Pathfinder 2E Is It Time for PF2 "Essentials"?

fearsomepirate said:

Paizo during its 1e era had about the same market share as WotC, and of course, WotC's 4e license was extremely restrictive, so that hardly any 3rd parties bothered with it. Today, D&D alone is something like half the total market, and P2e's share appears to be in the single digits. If you're a small publisher making 3rd-party product, the potential payoff from using your limited resources to make another 5e product rather than translating it to PF2e product seems like a no-brainer.

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Thanks, that’s what I suspected. Too small a marketshare.

Justice and Rule said:

I'm still just utterly baffled by the people who think PF2 isn't a roleplaying game. It's such a weird, foreign idea to me, like creating rules to adjudicate situations suddenly eliminates any sort of roleplay possibilities.

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Except that isn’t exactly what was said upthread, or all that the poster intended. Their claim rather was: "The main problem with PF2 is that it is not a role-playing game. It is a tactical wargame with role-playing elements.“

So just pointing to roleplaying-elements doesn’t falsify but only corroborates the claim made.

How would one falsify it? That’s more complicated, but I recall two useful points from the 4e discussion regarding the same issue.

1. just saying that you can use game x to roleplay with doesn’t make x a roleplaying game. Descent 1 by Fantasy Flight is a dungeon crawl Boardgame and I used it to introduce my (elementary school age) nephews to RPGs. We just introduced skill checks using the Descent dice for perception, stealth, and persuasion, and then the players got bonuses on those die rolls if they roleplayed how they sneak past or parley with a monster. My nephews, on their own, came up with the idea to share their gold with one of the hobgoblins and recruited him as a henchman. The dialogue was comedy gold.

2. building on the same example: a game isn’t a RPG if, out of the box, it doesn’t encourage, incentivize, or demand roleplaying as a resolution mechanic; similarly, a game that allows you to roleplay decisions and outcome that are mechanically determined, isn’t thereby a rpg. For, if you want, you can roleplay the knight stabbing the king in chess, but that result wasn’t generated by roleplay, you’re just roleplaying a mechanical game result in the way an actor reads out (and gives life to) a pre-existing script. Similarly, you could totally roleplay your 4e powers hitting critters on the battle field, or re-skinning your powers to shoot green rays rather than blue. But that was surface dressing and didn’t drive the game‘s resolution mechanic one bit.

By metric (2.) above, Descent isn’t a roleplaying game though it can be used as one—and though I have some fonder RPG memories from Descent 1 than six years of D&D 4th edition.

By the same metric, 4e’s combat game—the core of the game—wasn’t a RPG. It was a DDM (d&d miniatures) clone, and a very enjoyable one at that. Both designed by Rob Heinsoo.

By the same metric, elements of 4E such as its disarm traps system (allowing players to disarm traps if they properly describe how they do that) and skill challenges tapped into a greater degree of RPG-ness than 3.x or Pathfinder (either iteration) ever did.

So I think the question whether something qualifies as a RPG or not depend on what someone thinks is at the heart of a game, and then how much they think that heart/core engine allows for roleplaying. It‘s not binary and frankly how a game is advertised or how it’s referred to for sales purposes is neither here nor there. Nor is it determined by "but I had my fondest RPG experience with game x“ though many people believe that’s the sole relevant criterion.

All the above is coming from someone who believes D&D 4e and PF2 are both roleplaying games. I mean, if I can roleplay a Fantasy Flight beer and pretzels game, some dissociated mechanics ain’t gonna stand in my way of good ol‘ roleplaying fun.

Windjammer said:

Except that isn’t what was said upthread. The claim rather was: "The main problem with PF2 is that it is not a role-playing game. It is a tactical wargame with role-playing elements.“

So just pointing to those elements doesn’t falsify but only corroborate the claim made.

