This thread has been brewing for a little while, with this other thread giving me the motivation to write it in full. Before then, I also wrote a separate brew for implementing characters without attributes in PF2e, and that had a number of interesting implications for dedication feats.
To start with the problem: although archetypes in general vary wildly in effectiveness and desirability in PF2e, dedication feats in particular tend to be the most underwhelming part of many archetypes, especially multiclass archetype dedications. In theory, because we opt into multiclass archetypes to get a taste of what makes a certain class so interesting, the dedication feats ought to start providing a little bit of that: in practice, however, their benefits are often generic, repetitious across dedications, and rarely good in and of themselves, as if they were a price to pay to start accessing the more interesting bits of a class. Their attribute prerequisites are either trivially easy to meet or essentially impossible to fulfil without twisting your character out of shape, which makes many archetypes arbitrarily incompatible with many classes. When a multiclass archetype offers any tangible amount of a class's power in its dedication, that dedication becomes a notable outlier, and on the other side of the spectrum you can get clunkers like the Swashbuckler Dedication, whose extremely specific attribute requirements reward you with... one trained skill. That's it.
In my opinion, it doesn't have to necessarily be this way. Although it's important for these multiclass archetypes to respect niche protection in 2e, I think it's possible to change how they're written in ways that would make them less restrictive, more streamlined, and better-equipped to feature a taste of their class. Here are a few examples of how I think this could be implemented:
Starting with the small fry: every martial multiclass dedication makes you trained in the class's DC, so might as well roll that into the multiclass trait, e.g. "When you select a feat with the multiclass trait, you become trained in the class's DC." This would be the same kind of change as the remaster moving the three-feat investment requirement to the dedication trait, and its only change from now is that it would make you trained in the class DC of spellcasters too, a trivial benefit given how most casters don't use their spell DC at all.
Trained skills are a filler benefit in most multiclass dedications, giving a bit of power that is neither directly relevant to the class nor all that tremendously useful when skill increases and Untrained Improvisation are easy to obtain. Meanwhile, attribute prerequisites are at best arbitrary and at worst needlessly prohibitive, so it could be worth killing two birds with one stone here: rather than have certain attribute modifiers as prerequisites, multiclass dedications could instead require certain skills as prerequisites, typically the skills you'd become trained with when picking the dedication. You'd then no longer become trained in those skills from the dedication. On its own, this would be a nerf, but it would open up more space in those feats' power budget to give something more specific to the class (and, as a generic replacement, you could always give a 1st-level class feat instead). In general, this would remove the element of arbitrary restriction on certain class archetypes, and as a minor side benefit would make Intelligence characters particularly good at multiclassing due to their plentiful trained skills.
Spellcasting archetypes condense a lot of their benefits into spellcasting benefits, which helps avoid a lot of repetition, yet for some reason this doesn't extend to spellcasting dedications, which nonetheless follow an extremely standard structure. There are effectively three types of spellcasting:
Listing these as initial spellcasting benefits, along with standard bits like becoming trained in spell attack modifier and spell DC, and being a spellcaster, would simplify the text of spellcaster dedications significantly, as well as make it clear which dedications currently offer more than others. In fact, this could probably even be taken further with the rest of the spellcasting benefits, as adding spells to your repertoire or spellbook/familiar when you gain more spell slots is itself pretty standard. So far, the only non-standard dedication is the Witch Dedication, which has reduced benefits to make up for the fact that you get a familiar, but implementing suggestion
#2 would free up room for both that familiar and the above initial spellcasting benefits.
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And that's about it for suggestions. These aren't huge, game-breaking recommendations, so much as a few suggestions to improve multiclass dedications so that they're a little less feeble, repetitively-worded, and arbitrarily limiting.
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I don't dislike the concept of having Multi-class Archetype's having a prerequisites of certain Trained skills, in general. However, I at least might consider the fact that it might limit classes that are short on skill trainings, from potentially have the resource room to invest in an Archetype unless it overlaps with the class already from a skill perspective. That might not be ideal, it might be trading one partially arbitrary constraint for another.
(had to afford attributes prerequisite due to the attributes not being a priority for the original class, vs. not having enough skill trainings to be able to afford the skill prerequisites.
