Pathfinder 1E So what do you think is wrong with Pathfinder? Post your problems and we will fix it.
- Thread starter ForeverSlayer
- Start date
pickin_grinnin
Explorer
IMHO, those charts are part of what make the core rulebook so unwieldy, and fill up space in other books that could be better used for other things. It isn't a big deal, they just irk me a bit. Nothing major.
The only real problem they have given me is when I encounter players who take charts as gospel, and then challenge me when what I do doesn't jibe with them. I correct those assumptions pretty quickly, so that's not a big deal, either. It's just a minor complaint.
Wicht
Hero
One man's trash, another man's treasure. Some of those charts, especially in the Bestiary, are the most used parts of my rule-books. They make designing monsters, NPCs and the like so much easier, at least for me. I can't think of much better use of the space. But I tell, you, if I ever had a player complain that their character didn't compare to this chart or that, I would laugh at them (nicely).
Ahnehnois
First Post
Well, we can't fix problems that don't exist, of which some implied disparity between your level 10 cleric/fighter/wizard/etc. is one. There have been plenty of tangential discussions, but there have also been plenty of suggestions for things that are.
Fix things that are actually broken?
If we're talking small scale, replace the barbarian's rage powers with something less power-y. Replace the gunslinger's grit with something more gritty. Switch the skill system back to 3.5 and add some more skills. Add in medium saves and spread them around rationally to fix some of that math.
If we're talking big scale, switch everything including spells to skill-based mechanics, expand the health system, get rid of niche protection and exception-based design and make everyone mechanically like a fighter. Add in nonlinear advancement. Add in active defense mechanics.
Ahnehnois
First Post
True, but what PF does have going for it is the scale and scope of playtesting they did. They gave us the full game, a game that everyone already knew a lot about, and made it free, and we did what we do and gave feedback. WotC still hasn't exactly come around to that approach. What that means is that what we have is the closest thing to consensus we're going to get.
If one class were better than the other, the playtest would have addressed that. And it did; what we've seen with PF is a significant smoothing out of the curve for all classes. Low-level spellcasters have a lot more stuff to play with, but their high-level spells are less world-break-y. Fighters and rogues don't look much different to start, but their charts are a lot fuller as the levels go on. This is what people wanted. This is a fix.
From this point, fixes are either going to be incremental (tweaking one class's progression, fixing a broken spell) or paradigm shifts. I'm all for a paradigm shift or two, but no we'll never get agreement on those.
Tequila Sunrise
Adventurer
Are you disagreeing with me here? I don't think I'm disagreeing with you.
I don't have percentages I go by or anything; I just don't like certain options being laughably inferior to others.
I guess that's where we differ; I want more than okay. As a DM, I want to be able to write or buy an adventure for level X characters, and be reasonably confident that it won't be a cakewalk or an assured TPK. I want to be able to tell my players "Build a character of X level" without having to hold a chargen seminar beforehand to avoid certain players feeling useless. I don't want to have to know my players' character sheets better than they do so that I can spend even more time prepping adventures to ensure that each of them gets their 15 minutes. I want a new player to be able to make his/her first PC without me needing to stand over their shoulder advising "I wouldn't take this one; it's not nearly as cool as it looks...please don't take that; it's kinda game-breaking."
Maybe this stuff comes second-nature to you; maybe you enjoy it. But I don't; I just want to play.
Ahnehnois
First Post
I don't know. I've used the bard in the past of an example of something that tends to be considered as inherently laughable (and indeed, the PF incarnation is not up to snuff, it's fair to say).
But that being said, if you're trying to imply that whole dynamic where the spellcasters are just better, or they're just better past a certain level, I think that's pretty clearly not the case, at least, not in the minds of Paizo and their playtesters and subsequent customers.
That just doesn't sound realistic to me. Again, too many variables. I don't think I've ever seen a plan that players couldn't completely blow up. The idea that advance prep can work on that level to me is unfeasible and not particularly desirable. To get it would require a lot of restrictions above and beyond normal rules (which is probably why organized play tends to have many such restrictions).
