Pathfinder 2E Another Deadly Session, and It's Getting Old

[Retreater]

Well, there IS a wizard in the party...

Is that a bad idea?

 

[Thomas Shey]

This is probably part of the problem. Buffs on top of debuffs are really potent. You can boost your hit and crit rates by 15~30% if you’re stacking them up right.

Same for things that make it more likely for opponents to make save fumbles and demotes their crit chances. Its probably one of the areas where I suspect experience with D&D3 and PF1 give people false positives in expectations, since a +/-2 on those things there is pretty trivial and generally lost in the noise, where if you're paying attention the effect can be pretty notable in PF2.

From a tactical perspective, traditional RPG tactics can be self-defeating. If everyone charges in to fight the boss, then you’re just saving it the trouble of spending actions to move over to engage with the party. Make it waste those actions, shooting it as it approaches. If they won initiative, have the melee martials delay, so they can be ready to attack once it gets close.

I have to admit I've rarely found an opportunity to use my bow in Age of Ashes and I'm probably more prone to closing up immediately than is always ideal (I'm often setting up my wife's character with a flank, but honestly, she's perfectly capable of doing a tumble through and getting a target flat-footed without my help). The only reason I've not done it more than I should is I'll often find a bard spell I want to throw early on. Part of that might be that so much of the encounters in the early part have been in-doors, and keeping things away from the oracle-sorcerer.

The same goes for third actions. Unless you’re a flurry ranger fighting your hunted prey, you really shouldn’t be making a third Strike. It’s not likely to succeed, so you’re basically fishing for crits. You probably have a better chance trying to Demoralize your opponent. Even just moving away can be decent effective healing when the boss is likely to hit on its third attack.

The only time I recall making a third strike with my fighter was the one time his shield got broken and I was fighting a golem. I just had nothing else useful to do (moving away was undesireable because I didn't particularly want it closing up with the cloistered cleric.)

Is this a matter of expectations or perception? Like, a “low-threat” encounter feels more difficult than what you would expect a “low-threat” encounter to be in another system?

It could be terminology, or it could be they just haven't run any systems that have a relatively high floor.

(One observation I made about another post; I can name a number of systems where letting two encounter merge that were individually moderate in threat would be really, really bad. The whole BRP family of games come to mind. In fact, the only ones I have regularly used where its not true is ones that combine mook rules or brittle opponents with easy group-delete effects. Its not something I'd do in almost any post-gunpowder game, for example).

 

[FrozenNorth]

Is that a bad idea?

I played a wizard in our game (up to level 5). It seemed to be consistently underpowered compared to the other characters.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I played a wizard in our game (up to level 5). It seemed to be consistently underpowered compared to the other characters.

From reading a lot of discussion on the Paizo forums, there seem to be two things that lead to this impression (and note, that is not me saying that its entirely incorrect, just that whether it is or not it seems so for these reasons):

1. In general, spellcasters have been cut back some from 3e era ones. That's because (and I know this doesn't go over well with some, but I don't know any better way to put it that is honest) they were out of balance with non-casters. That was just taken as a given by a lot of people and was viewed as somehow okay by many, but that didn't make it good design and one of the design choices in PF2e was to push the two types together. One of the areas where this is very visible is that spellcasting is generally a weak way to directly deal with a single opponent--and that's probably the single most visible sign of effectiveness that most people percieve. Spellcasting can still be a good way to start cooking up groups when a spell caster is willing to take some positioning chance, and good ways to buff and debuff (but as I noted, people who haven't internalized the importance of manipulating crit and fumble chances don't always see it that way), but neither of these tends to be as visible (and of course occasionally you'll get GMs who make it really hard to apply the first; personally, I've watched one players lightning-oriented sorcerers dump more damage out on a semi consistent basis than either of my fighting types did, she just doesn't do it all in one place).

2. Getting full value out of prepared spellcasters can sometimes be tricky, and if a group is not good at information gathering it can be trickier yet. This isn't as big a problem with clerics as it is with wizards, so it isn't quite as visible there. In addition, they were probably more conservative with wizard focus spells than they really needed to be, so a lot of people find them underwhelming.
That said, wizards are still perfectly functional, especially universalist wizards (who aren't dependent on getting value out of questionable focus spells); you have to simply do a general utility spell set you default to and only change up when you have better information. You can argue at that point you might as well played a sorcerer (and on those occasions when you don't have information, you're not wrong exactly), but when you do have information you have a lot more capability to bake a cake. But it requires the willingness to do that, and a GM who doesn't resist it heavily. If neither of those is the case, a wizard will probably suffer compared to a sorcerer.

