Pathfinder 2E Pathfinder 2e: Actual Play Experience

[Parmandur]

Unfortunately I am still looking for PF2e game, but you don’t need to have a full-on adventure day for a good time in 5e. We’ve been playing 5e from the beginning and I have a very casual approach to encounter design. We have 1-3 fights a day (if we fight) and have no issues. I have only had the 6-8 encounters people talk about a few times.

I think what he is referring to is Class balance, which is indeed designed around the narrative spotlight in a full day of adventuring. Truth is, 5E is super flexible though, and the game doesn't break if the DM takes it easy on a group.

 

[dave2008]

I think what he is referring to is Class balance, which is indeed designed around the narrative spotlight in a full day of adventuring. Truth is, 5E is super flexible though, and the game doesn't break if the DM takes it easy on a group.

I get that, I just haven’t experienced it myself. But both of my groups are still in there 1st 5e campaigns (which started basically when 5e came out). So I think we move at a slower pace and try fewer classes than some.

 

[Parmandur]

I get that, I just haven’t experienced it myself. But both of my groups are still in there 1st 5e campaigns (which started basically when 5e came out). So I think we move at a slower pace and try fewer classes than some.

For sure, that's part of the strength of the system: you can ignore the encounter guidelines and "balance" and things move along fine.

 

[Umbran]

Mod Note:

This thread started out looking for actual reports about people playing Pathfinder 2e.

At the moment, it seems to be a lot more theorycraft (which the OP specifically didn't ask for) and re-prosecution of preferences of past editions.

Could you folks at least try to bring it back around?

 

[Phion]

I think it's great people are playing so much PF2 that they have so many actual play reports to tell people about in this thread!

Oh wait...

XD hey man it is hard getting the time to play the game never mind do a report! We have been stuck in RP for the last 2 sessions and about 2 weeks until our next play. I will try to do a report around that time.

 

[Arilyn]

We have 3 players with characters ready to go, and one more still deciding on class. Hoping to give it a whirl this weekend.
We have a female goblin bard, a male human sorcerer with hag bloodline, and a female elf champion. They all have cool backgrounds and fun personality quirks, so hoping for a fun session. Will be doing Fall of Plaguestone, which looks serviceable.

 

[Tony Vargas]

You are trying to relativize again, placing d20 and 5E on the side of OP and unreasonable; while placing 4E on the side of balance and reason.

TBF, no version of D&D treads /too/ close to the side of balance & reason. But, it is all relative, yes.

5e is very much a compromise edition, it's carefully placed itself, issue by issue, as near the middle of the scatter-plot of other editions as practicable. When it comes to caster/martial balance, 5e is in the D&D-compromise position between the extreme imbalance of Tier 1 GodWizards & CoDzilla vs Tier 5 Fighter in 3.x/PF1, and the narrower imbalance of nominal resource parity AEDU fighter vs AEDU (plus extra cantrips, free rituals, and able to swap out D & U for an alternate every day) wizard.

Where PF2 stands in that scatter plot (relative to 5e) might be relevant if you're looking at it as a compromise edition of D&D, as well. But as a game in its own right, or as a successor to PF1, not so relevant as all that.

The exploration mode continuous to work well. I’m moving slowly with detect magic up most of the time, our theif sneaks around and if we hear anything our barabarian uses athletics to charge in. So we have a mix of skills often used for initiative, which is pretty cool. It feels right that the barbarian gets an edge because they are charging in, while the thief's edge comes from being subtle.

How much is there to 'exploration mode?' Is it a structure or mechanic that engages the whole party? A shortcut to move you through to the next 'scene?'

From a roleplaying point of view, PF1,2 D&D3,4,5 all feel pretty similar. Social skills are the same, and there are no explicit mechanisms for social encounters (4e has a resolution system which helps, but is not really anything special for social). 13th Age is way ahead in this regard with several systems aimed at social roleplaying.

Slightly disappointing.

