Pathfinder 2E Fighter Class Preview For Pathfinder 2nd Edition!

There is precious little as to what a fighter can do *outside* of combat...

 

[Eirikrautha]

The only thing an RPG needs in order for all actions to be possible is a robust, but ideally easy to use set of core rules that the GM can use to adjudicate the results of the actions the players describe. Giving players codified options of things they can do using a more specific set of rules, such as a spell or a combat maneuver, does not prevent other players from performing actions with similar intended results using the core rules of the game. Just because the Battlemaster in 5e has a disarm maneuver doesn’t mean only Battlemasters can disarm people. Just because the Rogue has Sneak Attack doesn’t mean only Rogues can attack people’s weak points from a hidden position. People seem to draw these weird arbitrary lines where it’s ok for characters other than the Ranger to follow tracks, but for some reason if a Feat called “Whirlwind Attack” exists, nobody who doesn’t have it is allowed to spin around in a circle when they attack. It’s bizarre.

Ideally, that would be how it worked. But both organizationally and mechanically, it's not. I've benn at PFS tables at Cons where players were told outright, "You don't have X feat, so you can't do that." Maybe those GMs were "doing it wrong." But I've watched it happen, and I don't think its that rare. It becomes the expectation that, if a mechanical option is available that it will become the preferred method of doing that thing.

Your own examples support this. If "attack people’s weak points from a hidden position" is codified in the game rules as "do more damage" then only a Rogue gets sneak attack damage. If the game is balanced around the chance a Battlemaster has to disarm, then either you trivialize the BM's ability by giving everyone else the same chance to succeed, or the game mechanics numerically "persuade" others not to try because the numbers mean they have a radically lower chance of success (this was one serious problem with PF1's skill system). Either way, the build choices reduce the *viable* choices.

Of course, this is necessary in any RPG. The question is the extent. And that circles back around to my original point. The OP could tell very quickly whether the new PF would fit his balance of where player choice occurs,

 

[Dungeonosophy]

A newbie question: why doesn't a shield help against breath weapons and fireballs, even at 1st level, whether I'm a Fighter or not?

 

[Charlaquin]

Ideally, that would be how it worked. But both organizationally and mechanically, it's not. I've benn at PFS tables at Cons where players were told outright, "You don't have X feat, so you can't do that." Maybe those GMs were "doing it wrong." But I've watched it happen, and I don't think its that rare. It becomes the expectation that, if a mechanical option is available that it will become the preferred method of doing that thing.

I’m not interested in designing games around “bad DM proofing” them. I’d much rather the designers assume DM competence, and then the community teach DMs to do it well than for the designers to restrict themselves because someone somewhere might handle it less than ideally.

Your own examples support this. If "attack people’s weak points from a hidden position" is codified in the game rules as "do more damage" then only a Rogue gets sneak attack damage.

It’s not. The Rogue’s Sneak Attack feature is codified as “do more damage when you attack someone’s weak points from a hidden position.” This is an example of a really well designed maneuver because rather than allowing the character to do something specific (and in some DMs minds, disallowing other characters from doing it), it gives them a unique benefit when they do something that anyone can do. Ideally, this is how all maneuvers, feats, etc. should be designed. This is why 4e’s Hammer Hands (an at-will stance that lets you shove an enemy 5 feet and then move into the space you shoved them out of whenever you hit with a melee attack while in the stance) is a better-designed Power than Tide of Iron (an at-will Attack that does the sake shove-and-shift effect on a hit), despite having nearly identical effects.

If the game is balanced around the chance a Battlemaster has to disarm, then either you trivialize the BM's ability by giving everyone else the same chance to succeed, or the game mechanics numerically "persuade" others not to try because the numbers mean they have a radically lower chance of success (this was one serious problem with PF1's skill system). Either way, the build choices reduce the *viable* choices.

This problem doesn’t go away in a streamlined system. If you let a player’s described action in combat do something other than the system-prescribed effects of an attack, and the result is better than a normal attack, you trivialize normal attacks. If the result is worse than an attack, the game mechanics “persuade” other players not to try. This was part of the reason for the shift towards “front loaded” maneuvers in the first place - players wanted to be able to do cool things without having to rely on DM adjudication either invalidating normal attacks or making cool improvised options not worthwhile. This is just something you kind of have to accept as part of roleplaying games. DM-adjudicated results are always going to run the risk of not being perfectly numerically balanced witn the rest of the system. The inclusion or exclusion of codified maneuvers doesn’t change this fact either way.

