I'm pretty sure that's why Disarm was nerfed so hard in PF2: Everyone hated it when it happened to them in PF1. It was a classic "players like to do this but really hate it in response" situation. Which tends to not be very fun as a GM, but it's not fun for a player who is based around using weapons when your weapon keeps getting removed and you're crippled.
Course, in premaster PF2 it was awful because it was over-nerfed. The penalty lasting until its removed with an action made it a lot better. You still won't actually "disarm" very often (something which trips newbies up) but the success outcome is solid.
Similar reason why grapple also got nerfed. A character built for grappling could pretty much shutdown a large number of enemies with basically no recourse for that enemy. In single boss fights it was a huge problem. Now, a successful grapple only grabs them, and you need a crit success to get restrained.
I'm pretty sure that's why Disarm was nerfed so hard in PF2: Everyone hated it when it happened to them in PF1. It was a classic "players like to do this but really hate it in response" situation. Which tends to not be very fun as a GM, but it's not fun for a player who is based around using weapons when your weapon keeps getting removed and you're crippled.
Course, in premaster PF2 it was awful because it was over-nerfed. The penalty lasting until its removed with an action made it a lot better. You still won't actually "disarm" very often (something which trips newbies up) but the success outcome is solid.
To get Disarm to be a reasonable tactic you would probably need to aloow players to be effective without their magic weapon with all the right runes. But players like their special weapons...
Similar reason why grapple also got nerfed. A character built for grappling could pretty much shutdown a large number of enemies with basically no recourse for that enemy. In single boss fights it was a huge problem. Now, a successful grapple only grabs them, and you need a crit success to get restrained.
Grapple was just broken and too complex.
I'm pretty sure that's why Disarm was nerfed so hard in PF2: Everyone hated it when it happened to them in PF1. It was a classic "players like to do this but really hate it in response" situation. Which tends to not be very fun as a GM, but it's not fun for a player who is based around using weapons when your weapon keeps getting removed and you're crippled.
Course, in premaster PF2 it was awful because it was over-nerfed. The penalty lasting until its removed with an action made it a lot better. You still won't actually "disarm" very often (something which trips newbies up) but the success outcome is solid.
To get Disarm to be a reasonable tactic you would probably need to aloow players to be effective without their magic weapon with all the right runes. But players like their special weapons...
Similar reason why grapple also got nerfed. A character built for grappling could pretty much shutdown a large number of enemies with basically no recourse for that enemy. In single boss fights it was a huge problem. Now, a successful grapple only grabs them, and you need a crit success to get restrained.Grapple was just broken and too complex.
Automatic Bonus Progression does help to make disarm a more usable tactic. I hope in some future version of the game, ABP is the default system because as it exists now there are rough edges with it. But when literally every weapon you wield get the same bonus to attack bonus and multiple weapon damage dice now you just need a backup weapon. It make disarm with the current critical success result still valuable, the person has to spend action to recover their weapon or get the backup weapon. To the point that with ABP you could probably adjust the outcomes some so that you're actually disarming the enemy more often.
I agree that grapple was overly complex, we needed a flow chart just to make sure we did it right. And on a dedicated grappler, yes it was absolutely broken.
It would help but the default guidance is mostly fine.
Yeah...there's a reason the Sunder rules were left out of 2E.
Just one? XD
Hmm. That doesn't seem to address striking runes, or attacks that deal multiple damage dice.
A frost giant disarmed of his axe isn't going to be stuck doing 1d4 damage with his fists.
They don't, they do 2d8+12. Pretty much all giants have fists listed in their stat blocks. (Which is probably intended to be used for all their unarmed strikes like PCs. It is easier to see giant stomping on a human than punching them.)
They seem to be pretty careful about listing unarmed strikes for creatures this matters for. But a regular human knight NPC is essentially subject to the same penalties as a human knight PC. Maybe a little less since they get higher static damage bonuses.
https://2e.aonprd.com/Monsters.aspx?ID=3013&Redirected=1