Looking At The Pathfinder 2 Wizard Class

Yesterday's Pathfinder 2 playtest update at the Paizo website talked about the Wizard class for the game.

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It looks like the wizard is going to start out with plenty of options for players. "[FONT=&amp]At 1st level, you begin play with a spellbook containing 10 cantrips and eight 1st-level spells, giving you a wide variety of spells to draw upon when you prepare your magic each morning. Starting out, you can prepare four cantrips and two 1st-level spells each day. In addition, you also select your arcane school at 1st level, which grants you one extra spell slot of each level that you can use only to prepare a spell from your chosen school.[/FONT][FONT=&amp]" They also talk about one of the special abilities of the wizard, "[/FONT][FONT=&amp]Speaking of which, all wizards gain the ability to place some of their power into a designated item called an arcane focus. You can drain the power from that focus once per day to cast any one spell that you have already cast without spending another spell slot. Universalists get to use this ability once for each level of spell that they can cast![/FONT][FONT=&amp]"[/FONT]
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They also give us a look at some magic, including the ever popular Magic Missile.

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It looks like they're going to play with the options that are available to the class as well, making the wizard a bit more flexible. This is one of those classes that attracts a lot of controversy, so I am sure that someone​ will be unhappy with the decisions that they're going to make for the class.

 

[mellored]

I thought people hated time based cool downs because they were video gamey?

Just because a video game uses it, doesn't mean it's bad.

And really, what else is D&D magic if not on a cooldown?

 

[Parmandur]

Polytheism doesnt have to be a problem. If it is easy to swap it out, then no problem.

Just make the cleric class make sense for various kinds of sacred traditions and various kinds of settings. If the DM makes a setting without polytheism, no problem, or with polytheism, no problem. Same cleric class, same rules. Just remove the Great Wheel from the setting − and done! If the player wants to play an adherent of an abstract sacred tradition, great, or an adherent of polytheism that personifies the concept, that is fine too. (Most Non-Western sacred traditions emphasize abstract sacred concepts, so there are good reallife multicultural benefits to diversifying the cleric class. Only Westerners seem to need to worship a personification.) There neednt be a problem.



Unfortunately, 4e and especially 5e made polytheism a problem. These systems bake polytheistic flavor deeply into the cleric class features, the spells, the races, the monsters, the planes, the setting assumptions, it is hard to find a chapter that avoids saturating the mechanics with the unwanted polytheism flavor. Even sections that mention alternatives to polytheism still push polytheism in the most heavy-handed way possible, like recommending to DMs and players who dislike polytheism that they should use polytheism anyway, or use pantheism worshiping multiple gods at the same time.

I know, because in the attempt to try remove polytheism from the rules in the 5e SRD, and I gave up, having lost interest in the amount of time and energy that it takes to remove it. I am sick of polytheism.

In the 3e, I was neutral about polytheism, because the rules let me be neutral. 4e and 5e made polytheism a problem.



Anyway, keep setting assumptions in separate textboxes. For example, for the cleric class have a sidebar that mentions the most prominent sacred traditions in Golarion, how a cleric character might fit within each one of them. A textbox is easy to blot out (even literally). Oppositely, baking something into all mechanics everywhere is hard to ignore.

Compartmentalize flavor options for the same reason that it is useful to compartmentalize mechanical options.

Personally speaking, I am a strict Monotheist, but I hardly see any problem with the D&D setup, nor do I feel any of the editions mentioned make it at all difficult to reflavor as needed. I fail to see anywhere in the 5E rules that make polytheism necessary.

 

[Ancalagon]

Personally speaking, I am a strict Monotheist, but I hardly see any problem with the D&D setup, nor do I feel any of the editions mentioned make it at all difficult to reflavor as needed. I fail to see anywhere in the 5E rules that make polytheism necessary.

I concur. I'm startled by the notion that polytheism is so hard to remove that it ruined the game for him. It's as if someone said they refused play warhammer because they hate crossbows...

 

[Staffan]

I know, because in the attempt to try remove polytheism from the rules in the 5e SRD, and I gave up, having lost interest in the amount of time and energy that it takes to remove it. I am sick of polytheism.

