Like with the fighter and reactive strike, there is the problem of pricing in the prerequisite of enemies allowing you to trigger this.
Part of the champion's reaction is the idea that you make enemies choose between suffering for attacking your allies (while doing less damage to them) or attacking you, who will be well armed and resilient.
Even halfway intelligent enemies will likely pick the latter after one turn of suffering from strong reprisals.
There is also the issues that depending on what attacks you use it against, your shield could quickly give out, since at least one of your reactions has to include the shield block.
With the recent errata, there is also the benefit of blessed armament doing more for you, which you will be trading in for the blessed shield, including its class feat chain.
You do require three champion class feats and one archetype for this, which you then need to compare to the most damage optimizing feat choices and archetypes you could add instead.
Also, to avoid some penalty, you would need something like the agile shield grip feat to fully make use of double slice.
Barring that, you would effectively trade a +3 to hit (-2 attack vs -5) for the lower damage of the shield boss / spike on top of the issue of likely lacking property runes for extra damage on the shield until higher levels when the better doubling rings come into play.
That can make the exact numbers at least a bit tricky, especially if the potential factor of damage resistance comes into play making many weak attacks less advantageous. And unlike other abilities, DR is relatively common to face.
While I would not dismiss the point, it at least is not fully as straightforward.
You would really need to fully stat out the optimized 1handed weapon and shield vs 2handed weapon build, including obvious choices for archetype to maximize damage for a fair comparison.
Selfless (champion) - a champion who defends their allies with their reaction by mitigating damage
I usually use the term altruist for these champions but selfless is not wrong.
For the rest of the post, I will be focusing on justice champions, unless specified otherwise. Why? Because they are the ones suffering in a bit of identity crisis. They are defenders, like the other Selfless Causes, but their reaction and reputation in the community leads them to be thought of a damage dealers or Threat-Tanks. I identified two primary issues with them, and surprisingly both relate to their weapons.
I don't know if call it as a "identity crisis" because the role of champion having to be a tanker inspired in MMORPG class comes from the community due the fact that champions is one of most defensively stronger class that punishes enemies who tries to attack other PCs while protecting them using their reaction what stimulates intelligent enemies (and GM) to focus their damage output on them instead of other PCs but nothing of that says that champions cannot do some good damage like an old Lineage 2 tanky class being perfectly fine that champions can have some good offensive power. Including I have a impression that Justice Champions (also called Paladins in legacy) are the most played champion subclass due this.
Part 1: The One-Handed Problem
Justice Champions, if looked at as damage dealing threat tanks often gravitate towards bigger, two handed weapons, especially with the reach trait (see part 2). This however, in the current state of the game is misleading. Because of the Shield of Reckoning feat-tree (Blessed Shield -> Shield Warden -> Quick Shield Block -> Shield of Reckoning), justice champions with a one handed weapon and shield can start using an additional reaction per turn, starting at level 10, compared to all other champions, who only get an extra use of their main class feature at level 14, taking the Divine Reflexes feat. The extra reaction is absurdly powerful, giving them an extra attack unaffected by the Multiple Attack Penalty. This progression is only matched by the Fighter, the most famous and effective damage dealer in the system. Champions however, can only do this with a small weapon, unlike Fighters, who can run around with a d10/d12 weapon Reactive Striking left and right. If this doesn't invalidate two-handed justice champions enough, a shield attachment and a single class feat sacrificed gets the one-handed build Double Slice through the Two Weapon Warrior Dedication at level 2. With a rather simple setup like this, our one handed champion gets to make 4 MAP-less attacks at level 10. Yes, 4. That's more than most people make normal attacks. Meanwhile, our two-handed champion is stuck with a free rune on their weapon, no special actions and no way to match the scaling of it's one-handed sibling.
I see this as a possible balance concern and problem because most people believe (myself included, I only found out about this interaction a bit ago) that a two handed champion should deal more damage. Sadly, most of these people end up with fairly underwhelming characters that have sacrificed their defenses for nothing. Yes, that's the issue. A one handed champion gets to keep their defensive upside while also dealing more damage. The sacrifice of using a two-handed weapon somehow gets it behind, not ahead.
Yes yet I don't know if the use of 2-handed weapon is really an alternative focus to the class but just something that is possible to do. IMO it's just like fighting with a dagger. It will work but probably the finesse and agile traits won't worth for justice champions they lower damage for a character that usually have a low amount Dex and/or does a low number of attacks with MAP to really worth.
Champions is a class very focused in using shields also to improve their survivability due their reactions calls too much enemy attention. IMO if the idea is to make a two-handed champion more damage focused probably a champion MC archetype is a better idea. This would allow the character to have a better offensive power with such weapons while still punishes enemies who tries to attack allies. This a very strong build for both fighters and barbarians.
