| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Fighters have feats and features that let them get more critical hits from more than just their proficiency bonus.
Reactive strike is free and is a no map attack until later feats will give you multiple ones still with no MAP.
Feats like swipe functionally give you another one as well, especially if the party learns how to set you up for it.
Fighter feats create their own combat styles with weapons and lean heavily on different critical effect features from both the weapon itself and the runes you put on it. So the flexibility is already there.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
What would you take away from what's already one of the best classes in the game for the pile of extra features you want to give them?Because the Fighter lacks an identity, that's why.
The other martial classes have a pre-determined path with their features and proficiencies that allow better characterisation. This is something missing from the Fighter.
For instance, if you're a barbarian and ranger, you're close to nature, just like if you're a magus or thaumatheurge, you're well-versed into magic.
If you're a Fighter, you're... someone... that's it.
And that's super popular for a reason: it's a blank canvas. You can be ANYTHING as a Fighter. The class doesn't impose any assumptions on you, and people's perception of the class from past versions also doesn't impose any assumptions on you. (That's also one of the reasons Human is so popular.)
For some reason you want to remove a feature that people like about Fighter vs other classes to try to make it fit into a smaller box so you can give it more stuff that it doesn't need.
Except that a Fighter who picked the Sword group cannot apply the Versatile trait on all associated weapons... or getting rid of the Volley trait on all Bow weapons... or adding the Jousting trait to all Spear weapons.
1. It actually can get rid of the Volley trait on all bow weapons. There's a stance for that.
2. So what? Nothing intrinsically says that Fighter should be able to do these things.
3. As was pointed out, this is already an Inventor thing. Why would it make sense to give Fighter a thing to make it more unique by taking it from another class?
Fighter is one of the best designed classes in the game at doing what it's intended to do. It doesn't need these kind of changes. Maybe it's just not the class for you, and that's fine.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Except that a Fighter who picked the Sword group cannot apply the Versatile trait on all associated weapons... or getting rid of the Volley trait on all Bow weapons... or adding the Jousting trait to all Spear weapons.... You're describing the Inventor now, you realise? Why would the a weapon master add more traits to weapons, instead of having feats that key off the existing traits on weapons like, IDK, the Fighter?
Also, they can already get rid of volley, it's called Point Blank Stance. Do you actually read the Fighter before you make such weird complaints?
Hey, now; manners, please. Not everybody is 100% familiar with the available content in the game, even in Core content. The books are damned thick, after all, and dense with stuff to boot!
They were simply making a suggestion based on what they believed were faults, and I do believe they were moreso making a point that they think Fighter could use more stuff to make them feel "weapon master"y. While I do not agree with this assessment, it's important to be civil when discussing it.| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
When you are complaining about Fighter (ridiculously) you really at the very least should've read the class completely.
"Reading the class completely" and "remembering and understanding the implications of one out of all 112 (one hundred and twelve) of its feats" are two very different things, friend.
It's funny how perspective colors the relationship of different game systems.
Because where you are saying that PF2 could take a particular thing from D&D I am seeing a thing which D&D just recently "we'll do that too"'d from PF2 because the it's-not-a-new-edition D&D "weapon mastery" details are basically just a take on PF2's weapon traits and critical specializations blended together (and then made artificially limited so that gaining more as you level up can be presented as if it were a meaningful benefit even though you already picked the most relevant and/or can swap out for the most relevant options at regular intervals).
Eh, the Weapon Masteries system in D&D 5e 2024 is something that could have easily been made completely independently. It's not exactly like it takes that much fantasizing to think "maybe someone who is familiar with hammers should be able to use their weight to toss an enemy back 10 feet when they hit the monster with it" or something. While it's a mighty fine coincidence they happened around the same time as the 2e Remaster, I don't think they were really "cribbing" anything there.
Except that a Fighter who picked the Sword group cannot apply the Versatile trait on all associated weapons... or getting rid of the Volley trait on all Bow weapons... or adding the Jousting trait to all Spear weapons.... You're describing the Inventor now, you realise? Why would the a weapon master add more traits to weapons, instead of having feats that key off the existing traits on weapons like, IDK, the Fighter?
It's not about "adding more traits" to an existing weapon, it's about the Fighter treating a selected weapon with extra traits.
