Sorry, I really can't see Animist getting in the way of a Champion, Sorceror and Investigator and definitely not Rogue, Barbarian and Witch.
"I personally can't imagine or feel this way" is not a valid argument when it comes to disproving the existence of something. To once again repeat what I have already stated, the point here isn't that the Animist was outperforming all of these classes all of the time, the point is that the Animist was able to encroach on a lot of these classes' strengths and sometimes even exceed some of them when orienting themselves a certain way, as with that Forest's Heart area control combo. It's not that these other classes were performing poorly, either, the Animist was simply performing well at a bunch of different things on the same character.
However, fact remains that it is hard to you need Liturgist lvl 9 and something like skirmish strike not to be 1 action per round behind
As already pointed out in the post you are literally quoting right now, the Animist starts 1 action ahead, and that action makes for a significant difference in tempo. You are starting to sound like a broken record.
even if you have that maintaining 2 vessel spells, like combined EoB in your example, brings us back to 1 action per round behind.
Remind me what actions you're taking while polymorphed? Because if we're assuming two Strikes and a Stride, that's something a Liturgist can do while Sustaining twice with the combination of Skirmish Strike and Tumble Through. With just devouring dark form and Monstrous Inclinations, a Liturgist can even use Skirmish Strike to Strike x2 and still have two actions left for a Spine Rake in sea serpent form, so once more, the Liturgist has far better action economy here. This would in fact have compared extremely favorably to an Untamed Druid in that same battle form with your Bard party.
Sure, ok, but why would Elf Step and 2 strikes while maintaining RCM and DFF be synergizing better than Skirmish Strike and Maneuvering Spell while maintaining RCM and anything else, like e.g. EB to pick one?
Well, given how you were criticizing the Animist's martial potential, I figured that including DFF here would allow you to start making at least slightly more than the most token efforts towards improving it. Maneuvering Spell, while excellent, is not going to make you a better gish when you're also using Skirmish Strike, unless of course you're using devouring dark form to Grapple as well as Strike. If making the most of the Animist's gish potential was never your objective, that's fine, but perhaps that's something you should say outright.
It boils down to generalist vs specialist. No matter how you build your Animist, no, not even yours, you will never come close to the striking power of that Rogue
But they did, is the problem. At several points in the game, my Animist got to Strike accurately and hard enough that they were most of the way there, and thanks to certain tools in their kit they could achieve things via martial means that no other martial could easily achieve, like that aforementioned 30-foot reach control combo. Had I used different apparitions, they would have similarly become very durable, and as others have pointed out, nymph's grace in particular provides excellent crowd control against crowds in addition to survivability. If we put aside the optics of comparing the Animist to martial classes for one second, this is clearly far and above what other gish casters can achieve, including dedicated gish builds like the Battle Harbinger or Warpriest. Again, we have been over this, and others have pointed out that even when the Animist isn't full-on outperforming others, like the Psychic you're so keen to dismiss, they're still crossing the threshold of what is allowed for other far less flexible generalists. This is, once more, another broken record moment that you're not going to win through repetition.
I said that at the level liturgist kicks in those where the Apparitions I generally attuned. At the lower levels I made other choices, and of course in downtime as well. And if we had a good idea of what we were up against that day that might make a difference as well, obviously.
Not what I'm pointing out. Specifically, what I'm pointing out is that there are a whole bunch of apparitions you flat-out ignored, and it's plain to see that you didn't bother putting the battle form spells to any consistent use even when you did reach level 9. I'm not asking you to anticipate future scenarios here, I'm pointing out you didn't give most of the Animist a chance, and now here you are, complaining that they don't do the things people say they do, when others have in fact played more of the Animist than you have.
I know how prepared casters work, thank you very much, and how to properly evaluate this particular strength.
That's great to hear! Then why, in that case, is it so hard to see that the Animist's apparition attunement is no different? Because we're seeing the effects of it right now: you clearly did not put a whole bunch of the class's apparitions to much use, and now you're complaining that the class isn't that good at the things done by those apparitions you've ignored. Just as one example, you kept criticizing the class's comparative Striking power relative to other martial classes in a party with a Bard, yet failed to adapt to that situation and pick a battle form apparition despite the fact that doing so would have given you much better Strikes. Clearly, there is a disconnect here.
