats that do grant things like cantrip abilities are generally worse than having cantrips memorized, as they probably should be. Recalling knowledge is a skill feature that spells can’t really do (although some make it easier). At the same time, the game is pretty loaded at this point with ways to get better at recalling knowledge if your character wants to focus on that. If it is something that is going to be skill feat or class feat related, it really doesn’t need to wizard only, because wizards don’t have a class feature activity that they use all that often to connect it to.
Like the bounty hunter archetype gives a lot of very ranger abilities, and the archetypical bounty hunter probably is a ranger, but the ranger class doesn’t need all the bounty hunter stuff saddling down the base class. Same with the snare crafter. I kind of think the lore master wizard is the same way. A wizard makes a very good remaster, probably the iconic one, but a lore master doesnt need to be a wizard and a wizard doesn’t need to be a lore master.
The way you show you have become more powerful and better at magic in PF2 is by casting more and higher rank spells.that is what wizards spend their careers trying to do.
Not everything has to be strictly about mechanical power. Sometimes something should be on a class for stylistic purposes such as the wizard being the intelligence class that has a curriculum which is associated with schooling having skills at a high level to simulate that academic aspect of the class.
Every single magic user in the game gains spell power increases by level. Certainly not a unique aspect of the wizard. Just bog standard spell progression for all 10 level casters.
It still odd to me that the bard is the master of so much. Why exactly did the bard become such a master of everything while the wizard is solely focused on the arcane? Why the sudden bard love by both the PF and D and D design teams? Even 5E really amped the power of the bard and so did PF. Must have been some real bard love in whatever polls they took to build that class into what it now is in both D&D and PF2.
Thank you very much for the kind words, and absolutely, yes! I'll be happy to answer any questions you or anyone else may have about my brew, and would be more than glad to help integrate it into your game.
Ok so:
1) Am i missing something due my inexperience with the 2e rules or the Civic Wizardry Spellshape Feat is a little underwhelming compared to the others? I've checked both Player Core 1 and 2 and i either have not found many Spells that can benefit from it or it's a benefit so good that it compensate its more limited application. What is that i'm not seeing?
2) Universal magic says to add all spells you have access to to your Spellbok, does that mean that the Wizard still needs to find those Spells through Scrolls or Teacher, or do they just add all common Spells to the Spellbook as soon as the Spell Rank is available, giving them access to basically all core spell regardless of tradition for no cost?
3) If i plan to run premade adventures, should i be careful about particular applications of abilities that might need a stricter adjudication to not be abusable?
(i also might have found a typo and a layout issue:
Typo: Universal Magic School mentions adding all 1st LEVEL spells;
Layout: Scroll Polymath text cuts off even though in the source it is displayed in full.)
I agree with Ryangwy on this one.
Wizards are themed on housing huge libraries of not just magic tomes but also lore and secrets on anything and everything. They certainly would be the most studied person in a party on the nature of magic but they also have fields of study in this game. Civic wizards better know a thing or two about city planning. The battle wizard about warfare. The protean wizard about physiology of many living things. The mentalist wizard about the mind/behavior and the brain in order for their magics to manipulate or communicate.
This idea that the wizard interacts with all these different parts of science with magic without knowing anything about the science is sort of a weak theme and fantasy of a studious master of magic using it to master some aspect of reality.
ideally a wizard knows in depth about the aspects of reality they wish to use magic to master.
The style matters for us players who love class flavor in our roleplaying. A bard makes music.
I was speaking strictly thematically. The bard thematically is studious and thematically is also an academic. It's in the lore that this is the case. One of the muses is polymath after all, which is exactly what people are saying the wizard should be. Occult also as a tradition does call out it is not faith based and more intellectual like arcane but this is not what I was basing it off, and I wasn't thinking about mechanics when I said what I said. Bards are within canon studious and learned
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The style matters for us players who love class flavor in our roleplaying. A bard makes music.I was speaking strictly thematically. The bard thematically is studious and thematically is also an academic. It's in the lore that this is the case. One of the muses is polymath after all, which is exactly what people are saying the wizard should be. Occult also as a tradition does call out it is not faith based and more intellectual like arcane but this is not what I was basing it off, and I wasn't thinking about mechanics when I said what I said. Bards are within canon studious and learned
One of the Bards themes is that of the scholar. Though not necessarily an academic, as their scholarship is drawn from undercovering stories, art, one who studies and seeks out mysteries to unravel. It need not be so formal as formal academia.
Also the Muse whcih grants Bardic Lore is the Enigma, not the Polymath. You've misunderstood the themes of both and how it relates to general scholarship.
It's all in all, a very different set of knowledge-character tropes.
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1) Am i missing something due my inexperience with the 2e rules or the Civic Wizardry Spellshape Feat is a little underwhelming compared to the others? I've checked both Player Core 1 and 2 and i either have not found many Spells that can benefit from it or it's a benefit so good that it compensate its more limited application. What is that i'm not seeing?
You're not wrong that it's pretty niche, and probably not quite as strong as the others due to being a free-action spellshape (most spells it affects are three-action spells). Hardness does have its applications, though, because it means all of your magically-created objects, constructs, etc. will negate more damage each time, and thus become a fair bit more durable.
