Pathfinder 2E Looks like I will be running a PF2e game in a few weeks...suggestions?

[Philip Benz]

Capn, I strongly disagree with the entirety of your comments.
A clever DM can use PF2 (or any other flavor of RPG) to run any of the types of games being discussed here. You can do "sandbox" games just as easily as with any other game.
And far from being a "combat arena" centered system, PF2 goes out of its way to codify all sorts of out of combat situations.

Folks, don't let the strong opinions of one forum poster sway you one way or another (including me). The best way to judge a game on its relative merits is to play it for a few sessions. For PF2, the beginner's box and the Trouble in Otari adventures are a good place to start, but you can just as well use it for homebrewed adventures as for following published materials. I'm sure the same is true for almost any flavor of RPG anyone would care to mention.

 

[kenada]

And a highly ritualized arena-style combat at that, where if the opposition is even slightly too difficult will likely result in PC death.

That’s the point. Pathfinder 2e isn’t different from earlier editions of D&D in that regard. Old-school D&D has a reputation for being very deadly exactly because PCs are fragile and tougher creatures will destroy them. The game evolved the way it did because enough people wanted balanced arena fights, but that doesn’t mean the things you identify as a problem are a problem for a creative agenda that eschews arena fights.

Nothing about this particular variant of D&D is suited to sandbox play with very varied encounters. As soon as you deviate with long range or unusual terrain or monster groups interacting the meat of the game, it's carefully calibrated - and heavily enforced - balance, goes out the window.

This seems like a shift in the goalposts. So now not only combining encounters but also those with larger scares or varied terrain are problematic too? I think the idea of balance being offered has been distorted in a way that won’t resonate with those who do want balanced fights. I expect those who want balanced encounters assume they should win every fight (without having to engage in war tactics) rather than have them all be so tuned for optimal amounts of exertion from both them and the PCs in every case. 5e doesn’t even do that!

You would not utilize the strengths of PF2 and you would have to manage yourself what the game does not.

I'm not saying you can't make it happen. Heck, I could make it happen!

But why would I? I'm saying I would strongly recommend a looser version of D&D for it.

I agree and disagree with you here. I burned out on PF2 because my group just isn’t into tactical play in combat, and my preferences as a GM shifted. I don’t like the way skill resolution works in PF2, and I don’t like DCs. Ironically, I declared it would be too much work to try to fix skill actions in PF2, and here I am retrocloning WWN because the book is such a mess.

Pathfinder 2e would not be my recommendation if someone wanted to do an old-school or sandbox campaign. I would recommend an OSR system because there is a lot more community support for that kind of play, and those systems are more in line with my aesthetics and preferences. However, if someone really likes PF2, they can make it work.

Again, Pathfinder 2e isn’t very different from OSR games in how deadly encounters can be if you follow OSR-style principles, but you have to follow all of them, and that means giving up on balanced encounters. As soon as you do that, then the issues you cite with PF2 become non-issues (because having balanced encounters is not a thing one values in this approach). Getting into those fights is a failure state. You’re not supposed to just go up and wail on everything.

My advice for anyone wanting to run an old-school style game in PF2 to read the Principia Apocrypha and take it to heart. You’re going to have to do things differently than one might running a Paizo adventure path where encounters are parceled out in balanced chunks. It’s different, but those differences are the point.

 

[Retreater]

But if there's any edition of D&D or Pathfinder that simply isn't geared for "any" adventure in my opinion, it's Pathfinder 2. Think of PF2 as perhaps the most specialized version of D&D there is (that I've come across).

IMO, D&D 4e might be equally as specialized.

I can say that PF2 isn't a satisfying as a "combat arena" game for me - which I know from my attempt at running Abomination Vaults. D&D 4e handles that much better by having tighter combat options, more interesting creature design, more defined powers and rules options for classes.

I've run part of two APs. I don't think either of my experiences adequately tested PF2, because they were just that: tests and not real games. We wanted to see how the system works, to learn how combat and other subsystems worked. But what we didn't do in either was actually have a campaign with role-playing, character motivations, mysteries, sessions of exploring, etc. Until that is done, you're just rolling dice to see how fun combat is without any real connection to a character or story.

It's test-driving a new car in the dealer's parking lot. You don't really know how it drives until you get it on the open road.

 

[willrali]

Folks, don't let the strong opinions of one forum poster sway you one way or another (including me). The best way to judge a game on its relative merits is to play it for a few sessions. For PF2, the beginner's box and the Trouble in Otari adventures are a good place to start, but you can just as well use it for homebrewed adventures as for following published materials. I'm sure the same is true for almost any flavor of RPG anyone would care to mention.

