I don't like the idea that the Fighters are the "Best at combat", Rogues are "Best at skills" and Wizards are "Best at spells" either, but that's pretty much the core idea behind these classes. I was just pointing out that a lot of people ignore this inherent lack of flavor and problematic "niche" in Fighters and Rogues precisely because they get special treatment that makes them a cut above other classes, while the Wizard doesn't.
Honestly I just don't think the wizard should be "best at spells". I think the wizard should have a specific play style and combat niche. I think the arcane list should tell a spellcaster what their niche is, and a class chassis give a specific way to do that which has its own strengths and weaknesses
It should be that the arcane spell lists says, "You are good at crowd control/battlefield control and blasting, you are okay at summoning and debuffing, you are bad at buffing and you can't heal. Outside of combat you have the best swiss army knife when it comes to problem solving/utility." Then the wizard chassis says "you focus on your slotted spells more than focus spells or cantrips, and your class features and feats let you manipulate the parameters of spells to gain tactical advantages to accentuate the strengths of the arcane list, and you get class features that let you manipulate spellslots themselves to cast more spells and do things with a flexibility other prepared casters cannot do." The niche of the wizards becomes making spells have better more complex functions that allow more tactical versatility, and spellslot manipulation, and thus niche becomes protected. No one else gets it like they do, their metamagic is better and no one else gets to mess with, or recharge, spelled slots. Arguably they also get the counter and dispell magic the best cuz it fits their theme, but I don't think that niche needs as much protection. The current wizard does *some of this* and it isn't super well protected as niche
By contrast I think sorcerers should get a +1 to spell DC and attack rolls, NOT the wizard, and I think they should get better bonuses to spells damage, or if they're divine slightly better healing, and I think they should get spell penetration as well and a better version of quicken spell. If a wizard can do it once, sorcerers maybe can do it twice or three times a day, maybe get it a bit sooner. The difference between an arcane sorcerer and a wizard should be that wizards have to exploit weaknesses to maximize damage, and sorcerers do not. Wizards need to carefully manipulate the battlefield with well placed spells, and sorcerers should just overwhelm enemies with magical might. Sorcerers should get better focus spells than wizards but FEWER spellslots. I think the old design sensibility from 3.X/PF1E where sorcerers got more slots does NOT apply in 2E and it only exacerbates the gulf between sorcerers and wizards in combat with their flexibility by giving them 4 slots a day. Wizards should have 3+1 and sorcerers should have 3
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Being trained in skills is fairly meaningless as the game goes on. Your success rate plummets relative to skills with investment, but you can only really have 2 or 3 skills with investment, depending on your level. It is nice early, though, sure.That simply isn't true. Success rates sky rocket as the game goes on.
It's just not often perceived that way since you're often confronted with greater challenges.
Scaling a DC 20 cliff at 1st-level can be quite difficult. Someone trained in Athletics and using the proper gear will likely make it to the top, whereas everyone else won't.
Ten levels later though? Everyone with any training in Athletics at all makes it to the top of that cliff, with or without gear. Only those without training still struggle (and even they can make it with Follow the Expert). And that's not even accounting for a host of additional options--like extreme jumping, flight, or teleportation--that can circumnavigate the obstacle altogether. The party's success rate is probably 100% or close to it, whereas it was maybe 50% for the party athlete.
There's no denying that things have become substantially easier for everyone involved.
By the time you get to 17th-level, you're probably not just scaling a traditional cliff though. You now find yourself scaling a mountain of tormented souls in the Outer Rifts. Souls that grab and bite at you as you climb, that try to throw you off, all while fiendish imps harry you from the toxic air, a demon lord tries to distract your by lashing his whip menacingly from high above, and acid rain pours down on your head making everything slippery and caustic. In this case, the DC is probably closer to 40, or even higher.
That still doesn't change the fact that you've long become a worlds-class climber that has a far higher chance of succeeding than you did at low levels. Success rates go up, never down. Challenges just get harder.
And that DOES matter, because you are likely going to be encountering...
This strikes me as a particularly bad interpretation of my statement. There is no question that the success rate for trained skills with no investment and the success rate for increased skills with item bonuses diverges more and more as the game goes on. Even when trained hits "always succeeds" thresholds for a task, invested skills will still crit more.
This further ignores the qualitative expansion of what increased skills can do. Stealth with Foil Senses is very different from stealth without Foil Senses, for example, and some checks are entirely proficiency gated.
The simple fact is that even if success rates relative to a given task always go up, success rates relative to both an invested user of the skill and the standard DC for your level go down.
You can say it's a "GM staging problem" if we never climb mundane mountains, but it strikes me as just as much of a staging problem if players start interacting with people they only have a 5% chance of failing diplomacy against all the time, or if the game is bogged down with checks that are trivial for the party members who can perform them. There is a balance here, but the fixed DC 20 mountain is the one you will and should see less often at the table as the game goes on—there just aren't any stakes past a certain point. A few checks like that are good reminders, but too many are ultimately boring.