Leveling from 1 to 2 was way easier than character creation. All five of did it in 15 mins between two encounters sharing 3 books. Honestly, initial character creation is the most fiddly part of the game, throwing all kinds of terms you have to work out and requiring much look up . Second level was so much easier, taking a feat to become a Sorceror multiclass (extra skills! Two more cantrips!). You have probably guessed I’m not really going for an optimal character, as my prime stat for cleric is 12 wisdom and I have a 14 for the sorceror charisma.

So, at 2nd, does everyone just get a feat and decide what to do with it? Or does each class get something of their own at that level, too?

Three actions plus one off-turn reaction is absolutely right as a design decision for a tactical combat game like D&D. ...Still not sure about shields. I used one in the play test often and quite liked the way if worked. Maybe it’s just that with this character I rarely have a spare action to raise it / cast it, but it feels a bit weaksauce. Remind me of this when failing to raise my shield means the dragon crits me and kills me.

I've been curious about the impact of an action to use a shield, since I've heard about it. I'd like to hear more about how this works out for you.

 

[Staffan]

I'm used to 3e and PF1 so some of the things that take an action in the 3 action economy I'd probably house rule as taking no action like drawing a weapon. I've been runing PF1 for ten years and I'm running two adventure paths now in PF1 so I'm not sure I'm going to switch. But I'm looking forward to playing more of PF2 to get a sense of the system before I decide to run it.

I strongly recommend playing with the 3-action economy as is before making any changes. Stuff like using actions to draw weapons or change grip are a key part of the game balance. There are also several abilities that play with the action economy, and messing with the default settings of it changes the balance of these.

For example, in 5e an eldritch knight can easily use a two-handed weapon and go "OK, I let go of my sword with my left hand and shoot a fire bolt at that orc over there, and then I re-grip the sword to use the bonus action from War Magic to hit the other orc." In PF2, re-grasping your sword would be an action, so trying to combine a two-hander with spellcasting is very difficult - so you'd have to use a one-handed weapon instead, or use some shenanigans like the cleric's Emblazon Armament ability.

Also, note that in PF2 you can draw a weapon, move, and attack. You just can't attack more than once (unless you have something like Quickdraw).

 

[Staffan]

So, at 2nd, does everyone just get a feat and decide what to do with it? Or does each class get something of their own at that level, too?

2nd level gets you a class feat and a skill feat, in addition to math stuff.

I've been curious about the impact of an action to use a shield, since I've heard about it. I'd like to hear more about how this works out for you.

I'm playing a sorcerer so I don't use a shield, but I'll try to see how the cleric in our group (the only shield-wielder) does.

From a theory-crafting standpoint, raising a shield instead of a third attack (at -10) seems like a no-brainer. But when comparing it to things like a three-action AOE heal, or being able to move and cast a spell, the choice becomes more interesting.

 

[dungeonHamster]

Yeah I'm a DM coming from 5e. In an effort to keep interest with my players, I switched systems to 2E.

What are your actual experiences in running the game?
I guess we have 8 sessions under our belt now. We adopted the remnants of a 5E campaign where the party TPK'd so that the players could continue the story with fresh level 1 adventurers with the plot hook that they were uncovering what happened to the advanced level'd TPK party.

What works for you in practice and why?
It's been said to death so I wont' elaborate further, but the three action economy is a godsend both for my players engagement and for my own interest in running the monsters.

Speaking of which, I really dig all the neat little abilities they give monsters in the manual. So far my favorite are the goblins and their assorted pals (like Goblin dogs). The abilities are fun and fluffy and constantly surprise the players in ways they're not used to.

Feats are huge. While I really dug (and still do dig) 5e's approach to theatrical combat, in practice people would be paralyzed by options and just attack or cantrip. Feats give things narrative flair that don't overheat my player's braincells in trying to come up with "cool attack variation a" and combat is already highly varied by level 3 with all the different abilities players switch between depending on the situation.

I really like how things are broken down into exploration activities: even though all of those options are available in other rpgs, somehow codifying it makes it easier on my players.

Experience: it's great that we know how much is needed for next level without looking up some table. Monsters/traps giving scaling xp based on threat makes sense.

Shields: my fighter players LOVE how shields take damage. As a DM, I'm not exactly sure how useful it is, but thematically its great! I would be willing to bet this depends highly on how useful your players think the Shield Block reaction is.