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In fairness, no elements as to why it's a "tactical wargame with role-playing elements" are ever given in that post beyond "NPCs aren't built like PCs", which I find to be absurd. My comment's focus from when Starfox described it previously in another thread where I made a similar point and they responded. Here's the quote:

Starfox said:

My point is the exact opposite: the part of a game emphasized in the rules is the part likely to be used most. And PF2 and 4E both focus on the boardgame elements. Thus play in these games tend to focus on the battlemap and combat abilities. The mechanics of non-combat events in 4E/PF2 seem to be made to gloss over such events using simplistic mechanics like the skill challenge, that encourages roll-play over role-play to save time and allow more time to be spent on the focus of the game, combat.

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I think the first idea (That combat rules are emphasized) is meaningless since most d20 games emphasize combat: they are regularly the biggest parts of the book, and most class features revolve around them. PF2 doesn't emphasize a battlemap anymore than 5E does, and even 4E can be played TotM if you just convert squares into feet. Every edition of D&D basically works better with a battle map because every edition of D&D uses precise distances when it comes to weapon reach, range, threat range, blasts, etc. If you want to tell me that something is less "boardgamey", you don't tell me to look at another d20 game, you should be telling me to look at something like FFG Star Wars, where distance is abstracted and exact measurements are not given.

But the second half is what I'm talking about: when people use the term "roll-play", it's about having systems of arbitration built into the game, rather than relying on GM fiat to decide things. PF2 has more rules for social encounters, which to me says that they are trying to encourage people to actually do things with social skills rather than having to rely on whatever their GM decides to allow them to do that day. I mean, to use the same system again, FFG Star Wars has more rules for social encounter adjudication than most D&D games, but I'd say that it encourages those aspects much more within the game compared to combat. Having more ways that the system interacts with something doesn't decrease one's ability to roleplay within it.

Windjammer said:

How would one falsify it? That’s more complicated, but I recall two useful points from the 4e discussion regarding the same issue.

1. just saying that you can use game x to roleplay with doesn’t make x a roleplaying game. Descent 1 by Fantasy Flight is a dungeon crawl Boardgame and I used it to introduce my nephews to RPGs. We just introduced skill checks using the Descent dice for perception, stealth, and persuasion, and then the players got bonuses on those die rolls if they roleplayed how they sneak past or parley with a monster.

2. building on the same example: a game isn’t a RPG if, out of the box, it doesn’t encourage, incentivize, or demand roleplaying as a resolution mechanic; similarly, a game that allows you to roleplay decisions and outcome that are mechanically determined, isn’t thereby a rpg. For, if you want, you can roleplay the knight stabbing the king in chess, but that result wasn’t generated by roleplay, you’re just roleplaying a mechanical game result in the way an actor reads out (and gives life to) a pre-existing script.

By metric 2, Descent isn’t a roleplaying game though it can be used as one. By the same metric, 4e‘s combat game—the core of the game—wasn’t a RPG. It was DDM/d&d minis, and a very enjoyable one at that.

By the same metric, elements of 4E such as its disarm traps system (allowing players to disarm traps if they properly describe how they do that) and skill challenges tapped into a greater degree of RPG-ness than 3.x or Pathfinder (either iteration) ever did.

So I think the question whether something qualifies as a RPG or not depend on what someone thinks is at the heart of a game, and then how much they think that heart/core engine allows for roleplaying. It‘s not binary and frankly how a game is advertised or how it’s referred to for sales purposes is neither here nor there.

Coming from someone who believes D&D 4e and PF2 are both roleplaying games.

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No, I would largely agree with your analysis. I suppose I wasn't clear on what I meant because I was basically continuing an argument from a month ago in a different thread. My bad for the confusion.

I ran 4e totm and it’s a lot more involved than just squares to feet, but yea.

also the ORIGINAL rpg monsters (and NPCs) were not built like PCs so that just poped out to me as especially absurd.

Pathfinder Second Edition has elaborate systems built around exploration, stealth, social interaction, and down time. It dedicates more effort than any game other than Exalted Third Edition to what happens outside of combat that I have seen in a traditional game.

