| 8 people marked this as a favorite. |
Pathfinder 2e is a tabletop game known for its engaging, tactical combat, and its centerpiece is melee: by nature, melee combat tends to require actions to get in range, but Paizo added a huge amount of depth and options to this with various skill actions, particularly Athletics maneuvers but also Feinting for Charisma classes, and positioning-based flanking. The end result is a combat system that is hugely diverse, with plenty of room for smart plays, tons of mechanical hooks for characters to build upon, and melee builds that can easily feel amazing at what they're meant to do.
... and then there's ranged combat. Although some skill actions can be used at range as well as melee, many can't be used at range without specifically committing to certain build options. The only ranged-exclusive mechanic is cover, a situational mechanic that often harms more than it helps, since having cover from an enemy means that enemy also has cover from you. As a result, ranged combat doesn't have that same diversity, those same mechanical hooks, or that same depth of play.
For a while, this was largely fine, as Pathfinder's combat is primarily melee-based (this is likely also why melee received more attention). However, this is becoming increasingly less true in a system that has expanded a lot since the original release of the CRB:
That is, of course, unless you're a Starlit Span Magus. Like a melee Magus, the class will want to spend two actions using their uber-powerful Spellstrike, and then another action to recharge. Trouble is, whereas melee Magi will usually want to stagger Spellstriking and reloading across different turns due to the need to spend actions on other things in melee, such as repositioning, Starlit Span has no such incentive. Thus, they get to spend all three actions Spellstriking and reloading on their turn, then all three actions Spellstriking and reloading on their next turn, and the next, and so on and so forth. What should have been a subclass that gained extra range in exchange for weaker ranged damage instead become the most damaging subclass by far, but also by far the most repetitive and least tactically engaging. Its cousin the Eldritch Archer archetype suffers from the exact same problem, which highlights a fundamental issue with ranged builds in 2e: unless the developers specifically force diverse turns into a ranged martial class or subclass, that build will always be at risk of devolving into extremely repetitive and tactically uninteresting gameplay.
This bodes particularly poorly for the one ranged-centric martial class in Pathfinder:
Now, it wouldn't be fair to pin all of the Gunslinger's problems on ranged combat: the class has a lot of problems by itself, including the need to accommodate an intentionally undertuned range of weapons, and many threads discuss these problems at length, such as this one. However, 2e's ranged combat design certainly doesn't make things easier: firearms operate on an even lower baseline than other ranged weapons, which already deal a lot less damage than melee weapons, so the weapon type normally known in fiction for its high damage often ends up feeling particularly anemic. Although Gunslingers rarely have the same rotation of actions each turn, this is often only because their need to reload after every shot has them Strike->Reload->Strike on one turn, then Reload->Strike->Reload on the next. The class tends to be compared quite unfavorably to a ranged Fighter, and generally struggles to offer the same depth of play or major contributions as other martial classes. Although their subclasses and feats do give them additional things to do, the general lack of mechanical hooks to ranged combat severely limits their ability to build upon aspects of ranged combat that are inherently interesting, which is probably why so many Gunslinger ways push the class into melee range.
Notice how when I mention ranged combat, though, I mention "2e's ranged combat" and not "Pathfinder 2e's ranged combat". I've phrased it this way specifically because as of last year, 2e is a system that spans not just one, but two official Paizo games with the upcoming release of Starfinder 2e: unlike Pathfinder, Starfinder's combat is centered around range and its sci-fi guns, and with the exception of the Solarian, even martial classes are ranged by default. Despite these changes in meta, SF2e aims to be compatible with PF2e, using the same core rules and following similar, though not identical balancing. How then does its ranged-centric combat hold up?
In my playtesting experience and that of many others: not terribly well. It's not just that ranged combat inherently lacks depth: because everyone has Pathfinder-grade survivability but largely only ranged-grade damage, combat encounters are incredibly drawn out on top of being repetitive, a problem made all the worse by it being far too easy to get entrenched in cover. Guns, the bread-and-butter of Starfinder's combat, feel weak by virtue of sometimes dealing only a single point of damage on a hit, and this weak ranged damage faceplants against enemies with Hardness or resistance, grossly imbalancing certain monsters and build options. The Starfriends have done a fantastic job of adapting so much of Starfinder's content to 2e and making it fun, but there's only so much that can be done when you're building on top of a weak foundation.
And I guess this is what ultimately motivated me to make this post in PF2e's general discussion subforum: 2e's ranged combat needs more meat on its bones, starting with Pathfinder, because on top of this affecting many builds in Pathfinder, I fear this is going to really hurt Starfinder when its second edition releases. It's not just that many Pathfinder classes and subclasses could benefit significantly from more in-depth ranged combat rules: for Starfinder, I think they're a necessity. 2e is no longer a system that can afford to flesh out only part of its combat: if the system is to succeed with both a melee meta and a ranged meta, both forms of combat need the same amount of baseline mechanical depth and rewarding gameplay.
To resume with a TL;DR: 2e did an awesome job of fleshing out its melee combat, but ranged combat is significantly underdeveloped by comparison. This is not great for ranged-specific martial classes and subclasses in Pathfinder, who often struggle to contribute as meaningfully and play as interestingly as their melee counterparts, but is especially bad for Starfinder, whose ranged-centric combat fails to offer the tactical depth and diversity of play needed for what is meant to be its core gameplay. I don't necessarily know how Paizo could go about addressing this cleanly, if there is even a desire to change or expand ranged combat rules in the first place, but doing so would in my opinion bring major positive returns to many character builds in Pathfinder, and significantly increase the success chances of one of Paizo's biggest upcoming products.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Another thing is that if you took cover you should at least be able to downgrade the amount of protection your cover gives to the enemy if not completely ignore it because if it doesn't you're not really benefiting from it unless some of the enemies are on the other side of the cover, which they probably won't.
...but Cover already isn't always symmetrically applied. Remember, Gm adjudicating the level of cover that makes sense is the primary method and drawing center to center lines on the map is secondary and the cover rules do say that depending on circumstances, the cover levels can be different in the two directions.
I'd absolutely agree that more guidance and examples are called for than the PF2 books have (and that was a point I brought up in my SF2 playtest surveys), but let's not act like the rule is something it isn't.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Thinking about it, I thought I had read something about partial cover that was closer to you than your enemy might not have given them cover, but I must have misremembered it. Checking the rules, it only discusses some circumstances that the GM can consider, such as using an arrow slit for cover, or shooting around a corner.
Perhaps an optional set of rules to make ranged more interesting and more fleshed out would be a good idea.
I think it is reasonable to give flanking bonus to a ranged attack when there is a someone threatening them on the other side. As to ranged flanking, I don't know that I want everyone who 'could shoot' said person to apply for flanking for ranged by default. On the other hand, I could imagine successful strikes made by a ranged weapon creating a threat awareness situation that might enable flanking from range. You might be able to allow it for attacks even on a failure, but not critical failure.
Hmmm... what about a feat that gives a Ranged combatant a reaction that would allow them to make a ranged attack within the first range increment when an ally makes an attack which if the ranged attack were considered a melee attack, would make the target be off-guard. In doing so both the triggering attack from the Ally and the ranged attack in the reaction benefit from the defender being considered off-guard.
Actually, as you mentioned people taking the Take Cover action, being able to potentially ignore, or reduce the cover to their opponent, if the only cover blocking their line of effect to the opponent is adjacent to them. (something like either eliminating their own circumstance penalty, or reducing it down to lesser cover penalty) That is in line with the rules saying you normally need to spend an action somehow to leverage your cover to your advantage. So I think making that a generalized ruling would actually be able to fall within RAW.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Thinking about it, I thought I had read something about partial cover that was closer to you than your enemy might not have given them cover, but I must have misremembered it. Checking the rules, it only discusses some circumstances that the GM can consider, such as using an arrow slit for cover, or shooting around a corner.