Part 2: The Reach Problem
Now, let's start talking about the biggest issue the justice cause has: reach. A High-OP justice champion simply can't be effective without a reach weapon, no matter the hands. This is thanks to their unique reaction, that not only requires the triggering enemy and hurt ally to be in your champion's aura, but also for the enemy to be in your weapon's reach. People are quick to jump to the Nimble Reprisal feat as a solution, but it's sadly only making the problem worse. While it tries to help non-reach weapons compete with reach, it makes reach weapons overwhelmingly stronger. As an example, if you're a justice champion and you're standing on a diagonal line, with an ally in the middle and an enemy on it's other side, even with nimble reprisal, you cannot step anywhere in a way your enemy ends up in your reach. Reach weapons however, don't struggle from this. On top of that, reach weapons let you cover and threaten more od the battlefield at any time, making you just better at your job. Workarounds of throwing weapons and/or getting Enlarged all have fairly major downsides, such as making said attack with Dexterity or being Clumsy for the duration.
You still have the option to use a Gnome Flickmace. It's not hard to take once it is an advanced weapon with ancestry trait so you can easily take it playing as a gnome or using Adopted Ancestry and taking the Gnome Weapon Familiarity. This was a so good alternative to give champions more reach that IMO Paizo designers have nerfed it from d8 to d6 + sweep exactly to diminish the must have sensation for champions when they made this change in CRB 4th print once that are champion build was most prejudiced by this change because shielded champions rarely uses 2 strikes in their turn. Yet just lose 1 avg damage per weapon damage dice (d8 to d6) still worth once that the alternative of use thrown weapons (trident) is a MAD option that makes you sacrifice other things (usually your max HP due lowest Con) and also is not a way better damage (due Dex becomes your key attribute instead of Str you have -1 damage during many levels and -2 in the end of the game so invest in a thrown weapon for champions it isn't a so great benefit).
justice champion are far better at damage than any other subclass
I no more agree after remaster due Expand Aura. Have a 30 ft aura is very very good thing to have with a champion but for Paladins Justice Champions try effectively fully benefit from their reactions to protect an ally far from 20ft means that you need a thrown weapon and even the strongest thrown weapon that is the Trident will have a lowest hit rate if the enemy is far from your 20ft weapon range. Yet Expand Aura is so good that it still worth for Paladins Justice Champions but I also start to consider that other reaction options like Flash of Grandeur and Glimpse of Redemption are better alternatives for such range.
all champion can also get the new draconic barrage
Not all only those who choose to worship a deity with a dragon domain.
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I play a Dual Dagger Justice Champion in Age of Ashes alongside a Shield of Reckoning Justice Champion.
In terms of damage, the Shield of Reckoning Justice Champion is ridiculous. He makes one attack per round in general (having to Raise their Shield to get their juicy reactions), considering that his reactions are not triggered that often (especially Shield of Reckoning, adjacency is hard to get at level 10).
As I can throw my daggers I trigger more free attacks from Ranged Reprisal and still don't get it every round, far from it.
A Shield of Reckoning Champion is in the extreme low end in terms of damage. Also, reactions are very far from a given, the only ones that can be triggered consistently are those akin to Opportune Backstab or Topple Foe.
As a side note: Despite its rarity, Shield of Reckoning is massive when it triggers. And the Shield of Reckoning Justice Champion is an absolute tank, there's no doubt about that. But it's nowhere close to an average damage dealer.
Just putting in that I played through AV and FotRP with a paladin that had dual weapon warrior. Lizard folk +shield to make everything adjacent flat footed to them and getting additional rune from special material. Did very well for damage and survivability.
Seemed to keep up with the ranged rogue and katana fighter in the group, with my melee druid lagging behind some.
The champion is a playable class. I know a few of my players enjoy the concept, but having played a few and run more it has problems.
1. The Aura: The aura is way too small. Martials tend to like to flank. Flanking, especially oversized creatures, is detrimental to the champion's reaction ability. If you're fighting even a large creature, you have to ensure perfect placement in the aura to use the champion's reaction if flanking. If the creature is huge or more, your aura better be bigger.
The aura is way too small. The Champion's Reaction should not be tied to the aura. It should have a 30 foot or more range in all directions without any concerns about the aura.
Champions should not have their key ability limited by an aura or such a short range.
2. Range Period: Champions get wrecked by ranged combat. You can completely negate the effectiveness of a champion by using longer ranged attacks. They are almost useless even a moderately effective ranged weapon strategy.