On a final note—and this is a personal issue more than a genuine critique—because trained progression is automatic and requires no investing points at levelup or anything similar, I tend to feel like it isn't something my character is actually choosing to improve at, even if the number goes up. I feel significant cognitive dissonance when a character that has diplomacy as a throwaway trained skill can suddenly sweet talk any normal villager, especially when they'd typically defer to someone more invested in the skill when the need for diplomacy arises.
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Being trained in skills is fairly meaningless as the game goes on. Your success rate plummets relative to skills with investment, but you can only really have 2 or 3 skills with investment, depending on your level. It is nice early, though, sure.That simply isn't true. Success rates sky rocket as the game goes on.
It's just not often perceived that way since you're often confronted with greater challenges.
Scaling a DC 20 cliff at 1st-level can be quite difficult. Someone trained in Athletics and using the proper gear will likely make it to the top, whereas everyone else won't.
Ten levels later though? Everyone with any training in Athletics at all makes it to the top of that cliff, with or without gear. Only those without training still struggle (and even they can make it with Follow the Expert). And that's not even accounting for a host of additional options--like extreme jumping, flight, or teleportation--that can circumnavigate the obstacle altogether. The party's success rate is probably 100% or close to it, whereas it was maybe 50% for the party athlete.
There's no denying that things have become substantially easier for everyone involved.
By the time you get to 17th-level, you're probably not just scaling a traditional cliff though. You now find yourself scaling a mountain of tormented souls in the Outer Rifts. Souls that grab and bite at you as you climb, that try to throw you off, all while fiendish imps harry you from the toxic air, a demon lord tries to distract your by lashing his whip menacingly from high above, and acid rain pours down on your head making everything slippery and caustic. In this case, the DC is probably closer to 40, or even higher.
That still doesn't change the fact that you've long become a worlds-class climber that has a far higher chance of succeeding than you did at low levels. Success rates go up, never down. Challenges just get harder.
And that DOES matter, because you are likely going to be encountering...
I partially disagree.
It's fact be trained in many different skill at high levels makes many minor things trivial. You can climb walls that have trained difficult, balance over most trained uneven ground, steep ascent or descent with Maneuver in Flight and so on. It's so easy to do this things in these levels that you probably not even have a risk of failure (your bonus is so high that if you roll a NAT 1 instead of failures you get a success because all other results are critical success).
Yet for normal skill challenges expected after level 15, trained means that you probably will fail. I GMed a LvL 16 mini-game full of many different skill check in a famous AP and those players that have trained only usually just fails because the DC vary from 34-38. Basically making to have many trained skills was pretty limited.
Yet that was useful for Aid someone that was legendary due its normal DC is 15 so it is not like it was completely useless but they are clearly not enough for those skill challenges. Also I believe most GMs stop to ask for low DC skill checks in such high level that AP not even consider such things anymore.
So I don't think that int advantage of get more trained skill makes it competitive with other stats benefits.
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That's the entire point, INT is good for skills but when at higher levels they expect you to have more then Trained I.E Expert, Master and Legendary then you're just wasting attribute modifiers. Yet if you ever wanted to do low skill challenges you can never fail which is funny because trivial skill checks or encounters is not something you see so being level 10 and having a skill at +12 with 0 modifiers other then Trained + Level what are you actually gonna do with that skill? Sure you can Aid an ally with the DC being a simple 15 but this is neither here nor there.
IF Wizards got a Wizard Lore that is like Lore Master Lore then it'd be fine. Let the Wizards be smart and use their INT to do impressive stuff. Some times the skill feats i feel best at as a Wizard was Additional Lore. However I feel like with the Commander Playtest even this got stripped from the Wizard with the sad fact that they get Warfare Lore to Legendary which strips you of one fact and let's not talk about Thaumaturge and Diverse Lore which a -2 is nothing if you got a Tome or level 7 or higher. Master with a -2 is the same as having Expert Bardic Lore/Loremaster lore at level 15 with the requirement of a completwly other skill at Legendary.
So the real question is the following.
What does the Wizard actually suppose to excel at?
Then ask yourself these questions,
-if a Spell Blending Wizard Blasts then is it worth having +2 (14) Charisma so you can take Dangerous Sorcery and Blast like a Sorcerer?
- If Spell Substitution is your answer then are you going to get the most out of it instead of an Arcane Sorcerer? Can you actually make the most of your low level nearly worthless feats?
- if the above is false then why not Arcane Witch?
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this Wizard actually has nearly 50% more top spell slots compared to a Sorcerer. I do think you're undervaluing them.
.I would like to check your math on this.
If both are optimising for Max top-level spell slots, taking into account things like spell blending, evolution feats, Arcane bond, etc, a Wizard can have 1 more top level slot than a sorcerer.
To get that however, the Wizard has traded in more overall spells per day.