2) Universal magic says to add all spells you have access to to your Spellbok, does that mean that the Wizard still needs to find those Spells through Scrolls or Teacher, or do they just add all common Spells to the Spellbook as soon as the Spell Rank is available, giving them access to basically all core spell regardless of tradition for no cost?
You'd add all common spells to your spellbook with that thesis, allowing you to prepare from them without the cost of having to learn them!
3) If i plan to run premade adventures, should i be careful about particular applications of abilities that might need a stricter adjudication to not be abusable?
All of these effects play with what you can do with magic, but don't expressly let you do specific things you or another character wouldn't be able to like fly at early levels or the like. Thus, while the balance may not be perfect, this shouldn't break your games.
The one effect I'd probably keep an eye out for is the Field Research feat, which lets you commit spells you've recognized to memory and learn them without the need of a scroll or person: if you're planning on giving enemies uncommon or rare spells that you really don't want your party to use, then you might want to disallow this feat.
(i also might have found a typo and a layout issue:
Typo: Universal Magic School mentions adding all 1st LEVEL spells;
Layout: Scroll Polymath text cuts off even though in the source it is displayed in full.)
Good catch on Universal Magic, I've amended the writing! As for the layout, I've seen this happen for different people on different browsers: which browser are you using? I edited my document in Chrome, and shortened a bit of the preceding feat's text so that Scroll Polymath hopefully doesn't cut off on your side.
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In terms of homebrew stuff, I've also been toying with the idea of taking the class back to basics and rebuilding it with some big fundamental changes.
Start off as a generic 3 slot prepared caster shell and work up.
No thesis, No arcane bond, no 4th school slot, schools reduced to a scaling lore skill and a single focus spell which is basically a custom spellshape which reflects the magical outlook of the school.
Redesign subclasses to be more flavourful and overall impactful.
For example, a lore focused subclass that gets an omni-RK skill as a first level feat. Their USP being they have a remastered Alchemist-style ability to create a limited number of "Scribed Scrolls", scrolls they can produce as temporary items which would allow for the functional equivalent of a 4th slot, but with additional feats can be expanded on to use in other ways. With additional focus spell feats which allow you to do with things with scrolls. Also toying with the idea of the ability to regenerate some lower level scrolls on refocus, but that might be too greedy.
A second one being a functional replacement for staff nexus, but reworked to be more versatile. Have it so that everyday you gain a pool of charges equal to your highest spell rank that you can use to cast spells from a staff or wands without using their charge. With your charge pool growing overtime. Making it fairly expansive so that you can once again operate with a functional 4th slot, but more dynamic overall.
A 3rd being a replacement for the Universalist. A more streamlined version which gains a straight-up 4th slot, but loses the dynamism of the other subclasses. It would gain a lesser number of custom feats and fewer focus spell options. Providing a close-to-now flavour, but still with some of the rough edges sanded off.
Still very much in the brainstorming stage for all of it.
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The one effect I'd probably keep an eye out for is the Field Research feat, which lets you commit spells you've recognized to memory and learn them without the need of a scroll or person: if you're planning on giving enemies uncommon or rare spells that you really don't want your...
That makes a lot of sense, i will keep an eye out for that.
As for the layout, I've seen this happen for different people on different browsers: which browser are you using? I edited my document in Chrome, and shortened a bit of the preceding feat's text so that Scroll Polymath hopefully doesn't cut off on your side
Ok, that solved the issue, thank you very much.
Thank you for all the answers as well. I'll let you know how it goes if one of my players choses to test this out.
The style matters for us players who love class flavor in our roleplaying. A bard makes music.I was speaking strictly thematically. The bard thematically is studious and thematically is also an academic. It's in the lore that this is the case. One of the muses is polymath after all, which is exactly what people are saying the wizard should be. Occult also as a tradition does call out it is not faith based and more intellectual like arcane but this is not what I was basing it off, and I wasn't thinking about mechanics when I said what I said. Bards are within canon studious and learnedOne of the Bards themes is that of the scholar. Though not necessarily an academic, as their scholarship is drawn from undercovering stories, art, one who studies and seeks out mysteries to unravel. It need not be so formal as formal academia.
Also the Muse whcih grants Bardic Lore is the Enigma, not the Polymath. You've misunderstood the themes of both and how it relates to general scholarship.
It's all in all, a very different set of knowledge-character tropes.
People asking for more skills and skill increases because int is asking wizards to be a polymath, in the literal sense of the word. Also all bards are scholar and academic is quite literally a synonym. The fact there is more art in their academic pursuits doesn't make it less academic. How formal is informal doesn't matter though. Plenty of wizards have informal schools
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People asking for more skills and skill increases because int is asking wizards to be a polymath, in the literal sense of the word. Also all bards are scholar and academic is quite literally a synonym. The fact there is more art in their academic pursuits doesn't make it less academic. How formal is informal doesn't matter though. Plenty of wizards have informal schoolsOne of the Bards themes is that of the scholar. Though not necessarily an academic, as their scholarship is drawn from undercovering stories, art, one who studies and seeks out mysteries to unravel. It need not be so formal as formal academia.
Also the Muse whcih grants Bardic Lore is the Enigma, not the Polymath. You've misunderstood the themes of both and how it relates to general scholarship.
It's all in all, a very different set of knowledge-character tropes.
