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Bit of a silly question, but if you're playing with Free Archetype, can you "switch" to a second Archetype using those feats after you meet the requirement of two feats from the first one before taking a second Dedication, or are those feats exclusively for whichever Archetype you select first and any other archetypes you wanna add have to be paid for in class feat spots as normal?
Mostly just asking because there's an Archetype I want for a character but it doesn't make narrative sense for him to take it so early in his career, and just wanna plan his build out properly.
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This will be GM dependent. Lots of people play it wide open so you just have extra slots you can use on any valid archetype feats you want, while others play with a curated list of archetypes that you can select from.
If your GM has just said "free archetype" and hasn't given a curated list, it's very likely your free archetype feat slots are free for you to do with as you wish.
If your FA feats are unrestricted, you can switch. You have to follow the normal rules: 2 extra feats in a given archetype before you can take another dedication. FA doesn't change that.
For example if you take a dedication at level 2, then you can't take another dedication (via FA or your class feats) until you have 2 more feats from it. So you could take FA archetype feats at 4 and 6, then a dedication at 8. Or you could use both your FA and your class feat to take archetype feats at 4, and get another dedication at 6. You can also wait longer before taking another dedication, of course.
As to if your FA feat choices are limited or not, that's a GM question. Here's what the Free Archetype Variant Rule says:
The only difference between a normal character and a free archetype character is that the character receives an extra class feat at 2nd level and every even level thereafter that they can use only for archetype feats. You might restrict the free feats to those of a single archetype each character in the group has (for a shared backstory), those of archetypes fitting a certain theme (such as only ones from magical archetypes in a game set in a magic school), or entirely unrestricted if you just want a higher-powered game.
If the group all has the same archetype or draws from a limited list, you might want to ignore the free archetype's normal restriction of selecting a certain number of feats before taking a new archetype. That way a character can still pursue another archetype that also fits their character.
That says that the GM is free to limit the list however they want to fit the narrative, or not at all. In Strength of Thousands I used FA but basically told people they would need to take either Wizard or Druid (to fit the theme) and would have to have a certain number of feats in it at certain milestones. If they meet those, their other feat choices are wide open.
Other GMs may do it differently. In the Kingmaker game I'm playing in, we have FA and there's no limitations on what we can take aside from rarity/access.
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For example if you take a dedication at level 2, then you can't take another dedication (via FA or your class feats) until you have 2 more feats from it. So you could take FA archetype feats at 4 and 6, then a dedication at 8. Or you could use both your FA and your class feat to take archetype feats at 4, and get another dedication at 6. You can also wait longer before taking another dedication, of course.
I'll make an addendum to that, as there are Archetypes with skill feats, so it's possible to spend your normal skill feats to get out of an archetype quicker without using your free archetype feats.
Lets say you start off as a Rogue with Archaeologist for your first free archetype slot. You could take We're on the List at 3rd and Settlement Scholastics at 4th using your Skill feats and then take another dedication with your 4th level free archetype slot.
Even with a curated list of archetypes available, I haven't envisioned any GMs that would require one-and-only-one Archetype choice for every last Free Archetype slot for the entire career of the character.
I would think that filling the first 3 Free Archetype feats from the first archetype would mean that at level 8 (at the latest) you would be eligible to take the Dedication feat from a different available archetype.
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Even with a curated list of archetypes available, I haven't envisioned any GMs that would require one-and-only-one Archetype choice for every last Free Archetype slot for the entire career of the character.
I've been in games where the Dm had everyone take a single Archetype, like everyone is a Pirate or Viking or Gladiator and used Free archetype for it. I've never been in one to a high enough level to find out what happened when we would have run out of available feats.
Variant rules are always going to require a conversation with the GM, since the GM is the person who implements the variant rule and they have their own reasons for doing so.
For some people it's going to be "free archetype makes character building more free and fun" for other people it's going to be "for purposes of this campaign, everybody in the party should be a Knight of Lastwall" and both are equally valid.
If you're doing a themed free archetype campaign (like Strength of Thousands), where the reason is "the PCs are people at a magic school, there should be a reason you're at a magic school" the GM is likely to greenlight other archetypes relevant to what one might study at a magic school, but probably not "dual weapon warrior", "assassin", "sniping duo", "trapsmith", or "wrestler."
Even with a curated list of archetypes available, I haven't envisioned any GMs that would require one-and-only-one Archetype choice for every last Free Archetype slot for the entire career of the character.I've been in games where the Dm had everyone take a single Archetype, like everyone is a Pirate or Viking or Gladiator and used Free archetype for it. I've never been in one to a high enough level to find out what happened when we would have run out of available feats.
That's true, there may be themed campaigns where everyone gets one particular archetype.
Even in the case where everyone gets their choice of either Pirate or Viking, I would half expect that the GM would be fine with taking both eventually.
But maybe I am just being generous about it.
Even with a curated list of archetypes available, I haven't envisioned any GMs that would require one-and-only-one Archetype choice for every last Free Archetype slot for the entire career of the character.
Other than Strength of Thousands, I haven't either.
Although the GM may allow the Free Archetype feats to be used on Magaambyan archetypes halcyon speaker, Magaambyan attendant, and/or magic warrior, not every character will find them compatible and will be "stuck" taking druid or wizard archetype feats.
Prey for Death is another recent adventure where FA but only Red Mantis Assassin is pretty thematic.
Other than Strength of Thousands, I haven't either.Although the GM may allow the Free Archetype feats to be used on Magaambyan archetypes halcyon speaker, Magaambyan attendant, and/or magic warrior, not every character will find them compatible and will be "stuck" taking druid or wizard archetype feats.
I resolved that in SoT by saying that players must have X Wizard/Druid archetype feats by certain levels, but were otherwise free to do whatever they wanted. It makes sense to me that you'd pick up some magic at a magic school, but I don't want to lock them into that immediately or by a huge amount.
I think it was something like the Dedication at 2, 1 feat by 8, and 2 feats by 14. Beyond that, they're wide open to do whatever they want.
They were okay with that.
Blood Lords could be another AP where it could make sense for using the Free Archetype: All the PCs are undead using the undead archetypes in Book of the Dead; a skeleton could use the reanimator archetype and (with GM permission) "upgrade" the Rejuvenation Token into a soul cage to qualify for the lich archetype.