On top of the fact that when you start talking percentages, you start making things sound way better than they are.
My wizard has 50% more top slots than the sorcerer.
Crowd goes, "Ooooh. 50 percent. That's a lot."
It's 2 more top slots that they have given up multiple usable lower level slots for that could be used to cast slow or haste or some other useful spells. This idea of top slots being so great is a completely falsehood in PF2.
Top level slots are not worth giving up lower level slots as you level.
Rank has no effect on the DC or spell attack roll.
Even for blasting spells it's an extra dice or two of damage.
I use plenty of low level slots at high level. I cast single target slow. I use see invis. I use sure strike. I use vision of death. I use level 5 synesthesia.
I don't like to give up lower level slots for higher level slots as those lower level slots are still highly useful.
For what? A few extra dice of chain lightning or eclipse curse? 4d6 on a fireball a few more times per day while giving up another casting of 6d6 fireball or some other useful spell?
Not worth it to me.
I've played a ton of high level casters. Spell Blending is one of the most over-rated theses in these wizard versus other caster discussions used by folks to theorycraft examples that make it seem really good when actual play says otherwise.
You don't need extra high level slots. It's not much of an advantage and especially not when you're giving up lower level slots filled with useful spells for a few extra dice of damage at the highest levels.
That is not a well designed class if DM Fiat is what is necessary to make them on par with other classes.
Good design or bad design it's fundamental to how the Wizard is built. Its primary strength in spellcasting mechanics is being able to change out its options daily from a potentially broad lists, so a GM who makes that information hard to come by and/or limits the ability of the wizard to grab new spells is making them much worse in the process.
For better or worse, Paizo clearly doesn't mind designing classes that aren't going to be suitable for certain campaign types or are sensitive to GM considerations.
... So before you play a wizard it's important to check with your GM to see if it's going to be a wizard friendly campaign or not.
It's never been that way in the past, not sure why you think it should be that way now.
The wizard spells worked prior. Worked regardless of who was DM. The class worked regardless of who was DM. Because all the class features and spells were powerful regardless of who was DM.
As in DM fiat did not decide if a campaign was "wizard friendly", their skills and abilities worked regardless of the DM.
Why a bunch of folks suddenly think a class works due to GM Fiat is beyond me because the wizard never needed GM fiat to work. Never.
As I said, I had a wizard in nearly every campaign since I first started playing this game until PF2. Even the 5E wizard is a great class in my opinion.
The PF2 wizard is the worst version of the wizard I have seen in the history of D&D type of games. I've been playing since the red box.
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It is pretty hilarious to see how wide opinions vary on the things like the value of top level spell slots. There are tons of different ways to play a caster effectively in PF2. The key is to keep trying out different things until you start having fun with it.
What about level 8 on with staff nexus I didnt see anyone talk this one up?
At 8 you have these slots
R1 4
R2 4
R3 4
R4 4
And lets say you craft your nexus staff into a greater staff of fire at this point. naturally preparing the staff gives 8 charges. Enough for 2 R3 fireballs that day. Could give up 2 level 2 spells and end up with 12 charges for a total of 4 R3 fireballs that day.
That will probably meet all your fireball needs for the day leaving open all your 3 free level 3 slots for things like slow or haste or anything else you want and of course you have your school slot for whatever you have for it.
Alternatively you can give up the level 3 school slot and a level 1 school slot and get the same 4 R3 fireballs for the day with your staff.
I mean a non nexus staff Wizard has less options in this this department.
Also I think the ability to convert school slots to staff charges is just a good overall synergy for the wizard that doesn't like the school spells they have at any particular ranks. This can be done without staff nexus but with it you get to swap out more unwanted school slots for charges on a staff you chose.
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I think no matter how many fireballs you can throw, you're still going to end up with people who are disappointed they couldn't get one more. Which suggests to me this is mostly of an issue of expecations management and encounter design.
Like how often is it appropriate to have a Wizard expending a meaningful spell slot on something? What sort of effect should this have?
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You can say it's a "GM staging problem" if we never climb mundane mountains, but it strikes me as just as much of a staging problem if players start interacting with people they only have a 5% chance of failing diplomacy against all the time, or if the game is bogged down with checks that are trivial for the party members who can perform them. There is a balance here, but the fixed DC 20 mountain is the one you will and should see less often at the table as the game goes on—there just aren't any stakes past a certain point. A few checks like that are good reminders, but too many are ultimately boring.
It's a GM staging problem. Fortunately, my players take narrative control of my stagings and correct it for me.
For example, at the beginning of the 4th module in Ironfang Invasion, Siege of Stone, the party needs to go to the Valley of Aloi. In the 3rd module, Assault on Longshadow, a massive army of the Ironfang Legion was camped at the mouth of the valley. The writer of Siege of Stone decided that the army simply packed up and left, despite that contradicting the long-term conquest goals of the Ironfang Legion, so that the party would not be distracted from the main quest in Siege of Stone by a big fight.