A bastard sword won't gain Versatile P on its own, but a Fighter could deal Piercing damage with it, just like you could wield a longsword with 2 hands, grating it the Two-Hand 1d10 trait.
Also, they can already get rid of volley, it's called Point Blank Stance. Do you actually read the Fighter before you make such weird complaints?
and then there's this part:
When using a ranged weapon that doesn’t have the volley trait, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus to damage rolls on attacks against targets within the weapon’s first range increment.
If it was coupled with a feat that removed the Volley trait from any Bow weapon, you could benefit from the extra +2 with a composite longbow, because you would treat it without the problematic trait.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Fighter has the best feats for using weapons.
Feats that all work together and stack to constantly improve your weapon/fighting style. Many of them level 10+ so others can't get them.
Fighters are those with the most accuracy and skill with a weapon group of choice. I think that's plenty identity and mechanical power.
There's a reason they "fixed" the ability to get full scaling in multiple types of weapons.
One thing that PF2 could steal from D&D is weapons having secondary effects, with fighters being the masters of using those secondary effects. I know that PF2 has critical effects and that Fighters are the best at scoring critical hits. Still, a system where every attack has a minor effect attached to it would make "just" swinging a weapon each round feel more engaging without adding a lot of extra overhead or decision-making to the game.Plenty of weapons do have special effects, though, tied to traits. Razing weapons cut through shields like butter, weapons with "maneuver" traits (Shove, Trip, etc.) let you use that maneuver with that weapon's item bonus. Hampering lets you use an action to slow the target by 10 feet after scoring a hit. Parry weapons let you get a buckler-like bonus to your AC when you Raise them.
Plus, a good chunk of Fighter's feats are allocated to secondary effects on Strikes already. They already sorta *do* this. Oh, you hit with this Strike? That guy's Grabbed now. You hit a Strike on a Fightened foe? They're Off-Guard now. You hit someone with your ranged weapon? Your next ally gets a +1/+2 to hit them. Oh, you missed with this Strike? No MAP penalty because you can follow-through properly.
Weapon traits an special abilities are hardly new to or unique to PF2. AD&D had variable attack speeds and different damage values against different sized creatures and D&D 3.0 invented the current keyword weapon traits system that PF1 and now PF2 use. Maneuver weapons have existed since at least 3rd edition D&D and hardly count as an ability given that those maneuvers are literally the entire reason why those weapons are designed the way they are.
The other stuff like hindering that costs an action in PF2 is an automatic part of scoring a hit with a weapon in D&D 2024. Fighting styles give bonuses to various things, including AC, when used with specific types of weapons. The fact that these bonuses are automatic make them feel far nicer to use that PF2's system where *everything* is an action.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
One thing that PF2 could steal from D&D is weapons having secondary effects, with fighters being the masters of using those secondary effects. I know that PF2 has critical effects and that Fighters are the best at scoring critical hits. Still, a system where every attack has a minor effect attached to it would make "just" swinging a weapon each round feel more engaging without adding a lot of extra overhead or decision-making to the game.It's funny how perspective colors the relationship of different game systems.
Because where you are saying that PF2 could take a particular thing from D&D I am seeing a thing which D&D just recently "we'll do that too"'d from PF2 because the it's-not-a-new-edition D&D "weapon mastery" details are basically just a take on PF2's weapon traits and critical specializations blended together (and then made artificially limited so that gaining more as you level up can be presented as if it were a meaningful benefit even though you already picked the most relevant and/or can swap out for the most relevant options at regular intervals).
PF1 and 2 both took the weapon traits idea wholesale from D&D 3.x. 3 x also had stuff like harpoons that could stick into foes and allow them to be dragged around the battlefield until it was removed. The idea of a weapon that can do more than just attack is straight from the OGL. Expanding that to more effects is something that was bound to happen and that had already happened in CRPGs well before PF2 used them.
The difference between the current D&D implementation and PF2 is that PF2 wants to action tax you for everything to the point of making characters feel less skilled a fluid in combat than a guy who does HEMA on weekends. It shouldn't cost tempo to use a shield properly or make a thrust with a cut and thrust sword. Nor does it make sense that slowing somebody with a weapon should take an extra action after the attack has already landed.
PF2 would be a better game if it removed some clunky action taxes without destroying its bslance.