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1. Roll class DC training into the multiclass trait
Class DC is weird. Most spells requires saving throws against their effects, so spellcasters have spellcasting DCs for those saves. But martials have almost no abilities that require enemies to make saving throws. In the rare case that they do, they have a class DC. For example, an Animal Instinct barbarian with Spider as their chosen animal has the save to escape from their web versus barbarian class DC. The developers avoid using a skill DC for this purpose, because skill proficiency can vary too much.
The remaster merged the spellcasting DCs of all four magic traditions into one all-purpose spellcasting DC. I think that likewise, all classes should be at least trained in an all-purpose character DC that serves the current purpose of class DC. Some classes will raise the proficiency in character DC faster than other classes, but that would be okay with me.
2. Skill prerequisites, not attribute prerequisites or trained skills
An attribute prerequisite demonstrates inborn talent, but a skill prerequisite demonstrated previous interest. Previous interest seems better for character development.
In addition, qualifying for attribute prerequisites requires a lot more pre-planning than skill or skill feat prerequisites. Suppose a 1st-level party formed and the player had not coordinated and they had no healer. Multiclassing to cleric won't help much, since the cleric multiclass archetype does not offer a divine font and the character would not gain the Heal spell before 4th level, but it still has the hefty "Wisdom +2" prerequisite. A character cannot increase attributes until 5th level and that is only a +1. Champion multiclass would enable Lay on Hands at 4th level, but it has a tougher prerequisite, "Charisma +2; Strength +2." A character with Str +2 probably is already training in light and medium armor, so the Champion Multiclass Dedication is mostly a feat tax. In comparison, Medic Archetype has Battle Medicine and trained in Healing as its prerequisites, so a character with no advance planning can increase Medicine Skill, learn Battle Medicine, and take Medic Dedication all at 2nd level, which instantly increases proficiency in Medicine to expert.
3. Initial spellcasting benefits
More standardization of initial spellcasting benefits works when classes are built to only three standards, but some spellcasting classes don't fit those standards. The Summoner Archetype grants spellcasting via a 6th-level feat. An animist's spells are divine, but their apparation spells are not necessarily divine, and the Animist Archetype folds the non-divine spells into the basic divine spellcasting.
I personally have a conundrum about basic spellcasting myself. I have been creating stat blocks for the teachers at the Magaambya Academy in my Strength of Thousands campaign, because I added educational field trips supervised by a teacher, including trips that fight will-o'-wisps and zombies. I wanted to give a teacher the Magic Warrior archetype, an archetype that honors the Ten Magic Warriors who founded the Magaambya Academy. Alas, the archetype was badly ported to Pathfinder 2nd Edition and is unworkable. It had been a magus class archetype in Pathfinder 1st Edition and the magus class granted the martial and spellcasting abilities that a Magic Warrior needs. The PF2 version is only the feats that altered a magus into a Magic Warrior without granting martial proficienicies or spellcasting capability. See my thread Has Anyone Tried the Magic Warrior Archetype?
Thus, I plan to rewrite the Magic Warrior archetype to add feats to gain routine martial combat and basic spellcasting. But the Magic Warrior Dedication offers other features already so that adding two cantrips would make it overpowered. Therefore, the cantrips will have to come from a 4th-level feat. But two cantrips is too weak for a 4th-level feat. Should the feat offer three or four cantrips? Or maybe two cantrips and the standard Basic Spellcasting benefits? Having to wait to 6th level for a Magic Warrior's first 1st-level spell would be frustrating.
I don't dislike the concept of having Multi-class Archetype's having a prerequisites of certain Trained skills, in general. However, I at least might consider the fact that it might limit classes that are short on skill trainings, from potentially have the resource room to invest in an Archetype unless it overlaps with the class already from a skill perspective. That might not be ideal, it might be trading one partially arbitrary constraint for another.
(had to afford attributes prerequisite due to the attributes not being a priority for the original class, vs. not having enough skill trainings to be able to afford the skill prerequisites.
This is fair, and this definitely does put classes like the Magus at a disadvantage. I do think skill increases have the advantage of being somewhat easier to pick up (you get a bunch to start with and at least ten more after), while also generally being more appropriate for certain dedications, but I also agree that often they don't necessarily directly relate to a class's power either. In certain cases, the better approach may simply to remove the requirements entirely.