I left the army there, because my players liked fighting the Ironfang Legion.
Yet my players realized, like the writer, that such a fight would hamper their quest. They entered the valley not by fighting through the army at the mouth of the valley. Instead, they climbed over the mountains north of the valley. That required multiple DC 20 and DC 25 Climb checks. They were all 13th level and trained in Athletics, two expert or master, but most favored Dexterity over Strength. The gnome druid had a flying mount. The goblin champion had a Climb speed. They could conjure Phantom Steeds that could walk on air. The mountains were not a serious obstacle to them. It was barely a slowdown.
I did not create this mountain-climbing adventure. My players did. And that made it more interesting to them.
On a final note—and this is a personal issue more than a genuine critique—because trained progression is automatic and requires no investing points at levelup or anything similar, I tend to feel like it isn't something my character is actually choosing to improve at, even if the number goes up. I feel significant cognitive dissonance when a character that has diplomacy as a throwaway trained skill can suddenly sweet talk any normal villager, especially when they'd typically defer to someone more invested in the skill when the need for diplomacy arises.
I remember D&D 3rd Edition in which the characters would earn skill points per level from their class with addition skill points equal to their INT bonus. They received 4 times their usual skill points at 1st level can could have a maximum of level+3 skill ranks in each skill. Pathfinder 1st Edition largely copied the skill point system, except that they dropped the 4 times at 1st level, dropped the level+3 cap to level+0, and instead gave a +3 bonus to the class skills of a class.
The skill point system meant that if I were playing a cleric that gained 2+INT skill points per level with INT +3, then I could keep 5 skills at maximum proficiency, of 4 skills at maximum proficiency and 2 at half maximum proficiency, or 3 skills at maximum proficiency and 4 at half maximum proficiency, etc. And I usually choose to keep a few skills at half maximum proficiency, because sometimes, like with mountain climbing, my character could benefit well from being good at the skill without being among the best at the skill.
Likewise, in Pathfinder 2nd Edition, a typical character class gains a skill increate at 3rd level and every 2 levels thereafter. At 3rd level I chose my first expert skill, at 5th level I chose my 2nd expert skill, and then at 7th and 9th level I might make those two skills master. At 11th level a third skill can become expert. At 13th level either a 4th skill becomes expert or that 3rd skill becomes master. A wizard's high Intelligence has no effect. Unless a character limits themselves to only those 3 or 4 checks, a lot of skill use will be with trained proficiency.
It is not that the player is deliberately letting those merely-trained skills rust away from disuse. Instead, letting the skills progress by level without skill increases is the equivalent to spending a skill point every other level for half maximum proficiency in Pathfinder 1st Edition. PF2 switched to an automatic slow skill progression to cut back on the paperwork of assigning skill points.
And the first playtest document for PF2 had level added to untrained proficiency.
Proficiency Modifier
For most of your statistics, your class and other character choices will give you a proficiency rank. When you make a roll, you add a proficiency modifier that depends on your level and your proficiency rank in the statistic or item you are using. You add only one proficiency modifier to a roll.You’re untrained if you have little or no knowledge in the statistic or item. Your proficiency modifier is equal to your level minus 2. Unless your class or another choice you’ve made gives you a different rank of proficiency, you’re untrained.
If you’ve been trained in the statistic or item, your proficiency modifier is equal to your level.
As an expert, you are highly trained in the statistic or item. Your proficiency modifier is equal to your level plus 1.
At a master rank, you’ve achieved world-class proficiency in the statistic or item. Your proficiency
modifier is equal to your character level plus 2.If you’re legendary, your statistic or familiarity with the item is so high that you’ll go down in history. Your proficiency modifier is equal to your level plus 3.
Many playtesters, including me, thought that was too much bonus in everything. We wanted our characters to be bad at some skills. The Paizo developers listened and removed level-to-proficiency from untrained.
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If I had been them, I would have just scrapped the schools. They provide almost nothing worthwhile. Just an atavistic class ability no longer necessary when they are splitting off from the old game.
I would rather have seen stuff like a necromancer with an undead pet.
A blaster with some boost to blasting spells.
Or things of this nature.
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Considering the Wizard is meant to be the academic magic option the schools make more sense than just giving random bonuses.
The academic with no additional skill increases to make that academia seem real. You want to know who the academics are in PF2? The investigator, rogue, and tome thaumaturge who have class support for being an academic.
So why pretend a role exists that is no longer supported? Just move it in a new direction that you will support.
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I like the idea of the schools.
IMO they make wizards more interesting.
They blend an element of a background component like attending a specific school with sometimes a motivation, purpose, or interest like the magic academic for academics sake (Ars Grammatica) or using magic to serve your people (civic wizardry) or using magic to discover whats beyond your world (the boundary) or being that kind of mage who's trained to use magic in war (Battle magic).