Except that a Fighter who picked the Sword group cannot apply the Versatile trait on all associated weapons... or getting rid of the Volley trait on all Bow weapons... or adding the Jousting trait to all Spear weapons.... You're describing the Inventor now, you realise? Why would the a weapon master add more traits to weapons, instead of having feats that key off the existing traits on weapons like, IDK, the Fighter?
Also, they can already get rid of volley, it's called Point Blank Stance. Do you actually read the Fighter before you make such weird complaints?
IRL a hand-and-a-half cut and thrust sword in the hands of a not exceptionally skilled user can cut, thrust, bind, parry, shift between one and two hands, and shove without any loss of tempo. With a loss of tempo it can also bludgeon and trip.
A skilled Fighter in PF2 takes an action to change between cutting and thrusting and uses a shield worse than a beginner at an SCA event much less a HEMA practitioner. There's room to just give characters abilities that an average weekend warrior can employ after a few hours of practice.
There's also the fact that longbowmen didn't volley fire and tended to make aimed directly fired shots. Nobody worthy of being labeled proficient with a longbow should deal with anything so ill informed as a volley penalty.
Being a the only legendary martial puts fighter constantly above the curve for both accuracy and crit such that often fighters have twice the crit chance of other martials and 3 to 4 times or more than any other class swinging a weapon.
So really if you want to make a character that leans into crit spec of a weapon group its the fighter that will pull it off, if you want to count on runes that trigger effects on crit, its the fighter you want to be for that too.
That leads to interesting combinations to double down on crit effects.
Club or flail group weapon with a frost rune to push back/knockdown and slow on crit.
Axe group weapon with shock, on a sweeping weapon while swiping or whirlwind
Knife group weapon with flaming
Razing weapon with corrosive
Sword group weapon with fearsome rune for fear and offguard
A skilled Fighter in PF2 takes an action to change between cutting and thrustingversatile doesn't take an action. Modular does, but thats like twisting knobs and doing things no actual weapon does IRL
My bad, but even a modular or combination weapon taking an action to change sucks given how often the juice isn't worth the squeeze. It also doesn't address the other ways in which PF2 makes even high level martial characters play like chumps.
Weapon traits an special abilities are hardly new to or unique to PF2. AD&D had variable attack speeds and different damage values against different sized creatures and D&D 3.0 invented the current keyword weapon traits system that PF1 and now PF2 use. Maneuver weapons have existed since at least 3rd edition D&D and hardly count as an ability given that those maneuvers are literally the entire reason why those weapons are designed the way they are.
The other stuff like hindering that costs an action in PF2 is an automatic part of scoring a hit with a weapon in D&D 2024. Fighting styles give bonuses to various things, including AC, when used with specific types of weapons. The fact that these bonuses are automatic make them feel far nicer to use that PF2's system where *everything* is an action.
Look; I ain't starting an edition war here, friend. I already even stated that 2024 5e's Weapon Masteries weren't even likely a crib from anything because, like, obviously one of the first things you look at to make weapon users seem cooler is to take a look at the weapons, much like how you'd look at the spells if you wanted to make spell users seem cooler. It ain't rocket surgery.
Like, my ENTIRE POINT was that PF2 has something akin to the Weapon Masteries, and that Fighter's feats are some of the BEST at taking advantage of them because they are the most likely to compress your actions/MAP to more freely allow you to USE the extra stuff your weapons afford you. I never claimed they were new.
1. It actually can get rid of the Volley trait on all bow weapons. There's a stance for that.
2. So what? Nothing intrinsically says that Fighter should be able to do these things.
3. As was pointed out, this is already an Inventor thing. Why would it make sense to give Fighter a thing to make it more unique by taking it from another class?
Fighter is one of the best designed classes in the game at doing what it's intended to do. It doesn't need these kind of changes. Maybe it's just not the class for you, and that's fine.
1) I'm not talking about a stance, I'm talking about treating weapon swith extra traits.
2) So the Fighter, often considered a "weapon master", shouldn't be able to treat weapons "better" than other classes?
3) The Inventor can craft its own weapons. The Fighter should wield weapons in better ways than other classes.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
2) So the Fighter, often considered a "weapon master", shouldn't be able to treat weapons "better" than other classes?
I don't mean to interject, but isn't that reflected in their higher proficiency with their favored weapon group, and class feats that allow them to do things that other classes can't?
There are plenty of things that reflect the idea of "fighters using weapons better than others".