Invisible casters flying with range wreck champions. The champion has such narrow build options they have nearly nothing they can do against a caster barrage or ranged attackers. It looks pathetic when the slow heavily armored shield using champion who looks so strong against melee characters, but turns into a baby that can't swim against ranged attackers drowning damage while able to do nearly nothing.
If they could even protect targets at range, it would be something useful.
3. The Champion Reaction Upgrades are terrible. If you're already having trouble protecting a party member in a 15 foot aura fighting a huge melee monster, the group damage resistance from a dragon 50 feet away unleashing a cone on your spread out group makes the Champion Reaction group protection upgrade useless.
You have enemies getting stronger with more reach and range while you're stuck using a Champion's Reaction with a far too limited range that makes the upgrades so bad, you forget they even exist.
This has a bad effect on the champion by making the lowest level of the Champion's reaction the most useful which makes it so fighters and monks are often better champions than champions at doing the same thing. So why even play one to max level?
4. Feats: A lot of champion feats are not very attractive, especially at higher levels. You take the feats that give you extra reactions, aura of courage, maybe a smite or some extra damage or the shield line, but even the level 20 feats are barely worth taking and the fighter gets the best champion level 20 feat at level 12 that allows you to raise your shield for a free action.
The champion could use at least the protective ability of the champion's reaction to operate at longer ranges. The upgraded Champion reaction that affects a whole group really needs a much longer range. This trying to make sure everyone is in your tiny 15 foot aura is too limiting strategically.
Those are my thoughts on the champion. It's still a very playable class and the Legendary AC is absolutely a brutal ability that makes the class attractive, but I personally like being a monk or fighter better with champion's reaction to accomplish the same group role. The champion playstyle has too many weak points of play and you feel like you're wasting your time with the champion reaction upgrades and it's lame for a player and DM to have to perfectly calculate aura locations to ensure you, the PC you want to protect, and the creature are all in the aura, especially lame when trying to protect a group from something like a fireball or breath weapon.
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Champs can pick up expand aura at level 6, at lvl 10 it lasts a minute, and by level 16 its an on until you dismiss it.
Champs can pick up expand aura at level 6, at lvl 10 it lasts a minute, and by level 16 its an on until you dismiss it.
So they can spend a level 6 feat to expand an aura that should be larger instead of taking a better feat to enhance their other abilities? So it's a feat tax to still not have a big enough aura to defend against he main forms of AOE damage to use the group protection function of the Champion's reaction: casters and breath weapons done from far outside even a large aura.
A feat tax and an action tax. Unreal.
I agree with Deriven that the Champion doesn't age very well. I was not aware of Expand Aura, it solves part of the issue but I agree it sounds like a tax feat (considering the very small number of those in PF2 I won't scream). The other problem the Champion faces at high level is that it's an AC tank, when it comes to save-based effects it's rather weak. And at high level, the danger comes more often than not from save-based effects.
Still, it's a nice and solid class, a solid martial. But it's not a crazy damage dealer like the OP says.
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Putting everything under the aura's cover was already a way for the remaster to try to make things more concise, it's a way to justify how the champion can protect those far from him and how to expand this range.
The biggest problem in my opinion is the fact that the champion's reaction requires the enemy to also be in the aura. Which honestly doesn't make sense and creates a strange situation where enemies attacking from a distance basically cancel out the champion's reaction.
Luckily, the guardian will probably avoid this problem. Not that it solves the champion's situation, but at least it will give players a more sensible solution to protect their allies.
As for the feats part, I agree, but I disagree with the fact that it's only at high levels. Even at level 4, the champion is already starting to run out of interesting feats. The thing that gets better is the more feats that improve blocking appear, but it doesn't improve much. What still saves a little is being able to cast domain spells, but the champion's action economy is very tight so even that is difficult.
That said this is a thing that can be progressively being solved as long Paizo publishes new feats.
Expand Aura isn't just a tax feat, it's more of a band-aid. It was added in the remaster along with the aura-binding reaction to try to alleviate the reaction range issue. The issue is that it was an incomplete workaround for a class that needed a more fundamental tweak.
All that said, playing a champion is still pretty cool! But you have to deal with these weird quirks.
I'm slightly confused what the issue is with the two handed Justice Champion because of all the martial classes they care the most about the base damage of their weapon (because they have no flat damage booster).
Yes, if you take a very specific combination of feats, at 14th level you can use up to 3 reactions. In theory. In practice, having that many triggers relies on a very specific GM psychology, since the triggers for your reactions are very obvious. And if you do then... good for you? You spent 4 feats on shields and then another 2 feats on top of that for reactions, you can have your multiple attacks that aren't controlled by you. Meanwhile some other Champion has, IDK, a horse that rides them around for free, or can cast heroism on themself, w.e.