NotEveryoneGetsOpportunity: My players keep guessing which monsters have it, which is great fun as a DM, and my fighters like that they have something special others have to feat for. I also dig that there are different types, which is especially fun for the players. The amount of "high fives" on the table has been increasing.

Character Construction: I really liked how easy and fast it was to create a character, though I have some complaints on that below. What really sped things up was that the "boost" system made getting stats a snap. It feels fun to use to go through and, were it not for the deluge of feats, I'm sure my players would quickly roll up new characters.

Numbers: I like that we have more than just "advantage/disadvantage" but at the same time...... see below.

Three action economy: crap I mentioned that already didn't I?

Three action economy: Seriously though, I'm stealing this if we ever go back to 5e.

Something else I'm stealing for 5e:
Doing initiative based upon the skill that brought about combat. In practice, this is almost always stealth, perception, or diplomacy, but it's great that players are rolling on the ability that initiated combat!

Weapons: It's a pain to get used to their special abilities, but once you do, it's fun as hell. The thematic flair of a glaive actually having its own niche is great. All my martials, and even my wizards & friends, use different weapons and love them. That's awesome.

TLR I like a lot of things, but my players like things more.

If something isn't working for you in practice, why is that?

This might be more due to my transition from 5e, but I could swear the spell list is even more confusing than 5e's and harder to reference.

Modifiers: stacking -2 modifiers is hard to keep track of. As a DM, I have to enforce it since my players will conveniently forget when they're flat footed but will never fail to remind me that a monster is. Add on various things like "sickened" or disarmed and it becomes a nightmare to keep track of everything. I guess I could use tokens and the condition cards though... wait, did they make it like this to sell me more stuff? (Players dig it so long as I do the work).

Feats: Yeah yeah yeah, my players love this and I love that they have so much choice, but I have to look things up constantly because players often times mix things up with 5e feats or don't read things correctly. Probably solvable if you can force your players to write down their feats verbatim, but good luck with that.

Lack of Legendary Monsters/Layer Actions: I get that Pathfinder monsters have more actions on the aggregate, but I really dug how a 5e Dragon affected the very terrain it occupied in a gameplay manner.

Character Construction: Just like my players are paralyzed by choice in 5e action to the point where they just end up attacking, my players take forever to make new characters. I have the type of player who doesn't read the rules outside of the game so every new PK is at least a two hour wait while the player creates a new character. It's the fact that feats are in ancestries, skills, general, and classes. There are so many, which is awesome, but my players will NOT read that stuff outside of gametime so it's a huge time sink.

I also have some "dang this was great in 5e why isn't it here?" wishes in terms of skills. Specifically persuasion (is that just diplomacy?) and insight (is that society?).

Also, are you coming to PF2E from PF1E or 5e?
We're coming from 5e.

If so, what have you noticed are the major differences in actual play between the games?

three action economy I know I know, but seriously this is thing my players applaud most about the entire system. Players have more interesting turns, they still go quickly, and it feels like they're making real choices. I know I am with the monsters at least.

fighters and friends: wizards act like support and my martials, of which I have three out of six, feel more engaged. Their turn is never just "attack three times." It's "attack into exacting strike with my glaive oh man I hit again that's more damage!" and the table goes wild.

wizards are significantly less powerful: I'm not sure if this is a positive or a negative and my guys are still level 5. I do like that martials get a lot more spotlight.

magic items: I've caught myself giving out more magic items since there is a table with suggestions how many I should give at which levels. I've noticed that D&D official adventures tend to have next to none while I've heard that Paizo official adventures tend to have tons. Not sure how I feel about this, but my players seem to like it.

This is an important question: are you completely new to D&D style games?
No, we picked up D&D with 5e about a year and a half ago due to critical role. I wouldn't say I'm a veteran, but I'm definitely not new anymore. We've done Phandelver, Dragon Horde, Strahd, and Dragon Heist.

As an addendum, my players are deadset on making a permanent switch to Pathfinder, but honestly I want to see what Paizo adventure paths are like before I commit myself. We're diving into Rise of the Runelords converted into 2e. TBH this looks really promising, but the D&D official stuff has been phenomenal so we'll see.