The Gaming Den

So a friend recently mentioned to me that Pathfinder was coming out with a second edition soon and I think I have a memory of seeing one in a Barnes & Nobles so I guess it actually dropped. I probably would have heard more buzz around it if I had not dropped out of the TTRPG scene so hard.

What's the word on PF 2nd Ed? Is it any good? If not, anyone done an autopsy on this cash-motivated abortion yet? All I remember hearing about it as that it removed iterative attacks, which did not sound like a good sign (the grognard in me just quite likes iterative attacks, I have no further excuse).

(I personally didn't think that Pathfinder needed a second edition, not because PF is perfect (LOL), just because I kind of think of Pathfinder as already being the 3.75 Edition of a game called D&D and not really a game in its own right. I dunno it's vaguely analogous to the whole Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 2 thing. There was never a game titled that, I know, but that is what the full title of MW2 would have been if they were logically consistent.)

PF 2e doesn't release until August 2019. They were selling physical copies of the playtest materials.

That’s halfway down the first page and uses a lowecase “e”. Can’t expect a motherfucker to find that shit!

Axebird wrote:PF 2e doesn't release until August 2019. They were selling physical copies of the playtest materials.

How fucking dare they. Seriously, what incredible nerve.

erik wrote:That’s halfway down the first page and uses a lowecase “e”. Can’t expect a motherfucker to find that shit!

Word.

Neurosis wrote:

Axebird wrote:PF 2e doesn't release until August 2019. They were selling physical copies of the playtest materials.

How fucking dare they. Seriously, what incredible nerve.

It gets worse. Halfway through the playtest they started releasing updates that significantly changed the core systems of the game and often invalidated feedback. Less than a month after they started selling copies of the playtest materials, they were all rendered useless.

They should've really done a partial Alpha release before this, it got most of the stuff everyone hated out of the first edition. But you know, if something works amazing well for you, and is the entire reason your company exists now, why not change it?

I've DMed 3.5 a bit, just over a year (while being a complete n00b)

I've DMed PF1 since its release, gradually de-n00byfying myself in the process.

I've also Played/DMed one or two sessions of other systems here and there (Starwars d20, Mascarade and some homebrew systems, including my own).

PF2 has a lot of issues, of course, but after DMing around 12 sessions (4 from the HORRIBLE playtest adventure and 8 of my own homebrew campaign) I'd say that the 3 action system is not one of them. The execution is shit in a couple of places, sure, but most of the time it creates interesting combat situations.

The worst part, I think, is the infamous "table 10-2". Basically you "input" the level of the challenge and its relative difficulty ("Easy", "Normal", "Hard", "Severe" or "Extreme") and it gives you the DC.

However, when a player asks what level is climbing this tree or what level is foraging food in this forest the answer is, of course "ask the DM". And when the DM asks that question the answer is "go fuck yourself" because there is very little information in the rulebook about this and not a lot of examples.

Also, 99% of skill feats are shit. That's really a missed opportunity, because if you read the forums you'll find a bunch of suggestions as to how to "un-shit" them and some of them even make sense (like taking the non-shit design of said 1% of good feats and applying it to the others).

While the constant updates invalidated the paper copy of the playtest rules on literally 2 weeks, most of the time they contained changes that helped reduce some of the problems and expanded some options. More than a resource, that "playtest rulebook" was a collector’s item, I think. Anyone who bought it got screwed anyhow IMO.

Anyway, since the amount of material to go by is very limited (on some mid to high levels all but one or two of the enemies are elementals, dragons or demons) I'm thinking about wrapping up this campaign soonish and play something else until the final game comes out.

Yesterday's Hero wrote:PF2 has a lot of issues, of course, but after DMing around 12 sessions (4 from the HORRIBLE playtest adventure and 8 of my own homebrew campaign) I'd say that the 3 action system is not one of them. The execution is shit in a couple of places, sure, but most of the time it creates interesting combat situations.

Like what?

MGuy wrote:Like what?

Do I move towards the enemy, hit it and then raise a shield or do I go for a second attack? I might also use the third action to retrieve a potion and use it on the following turn, or switch stances, or take a step before moving to avoid AoO from adjacent enemies, or take cover to increase its AC value, or I might heal with the 1 action version of the Heal spell (either me or an adjacent ally), or further reposition after hitting, and so on and so forth.

Yesterday's Hero wrote:

MGuy wrote:Like what?

Do I move towards the enemy, hit it and then raise a shield or do I go for a second attack? I might also use the third action to retrieve a potion and use it on the following turn, or switch stances, or take a step before moving to avoid AoO from adjacent enemies, or take cover to increase its AC value, or I might heal with the 1 action version of the Heal spell (either me or an adjacent ally), or further reposition after hitting, and so on and so forth.

Wait, a fucking potion takes 2 actions? Potions in most games already seem like they're of dubious value with 1 action. When you can heal for 0 gold with a spell, or take more than zero gold and also twice as many actions, and also can only affect yourself...

Iduno wrote:Wait, a fucking potion takes 2 actions? Potions in most games already seem like they're of dubious value with 1 action. When you can heal for 0 gold with a spell, or take more than zero gold and also twice as many actions, and also can only affect yourself...

One action to "wield it" and one to drink it, yes. Keep in mind that most spells on the system cost 2 actions to cast and potions basically reproduce spell effects.