The remaster merged the spellcasting DCs of all four magic traditions into one all-purpose spellcasting DC. I think that likewise, all classes should be at least trained in an all-purpose character DC that serves the current purpose of class DC. Some classes will raise the proficiency in character DC faster than other classes, but that would be okay with me.
Yeah, on a larger scale I'd be very happy to see class DC and spell DC merged and spell attack proficiency scaled along different level brackets (trained/expert/master at 1/5/13 while benefiting from item bonuses to attack rolls), though that's a whole other discussion by itself. I can sort of see why Paizo wants to isolate different DCs from one another, as certain classes like the Exemplar do have a lot of ikons that make use of their class DC, but even then I'm not sure that's strictly necessary.
An attribute prerequisite demonstrates inborn talent, but a skill prerequisite demonstrated previous interest. Previous interest seems better for character development.
In addition, qualifying for attribute prerequisites requires a lot more pre-planning than skill or skill feat prerequisites.
Fully agreed. Attribute prerequisites in my experience have largely been things you either already qualify for already and/or have build your character around from the ground up (e.g. a Magus with a +2 to Int just for that Psychic multiclass), or just a hard "no" to your character ever accessing that archetype. A Sorcerer isn't going to bend over backwards to get Int +2 for a Wizard MC even though the combo could have some thematic value, and in general attribute prerequisites make it arbitrarily difficult for Int and Charisma-centric classes to opt into each other's archetypes.
More standardization of initial spellcasting benefits works when classes are built to only three standards, but some spellcasting classes don't fit those standards. The Summoner Archetype grants spellcasting via a 6th-level feat. An animist's spells are divine, but their apparation spells are not necessarily divine, and the Animist Archetype folds the non-divine spells into the basic divine spellcasting.
I think both cases are actually quite easily resolved under the above framework. The Animist's "thing" is letting you prepare apparition spells as divine spells, and that could be something noted in the dedication from the start (or just the basic spellcasting feat, as is already the case), whereas the Summoner could just offer the basic spellcasting benefits in that feat with the proficiencies you'd normally find in the dedication, or even offer the initial spellcasting benefits in an earlier feat. I do think bounded spellcasting benefits need a redo as well, as they're awful right now, and really, the benefit here is avoiding repetition whenever possible, so even if some archetypes remain non-standard it would still be a wider benefit in clarity and economy of text.
Thus, I plan to rewrite the Magic Warrior archetype to add feats to gain routine martial combat and basic spellcasting. But the Magic Warrior Dedication offers other features already so that adding two cantrips would make it overpowered. Therefore, the cantrips will have to come from a 4th-level feat. But two cantrips is too weak for a 4th-level feat. Should the feat offer three or four cantrips? Or maybe two cantrips and the standard Basic Spellcasting benefits? Having to wait to 6th level for a Magic Warrior's first 1st-level spell would be frustrating.
My take is that if you removed the trained skills and made the Arcana or Nature proficiency part of the prerequisites, while stripping the bonus against divination effects (which are no longer a thing in the remaster), then you'd have a blank slate to grant initial spellcasting benefits and also martial training in the dedication feat. Really, the dedication right now is already dated and could use a redo (that, and "Nameless Anonymity" is quite possibly the absolute worst feat name I have seen thus far for PF2e), so there are a variety of ways in which you could approach this.
So if you switched Multiclass dedications from having attribute prerequisites, to having skill prerequisites.
How might you change them.
For Swashbuckler Dedication
- Prerequisite: Charisma +2; Dexterity +2
+ Prerequisite: Already trained in either Acrobatics or the Skill of their chosen Style.
Would the dedication then grant the other trained skill (Acrobatics or Style Skill) at Trained or a choice if both already trained.
Now picking an arbitrary other class to examine
Sorcerer Dedication
- Prerequisites Charisma +2
+ Prerequisites Already trained in one of the two skills of the chosen Bloodline.
It looks like it grants the two Bloodline Skills as trained normally, so would you change the prerequisite to having one of the two Bloodline skills, and have it grant the other one. (that still leaves a net loss in the change, unless you have it grant a free additional skill)
Actually, honestly I'd suggest that since Sorcerer's don't get to change their cantrips out daily, that they start with two cantrips chosen, and add their bloodline cantrip, to the two chosen.