"Clerics in this setting are attuned to fundamental cosmic forces, represented by the various domains available. This is a learned skill, unlike that of a sorcerer, but at the same time it is based on a deep emotional understanding rather than factual knowledge (which is why cleric magic is based on Wisdom rather than Intelligence or Charisma)." That's 2-3 sentences, and IMO decouple the cleric class fairly strongly from the theism (both mono-, poly-, and heno-)

That's basically the idea I have rolling around in my head for my homebrew. In my version, there are still religions, but they are mostly orthogonal to the concept of clerical magic. Some clerics of War will follow Kord or Bane and preach their values, but so will some fighters and barbarians. And many who are clerics of War do not recognize the existence of deities, or they consider war gods to be an imperfect understanding of the Truth beheind the concept, or whatever.

As for Pathfinder, it is very unlikely that you'll see Paizo acknowledging the idea that clerics don't need deities, particularly for the more Golarion-focused 2nd edition. James Jacobs (Pathfinder creative director) is on record as saying that clerics need a deity, and if you want to play a divine caster that doesn't worship a particular god, you should play an oracle instead.

 

[Emerikol]

Honestly I wish they'd have an option not to have at-will wizard casting. I like magic to be a limited resource and not a video game style blaster. Obviously, it just has to be an option. I missed this earlier. A negative.

 

[Yaarel]

Honestly I wish they'd have an option not to have at-will wizard casting. I like magic to be a limited resource and not a video game style blaster. Obviously, it just has to be an option. I missed this earlier. A negative.

The wizard rules can easily let the player choose between a cantrip and a weapon proficiency. I feel wizards who master cantrips have no business knowing how to wield weapons.

 

[Shasarak]

I always disliked how 3e put a limit on cantrip use. Looks like Pathfinder is continuing this trend wherein a low level wizard who has cast all his offense spells for the day now gets to be a really bad fighter with lousy attack bonus, lousy damage, lousy ac, and lousy hp. Joy! Swing that quarterstaff, Gandalf. Because stick fighting is what being a wizard is really about!

To be honest I would much rather play a Wizard that conserves his spells and fulls back on his Crossbow then one that can shoot an infinite amount of fire bolts. Because after all Gandalf was not constantly spamming fire attacks.

But I understand that you have to adapt to the video game generation.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Just because a video game uses it, doesn't mean it's bad.

And really, what else is D&D magic if not on a cooldown?

Sounds like a person who wasn't here during the Edition Wars.

 

[Charlaquin]

Sounds like a person who wasn't here during the Edition Wars.

Mellored was a very prominent poster on the WotC forums during the 5e playtest, so I think it’s safe to assume they are well familiar with the Edition Wars.

To be honest I would much rather play a Wizard that conserves his spells and fulls back on his Crossbow then one that can shoot an infinite amount of fire bolts. Because after all Gandalf was not constantly spamming fire attacks.

But I understand that you have to adapt to the video game generation.

D&D and its ilk haven’t been Lord of the Rings for a long time, and I don’t think video games are to blame. At least not solely to blame. Tolkien’s fingerprints will always be there on the genre, but it didn’t take long for people to start craving a world that was more fantastical, where magic played a big part in everyday life. For as long as there have been people roleplaying as wizards, there have been people wishing that they could be doing magic instead of using weapons badly. Doing magic is, after all, the primary appeal of being a wizard. And honestly, what’s the big deal if the ~4.5 damage per turn the wizard can do without expending a resource comes from a 1d8 crossbow or a 1d8 magic beam? If the damage type is that big of a concern, charge a small tax on the die size for it. But let the players who want to be the guy who casts spells actually cast spells.

 

[Aldarc]

To be honest I would much rather play a Wizard that conserves his spells and fulls back on his Crossbow then one that can shoot an infinite amount of fire bolts. Because after all Gandalf was not constantly spamming fire attacks.

He also wasn't spamming crossbow bolts either. (I also think that Gandalf is more Druid than Wizard.)

But I understand that you have to adapt to the video game generation.

This sentiment is a bit condescending, if not inaccurate.

This is less about video games and more about changing prevailing norms and tastes. For example, even outside of the spell conservation, the d4 HD wizard is gone. I don't think video games are to blame for that. Cantrips have increasingly become more basic combat functional across D&D editions so it is not surprising to see Pathfinder 2 follow suit. Sure Gandalf doesn't constantly spam spells, but other fantasy wizards and mages in literature do. "Hello, Wheel of Time" to name an obvious example. And D&D's power fantasy vastly outpaces anything out of Middle Earth.