Pathfinder 2E Regarding the complexity of Pathfinder 2

[kenada]

Right.

So, if I understand your question correctly...

...you're asking if reducing ABP to devastating strikes only leads to a problem with warriors being able to purchase more skill-boosting items?

Actually, I was just trying to understand the original statement give the way things work in the GMG. It seems like an aside though, so it’s not important.

I haven't suggested reducing ABP as a solution to the warrior-caster imbalance. I discussed reducing ABP because I feel that's a better ABP, one that doesn't remove more of the magic item economy than it absolutely has to. I realize you could infer there was a connection, but please read my thoughts on ABP as a sidetrack or rant. It was brought on by your mention, but not really germane to the main gold for XP discussion.

Since I don’t want to step into a discussion on martial-caster balance, I’m just going to snip this. I think that’s a worthwhile goal if you’re going to do ABP. People complain about the Christmas tree effect, but I think investiture helps mitigate that problem. If you want magic items to provide any kind of mechanical weight, then you need to factor them into the math. Otherwise, you’re just pretending that they don’t matter even when they do (like 5e does).

Well, you could make level be derived from all the options and items a PC has taken or acquired. That way, groups can do whatever they want, and the system’s tools for assessing balance would still work. Of course, that’s likely to be an almost entirely different game if people just buy the things they want with XP and build out however (tall or wide).

And of course, ABP came up when you suggested ABP as being better than PWL at fixing the rather PF2-specific issue where nothing you can purchase comes close to a level.

I was just proposing it as a way of dealing with the issue of the PCs not having the expected wealth to acquire the items the system expects them to have. I’m not a fan of the Arneson method for games like PF2, so a better option is not to use it and do something else.

I would say PWL is damned near mandatory for an XP for GP campaign with a functioning magic item economy where the same gold purchases everything. Another way of saying this is that the level you add to proficiency makes it impossible to mix gp and xp. If you run a game where gold can buy you xp but nothing else (i.e. you're running magic items much like 5E rather than the default PF2 system) you don't need to do anything, of course.

This is why I keep bringing up how old-school D&D does it. If the PCs don’t have to spend the gp to acquire XP, then it doesn’t mess up the magic item economy.

Using ABP on the other hand is retreating from a fully functional magic item economy, since far fewer items are left to exist in the game. Since you remove pretty much all the really worthwhile items, I'd say ABP amplifies the problem instead of mitigating it. If you can't even purchase a skill bonus (let alone an extra weapon die) you damn sure won't part with a penny that doesn't go towards XP...

I hadn’t considered that angle, but it makes sense. If they don’t even have the mandatory competing for their gp, then PCs probably would just focus on grinding out levels.

I hope that was on topic. But I'm not 100% sure...

I’m not even sure what this thread is about anymore.

 

[CapnZapp]

Since I don’t want to step into a discussion on martial-caster balance, I’m just going to snip this. I think that’s a worthwhile goal if you’re going to do ABP.

I don't need to discuss the wider martial-caster balance either, but just to be sure: are you talking about my suggestion to reduce ABP to a minimum here?

People complain about the Christmas tree effect, but I think investiture helps mitigate that problem. If you want magic items to provide any kind of mechanical weight, then you need to factor them into the math. Otherwise, you’re just pretending that they don’t matter even when they do (like 5e does).

Not sure I follow you here. The whole point of 5E is that magic item provides bonuses above and beyond "the math". This is actually far preferable, at least if the alternative is magic items like Pathfinder 2 or 4th Edition, where you never really feel rewarded for getting an item - instead you feel punished when you aren't.

Magic items in 3E or 5E have actual power. They can replace entire levels, and they can redefine your character (viewed from the "what can I achieve" lens). They are desirable and wondrous. If you like magic items that your players actually want and use, 5E is fun and easy.

Magic items in PF2 on the other hand are utilitarian. Minimal. Drab. Sure, striking runes are noticeably flashy, but that's the exception, not the rule. Even something like a Flaming rune is far diminished (except against Fire-vulnerable creatures) not because it deals less damage (it's still a bonus d6), but because damage is generally inflated in this game, so a d6 more or less matters little (unless you get it at first level, and you won't). Most items simply grant a very small bonus - and very small bonuses only increases your chances on average, they have little narrative power to change the story when you really want to. There are a few items that have the power to transform your character, but for every such item, there's ten items the party will simply sell or even not pick up at all. And even then, items are far too often saddled with obnoxious restrictions and limitations, often ensuring the only one in the party that can use them is the one that needs them the least.
Example: an item that grants a fairly powerful boost to, say, Stealth. Okay, but why does this item then have Requirement: must be Legendary in Stealth? ✱headpalm✱

Just about the only "advantage" of 4E/PF2-style magic items is that it's easy to just get rid of them altogether. And I regard the ABP variant to be a stealth removal of magic items.