 

[kenada]

I'd expect the latter, honestly, because even the rough fights I've been in just didn't last long enough to burn through most of anything but someone's absolute top level spells. We definitely needed some Treat Wounds at the end there (I've been playing pretty much the damage sponge in both games, a Fighter in one and a Champion/Bard in the other, so I was often the person who needed the most propping up; I went down in a couple times, so its not like I didn't see some rough ones), but the real issue is that there's just not time to spend all the resources involved. If people are having fights that last the 6-8 rounds routinely in kind of needs for that, I'd be interested in, well, how (and I don't mean to be critical in saying that, I'm just genuinely puzzled).

It probably depends on the group. If the players feel like they’re at risk for future encounters, then they’ll pull back and rest regardless of whether that’s actually necessary. Specifically, forcing them to burn daily resources makes them more inclined to think they’re “down” and need to stop and rest. That’s easy to trigger if they had used some prior to last fight.

 

[kenada]

The only time I recall making a third strike with my fighter was the one time his shield got broken and I was fighting a golem. I just had nothing else useful to do (moving away was undesireable because I didn't particularly want it closing up with the cloistered cleric.)

It depends on the player. Some will fish for that crit because it’s exciting when it lands (even though it’s a worse option tactically). We have one player like that, but he’s playing a flurry ranger now, so at least he’s supposed to be doing that now.

 

[Celtavian]

Retreater,

Remember the 3rd book in Age of Ashes if you get there. Near the end. You'll be back here with another TPK. If your group survives, I want to hear about it. That encounter was the most vicious in the AP so far. If you run it by the book with everything reacting in an expected manner, not many parties can survive well without luck. Keep an eye out for it when prepping the 3rd book.

 

[!DWolf]

Since we’re talking tactics I figured I would add this to the discussion:

I just ran a low-level game and my players stomped the encounters hard (one low, two severe one in which they didn’t have armor on, and one trivial). They aren’t tactical geniuses by any stretch but they are exploration focused and fairly cautious in combat: they really like to a) use shields instead of third attacks and b) at the start they do a lot of positioning/raising shields/readying actions/ranged attacks instead of rushing to engage opponents (the party is also dwarf heavy). This leads to a sort of flow of battle:

1. perceive danger and arm up (ready shields and weapons get on armor if necessary/possible, initial positioning and recall knowledge checks, occasionally altering the terrain, making general plans; note the wizard wants to do more here but currently lacks the slots for a lot of utility spells).
2. combat starts: positioning, raising shields, and readying, with a scattering of ranged attacks (all of the characters have ranged weapons now - why would you not have at least a sling?) and the enemy moves up (getting hit by readied attacks and AoOs). With a dwarf and shield heavy party, the PCs generally hold up really well to the initial assault.
3. the party counterattacks the opponents, generally shredding them. Notably the wizard has, in two severe encounters, been absolutely devastating with blasts in this stage. Also two fighters working together (occasionally with bless from the cleric) are absolutely killer at these levels.

 

[Celtavian]

Since we’re talking tactics I figured I would add this to the discussion:

I just ran a low-level game and my players stomped the encounters hard (one low, two severe one in which they didn’t have armor on, and one trivial). They aren’t tactical geniuses by any stretch but they are exploration focused and fairly cautious in combat: they really like to a) use shields instead of third attacks and b) at the start they do a lot of positioning/raising shields/readying actions/ranged attacks instead of rushing to engage opponents (the party is also dwarf heavy). This leads to a sort of flow of battle:

1. perceive danger and arm up (ready shields and weapons get on armor if necessary/possible, initial positioning and recall knowledge checks, occasionally altering the terrain, making general plans; note the wizard wants to do more here but currently lacks the slots for a lot of utility spells).
2. combat starts: positioning, raising shields, and readying, with a scattering of ranged attacks (all of the characters have ranged weapons now - why would you not have at least a sling?) and the enemy moves up (getting hit by readied attacks and AoOs). With a dwarf and shield heavy party, the PCs generally hold up really well to the initial assault.
3. the party counterattacks the opponents, generally shredding them. Notably the wizard has, in two severe encounters, been absolutely devastating with blasts in this stage. Also two fighters working together (occasionally with bless from the cleric) are absolutely killer at these levels.

I wonder how many people don't use the exploration activities? They can be very helpful to preventing you from walking into an ambush.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It probably depends on the group. If the players feel like they’re at risk for future encounters, then they’ll pull back and rest regardless of whether that’s actually necessary. Specifically, forcing them to burn daily resources makes them more inclined to think they’re “down” and need to stop and rest. That’s easy to trigger if they had used some prior to last fight.

Well, that's a problem with any resource-consumption game, honestly; if people have a very low threshold of risk-taking and see resource renewal as a significant way to bolster that, you're always going to get some form of the five-minute work-day if it can be done. I've seen versions of it in every system with limited amount of magical or psionic power ever (I just watched someone put off directly dealing with a problem in my Mythras game tonight because one of the players had burned through his Devotion Points and wasn't about to take a chance he'd need them, even though even without them he's probably as capable as the one non-magically oriented character.).