Of course, this is necessary in any RPG. The question is the extent. And that circles back around to my original point. The OP could tell very quickly whether the new PF would fit his balance of where player choice occurs,

Sure, but my point was they should have known that from the word “Pathfinder” in the title. Anyone who came into PF2 hoping it would be anything short of a crunchy, “front-loaded” system was setting themselves up for disappointment. Paizo knows their niche, and while they may be trying to streamline the complexity of the new system, they know that any significant loss of mechanical depth, particularly in terms of character building options, is going to lose their core audience’s interest.

 

[Charlaquin]

A newbie question: why doesn't a shield help against breath weapons and fireballs, even at 1st level, whether I'm a Fighter or not?

That is an excellent question. I personally think it should, especially since you have to spend an action to raise your shield now.

 

[Arakasius]

Most tables I've played at operate nothing like Critical Role. How you can leap from scripted streaming shows to "general community" is beyond me.

Critical Role is a show that is bringing a lot of new people to the game. They're likely to emulate the playstyle shown within. There is tons of other streams out there running 5e in a very similar way now. I don't think you can discount the effect that that show has on the game and how many people emulate it in their playing. And Mercer is actually a fairly strict rules DM compared to most people I know.

 

[mellored]

There is precious little as to what a fighter can do *outside* of combat...

It seems like everyone get's class feats, which are for combat, and skill feats and ancestor feats, which seem like they fill the non-combat part of things.

 

[Charlaquin]

It seems like everyone get's class feats, which are for combat, and skill feats and ancestor feats, which seem like they fill the non-combat part of things.

From what’s been previewed, there are Class Feats, which you get every even-numbered level, Ancestry Feats, which you get at 1st level and certain odd-numbered levels, and General Feats, which you get at odd-numbered levels where you don’t get an Ancestry Feat. Skill Feats are a sub-category of General Feats, so you can take those any time you get a General Feat. There may be some levels where you have to take a Skill Feat, but that’s not entirely clear. Also, at odd-numbered levels, you get Skill Increases, allowing you to increase your Proficiency with a limited number of Skills. Rogues get to do this every level.

So yeah, even if all Fighter Class Feats are combat-related, at least half of your Feats will still be able to get you things not directly related to combat, if you want them to.

 

[Ancalagon]

So you’re just going to ignore the part where I said “after level 3” then?

More like forget :/

Anyway, to address that more fully - There is definitely more in PF than 5e for that... but at the same time, because of feat chains etc, you need to plan your character in advance. So does "after level 3" really "exist"? Since you'll have made those choices already at low level...

 

[Ancalagon]

It seems like everyone get's class feats, which are for combat, and skill feats and ancestor feats, which seem like they fill the non-combat part of things.

You aren't the first to point it out, but this is good news. It's good when the fighter player can be more engaged

 

[Charlaquin]

More like forget :/

Anyway, to address that more fully - There is definitely more in PF than 5e for that... but at the same time, because of feat chains etc, you need to plan your character in advance. So does "after level 3" really "exist"? Since you'll have made those choices already at low level...

Now on that, I fully agree. That’s a big part of why I play 5e currently. My hope is that PF2 will rectify that, providing a game that offers plenty of build choices throughout a character’s careeer that are not so interdependent as to require you to plan the build ahead of time.

I mean, there is already a system that provides that. But hopefully PF2 will provide one that doesn’t carry the stigma 4e does.

 

[Shasarak]

A fighter in a less "crunchy" game is surrounded by three opponents who are trying to grab him. The player controlling the fighter looks at the GM and says, "I want to spin around with my sword held outward and try to strike all of the opponents surrounding me. They are crowding in on me, so they would have a hard time not being hit." The DM thinks about it and says,"O.K., that makes sense. It'll be harder to hit the opponents, because you are spinning and not aiming. Take a -5 penalty on each roll."

Yeah, sometimes I miss the days where you can just tell the DM that you are stabbing the Fool in the eye to get an insta-kill without having to go through the slog of peeling off his hit points the old fashioned way.

 

[Shasarak]

A newbie question: why doesn't a shield help against breath weapons and fireballs, even at 1st level, whether I'm a Fighter or not?

Because a shield adds to your AC and neither breath weapons nor fireballs target your AC.

Spoiler

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[Charlaquin]

Because a shield adds to your AC and neither breath weapons nor fireballs target your AC.

Sure, but that doesn’t explain why a shield adds to your AC but not to your Reflex. Cover adds to your Reflex, why not shields?