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
1) I'm not talking about a stance, I'm talking about treating weapon swith extra traits.1. It actually can get rid of the Volley trait on all bow weapons. There's a stance for that.
2. So what? Nothing intrinsically says that Fighter should be able to do these things.
3. As was pointed out, this is already an Inventor thing. Why would it make sense to give Fighter a thing to make it more unique by taking it from another class?
Fighter is one of the best designed classes in the game at doing what it's intended to do. It doesn't need these kind of changes. Maybe it's just not the class for you, and that's fine.
The net outcome is the same: changing how the weapon works in some way.
2) So the Fighter, often considered a "weapon master", shouldn't be able to treat weapons "better" than other classes?
It literally already does. Where do you think that proficiency bump is coming from?
That it doesn't do it in the hyper-specific way that you think it should doesn't matter.
3) The Inventor can craft its own weapons. The Fighter should wield weapons in better ways than other classes.
Literally anyone can craft their own weapons if they take Crafting. That's not an Inventor thing. Modifying weapons with additional traits IS an Inventor thing. That's the whole schtick of the weapon innovation.
Fighter doesn't need that and there's no particular reason to give it to them.
|
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
It also doesn't address the other ways in which PF2 makes even high level martial characters play like chumps.
Have you ever actually played a high level martial? Because "Play like chumps" are not the words that I'd use to describe the whirlwind of death that a high level martial actually is.
It also doesn't address the other ways in which PF2 makes even high level martial characters play like chumps.Have you ever actually played a high level martial? Because "Play like chumps" are not the words that I'd use to describe the whirlwind of death that a high level martial actually is.
Any character that needs a feat to do something a first month HEMA guy or novice martial artst will already being doing naturally - for example raising and blocking with a shield, firing a longbow directly, or entering a stance as part of making a strike - is playing like a chump regardless of their actual impact on the battlefield. The idea that any of these things should cost feats or actions is patently silly.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Any character that needs a feat to do something a first month HEMA guy or novice martial artst will already being doing naturally - for example raising and blocking with a shield, firing a longbow directly, or entering a stance as part of making a strike - is playing like a chump regardless of their actual impact on the battlefield. The idea that any of these things should cost feats or actions is patently silly.It also doesn't address the other ways in which PF2 makes even high level martial characters play like chumps.Have you ever actually played a high level martial? Because "Play like chumps" are not the words that I'd use to describe the whirlwind of death that a high level martial actually is.
The game doesn't attempt to be a simulation of real life, and some things exist purely for game balance.
In any event, as already mentioned raising a shield or firing a bow don't require a feat.
The Reactive Shield feat allows you to move your shield into place, when you weren't otherwise taking precautions to use your shield, effectively instead of needing to spend on of your 3 actions per round on it, you can do it as a reaction.
And Point Blank Stance doesn't enable you to fire the longbow. It enables you to do so, without taking a penalty for the target being too close with a weapon designed for mostly long range shots. Or helps you deal more damage on weapons that don't have the volley trait.
You're disregarding that all these things exist within the context of the game, and that "reality" has only the most tenuous of bearings on how the game mechanics work.
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Any character that needs a feat to do something a first month HEMA guy or novice martial artst will already being doing naturally - for example raising and blocking with a shield, firing a longbow directly, or entering a stance as part of making a strike - is playing like a chump regardless of their actual impact on the battlefield. The idea that any of these things should cost feats or actions is patently silly.It also doesn't address the other ways in which PF2 makes even high level martial characters play like chumps.Have you ever actually played a high level martial? Because "Play like chumps" are not the words that I'd use to describe the whirlwind of death that a high level martial actually is.
This whole branch of the RPG tree is horrible if you are looking for something that matches how melee fighting actually works -- if you want to play D&D or Pathfinder you have to engage willing suspension of disbelief and just go with it, focusing on game balance rather than realism. If you can't do that, this game system just may not be for you.
If you need a game with realistic combat, you should be playing something like GURPS Swashbuckler, where they truly focus on the swordplay mechanics.
I mean, in reality a single good hit is usually enough to kill. And a bad hit is often enough to disable, or at least remove someone from a fight.
All of that is terrible for an RPG, unless you love for a random hit to kill your character.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I mean, in reality a single good hit is usually enough to kill. And a bad hit is often enough to disable, or at least remove someone from a fight.