The Pathfinder Player Core describes bard as, "You are a master of artistry, a scholar of hidden secrets, and a captivating persuader. Using powerful performances, you influence minds and elevate souls to new levels of heroics. You might use your powers to become a charismatic leader, or perhaps you might instead be a counselor, manipulator, scholar, scoundrel, or virtuoso. While your versatility leads some to consider you a beguiling ne’erdo- well and a jack-of-all-trades, it’s dangerous to dismiss you as a master of none."
Academics publish. They are scholars of shared knowledge, not scholars of secrets. Once an academic uncovers a secret, they share it with the world. The knowledge in books in academic libraries is not secret.
This is part of the distinction between arcane magic and occult magic.
Arcane
Arcane spellcasters use logic and rationality to categorize the magic inherent in the world around them. Because of its far-reaching approach, the arcane tradition has the broadest spell list, though it’s generally poor at affecting the spirit or the soul. Wizards are a prototypical arcane spellcaster, poring over tomes and grimoires.Occult
The practitioners of occult traditions seek to understand the unexplainable, categorize the bizarre, and otherwise access the ephemeral in a systematic way. Bards are a fundamental occult spellcaster, collecting strange esoterica and using their performances to influence the mind or elevate the soul.
Occult means hidden. I like to think of occult magic as secrets man was not meant to know. Delving too deep into occult knowledge drives people insane. Instead, it is encoded in riddles and music so that bards can tap into occult knowledge on the surface without diving too deep.
Arcane, in contrast, means hard to understand. That makes it obscure and mysterious. Some people overgeneralize that to secret, but my friends warn people to not ask me about obscure and mysterious mathematics, because I will lecture more on the topic than they want to hear. Thus, we imagine teachers at arcane schools meticulously instructing on these magics until the students understand every detail.
And according the the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, polymath means "a person of encyclopedic learning." That sounds more like a wizard than a bard.
I am rather curious: why do people in this thread compare the wizard to the spontaneous casters sorcerer and bard? The wizard has more in common with the other primary prepared casters cleric, druid, and witch.
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I am rather curious: why do people in this thread compare the wizard to the spontaneous casters sorcerer and bard? The wizard has more in common with the other primary prepared casters cleric, druid, and witch.
The Sorcerer is simple, as both are cloth casters of 6hp and 4 slots and Sorcerer also having access to the Arcane list.
The bard I don't know, probably because they are able to recall knowledge on everything on a single skill, and people feel that as a schoolar wizard should probably be able to do some of that.
The bardic lore ability is fun, but it is limited and not very reliable. Your advancement is slow with it and you are a CHA class which makes boosting INT to +4 pretty costly.
The sorcerer ability Tap into Blood is using a skill that advances to Legendary, so that part is better, but everyone seems to be completely dismissing how annoying it is to not be able to use your recall knowledge action as your first action of an encounter (and that you have to use a focus point or cast a spell from a spell slot first), which is clearly a limiting factor that affects its power balance.
The Thaumaturge is the one who's RK ability is a bit out of balance, but it can really only be useful against creatures and haunts.
I do find it annoying that skill substitution seems to be something that can now be handed out like candy as long as it is for Recalling Knowledge (and Medicine related things), as that was something PF2 has rightly avoided pretty well. Singular skill expertise to do too much was a hallmark failing of PF1, especially with ways to really specialize in boosting skill ranks. At least PF2 doesn't have that part, but we are continuing to get classes that get abilities that are a bit excessive with recalling knowledge on creatures. Specifically, the lose rules around recall knowledge and the fact that a character who wanted to specialize just in learning a specific thing about any creature really can't do that with base skills means that they have to keep making up new mechanics to allow that for each class that cares about such things instead of just having something like tactical lore skills like "Weakness lore" where you just use this one skill to learn creatures weaknesses, and instead either have to be the right class to get it, or take a million skills.
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You know I think I take issue with one part of the occult description in the game.
The in a systemic way.
That still sounds like arcane to me. Arcane practictioners will approach the occult in a systemic way and fall flat because the occult defies rational approaches.
Occult means hidden. I like to think of occult magic as secrets man was not meant to know. Delving too deep into occult knowledge drives people insane. Instead, it is encoded in riddles and music so that bards can tap into occult knowledge on the surface without diving too deep.
Arcane, in contrast, means hard to understand. That makes it obscure and mysterious. Some people overgeneralize that to secret, but my friends warn people to not ask me about obscure and mysterious mathematics, because I will lecture more on the topic than they want to hear. Thus, we imagine teachers at arcane schools meticulously instructing on these magics until the students understand every detail.
And according the the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, polymath means "a person of encyclopedic learning." That sounds more like a wizard than a bard.
I am rather curious: why do people in this thread compare the wizard to the spontaneous casters sorcerer and bard? The wizard has more in common with the other primary prepared casters cleric, druid, and witch.
My point is there is actually a lot of wizard stereotypes and archetypes that exist in other classes and that the bard specifically, in a thematic sense, is very much a music wizard up to and including the scholarly/academic aspects. It also gains abilities, however successfully, that do some of that knowledge stuff people want a wizard to do. I didn't have one single point here, but I wanted to illustrate that there is a lot people are considering the sole domain of wizards, from a thematic perspective, that really isn't. Wizards are kind of losing identity because their initial creation in d&d was as the only magic user. As more get added more is taken from the original conception of the wizard. This is why the wizard might need reinvention. "Wizards study their magic" just doesn't cut it as a class theme when we knowk bards do too, and they get into more esoteric knowledge, somehow... Apparently.