I want to be able to prepare material for level X characters and not know what is going to happen when I throw it at them. That's the fun part.
Kind of hard to avoid with the level of complexity inherent to D&D. Again, I don't think it's achievable.
Nor is it desirable. I wouldn't want to replace football with a game where anyone can just walk onto the field, start playing quarterback, and take a defense apart. You have to learn the playbook, learn how to read defenses in real time, practice in order to execute the plays properly, train athletically, communicate, take coaching, etc. D&D requires less effort than that, but it does require a buy-in. System mastery is not a bad thing in and of itself.
Moreover, I don't get the motivation to punish skill. If player 1 knows the game better than player 2, and doesn't get a better outcome, he's got to wonder why. If the players want to play to each other's level or the DM wants to force them into something, okay, but the game isn't responsible for doing that. I can't think of a lot of games where someone who doesn't know the rules doesn't feel useless.
What comes second nature to me is divesting myself from the outcome of the game. I don't expect anything on paper to dictate to me how it should go, and I'd rather improvise than have stuff on paper anyway. To me, DMing is about being neutral, not worrying about this kind of stuff at all. Whatever happens, happens. To me, that's what it means to just play.
wow... you're blisteringly unhelpful.
The problem i have is that what magic is capable of (conceptually) has no limits, whereas mundanes are effectively limited to what you or i can do in real life only maybe sometimes better. Magic, in D&D, has no inherent scope or limits placed on it's potential.
That people keep repeating it's a DM issue that the casters keep outshining the non-casters is just sad... you're acknowledging that you actively need to build encounters around the fact that the non-casters only have limited ability to participate in the game and that casters have very powerful option, while the GM must force himself to create situations where not only these characters can participate BUT also show that they are required.
the scope of what non-casters and casters are capable of is so wildly varied that this GREATLY limits the scenarios I can put in front of my players since I can't get a good gauge on what they're capable of.
a level 3 wizard and a level 9 wizard will each approach the same problem in a different manner (unless there is a low-level spell that both have access to that simply solves the issue). two fighters of those same levels will, however, most likely treat the problem in the same manner, the higher level fighter just (i hope, anyways) has a bigger bonus.
the reason for this is that the options available to the mage are much wider in scope then the fighter's. a fighter's options, barring magic items, will be the same ones as you or i have in real life (just probably better as it's seen through the filter of fantasy). the wizard, however, has access to those very same options as the fighter AND he has magic.
knock and arcane lock changed from 3.5 to PF so it's no longer the rogue stopper (for those interested, OL used to simply open the thing rather then give an alternate check with a bonus and AL simply said "you can't pick this lock, you need dispel magic or knock"), but nothing was stopping the wizard from taking open lock in the first place. he has more then enough skill points to do so.
because options. the wizard is meant to be a mix of nearly every spellcaster archetype in litterature and the devs have given him the spell selection to do so. this means that one can easily pick and choose which of these options they want unless the gm is so skilled, so talented, that he was able to out-design the devs AND his players and see that a given spell or spell combination (often one gained by mixing to different elements from what should be different design concepts) and nip it in the bud before it occurs.
My ideal medium would be "less focused then the barbarian but more then the wizard".
more options is fine, as long as the options are spread out evenly. it becomes difficult to design encounters and adventures around a large disparity of not just options but the power of those options.
except we don't understand the purpose of feats byond that they're a nebulous resource. they're all over the place. why is there a shared resource that combines combat, non-combat, magic, mundane, etc...
to say that "i can just use the ones i want" doesn't change that they are a conceptual mess as a whole and many problems with feats could have been nipped in the bud had the devs sat down and focused on what they want feats to represent beyond "a vague anything and everything".
feats lack direction, and having Power Attack, Empower Spell & Acrobatic all cover the same design space AND resource cost boggles my mind. This makes feat choice difficult as sometimes you want feats so your character stays relevant (barbarian with combat feats) but, as you point out later on, also need feats to shore up deficiencies in the system (like, say, limited skill points and skill selection).