All of that is terrible for an RPG, unless you love for a random hit to kill your character.
Yeah, Hit Points are an abstraction to make combat less swingy and random, the fact that a 10th level character can survive getting hit by a dozen arrows is part of the cost of "we're not making combat even swingier than it already is."
Combat is generally the best place to lean on "make the game fun" rather than "make it simulationist" since it's the kind of conflict that, if done properly, is easy to iterate on in the case of a story.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Any character that needs a feat to do something a first month HEMA guy or novice martial artst will already being doing naturally - for example raising and blocking with a shield, firing a longbow directly, or entering a stance as part of making a strike - is playing like a chump regardless of their actual impact on the battlefield. The idea that any of these things should cost feats or actions is patently silly.
You wanna really be pedantic? A "first month HEMA guy" of today has the equivalent of an Akashic Tome in their back pocket that gives them the effective accumulation of all compiled human knowledge of HEMA.
A 1st level adventurer has learned just enough from whatever teacher they had that they can strike out on their own, and everything else needs to be learned through the heat of adventure. That's what feats represent. Growth. Your character learning new, valuable things that make their lives easier. They ain't gonna be perfect, and you sure as Hell won't be well-rounded unless - gasp - you choose feats for your character to be well-rounded.
A 20th level Fighter CAN, in fact, still need an action to Raise their Shield like any 1st level character would. But, in context? That Fighter is probably Guts McSmash, squashing baddies into paste with a warhammer longer than his body. So I doubt he cares much for wanting to become better with a shield.
| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
Game balance should always be secondary to fun and verisimilitude.
No. Unbalanced stuff is not fun unless your the one at the top.
I mean, in reality a single good hit is usually enough to kill. And a bad hit is often enough to disable, or at least remove someone from a fight.
All of that is terrible for an RPG, unless you love for a random hit to kill your character.
I play Cyberpunk 2020, where that is already the case, and that game isn't any less fun for having combat be a deadly thing that should be avoided unless one has a serious advantage. There are also games like the Riddle of Steel, which can be even more brutal but that brutality isn't what makes them unfun; TRoS sucks because resolving attacks in pen and paper is clunky as heck.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I play Cyberpunk 2020, where that is already the case, and that game isn't any less fun for having combat be a deadly thing that should be avoided unless one has a serious advantage. There are also games like the Riddle of Steel, which can be even more brutal but that brutality isn't what makes them unfun; TRoS sucks because resolving attacks in pen and paper is clunky as heck.I mean, in reality a single good hit is usually enough to kill. And a bad hit is often enough to disable, or at least remove someone from a fight.
All of that is terrible for an RPG, unless you love for a random hit to kill your character.
This ain't Cyberpunk, chom, this is Pathfinder 2e.
|
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Game balance should always be secondary to fun and verisimilitude.
That may be true about the games that you enjoy, but it is not a blanket statement that can be made for all games. It is a fundamental question of game design philosophy that has to be determined for each game separately.
Once a game has defined its philosophy on these matters, it is a mistake to change it -- that's where things become disjointed.
I'm a trained melee fighter who also happens to be ambidextrous. If I tried to poke holes in everything that RPGs got wrong with regards to two-weapon fighting, main hand vs off-hand, and ambidexterity, I wouldn't have time to do anything else with my life. If you are going to enjoy a game, you just have to let that stuff go.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Most Fantasy RPGs have never been about realistically portraying historical combat. We have long swords instead of arming swords and soft leather as armor. 3.5 had more realism, a mid tier magic user would just toy with a martial character. We aren't here for any of that.
I might not like where the bar for balance is, but I'm glad it's a priority.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Cyberpunk is meant to be deadly, Pathfinder 2e is heroic fantasy. PCs are expected to fight against monsters in the early levels and interdimensional beings in the higher ones. I admit I only played Cyberpunk a few times but IIRC combat there is something meant to be avoided if possible, while in PF2e combat is something the players both want and expect. Its like comparing Call of Cthulhu's combat to D&D's.
Realism is IMO the worst thing that ever happened to fantasy TTRPGs, mostly because the average TTRPG player (myself included) couldn't run more than half a block without running out of steam, so what most of us think is "average" fitness is far from being the real average. TTRPG players think that spending 2 seconds (the amount of times that it takes to make 1 action) to put some bandages on someone can heal the damage from getting stabbed in the chest multiple times just fine, but if you want your high level martial to put a dent on the fabric of reality then that's too much.