I want to put emphasis on something, which is that occult in this game means what arcane means in the real world. You say arcane doesn't mean mysterious or secret, but it does actually factually mean that IRL. I even made a thread about this a while ago. Problem is that people have started using arcane to just refer to magic because of the existence of these games making arcane not mean what it used to mean
Thats true.
Arcane writings in real life refers to something either old and obscure or secret and indecipherable.
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My point is there is actually a lot of wizard stereotypes and archetypes that exist in other classes and that the bard specifically, in a thematic sense, is very much a music wizard up to and including the scholarly/academic aspects. ... I didn't have one single point here, but I wanted to illustrate that there is a lot people are considering the sole domain of wizards, from a thematic perspective, that really isn't. Wizards are kind of losing identity because their initial creation in d&d was as the only magic user.
By the same standards, a lot of Fighter stereotypes and archetypes exist in other classes, and the swashbuckler specifically, in a thematic sense, is very much a dexterity fighter up to an including the combat training aspects that are the fighter's main theme.
Pathfinder is built on a legacy of rules designed for the cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard. All martial classes will resemble the fighter. All spellcasting classes will resemble the wizard.
"Wizards study their magic" just doesn't cut it as a class theme when we knowk bards do too, and they get into more esoteric knowledge, somehow... Apparently.
"Wizards study their magic" just doesn't cut it as a class theme period. We don't need to compare them to another class to acknowledge that.
The problem is that I and some other people hope that a stronger theme on wizards will give a foundation for better balancing the class without making them seem like sorcerers or bards or druids. We already have those classes and don't need a copycat. We look at wizards and see that their unique features in PF2 mechanics are Spellbook, Arcane Bond, Arcane Thesis, and Arcane School.
The magus shares the Spellbook feature, but their martial skills and wave casting make them sufficiently distinct from wizards. Sadly, the spellbook is a ball and chain that keeps the wizard from accessing the entire arcane spell list like the cleric accesses the entire common divine list and the druid accesses the entire common primal list. It is a liability rather than an asset. But with the Spell Substitution arcane thesis the spellbook becomes an asset, so many people want that as a feature for all wizards.
Drain Bonded Item from Arcane Bond is a once-per-day ability. That is too infrequent to define a class.
Arcane Thesis is much like the routine specialties of other classes, such as the druid's Orders or the Swashbuckler's Styles. The thesis does not reflect a deep inner nature like the sorcerer's Bloodlines or a life-defining devotion like the champion's Causes. Arcane Thesis can help define a type of wizard, but does not define all wizards.
Arcane School has a scholarly theme that complements that Spellbook is a book. But the individual arcane schools are weak in flavor and weak in power.
Recall Knowledge was a strength of wizards in Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition and Pathfinder 1st Edition. The skill-point system rewarded high Intelligence with the ability to keep many skill at maximum ranks. And the Knowledge skills had Intelligence bonuses, so the wizard was better served to support those skills rather than investing in Diplomacy or Sleight of Hand. Knowledge to identify creatures complemented the wizard's magic by telling that a creature was resistant to fire before throwing a fireball at them. Some people have nostalgia for playing a wizard that way and argue that it fits the scholar theme that matches with Spellbook and Arcane School. That is all.
I am perfectly willing to give up on wizards as Recall Knowledge experts. I just don't like that wizards are among three lowest classes in initial trained skills. That makes them the students who did not pay attention in class rather than a scholar. And a mere Arcane+2+INT+background initial trained skills is hard to work with in character construction.
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My point is there is actually a lot of wizard stereotypes and archetypes that exist in other classes and that the bard specifically, in a thematic sense, is very much a music wizard up to and including the scholarly/academic aspects. ... I didn't have one single point here, but I wanted to illustrate that there is a lot people are considering the sole domain of wizards, from a thematic perspective, that really isn't. Wizards are kind of losing identity because their initial creation in d&d was as the only magic user.By the same standards, a lot of Fighter stereotypes and archetypes exist in other classes, and the swashbuckler specifically, in a thematic sense, is very much a dexterity fighter up to an including the combat training aspects that are the fighter's main theme.
Pathfinder is built on a legacy of rules designed for the cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard. All martial classes will resemble the fighter. All spellcasting classes will resemble the wizard.
"Wizards study their magic" just doesn't cut it as a class theme when we knowk bards do too, and they get into more esoteric knowledge, somehow... Apparently."Wizards study their magic" just doesn't cut it as a class theme period. We don't need to compare them to another class to acknowledge that.
The problem is that I and some other people hope that a stronger theme on wizards will give a foundation for better balancing the class without making them seem like sorcerers or bards or druids. We already have those classes and don't need a copycat. We look at wizards and see that their unique features in PF2 mechanics are Spellbook, Arcane Bond, Arcane Thesis, and Arcane School.
The magus shares the Spellbook feature, but their martial skills and wave casting make them sufficiently distinct from wizards. Sadly, the spellbook is a ball and chain that keeps the wizard from accessing the entire arcane spell list like the cleric accesses the entire common divine list...
