Would Paizo Make a Better Steward for Our Hobby?

[Neonchameleon]

You are still contentiously saying things that either don't mesh with reality or are so broad as to be meaningless.

If you mean that Paizo as a company is not selling to every gamer out there, I suppose that you are likely right.

I mean that Paizo are notably not even vaguely making the effort to make Pathfinder even as broad a tent as 3.5 was.

To illustrate, we can use Ultimate Combat as an example. Pathfinder is a game about super-powered wizards and their mundane warrior sidekicks with magic items I'm afraid. Ultimate Combat (as opposed to Ultimate Magic) is where the mundanes were meant to shine. Which meant that there were three approaches that could be taken. There were three possible paths here. The ordinary would have been to look to Complete Warrior for inspiration and have big feats with multiple useful effects to spice up combat like Shock Trooper and the other tactical feats. The daring would have been to look to the Book of Nine Swords (and in particular Iron Heart) for inspiration, to borrow a few pages out of 4e, and to give the non-mages big if realistic things to do. The doubling down on Pathfinder thing to do would be to avoid the Book of Weaboo Fitan Magic like the plague, go with relatively uninspired feats and a lot more support for spellcasters who get into combat.

It should surprise no one that Ultimate Combat has around half as many spells as Ultimate Magic. Even the book that's meant to be about combat is significantly devoted to the already existing and very well supported spellcasters.

This is what I mean about other styles. I could say the same about Pathfinder's Mythic Adventures and what it notably doesn't do. Whenever Pathfinder has had the opportunity to either broaden or double down on what it already does, neglecting those it doesn't cover it has doubled down. 4e on the other hand did broaden - we got the simple fighters who just hit things thank goodness. The Thief is an absolute gem of a class that would be more at home in AD&D than any version of D&D since.

However, WotC is most certainly not selling to every gamer out there either, and made a decision with 4e to purposefully cut off a segment of the base in an effort of increasing their brand.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't deliberate.

Now, on the other hand, I will point out, and I made this observation publically several times a few years back, that it struck me that while WotC was selling gaming products to primarily the 4e crowd, Paizo was selling products that appealed to both the 3e and the 4e crowd with their map-packs, stories, and the like.

And Wizards were selling minatures and dungeon tiles aimed at both groups. Paizo have done well with both I agree.

I'm not sure I want a single "steward" of the hobby. I think it far better for a robust market to, through competition, continue to promote excellence in gaming.

Agreed

 

[Herschel]

I think that's a little unfair - WotC were also selling dungeon tiles, miniatures, and the like that could be used by players of any edition. They had more of some things (minis) and less of others (map packs) than did Paizo, but they both had both. And WotC aren't responsible if the market chooses to use the Paizo 'generics' and not the WotC ones.

It's also worth noting that the Paizo-licensed minis are pretty much garbage materially and much more expensive than the WotC ones. It makes for a weird comparison.

It's too bad, because I like a lot of them aesthetically.

 

[billd91]

I mean that Paizo are notably not even vaguely making the effort to make Pathfinder even as broad a tent as 3.5 was.

To illustrate, we can use Ultimate Combat as an example. Pathfinder is a game about super-powered wizards and their mundane warrior sidekicks with magic items I'm afraid. Ultimate Combat (as opposed to Ultimate Magic) is where the mundanes were meant to shine. Which meant that there were three approaches that could be taken. There were three possible paths here. The ordinary would have been to look to Complete Warrior for inspiration and have big feats with multiple useful effects to spice up combat like Shock Trooper and the other tactical feats. The daring would have been to look to the Book of Nine Swords (and in particular Iron Heart) for inspiration, to borrow a few pages out of 4e, and to give the non-mages big if realistic things to do. The doubling down on Pathfinder thing to do would be to avoid the Book of Weaboo Fitan Magic like the plague, go with relatively uninspired feats and a lot more support for spellcasters who get into combat.


It should surprise no one that Ultimate Combat has around half as many spells as Ultimate Magic. Even the book that's meant to be about combat is significantly devoted to the already existing and very well supported spellcasters.

I think a lot of people are going to have to disagree with your point of view which just further illustrates how separated segments of the market really are on their approach to the game. That last segment I included in the excerpt from your post, I think, indicates this particularly well.

