Pathfinder 2E Simplified PF2e?

[JAMUMU]

I just don't see the "you can do whatever you want with the skills, the feats are not there to give permission" appear anywhere in the PF2 Core Rules or the Gamesmaster book. Skill feats "grant a new way of using a skill or make you better at using a skill in a particular way" (Core) and a game that uses the no skill feats option from the GMG means that characters will find skill-based tasks harder (it calls out social skills in particular). So while GM fiat is fine, it just ain't in the text itself.

The general/class feats I don't have a problem with, as I enjoy the way PF2 makes its many classes mechanically distinct from each other. But just like 5e had a less than ideal skill system, so does PF2, but in the other direction.

@Kichwas made the point about conditions and I think that's another area that feels unwieldy in play. You can be Flumped 1, Borked 2, Zorked 3, Frugged 1 and Glorbed 2, and all of these mean discrete, different things. And in any given fight, players and their opponents are Flumping and Borking and Frugging each other all over the place. Another player in our PF2 games says that a good VTT handles this very smoothly, but Machete don't VTT, so it's a cognitive load that would need reduced to really make PF2 appeal to me.

 

[Justice and Rule]

I just don't see the "you can do whatever you want with the skills, the feats are not there to give permission" appear anywhere in the PF2 Core Rules or the Gamesmaster book. Skill feats "grant a new way of using a skill or make you better at using a skill in a particular way" (Core) and a game that uses the no skill feats option from the GMG means that characters will find skill-based tasks harder (it calls out social skills in particular). So while GM fiat is fine, it just ain't in the text itself.

Yes, but there's nothing in the text that prevents you from using what those do. It doesn't say that's the only way to make a rumor or such, that's just a specific option that you have via the skill, which is exactly what you are saying: it's a new way to use a skill or make you better at a skill.

 

[payn]

Feats are not the only clunky part of the skill system, the proficiency gating is too.

 

[JAMUMU]

Yes, but there's nothing in the text that prevents you from using what those do. It doesn't say that's the only way to make a rumor or such, that's just a specific option that you have via the skill, which is exactly what you are saying: it's a new way to use a skill or make you better at a skill.

Yes, absolutely, any player in any game can attempt to start a rumor and it can be adjudicated by the referee without recourse to a rules text. However in PF2 the sow rumor feat is only for experts in the deception skill, and then it sets hard limits about what it can do, including the phrase "may be impossible". Sure, I can blow through the limits of what the text says, I can alter or ignore rules in any game and do things the way I want them. But a lot of people? When they read rules in a rules book? That's how they want it to work. But the OP is talking about a version of PF2 that is simpler, and dare I say it, less rules-bound. And this is the sort of thing I'd take a scalpel to.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Yes, but there's nothing in the text that prevents you from using what those do. It doesn't say that's the only way to make a rumor or such, that's just a specific option that you have via the skill, which is exactly what you are saying: it's a new way to use a skill or make you better at a skill.

Yup. The only places you can say the skill feats actually gate things is when they spell out that they do (Magical Crafting for example); otherwise its just the same overextension you've seen for years now about such things.

If someone wants to argue some of the specific ways it allows you to do things better should be default approaches, that's simultaneously a decent argument and a simple difference in how people assess how frequent such things are (after all, the feats do exist, so it can absolutely be something you see people do) but that's not the same as making an argument about them being absolute barriers to doing the things in general, as compared to doing them under the conditions spelled out with normal levels of difficulty.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Feats are not the only clunky part of the skill system, the proficiency gating is too.

Well, that's a simple case of them having decided they wanted certain things to limited to specialists in a skill, since otherwise everyone who invests in the skill even minimally could access them because of how level interacts with skill. It isn't something someone has to want, but I can't say it isn't serving a purpose.

 

[payn]

Well, that's a simple case of them having decided they wanted certain things to limited to specialists in a skill, since otherwise everyone who invests in the skill even minimally could access them because of how level interacts with skill. It isn't something someone has to want, but I can't say it isn't serving a purpose.

Sure, but the unintended side effect is folks think dont try something unless you are proficient, and you wont be really good unless you have the feat on top. It's taken the tactical paradigm of combat and added it to the skill system. One of those feature or bug depending on the person.

 

[Thomas Shey]

@Kichwas made the point about conditions and I think that's another area that feels unwieldy in play. You can be Flumped 1, Borked 2, Zorked 3, Frugged 1 and Glorbed 2, and all of these mean discrete, different things. And in any given fight, players and their opponents are Flumping and Borking and Frugging each other all over the place. Another player in our PF2 games says that a good VTT handles this very smoothly, but Machete don't VTT, so it's a cognitive load that would need reduced to really make PF2 appeal to me.

Though I think your arguments about the skill feats are partly based on a false premise, I wanted to comment that I think this is a much more legitimate position here. I think its worth making the distinctions, but I can understand someone who doesn't. I just find not doing something like this tends to either make things effect more or less than it should, but I can get people who don't care about that to want to deal with the overhead.

There's a knock-on effect from this one has to be aware of though; a lot of the useful non-damage spells in PF2e are about imposing conditions. If you simplify the conditions, its going to make at least some of those redundant, possibly creating some problems between various magic categories (as an example, a much bigger proportion of occult spells are condition modifiers than are wizard spells).

 

[Thomas Shey]

Sure, but the unintended side effect is folks think dont try something unless you are proficient, and you wont be really good unless you have the feat on top. It's taken the tactical paradigm of combat and added it to the skill system. One of those feature or bug depending on the person.

I can see the argument. This feeds into a thing Staffan talks about regarding the elevating difficulties, too.

(Personally, I'm of the opinion that one of the problems with most games is they're unwilling to apply some of the mechanical nuance that is usually applied to combat systems and apply them to other parts of the game, but some people either do want roll-and-get-it-done or requiring more GM/player interaction to make those parts actually sparkle).

 

[Justice and Rule]

Yes, absolutely, any player in any game can attempt to start a rumor and it can be adjudicated by the referee without recourse to a rules text. However in PF2 the sow rumor feat is only for experts in the deception skill, and then it sets hard limits about what it can do, including the phrase "may be impossible". Sure, I can blow through the limits of what the text says, I can alter or ignore rules in any game and do things the way I want them. But a lot of people? When they read rules in a rules book? That's how they want it to work. But the OP is talking about a version of PF2 that is simpler, and dare I say it, less rules-bound. And this is the sort of thing I'd take a scalpel to.

No, you're not listening. The only thing the Feat does is allow you to have a set way of doing it. It does not mean that no one else can do it, just perhaps not in that way. That is not breaking the game, that is just something implicit in the system rather than explicit. You don't ignore any rules in that unless you find me one where it says that you have to have the feat to sow any rumor period. The problem is that you look at someone having a systemized way of doing something as meaning only they can do it, which is not ever said within the system. Again, it's implicit, not explicit.