I actually think clerics should not get access to the whole divine list and should only get spells appropriate for their God, but I don't know how to implement this. It would be a 3e solution, but I frankly like the flavor of filling out the spellbook
What I think we need is a way to make spellcasters less homogenous so we aren't debating their power over marginal power differences like we are now and comparing classes which should feel much different. One thing we'd have to do is narrow the scope of a class like the wizard, or abandon the concept entirely. Perhaps the fighter is a relic that has no place in the future? I don't know, but it is worth considering. Some people will hate this, but keeping these generic overly broad classes might be a problem for the future of the game. If we keep the wizard in the future, and I would really like to, it needs a niche that can be protected and it needs to stop trying to do everything. Even if it is bad at doing everything, we need to stop thinking about the class this way. I think the niche should be the ability to customizes spells and perhaps still do funky stuff with spell slots like it does now
I'm also considering proposing the future edition (in 5-10 years) turns all spells at-will but balances them accordingly and all classes but the wizard get spells known, but the wizards gets to choose each day from the spell book what spells they know that day. Prepared, but all spells are at will. The number of different spells everyone has per day reduces a lot, but now casters can get more class features to differentiate each other. I don't know if this is the right move, but I would like to see it tested. Focus points can be used by some classes to maybe alter or overcharge spells, or swap spells known, or even still add unique class specific spells as they do now. Cantrips disappear from the game because of this though
Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
For what i see in my inexperienced dislike of the class as it is (which has always been my favourite in the past) is that while i like the current concept of the schools, the actual benefits feel disjointed and very vaguely related to the themes of the school... off the top of my head: why doesn't civic wizardry get mending but gets read aura? why doesn't battle magic get sure strike but gets mist? Not saying they aren't useful, but feels like they tried to cram in stuff to justify a class feature but didn't have enough material to make that class feature feel cohesive.
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There are a lot of potential answers to why certain spells are on certain lschool lists, but that is all open to subjective debate. The best answer is, “if there are spells that make more sense to you, talk to your GM and swap them out. Its suggested in the rules.”
Which I thinks handles things better than the old arbitrary school lists that were not mutable by default and the player really had to push uphill to make changes.
For what i see in my inexperienced dislike of the class as it is (which has always been my favourite in the past) is that while i like the current concept of the schools, the actual benefits feel disjointed and very vaguely related to the themes of the school... off the top of my head: why doesn't civic wizardry get mending but gets read aura? why doesn't battle magic get sure strike but gets mist? Not saying they aren't useful, but feels like they tried to cram in stuff to justify a class feature but didn't have enough material to make that class feature feel cohesive.Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
Ok so its the execution of the spell lists that you have a problem with.
I think that is always going to be valid. And as Unicore suggested the game anticipated people to be disappointment and made it expected that dialog with GMs to add or swap spells to the list would happen.But I want to also validate the problem here to a degree. GMs that don't work with players and act reasonably (not even favorably but just reasonably) undermine the class.
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There are other parts i'm not really enthusiast about, i was just answering my personal opinion why specifically schools feel thematically weak, at least to me.
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Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
As a person who said that the schools are weak in flavor, I will explain. Though I should qualify my statement that the schools seem weak in flavor, because I have not seen anyone play a Remastered wizard. The wizard Idris in my current campaign is a pre-Remaster divination wizard. I also think that the Remastered schools have a lot more potential for good flavor than the legacy sevenfold division of magic called schools.
Let me start with classes with strong flavors in their specialties.
I have seen three kineticists: the playtest kineticist Collin, the Fistful of Flowers kineticist Monet, and my Strength of Thousands kineticist Cara'sseth. Collin and Cara'sseth were played by the same player, but they seem different. Collin was an air and water kineticist who specialized in healing and travel. Monet was a water and wood kineticist who specialized in protection. Cara'sseth is a fire kineticist who specializes in damage. They are distinct kinds of kineticists.
I have seen three rogues. The thief-racket rogue Binny in my Ironfang Invasion campaign was a sniper, shooting her shortbow from hiding. She realied on her high Dexterity. The scoundrel racket rogue Sam in the same campaign was a magical trickster, attacking with cantrips and focus spells rather than weapons. Sam's preferred method of victory was Diplomacy or Deception for a peaceful resolution. He depended on his high Charisma. The eldritch-trickster rogue Roshan in my Strength of Thousands campaign is a wrestler, disabling people with Athletics because she took two archetypes for magical power (one free) but is not interested in explointing cantrips with Sneak Attacks like Sam did. The player relied on the Eldritch Trickster racket for her second archetype, because developing two archetypes is going to require all the class feats. The three rogues are distinct from each other.
I have seen two wizards. The wizard Corvin was 11 years ago in my Rise of the Runelords campaign, so I forget his school. He was scholarly. The wizard Idris in my Strength of Thousands campaign is a divination wizard. He is studious. Both functioned by casting arcane spells and hanging back away from combat.
The names of the Remasters Arcane Schools are great: a callback to the Latin grammar books Ars Grammatica for wizards of ancient lore, Battle Magic for wizards who what to fight, The Boundary for a hint about the planes, Civic Wizardry for wizards who want to build, Mentalism for wizards who contemplate the mind, and Protean Form for wizards who want to shapeshift. Those notions are quite distinct. The rulebook even gives the old universalist non-selection of a school a more colorful name, School of Unified Magical Theory.