From my viewpoint, inclusion of new combat options, and classes are best presented with the spells that fit them into an overall game context. After all, classes like the gunslinger shouldn't appear without spells to improve their abilities or counter them since the class wouldn't appear without a context in the game. There should also be support for classes who bridge the martial and spellcaster divide either by being in a class that does that inherently or because they wanted to multiclass.

 

[TwoSix]

From my viewpoint, inclusion of new combat options, and classes are best presented with the spells that fit them into an overall game context. After all, classes like the gunslinger shouldn't appear without spells to improve their abilities or counter them since the class wouldn't appear without a context in the game. There should also be support for classes who bridge the martial and spellcaster divide either by being in a class that does that inherently or because they wanted to multiclass.

Well, I think part of the problem is that Pathfinder (and also 3.5) don't support that many classes with no spells whatsoever. You have the Fighter, the Rogue, the Barbarian, the Cavalier, and the Gunslinger out of the 19 base classes currently in the game. So even to support some of the more combat-oriented classes like the Paladin or Ranger, you need to add more spells into the game.

 

[Wicht]

It's also worth noting that the Paizo-licensed minis are pretty much garbage materially and much more expensive than the WotC ones.

I assume you mean the wiz-kids minis. Paizo also licenses to Reaper and there are unpainted paizo minis available as both metal and bones material. But I personally have never had any problem with the wiz-kids minis. Their quality is at least on par with the WotC plastics as far as I can tell, and in some cases they appear superior. ymmv

 

[Wicht]

I mean that Paizo are notably not even vaguely making the effort to make Pathfinder even as broad a tent as 3.5 was.

I'm not sure how you arrive at that conclusion.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think a lot of people are going to have to disagree with your point of view which just further illustrates how separated segments of the market really are on their approach to the game. That last segment I included in the excerpt from your post, I think, indicates this particularly well.

From my viewpoint, inclusion of new combat options, and classes are best presented with the spells that fit them into an overall game context. After all, classes like the gunslinger shouldn't appear without spells to improve their abilities or counter them since the class wouldn't appear without a context in the game. There should also be support for classes who bridge the martial and spellcaster divide either by being in a class that does that inherently or because they wanted to multiclass.

If Ultimate Combat had included the Magus (credit where it's due, that's a good class) I wouldn't be having this problem to the same degree - the Magus' place is definitely arguable. But there are almost 20 first level sorceror/wizard spells in the book. Four are gun related (five if you count Jury Rig, six for Air Bubble). 32 second level spells - there's no reason for Protection from Chaos, Communal to be combat as opposed to magic.

And you are making my point. If we want context, there should be more in Ultimate Combat to support non-casters in beating up casters than there is to support casters being even more awesome than they already were. This is Pathfinder doubling down on one type of assumption (wizard supremacy) and with the failure to perform of the gunslinger further doubling down on the Fighters Don't Get Nice Things issue of Pathfinder.

Or if we want context your way should the ways to deal with spellcasters without magic be all over Ultimate Magic? After all we want to put the mages in context.

But that you think further increasing wizard supremacy is the right thing to do for Ultimate Combat is only making my point. It's a very pathfinder approach that turns many other people off. And that they do it all over the combat book further indicates that they have no interest in people who don't want magic uber allies. Limited playstyles supported indeed - your worldbuilding assumptions are whereas mine aren't. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with your assumption there, merely that it is narrow and puts others off. There is more than one way to do things, and Pathfinder goes the Pathfinder way rather than trying to broaden the tent where there are obvious opportunities to.

 

[Imaro]

It's also worth noting that the Paizo-licensed minis are pretty much garbage materially and much more expensive than the WotC ones. It makes for a weird comparison.

It's too bad, because I like a lot of them aesthetically.

I don't know about the minis, but I am glad they offered a cheap and readily available alternative with their pawns.

 

[DaveMage]

Minis are licensed - not a Paizo-created product. (Though they do approve them.)

 

[Herschel]

I assume you mean the wiz-kids minis. Paizo also licenses to Reaper and there are unpainted paizo minis available as both metal and bones material. But I personally have never had any problem with the wiz-kids minis. Their quality is at least on par with the WotC plastics as far as I can tell, and in some cases they appear superior. ymmv

Yeah the Paizo/Wiz-Kids plastics are terrible. The plastic is extremely brittle and designed poorly to stand up to use so I stopped buying them. Damage out-of-the-box was ridiculous, never mind table and shoebox durability.

The metal Reapers were, as one would expect, Reaper quality.