Pathfinder 2E Regarding the complexity of Pathfinder 2

[CapnZapp]

Except it wasn’t a 5e comparison.

I was responding to jmartkdr2 who said “if 2 floating modifiers is more than you can deal with - PF2 is not for you”.

I responded that it was more than 2 floating modifiers - the 2 modifiers mentioned did not take into account the specificities of any combat.

I pointed out that in my experience of low level PF2, there was generally at least one additional modifier on pretty much every attack. From what I’ve read, you agree with this and jmartkdr2 also agrees with this.

I specifically use examples from my game to try to avoid white-room theorycrafting. One example was a bonus to hit, the other two were penalties to AC, which affect the exact same attack.

If I wanted to white-room theorize, I would point out that claiming that there are 3 bonuses on an attack is itself inaccurate, because the attacker, in addition to having up to 3 typed bonuses, could at the same time have up to 3 typed penalties on the attack.

Anything else is misrepresenting my position.

Don't give up Frozen.

Pathfinder 2 combats can very easily become super intricate indeed, where you have to juggle lots of positive and negative modifiers and conditionals on the fly.

You can easily gain +1-1+2+1-5-1 on any given attack. That's, I dunno, a +1 modifier from Bless perhaps, a -1 modifier from fatigued, a +2 modifier from flatfootedness, a +1 modifier from a weapon quality such as Sweep (that really is turning a -5 MAP modifier into a -4), and a -1 modifier from enfeebled. Monster abilities regularly impose conditions on you that come and go throughout a fight. Spells too. Afflictions such as poisons and curses play a huge part in this game (as opposed to say 5E).

These modifiers aren't static throughout the fight either. They can apply only to your very next attack, until the end of your turn, until the beginning of your next turn, or until the monster's next turn, and so on. Individually and differently.

You are absolutely required to calculate and recalculate everything on the fly.

And so far we've only talked attack (and skill) checks.

Then we have damage. As you level up you start rolling heaps and heaps of dice. And this game loves to modify damage through weaknesses and resistances. A damage calculation like 3d8 slashing plus 1d6 fire plus 1d6 electricity plus 12 or 17 depending that's modified by -5 for slashing resistance plus +10 for electricity weakness that becomes 3d10 plus 1d6 plus 1d8 plus 17 times two plus 1d10 minus 5 plus 10 when you score a crit followed by applying persistent 2d6 that's lost when you pass a flat DC 15 check is not rare at mid level.

For each and every attack you make that round.

Again, some of us handle that "math load". Many of us Paizo customers I suspect (and, frankly, hope!)

I wouldn't dream of downplaying the game's complexity level, though.

 

[CapnZapp]

But to what end? What does everyone get out of agreeing with you? How does that help the game you purportedly love? If there’s a problem due to self-imposed constraints, then forgo those constraints. Don’t forget the first rule of Pathfinder 2e.

If you like to keep silent on what you perceive as painful missteps in an otherwise promising product, more power to you. Personally though, I do not like the idea that discussion forums should only be filled with uncritical praise. (Not saying you push this, Kenada. But every time I'm asked why I participate, I can't help hearing a small voice in the back of my head telling me "they just want you to shut up, grin, and bear it".)

I don't know why you come here, but a big reason why I frequent places like this is to be able to discuss and analyze anything from individual mechanics to overall design directions in as much of a brutally frank manner as civil discourse permits. And, of course, I'm not invulnerable to the pleasant feelings generated by managing to persuade my peers to acknowledge my points. I'm sure you have felt them too.

In this case, my basic theory is that Paizo completely ignored 5E in their design process, and that this is to the detriment of everybody playing PF2.

Instead of just saying "I don't like that", I am attempting to showcase exactly where and how the problems can occur. While advice such as "why complain, houserule!" contains a nugget of genuine helpfulness in telling frustrated gamers their rules aren't set in stone, such sentiments far too often come across as attempts to dismiss or shut down criticism. I also want to avoid ending up in relativisms like "you like it, I don't, everything's subjective, no game is better than another". I consider that nonsense. I absolutely believe some game designs are objectively better than others. I want to argue where Paizo could improve theirs.

Cheers

 

[CapnZapp]

What I was hoping someone would share is a link to a breakdown of encounters by difficulty. Book 1 has X severe, Y moderate, etc. I don’t have the books, and I’m not going to buy them just to look at what the spread of threats are in their encounters.

If I had to give a single representative answer, I would guess:

"3 low, 3 moderate, 3 severe each level"

Let's do three random spot checks to see how off I was (a quick look - I can easily have missed something)!

Age of Ashes level 19: low, low, severe, moderate, moderate, severe, severe, extreme. I haven't played this, but it comes across as very harsh. (I do know heroes become relatively more powerful compared to monsters as levels go up - in fact, looking at this string of encounters, I sure hope so!)
Extinction Curse level 6: low, moderate, moderate, moderate, moderate, moderate, severe, moderate, moderate. Quite typical, I'd say. When we played this, the group had considerable difficulties and routinely ended fights with one hero downed (=hour-long recuperation), despite me not increasing the difficulty to account for five players. Man, that level was a hard slog. (Apparently there's a big power jump at level 7)
Agents of Edgewood level 11: moderate, severe, moderate, moderate, moderate, severe, extreme. This is the very latest level written and published as of today.