I think the worst schools are mentalism and protean. Not because of what they offer but because to me they don't feel like a way of life or purpose driven schools. its too close to the old I study this type of magic rather than the new I use magic for a purpose in the world.
The unified theory is there to be the no school school. But even in there its the wizard that makes their own way and learns whatever they can and want how they can and want.
The best part is they are now open to make more. Likely a good thing to do to showcase new spells as well.
I simply despise the existence of spell slots. I hate that so many classes in the game use such a mechanical space that begs for bloat since ever expanding spell list that is 90% 2 action activities is just bad, I hate that spell slots cost about 90% of a class' power budget and it's the basis for so many classes, I hate how similar so many the proficiency track(for saves and weapon) a lot of casters have, and I hate the amount of exact copied feats each casters have.
So of course I find Wizard weak, it's emblemeatic of spell slots, and I have nothing but disdain for spell slots.
I also don't like the spell slots mechanics too but I thing that you are pointing the wrong problem in the wrong place.
IMO it would much better, easier to balance and much more familiar to early generations of players that are well more familiar with MP or a cooldown system. If instead of slots the spells used MP or a recharge mechanic similar to what breaths and Demilich have. But it won't change how the class' power budget is distributed nor make the feats better.
Casters are supposed to have their power and versatility linked to spell like they currently are. Spell is what defines casters just like weapons/unarmed attacks is what defines martials. A caster without spells would become a different thing while a fighter without a weapons/unarmed attacks also would become a different thing including that why the kineticist looks like more a super than a fighter or a caster because it doesn't looks like a caster nor a fighter but someone that have super-powers and use then so solve most of the situations and just like the fighter feats improves how stronger, versatile and flexible the fighter is fighting with weapon or unarmed, theoretically casters feats was supposed to do with casters the same with spells.
So probably what you fell more is that like most casters feats are pretty meh. In most part because that the feats that was supposed to improve you casting like the fighter feats improves Strikes that are metamagic spellshapes in the PF2e are just too weak or too situational or too limited and many of these feats are shared between many casters making that the only class feats that really worth are those who are more auxiliary that gives some extra casts or changes how you prepare/use your slots or gives focus spells or any non-casting related ability making the felling that many feats are weak or meh.
Anyway if you hate the PF2e casting system so much maybe it is not for you and probably is better to you to try to play as martial or kineticist instead.
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I like the idea of the schools.
IMO they make wizards more interesting.
They blend an element of a background component like attending a specific school with sometimes a motivation, purpose, or interest like the magic academic for academics sake (Ars Grammatica) or using magic to serve your people (civic wizardry) or using magic to discover whats beyond your world (the boundary) or being that kind of mage who's trained to use magic in war (Battle magic).
I think the worst schools are mentalism and protean. Not because of what they offer but because to me they don't feel like a way of life or purpose driven schools. its too close to the old I study this type of magic rather than the new I use magic for a purpose in the world.The unified theory is there to be the no school school. But even in there its the wizard that makes their own way and learns whatever they can and want how they can and want.
The best part is they are now open to make more. Likely a good thing to do to showcase new spells as well.
The implementation is mechanically weak under the new paradigm with a highly limited spell selection that limits allowing the wizard to reach spell slot parity with a class like the sorcerer.
If they want to keep this new curriculum paradigm, divorce it from spell slots and just provide it with interesting abilities that boost spells of the type that would be used by the school and some kind of academic feat attachment like.
For example,
Curriculum of Battle Magic
Intense Spells: +1 status bonus to damage to per spell rank for spells that do damage with no duration
Force Bolt:
Empower Spell: Spend a focus point. Spell adds one die of damage to the spell. Heightened 5th level: Adds 2 die of damage. 9th: adds 3 die of damage.
Lore: You get Warfare Lore and it advances in rank the same as additional lore feat.
Raises the slots to four a level. Call it a day. Curriculum vastly improved and no longer acting as some limiter to spell slots. Adds a meaningful ability to the class fantasy of the class. Better focus point abilities.
I like the idea of the schools.
IMO they make wizards more interesting.
They blend an element of a background component like attending a specific school with sometimes a motivation, purpose, or interest like the magic academic for academics sake (Ars Grammatica) or using magic to serve your people (civic wizardry) or using magic to discover whats beyond your world (the boundary) or being that kind of mage who's trained to use magic in war (Battle magic).
I think the worst schools are mentalism and protean. Not because of what they offer but because to me they don't feel like a way of life or purpose driven schools. its too close to the old I study this type of magic rather than the new I use magic for a purpose in the world.The unified theory is there to be the no school school. But even in there its the wizard that makes their own way and learns whatever they can and want how they can and want.
The best part is they are now open to make more. Likely a good thing to do to showcase new spells as well.
The implementation is mechanically weak under the new paradigm with a highly limited spell selection that limits allowing the wizard to reach spell slot parity with a class like the sorcerer.