Yes, in 3E items were both powerful and part of the math, which of course leads to mandatory Christmas trees. But to me this wasn't even in the top 3 problem areas of the edition. (Admittedly the related issue of NPCs also being forced to become Christmas trees for the heroes to loot was in the top list, but that's much better resolved by having NPCs not be built according to PC rules; now a moot issue since both 5E and PF2 have adopted this)

In my view 5E could have taken the top spot of my favorite magic item implementations hadn't they ruined everything by weaseling out of a robust magic item pricing structure. Not including items into math is actually quite liberating, and of course, having items be powerful is a must.

So I'm forced to still retain 3E (including PF1) as the number one magic item implementation, despite all its many issues. For instance, when I prepared the main hub of magic shoppes in my Curse of Annihilation campaign (a 5E campaign) the Magic Item Compendium (a thirteen year old sourcebook) was outright invaluable.

In third place comes... nothing. Pathfinder 2 does still edge out 4th Edition, whose magic items were the blandest beige-st collection of sorry useless junk I've ever come across (I routinely combined two items into one and the players still almost never cared to even remember having them!). The chief reason is that Paizo wisely based their magic on d20, meaning that items with magical effects can still matter. The other reason is that thanks to how criticals work, a +1 is significantly stronger in PF2 than in d20.

Okay rant over

This is why I keep bringing up how old-school D&D does it. If the PCs don’t have to spend the gp to acquire XP, then it doesn’t mess up the magic item economy.

Sounds like a good compromise.

Or, I guess I mean simple and easy to understand. Because I still like the idea of a campaign where one player chooses to purchase a shiny magic sword and a good set of armor while another opts for a new level, but I guess you need to go back as far as AD&D to find a ruleset where levels matters relatively little* and items matter relatively much.
*) again, nobody expects a level 1 character to ever choose anything else than multiplying her life expectancy by leveling up...

Pathfinder 2 certainly doesn't work with such a campaign, of that I am sure. (Not unless you modify the game quite heavily, and I hope we can agree that the game with both PWL and ABP makes for a quite heavily modified PF2)

 

[CapnZapp]

I’m not even sure what this thread is about anymore.

As the thread starter, I would say it is about me revealing the emperor be naked.

Meaning that for all the praise Pathfinder 2 is getting, it comes with huge baggage in the form of convoluted rules that clutter and slow the game for no good reason. (If the rules were better because they were complex it would have been one thing, but they're not. They're written with expectations that aren't borne out of actual gameplay, at least when you play official adventure paths. In a few cases, the complexity actively obscures the results to a degree lots of players still carry false beliefs about what the rules actually do, even now, a year after release!)

I would therefore say that the thread was about getting people to realize and ideally acknowledge these often huge flaws and blunders.

But of course as we approach 600 posts anyone who is determined to pretend these problem areas doesn't exist won't suddenly give me credit for spotting them, so I guess that is why we're now topic drifting.

That's my two cents, at least.

 

[CapnZapp]

Oh, I entirely forgot to discuss investiture in my post above the last one

Just want to point out that the limit of 10 invested items have had exactly zero impact on my game, and we're level 16.
The players with "most invested" characters have 7 such items. Considering how the problem "I have 11, I have to ditch one" is easily solved by getting rid of... the 11th most wanted item - an item so undesirable there's a whopping ten items more desirable - I can emphatically say there is no real limit in the game.

So I'm afraid the only response that I can give you on the mitigating effects of investiture has to be:

No?

 

[FrozenNorth]

Magic items in 3E or 5E have actual power. They can replace entire levels, and they can redefine your character (viewed from the "what can I achieve" lens). They are desirable and wondrous. If you like magic items that your players actually want and use, 5E is fun and easy.

I would second this. As a DM, I give very few permanent magical items (and not a lot of loot in general). Not having required loot works out in three ways for me: one, I don’t have worry that the characters are becoming relatively weaker because they didn’t find magic items, two, the magic items I do include are more memorable, and three, I can use magic items to shore up obvious weaknesses in the weaker characters (like a bandanna that provides bonus ki to the 4E monk).

 

[kenada]

I don't need to discuss the wider martial-caster balance either, but just to be sure: are you talking about my suggestion to reduce ABP to a minimum here?

Yes, I’m just talking about your change to reduce ABP to a minimum.