Now a potentially controversial one
Fighter Dedication
- Prerequisites Strength +2; Dexterity +2
+ Prerequisites Trained in either Acrobatics or Athletics
Would this grant training in the remaining skill of the pair above?
Honestly, I'm not entirely certain why the Dedication didn't offer a choice of Training:
[] Martial Weapons
[] Light and Medium Armor
For individuals whom already have Martial Weapons Training, potentially offer an alternate of selecting a single Advanced weapon to be treated as a Martial Weapons for training proficiency purposes.
For individuals whom already have Medium Armor Training, potentially offer them all armor training.
I have to admit however I don't know if it makes sense for ALL multiclass fighters to be trained in both Acrobatics and Athletics. It seems to be over-specific for individual's who's nature it to Dabble deeper into fighting.
I guess I should also apologize as I'm not just dealing with changing the prerequisites but also looking at what they grant. But I guess the OP was also saying maybe it could make room for the additions. So maybe this is still in scope.
What do people feel about the fighter Dedication basically pushing both skills. One you have to pre-allocate and the other getting consumed by Dedication budget?
How might you change them.
For Swashbuckler Dedication
- Prerequisite: Charisma +2; Dexterity +2
+ Prerequisite: Already trained in either Acrobatics or the Skill of their chosen Style.
For the Swashbuckler Dedication, I'd go:
Now picking an arbitrary other class to examine
Sorcerer Dedication
- Prerequisites Charisma +2
+ Prerequisites Already trained in one of the two skills of the chosen Bloodline.It looks like it grants the two Bloodline Skills as trained normally, so would you change the prerequisite to having one of the two Bloodline skills, and have it grant the other one. (that still leaves a net loss in the change, unless you have it grant a free additional skill)
Actually, honestly I'd suggest that since Sorcerer's don't get to change their cantrips out daily, that they start with two cantrips chosen, and add their bloodline cantrip, to the two chosen.
With the Sorcerer, I'd add both trained skills as prerequisites; you'd get the initial spellcasting benefits, and perhaps Basic Bloodline Spell on top too.
Now a potentially controversial one
Fighter Dedication
- Prerequisites Strength +2; Dexterity +2
+ Prerequisites Trained in either Acrobatics or AthleticsWould this grant training in the remaining skill of the pair above?
I'd have the feat include training in either skill as a prerequisite, no longer grant you training in either skill, and grant auto-scaling proficiency for martial weapons at 11th level, as with Weapon Proficiency (plus training in advanced weapons at that level). I definitely agree with you that the archetype could have offered more options or just scaling proficiency. I'd be tempted to offer familiarity with martial weapons, which could allow classes like the Monk to gain master proficiency in martial weapons too.
I guess I should also apologize as I'm not just dealing with changing the prerequisites but also looking at what they grant. But I guess the OP was also saying maybe it could make room for the additions. So maybe this is still in scope.
No need to be sorry! I think it's an interesting question to ask, and I definitely think subtracting skill training and making those prerequisites instead would leave a lot of room for power that feels more specific to the class being archetyped into. A lot of archetypes right now are structured to have feat taxes when general feats accomplish the same function, and many put off key benefits until some 4th-level feat too.
Here is a thought for your issue with Magic Warrior
Magic Warrior Dedication 2
Prerequisites ability to cast focus spells
+ Trained in Magic Warrior Lore; Arcana or Nature
Access You are from the Mwangi Expanse.
Grants:
Magic Warrior Lore becomes Expert (this is really very minor boost for flavor, and should be negligible power cost)
Pick your mask and associated creature.
Gain basic Spellcasting abilities, including Add one Variant Cantrip from the choice below:
Tame (variant is instead of being limited to any domesticated creatures is limited to creatures of the type selected by the mask)
Gouging Claw (variant causes damage is per spell save the damage type is per the primary damage of the animal aspect chosen)
The Cantrip take the Tradition of your focus spellcasting from your prerequisite.
Not sure how one would translate the Divination bonus. Maybe an ability like:
Reaction
Trigger: a spell or magic ability is invoked that would reveal your location, name or information about your abilities.
Effect: Apply a +1 status bonus to the DC required for the spell, or +1 to any save to prevent its success.