That sounds like you're remembering the Low Cover rule from Starfinder.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
The only real problem I have with ranged combat is that most, if not all, of the readily available options to improve accuracy don't work with ranged weapons. Flanking? No. Feinting? No. Even feats like a fighter's Shatter Defenses to make frightened enemies off-guard only works in melee too. Another example of this are rogues, who have tons of feat support for thrown builds, but unless they are playing a mastermind rogue, they literally don't have a way to get enemies off-guard against their thrown weapons unless they dip into gunslinger or pistol phenom for Pistol Twirl.
Edit: I just noticed Pistol Twirl requires a "loaded weapon". I was pretty sure it just said "ranged weapon" before. Well, if anything this further proves my point.
IMO flanking should work at ranged too (and probably impose a penalty to Reflex too, since the whole point of being flanked is that you can't properly evade attacks because you can't see the person behind you) but I kinda get why it doesn't. A well built PF1e ranged character was effectively immortal because the enemies woulnd't be able to reach them and the damage they dealt, while lower than a melee character, was doing a little less than that from miles away.
I feel Paizo was a little conservative when making PF2e to avoid making the same mistakes they did in PF1e again, which shows in how they usually take innecesary extra measures to keep something "in line" with the rest of the content (I.E, the whole design of firearms and casters in PF2e). The only downside ranged combat needs is that it deals less damage than melee but allows you to stay away, and that most of the effects of spells and other buffs have short ranges so its likely the ranged character can't be targeted with them. Not allowing them to flank or feint a target its probably way too much.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
While accuracy improvements are one thing that's missing, I feel it's not the only thing. Melee characters have access to 5 different athletics maneuvers that offer alternative ways to use your multiple attack penalty and lots of 3rd action options. Ranged characters just have less to do natively.
The other issue I've noticed is in encounter design. Ranged characters aren't encouraged to move much. Some of that might be because most parties have melee characters who can do the moving for them and keep certain threats away from ranged characters, but environments that offer tactical advantages for moving to a specific positon, or objectives that can only be completed by moving could go a long way to making ranged combat more dynamic.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I agree with a lot of this. The fact that Pistol Twirl is known as one of the more powerful Gunslinger feats, and so specifically because it lets you do one melee-specific skill action at range, to me is a strong indicator that ranged combatants, as a baseline, are starved for things to do. I'd very much appreciate more baseline actions, including more uses for positioning, that would incentivize ranged characters to spend actions on things other than Striking, and having melee flankers provide flanking for ranged attacks could go a long way towards this (though more for Pathfinder than Starfinder).
Beyond accuracy boosters and extra actions, I think one of the enduring problems with ranged combat is just how awful ranged weapons feel at low level: we've likely all been there where our successful hits with a ranged weapon dealt a grand total of 1 damage, not just once but often, and that feels really discouraging. It gets better once you get more damage dice, but it's impossible not to compare this to melee damage, which deal much more reliable damage by virtue of adding your Strength modifier.
To put it in context: the difference on a +4 Strength character between the lowest and highest baseline hit damage on a d12 weapon, which has the largest spread of possible values, is 5 versus 16, a factor just over 3. That is, all things considered, not a massive spread. By contrast, even a d4 ranged weapon, which has the tightest spread of numbers, differs in its lowest and highest hit damage value by a factor of 4, and on your shortbow it'll be a factor of 6. A +4 Strength martial's lowest hit damage will also be 5 times more damaging than your ranged weapon's minimum hit damage, so this is a point where ranged martials really struggle to feel effective at all, and where every point of bonus flat damage makes a huge difference.
I also agree that cover could use some tweaking, and at the very least less stuff that is left up to GM fiat. I don't think taking cover should give enemies cover from you, and instead one house rule I playtested to positive effect during my Starfinder 2e playtests was making characters taking cover off-guard to attacks coming from directions where they weren't benefiting from cover. This made cover a far more situational benefit where you had a real incentive to take it in the short term for the defense bonus, but where getting entrenched became super-risky due to how it gave opponents the time to reposition and attack you from an exposed angle (this is something the party Operative exploited to tremendous effect as well). Adding more ways to trade actions for accuracy at range I think could justify more drastic changes to weapons, such as increased damage, even a flat damage increase of some kind, in exchange for far shorter range increments: effectively, you'd deal more damage as a ranged martial, and fighting at risky ranges would constitute a major damage increase, but then you'd have to leverage the off-guard condition to offset accuracy reductions from fighting at farther range increments.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It's very difficult to provide more to ranged combat than is already available. Ranged combat allows you to leverage terrain better than any other form of combat and allows you to bypass terrain better than any other form of combat. With Blindfight being equally effective for ranged and melee combat, they even made concealment and hidden equally effective or ineffective against ranged or melee combat.
Ranged combat also improves action economy when it is used tactically. You can hammer targets before engaging in melee avoiding their attacks where they trade move actions for your attack actions at substantial range. This allows you to soften up targets.
Dex and Stealth synergize as well allowing you to make stealthy characters who can sneak up to targets and hammer them off-guard from a distance.
I'm not sure how you make it more than it is when it is already quite powerful.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm not sure how you make it more than it is when it is already quite powerful.
I can't help but feel this misses the point. Specifically, it's not that ranged combat is weak, but that it is underdeveloped: you're right, ranged attacks have far more inherent power than melee attacks, because ranged attacks don't require actions or movement to let you attack right away at most of the ranges where combat could possibly happen. The problem is that Paizo's answer to this was to balance ranged weapons by making their damage a lot weaker: not only does this not address the fundamental issue (ranged martials can still go full turret mode), it arguably makes ranged martial combat even less interesting by making ranged damage less effective overall. If there were more ways of getting more out of ranged combat by spending actions, much like how melee has flanking and all of its melee-specific skill actions, then ranged combat could feel a lot better at an appropriate tradeoff in actions. It's therefore less about straight-up buffing ranged damage, and more about adding more mechanical hooks that would make ranged combat more action-intensive to put to full use, but also resultingly more diverse and better able to shine through tactical play.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm not sure how you make it more than it is when it is already quite powerful.I can't help but feel this misses the point. Specifically, it's not that ranged combat is weak, but that it is underdeveloped: you're right, ranged attacks have far more inherent power than melee attacks, because ranged attacks don't require actions or movement to let you attack right away at most of the ranges where combat could possibly happen. The problem is that Paizo's answer to this was to balance ranged weapons by making their damage a lot weaker: not only does this not address the fundamental issue (ranged martials can still go full turret mode), it arguably makes ranged martial combat even less interesting by making ranged damage less effective overall. If there were more ways of getting more out of ranged combat by spending actions, much like how melee has flanking and all of its melee-specific skill actions, then ranged combat could feel a lot better at an appropriate tradeoff in actions. It's therefore less about straight-up buffing ranged damage, and more about adding more mechanical hooks that would make ranged combat more action-intensive to put to full use, but also resultingly more diverse and better able to shine through tactical play.
What should you be able to do at range?
Trip would be too insanely powerful.
Fighters can slow people with no save which absolutely crushes bosses with Debilitating Shot.
Rangers can off-guard targets at range.
Rogue ranged combatants take longer to come online, but once online are brutal with stealth and hiding. Once you can stick continuous off-guard on a target.
You have pin a crit specialization effect for bows which can pin a target requiring actions to get free.
The magus can do the most with the bow combined with spells.
Monk with bows is more damage focused, but has some nice damage feat boosts with the bow.
Barb can developed into a thrown weapon user, but thrown weapons aren't the best for ranged combat.
The masters of ranged combat are casters. Not much can match them for power and versatility, though they have limited slots.
What else can you do with it? I'm not sure.
Fleeing a little of the main focus and going straight to the consequence. I honestly like the fact that PF2E has more options and benefits in combat melee than ranged. Because in other systems such as D&D5e, the fact that ranged attacks are almost as good as melee makes melee an unnecessary risk and disadvantage in many cases. Especially in open maps where players (and enemies) can position themselves in a far and advantageous place, having a huge advantage over melee.