I couldn't say how many undecided new players peruse this particular forum, but I'm going to guess not many

Edition warring is as old as dirt and people love to do it.

(I've avoided going on to the dnd forums to proclaim how the 5th edition's classes and levels all manage to feel exactly the same thanks to its 'everyone gets +2 to whatever stuff at lvl 1 and +6 to stuff at lvl 20' routine. And how it drove me away from the hobby for a few years. Like, why even bother having classes and levels at all? But this is the pathfinder forum so we're amongst friends )

 

[Thomas Shey]

A clever DM can use PF2 (or any other flavor of RPG) to run any of the types of games being discussed here. You can do "sandbox" games just as easily as with any other game.

I'm not going to find myself on the same side as CZ on many things related to PF2e, but I think I will on this one.

Your second sentence and your first contradict each other. If it requires a "clever" DM do do this, its not "just as easy". And that's true with all kinds of games trying to do all kinds of things. There are wrenches and screwdrivers and Swiss Army knives; trying to use the first for the second or vice versa will always be harder than using the right tool for the job. And the third has the virtue its less hard, but it also means that most of what makes a game work is always going to have to come from the GM, which is less true with a system more aimed at the style of play it wants.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Pathfinder 2e would not be my recommendation if someone wanted to do an old-school or sandbox campaign. I would recommend an OSR system because there is a lot more community support for that kind of play, and those systems are more in line with my aesthetics and preferences. However, if someone really likes PF2, they can make it work.

Just an aside (and to make it clear I liked most of your post) but the problem with this for some of us would be that even when I'm wanting to run a sandbox, I want more mechanical engagement than most OSR games seem to want to give. Tactical play and wide open worlds are not intrinsically contradictory wants, though the combination can make running the game much more challenging (in terms of the fact that good mechanical support for tactical play often makes for opponents that are harder to do on the fly).

 

[Retreater]

Just an aside (and to make it clear I liked most of your post) but the problem with this for some of us would be that even when I'm wanting to run a sandbox, I want more mechanical engagement than most OSR games seem to want to give. Tactical play and wide open worlds are not intrinsically contradictory wants, though the combination can make running the game much more challenging (in terms of the fact that good mechanical support for tactical play often makes for opponents that are harder to do on the fly).

Maybe we don't need one system to do both? Maybe we can have one system for tactical combat play and another for world exploration?
This is an old tradition in D&D when Outdoor Survival came recommended as the overworld portion of the game.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Maybe we don't need one system to do both? Maybe we can have one system for tactical combat play and another for world exploration?
This is an old tradition in D&D when Outdoor Survival came recommended as the overworld portion of the game.

Please don't take this wrong, but my attitude toward such things is "I'd rather gouge out my eyes." I don't have an issue with subsystems that extend a base system into different areas, but the last thing I want is entirely distinct subsystems; didn't like it decades ago, and my opinion of it has not improved with time.

 

[kenada]

Just an aside (and to make it clear I liked most of your post) but the problem with this for some of us would be that even when I'm wanting to run a sandbox, I want more mechanical engagement than most OSR games seem to want to give.

That’s fair. I apologize if I created the impression I was discouraging PF2 or suggesting one shouldn’t try to do sandbox games in it. My intent wasn’t that so much as to say that if someone asked, my default recommendation would be something else like OSE (or another B/X game) or WWN rather PF2. WWN in particular is designed around sandbox games and has a bunch of good tools for the GM, which are also system independent (so usable in PF2).

Tactical play and wide open worlds are not intrinsically contradictory wants, though the combination can make running the game much more challenging (in terms of the fact that good mechanical support for tactical play often makes for opponents that are harder to do on the fly).

PF2 was mechanically fine. Its approach just didn’t work well for my group. That would have been true whether I was running my sandbox or running a pre-written adventure module. If the fight’s difficulty was “moderate threat” or higher, it was a potentially dangerous situation because my group just wasn’t inclined to do what the system expected of them.

 

[kenada]

Maybe we don't need one system to do both? Maybe we can have one system for tactical combat play and another for world exploration?
This is an old tradition in D&D when Outdoor Survival came recommended as the overworld portion of the game.

That worked in OD&D because OD&D characters had no skills. It was an empty space where you could plug in whatever approach you wanted. Doing that in a game like PF2 would be really weird because you’d have to set aside various aspects of the characters that should otherwise work in the exploration structure.