You can’t just look at Paizo’s APs and conclude that’s how the system intends GMs to design adventures.

I absolutely think I can.

I disagree with the notion that a game should not be judged by its official showcases and examples, just because that might be inconvenient.

 

[CapnZapp]

Pathfinder 2e is not Pathfinder 1e. Pathfinder 2e is explicit that rarity is meant to be a knob you can turn to control the amount of complexity in the game. Let me quote the introduction to the section on rarity in the GMG (emphasis mine).



It could not be any more clear than that. If you don’t want to allow other material, it is within your right as a GM to declare it rare (or whatever) and consequently unavailable except for special circumstances (e.g., you put it in the treasure as a reward). If players make bad assumptions about what material they can use, then that’s on them. The GM can point out their mistake, it can be corrected, and everyone can get on with playing the game.

I’ve omitted the rest of your post because I reject the idea that the GM is just helpless in the face of entitled players, so we shouldn’t use the tools available to us to shape our games. That’s not a system problem. That’s a social problem, and I see absolutely no reason to throw up my hands and acquiesce.

It absolutely could be more clear than that.

If the publisher itself offers official rules-legit feats that lets you pick uncommon rules elements without GM input, I absolutely consider that to undermine the so-called clear notion of what rarity entails.

That is why I wrote such a long and detailed post.

 

[CapnZapp]

Frozen never said attack rolls, he/she said attacks. You can't just dismiss that by saying the previous example was attack rolls. Frozen is specifically point out that the modifiers are not just to the rolls.

I have an opinion on the notion the game is simple just because some modifiers go to AC and not just to "To Hit"... y'all can probably guess what it is.

 

[CapnZapp]

I generally respond in spoiler when someone posts in spoiler. Even if my response is arguably not a spoiler, I’ll respect their decision to warn potential audiences of spoilers.

Fair enough.

 

[CapnZapp]

I honestly wish I could: I find this sort of practical data more useful than white-room theorizing. Unfortunately, I don’t have the adventures either.

I will point out that in my tally of encounters, I did include an encounter that our group bypassed through skill rolls. I don’t know whether that was possible for other encounters.

After you've read my random spot check (just a few posts above), feel free to ask if you have further questions.

 

[CapnZapp]

But please can we talk about the complexity that PF2 actually has, rather than things people have made up, or accidentally misrepresented with hasty posting?

Absolutely - that sounds like a great idea! I would love for you to give your response to my examples of rules complexity, for instance.

 

[CapnZapp]

For PF2 to be successful, 5e does not have to lose. The systems can be evaluated separately on their own merits. I think they both do good things, and they both have their issues. I see no reason to deny that PF2 does well what it set out to do just because the market leader opted to take a different path.

I absolutely think games don't exist in vacuum bubbles.

And I'm not too hot about the phrase "PF2 does well what it set out to do". I've seen it before, and I can't help to think it is sometimes used as a self-fulfilling prophecy: if the game aimed for exactly what it ended up doing, then it must be a great success! Right? Actually, no, that is not logical. I don't believe for a second the complexity of subsystems like Recall Knowledge, for instance, or the way Crafting goes to great lengths to hide the fact you can't actually make any money, is a good goal to strive towards. I find it much more likely a writer just got over-excited, and that there was noone to rein him or her back in.

Which leads me back to my point. I strongly believe PF2 would have done what "it set out to do" better if it had looked at what WotC accomplished with 5E. That is, by evaluating each proposed subsystem for clutter that could be removed with no real loss in functionality. 5th Edition comes across as a game with brutally effective management. Almost every darling D&D has ever seen has been examined, and ruthlessly eliminated if deemed non-critical. (Sure that game isn't perfect either. It dropped utility-based magic item pricing and it still has d20 levels of clutter in interaction between hands, objects and components, for instance.)

But Paizo sure could have benefited from strong project governance on the level of the 5E team. Oh, so many pages of obsolete or needless clutter that could have been removed with negligible loss in play fun...!

 

[CapnZapp]

A lot of people saying because they haven’t had much trouble learning PF2, then it’s not a complex game. But let’s be honest - we’re all uber nerds, and these sorts of forums attract people who revel in analysing and learning mechanics. We are far, far from typical gamers.

A more objective or empirical way to assess the relative complexity of PF2 is to compare it to other games. So out of the 10 most popular RPGs on the market today, where does PF2 rank? I’d put it as the second or third most complicated (after 3.5 and PF1). And that’s treating 3.5 and PF1 as living games. If we’re looking strictly at in-print games, PF2 may well the most complex popular RPG.

Hear ye, hear ye!