The only thing I think is bothering in PF2E is that it has weird metas, as already mentioned by the OP. This is the fact that if you want to be a good ranged, you are restricted to magus or gunslinger builds in general, while the melees have a much larger range of viable options.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Fleeing a little of the main focus and going straight to the consequence. I honestly like the fact that PF2E has more options and benefits in combat melee than ranged. Because in other systems such as D&D5e, the fact that ranged attacks are almost as good as melee makes melee an unnecessary risk and disadvantage in many cases. Especially in open maps where players (and enemies) can position themselves in a far and advantageous place, having a huge advantage over melee.
I definitely agree that it's a very good thing for ranged to be balanced on par with melee, though I'll mention that in D&D 5e, ranged combat is still just as boring, it's just that you deal almost the same damage as a melee character, and melee has comparatively far fewer options than PF2e. One of PF2e's great improvements is that by removing Reactive Strikes by default, melee no longer devolves into a gridlock where characters just move in, stay in the same place, and spam attacks until one side dies. The flipside to this is that it makes it very easy for ranged characters to move out of range or just keep shooting if an enemy gets within melee distance, but that I think isn't necessarily an unfixable problem.
What should you be able to do at range?
Most of what you mention comes from specific classes rather than general actions, though ranged trip weapons do in fact exist. I won't claim I have all the answers, but here are some things I'd be interested in seeing:
So to be clear: none of the suggestions I'm making here are about giving ranged combat free power. The basic principle to all of these effects is that as a ranged character, you should be encouraged to spend actions on things other than Striking or casting a spell, and spending those extra actions would let you support your team better and potentially also contribute more damage under the right circumstances. Virtually all of these suggestions are about teamwork as well: it's not so much about boosting your own power, as it is about boosting your allies and bouncing off of their own actions. Even though the above specifics needn't be implemented, something to that general effect I think would go a long way towards making ranged combat a lot more diverse and interesting, and giving ranged characters more mechanical hooks to build upon.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Sometime last year about, I had a post kicking around in the back of my head wondering if I was missing something about ranged combat. It's not just that the damage numbers are dishearteningly low (I'd be the first to point out that not needing to move to hit and not being in harm's way can be extremely valuable sources of 'power'), it's that it just isn't fun to plug away 1-6 damage per hit and have nothing better to do for your third action than that MAP-10 crit fish.
So yeah, I have to agree a lot with this sentiment. Whether or not ranged combat is powerful and balanced with melee, it doesn't feel powerful and, even worse, it's not very fun to do.
I'm not very well versed in what makes ranged combat optimal, nor what would possibly make it overpowered, but my instinct for what could make it more fun is more or less exactly the kinds of things Teridax is saying above--more ranged tactical options to replace the autoturret feeling. Some reason to spend your third action to reposition when the majority of all fights will be so far inside your range increment that the 'volley' trait exists purely so that longbow isn't automatically the superior option.
I'd really like some kind of incentive to stick close to your target despite the huge advantages gained by staying far back. The Point Blank Stance (adaptation of 1e's auto-take Point Blank Shot feat) is a damage bonus up to your first range increment, but imho it probably could have been limited to 15-30' without changing almost any of its power in most fights except encourage ranged characters to adjust footing from time to time--just enough that it actually feels like they're still in the same fight as the rest of the party when rooms get large.
I really like the suggestion of 'benefit from flanking without granting it' idea because again, it gives the ranged character a reason to run around looking for a clear target and not just stand back plugging 3 actions into the air at once. For myself I might consider adding a range restriction on that just like what I mention in PBS; maybe you can only outflank a target if you're within 15-30' of it in addition to being roughly opposite your ally. This way if you're further, you use that action to Hide behind cover and if you're closer you use that action to run in circles. If necessary, possibly combo the outflanking manoeuvres with something like the PB stance.
On the one hand, I know that we are many of us huge history nerds who love that verisimilitude and so the effective range of any bow-shaped weapon must be so-many dozen feet at least, but also for the purposes of actually having fun, tactical combat choices to make, on the other hand I feel like making a bow-hero's optimal range be much closer is fitting. At least, it has precedent in the Monster Hunter series where the bow is a ranged weapon that can theoretically damage your target without needing to stand in its path, but whose damage sharply falls off if you're standing outside a relatively short optimum range that's neither too close to the monster, nor too far, so you can still maneouvre to avoid attacks but not ever feel like you're just smashing the attack button until it falls over.
Kineticists can be rather effective ranged attackers, especially with weapon infusion.
Distraction and other stealth mechanisms help.
Thrown nets and bolas can be powerful, though their action economy cost can be a problem.
Combining ranged attacks with other tricks helps a lot. A ranged attacker can use traps for defense or poisons for offense. Special ammo can also allow instantly switching tactics or damage types; easy enough to keep a few cold iron and silver arrows in the quiver, plus any variety of magic ammo.
Kineticists can be rather effective ranged attackers, especially with weapon infusion.
Here we are entering in the casters plane once that kineticists only uses blasts when they don't have a better impulse for the situation or as 3rd action.
Kineticists can be rather effective ranged attackers, especially with weapon infusion.Here we are entering in the casters plane once that kineticists only uses blasts when they don't have a better impulse for the situation or as 3rd action.
Build dependant! My kin's damage is all from weapon infusion blasts. Otherwise they're all about control and defense, including using nets and bolas. The flexibility and range of the blasts means they get a high portion of kills and knockouts, sometimes taking out foes on opposite sides of the map in the same round.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think ranged flanking should exist. I think flanking is built with a risk-reward built in which makes it easier for melee. You are in melee range and can be hit for delivering hits. That's a balance point I don't think should be changed.
How do you off-guard for ranged:
1. Trip or grapple by a martial will do it.
2. Hide using stealth.
3. Invisibility spell level 4 or higher.
4. Create a Diversion which can be built up to be very effective with skills.
5. Thief rogue is very good at off-guarding a target endlessly if they can sneak attack it.
6. Other spells and feats that off-guard a target with no limitations like the Ranger Distracting Shot.
I think with teamwork, ranged off-guard has enough options. Flanking should be strictly melee or if the ranged attacker is willing to enter a flanking position.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
When the system assumes every martial is going to melee, gives more HP and better AC to martials because its assumed they are going to receive more damage because of being melee, and most if not all the combat-centric options only work for melee, then flanking isn't "high risk high reward" but rather just something the system assumes like normal for combat. Not to mention none of your fixes are as universal and easy to come by as flanking is.
Yet still is a high risk reward. Even having more HP and AC, the frontliners receive way more enemy attention and consequently way more damage.
Also, it's not too hard for ranged characters to get benefit from off-guard due to teamwork. As well pointed by Firelion is just the easier and obvious way to make a target off-guard, but there is a lot more like Trip and Grapple and the games expects that the party have someone in frontline.
This frontline probably can and will do something to trip or grab enemies, specially if it has Reactive Strikes, or else the backline will begin to be the new frontline.
Also, IMO what makes most non-casters ranged characters weaker usually is the lack of full str to damage as key attribute, a damage reaction and less maneuver options by default. This is what typically put them behind melee ones but for other side they are way less subject to be damaged.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Off-guard for ranged is pretty easy if the party isn't playing selfish. It gets much easier at higher levels as well.
I wanted to try a rogue archer. It started off rough, but slowly got better. Early on I used Stealth and Create a Diversion to get off-guard. It helps to have a trip martial or a level 4 invis, but by level 10 a thief rogue can lock in off-guard with a single off-guard attack then it's wide open hammer.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like it's important to remember that how easy it is to target off-guard from range isn't really the main point as I read it, but rather the lack of things for ranged combatants to do (and esp the lack of reasons ever to move once combat is joined). If quasi- or close-ranged flanking is no good and offguard is too easy to get, maybe propose something else a ranged character can do with their time. Hiding is good if you can get the cover, but it's just one thing and unless you're invested in Stealth (which, *is* good synergy for any ranged character's dex) you don't have much else for it.