Please discuss fixing the Magic Warrior archetype in my Magic Warrior thread rather than here. I copied Loreguard's suggestion over to that thread: Has Anyone Tried Magic Warrior Archetype, comment #31.
Edited out a part of my post about the Magic Warrior Dedication, but will leave my trailing thought.
Another question or alternative. What if the current attribute prerequisites moved from being prerequisites, to being attributes that if you meet them at say 11th level, you gain an improved benefit from your base dedication? Such attributes would be far easier to move into if you've had a couple extra sets of attributes to distribute into appropriate attributes.
Edited out a part of my post about the Magic Warrior Dedication, but will leave my trailing thought.
Another question or alternative. What if the current attribute prerequisites moved from being prerequisites, to being attributes that if you meet them at say 11th level, you gain an improved benefit from your base dedication? Such attributes would be far easier to move into if you've had a couple extra sets of attributes to distribute into appropriate attributes.
This is an interesting idea.
It would mean better benefits could be introduced as something you build to after dedication kind of like you started your journey and met some milestones getting better at it, and it makes the 3 feats requirement for dedications make a lot more sense as a restriction because it will now be there to keep characters from stacking too many dedications to get their milestones benefit. But maybe some thought would need to be put into the extra dedications you could gain from things like multi talented.Teo more thoughts though: it would make archtyping overall produce stronger characters.
It might make not archtyping a subpar choice if the milestone benefits are too good.
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I wasn't wild wild about adding skill requirements to multiclass dedications, because I actually like using them to get skill training. While in a 4P campaign you can have a pretty good division of labor with skills, in PFS because you don't always play in the same party, it's good to have more skills trained per character than baseline.
I think we should also ask, why are those requirements needed in the first place?
What purpose do the requirements serve?
I think a good reason would be "you're gonna need this ability to properly use the archetype, but the power budget for the dedication feat doesn't include giving you that ability".
If a dedication has to give you lots of baseline stuff, it means there's less power budget left for the interesting stuff.
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Well, let's apply that to for example the wizard dedication. Currently it's kinda bland. What if we changed it to:
- remove Intelligence requirement, although to be effective you'll probably want it anyway
- remove free Arcane, instead make it a requirement; you need Arcana to Learn Spell after all.
- give you a rank 1 school spell slot. If you gain generic wizard spell slots, this slot will go up in rank alongside, so if you had Basic Spellcasting and were level 8 you'd have a rank 3 school spell slot.
This way we put the school identity way more in the picture.
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So yeah, I've come round a bit on this. I think it has potential to make multiclass dedications a bit more exciting.
I do agree with the above, it may not even be necessary to have skill prerequisites in many cases when they don’t contribute to a feat’s mechanics. If forgoing free additional skills means leaving more room for more unique benefits, I’m absolutely in favor of that too, even if those trained skills can be useful in PFS.
narrative wise this does shift things from you dedicate into an archtype and start learning their things to you have to already know some of their things to start learning their things.
The narrative of the attribute requirement at least lends to I have the aptitude and with this dedication I started applying myself to a new discipline.
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One "small" thing I might add to this discussion is that the proficiency scaling for multiclass dedications is also just weird. I get the idea of delaying proficiency boosts to be "oh, you're not a full wizard, so you don't get the full benefits," except you kind of do... part of the time.
Levels 1-6, casters are all still at trained proficiency, so a martial picking up a dedication at 2 for wizard or cleric match them for the entire first five levels of after they can take it, other than stats. If you wanted to, say, be a sneaky dex-rogue with sorcerer dedication and charisma as a +3 in character creation, your save DCs will only be 1 below any other spell caster in the party, and at level 5, you can boost it to 4 even while the spell caster has their primary stat at 4.5, so you match them for that one, glorious moment.
Then casters hit expert at 7, pulling away with +2 DC above the multiclass dedication using martial character. Level 10, the spell caster will hit +5 on their stat as well, being at 3 higher DC - the largest gap so far - until 12, when the rogue in that theoretical campaign catches back up to where they started, at only 1 DC below. Until 15, when the full caster pulls ahead by +2 again, right as the rogue finishes getting to +5 charisma.