feats are a neat concept as they allow for customization, but they need more refinement and focus to be truly helpful.
instead of actually trying to see things from my angle you're telling me to "game better" rather then entertain the idea that the game might actually be flawed. what a great solution!
my problem, again, is that the skill selection various classes have access to is a mess. "get a better int score" or "use your feats to get skills" doesn't solve the conceptual issue that there are 35 unique skills in pathfinder and by default, the fighter of average intelligence can pick 2.
this seriously limits the number of viable concepts one can make as class choice should not inform how skilled the character is. that two fighters, one that comes from an aristocracy and all the educational and social privileges thereof and one that is basically a farmhand with a swordarm should not share the same conceptual skill base, yet they do. this is, IMO, a failing of the game.
as for why they (varied characters, not just my 2 theoretical fighters) should be equally skilled (note i mean equally skilled as a whole, not equally skilled in all the same areas), i would turn the statement around and state they should always have the option to be skillful. why is the fighter less skilled then the rogue? because the rogue was deigned as a skillmonkey? again... why? why should one class be a skill monkey? why not have a variety of skills and simply let everyone pick the same amount from them? why not let those that want unskilled characters have that option but i would posit that it has to be voluntary beyond choice of class.
to me the current setup limits meaningful character choice as it's very difficult to split the highly limited resources given in a way that gives you characters with an array of viable options.
weapons are tools. they are created with certain purposes. there is logic behind their madness beyond "it deals damage" and even then, how it deals damage, is VERY important contextually as it informs the use of the weapon.
weapons that rely on heft and momentum batters down on people and can still hurt when blocked. weapons can hook and pull aside shields, lock down other weapons or pull your enemy closer to you.
the choice of weapon greatly informs someone of how they'll fight, not just a vehicle for raw damage. a maul has inherent properties: you can't just block a maul's momentum. do so and you'll break your arm. this is why people fought with some of these weapons, as it informed their choices in combat and led to varied styles.
to quote you: "like a hammer is a hammer and a 50 foot length of rope is a 50 ft length of rope": these are tools meant for specific jobs and uses, yet we're somehow supposed to accept that a battleaxe and longsword are both mechanically the same thing and beyond weird feats does nothing to change how the character fights? they share the same design space yet work the same in-play.
on the flipside a hammer and a rope also share the same design space (tools) yet work differently and are expected to do so.
there is so much design space we could take advantage of with weapons to make them interesting in play, yet instead we simply use them as vehicles for a damage value, a damage type and maybe an extra conditional modifier.
simply calling something interesting does not make it so. Bigby's Interesting Bauble isn't actually interesting if all it does is sit there being a bauble, nor are exotic weapons inherently interesting because they're non-conventional medieval fantasy weapons.
things need to be actually interesting in play rather then superficially for me to care for them.
TL;DR
you're really bad at this whole "solve problems" things. i have various problems and you "solved" them by blissfully telling me they're non-existent or that i'm effectively a bad DM because instead of going along without complaint (or biting my tongue and bearing it in some cases) i dare question that "maybe this could have been designed better?". ignoring bad design limits how the GM and the players can meaningfully interact with the game elements and one another and no amount of rose-tinted glasses can make me unsee or forget the issues i have.
telling me you don't have this problem also doesn't help one bit. ok, so you don't have the problem. maybe our conditions are different, but in the end, i do have this problem and telling me that it's working as intended does not endear me to the system.
i came here hoping for answers because pathfinder strait up killed my interest in RPing for the last 6 months as it's the only game people play around here and i have no interest in playing the game as-is.
so hey, when someone proposes a thread to solve my issues i go "why not vent them here, someone might have a solution!" and my issues are met with "what issues?"
pardon my french but that's bullhonkey.
Okay, since oxybe asked nicely, lets look at some of his problems...
I'm going to combine these two together because they seem part and parcel of the same complaint... magic is magical...
yes...