I have faith our collective creativity can come up with something that's not too powerful that can make ranged combat more engaging to play than autoturret style. Sniping is one thing but it'd be nice to have more that don't depend on you staying around corners or finding cover on the battlefield.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Rangers with animal companions get to eek out more from ranged strikes basically adding something extra to to their shot.
My group rarely runs without a ranged martial. We consider them very strong and able to do interesting things. Starlight Span magus is the strongest damage dealer. Ranger and fighter both offer some good archer options. Monk is ok too. Rogue takes some work, but if you get it going it is strong and versatile.
We like leveraging archers for pulling encounters. Our martials wait as the ranged martial hits monsters first forcing them to spend move actions against our attack actions. That is a very favorable trade.
| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
"Ranged martials are good because Starlit Span exists" I think is about as strong a point as claiming every plant is a fruit by pointing to an orange. As the OP mentions, Starlit Span is a notorious outlier in terms of damage output even by melee standards, because they take a class that's meant to burst once every other turn, and use ranged martials' lack of things to do in order to burst every turn instead. In other words: not only is Starlit Span not a representative example of ranged martials, a world in which ranged martials had a healthy playstyle that required them to spend additional actions to optimize their damage is a world in which Starlit Span would not be able to play the way it does currently.
It is also for this reason that I think the argument of "but ranged martials are effective already" to miss the point completely: ranged martials are indeed balanced according to their constraints or lack thereof; it's just that unlike melee, there's far fewer ways for a ranged martial to optimize their playstyle. Melee classes have to get into melee range, flank, use Athletics maneuvers, and generally use the vast toolkit at their disposal to operate at their best, and the reward for that additional effort is that melee classes get to have extremely good damage and single-target crowd control. All of those tools create variance where there are optimal choices and suboptimal choices to make at any given moment, and the optimal choices lead to much greater results than the suboptimal choices.
Ranged combat, by contrast, does not have that same variance. When you read between the lines of what YuriP and Deriven are saying when they claim ranged martials are effective due to teamwork, the thing actually being said is that ranged martials lack the agency to make impactful choices: it's up to others to make those choices for them, and all the ranged martial has to do is just spam attacks. Everyone is more effective due to teamwork, but then everyone also gets to contribute to that teamwork in various ways. Ranged characters lack that inherently, and their contributions come primarily from opting into class feats and other specific mechanics. Because they have fewer choices to make, their effectiveness also ends up having a lot less variance than with other classes, which makes them less interesting and often feel less effective when they can't hit the same ceiling of power as others.
I also don't buy the argument that it's impossible to come up with ways of making ranged combat more interesting, because we've now had several comments from different people offering plenty of viable solutions. Even if ranged flanking is not your cup of tea, there are a ton of other suggestions on this very thread that would allow ranged characters to contribute utility, incentivize good positioning, and generally just inject more variance, more choices, and more elements of risk versus reward into their play. 2e has already proven that melee combat doesn't need to be this static slugfest where nobody moves around for fear of taking attacks of opportunity, and so I think there's room for ranged combat to evolve in a similar way.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
It's also important to note that the lack of variety in ranged characters is often a player choice.
Many players choose to play with long-range weapons precisely because they want something simple and less risky. They don't want to deal with movement and maneuvers frequently, they just want to snipe and shoot like a turret.
I'm not saying that the lack of standard ranged action options that don't depend on charisma or a specific class isn't a bad thing, but often what I see my ranged players wanting is to simply stay in a safe position and shoot as much as possible.
In any case, as I've said before, this lack of options for me is also part of the game's design choice to value melees, even though some underestimate the risks of being on the front line (they're the first to fall when things go wrong).
In any case, we will soon have SF2e with more options for those who like to play ranged, such as the suppressed condition, the option to AoE with the most diverse ranged weapons and throw some grenades with varied effects without needing to be an alchemist.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
That's the problem, though: SF2e doesn't give ranged characters all that many more options, nor does it give them a way to increase their damage output through skills or positioning, and as a result ranged combat feels weak and repetitive by default. That's the point I'm driving at: when your system makes ranged combat inherently simplistic, lacking in interesting choices, and low on variance as a result of lacking choices, that creates a really weak foundation for a game that tries to do ranged-centric combat like Starfinder. As mentioned in the OP, it's fine and dandy for Pathfinder 2e to focus more on melee than ranged (or, at least, it was back when the game wasn't full of ranged builds and that now has a primarily ranged martial class), but a system that neglects ranged combat is not very compatible with a game that uses that system for primarily ranged combat.
By far the biggest criticism playtesters have made of Starfinder 2e is that guns feel weak, ranged combat does not feel all that good, and enemies feel like bullet sponges, especially if they have resistances or Hardness. This is not just a balance problem, but a compatibility problem, because it's become clear that damage reduction is balanced around melee's higher damage, and is far too strong against the lower damage of ranged attacks, to the point of nullifying them entirely sometimes. Without wanting to catastrophize, I think this poses a significant risk to SF2e's early adoption, because if the core aspect of its gameplay fails to satisfy enough players, that will significantly harm its success chances. It'd like to avoid that, not just because the game would be a dream come true for me, but because Paizo has committed a huge amount of resources to this product and tends to really need these kinds of things to succeed.
So for the sake of 2e, the system and not just Pathfinder, ranged combat needs as much love as melee. Not in the sense that ranged weapons should have the same baseline damage as melee weapons, because that would just overpower ranged combat, but in the sense that ranged combat should be just as tactically deep and able to be optimized through moment-to-moment choices as melee. Spamming attacks in full turret mode is probably not something you could ever stop for ranged weapons, but it should still generally be the least optimal way of fighting at range. Instead, there ought to be far more tactically interesting and rewarding ways to spend other actions to get more out of your ranged weapons, and assist your team better too. Some of these will obviously stem from class and skill feats, but there needs to be a baseline of universal actions and mechanics to accomplish this, just like how melee has a solid baseline of positioning-based play even when you're not leveraging Athletics, Deception, or class feats in your favor.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
"Ranged martials are good because Starlit Span exists" I think is about as strong a point as claiming every plant is a fruit by pointing to an orange. As the OP mentions, Starlit Span is a notorious outlier in terms of damage output even by melee standards, because they take a class that's meant to burst once every other turn, and use ranged martials' lack of things to do in order to burst every turn instead. In other words: not only is Starlit Span not a representative example of ranged martials, a world in which ranged martials had a healthy playstyle that required them to spend additional actions to optimize their damage is a world in which Starlit Span would not be able to play the way it does currently.
It is also for this reason that I think the argument of "but ranged martials are effective already" to miss the point completely: ranged martials are indeed balanced according to their constraints or lack thereof; it's just that unlike melee, there's far fewer ways for a ranged martial to optimize their playstyle. Melee classes have to get into melee range, flank, use Athletics maneuvers, and generally use the vast toolkit at their disposal to operate at their best, and the reward for that additional effort is that melee classes get to have extremely good damage and single-target crowd control. All of those tools create variance where there are optimal choices and suboptimal choices to make at any given moment, and the optimal choices lead to much greater results than the suboptimal choices.
Ranged combat, by contrast, does not have that same variance. When you read between the lines of what YuriP and Deriven are saying when they claim ranged martials are effective due to teamwork, the thing actually being said is that ranged martials lack the agency to make impactful choices: it's up to others to make those choices for them, and all the ranged martial has to do is just spam attacks. Everyone is more effective due to teamwork, but then everyone also gets to contribute to that teamwork in various...
Good to see the strawman come out as I did not say "Starlit Span" did great damage so everything is fine or anything of the kind.
Every single class in this game requires teamwork to work well. No one single class in PF2 will do anything but die without teamwork. Some people hate this, some people like it. It is the way it is.
Martials die if they don't get healing. Melee rogues need a flanker. Casters need martials in front of them or they get ripped apart. So claiming that archers are in some unusual position is not how it is at all.