If they want to keep this new curriculum paradigm, divorce it from spell slots and just provide it with interesting abilities that boost spells of the type that would be used by the school and some kind of academic feat attachment like.
For example,
Curriculum of Battle Magic
Intense Spells: +1 status bonus to damage to per spell rank for spells that do damage with no duration
Force Bolt:
Empower Spell: Spend a focus point. Spell adds one die of damage to the spell. Heightened 5th level: Adds 2 die of damage. 9th: adds 3 die of damage.
Lore: You get Warfare Lore and it advances in rank the same as additional lore feat.
Raises the slots to four a level. Call it a day. Curriculum vastly improved and no longer acting as some limiter to spell slots....
I really do agree that each school should have had a lore skill that came with it. They are representing academics after all.
sorcerer has the I increase the damage of my spells already right? Dangerous sorcery and through some bloodline effects. I guess this extra oomph comes from raw magic power in their blood.
Should wizard approach spellcasting the same way? There has to be a unique approach to power that is something else entirely.
I think I would lean even more into that lore skill idea, have a given lore skill per curriculum, have it auto scale as a curriculum feature. Give wizards of a school a way to leverage a given lore skill for a themed advantage in spell casting. They would literally be doing better with magic through knowledge in their field of study. A battle mage would have warfare and so a tactical advantage with aoe spells might be appropriate when you succeed on an warfare check or something like that. maybe this could have tied into focus spells in some way.
I like the idea of the schools.
IMO they make wizards more interesting.
They blend an element of a background component like attending a specific school with sometimes a motivation, purpose, or interest like the magic academic for academics sake (Ars Grammatica) or using magic to serve your people (civic wizardry) or using magic to discover whats beyond your world (the boundary) or being that kind of mage who's trained to use magic in war (Battle magic).
I think the worst schools are mentalism and protean. Not because of what they offer but because to me they don't feel like a way of life or purpose driven schools. its too close to the old I study this type of magic rather than the new I use magic for a purpose in the world.The unified theory is there to be the no school school. But even in there its the wizard that makes their own way and learns whatever they can and want how they can and want.
The best part is they are now open to make more. Likely a good thing to do to showcase new spells as well.
This looks good in theory but in practice none of the schools can scrounge together 3 spells per rank, meaning it ends up feeling like a side course than an actual school. Boundary is awkward in that it's 90% the undead interacting school, and it's pretty obvious when you look at where they expect you to know it, but they threw in teleport randomly to make up numbers because I guess they realised there weren't enough necromancy spells? Ars Grammatica delenda est, it's a total mess of a school that conflates languages, runic diagrams and geometry and still can't manage to scrounge up 2 spells per level. I seriously have to ask what kind of school that is.
I won't go as far as Deriven but I do think the wizard school designer needs to take a long, hard look at their schools because as it stands most of them can't support a thematically cohesive wizard's four known spells per rank. Frankly, some of them can't even make two.
From what it seems they did, they only were shooting for 2 spells per rank. I think its because they didnt want any wizard to be discouraged from the full casting options available to them.
This isnt really a rebuttal of your point but more of an observation and a guess.| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
There's also value in not having to print so many arcane spells in one book, when you can just add more spells to the schools later when you want.
I allow any Wizard player to add any spell to their school list if the player can explain how that spell is related to what they studied, like "why is this useful to civic magic" etc.
From what it...I like the idea of the schools.
IMO they make wizards more interesting.
They blend an element of a background component like attending a specific school with sometimes a motivation, purpose, or interest like the magic academic for academics sake (Ars Grammatica) or using magic to serve your people (civic wizardry) or using magic to discover whats beyond your world (the boundary) or being that kind of mage who's trained to use magic in war (Battle magic).
I think the worst schools are mentalism and protean. Not because of what they offer but because to me they don't feel like a way of life or purpose driven schools. its too close to the old I study this type of magic rather than the new I use magic for a purpose in the world.The unified theory is there to be the no school school. But even in there its the wizard that makes their own way and learns whatever they can and want how they can and want.
The best part is they are now open to make more. Likely a good thing to do to showcase new spells as well.
This looks good in theory but in practice none of the schools can scrounge together 3 spells per rank, meaning it ends up feeling like a side course than an actual school. Boundary is awkward in that it's 90% the undead interacting school, and it's pretty obvious when you look at where they expect you to know it, but they threw in teleport randomly to make up numbers because I guess they realised there weren't enough necromancy spells? Ars Grammatica delenda est, it's a total mess of a school that conflates languages, runic diagrams and geometry and still can't manage to scrounge up 2 spells per level. I seriously have to ask what kind of school that is.
I won't go as far as Deriven but I do think the wizard school designer needs to take a long, hard look at their schools because as it stands most of them can't support a thematically cohesive wizard's four known spells per rank. Frankly, some of them can't even make two.