Okay...
Alright, I confess I'm not really sure what the complaint is here. Of course magic is magical and able to accomplish non-mundane things.
Now, if the question is whether or not non-magic users can perform on-par with magic users, I would postulate (and have often in the past) that they can. In their own way, the fighter and rogue (two of my favorite classes) shine brightly. While granted that the high-fantasy tropes expect that the rogue is going to eventually get some sort of nifty magical gear that allows them to shadow-walk, and the fighter is going to get Exbladius Magnificus, the sword above all other swords, these classes rely on not using spells to accomplish their goals and the satisfaction in playing them should come from their cleverness and strength. If the wizards are outshining these classes, I would suspect there is a DM problem somewhere that needs addressed. (and if this is the case, and if you are willing to be open-minded, then we can address some of the things that might be causing this)
Now, if the complaint is that you want a world in which there is not a lot of magic, then you need to make some serious changes to the class options you give to your players, change the setting, and learn how to run a grittier style game (which can be done).
The problem i have is that what magic is capable of (conceptually) has no limits, whereas mundanes are effectively limited to what you or i can do in real life only maybe sometimes better. Magic, in D&D, has no inherent scope or limits placed on it's potential.
That people keep repeating it's a DM issue that the casters keep outshining the non-casters is just sad... you're acknowledging that you actively need to build encounters around the fact that the non-casters only have limited ability to participate in the game and that casters have very powerful option, while the GM must force himself to create situations where not only these characters can participate BUT also show that they are required.
the scope of what non-casters and casters are capable of is so wildly varied that this GREATLY limits the scenarios I can put in front of my players since I can't get a good gauge on what they're capable of.
a level 3 wizard and a level 9 wizard will each approach the same problem in a different manner (unless there is a low-level spell that both have access to that simply solves the issue). two fighters of those same levels will, however, most likely treat the problem in the same manner, the higher level fighter just (i hope, anyways) has a bigger bonus.
the reason for this is that the options available to the mage are much wider in scope then the fighter's. a fighter's options, barring magic items, will be the same ones as you or i have in real life (just probably better as it's seen through the filter of fantasy). the wizard, however, has access to those very same options as the fighter AND he has magic.
knock and arcane lock changed from 3.5 to PF so it's no longer the rogue stopper (for those interested, OL used to simply open the thing rather then give an alternate check with a bonus and AL simply said "you can't pick this lock, you need dispel magic or knock"), but nothing was stopping the wizard from taking open lock in the first place. he has more then enough skill points to do so.
because options. the wizard is meant to be a mix of nearly every spellcaster archetype in litterature and the devs have given him the spell selection to do so. this means that one can easily pick and choose which of these options they want unless the gm is so skilled, so talented, that he was able to out-design the devs AND his players and see that a given spell or spell combination (often one gained by mixing to different elements from what should be different design concepts) and nip it in the bud before it occurs.
My ideal medium would be "less focused then the barbarian but more then the wizard".
more options is fine, as long as the options are spread out evenly. it becomes difficult to design encounters and adventures around a large disparity of not just options but the power of those options.
except we don't understand the purpose of feats byond that they're a nebulous resource. they're all over the place. why is there a shared resource that combines combat, non-combat, magic, mundane, etc...
to say that "i can just use the ones i want" doesn't change that they are a conceptual mess as a whole and many problems with feats could have been nipped in the bud had the devs sat down and focused on what they want feats to represent beyond "a vague anything and everything".
feats lack direction, and having Power Attack, Empower Spell & Acrobatic all cover the same design space AND resource cost boggles my mind. This makes feat choice difficult as sometimes you want feats so your character stays relevant (barbarian with combat feats) but, as you point out later on, also need feats to shore up deficiencies in the system (like, say, limited skill points and skill selection).
feats are a neat concept as they allow for customization, but they need more refinement and focus to be truly helpful.
instead of actually trying to see things from my angle you're telling me to "game better" rather then entertain the idea that the game might actually be flawed. what a great solution!