I've seen Ranger Archers do great damage. Fighters with Debilitating Shot own bosses while doing damage. I played a rogue archer that did great damage at higher level.
We do not make Starlit Span archers over and over again. In fact, many in my group don't even enjoy Starlit Span more than once because it's boring.
Fighter archers are the most popular archer in my group followed by ranger archers. I've seen Fighter archers crush bosses with damage and effects. Ranger archers with flurry at higher level have some really insane rounds blasting off damage while adding in effects like Distracting Shot to offguard things and applying support against bosses to give the flurry bonuses to other martials.
The complaints I'm seeing on this thread seem like complaints from players that have played archers to level 4 or 5. High level archers do a lot of stuff.
For some reason, I come to these threads using real examples versus these complaints that don't even discuss what each ranged martial does.
How do you not know how a ranger off-guards enemies at range? How do you not know a fighter archer has a feat that allows them to flank with a bow? How do you not know about Debilitating shot? How have you not seen a flurry archer do crazy damage while off-guarding a target by hitting it a few times and applying Marked Prey to give flurry to other members of the party?
Most people that post with me know I'm an optimizer. If I saw a problem with ranged strikers over the course of levels, I'd say something.
Sure, Starlit Span can do some crazy damage. I've seen it and played it. But it's super boring. It consists of Shoot, recharge, shoot. Maybe incorporate an AoE spell or something. You can't give the Starlit Span anymore than they have or you turn an already ridiculous damage class into something far too powerful compared to every other martial. Starlit Span is overpowered and I think it will get nerfed at some point. It's clearly way above the expected damage for a ranged combatant. If it weren't so boring, I'm sure my players would play it more.
I think ranged combatants have a good mix of builds and options that synergize well with groups. They have the ability to off-guard targets, hit multiple targets, apply effects, and enhance overall group play.
I don't see melee martials as clearly better than them except maybe the first few levels before you get a striking rune.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
…
So for the sake of 2e, the system and not just Pathfinder, ranged combat needs as much love as melee. Not in the sense that ranged weapons should have the same baseline damage as melee weapons, because that would just overpower ranged combat, but in the sense that ranged combat should be just as tactically deep and able to be optimized through moment-to-moment choices as melee. Spamming attacks in full turret mode is probably not something you could ever stop for ranged weapons, but it should still generally be the least optimal way of fighting at range. Instead, there ought to be far more tactically interesting and rewarding ways to spend other actions to get more out of your ranged weapons, and assist your team better too. Some of these will obviously stem from class and skill feats, but there needs to be a baseline of universal actions and mechanics to accomplish this, just like how melee has a solid baseline of positioning-based play even when you're not leveraging Athletics, Deception, or class feats in your favor.
We already have interesting distance tactics. Cover and hide are examples. Although I don't like to put in the middle because they use charisma, but as the same goes for Melee, Demoralizing and Create a Diversion are also things that can be done as part of their horizontal skills.
For more specific classes, monks can give Stun with bows, and we have the examples above quoted by Firelion as well. What is left beyond that the melees really have is Trip, Grab and more damage! And as I said SF2e, as much as people complain that the distance damage is weaker (and it has to be there, the melees must have an advantage), it also adds suppressed and AoE to the attacks of Range.
And then we come back to the problem I quoted from D&D, how much more love do you want? Trip and Grab at a distance? Damage parity? If this is given, then, why fight from Melee? It will fall into the same question that people do there in the forums of the 5e, that except for specific powers of some classes, to fight melee is not worth it, because the effectiveness is the same while you have the safety of distance.
Or to point this to our system, that's what happens to Magus today! Starlit Span avoids the main concerns of its melee versions (triggering reactions, having to deal with the Recharge action while needing to walk), even with them being able to cause more damage or to make other effects such as using the shield bonus in magic saves and even blocking magical damage, Starlit is preferred from afar for being in a safe position while causing high damage.
I know Magus is an example perhaps even a little exaggerated, but it is a good demonstration of what happens if a character as the benefits of fighting range starts to match or overcome the melee. If now we have some discontent people with ranged attacks if ranged characters would get same grade of tools that melee have we will have melee players discontent because they are thinking that are playing in risky position for no benefit just a need of 'someone need to have to be in frontline to protect the backline'.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
Good to see the strawman come out as I did not say "Starlit Span" did great damage so everything is fine or anything of the kind.
Not only is this what you've said, you went as far as to call Starlit Span "the strongest damage dealer":
My group rarely runs without a ranged martial. We consider them very strong and able to do interesting things. Starlight Span magus is the strongest damage dealer.
Your words, not mine. Incidentally I agree with you: Starlit Span is a really strong damage-dealer, more so even than many melee builds. That is because the subclass is infamously broken, in terms of both balance and design. It was a mistake to use the subclass as a representative example of ranged combat effectiveness in the first place, and it is not a straw man argument to call this out.
Every single class in this game requires teamwork to work well. No one single class in PF2 will do anything but die without teamwork. Some people hate this, some people like it. It is the way it is.
This is a platitude I've addressed directly in the post you're quoting:
When you read between the lines of what YuriP and Deriven are saying when they claim ranged martials are effective due to teamwork, the thing actually being said is that ranged martials lack the agency to make impactful choices: it's up to others to make those choices for them, and all the ranged martial has to do is just spam attacks. Everyone is more effective due to teamwork, but then everyone also gets to contribute to that teamwork in various ways. Ranged characters lack that inherently, and their contributions come primarily from opting into class feats and other specific mechanics.
Emphasis added for your convenience. So once again: it is obvious that teamwork benefits everyone; the point that has been made several times already though is that ranged martial characters are primarily beneficiaries of teamwork, not major contributors. This is in fact an oft-cited problem with the Gunslinger, where they're supposed to contribute an amount of skill-based utility but really need the help of their team to shine.
The complaints I'm seeing on this thread seem like complaints from players that have played archers to level 4 or 5. High level archers do a lot of stuff.
This accusation is in no way supported by evidence, and even if it were true, that criticism would still be just as valid. Reading between the lines of what you're saying, you're implicitly stating that ranged martial combatants perform poorly at low levels, in fact up to half the levels at which most campaigns are played. That to me sounds like a problem that ought to be addressed.
For some reason, I come to these threads using real examples versus these complaints that don't even discuss what each ranged martial does.
How do you not know how a ranger off-guards enemies at range? How do you not know a fighter archer has a feat that allows them to flank with a bow? How do you not know about Debilitating shot? How have you not seen a flurry archer do crazy damage while off-guarding a target by hitting it a few times and applying Marked Prey to give flurry to other members of the party?
So this is an actual straw man, one that is yet again addressed in that same post you quoted (I'm sensing a theme here):
Everyone is more effective due to teamwork, but then everyone also gets to contribute to that teamwork in various ways. Ranged characters lack that inherently, and their contributions come primarily from opting into class feats and other specific mechanics.
Emphasis added once more. It's almost as if actually reading the post you were replying to could have saved you a lot of trouble.
So, once again, I am aware of the class feats that let you do interesting things. Given how others have argued their case and cited class feats as well, I am pretty sure nobody here is criticizing ranged classes from a place of ignorance. The point being consistently made, however, and again the very thing you are implicitly admitting to in-between the lines of your own post, is that ranged combat is inherently lacking in baseline options, and it's up to specific classes to fill in the gaps with feats and class features. This is insufficient to make ranged combat diverse, and is made all the more difficult by the lack of mechanical hooks to ranged combat limiting the things class feats can build upon. More baseline things to do from range would mean more opportunities for class feats to enhance those things or incorporate them into new moves.
Most people that post with me know I'm an optimizer. If I saw a problem with ranged strikers over the course of levels, I'd say something.
And that's the problem: you see things purely in terms of power, and in fact appear entirely incapable of seeing how others could value game elements along different metrics. This is why your replies are so consistently off-base, because you do not actually listen to what anyone else has to say; you just use conversations like these to rattle off talking points. There is no way you can claim otherwise when you make this sort of statement:
I don't see melee martials as clearly better than them except maybe the first few levels before you get a striking rune.
