Meet Pathfinder 2's Cleric; Plus Spellcasting Basics!

On the Paizo comments a lot of people are annoyed that classes get less than PF1, less class features and have to pay feats to get them back. The counter argument is that you get those feats instead of class features, just meaning you can chose how you want your class - rather than stuck with what is written. The same applies to races/ancestries. Either argument aside it does seem that all classes and races are nerfed, you don't have enough feats at level 1 in PF2 to get all the features to equal level 1 PF1. We haven't seen what backgrounds and Archetypes exactly do yet tho. I think this is a good thing, spread the power - but people don't like having things taken away I guess.

Secondly a lot of comments about only getting, max, 3 spells memorised per spell level. Another good thing IMO, to lower the power of casters vs mundanes; and also casters won;t have the spell to do automatically what other classes roll skills etc for all the time. There is the concern about 15 min adventure day tho, but that is partially offset by scaling cantrips.

These things mostly look good to me, as a DM normally I don't care about PC's having less than PF1. As long as they are better balanced against each other and opponents, it's irrelevant - but there is a lot of the Endowment Effect going on

Very interested to see the entire Playtest tho, very hard to get a feel with these tiny titbits - not that it hasn't released the rage on Paizo!

 

[CapnZapp]

Laughable. 5e hypothetically balances casters on a 6-8 encounter day basically no one uses. You get to claim balance in theory, while enjoying D&D's traditional tier-1 caster supremacy, in practice. I'm sure PF2 will deliver the same thing.

You've either confused me for another poster, or you're having a really bad day...

You know I'm one of the hardest critics of 6-8 days, precisely because that never happens.

That does not change my assessment of 5E one bit. And I have veeery optimized players. If casters had had even some of the humongous imbalance advantage from d20, do you think they'd still play martials?

I don't think so. If the caster martial balance hadn't been fundamentally and comprehensively shifted I would never have said it had.

But it has. It really has. 5E has really truly shifted that balance in a monumental way.

In a good way. I believe it is a strong draw of the edition.

 

[Sunseeker]

You've either confused me for another poster, or you're having a really bad day...

You know I'm one of the hardest critics of 6-8 days, precisely because that never happens.

That does not change my assessment of 5E one bit. And I have veeery optimized players. If casters had had even some of the humongous imbalance advantage from d20, do you think they'd still play martials?

I don't think so. If the caster martial balance hadn't been fundamentally and comprehensively shifted I would never have said it had.

But it has. It really has. 5E has really truly shifted that balance in a monumental way.

In a good way. I believe it is a strong draw of the edition.

Lots of people play weaker classes simply because they like them more. Even among optimizers. I'd go so far as to argue that optimizing mechanically flawed or weaker classes is where optimization really shines. It's easy to make an OP Cleric or Druid or Wizard. It's a little bit more work to optimize a fighter.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You know I'm one of the hardest critics of 6-8 days, precisely because that never happens.
And I have veeery optimized players. If casters had had even some of the humongous imbalance advantage from d20, do you think they'd still play martials?

Sure! It's an engaging optimization challenge. No one in my 3.x group ever played a wizard or Druid, for instance: too easy.

But it has. It really has. 5E has really truly shifted that balance in a monumental way.
In a good way. I believe it is a strong draw of the edition.

Compared to 4e, it's shifted away from balance, and, yes, it's a strong draw of the edition. 'Real D&D' isn't really balanced.

Lots of people play weaker classes simply because they like them more.

Yep. The disfavored classes, balance-wise, are often the ones that represent the most popular and/or approachable archetypes.

Even among optimizers. I'd go so far as to argue that optimizing mechanically flawed or weaker classes is where optimization really shines. It's easy to make an OP Cleric or Druid or Wizard. It's a little bit more work to optimize a fighter.

And you get a viable character out of the exercise, rather than a campaign-wrecker.

 

[Charlaquin]

4e fans were the ones willing to give a new edition a fair try, so we're mostly playing 5e, at least when not playing 4e, as well. I'm like "where's my Warlord!?! It's been years!" but I'm still playing it. OK, running it, specifically, in my case.

