Proficiency Alternate Rule (Divide level by three instead of Nerfing it)

[Indi523]

This question is regarding the suggestion in the GM Core that you can remove levels from the Proficiency bonus in second edition. They suggest if you do this just add the +2/4/6//8 from the level of the skill or ability and not the level. To do so you should changed untrained to -2 instead of 0.

Fair enough but I like some variation by level I just don't want it to be a 19 point variance from level 1 to level 20. Every starting guy with a javelin should have some chance to hit through dumb luck.

I am thinking of adding the level divided by three rounded as normal. So at first level this is 1/3 or 0.33 which rounds to 0 while at level 2 this is 0.67 that rounds to 1. This way you add a number from 0 to 7 to the proficiency bonus. This makes the few skills and attacks that go to legendary that much more meaningful because the +8 bonus for the legendary status for the skill or roll is higher than the +7 bonus for the level.

I think this could still work. You could use monster stats from the books as is just so long as you understand by not nerfing their values for the monster stats make all the monsters a little tougher.

I don't know, does anyone thing that will work?

[Loreguard]

You can certainly adjust the proficiency to a fraction of the level instead of level, but it will affect DC values and target DCs for skills etc.

As second edition is designed to make judging danger levels by Level being more accurate to better judge the risks, I would wholeheartedly suggest you not leave the monsters and other things the same and just acknowledge they are harder. You should probably adjust the values in your case approximately 2/3 of the way from normal, to the vale listed in archives of Beth’s for the proficiency without level variant.

Really you are getting close to DnD where they use 1/4 level to advance their proficiency value. I haven’t ever done it, but I can say I had contemplated 1/2 level very early on, but I just never actually tried it.

[Indi523]

Loreguard wrote:

You can certainly adjust the proficiency to a fraction of the level instead of level, but it will affect DC values and target DCs for skills etc.

As second edition is designed to make judging danger levels by Level being more accurate to better judge the risks, I would wholeheartedly suggest you not leave the monsters and other things the same and just acknowledge they are harder. You should probably adjust the values in your case approximately 2/3 of the way from normal, to the vale listed in archives of Beth’s for the proficiency without level variant.

Really you are getting close to DnD where they use 1/4 level to advance their proficiency value. I haven’t ever done it, but I can say I had contemplated 1/2 level very early on, but I just never actually tried it.

The difference here is the Pathfinder system has levels of proficiency for skills, spells , AC, attacks etc. that give that +2 through +8.

I like 1/3 because 20/3 is 6.67 rounds up to 7 for +7 while being legendary trained gives you a +8. Thus by upping a skill to legendary in training someone can still beat out a trained person at lower level.

[Sibelius Eos Owm]

I still think its worth saying that leaving the monster numbers unchanged in PWL (or even Proficiency1/2 or 1/3) dows a lot more than make them a bit more difficult. The numbers game in 2e is such that the stat difference between a 4 person party and a monster only 2 levels higher than them makes that monster a credible threat as a boss.

A 12th level character would likely struggle to hit the AC of even a level 8 foe, even though their striking rune would be dealing significant chunks of their health... and vice versa, the 8th level monster would regularly crit despite their relatively low damage.

Of course, this could be the kind of effect you're looking for, in which case, carry on, but it bears mentioning just how much of an effect letting monsters outclass PCs in raw stats so much does to the game.