When I and several others have consistently indicated that the problem here is not about relative differences in performance, so much as range of options and depth of play:
I can't help but feel this misses the point. Specifically, it's not that ranged combat is weak, but that it is underdeveloped: you're right, ranged attacks have far more inherent power than melee attacks, because ranged attacks don't require actions or movement to let you attack right away at most of the ranges where combat could possibly happen. The problem is that Paizo's answer to this was to balance ranged weapons by making their damage a lot weaker: not only does this not address the fundamental issue (ranged martials can still go full turret mode), it arguably makes ranged martial combat even less interesting by making ranged damage less effective overall. If there were more ways of getting more out of ranged combat by spending actions, much like how melee has flanking and all of its melee-specific skill actions, then ranged combat could feel a lot better at an appropriate tradeoff in actions. It's therefore less about straight-up buffing ranged damage, and more about adding more mechanical hooks that would make ranged combat more action-intensive to put to full use, but also resultingly more diverse and better able to shine through tactical play.
Fleeing a little of the main focus and going straight to the consequence. I honestly like the fact that PF2E has more options and benefits in combat melee than ranged. Because in other systems such as D&D5e, the fact that ranged attacks are almost as good as melee makes melee an unnecessary risk and disadvantage in many cases. Especially in open maps where players (and enemies) can position themselves in a far and advantageous place, having a huge advantage over melee.
The only thing I think is bothering in PF2E is that it has weird metas, as already mentioned by the OP. This is the fact that if you want to be a good ranged, you are restricted to magus or gunslinger builds in general, while the melees have a much larger range of viable options.
Sometime last year about, I had a post kicking around in the back of my head wondering if I was missing something about ranged combat. It's not just that the damage numbers are dishearteningly low (I'd be the first to point out that not needing to move to hit and not being in harm's way can be extremely valuable sources of 'power'), it's that it just isn't fun to plug away 1-6 damage per hit and have nothing better to do for your third action than that MAP-10 crit fish.
So yeah, I have to agree a lot with this sentiment. Whether or not ranged combat is powerful and balanced with melee, it doesn't feel powerful and, even worse, it's not very fun to do.
What makes this breakdown in communication all the more disappointing is that we're agreeing with each other, Deriven. You yourself explicitly state how boring Starlit Span is:
Sure, Starlit Span can do some crazy damage. I've seen it and played it. But it's super boring. It consists of Shoot, recharge, shoot. Maybe incorporate an AoE spell or something. You can't give the Starlit Span anymore than they have or you turn an already ridiculous damage class into something far too powerful compared to every other martial. Starlit Span is overpowered and I think it will get nerfed at some point. It's clearly way above the expected damage for a ranged combatant. If it weren't so boring, I'm sure my players would play it more.
I fully agree with you on this: Starlit Span and similar ranged builds are powerful, but boring. That is in fact the entire point I am making: ranged combat isn't weak, it's underdeveloped. Ranged characters often feel weak, even when they're not, because no baseline tools exist to let them spend actions and take risks to make the same massive plays as melee combatants, and the builds that do get to deal massive damage tend to be super boring by virtue of doing the exact same thing every turn. I would like a world where ranged builds aren't inherently boring and repetitive unless forced to play otherwise, and in fact would be willing to make ranged combat weaker in certain respects if it meant opening up room for ranged combatants to shine brighter when played optimally. Keep the power level the same, but inject more variance, more choice, more gameplay. Surely that's not a bad thing to want?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
There is a fundamental issue with making ranged combat interesting in a fantasy d20 system, that being that there's no real risk to the ranged weapon user. Most enemies will be melee-focused or limited to short-ranged spells, so you can easily afford to stand still and be a turret. Even when there are ranged enemies present, cover is only a bonus to your AC and getting hit only takes off some HP, so there isn't much incentive to do anything interesting unless somebody is trying to get in your face.
In games built around ranged combat, the idea of AC doesn't often exist. Hitting a human-sized target has a base target number with armour and cover adding damage reduction, range and target movement adding penalties to your rolls, called shots existing as an option, etc. These games are often fundamentally more deadly as well to keep up the idea that you want to lay down suppressive fire, move, take cover, and generally focus on either turning the enemy into hamburger in an ambush or laying down suppressive fire and disengaging.
I don't see many easy ways to make ranged combat interesting in a d20, HP-based system. If you give ranged characters more options, they easily become dominant anytime you don't force combat into confined spaces. The only way to fix ranged combat would be to implement a system where they can take a penalty to hit or a penalty to damage to add a rider to their attacks. PF2 might implement this as stances that ranged martial characters can use.
Stances might do things like reduce your damage by -1 per damage die, in exchange for a minor effect. Reduce your damage by -2 per damage die for a larger effect. Make your strike at -5 to hit for a major effect. What these effects could be would need to be debated and playtested, but this might be the best way to deal with the ranged issue in PF2.
In SF2, I think ranged weapons need penetration to mitigate hardness and damage resistance. Melee does more base damage and can decimate enemies, where they can bypass their resistances, but ranged weapons deal lower damage reliably regardless of enemy resistances.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I agree with RPG-Geek that ranged combat is inherently difficult to make interesting due to how easy it is to make ranged attacks: whereas melee characters are forced to be at a certain range to attack at all, range increments make it almost impossible to be unable to attack. This significantly raises the floor for ranged effectiveness, which makes it more difficult to set a high ceiling at the same time.
However, I don't think it's impossible to create variance either. Plenty of players have mentioned how positioning could make a difference, and even when putting aside flanking, there's other stuff to play off of, like differences in elevation and other terrain features. For instance, and just to spitball an example, here's a condition you could implement:
Exposed You have the low ground, causing gravity to take the force out of your attacks and add it to oncoming hits. The exposed condition always includes a value. You take a circumstance penalty equal to this value to the damage rolls of attacks against targets you're exposed to, and the range increments of your attacks against those targets are halved. Creatures you're exposed to gain a circumstance bonus equal to your exposed value to the damage rolls of attacks against you, and the range increments of their attacks against you are doubled. You're automatically exposed to creatures who have the high ground against you: the GM determines what counts as a sufficient difference in elevation to expose you; this is usually at least 5 feet for every 15 feet the creature is from you for you to be exposed 1, with each additional 5 feet per unit of distance increasing the condition's value by 1.
---
And automatically, this could add so much gameplay: if you're a ranged attacker in combat, find the high ground first and attack from there. If your team's on board, force the enemy to come up to you from lower ground, and if you have casters to help, they could outright create this high ground with spells like sliding blocks. This would also create a new mechanical hook for feats: perhaps you could have a plunging attack feat for the Rogue that lets you drop down onto an enemy and use their exposure to you on a melee attack, for instance, or a Ranger feat that lets you run up an adjacent enemy as a Ranger, backflip off of them, and make a ranged attack against them from a high enough elevation to give them exposure to you. It would also lend itself really well to the fiction of these kinds of combats, where fighting enemies up a stairwell would be a lot more difficult than attacking them on even ground, defending a city would require creating elevation points from which to shoot invading forces, and a sniper attacking you from atop a tower or tree would have a significant tactical advantage, to the point where you'd want to prioritize knocking them off their perch. If all of this can come from just one hastily-written mechanic, imagine what could come out of more like this, including skill actions.
Another way of creating more tactical play could be, as mentioned above, to reduce the range increments on weapons: you'd still be able to shoot from a large distance away, especially if you use the above exposed condition and shoot from the high ground, but you'd also be at your best skirting just outside the melee instead of shooting from miles away. You'd still be ranged, and would have the advantage that comes with that, but would need to expose yourself more to make the most out of your attacks, and would thus make it easier for melee opponents to catch up to you. This is something that's baked into many caster spells, particularly cantrips, with a frequent range limitation of 30 feet: although this has backfired somewhat in some of Starfinder's larger combat areas, the base idea is sound.