The other point though I think I am wondering on is, why is it a problem that 1 slot needs to be a curriculumn spell. How often is it a dead slot? And given what wizards can do with staves a dead slot can be put into a staff when you prepare it. Probably the best reason for Staff Nexus since you can shove more slots into a staff that has spells you want to use.
I did play kineticists and mostly play martials before, but after playin kineticists it just made me feel even more disliking of the way spellcasting works for the rest of the classes.
As much as the kineticist is a good design for a caster, the way they function is not a good fit for the wizard in specific. Fine with this system replacing spontaneous casting in PF3 though
I don't care for kineticists over casters. Glad it is there for those that want to play that kind of class, but I much prefer the power of casters with the ability to seriously affect combat or do absolutely nutty things with their spells as simple utility stuff like teleport which makes you feel like a boss when it comes to travel.
I'd never enjoy casters as limited as kineticists after tasting caster power for all these decades. I don't care if it takes 10 minutes, being able to teleport all over the place or create magnificent mansions and summons golems or unleash Eclipse Burst is more what I want to do.
Even in PF2 at high level, casters do absolutely nutty things on a battlefield that can end fights before they even start. It makes you feel like you're playing Merlin or Gandalf and having that kind of effect on the battlefield even if the visuals are different.
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So here's my real question.
They'd already made Strength of Thousands. Why didn't they make Wizard Schools work like the Branch Schools in that game? An Additional Lore, one theme-related scaling skill, 3 Bonus Skill Feats from a list, an additional general feat, and some scattered situational modifiers over the course of 20 levels?
Obviously that is *too much* -- you'd have to cut it probably in half. I think I'd land on a specified Additional Lore, a themed scaling skill, 2 bonus skill feats from a list, and +1 (+2 at Master) to something thematic. Then add a list of 4 School-related spells per level to cast in your bonus slot (1 of which is filched from another list) and you're golden.
(As long as I'm redesigning, I'd go no Focus spells but give everybody the Unified Theory version of Drain Bonded Item. This is not because I dislike Focus spells, but to give Wizards a playstyle that sets them apart from other casters, and to reduce the pagecount and design needed for new schools so that we could get a lot more of them. )
I'm not really saying this is better -- what surprises me is *they already designed this* as something that feels like an academic school. So when they needed to pivot to making academically themed schools *why not use the model you already made*.
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I'm not really saying this is better -- what surprises me is *they already designed this* as something that feels like an academic school. So when they needed to pivot to making academically themed schools *why not use the model you already made*.
Probably because it's even easier to not change anything at all. The schools we got are the same framework as what we had pre-remaster, just with bespoke spell lists. Many of the focus spells are even exactly the same.
I think the goal was to just publish something rather than really come up with a meaningful solution to any of the thematic issues with the wizard. PC1 just did not have a lot of time to cook.
I'm not really saying this is better -- what surprises me is *they already designed this* as something that feels like an academic school. So when they needed to pivot to making academically themed schools *why not use the model you already made*.Probably because it's even easier to not change anything at all. The schools we got are the same framework as what we had pre-remaster, just with bespoke spell lists. Many of the focus spells are even exactly the same.
I think the goal was to just publish something rather than really come up with a meaningful solution to any of the thematic issues with the wizard. PC1 just did not have a lot of time to cook.
That and the selection of classes for PC1 are all the classes they didnt want to change much on anyway pushing classes they did want to put more work into to PC2
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I don't really see how the new schools are more "all over the place thematically" than the old schools.
Like a school of magic about wards, runes, symbols and language seems thematically cleaner than "Necromancy" and a school of magic about applications to either war or city-building/maintenance seems just as thematically tight as "Transmutation" or "Conjuration."
I don't really see how the new schools are more "all over the place thematically" than the old schools.
Like a school of magic about wards, runes, symbols and language seems thematically cleaner than "Necromancy" and a school of magic about applications to either war or city-building/maintenance seems just as thematically tight as "Transmutation" or "Conjuration."
This thematic change was more about from "the wizards studies the essence of the spells" to the "applicability of the spells".
It's like was the legacy wizards was physics and the remaster wizards are engineers.
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I don't really see how the new schools are more "all over the place thematically" than the old schools.
Like a school of magic about wards, runes, symbols and language seems thematically cleaner than "Necromancy" and a school of magic about applications to either war or city-building/maintenance seems just as thematically tight as "Transmutation" or "Conjuration."
I mean, for one, Ars Grammatica delenda est, there really isn't anything tying wards, runes, symbols and languages together other than a vague 'they have letters?' thing. Command is about talking to people, Runic Body involves etching symbols, one of them is talking about how the spell is used and the other is talking about how the spell is made and that's not really related? And even with all that it's the school with gaping holes in it's roster.