I’m still running 5e too, but only because there isn’t a better alternative that’s currently supported. PF2 is looking like it could be that alternative, for me and a lot of other 4e fans.

That's worked exactly never in the history of RPGs - OK, not fair, lots of RPGs have carved out niches for themselves, that way. I'd expect Paizo to aim higher than just another "like D&D, but better!" fantasy heartbreaker, though.

I don’t really agree, on either count. Plenty of games attract players on their own merit, and “D&D, but better” has always been Pathfinder’s shtick.

New RPGers tend to try D&D first, so any new fans would have to be drawn from the sub-sub-set of potential new fans disappointed by D&D enough to look for a better RPG, but not repulsed enough to just walk away from the hobby for good.

I don’t expect PF2 to bring new players into the hobby. 5e is a MUCH better game for that purpose. PF2 is looking like a game with its own appeal, for people who enjoy RPGs but want something a little crunchier and more option-rich than D&D. Which is exactly what I’d hope it would be.

It seems to me that Paizo has an excellent relationship with their existing PF1 fan base, I'd think they'd want to build on that. They've certainly done a great job of managing that market, so far.

The problem is, again, that market isn’t sustainable. If it was, I don’t think Paizo would be making a new edition of Pathfinder, or if they did it would have a much stronger emphasis on backwards compatibility.

The PF1 fans who played it because they wanted to play D&D but didn’t want to play 4e have already left. The ones who played it because they want to play 3.X forever are never going to be happy with a new edition. The ones who just love everything Paizo does aren’t going anywhere. What Paizo needs to do (and seems to be doing) is to stop trying to be D&D and start trying to be Pathfinder, and to hope the people who want to play whatever they decide Pathfinder looks like outnumber the people who want to play D&D 3.X forever.

 

[Connorsrpg]

Wow, the one post here really cast the bait and wasn't it taken? Wouldn't it be good if threads actually just talked about the information posted? Thread derailing seems to be happening a lot earlier now

Anyway, I play 5E, I am interested in anything D&D (in Pathfinder 2). I like these snippets. I hope it is another great game for us to enjoy (or even borrow from for your own favourite game).

 

[Connorsrpg]

People should also stop trying to define what other people play. I like all editions and am still interested in all advancements. Anyhoo, now I am completely off the topic of this news post about clerics! Sorry.

 

[Sunseeker]

Yep. The disfavored classes, balance-wise, are often the ones that represent the most popular and/or approachable archetypes.

And you get a viable character out of the exercise, rather than a campaign-wrecker.

Eh, I think 3.5 Fighters are perfectly viable right out of the box. I don't expect to ya know, be breaking the game with one, but I think they're fine.

As I've written about, campaign wrecking depends on several variables. Obviously capability is one of them, but you can build an insanely OP Cleric, Druid or Wizard right out of the Core Rulebook (or PHB). Some campaigns (read: DMs) are capable of handling this. It's not hard to handle highly optimized characters. You just optimize your fights, problem solved. Tactical enemies with a couple class levels go a long way to making fights significantly harder. Some campaigns are more "breakable" than others. The older, sloppy math tended to produce two results: either very narrow campaigns that fixated on a specific "power level" and anything deviating from that broke the campaign, BUT it also could also generate highly fluid games where any level of power was tolerable. Thirdly, your need to have the desire to wreck a campaign. All the capacity in the world is meaningless if you don't use it.

That aside, I've built some fairly OP fighters. My DM made the mistake of letting me play a Minotaur for a few sessions once. Level 10, right in that sweet spot before casters get crazy. I built a Bull-Rush-based character. Hit 'em, knock 'em back, move up, hit 'em again, knock 'em back; rinse and repeat until I ran out of iterative attacks. Even had Pounce thanks to a dip in Barbarian.

Yeah, I've also built some level 20 Druids who can turn into Colossal Dragons an unlimited number of times per day, but around level 10, I made all those silly spellcasters wish they had a big fat hammer to hit things with instead of a holy symbol.

