I had this thought of giving out Dedications and subsequent class feats as a reward PCs can train into with downtime after "unlocking" the dedication from NPCs and in game factions.
These would not cut into leveling budget they would just be a bonus they gain for the in game choices they make and downtime spent training into them.
I am not running my games with Free archtype rules but this seems like its not too different and perhaps actually less impactful than running full a free archtype game.
I think these would be very valuable and sought after rewards though by my players especially if they made in game decisions to pursue them and gaining them makes sense within the campaign.
Has anyone else done this in their games before? For actual free archtype games do you increase xp budgets or is the impact on difficulty negligible?
I have not done it, but I've recently considered the impact of it. (For a PF2 Skull & Shackles where the PCs would have a list of "pirate-adjacent" Archetypes to pick from as they become more acclaimed pirates). Which is to say I endorse it and see it as a novel way to reward players outside the norm, but can't measure the mechanical impact for you.
I know some of my PC builds w/ Archetypes would tilt the game if those feats were free in an FA game, yet that's something PF2's sturdy foundation can handle. Higher levels (according to some FA advocates) demonstrate more imbalance which might need counterbalance depending on what level of heroism/struggle/dread your narrative encourages. At minimum the PCs should be sturdier and trickier, but arguably the monsters share that property too. Heck, maybe give enemies bonus, level-appropriate Archetype feats to match (if that's not too much labor).
As long as all of the characters are getting the bonus feats slots (group quest rewards rather than individual), then it is basically Free Archetype with extra steps. The balance should be fine.
For doubling up and having characters with Free Archetype already and adding another set of bonus archetype feats on top of it, I still don't think that you need to adjust encounter difficulty. Archetypes don't really add power, they add flexibility. Flexibility is powerful, but it doesn't give a numerical advantage to a character's best abilities that they are going to use in a hard fight. Flexibility increases the worst options that characters have so that those options become usable.
I've given feats as quest rewards before, since the PF2 feat system effectively makes more feats a horizontal power expansion (i.e. you have more options) rather than a vertical one (i.e. you are better at one thing) I don't think there's a problem doing it, so long as every PC is getting something that they equally value. But you already have to adjust loot for "things the party is going to want" and this isn't fundamentally different (though it might be harder to work into the narrative.)
Thats good to know. Thanks for the responses.
Castilliano I am using foundry for the game so enemy adjustments are pretty easy as long as I already have the a base creature and art assets ready to go, I can search drag and drop existing actions/activities on to a creature. Or if I made the creature using PC rules I can drag and drop class features.
Finoan and PossibleCabbage with what I had in mind it would be based on player choices. if they sandboxed to one town instead of another or made this alliance instead of that one I was thinking that would dictate what was available to train into. That would lead to asymmetry though but make incorporating things into narrative easier since I would be fitting in NPCs/ancient manuscripts/or whatever it is in places where they make sense to put them.
I was thumbing through my copy of Battlecry! since It just came in and there are quite few really cool new archtypes that my players would thing are amazing rewards to pursue especially if they know they are getting them above and beyond normal level progression. Lol its probably me more excited to use the new stuff than anything else so far though.
You know I like that this system enables this in an easy way.
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Strength of Thousands has a whole system giving you extra archetypes, skill increases and feats - and probably has the encounters scaled accordingly, we have not finished it yet.
We enjoy the extra stuff a lot.
Our GM granted us the Alkenstar Agent dedication at some point in Outlaws of Alkenstar, not sure if that was suggested by the AP or more of a homebrew.
Unlocking dedications during the story is something i have seen in Abomination Vaults, but i doubt many people use these options - but who knows?
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I think it makes a lot of sense to unlock things and to even offer them free (or as mentioned with committing downtime to it after unlocking it).
I will say that since we are talking about unlocking/granting specific Feats, it is relevant to note that while giving these things for free would generally probably be seen favorably by most. If the things being granted/offered for free never seem to coincide with something that would be in character for a particular character in the party, it could create a situation where that person feels left or pushed out from the center of play.
To solve this the GM might feel compelled to give them something more to their liking, and of course that could then affect others, who accepted the 'given' ability because it was the only choice, and after seeing someone get 'what they wanted instead' might feel a little robbed themselves.
I'd suggest that to avoid such a cascade of 'hey, how come they got that' I would say it could be brought up in session zero that some things may become unlocked and available for people to earn as free extra feats, but they aren't mandated, and presumably would not have other alternatives, other than any other feats that are earned and unlocked by the story.
If in session zero there is already known to be a character concept that doesn't fit into the typical mold expect of the characters, if there is going to be any alternatives for that character, that can be worked out ahead of time, and any other players whom would have a problem with such accommodations can voice it in the start, rather than at the end, assuming the given player requests such accommodations, and the GM agrees to be willing to make accommodations.
The important thing being to make it so people feel like they already expect any such change, so it doesn't catch them unexpectedly.
I certainly feel that by making them free, it makes it easier to make room for them in your character build. Otherwise, if you have started already planning for some other feat, giving up your planned feat to leverage a 'unlocked' feat to get more into the story line may end up feeling like it is robbing you of your plans, more than it is a reward for you work in the story. (or you bypass the opportunity, and feel like you aren't leaning into the story, because it conflicted with your character idea) Again, internal conflict that might not feel like it contributes to the fun of the story.
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I've done this, been in a game that did it, and also am GMing SoT which does a LOT of it.
The biggest challenge I see with it is simply giving out feats that are equally beneficial to the people getting them. They need to be somewhat tailored to the character, or something that is just generally applicable to the campaign (like an appropriate Lore), otherwise you can wind up with cases where the reward feels awesome to one player but another just forgets they have it because it's not relevant.
You could resolve that with a gated version of Free Archetype: where it's Free Archetype but you have to unlock the extra feat slots. Since players are picking their own feats, everyone is getting something they want.
As a SoT GM, the extra stuff feels like a lot. Some of it is better received than others. The skill boosts are extremely welcome, and relevant lores have been useful. The "+1 to checks related to your branch" bonuses are almost always forgotten about. Only one person was actually interested in the Attendant dedication, so I switched things up and gave them full FA instead and the branch levels unlock those things as options rather than giving it to them (there's only one primary caster in the party so some of the branch feats just aren't of interest to how most of the players are playing).
Course, the one primary caster I have is going all-in on it and trying to be able to cast all four traditions of magic, so the extra stuff has been a huge boon for him. For the -1 INT Kineticist it's more of a running joke that he's Golarian's least intelligent Wizard since SoT waives the ability score requirements on the Wizard/Druid dedication it wants you to take, but he's not actually using it for much.
Other groups would probably run it differently, but it's working for us.
In a game where I was a player and this was a thing, I leaned hard into it and put a lot of effort into unlocking the bonus feats. The other players didn't understand it was an option (I'm not really sure why) or didn't care, and didn't put that effort in. So the GM only really had one player engaging with it to get those things and that didn't feel great.