I also think LinnormSurface has good ideas with ranged attack pseudo-spellshapes: if nothing else, taking an action to double a ranged attack's contribution to MAP but also add flat damage (maybe precision damage?) would allow ranged attacks to feel meatier when necessary and deal much better against resistances and Hardness. There's precedent to this, too, with certain Starfinder guns having a boost trait that let you spend an action to add damage to your next shot: although the trait itself wasn't very good on the few weapons that had it, the general idea I think is sound. There's probably value as well in having that same kind of framework for activating your weapon's critical specialization effect, if you have it: effectively, you'd be sacrificing damage for utility, and so depending on your weapon could try pinning someone to a wall or stunning them.
At what level does ranged combat begin to give the complexity to be interesting to play for a class?
I say this because it really is different for each class. Not to mention anyone can build a boring character that doesn't do much more than one thing.
But if you make the effort to make an intersting ranged character what level does it get there and for which class?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The complaints I'm seeing on this thread seem like complaints from players that have played archers to level 4 or 5. High level archers do a lot of stuff.
As a matter of fact, that is right about the levels where my first ranged-focused player decided to leave 2e forever (actually lv6 iirc) and return to 5e. While I do not miss him for a moment, it has made me pay attention to when my players try to partake in ranged weapons. It striking to me just how much less fun I often see players having the moment they swap to range, including this last week when the rogue had one melee combat and one ranged combat back to back. While I know what kind of suggestions I can make to make melee combat more interesting, I am at something of a loss for ranged combat. Melee at least has flanking tactics built in, but ranged has almost nothing to do if they don't spec into stealth.
I see that the archer archetype does have several higher level play options, but I feel like making ranged combat tactically interesting to do from low level can only improve the odds that a typical player will want to stick it out long enough to enjoy it. I don't think it should be controversial to say that the game should be fun to play at all levels.
For the people suggesting that ranged combat needs no changes, perhaps you would like to offer insight what things you do to spuce things up at low level that are actually in the ranged character's control. Kiting an enemy is a great tactic, but once your party decides it's time to engage in melee, what comes next but turret mode until dead?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Throw a net. Throw a bola. Use ranged attacks to interact with the battlefield. Use unusual ammo. Use the various long-distance skill abilities.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And that's the problem: you see things purely in terms of power, and in fact appear entirely incapable of seeing how others could value game elements along different metrics. This is why your replies are so consistently off-base, because you do not actually listen to what anyone else has to say; you just use conversations like these to rattle off talking points. There is no way you can claim otherwise when you make this sort of statement:
The problem is that some folks post "interesting" things that increase their power while pretending that is not what they are asking for.
Combat maneuvers at range are more powerful. If you can trip up to a 100 feet away, then you are taking far less risk than a melee martial who has to be in range to take damage to trip.
Flanking at range is more powerful as gaining flank bonuses up to 100 feet away while you can't take damage is more powerful than a melee in melee range having to take damage to deliver the maneuver.
Anything you can do 100 feet plus away while flying must be carefully balanced for the fact you can do it while avoiding danger and damage. You can massively increase the power of ranged combatants by allowing them to do what melee characters do in melee range.
Melee damage and options are balanced against the risk they must take to deliver the attacks.
So I'm not sure what more they can provide against the power of attacking from ranged which provides the following:
1. Massive action economy advantage due to not having to move.
2. Massive ability to avoid damage from melee, auras, AOE attacks, and the like.
Adding in other combat options that don't already exist seems like something the designers likely looked at and deemed too powerful for ranged combatant given all their advantages.
I could be wrong, but it sure seems that way. The designers have to be real careful adding options to ranged combat that allow them to break the system like tripping or grappling or taking away actions at long range where they can kill something without it ever getting close to them.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Throw a net. Throw a bola. Use ranged attacks to interact with the battlefield. Use unusual ammo. Use the various long-distance skill abilities.
A rope-attached net has an effective range of 10 feet, so I don't think it's terribly honest to call it a ranged weapon. Bolas are only slightly better at a 20-foot range increment, but unless you're packing spares, you're going to have to recover the bola before you use it again. Returning runes aren't cheap at levels 1-4, and it won't help if you try to make a ranged trip, presumably what you're recommending the bola for. Similarly, unusual ammo is prohibitively expensive at those levels, and as for "the various long-distance skill abilities"... which ones? I think Sibelius asked a valid question here, and this doesn't strike me as a particularly genuine response.
The problem is that some folks post "interesting" things that increase their power while pretending that is not what they are asking for.
Combat maneuvers at range are more powerful. If you can trip up to a 100 feet away, then you are taking far less risk than a melee martial who has to be in range to take damage to trip.
Literally where did anyone ask for a 100-foot trip? In fact, who here asked for maneuvers at all? The closest I can see is LinnormSurface suggesting options for things like maneuvers, and the examples they gave of pushing someone 5 feet or making them temporarily off-guard are distinctly inferior to actual maneuvers.
So I'm not sure what more they can provide against the power of attacking from ranged which provides the following:
1. Massive action economy advantage due to not having to move.
2. Massive ability to avoid damage from melee, auras, AOE attacks, and the like.
I mean, one could start by challenging the first assumption already, and encouraging ranged characters to move in order to optimize their damage. I wrote an example of a condition that would incentivize this, and even just ranged flanking would encourage better positioning. If this makes ranged too strong, I'd personally endorse a decrease in the baseline effectiveness of ranged attacks to accommodate more avenues for optimization (and the need to spend actions moving to deal optimal ranged damage).
As for the second, I think that too can be played with, such as by decreasing range increments. If attacking at maximum effectiveness means putting yourself a Stride away from a melee opponent, and attacking from a safe distance means taking a -2 or greater penalty to your attacks, that I think would push ranged martials to take more risks.
Adding in other combat options that don't already exist seems like something the designers likely looked at and deemed too powerful for ranged combatant given all their advantages.
By this logic, everything released post-CRB was deemed too powerful by the designers, right up until it wasn't. Alternatively, the designers simply assumed 2e would be melee-centric because at the time it was just Pathfinder 2e, and focused mainly on fleshing out melee while treating ranged combat as secondary. I agree it's important to be careful not to overpower ranged combat, but I don't think that should equate to doing literally nothing when there is clearly room for improvement.
Hasty Generalization (i.e., anecdotal evidence). Also just completely missing the point of this thread. Stop using your personal experience as some kind of bastion of evidence. It isn't a meaningful comment.
Statement of rules and experience using those rules is real data. It has nothing to do with personal experience. It is stating what seems to be often ignored in these threads: the actual options for ranged combatants. What can they actually do with feats and other options. I stated them because they can already do quite a bit of what some of you are asking for and you keep asking for it like it isn't already there.
1. Damage: They already do a lot of damage, even non-Starlit Span do a lot of damage. I've watched all kinds of crazy damage delivered at ranges with fighter, rangers, monks, and rogues.
2. Interesting Options: They have interesting options which you get access to as you level as all other characters.
Fighter:
Debilitating Shot: No save slow with damage for 2 actions.
Point blank shot: Stance that eliminate volley penalty.
Double Shot line of Feats with Multishot Stance: Accuracy enhancer for the highest accuracy martial in the game.
Flanking Stance: Stance that allows you to flank with bow in melee range.
Ranger:
Hunter's Aim: Good accuracy enhancer.
Hunter's Shot: Great Action economy booster.
Gravity Weapon: Works with bow first shot.
Impossible Volley: AOE arrows.
Flurry: Super turret of Arrows.
Precision: Extra damage with arrows.
Distracting Shot and Improved Distracting Shot: Off-guard targets at range.
Monk:
Archery Stance that allows Flurry of Blows and supporting feats and focus spells with bow including feats like Stunning Fist with a bow.
Triangle Shot: A nasty feat.
Starlit Span:
Most know about the power of this class.