my problem, again, is that the skill selection various classes have access to is a mess. "get a better int score" or "use your feats to get skills" doesn't solve the conceptual issue that there are 35 unique skills in pathfinder and by default, the fighter of average intelligence can pick 2.
this seriously limits the number of viable concepts one can make as class choice should not inform how skilled the character is. that two fighters, one that comes from an aristocracy and all the educational and social privileges thereof and one that is basically a farmhand with a swordarm should not share the same conceptual skill base, yet they do. this is, IMO, a failing of the game.
as for why they (varied characters, not just my 2 theoretical fighters) should be equally skilled (note i mean equally skilled as a whole, not equally skilled in all the same areas), i would turn the statement around and state they should always have the option to be skillful. why is the fighter less skilled then the rogue? because the rogue was deigned as a skillmonkey? again... why? why should one class be a skill monkey? why not have a variety of skills and simply let everyone pick the same amount from them? why not let those that want unskilled characters have that option but i would posit that it has to be voluntary beyond choice of class.
to me the current setup limits meaningful character choice as it's very difficult to split the highly limited resources given in a way that gives you characters with an array of viable options.
weapons are tools. they are created with certain purposes. there is logic behind their madness beyond "it deals damage" and even then, how it deals damage, is VERY important contextually as it informs the use of the weapon.
weapons that rely on heft and momentum batters down on people and can still hurt when blocked. weapons can hook and pull aside shields, lock down other weapons or pull your enemy closer to you.
the choice of weapon greatly informs someone of how they'll fight, not just a vehicle for raw damage. a maul has inherent properties: you can't just block a maul's momentum. do so and you'll break your arm. this is why people fought with some of these weapons, as it informed their choices in combat and led to varied styles.
to quote you: "like a hammer is a hammer and a 50 foot length of rope is a 50 ft length of rope": these are tools meant for specific jobs and uses, yet we're somehow supposed to accept that a battleaxe and longsword are both mechanically the same thing and beyond weird feats does nothing to change how the character fights? they share the same design space yet work the same in-play.
on the flipside a hammer and a rope also share the same design space (tools) yet work differently and are expected to do so.
there is so much design space we could take advantage of with weapons to make them interesting in play, yet instead we simply use them as vehicles for a damage value, a damage type and maybe an extra conditional modifier.
simply calling something interesting does not make it so. Bigby's Interesting Bauble isn't actually interesting if all it does is sit there being a bauble, nor are exotic weapons inherently interesting because they're non-conventional medieval fantasy weapons.
things need to be actually interesting in play rather then superficially for me to care for them.
TL;DR
you're really bad at this whole "solve problems" things. i have various problems and you "solved" them by blissfully telling me they're non-existent or that i'm effectively a bad DM because instead of going along without complaint (or biting my tongue and bearing it in some cases) i dare question that "maybe this could have been designed better?". ignoring bad design limits how the GM and the players can meaningfully interact with the game elements and one another and no amount of rose-tinted glasses can make me unsee or forget the issues i have.
telling me you don't have this problem also doesn't help one bit. ok, so you don't have the problem. maybe our conditions are different, but in the end, i do have this problem and telling me that it's working as intended does not endear me to the system.
i came here hoping for answers because pathfinder strait up killed my interest in RPing for the last 6 months as it's the only game people play around here and i have no interest in playing the game as-is.
so hey, when someone proposes a thread to solve my issues i go "why not vent them here, someone might have a solution!" and my issues are met with "what issues?"
pardon my french but that's bullhonkey.
Wicht
Hero
Oxybe
I am sorry you found my suggestions as less than a desirable place to begin a discussion.
Reading through your complaints, it sounds to me that what you are actually looking for is a single class game (or classless) where all the characters have access to all the exact same choices.
I don't remember telling you that you were a bad DM. I was trying to suggest ways in which to improve your game, or at least look at the situation from a different angle.
Let me address a few points though...