And the thing is, I don't necessarily blame you for not trying all those apparitions out thoroughly, because I made similar mistakes in my own playthrough: specifically, I really didn't value nymph's grace very much, because the few times I tried it out were encounters where enemies were too few and too high-level. It took another player's play experience with the Animist and the vessel spell against crowds of lower-level enemies for me to see that spell's true potential and realize just how powerful it is. The difference is that I updated my appreciation of the Animist in view of that evidence, whereas it appears you're just straight-up refusing to acknowledge any part of any experience that isn't your own, which makes asking for details of said experience particularly insincere.
Can it make a difference? Yeah, sure it can, just like for Wizards and the other prepared casters, and I refer you to the many, many threads about the subject. A huge difference? Nah, not really, no. Most of the time you don't have a complete picture of what you will be up against and the other PC's can't shift roles on day to day basis and those will be covered, and the expectation that you cover yours.
I highlighted both these points, because I think in both cases this demonstrates a severe misunderstanding of how the Animist works and what they're about.
To start with the first point: you are correct, the party will often not have a complete picture of what they'll be up against. Thankfully, the Animist gets to attune to a large number of different apparitions, and can switch vessel spells, the spells that help define their playstyle in encounters, during exploration. If you're a Liturgist, which pretty much every Animist is, you even get to switch mid-encounter with Circle of Spirits. That immense flexibility is what lets the Animist adapt to the circumstances even as they're happening.
The second point I think highlights a larger problem of rigid expectations that fundamentally conflicts with what the Animist is as a class: you're right, other PCs can't generally rebuild themselves from day to day, let alone within the day, but that still leaves many more niches to fill than even an Animist can fill at any given moment. You personally chose to stick to playing bodyguard to the Champion and Rogue, but you could have easily also have stayed closer to the Bard and blasted, particularly as neither the Bard nor the Champion are amazing damage-dealers. With that Bard in the party, you could have easily gone full gish if you wanted and leaned more into battle form spells, and had you leaned into the Crafter in the Vault as a useful side pick, that could have given the Rogue more breathing room to opt into more skills. All of this was on offer to you, but you stuck to doing the same thing every time. The fact that you can't even see these alternate possibilities highlights a problem I've been bringing up since the start of this thread: the Animist is a class that offers a vast number of choices, and the rigidity that some players ascribe to the class I think is more projection than reality. You can choose not to Sustain when you don't want to, just as you can rebuild your character into a far greater variety of roles than you believe. Stating that you can't in either case when the proof to the contrary is right there ultimately doesn't really say much about the Animist as a class.
All of which is to say: the Animist is an incredibly powerful class, but also one that requires a degree of flexibility on the player's part to put to the fullest use. You can certainly stick to a small handful of comfort apparitions, never switch even when other apparitions would be a better fit, stick to rigid action rotations even when breaking from those and no longer Sustaining a spell would be optimal, and still end up with a really strong class. It just so happens that when you do make those optimal build and play decisions, the class ends up being significantly stronger. This can perhaps be a good thing to have as part of the class's mastery curve, but the fact that so many players are turned off by the Animist's complexity and end up reverting to a small number of apparitions and fixed rotations suggests the implementation has come at a significant cost in accessibility.
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"I personally can't imagine or feel this way" is not a valid argument when it comes to disproving the existence of something. To once again repeat what I have already stated, the point here isn't that the Animist was outperforming all of these classes all of the time, the point is that the Animist was able to encroach on a lot of these classes' strengths and sometimes even exceed some of them when orienting themselves a certain way, as with that Forest's Heart area control combo. It's not that these other classes were performing poorly, either, the Animist was simply performing well at a bunch of different things on the same character.
This statement shows that you have vastly over-stated your argument. Even in your own group there are times when the other classes perform better. I've found that every class experiences this where they have moments they shine followed by lulls. Thus there is little evidence the animist is over-powered or over-shadowing other classes in an unusual way that doesn't also occur with many powerful classes.
One person's personal play experience is not a valid argument when it comes to proving a theory. Your hypothesis is something like, "The animist is overpowered" and your evidence is your personal play experience. It is not supported by the experience of the collective community with data.
Until I see thread after thread by many players with supporting data like we have with the starlit span magus or the fighter or the giant barbarian that a class is over-powered including damage charts, the anecdotal and theoretical evidence is not compelling with an N of 1.
To me this is a "Myth busted" as the show that spawned that phrase would render the theory "Animists are Over-powered."
I bid this thread good bye. I have no more to say on the animist.
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It looks like everyone has said all they want to say without repeating! I'd like to note there was baiting on both sides here as well. I'm going to lock the thread. If you'd like to discuss this topic more, take some time to breathe and make a new calmer thread with fresh eyes.