TTRPGs should embrace unrealism because the very concept of fantasy adventurers that fight monsters or interdimensional beings who come from multiple species and have varying capabilities that range from being weapon masters to consolidated spell-slingers is in itself a unrealistic concept. No human on earth can wrestle with a polar bear, but in PF2e a group of low level characters can.
Cyberpunk is meant to be deadly, Pathfinder 2e is heroic fantasy. PCs are expected to fight against monsters in the early levels and interdimensional beings in the higher ones. I admit I only played Cyberpunk a few times but IIRC combat there is something meant to be avoided if possible, while in PF2e combat is something the players both want and expect. Its like comparing Call of Cthulhu's combat to D&D's.
Cyberpunk wants you to avoid fair fights and fights that don't obviously benefit you. You can run a game in the system where combat is frequent, but it takes a skilled hand to make it work.
Realism is IMO the worst thing that ever happened to fantasy TTRPGs, mostly because the average TTRPG player (myself included) couldn't run more than half a block without running out of steam, so what most of us think is "average" fitness is far from being the real average.
TTRPG devs really ought to base movement speeds on athletes. Monks should be based on spinters, while a barbarian or fighter could be based on modern soldiers or NFL players. Then you'd have non-athletic classes being comparatively less mobile and less able to sustain their relatively meagre top speed. This in turn would mean that squishy classes that dump physical stats need their front line to protect them lest they be overrun and easily taken down.
TTRPG players think that spending 2 seconds (the amount of times that it takes to make 1 action) to put some bandages on someone can heal the damage from getting stabbed in the chest multiple times just fine, but if you want your high level martial to put a dent on the fabric of reality then that's too much.
I have often argued that TTRPG heroes should be able to do everything a skilled warrior can do and then some. PF2 is especially egregious in making your characters worse than we would expect them to be in terms of flexibility in maneuver, use of skills, and movement.
TTRPGs should embrace unrealism because the very concept of fantasy adventurers that fight monsters or interdimensional beings who come from multiple species and have varying capabilities that range from being weapon masters to consolidated spell-slingers is in itself a unrealistic concept. No human on earth can wrestle with a polar bear, but in PF2e a group of low level characters can.
You can embrace superheroic fantasy and verisimilitude simultaneously. All it takes is making sure you don't run into issues where your god slaying warrior is worse than an IRL schlub at very basic tasks.
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
Because there is a long history of players ruining the fun of the game by intentionally or unintentionally using imbalances.
I honestly don't know where this idea of dissociating balance from fun comes from. In the medium and long term, imbalance becomes one of the main causes of ruining the fun of a game. In fact, any type of game, sooner or later, seeks balance precisely to prevent its own collapse.
In addition, simplifying it to "mature adults who want the same things from the experience" also places all the weight of any moment of lack of fun on the players themselves, even when they are simply trying to have fun. Imbalance affects everyone, both players who simply want to optimize and those who just want to make a character archetype to have fun, because it not only creates a significant difference between players who focus on having fun while being efficient, but also puts pressure on players who just make a character of an interesting archetype without worrying about optimization. Both are affected, the first one often trivializes the game or, if the game is balanced based on it, makes the experience difficult for others, both for those who are building a character just to create the archetype they want and end up being extremely punished for not seeking efficiency.
In fact, this is one of the points that my players praise PF2e for, the fact that they can build their characters however they want without worrying about whether they will be super-efficient or not, because they know that it is very difficult to create a weak and useless character even when they do not seek optimization. At the same time, the optimizing players still have fun looking for the most effective ways to use their resources and I, as a GM, can make the story progress without worrying about whether the fight will be trivialized or fatal for my players regardless of how they built their builds.
That said, there is still some minor degree of imbalance and difference in efficiency between different players and different encounters, yes there is a lot, but rarely (unless the players' skills are specifically efficient against a certain type of enemy or vice versa, which is often interesting to do from time to time) do I need to worry about the game's mechanical issues being trivialized or brutalized by/to my players.
So yes, balance needs to be one of the primary factors of the game to avoid its ruin, even at tables with "mature adults".