So, sure, if your main method of healing/buffing is potions you are an idiot. But if you keep some of them for emergencies (say one Healing, one Haste and one Invisibility potion) they may get you out of a tricky situation.

Yesterday's Hero wrote:

Iduno wrote:Wait, a fucking potion takes 2 actions? Potions in most games already seem like they're of dubious value with 1 action. When you can heal for 0 gold with a spell, or take more than zero gold and also twice as many actions, and also can only affect yourself...

One action to "wield it" and one to drink it, yes. Keep in mind that most spells on the system cost 2 actions to cast and potions basically reproduce spell effects.

So, sure, if your main method of healing/buffing is potions you are an idiot. But if you keep some of them for emergencies (say one Healing, one Haste and one Invisibility potion) they may get you out of a tricky situation.

... Except, amusingly, for the heal spell targeting yourself (it costs only one action).

Haste is for losers is PF2. All it does is adding one attack with a -10 penalty. It's stupid to spend an action on this for any measure of "stupid". It's even more stupid to spend two action on this.

... And that's PF2 in a pinch: a lot of option, but 99.9% on those are stupid trap. You can do a lot of different actions during your turn, but if your actions aren't "move", "attack", "intimidate" or "cast a heal spell" you're gimping yourself.

Yesterday's Hero wrote:Also, 99% of skill feats are shit. That's really a missed opportunity, because if you read the forums you'll find a bunch of suggestions as to how to "un-shit" them and some of them even make sense (like taking the non-shit design of said 1% of good feats and applying it to the others).

I'm curious about this "1% of good feats" and the "non-shit design" insights to be gleaned from them. Please do go on.

Mord wrote:

Yesterday's Hero wrote:Also, 99% of skill feats are shit. That's really a missed opportunity, because if you read the forums you'll find a bunch of suggestions as to how to "un-shit" them and some of them even make sense (like taking the non-shit design of said 1% of good feats and applying it to the others).

I'm curious about this "1% of good feats" and the "non-shit design" insights to be gleaned from them. Please do go on.

CAT FALL FEAT 1
Prerequisites trained in Acrobatics
Your catlike aerial acrobatics allow you to cushion
your fall. Treat all falls as if you fell 10 fewer feet. If you’re an
expert in Acrobatics, treat falls as 25 feet shorter. If you’re a
master in Acrobatics, treat them as 50 feet shorter. If you’re
legendary in Acrobatics, you always land on your feet and don’t
take damage, regardless of the distance of the fall.

This feat scales with the proficiency system, which is an integral part of the game. It's not a huge effect (skill feats are not supposed to be huge), but it is useful at all levels of play. Some poster made a thread on the Paizo forums where she applied this same design style to almost all skills and the result was a series of skill feats that were useful but not overbearing, like this one. Paizo is infamous for having printed pages upon pages unplayable feats, so this a good direction for the game.

If "skill feats scale with proficiency" were the basis of the design, instead of that plus a bunch of "if you're proficient enough, you can burn a feat to take this level inappropriate ability" it would have at least been a decent starting point.

Axebird wrote:

Neurosis wrote:

Axebird wrote:PF 2e doesn't release until August 2019. They were selling physical copies of the playtest materials.

How fucking dare they. Seriously, what incredible nerve.

It gets worse. Halfway through the playtest they started releasing updates that significantly changed the core systems of the game and often invalidated feedback. Less than a month after they started selling copies of the playtest materials, they were all rendered useless.

...

...

...I'm just going to go ahead and not say any more of what I think about this, since I'd like to continue to keep hope alive that one day Paizo will pay me to write stuff and I cannot find diplomatic words to express my feelings on this move.

I really wish gaming companies in general would realize that playtesters are doing them a favor and act accordingly.

Oh, also, I apologize for making a duplicate PF2E thread and if anyone wants to lock this one so we can focus on the other, that's fine by me.

I was just giving you shit earlier. I too have been that same motherfucker or worse. A lock or merge is probly smart tho.

4th edition's "Move, Minor, Standard" action paradigm was the logical extension of where 3rd edition was going. Now a lot of people have tried to simplify things more than that, and the thing people keep coming back to is "why don't we just have one kind of actions?" 5th edition tried it, Shadowrun has tried that, Storyteller has tried that and so on. And it never actually works.

The reality is that actions aren't equally important. Attacks are more valuable than reloads. It doesn't really matter how your system works, that is just factually true. It's entirely plausible to draw or load a weapon when your opponents aren't attacking you, and it's rarely possible to shoot your opponents unless they are in a position to potentially shoot back.

The next crushing realization is that people want their characters to move. And saying "Moving is your action." is just terrible. It's not just terrible because it encourages people to leave their miniatures in place and trade blows until somebody falls over - although obviously that is terrible. Then you get into questions like "What if I want to charge or overrun?" or "What if I'm riding a horse? Whose action is that movement?" And there aren't elegant answers for that.

Shadowrun ended up making moving be "not an action" and acted as a modifier to other things you were doing if you were walking or running. Storyteller ended up being just extremely incoherent. And so on. The simple elegance of "Move, Minor, Standard" is that it gives you three boxes to put actions where you actually legitimately want to put actions in them. It's a classification system that solves problems instead of creating them.

And it's prior art. We already do things this way. If you want to change that, you gotta have a reason. And PF2 doesn't have a reason for fucking anything.

-Username17