How is a school about the magic of words going to include both written and spoken words? That seems about as clear as can be to me, and is based on real world mystic traditions (and thus not a D&D IP). It is way, way cooler for schools to be more practically focused on a philosophy of magic and what you want to do with it, than about a janky classification of all magic that is further eroded by the fact that the wizard doesn’t get access to many spells that are in the school of magic that they are supposed to be studying.
A lot of people really like the 8 D&D schools of magic. They have been around a long time with some excellent (and some confusing and some bad) lore surrounding them. They are also not Paizo’s creations, pretty much only existed in PF2 for wizards, and were something that never did much in this system exactly because Paizo was trying to move away from explicitly D&D world building narratives from the beginning of the system.
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Yeah, like a basic problem with the original 8 schools is that almost any magical effect you can think of could be categorized as "transmutation" since via magic you're causing something to be other than what it was. There was a real problem with this in PF1 with the rapid release schedule for Players Companions etc. - they got hugely more Transmutation spells than they did other traditions and had to figure out how to turn some of the Transmutation spells into something else.
Talking about "what this is used for" seems like much cleaner theming than "what is the essence for this spell" since the actual essence for magic in Pathfinder are matter, spirit, mind, and life. The Arcane tradition only deals with 2 of these (matter and mind.)
Like a good reason to drop the schools was that basically the Wizard was the only class who really used them. It's not really a good idea to have one mechanic that applies to all of the spells in the game that only one class gets value out of it.
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The schools had significant value for themed archetypes like the Captivator. It doesn't really matter because they had to drop the schools regardless but the wizard being put in a situation where it is largely the same except it has fewer choices for school slots is deeply unfortunate.
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I find it amazing that this thread has carried on for 400+ responses, and yet OP hasn't added anything beyond the first post.
Just an observation.
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I been looking somewhat in-depth at the wizard these last few days and, even when I do like the new schools because they feel like more thematic-focused packages, I also totally could see wizards just having 4 spell slots per spell rank like sorcerers and calling it a day. The only real advantage that wizards have over other prepared casters is spell blending, which isn't even something all wizards have. The class that is the easiest to compare the wizards is the witch, which to be fair has more going on for it and can be easily reflavored as a wizard without much trouble.
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One of the things I like about the witch, a class I may never play, is that it allows for the “wizard with more class features” pretty well, leaving the wizard to be the “spell slots” class, for those of us who just want to cast a lot of different spells with our characters.
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A word on Vancian casting for a moment.
It isn't the slotting of spells that is the problem, it is the forgetting of it after it is cast. A wizard, Cleric, and other prepared casters in the game (PF2 or otherwise) need to be able to pull on the spells they have put to memory without having to waste resources to slot in extra copies for multiple castings. This is something that should have been down with D&D 3.0 instead of including both Wizard and Sorcerer with cross competing mechanics that needed nerfed on one end to prop up the other.
A word on Vancian casting for a moment.
It isn't the slotting of spells that is the problem, it is the forgetting of it after it is cast. A wizard, Cleric, and other prepared casters in the game (PF2 or otherwise) need to be able to pull on the spells they have put to memory without having to waste resources to slot in extra copies for multiple castings. This is something that should have been down with D&D 3.0 instead of including both Wizard and Sorcerer with cross competing mechanics that needed nerfed on one end to prop up the other.
The flexible caster archetype—rightly or wrongly—clearly indicates the devs think this is powerful enough to warrant losing quite a few spell slots.
I don't think 5E wizard/1E arcanist casting on an otherwise unchanged 2E wizard would be balanced against sorc, either, for what it's worth. Maybe there'd be more of an argument if signature spells weren't needed for sorc and their spells known increased.
Also, fwiw, I personally don't think vancian casting is an issue in any form. Wizards having a lot of non-fungible resources of varying strength is interesting design. I'm not opposed to other classes getting different kinds of resources in the future, but I do think vancian casting is a compelling resource management problem.
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What does the Wizard actually suppose to excel at?
The Wizard has lack something that it was explicitly or specifically good at since 2019.
It's best claim to something like this is that it is the king of marginal gains over some other casters. And its worse at that now than before due to its decreased flexability.
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I realy like the prepared nature of Druid, have not played wizard in pf2 yet. but i would not want them to go away from that concept in pf3.
really disliked what they did in 5:e with casters so would not want them to do the same in pf3.
The prepared felling of druids and clerics are different from wizards and witches because druids and clerics already know all common spells of their lists.
This difference not only allows these casters to change to a spell that meet their needs without needing to running around seeking for new spells and scrolls to improve your spellbook but also give a psychological reward too. You don't have the same flexibility of a spontaneous caster that can choose the spell in time but you have access to almost your full tradition list instead to make changes as you need next day.
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One of the things I like about the witch, a class I may never play, is that it allows for the “wizard with more class features” pretty well, leaving the wizard to be the “spell slots” class, for those of us who just want to cast a lot of different spells with our characters.
Witch is awesome! Arcane witch, unfortunately, got the short end of stick on familiar abilities so arcane casters continue to not really have full class features