And of course, the rogue at 18 catches up fully, both at master proficiency for spell DC, both at +5 casting stat, super late game. For one level. Then the main casters hit Legendary at 19 and pull ahead by +2 again, and +3 for level 20.
It ends up with this very strange feeling up and down of being on level, then below level, then on level, then below level. Meanwhile though, a spell caster taking another spellcasting class's dedication just uses their own existing proficiency for their DCs.
It's similar for if you want to play a spell caster and take a martial dedication, but kind of worse even. Fighter dedication gives proficiency in martial weapons, and at level 12, you can get Expert proficiency in them. But there's no feat to boost to Master proficiency in your weapon proficiency gained from the dedication, even though Fighter will have Legendary Proficiency at level 13. Rogue and Barbarian don't even give any weapon proficiencies, so you just have to use your base proficiencies from your spell casting class, not even getting to upgrade to using a rapier when taking a rogue dedication for a high dex wizard.
Again, you start trained in simple weapons though, for everyone. A first level wizard with a +3 dex and a dagger hits nearly as accurately as a first level rogue. For the first four levels, at least. Level 5 and 13 being the break points for proficiencies of martial characters means that a wizard-rogue or wizard-fighter is going to suffer being extra inaccurate with any weapons they might want to use for most of their career once they hit level 5. Even though they started with barely any gap compared to the rogue or barbarian, or even no gap if they wanted to play a full strength or full dex caster (using their magic for buffs and movement options while actually fighting with a weapon.)
And the spell casters can't even rely on their spell attacks to benefit from the basically non-scaling d4-d6 sneak attack on rogue dedication since it's only weapon attacks and unarmed strikes without a rogue feat that wasn't revised or reprinted for the remaster. Martial characters can benefit a bit from it, though.
Multiclass dedications look great and all for the first 4-6 levels of play, and then suddenly feelbad. Because a +1 is noticeable, but not too bad, but a +2 is pretty significant, and a +3 is a lot in PF2e. To say nothing about comparing a full fighter to the Fighter Dedication being 2 behind for the first 4 levels and then 4 behind on proficiency until level 12... and again right after at level 13 for the rest of the game.
Isn't the balance already that you get feats at half the level, have to also spend class feats on the basic features, and that you get fewer spell slots and a spell rank behind the full caster classes? Why are proficiency progressions actually lower at all on top of that, if they're not even consistent about it?
While I think it's okay for archetype progression to cap Strike proficiency at expert (the Sixth Pillar archetype used to give master unarmed attack proficiency and was significantly overpicked for that reason until it was errata'd), I agree that the math for proficiency progression is a bit weird, given that it both respects niche protection and also doesn't depending on what level you're at. This is a general bit of weirdness in PF2e where many stats will often start the same and then increase at radically different rates depending on class and archetype, causing classes that are meant to be markedly different at a certain stat to match one another or even turn the tables on some levels. I don't think that's something that could necessarily ever be fixed in PF2e, nor something the devs may even necessarily consider a bug so much as a feature, but in a hypothetical perfect system I agree it'd be much nicer if these differences were much more consistent.
Yeah, I personally dislike how it goes with proficiencies like that in part due to how it makes really cool ideas completely inconsistent in a story progression of characters. Good briefly, then bad, then good again, then bad all over again.
But I'll personally say that really, proficiency feels like the wrong place to nerf things if you want to keep niche protection anyway. Limited spell selection, reduced spell rank, and lower uses per day for casters is good at that without lowering the DC and spell attack modifiers already. Martial characters get their neatest, strongest stuff at later levels, too, which are pushed back in multiclass dedications.
Meanwhile, being stealthy as a rogue or being a skilled crafter isn't class locked, since you use skills for those that everyone can raise, even if some classes get feat support and already have the right stat as their primary. The alchemist isn't made less an alchemist by a rogue being able to brew an invisibility potion or a firebomb to toss at a mansion's stables on the way out from a heist.
I honestly struggle to think how a 10-20% accuracy debuff on top of things is really needed unless you just actively want to discourage any dipping from caster to martial or the other way around all together. In which case... just don't allow it? Call all multiclass dedications "optional rules," make the attack proficiencies and DCs scale properly for builds to use them for fun even if not optimal stuff, and call it a day by letting DMs decide if they're allowing those on top of the non class archetypes that can be standard.