Also it's... fine that some specific weapons are better than others for certain builds, the Justice Champion needing to use reach or thrown weapons to guarantee they hit someone is perfectly reasonable. What kind of fix is expected anyway, you step 15ft-the reach of your weapon? You can also just cast enlarge on yourself.
TL;DR, I don't think the fact that a specific chain of 4 feats making two handed weapons without reach a worse choice than one-handed+shield on a very specific subclass is a problem.
This was one of the points I focused on. Theoretically, being able to use the champion's reaction 3 times seems interesting on paper, but in practice this doesn't happen unless the GM wants to force it to happen. In the end, most of your reactions will end up being used in blocking since it makes little sense to keep activating the champion's reaction knowing that it exists.
However, this also means that without the shield, the champion has very few uses for the reaction (it is still possible to get Reactive Strike, but it will consume a level 6 feat that competes in slot with Expand Aura). In general terms, for me, it makes very little sense to invest in a champion without a shield. In the end, if your focus is not on increasing your defensive capacity using a shield, but you still want to protect your allies, it is most likely better to pick another class and leave the champion as an archetype because you will probably have much better results.
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justice champions with a one handed weapon and shield can start using an additional reaction per turn, starting at level 10
What ability are you referencing here?
Quick Shield Block is at level 8 and is available to any Champion using a shield, not just Justice Cause.
My only thought is Shield of Reckoning, which when combined with Quick Shield Block would let any Champion use both Shield Block and their Champion Reaction twice per round. For Justice Cause that would let them make an additional Strike as a reaction in rounds that an enemy triggers Shield of Reckoning twice.
The extra reaction is absurdly powerful, giving them an extra attack unaffected by the Multiple Attack Penalty. This progression is only matched by the Fighter, the most famous and effective damage dealer in the system. Champions however, can only do this with a small weapon, unlike Fighters, who can run around with a d10/d12 weapon Reactive Striking left and right.
Fighter is intended to be the best fighter. Cherry picking Fighter as your typical example for comparison results in an invalid comparison. Champion isn't intended to be as good of a fighter as a Fighter.
Being limited to 1-hand weapons seems like a valid cost to pay to be allowed to potentially have 2 0-MAP Strike reactions available like a Fighter does.
a shield attachment and a single class feat sacrificed gets the one-handed build Double Slice through the Two Weapon Warrior Dedication at level 2. With a rather simple setup like this, our one handed champion gets to make 4 MAP-less attacks at level 10. Yes, 4. That's more than most people make normal attacks.
Subordinate Actions. You don't get to use Double Slice in place of Strike when Reactive Strike or Shield of Reckoning or your Champion Reaction tell you to use Strike.
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Putting everything under the aura's cover was already a way for the remaster to try to make things more concise, it's a way to justify how the champion can protect those far from him and how to expand this range.
The biggest problem in my opinion is the fact that the champion's reaction requires the enemy to also be in the aura. Which honestly doesn't make sense and creates a strange situation where enemies attacking from a distance basically cancel out the champion's reaction.
Luckily, the guardian will probably avoid this problem. Not that it solves the champion's situation, but at least it will give players a more sensible solution to protect their allies.
As for the feats part, I agree, but I disagree with the fact that it's only at high levels. Even at level 4, the champion is already starting to run out of interesting feats. The thing that gets better is the more feats that improve blocking appear, but it doesn't improve much. What still saves a little is being able to cast domain spells, but the champion's action economy is very tight so even that is difficult.
That said this is a thing that can be progressively being solved as long Paizo publishes new feats.
Expand Aura isn't just a tax feat, it's more of a band-aid. It was added in the remaster along with the aura-binding reaction to try to alleviate the reaction range issue. The issue is that it was an incomplete workaround for a class that needed a more fundamental tweak.
All that said, playing a champion is still pretty cool! But you have to deal with these weird quirks.
...I'm slightly confused what the issue is with the two handed Justice Champion because of all the martial classes they care the most about the base damage of their weapon (because they have no flat damage booster).
Yes, if you take a very specific combination of feats, at 14th level you can use up to 3 reactions. In theory. In practice, having that many triggers relies on a very specific GM psychology, since the triggers for your
If they got rid of the requirement for the enemy to be in the aura, that would also help a lot. It's all this work to try to position both the enemy and PCs in the aura that makes the Champion's reaction weaker than it should be as you level and deal more and more with strong ranged enemies, especially high level casters and AOE creatures who can drop it from far away.