While "we" may not understand the purpose of feats, "I" understand it just fine. The purpose of feats is to allow greater flexibility and customization of each individual character. They are meant to be all over the place. If they were not, they would not be fulfilling their purpose. Perhaps you would like each character to be able to pick one combat feat, one utility feat, and one spell feat per level, but personally I like it better the way it is. I don't think it desirable to force non-magic-users into having spell abilities or magic-users into having combat abilities if the players do not think those things fit their concept.
The skill "deficiency" in certain classes is intentional, forcing players to sacrifice in one area if they want their characters to excel in another. I personally like more skills in a character, but it is what it is for a reason. To counter, why should an average intelligence fighter be skilled in a variety of non-fighting skills? If you are playing the quintessential farm-hand who is big on brawn but not too well endowed intellectually, why should you be able to have half a dozen skill sets? On the other hand, if you want to play a more classy sort of fighter who knows a little bit of everything, it makes sense that you put some ability into intelligence and drop a feat or two on your education. No offense, but it sounds like you want benefits without sacrifices or meaningful choices.
Also, seriously, though you dismissed this out of hand, do try naming weapons and giving them a history before giving them to your characters. It may seem superficial to you but it works wonders for gameplay. Its good advice if I do say so myself.
I am sorry you found my suggestions as less than a desirable place to begin a discussion.
Reading through your complaints, it sounds to me that what you are actually looking for is a single class game (or classless) where all the characters have access to all the exact same choices.
I don't remember telling you that you were a bad DM. I was trying to suggest ways in which to improve your game, or at least look at the situation from a different angle.
Let me address a few points though...
While "we" may not understand the purpose of feats, "I" understand it just fine. The purpose of feats is to allow greater flexibility and customization of each individual character. They are meant to be all over the place. If they were not, they would not be fulfilling their purpose. Perhaps you would like each character to be able to pick one combat feat, one utility feat, and one spell feat per level, but personally I like it better the way it is. I don't think it desirable to force non-magic-users into having spell abilities or magic-users into having combat abilities if the players do not think those things fit their concept.
The skill "deficiency" in certain classes is intentional, forcing players to sacrifice in one area if they want their characters to excel in another. I personally like more skills in a character, but it is what it is for a reason. To counter, why should an average intelligence fighter be skilled in a variety of non-fighting skills? If you are playing the quintessential farm-hand who is big on brawn but not too well endowed intellectually, why should you be able to have half a dozen skill sets? On the other hand, if you want to play a more classy sort of fighter who knows a little bit of everything, it makes sense that you put some ability into intelligence and drop a feat or two on your education. No offense, but it sounds like you want benefits without sacrifices or meaningful choices.
Also, seriously, though you dismissed this out of hand, do try naming weapons and giving them a history before giving them to your characters. It may seem superficial to you but it works wonders for gameplay. Its good advice if I do say so myself.
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Tequila Sunrise
Adventurer
Yes, we've established that you enjoy a wide range of power levels.
...You don't spend much time on the Paizo forums, do you? Plenty of PF fans think that LFQW is a problem, although it's anyone's guess which group is in the majority.
In any case, I'm not just talking about the LFQW issue; every given set of PF options includes an undesirablely wide range of power levels. Classes, archetypes, feats, spells, you name it.
Like the edition or not, 4e has proven that D&D can take on much more of the burden of prep. It's perfectly feasible, if you're willing to give up the extreme ends of the power spectrum. You are of course still entitled to your preferences.
Oh, and I like uncertainty too; I just don't like "This could be a boring cakewalk, or a first encounter TPK" level of uncertainty.
A degree of system mastery is inevitable, and arguably even desirable -- though I'm more accustomed to seeing the 'this game must reward skill' argument in reference to competitive games rather than cooperative ones.
What I find highly undesirable is telling a new player "Sorry you died in your first encounter Timmy, next time you know better than to play a monk." (Fudging the dice to avoid souring Timmy to the hobby not only contradicts your 'reward skill' philosophy, but I also just don't care for fudging.)
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