Not sure I follow you here. The whole point of 5E is that magic item provides bonuses above and beyond "the math". This is actually far preferable, at least if the alternative is magic items like Pathfinder 2 or 4th Edition, where you never really feel rewarded for getting an item - instead you feel punished when you aren't.

Magic items in 3E or 5E have actual power. They can replace entire levels, and they can redefine your character (viewed from the "what can I achieve" lens). They are desirable and wondrous. If you like magic items that your players actually want and use, 5E is fun and easy.

This is a contradiction. 5e still has stat-boosting items. It still has +X weapons. By pretending they aren’t part of the math, it ensures that it can never provide good tools for assessing how strong the PCs are or what they can face.

You don’t have to necessarily make them an assumption. That’s where I was going about alternate ways to assess characters. If, as you say, they can replace levels, then those level-altering items ought to be flagged with a level modifier or something to indicate that, so the GM can take that into account.

Oh, I entirely forgot to discuss investiture in my post above the last one

Just want to point out that the limit of 10 invested items have had exactly zero impact on my game, and we're level 16.
The players with "most invested" characters have 7 such items. Considering how the problem "I have 11, I have to ditch one" is easily solved by getting rid of... the 11th most wanted item - an item so undesirable there's a whopping ten items more desirable - I can emphatically say there is no real limit in the game.

So I'm afraid the only response that I can give you on the mitigating effects of investiture has to be:

No?

Investiture means you don’t have to worry about item slots. Stat-boosting items can exist, and they don’t compete with other items in that slot because you can just wear both of them.

It may not serve as a practical limit on how many you can wear, but neither did item slots in 3e. I can’t recall (even past 20th level) a character in a campaign I’ve run filling every single slot. What items slots did do was ensure players ever only wanted stat-boosting items in their slots.

That’s why having an expected progression is fine with me. Those items don’t compete with fun items for slots, so they can exist and provide an alternate sense of progression. That striking runes are so good doesn’t bother me either because I’d give them out anyway. Yes, obviously it would be better if PF2 provided a way to assess them for GMs who didn’t want to do that or be bound by that.

 

[kenada]

Meaning that for all the praise Pathfinder 2 is getting, it comes with huge baggage in the form of convoluted rules that clutter and slow the game for no good reason. (If the rules were better because they were complex it would have been one thing, but they're not. They're written with expectations that aren't borne out of actual gameplay, at least when you play official adventure paths. In a few cases, the complexity actively obscures the results to a degree lots of players still carry false beliefs about what the rules actually do, even now, a year after release!)

I made an exploration tracker with summaries of the major exploration activities. That makes me unhappy. For a couple of reasons.

First, I’m back to making reference sheets like I did for PF1. While there is some value in making your own as a way to learn a system, I dislike that I am reminded of my experience running PF1. My custom GM screen in that game was really good, but I eventually just couldn’t run it anymore (but to be fair, for different reasons than that).

The second reason is a summarized several pages of exploration activities without losing anything. The only change I made was to Detect Magic and Search, and that was to omit the part about moving faster than 300 feet per minute because it is almost never applicable. If you have to move half speed, then you’d need to have a base speed of 60 feet for it to come up. Bleh.

I did the same thing with weapon traits. The game makes it more difficult to internalize how it works because it is verbose and wordy in ways that hinder clarity. That’s easily my least favorite aspect of PF2.

But of course as we approach 600 posts anyone who is determined to pretend these problem areas doesn't exist won't suddenly give me credit for spotting them, so I guess that is why we're now topic drifting.

I don’t think people are being obstinate. They just don’t see the things you identified as problems or problems with the same severity that you do. That shouldn’t be surprising, and it probably ought to be expected.

 

[kenada]

I agree with you.

I’m going to partially retract that statement. I started working on pre-gen last night, and just having a boost and a free boost was a little boring. It was was especially stark when rolling (or drawing) stats because then e.g., the Strength-based ancestry became the only way to get an 18 Strength.

What ended up happening (using the core method) is I’d just pick two boosts I wanted. Because there were no trade-offs involved, it ultimately felt a little rote and generic. Everyone ended up having similar arrays except distributed differently.

Since I want to draw scores (using the 445566777889 card method), I’m going to experiment today with using half boosts and flaws to see if that works better than just dropping the free boost. It feels kind of a bit crappy not being able to get an 18 at 1st level, but it was easy to get a 17. A 17 lets you get a 19, which turns into a 20 at the same rate as an 18, but I don’t think that is much of a consolation.