 

[Tranquilis]

I disagree. In fact, I can say with relative certainty that, at most tables, delineated abilities only increase player choice at creation and serve to restrict player choice during play. I'll give you an example.

A fighter in a less "crunchy" game is surrounded by three opponents who are trying to grab him. The player controlling the fighter looks at the GM and says, "I want to spin around with my sword held outward and try to strike all of the opponents surrounding me. They are crowding in on me, so they would have a hard time not being hit." The DM thinks about it and says,"O.K., that makes sense. It'll be harder to hit the opponents, because you are spinning and not aiming. Take a -5 penalty on each roll."

In a more crunchy game, the DM is more likely to say, "That sounds like a Whirlwind attack. Did you take that feat? If not, you can't do that." Now a more flexible DM might allow someone to try a whirlwind attack untrained with penalties, but then runs the risk of irritating the player who took that feat, as it might be seen as devaluing that feat choice (if anyone can do it, the feat just becomes about bonuses). I've actually seen this happen at the table in a PFS game.

You see, by delineating these choices in the rules, you add to your choices during character creation. But in many circumstances, you've now closed off the other actions you didn't take feats for during play. It's the difference between a board game and a role playing game. In an ideal (meaning theoretical) board game, all actions are prescribed precisely by the rules. In an ideal RPG, all actions are possible, with the rules determining the results. The middle generation of RPGs (3.5, et al.) became more like board games ( I'd argue because of a fear of bad DMs restricting player agency and also the desire to minimize "arbitrary" decisions at the table... but that's another argument). This has somewhat trained many DMs and players to think of RPGs as pseudo-board games (especially in combat), with only those actions expressly permitted as being allowed. AD&D had rules to describe the results of actions; modern RPGs of the same lineage have rules to explain what *can* be done (look at the action economy rules, with bonus actions, reactions, etc...). Pathfinder 1 was firmly in that mold (and less so than 5e is). PF2 appears to have the same underlying rationale...

Preach on!! Less "ruled" options, and more imagination, please.

 

[Eirikrautha]

Yeah, sometimes I miss the days where you can just tell the DM that you are stabbing the Fool in the eye to get an insta-kill without having to go through the slog of peeling off his hit points the old fashioned way.

Hopefully, the first PF2 monster compendium will contain a stat block for Straw Dogs, since you seem fond of them.

P.S. As per AD&D PH - Incapacitated creatures may be killed at the rate of one per round (no pesky hp need be peeled)...

 

[Shasarak]

Hopefully, the first PF2 monster compendium will contain a stat block for Straw Dogs, since you seem fond of them.

P.S. As per AD&D PH - Incapacitated creatures may be killed at the rate of one per round (no pesky hp need be peeled)...

It is amusing that you had to find a "rule" to describe a narrative attack. I guess you must be more used to "crunchy" games.

 

[houser2112]

Preach on!! Less "ruled" options, and more imagination, please.

It's ok if you like that style of game. Lo and behold, there is a game just for you called Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition. I hear its mantra is "Rulings, not rules". Why you want to turn Pathfinder into 5E when you already have 5E and all the OSR systems that cater to that style is beyond me. As another poster said:

Sure, but my point was they should have known that from the word “Pathfinder” in the title. Anyone who came into PF2 hoping it would be anything short of a crunchy, “front-loaded” system was setting themselves up for disappointment. Paizo knows their niche, and while they may be trying to streamline the complexity of the new system, they know that any significant loss of mechanical depth, particularly in terms of character building options, is going to lose their core audience’s interest.

 

[Arilyn]

Preach on!! Less "ruled" options, and more imagination, please.

Ahh, but even 5e is pretty crunchy. If you really want less rules, more imagination, you should be looking at games like Heroquest by Robin D. Laws or Barbarians of Lemuria. These are examples of games that actually fit the parameters of "rules light". 5e's got plenty of rules, or we wouldn't see so many discussions on the forum about what specific spells or feats do. And even back in the day,with ADnD and 2e, there was plenty of warnings in both game books to be very very careful about changing rules, lest the whole balance of the game come tumbling upon you. Sure PF is crunchier than 5e, but arguing about "rulings not rules" in any DnD game, except original (mostly cause they were incomprehensible) doesn't actually bear up.

 

[Shasarak]

Sure, but that doesn’t explain why a shield adds to your AC but not to your Reflex. Cover adds to your Reflex, why not shields?

Maybe you can provide that feedback during the playtest?

 

[Charlaquin]

Maybe you can provide that feedback during the playtest?

I will, if after playing with the rules as written I feel like shields could use a bit of a boost.