But in practice, those schools are mostly a list of spells the wizard can know without study, when one of the wizard's strengths is learning new spells. What's the point? The point is that the wizard is restricted to three spell slots per level without those spells. That is not delicious flavor. That is a parent telling their child to eat their vegetables even if they taste awful. And the selection of spells does not live up to the flavor of the names, as TittoPaolo210 pointed out. (I hope this last objection will be corrected in Lost Omens: Rival Academies.)
The flavor of several focus spells does not help the school's theme either. Does Protective Wards from Ars Grammatica imply anything about language? Does beefing up a summoned creature with Fortify Summoning tell anything about the boundary beyond our universe and the path to the planes? Scramble Body from the School of Protean Form suggests that it is about shapeshifting, but instead it makes the target sick. Earhworks from the School of Civic Wizardry is named as if it built a barrier of earth, but really it conjures a temporary barrier rather than building anything.
Force Bolt from the School of Battle Magic does deal damage, but the damage is a mere 1d4+1 (Heightened (+2) The damage increases by 1d4+1.) it is superior to cantrips because it automatically hits, but is lacking an attack roll really the correct flavor for a battle mage?
Charming Push in contrast has a weak name but it fits the Mentalism theme. It is a mental command to not attack the wizard. Unfortunately, Charming Push would be better in the hands of enemies than in the hands of PCs. Against a party the Charmingly-Pushed creature would simply attack another party member. The wizard usually isn't on the front line anyways. On the other side of the coin, a high-level enemy wizard with 3 focus points could command three party members to not attack themself, evilly pushing the battle onto the minions.
I haven't looked at the advanced focus spells, but since they cost a feat to learn, I hope they are worthy of the cost.
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I love the Ars Grammatica school and have been having a blast with my now 8th level wizard. It is not just a school about language, it is a school about the inherent magical power of words and symbols. Her protective wards are runic symbols that expand out around her, warding herself and her allies. She is a tank of a wizard, usually found right up in the thick of things. She has a bunch of different spells she uses that are not in her school to help her fulfill this theme of words of protective warding theme, but she also uses dispel magic all the time, command almost every day, and dispelling globe.
She is not limited by her school’s theme, but it helped her decide to carry a shield and be able to switch from battle field controller to tank from round to round. Translate has also been a very useful spell for my party, so the language and symbols theme merges really easily with the wards mechanics. The advanced spell for the school is great. A one action version of a 10 minute cast spell that lasts an hour is great. She is neither an Abjurer nor a diviner, but a good bit of both wrapped up in her own unique flavor. She is a spell substitution wizard who now has over 40 spells in her spell book, including 9 rank 4 spells: Fly, Mountain Resilience, Dispelling Globe, Clairvoyance, Translocate, Vision of Death, Spell Immunity, Wall of Fire, Shape Stone. Not to mention all of the spells I can heighten to that rank. I skipped suggestion because my table really dislikes mind control magic. Command gets a pass because it is a set of limited actions with an immediate duration, but I won’t touch other stuff, even charm makes folks uncomfortable.
The last major dungeon was a doozy. We started it at the start of level 6 and leveled up to 8 before the day was over, so I have yet to cast a 4th rank spell, but I am excited that we got 2 weeks of down time afterwards to catch up on learning some new spells. Having a good mix of combat spells and all the out of combat spells you can think to cast goes a long way to making the spell substitution wizard a really unique play experience. You start the unknown day with mostly combat spells memorized, but can trade them out as you find uses for other spells and then you can rememorize spells that you use, so you don’t have to waste slots with a lot of duplicates. Even on a day where we fought over 35 enemies, three of which were level +2 creatures and one creature we should not have fought was level +8, I just barely ran out of spells in the very last encounter, having also used about 10 total scrolls on the day. All in all in that dungeon I cast 2 slows, 2 fire balls, one lightning bolt, one dispel magic, and one life saving wooden double. I will probably never cast those same spells in a day again as it was very dungeon dependent that I even had the slow spells memorized along side a fireball I cast twice through my bonded item.
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Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
Because the schools do nothing outside limiting the spell choices of the 4th slot and giving a weak focus spell. Also does not help that it don't have school feats that plays on theme.
I will compare to the current prepared casters, cleric and druid as Mathmuse mentioned that might be a better way to do it.
Druid orders only gives a feat and a focus spell as they can pick other orders, but Storm per example as it's the more spellcasting one, have a flavorful feat, a strong focus spell and if you want, it have more feats ahead on theme, also helps how easy it's to increase the focus pool on druid feats alone so they can use even more Tempest Surge.
Cloistered Clerics we could say that the deity is the subclass, giving you the type of font, being able to pick 1 out of 4 focus spells on domains and also spells outside of the divine list that clerics of other deities likely don't have access and like the Druid, the feats ahead also support it, either by picking more domains from that deity or making the font that they grant better of having new effects.
Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
As a person who said that the schools are weak in flavor, I will explain. Though I should qualify my statement that the schools seem weak in flavor, because I have not seen anyone play a Remastered wizard. The wizard Idris in my current campaign is a pre-Remaster divination wizard. I also think that the Remastered schools have a lot more potential for good flavor than the legacy sevenfold division of magic called schools.