 

[CapnZapp]

This is a contradiction. 5e still has stat-boosting items. It still has +X weapons. By pretending they aren’t part of the math, it ensures that it can never provide good tools for assessing how strong the PCs are or what they can face.

You're right insofar that any given game can't achieve really tight math if it needs to support both magic-less and magic-full characters.

The bigger question that needs to be asked what is preferable?

I just know that I don't want tight math if it depends on anemic items. Yes, I love PF2's tight math. No, I don't agree with their design decisions - specifically that they include the items in their math and so feel compelled to make them almost as lifeless as 4E's.

Including items into the math compels the game, adventure and GM to hand them out. The better and more fun they are, the harder it becomes to avoid Christmas forests.

So the solution isn't 3E. Or 5E - Pathfinder 2 sports much more challenging and interesting monsters and combats. There could have been a game going for the best of both worlds by making combats challenging (like PF2) and then offer cool and interesting and really character-defining items (a la 3E or 5E) for those groups that feel they don't appreciate the lethality!

...and since monsters are much more capable and powerful, it's much easier to hand out fun items even to groups that doesn't need them, simply because I don't need to completely replace monsters (or add so many of them). The more the group struggles, the more items they can be assisted by.

Give a party of PF2 characters their selection of 5E items, and it's still easy to put the fear of God into them, just by adding a single L+4 monster to whatever encounter they think they're too cool for!

I am saying I don't see any need for PF2's tight math to be extended to items. The game would have served my needs much better if items were NOT expected/incorporated in "the math", so you aren't forced to hand out striking runes etc - but offer cool and powerful items (with clearly defined prices) when you do find them.

In PF2 you only have the illusion of an a la carte menu. In reality you must put your money towards fundamental rules. Not cool.

tl;dr: the benefit that a striking rune confers should totally be my choice (as GM) to hand out, not something whose absence cripples the character.

 

[kenada]

You're right insofar that any given game can't achieve really tight math if it needs to support both magic-less and magic-full characters.

The bigger question that needs to be asked what is preferable?

I just know that I don't want tight math if it depends on anemic items. Yes, I love PF2's tight math. No, I don't agree with their design decisions - specifically that they include the items in their math and so feel compelled to make them almost as lifeless as 4E's.

Including items into the math compels the game, adventure and GM to hand them out. The better and more fun they are, the harder it becomes to avoid Christmas forests.

So the solution isn't 3E. Or 5E - Pathfinder 2 sports much more challenging and interesting monsters and combats. There could have been a game going for the best of both worlds by making combats challenging (like PF2) and then offer cool and interesting and really character-defining items (a la 3E or 5E) for those groups that feel they don't appreciate the lethality!

...and since monsters are much more capable and powerful, it's much easier to hand out fun items even to groups that doesn't need them, simply because I don't need to completely replace monsters (or add so many of them). The more the group struggles, the more items they can be assisted by.

Give a party of PF2 characters their selection of 5E items, and it's still easy to put the fear of God into them, just by adding a single L+4 monster to whatever encounter they think they're too cool for!

I am saying I don't see any need for PF2's tight math to be extended to items. The game would have served my needs much better if items were NOT expected/incorporated in "the math", so you aren't forced to hand out striking runes etc - but offer cool and powerful items (with clearly defined prices) when you do find them.

In PF2 you only have the illusion of an a la carte menu. In reality you must put your money towards fundamental rules. Not cool.

tl;dr: the benefit that a striking rune confers should totally be my choice (as GM) to hand out, not something whose absence cripples the character.

You make a good point. I think those items need to be there because they’re kind of iconic — people who have played D&D expect +1 longswords to exist however boring they might be — but they affect the math, and that has implications for the system.

I’ve said it before, but I really wish Paizo had included a knob in the encounter building guidelines. My group isn’t good at tactics, so I switched the benchmark for moderate encounters from party level to party level − 1. That seems intuitively okay, but we’ll see how it goes in practice at our one-naughty word this weekend. Anyway, that should also go for items. If you don’t want to hand out certain items (for whatever reason) like striking runes, then you should be able to shift your expectations and continue to benefit from the tight math.

Has anyone done the math comparing a party with striking runes to one without? They’re obviously good, but how good? If we can measure that, then we can devise rules of thumb for adjusting the guidelines when one wants not to use those items. You can just say, “a moderate encounter for a 6th level party with no striking runes is actually two level 5 creatures,” and the math still just works. Proficiency Without Level adjusts the math, so I don’t think this is impossible.

Another alternative is the overall XP values remain the same, but you scale the creature selection math. Having level-specific versions of that seems like it would be more cluttered and less modular (because you would need versions for both core and PWL games).