Rogue Thief: Bad low level archer. Much better high level archer. Sneak attack works with archery. Thief has Debilitations and feats and synergizes well with Stealth an Deception to create a nasty archer as you level.
I can't speak on the Gunslinger as I don't know it.
So why don't you start there and try to have a constructive discussion. By your own admission the game is bad for L1-L4 ranged combatants. What would you do to fix it?
Everyone is not great a low level. That's why we have a thread on low level hit points being a problem.
For low level archers, Precision Ranger, Fighter, Monk, and Starlit Span are not bad and can often do as much or more damage than anything but a two-hander martial.
I would in fact say that Ranger Precision archer feels pretty good and powerful at the start. Magus feels pretty good. If I were ranking starting archers in order, it would be the following:
1. Ranger Precision
2. Starlit Span Magus
3. Fighter Archer
4. Monk Archer
5. Rogue Archer
The first four feel pretty good compared to starting martials and definitely better than 6 hp casters which are the absolutely worst starting characters.
The complaints I'm seeing on this thread seem like complaints from players that have played archers to level 4 or 5. High level archers do a lot of stuff.As a matter of fact, that is right about the levels where my first ranged-focused player decided to leave 2e forever (actually lv6 iirc) and return to 5e. While I do not miss him for a moment, it has made me pay attention to when my players try to partake in ranged weapons. It striking to me just how much less fun I often see players having the moment they swap to range, including this last week when the rogue had one melee combat and one ranged combat back to back. While I know what kind of suggestions I can make to make melee combat more interesting, I am at something of a loss for ranged combat. Melee at least has flanking tactics built in, but ranged has almost nothing to do if they don't spec into stealth.
I see that the archer archetype does have several higher level play options, but I feel like making ranged combat tactically interesting to do from low level can only improve the odds that a typical player will want to stick it out long enough to enjoy it. I don't think it should be controversial to say that the game should be fun to play at all levels.
For the people suggesting that ranged combat needs no changes, perhaps you would like to offer insight what things you do to spuce things up at low level that are actually in the ranged character's control. Kiting an enemy is a great tactic, but once your party decides it's time to engage in melee, what comes next but turret mode until dead?
Build a ranged combatant is the number one thing I'd recommend. PF2 and other such games are specialized. If you're going to be an archer, you have to commit to it.
5E had one vastly overpowered feat that made ranged combat powerful and one vastly powerful feat when combined with bless that made melee combat powerful. Yet the game did not create monsters strong enough to stand up to these feats when used by optimizers. I run a group of optimizers so they completely crushed 5E.
I still recall getting into a discussion about the ease of 5E with a DM who claimed they could make 5E hard and then proceeded to not make the monsters or game hard by following the rules, but by writing up an environmental hazard that worked against the strategy I employed against 5E just to make the ludicrous claim they could make the game hard. Suffice it to say this environment would not be usable all the time and even that environment barely slowed down the tactics employed to ruin their 5E encounter. That DM proved very clear they could not take monsters out of the bestiary and make them challenging even with lair actions and legendary resistance against optimal tactics in 5E.
Which is why I don't find it desirable for PF2 to do other than they have and make players commit to a fighting style if they want to be good at it. The 5E do whatever because it's all advantage and one optional feat can make you an archer or a power attacker is not what I want.
So you must commit to a fighting style to be good at it. If you do in PF2, your archer or ranged attacker will be quite good.
If you want to be a good switch hitter, then you must build for it. I can recommend those builds as well, but they take a bit longer to come online. If you want to used ranged combat well early, commit to it and take a class like a Precision Ranger, Starlit Span, or Monk archer that can pick up advantages very early.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I feel like the biggest issue for improving ranged versatility is the game's math and design.
In general, if there's a melee maneuver that gives a bonus or penalty, you'd want the ranged bonus to give less than that. But let's take an example of a melee maneuver: Dirty Trick. It gives the opponent Clumsy 1, so a -1. There's no room to create a ranged version of it because -1 is the smallest penalty you can give.
Other effects, it's just not obvious how you could make them worth much. You could make a ranged maneuver that overlaps grapple or trip and gives a -1 circumstance penalty to AC, but it taking a whole action to break or making someone spend an action to get up from prone is probably too much, and -1 circumstance to enemy AC isn't all that helpful to anyone besides the ranged. It'd also overlap functionality with intimidate and create a diversion somewhat, which both already exist to help a ranged decrease AC.
When you look at the conditions to inflict anything similar with pre-existing feats, too, they're expensive. Take Monk's pinning fire. If you hit with both flurry attacks and spend a reaction, and the enemy fails a reflex save, you immobilize the enemy until they succeed a DC 10 athletics check? As a level 8 feat?
Stuff like assisting shot is also pretty depressing. Press trait, in conjunction with the desirability of double shot, make it rough a lot of the time. The most interesting non-attack options for ranged are often spells gotten from your class or archetyping. And that's nothing unique to ranged.
I don't feel like ranged is weak, not in the least. And I'm not pinning that assessment on starlit span, either; I think ranged is strong, generally. I just think the options available to ranged martials are less interesting, particularly the ones exclusive to ranged martials.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Unroped net is 20'. Net and bola are both cheap, and you probably won't be spamming them.
Unusual ammo starts at 3gp. You don't spam it, but you can certainly use it when it matters.
Demoralize is 30'
Create a Diversion has no range
Recall Knowledge has no range.
Command Animal has no range.
Hide/Sneak are obviously useful.
Thievery abilities are... their own thread.
Aid, Point Out, and Sense Motive have no range.
Seek is 30'
Fascinating Performance and Distracting Performance have no range.
Recognize Spell has no range.
There is *stuff to do* beyond being a turret.
I could be convinced that ranged ammo would be a whole lot better. The DCs are so low as to feel not worthwhile. Be more worthwhile if ammo were tied to class DC or caster DC.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I could be convinced that ranged ammo would be a whole lot better. The DCs are so low as to feel not worthwhile. Be more worthwhile if ammo were tied to class DC or caster DC.
PF2E's handling of item DCs is an overall design issue with the whole system that at least needs a way to pay to scale things up.
That said, these always work, as they don't rely on an initial non-flat DC, and most have no DC:
Shining Ammunition
Silver Salve
Life Shot
Aromatic Ammunition
Climbing Bolt
Ranging Shot
Trustworthy Round
Beacon Shot
Vine Arrow
Exsanguinating Ammunition
Viper Arrow
Energized Cartridge
Elemental Ammunition
Sampling Ammunition
Imp Shot
Bane Ammunition
Bola Shot
Conduit Shot
Fate Shot
Lightning Rod Shot
Magnetic Shot
Corrosive Ammunition
Sighting Shot
Mindlock Shot
Dimension Shot
Penetrating Ammunition
Shrieking Skull
Ghost Ammunition
Garrote Shot
Spell Echo Shot
And this list is all Common, PFS-legal stuff.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I could be convinced that ranged ammo would be a whole lot better. The DCs are so low as to feel not worthwhile. Be more worthwhile if ammo were tied to class DC or caster DC.PF2E's handling of item DCs is an overall design issue with the whole system that at least needs a way to pay to scale things up.
That said, these always work, as they don't rely on an initial non-flat DC, and most have no DC:
Shining Ammunition
Silver Salve
Life Shot
Aromatic Ammunition
Climbing Bolt
Ranging Shot
Trustworthy Round
Beacon Shot
Vine Arrow
Exsanguinating Ammunition
Viper Arrow
Energized Cartridge
Elemental Ammunition
Sampling Ammunition
Imp Shot
Bane Ammunition
Bola Shot
Conduit Shot
Fate Shot
Lightning Rod Shot
Magnetic Shot
Corrosive Ammunition
Sighting Shot
Mindlock Shot
Dimension Shot
Penetrating Ammunition
Shrieking Skull
Ghost Ammunition
Garrote Shot
Spell Echo ShotAnd this list is all Common, PFS-legal stuff.
How many are worth a full action to use?