Fortunately this DM's campaign was fairly durable, and he could optimize with the best of us.

--------------------

Anyway, I just wanted to say that I'm a bit of a stickler 4E'er. If it doesn't have AEDU powers, it ain't playing to me as a 4E'er. Simplified math is great, but that's a natural reaction to RNG-weariness over time. People get tired of getting a raw deal on HP, people get tired of the d20 meaning too little (3.5 high levels) or meaning too much (5e the whole way).

I LIKE that 4E is this weird different beast of D&D. It's still my favorite edition of D&D. Every time I see attempts to balance Vancian casting I just roll my eyes and go "Here we go again..."

 

[Charlaquin]

On topic, I hope the free 3+Wis castings of heal/harm end up getting rolled into Spell Points, or that they just go back to Clerics always being able to channel a prepared spell into a heal/harm. Cause having to track spell slots, Heals/Harms, and Spell Points would seem to defeat the purpose of unifying the various X/day class features into one Spell Point system.

 

[wakedown]

So I've played plenty of 3e and Pathfinder. Thousands of hours, at least half the APs and probably 75% of the organized play scenarios.

Right now PF2e is running so close to 5e, most of the core gamers I socialize with would rather just switch from PF1e over to 5e than PF2e. Each person has their own reasons, but the general sentiment is along the lines of "if I'm gonna have to learn a bunch of new stuff, might as well learn them in the more mainstream game". Probably 2/3rd of these are folks that haven't played 5e yet, but were happily playing PF1e in some sense up until the PF2e announcement.

That's the biggest dilemma is the "switch cost" is so high right now. Very little remains that's a natural re-application of the system mastery of 3e/PF1e. How you manage your actions. How you build your chars (abil pts coming from boosts from ancestry, class). How you run basic fighter-based combat. How you even speak ("stride" vs "step" vs "strike" actions). The system feels like a 90-degree turn that has a lot of new things to learn and that's what's straight up scared away many of my players to either entrench further into PF1e or simply want to soldier through the 5e learning curve.

5e wins that decision point for them hands down because they'd love to return to the settings, deities, proprietary monsters (beholders, mind flayers), etc.

If some third party were to jump in at this point and pick up the torch and ship a 3.85e set of books, I can guarantee they'd end up with $100 of purchases (assuming 2 $49 books) from over a dozen gamers who are wondering what their 2019 and beyond gaming looks like.

 

[Parmandur]

So I've played plenty of 3e and Pathfinder. Thousands of hours, at least half the APs and probably 75% of the organized play scenarios.

Right now PF2e is running so close to 5e, most of the core gamers I socialize with would rather just switch from PF1e over to 5e than PF2e. Each person has their own reasons, but the general sentiment is along the lines of "if I'm gonna have to learn a bunch of new stuff, might as well learn them in the more mainstream game". Probably 2/3rd of these are folks that haven't played 5e yet, but were happily playing PF1e in some sense up until the PF2e announcement.

That's the biggest dilemma is the "switch cost" is so high right now. Very little remains that's a natural re-application of the system mastery of 3e/PF1e. How you manage your actions. How you build your chars (abil pts coming from boosts from ancestry, class). How you run basic fighter-based combat. How you even speak ("stride" vs "step" vs "strike" actions). The system feels like a 90-degree turn that has a lot of new things to learn and that's what's straight up scared away many of my players to either entrench further into PF1e or simply want to soldier through the 5e learning curve.

5e wins that decision point for them hands down because they'd love to return to the settings, deities, proprietary monsters (beholders, mind flayers), etc.

If some third party were to jump in at this point and pick up the torch and ship a 3.85e set of books, I can guarantee they'd end up with $100 of purchases (assuming 2 $49 books) from over a dozen gamers who are wondering what their 2019 and beyond gaming looks like.

Honestly, hearing way more of this than anything else: destroying backwards compatibility is a very strange decision for Paizo here.