Let me start with classes with strong flavors in their specialties.
I have seen three kineticists: the playtest kineticist Collin, the Fistful of Flowers kineticist Monet, and my Strength of Thousands kineticist Cara'sseth. Collin and Cara'sseth were played by the same player, but they seem different. Collin was an air and water kineticist who specialized in healing and travel. Monet was a water and wood kineticist who specialized in protection. Cara'sseth is a fire kineticist who specializes in damage. They are distinct kinds of kineticists.
I have seen three rogues. The thief-racket rogue Binny in my Ironfang Invasion campaign was a sniper, shooting her shortbow from hiding. She realied on her high Dexterity. The scoundrel racket rogue Sam in the same campaign was a magical trickster, attacking with cantrips and focus spells rather than weapons. Sam's preferred method of victory...
I agree rogue is a versatile class, but thats also evident in having quite a few choices for KAS.
But if I understand right, your issue with the wizard on theming is the nature of the spell book and focus spells?
Like sure they might start out with different sets of spells but the higher in level they go the more their spell books begin to look alike?
And the focus spells fall short of fulfilling the themes of the schools?
The second of these I think I agree with the way you've explained it for some of the rank 1 focus spells but I dont agree with all of them.
Ars putting out words that protect is pretty well into its school theme. Even if the power of the focus spell isn't as much as some expect.
Proteans focus spell is probably the worst. I understand it cant be shapechanging (that's what druids do), cant polymorph an enemy (way to high level an effect for focus rank 1), probably shouldn't do what mutigens do (thats alchemist territory), so they decided it made a foe sick with nausea (which feels too close in effect to the evil eye from the witch.) I looked at the list of polymorph spells and the only effects that are low enough in rank to fit are shrink/enlarge. Most form spells effects are higher level and animal form is very druid.
Can someone explain to me what about the wizard schools makes them weak in flavor.
I thought the themeing of the wizard schools was actually one of the good changes about wizards, mechanics are another thing entirely but whether its something you like or dont (or think missed the mark in spell selection) having a spell slot dedicated to the school theme is at least an attempt to have mechanics reflect theme.
Because the schools do nothing outside limiting the spell choices of the 4th slot and giving a weak focus spell. Also does not help that it don't have school feats that plays on theme.
I will compare to the current prepared casters, cleric and druid as Mathmuse mentioned that might be a better way to do it.
Druid orders only gives a feat and a focus spell as they can pick other orders, but Storm per example as it's the more spellcasting one, have a flavorful feat, a strong focus spell and if you want, it have more feats ahead on theme, also helps how easy it's to increase the focus pool on druid feats alone so they can use even more Tempest Surge.
Cloistered Clerics we could say that the deity is the subclass, giving you the type of font, being able to pick 1 out of 4 focus spells on domains and also spells outside of the divine list that clerics of other deities likely don't have access and like the Druid, the feats ahead also support it, either by picking more domains from that deity or making the font that they grant better of having new effects.
Ok i see what your saying. And I actually think they hinted in the wizard rules that school specific feats would be developed later to address it.
Just to stretch the curriculum slot argument to absurdity. would it have been better if all the wizards slots were curriculum slots? I mean that would mean all a wizards spellcasting would be themed.(I know that would have been far worse and sounds ridiculous, but I point it out because only restricting one slot is being hit for not themeing the wizard school enough and yet if they themed all slots as curriculumn the wizard would be a very weak yet very deep into theme spellcaster.)
There are other parts i'm not really enthusiast about, i was just answering my personal opinion why specifically schools feel thematically weak, at least to me.For what it's worth, I support you and have been saying that Wizard is the rare class that's gotten worse remastered thematically and floor-eise, and a lot if that is down to the extremely peculiar way they did schools. Not capable of covering the depth of the old schools, some extremely weird choices of focus spells, and the school spells are just terribly done with a "ask you GM" sticker to alleviate criticism which frankly sucks especially since this is a core, common basic build choice thing.
Ok i see what your saying. And I actually think they hinted in the wizard rules that school specific feats would be developed later to address it.
Just to stretch the curriculum slot argument to absurdity. would it have been better if all the wizards slots were curriculum slots? I mean that would mean all a wizards spellcasting would be themed.
(I know that would have been far worse and sounds ridiculous, but I point it out because only restricting one slot is being hit for not themeing...I mean... yes, if they're willing to follow through on it? Sorcerers quite often effectively act as though every slot is a bloodline slot (because so many class features trigger of them) and they're also considered hugely thematic for doing so.
Right now you're hinging hopes on non core feats to provide any sort of heft to schools and I'm sorry to say that we're this many years into PF2e and there's only one class that's received additional feats for existing subclasses (as opposed to new subclasses) outside the APG/remaster and that's monk and their elemental stances. That's it. You're asking for something Paizo has never done and have no indication will ever do.
I wouldn't be so sure about saying never. The remaster project put them in a tight timeline to get everything out where just this month they finally got PC2 out providing all the core classes remasterd. I agree Wizards dont flesh out theme as it levels and they have very few feats compared to other classes. it would seem they pushed back doing school feats until they had time to really do them well. Looking at the dedication it seems they had school feats in mind. A deep dive wizard book would probably get that kind of attention to add in school feats. Isnt there a book like that in the works?