That said, yes, sometimes I think some design decisions sometimes exaggerate in sacrificing verisimilitude and could be done differently, but most of the time I understand the decision, especially when it is also made with a focus on simplicity, such as the Shield Block mechanic, which I hated at first because of how unrealistic it is, but then I understood it and even started to like it because of the simple and efficient way it works.
But getting back to the point, imbalance is the opposite of fun. It may be funny at first, but it gradually becomes an annoyance and a problem to be dealt with in many situations. While balance may seem annoying at first, you quickly realize that it ensures fluid and fun gameplay for everyone with minimal or no concern for the GM.
Because there is a long history of players ruining the fun of the game by intentionally or unintentionally using imbalances.
I honestly don't know where this idea of dissociating balance from fun comes from. In the medium and long term, imbalance becomes one of the main causes of ruining the fun of a game. In fact, any type of game, sooner or later, seeks balance precisely to prevent its own collapse.
That's very clearly not the case because if it was multiplayer games would strive for balance above all else, but, PF2 aside, they very rarely make strict balance a priority. D&D is a prime example of a massively popular game with a large entrenched playerbase that doesn't care about balance. TCGs are also not balanced, with certain strategies and cards being clearly more effective than others. The most popular wargames, Warhammer 40k and BattleTech, are notoriously unbalanced even with Games Workshop taking a far more balance-focused approach to their game in recent years.
These games are all as large or larger than PF2 and show that balance does not play a huge role in how enjoyable or popular a game is.
In addition, simplifying it to "mature adults who want the same things from the experience" also places all the weight of any moment of lack of fun on the players themselves, even when they are simply trying to have fun. Imbalance affects everyone, both players who simply want to optimize and those who just want to make a character archetype to have fun, because it not only creates a significant difference between players who focus on having fun while being efficient, but also puts pressure on players who just make a character of an interesting archetype without worrying about optimization. Both are affected, the first one often trivializes the game or, if the game is balanced based on it, makes the experience difficult for others, both for those who are building a character just to create the archetype they want and end up being extremely punished for not seeking efficiency.
This entire argument has you attempting to put players who want different things from their characters into the same game. To make that work, you need to have a detailed session 0, let the flavor first players build their characters first and then tell the optimizers that these characters are their power ceiling so they should focus on building characters that optimize things that wouldn't normally make the cut in a full power anything goes campaign.
In fact, this is one of the points that my players praise PF2e for, the fact that they can build their characters however they want without worrying about whether they will be super-efficient or not, because they know that it is very difficult to create a weak and useless character even when they do not seek optimization. At the same time, the optimizing players still have fun looking for the most effective ways to use their resources and I, as a GM, can make the story progress without worrying about whether the fight will be trivialized or fatal for my players regardless of how they built their builds.
The fraction of TTRPG players who have tried and enjoyed PF2 tend to be self-selected as people who care about balance and a specific flow of tactical combat. The vast majority of people who play and run TTRPGs clearly don't care about balance enough to make the switch to PF2.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
At least D&D doesn't make your character slow down their offensive tempo to use a shield properly, enter a stance, or shoot aimed directly fired shots using a longbow.
It does, however, think you should take a Bonus Action to whistle to your animal companion so it knows to bite a guy. A competent animal trainer can train their companions to do things with subtle movements or simple sounds , or even act independently to react to cues in the environment. By all accounts, all animal companions and familiars should freely be in their own initiative - but they aren't, because that would be annoying and bog down 5e's gameplay, which is against its own design goals.
There are concessions you have to make when translating things into game mechanics. If you want to have a game where things line up more with how they are in real life, that's fine; there are games for an even harder simulationist feel. Pathfinder 2e is NOT one of those games, as it attempts to strike a balance between gameplay that evokes themes of character growth and heroism - you start slower and clunkier as a level 1 adventurer, sometimes not able to do everything you want in your turn. As you gain levels, you gain ways of lessening your clunkiness and becoming a more smooth operator in the ways your character prefers, and by the time you hit level 20 you're doing superheroics. That's its stated design goal, and it does it well. Not perfectly, mind you, but no system is perfect.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I don't understand why PF2 had to make combat less realistic for the sake of balance. It shouldn't be difficult to make using a shield properly, shooting a longbow properly, or fighting with two weapons behave in a way that people who understand historical martial arts won't roll their eyes at without destroying balance.