The way it weighs Accomplishment Rewards (and rewards everyone for them) so heavily actively encourages going after your goals rather than just fighting everything.

Rituals and rarity reward active engagement with the world.

I would not say it is more of a roleplaying game than its competition, but if we want to have that argument I feel comfortable Pathfinder Second Edition holds its own.

Assessing whether something is a role-playing game is fraught. For whatever academic value it has, it seems like it’s mostly used as a way to delegitimize games or styles of play the assessor doesn’t like. Here, lacking 3e’s simulation aspects is cited as one of PF2’s “board game elements”. In John Wick’s “Chess is not an RPG”, it was being able to succeed using just mechanics. It stinks of gatekeeping.

My inclination is to defer to those playing a game to determine whether it’s an RPG. Descriptivism seems like the way to go when it comes to these kinds of things.

I don't really care to defend my points; they are after all opinions and everyone is allowed their own. What I tell myself I am trying to do is to explain to PF2 designers and fans what turns people (me) away from the game so they can avoid this situation in the future.

Nilbog said:

I am slowly coming to the conclusion that there is a definite trend for people to be happy to see things fail that they personally don't enjoy, and that saddens me

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I think this is always true. And triply so on the internet.

However, the reverse applies as well. People will insist that the thing they like is perfect "as is" and no amount of evidence will change that.

I think PF2E failed to learn from 4E when it went all-in on a math-balance first mechanic foundation.

It isn't growing. It isn't gaining popularity. It is "fine", I suppose because of course nobody can say what Paizo wanted. But you can't even point to any evidence that it is doing better than PF was doing the day before PF2E was announced. It trades off with Call of Chthulu in sales and there is now 5E 3PP that is solidly outselling it day over day on Amazon.

I know it is considered a low blow to compare PF2E to 5E. But this is 5E 3PP!!!!
I have a hard time believing that Paizo couldn't CRUSH any other 5E 3PP if they had elected to go that direction. And they could have done it with a far smaller investment.

And, of course, I'm just saying this because I'm sour. OK. Guilty. It doesn't make it not true. I'll completely own that I was super excited for the design team of Paizo to turn their talents to a more modern game that still provided the game experience I enjoy. But they turned away from that and I'm bummed by that.

I do like 5E. I like it a lot. But if they wanted to make my personal ideal game it would be a lot different. And it would be a lot less popular. A whole lot less. I am quite conscious of my personal taste bias. And I don't confuse that for trying to look at the data honestly.

I anyone thinks that four years ago the Paizo mgmt sat down and said "go design a game that will be on par with CoC and behind 5E 3PP after 18 months" then I think they are out to lunch.

kenada said:

Assessing whether something is a role-playing game is fraught. For whatever academic value it has, it seems like it’s mostly used as a way to delegitimize games or styles of play the assessor doesn’t like. Here, lacking 3e’s simulation aspects is cited as one of PF2’s “board game elements”. In John Wick’s “Chess is not an RPG”, it was being able to succeed using just mechanics. It stinks of gatekeeping.

My inclination is to defer to those playing a game to determine whether it’s an RPG. Descriptivism seems like the way to go when it comes to these kinds of things.

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The gatekeeping claims are 100% BS.

To the contrary, people complaining about PF2E want it to appeal to MORE people.

Teemu said:

Not a single officially published NPC in 5e uses the PC creation rules. They don’t get feats or ASIs, they don’t get XP, they don’t have inspiration. All built with the “monster” creation rules.

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As a DM I can create NPCs with the PC character creation tools, but I don't have to - which is great. 90% of NPCs have one or two scenes - no reason for me to was all the time to make a PC type NPC.

FYI, both the MM and DMG have rough guidelines for class levels for monsters/NPCs. From the DMG:

kenada said:

but it was my understanding that it is growing slowly on roll20.

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the latest Orr report doesn't agree.