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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Retreater" data-source="post: 8725903" data-attributes="member: 42040">Having run (at least the beginning) Age of Ashes, Extinction Curse, and Abomination Vaults, I will give my opinion (which is only my opinion, and not indicative of the entire hobby):1) Age of Ashes was difficult. Way too difficult. There was an unimportant, throwaway encounter midway in the first book that is legendarily TPK-territory. (My group averaged a TPK every 3 sessions until we abandoned the campaign, the system, and even the gaming group that had been together for around 8 years.) 2) Extinction Curse is also too difficult. I had a TPK, again to an unimportant, throwaway encounter midway into the first book. It is also commonly a TPK-point (according to posters on the Paizo forums). This was after our first 3 sessions, and we abandoned the campaign and the system. The group nearly folded as well.3) Abomination Vaults, having the virtue of being written after the other two modules, didn't seem as deadly. It was still difficult and challenged the players (who I think were more tactically proficient) more than they'd probably enjoy. Speaking only for myself, I think the group lost interest because it was so repetitive and the dungeon crawl didn't hold their attention. I'm not suggesting 5e players should be Paizo's target audience, but there are a lot of 5e players who could be interested in PF2. Like I suggested early in the life cycle of the system, they should make a "beginner's adventure path" that teaches how to play the game and how to run it. (Even the Beginner Box has a - spoiler alert - a devastating final boss that frequently TPKs parties.) Even their free demo adventure includes an encounter that is well beyond what most groups would be able to handle. And that's not a way to get fans. The challenge and difficulty of encounters is not the selling point of Pathfinder: it is the tactical depth, the customization, the world. When players are constantly at risk of getting their characters killed, they are not going to try new tactics. They aren't going to learn how to customize their characters when they constantly die. They aren't going to become engaged in a world when they rage quit Adventure Paths.It might be better now. From what I've heard, Strength of Thousands is excellent and they've largely gotten the challenge level figured out. Of course this comes at a point that we're now three years into a system - and a lot of the initial goodwill and excitement has been spent. There are many groups that won't have a positive first impression of the system.</blockquote>

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