Spending actions on the shield prevents it from becoming over-efficient. In D&D, the shield is so efficient that it becomes part of the armor, where you are punished for not having one, leading to a situation where the player only doesn't have a shield if it gets in the way of using something better than it. For me, it was a simple, elegant and even realistic solution by PF2e to spend actions to keep the shield up, demonstrating the focus on defending oneself with it.
The Volley trait of the longbow is a legacy from D&D 3.x/PF1, where the Point Blank Shot gave a hit and damage bonus on shots less than 30 feet away (practically being a +1 weapon in addition to its normal benefit). In PF2e, the designers had the idea of making it more interesting by giving a penalty to shots made with it at close range as a way to compensate for the fact that it does more damage than a shortbow, while at the same time making the Point Blank Shot simply nullify this penalty and give a higher damage bonus to shortbows, thus avoiding the problem of the shortbow's devaluation while also giving a tactical use to both weapons. Not to mention that the concept of only using 2 hands to attack was added to it, allowing the use of a free hand for anything else without having to change grips.
And fighting with 2 weapons has always been a problematic issue in D&D, giving an extra attack is something very powerful in any game, doing it just because you have a second weapon is unrealistic too, and if we consider the historical context, fighting with 2 weapons has always been a difficult technique to master to the point that most melee weapons focused on fighting with 2 hands. So having the benefit of a second weapon with different traits is already an interesting advantage in itself, there is no need to resort to the extra attack and also as already pointed out by colleagues here on the forum, this is a fantasy, it does not necessarily need to be realistic, additionally the fact that you use feats to fight well with 2 weapons reflects the additional training with this type of fighting.
Because there is a long history of players ruining the fun of the game by intentionally or unintentionally using imbalances.
I honestly don't know where this idea of dissociating balance from fun comes from. In the medium and long term, imbalance becomes one of the main causes of ruining the fun of a game. In fact, any type of game, sooner or later, seeks balance precisely to prevent its own collapse.
That's very clearly not the case because if it was multiplayer games would strive for balance above all else, but, PF2 aside, they very rarely make strict balance a priority. D&D is a prime example of a massively popular game with a large entrenched playerbase that doesn't care about balance. TCGs are also not balanced, with certain strategies and cards being clearly more effective than others. The most popular wargames, Warhammer 40k and BattleTech, are notoriously unbalanced even with Games Workshop taking a far more balance-focused approach to their game in recent years.
These games are all as large or larger than PF2 and show that balance does not play a huge role in how enjoyable or popular a game is.
But these games try to be balanced all the time! They seek balance, not the other way around. The issue is that balancing an asymmetrical game is a complex process that requires constant adjustments as serious balance flaws are found. This even applies to PF2e and D&D, which receive errata and adjustments between versions.
If they let go of balance, the game would end up being abandoned.
At least D&D doesn't make your character slow down their offensive tempo to use a shield properly, enter a stance, or shoot aimed directly fired shots using a longbow.It does, however, think you should take a Bonus Action to whistle to your animal companion so it knows to bite a guy. A competent animal trainer can train their companions to do things with subtle movements or simple sounds , or even act independently to react to cues in the environment. By all accounts, all animal companions and familiars should freely be in their own initiative - but they aren't, because that would be annoying and bog down 5e's gameplay, which is against its own design goals.
Ranger is widely considered the worst-designed class in the game and the class which got the least improvement in the 2024 rules. Using that to contrast something that impacts every character who uses a shield is pretty weak.
There are concessions you have to make when translating things into game mechanics. If you want to have a game where things line up more with how they are in real life, that's fine; there are games for an even harder simulationist feel. Pathfinder 2e is NOT one of those games, as it attempts to strike a balance between gameplay that evokes themes of character growth and heroism - you start slower and clunkier as a level 1 adventurer, sometimes not able to do everything you want in your turn. As you gain levels, you gain ways of lessening your clunkiness and becoming a more smooth operator in the ways your character prefers, and by the time you hit level 20 you're doing superheroics. That's its stated design goal, and it does it well. Not perfectly, mind you, but no system is perfect.
My issue is that even a high-level character in PF2 will be unable to do things a fairly average person can do without issue. That godly 20th-level fighter still only runs a 26.24-second 100 m dash, and even doubling that movement speed to 50 feet per action doesn't get you close to what a modern sprinter can do. It's stuff like this that makes even high-level PF2 characters feel hamstrung.