I really think the design of the new schools is that support for specific schools would be a mistake. Attaching feats to specific schools, for example, just means that feat is only useable by 1/7th or less (as more schools get published) of wizards. Printing 7 feats every time you want to give the wizard 1 new option is bad design direction for players.
The whole idea behind the new schools is that they are minimally invasive on your character build and easy to produce new ones. So I'd much rather see a bunch of new schools come to print than to see any material tied explicitly to an existing school. The existing schools are such a small piece of the puzzle that neither the GM nor the player need to worry much about suggesting modifications to an existing school. The more stuff that gets attached to the schools, the more difficult it gets to modifying them in a balanced way. The school is a minor ribbon feature now, baking it in harder would be a detriment to the class.
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I really think the design of the new schools is that support for specific schools would be a mistake. Attaching feats to specific schools, for example, just means that feat is only useable by 1/7th or less (as more schools get published) of wizards. Printing 7 feats every time you want to give the wizard 1 new option is bad design direction for players.
The whole idea behind the new schools is that they are minimally invasive on your character build and easy to produce new ones. So I'd much rather see a bunch of new schools come to print than to see any material tied explicitly to an existing school. The existing schools are such a small piece of the puzzle that neither the GM nor the player need to worry much about suggesting modifications to an existing school. The more stuff that gets attached to the schools, the more difficult it gets to modifying them in a balanced way. The school is a minor ribbon feature now, baking it in harder would be a detriment to the class.
A minor ribbon that actively hinders you compared to other 4 slot casters. I wouldn't classify that as minimally invasive.
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New druid orders come, here at least 3-4 new feats on theme.
New Magus studies? Here 2 new feats.
Schools right now are basically only a limiter for the 4th slot, I would rather just scrap schools and let the Wizard just choose their flavor of below average focus spells that they have.
And about asking GM about changing schools from curriculum? Any class could do that. Like a Imperial Sorcerer asking the GM if they can switch the Force Barrage sorcerous gift for Sure Strike, or an flame oracle asking for Floating Flame instead of Blazing Bolt and so on.
I misspoke calling the school a ribbon. The focus spell is mechanically significant. The free spells added to your book, and thus corresponding limitations placed on your 4th slot are mechanically significant.
It is easy to feel negative about school spells if you dislike your options for both.
If you like your options for both, the schools are fine without saddling them with any additional mechanical effect. More schools increases the odds of finding a school that gives you both, as long as you understand why and how wizard focus spells are different from druid or Sorcerer or Witch focus spells.
The curriculum spells are very easy to modify as a GM with minimal balance impact on the game. Trading out bloodline spells on a sorcerer can have a massive balance impact on the their power level in the party because everything the sorcerer does runs through blood magic. Giving Imperial sorcerers sure strike as a bloodline spell would change how the class plays much more than giving sure strike to a battle mage. So I disagree vehemently with "anything in the game can be changed, so the advice in the book to talk to your GM about changing curriculum spells is irrelevant." The advice is there because the GM can change this with minimal negative impact or needing to think about how this change is going to cascade into other things. The more you try to force the wizard into treating their curriculum spells like bloodline spells, the less flexibility GMs will have changing them out.
It would suck if convincing illusion, conceal spell, Spell protection array, Detonating spell, etc. was locked behind 1 school, which is what would have happened if the remaster tried to give school specific feats from the beginning. Minimally you would have to have a feat to let you choose other feats from other schools and I don't think that is a particular strength of the Druid. A lot of people wanted this from the beginning of PF2 with schools and I think the developers understood that they never had the intention of making school selection matter in PF2 the same way it does in D&D, (not that it doesn't matter now, but it is just not the same as when there were spell focus feats and other ways to try to focus on just casting a few specific spells better.
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Hi, I was just looking through Player Core's Wizards, and I got to ask, because I want to make sure it's not just me:
Anyone else feel a Wizard should get their Advanced School Spell without having to use a feat? I mean, both sample Wizards list Advanced School Spell as their 8th feat. I feel that, if a School's Advanced School Spell is an ideal part of every build, I feel like it should be a feature rather than a feat.
So why not just give Wizards their Advanced School Spell at 8th level?
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I see there's plans to Remaster Guns and Gears. So there's hope for a Remaster of Secrets of Magic, too. Lots of potential there.
I really think the design of the new schools is that support for specific schools would be a mistake. Attaching feats to specific schools, for example, just means that feat is only useable by 1/7th or less (as more schools get published) of wizards. Printing 7 feats every time you want to give the wizard 1 new option is bad design direction for players.
The whole idea behind the new schools is that they are minimally invasive on your character build and easy to produce new ones. So I'd much rather see a bunch of new schools come to print than to see any material tied explicitly to an existing school. The existing schools are such a small piece of the puzzle that neither the GM nor the player need to worry much about suggesting modifications to an existing school. The more stuff that gets attached to the schools, the more difficult it gets to modifying them in a balanced way. The school is a minor ribbon feature now, baking it in harder would be a detriment to the class.
More the reason to delay printing them I think.
They gave themselves time to figure out how to approach school feats in a way that does work.