Pathfinder 2E Five unusual things I'd like to see Paizo do.

[Dungeonosophy]

I realize that Paizo does "its thing," and that that "thing" works and sells. Okay great.

But as a D&D Refugee, and as a GM (formerly DM), who is considering converting to PF2, here are a few (unusual?) requests:

1) Make an official Paizo 5E to PF2 conversion document and online app, covering at least what is available in the CC 5.1 SRD.

2) Support a make-your-own-world, worldbuilding sandbox approach, instead of (or rather, in addition to) tying it so tightly with Golarion.

3) To support that: if/when a new printing of PF comes out (e.g. a de-OGLed revision), enclose all proper nouns in brackets <Otari>, as a reminder that you're supposed to make up your own proper names. And for all proper names, have an appendix in the back with a random name generator table tailored to each named feature, with the tables being Open content. (While keeping the actual Golarion names as closed IP.)

4) Form sort of shared meta-verse (Pluriverse? Polyverse? Omniverse?) which (at least nominally) brings together Golarion with the worlds of other former TSR/WOTC designers: e.g. the non-WOTC settings which are owned by Keith Baker, Monte Cook, Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman, Chris Pramas, Bruce Heard (Calidar), Ed Greenwood, R.A. Salvatore, etc.

And this is a biggy...

5) Um, PF2 is pretty (very) crunchy. I love Paizo's attitude. I love what Paizo stands for (the "two nickels" and all that). But, uh, what if Paizo developed a second house system which was ultra-lite (I mean, way simpler than 5E), and also offered its adventures and setting material in that ultra-lite system as well? Or maybe Paizo could just buy the best existing ultra-lite d20-ish game (e.g. Index Card RPG? The Black Hack? Heroes & Monsters? Mazes?), and use that. I guess Savage Pathfinder was something in that direction. But I could really go for an ultra-lite rules-set, but featuring the same Adventure Path stories, and having the same variety in character ancestries and classes...even though their stats would be a lot simpler. (And no, I don't want to play the Pathfinder card game.)

 

[Lojaan]

These are cool ideas but do we need Piazo to do them?

I think PF2 would benefit from different takes on the core system, the same way Grim Hollow, Aurora, Drackenheim, and Humblewood are different takes on 5e.

It would be so great to see PF2 versions of Star Wars or Forbidden Lands and the like.

Keep the core system and math and play around with different design philosophies.

Personally I'd love a PF2 version with very little complexity at level 1, and really interesting choices (class, subclass, prestige class etc...) as you progress through the game.

 

[Lojaan]

Oh hello

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hopefinder/hopefinder-roleplaying-game

 

[Retreater]

1) Make an official Paizo 5E to PF2 conversion document and online app, covering at least what is available in the CC 5.1 SRD.

There are some YouTubers making videos to demonstrate doing this right now. If you're interested in that format, let me know and I'll post some.
In my take, the conversion isn't especially difficult because the names are all the same or clear enough to tell (such as a 5E Paladin would become a Champion in PF2.)
So if you have a 7th elven monk in D&D, just make one in Pathfinder. Rebuild using the same class and ancestry but use the given rules in PF2 to make sure ability scores, feats, magic items are correct for that level (otherwise you risk imbalacing the encounters).

 

[Dungeonosophy]

There are some YouTubers making videos to demonstrate doing this right now. If you're interested in that format, let me know and I'll post some.
In my take, the conversion isn't especially difficult because the names are all the same or clear enough to tell (such as a 5E Paladin would become a Champion in PF2.)
So if you have a 7th elven monk in D&D, just make one in Pathfinder. Rebuild using the same class and ancestry but use the given rules in PF2 to make sure ability scores, feats, magic items are correct for that level (otherwise you risk imbalacing the encounters).

Yeah, if you have a nice list of good links, lemme know. Still, the conversion equivalents could be systematically laid out on the Paizo website or something.

 

[Dungeonosophy]

I guess another way of going about "#5", would be for Paizo to do more collaborative Kickstarters like it did with Savage Pathfinder. Namely...

...Pathfinder OSE Kickstarter, in collaboration with Necrotic Gnome.
...Pathfinder MAZES Kickstarter, in collaboration with 9thLevel.
...Pathfinder The Black Hack Kickstarter, in collaboration with Gold Piece Publications.
...Pathfinder The Index Card RPG Kickstarter, in collaboration with Runehammer Games.

...heck, do 'em all, and just see which sells best!

 

[Reynard]

PF2 and Paizo have likely benefited from the OGL in a positive and unexpected way, but it would be a mistake for them to.upend their whole publishing strategy and design philosophy to benefit 5E refugees -- the majority of whom probably will return to 5E and 1D&D within a few months.

Paizo is in a unique position among publishers because of their subscription format: they know how big their core audience is. They aren't going to upset that for the uncertainty of chasing 5E dollars or OSR dollars.

 

[Velderan]

PF2 and Paizo have likely benefited from the OGL in a positive and unexpected way, but it would be a mistake for them to.upend their whole publishing strategy and design philosophy to benefit 5E refugees -- the majority of whom probably will return to 5E and 1D&D within a few months.

Paizo is in a unique position among publishers because of their subscription format: they know how big their core audience is. They aren't going to upset that for the uncertainty of chasing 5E dollars or OSR dollars.

As a 5e refugee, I actually don't want them to change a thing. A few people on this forum have referred to 5e as the compromise edition and that's all it was to me. It did some things well, other things horribly and in the end I was looking for something different even before the OGL fiasco. The OGL fiasco got me to look at what else was out there and PF2e checked so many blocks for what I was looking for in a game.

That being said, I wouldn't be overly concerned as a newbie to PF2e if Paizo decided they could support a rules lite version of PF completely independent from 2e even though I wouldn't be interested in such a game.

 

[ScYork]

Paizo, keep doing what you are doing. I'm glad you are becoming more and more distinct from D&D in system design...its a breath of fresh air, don't copy D&Ds mistakes. It's nice to provide some supports to learn a new game, but if you listen to all the request from so called D&D refugees PF2 will revert to some sort of sad watered down version of D&D...PF2 needs to continue to innovate and differentiate from D&D not be some sad clone!

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

Well good to know you are just about as crazy on the Pathfinder forum as you are on the D&D forums!