Pathfinder 2E Is this a fair review of PF2?

[Ancalagon]

Such unjustified rapid healing is the most ridiculous design decision of all time, and it renders otherwise-decent games (such as 5E, and apparently PF2) completely unplayable to anyone who cares in the slightest about having a world that makes any amount of sense.

I see your dilemma. I'm going to repeat myself from another thread.

5e characters are not normal human being. A 5th 5e level character can jump off a 5 story building and survive. Sure, normal humans have done that too. But they can't do it every day and wake up just fine the following morning! Not taking "real" damage in a sword fight might be "luck". But falling down a 50 foot cliff? That's not luck or skill, that's... concrete.

So the PCs are ... legendary heroes - not just at level 20, at level 5. They are blessed by the gods. Heck, maybe they are gods - very minor gods, but gods nevertheless. I saw a show that was a decent (not great) re-rendition of "journey to the west" called "new legend of monkey" and the characters - who are mostly gods - really feel like level 5-9 D&D characters...

You can even have a world where there are two rulesets in effect, one for "mere mortals" and one for such heroes: The Monkey King and the GLOG Funnel

I suppose you could say that other rules with fast healing are also pointing to that direction, such as PF2. Although if it takes 40 minutes of table time to heal, "fast" is... perhaps a misnomer

 

[Cadence]

According to Tim Kask (see the link here), hit points were never supposed to be actual physical damage, even at the earliest stages of DnD.

They seem to have been at least in part in the 1e PhB though: "A certain amount of these hit points represent the actual physical punishment which can be sustained. The remainder, a significant portion of hit points at higher levels, stands for skill, luck, and/or magical factors. [...] Thus, the majority of hit points are symbolic of combat skill, luck (bestowed by supernatural powers), and magical forces."

 

[Doctor Futurity]

All of these assessments sound a bit silly. I've been running PF2E twice a week since it came out and I think it was maybe 2-3 sessions at the most before we got over an initial learning curve slowdown, and the game runs incredibly smoothly. I have completed one campaign from level 1-20 with me as GM, and have three other shorter campaigns of various levels in process.

 

[Doctor Futurity]

I suppose you could say that other rules with fast healing are also pointing to that direction, such as PF2. Although if it takes 40 minutes of table time to heal, "fast" is... perhaps a misnomer

I'm not even sure where this is coming from. Maybe hypothetically it's possible to spend forty minutes learning the rules while playing in the first couple of sessions as you adjust to the healing mechanics at first (and even then it didn't take that long for my group at the start, maybe ten minutes debating the finer points of treat wounds vs. healing options?), but after that healing takes no more time in PF2E than it does in 5E. Color me confused (and I've run Pathfinder 2E twice a week for the last year).

 

[Doctor Futurity]

Wait what? It took 40 minutes of table time to deal with healing?!?!? This should be a 5 minute activity - it can take 10 minutes because people waffle in my experience but 40?!?

I hope I simply misunderstood you there...

It is a five minute activity in PF2E. I am not sure where the confusion on the healing rules are coming from. In-game can take longer, as healing has some mechanical impact in terms of how often you can treat wounds and such, but in terms of play time it's a five minute activity.

 

[MichaelSomething]

I see your dilemma. I'm going to repeat myself from another thread.

5e characters are not normal human being. A 5th 5e level character can jump off a 5 story building and survive. Sure, normal humans have done that too. But they can't do it every day and wake up just fine the following morning! Not taking "real" damage in a sword fight might be "luck". But falling down a 50 foot cliff? That's not luck or skill, that's... concrete.

So the PCs are ... legendary heroes - not just at level 20, at level 5. They are blessed by the gods. Heck, maybe they are gods - very minor gods, but gods nevertheless. I saw a show that was a decent (not great) re-rendition of "journey to the west" called "new legend of monkey" and the characters - who are mostly gods - really feel like level 5-9 D&D characters...

You can even have a world where there are two rulesets in effect, one for "mere mortals" and one for such heroes: The Monkey King and the GLOG Funnel

I suppose you could say that other rules with fast healing are also pointing to that direction, such as PF2. Although if it takes 40 minutes of table time to heal, "fast" is... perhaps a misnomer

Another option is to reduce all PC stats by 4 each at first level. That'll bring them down a power level or two.

 

[Ancalagon]

Another option is to reduce all PC stats by 4 each at first level. That'll bring them down a power level or two.

... 3d6, in order, reroll one based on your race. This is the (glog) way.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

5e characters are not normal human being. A 5th 5e level character can jump off a 5 story building and survive. Sure, normal humans have done that too. But they can't do it every day and wake up just fine the following morning! Not taking "real" damage in a sword fight might be "luck". But falling down a 50 foot cliff? That's not luck or skill, that's... concrete.

I'm honestly not too concerned with high-level characters. (A level 5 character is fairly high-level, as far as things go.) What I care about is having a world that makes sense; and the behavior of a few outliers does not tell us much about that.

The ability of some people to survive incredible impacts is one thing. I can buy that some people just will. not. die. even when common sense says that they should. That's a thing. (And there's no point in arguing that sword-damage is mitigated by luck, as long as fall-damage is toughness. You don't need luck when we know that you really are that tough.)

The canonical existence of "luck" has major implications for the setting, though. If people really are being hit and physically injured, but all wounds automatically heal overnight, then that has major implications for the setting. If an attack roll that "hits" does not translate into a physical impact within the narrative, then that has catastrophic consequences for our world model, because now we have no idea what's actually going on in combat.

Yes, heroic adventurers are distinct from non-adventuring NPCs, and the book tells us what that means. It generally translates into better stats and more hit points. It's never suggested that they actually use a different ruleset. An NPC with Strength 10 and 4hp interacts with the same rules as a PC with Strength 20 and 400hp; they just plug different numbers into the same formulae. Which is great! And moreover, it's the only way things really could work, without writing a whole other ruleset to govern different segments of the population.

Although I suppose that could work, if they really wanted to write two different rulesets into the book, it's never really been suggested as what they're trying to do here. "You play as a demi-god, with the ability to regenerate from any wound over the course of an hour," has a much more limited appeal than, "You play as a hero, who is stronger and more capable than normal people," does.

For the sake of PF2, though, it's probably best to not derail this thread any further. The designers made their choice, that they care much more about building a balanced skirmish game than they do about having a believable world setting, and nothing we can do will change that.

 

[Gorgon Zee]

For the sake of PF2, though, it's probably best to not derail this thread any further. The designers made their choice, that they care much more about building a balanced skirmish game than they do about having a believable world setting, and nothing we can do will change that.

Yup, D&D hit points are simply not possible to reconcile with plausibility. If that's a huge sticking point for you, games with wound systems like Savage Worlds, Rolemaster or Fate are probably a better option. But they do make the game fantastically more playable, so I doubt we'll see any changes anytime soon to core D&D. Having said that, I did quite like the WotC Star Wars Saga version of damage, and wouldn't mind seeing a version of D&D with that form. But it seems unlikely ...

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Yup, D&D hit points are simply not possible to reconcile with plausibility. If that's a huge sticking point for you, games with wound systems like Savage Worlds, Rolemaster or Fate are probably a better option.

It's hilarious to me that you would suggest Savage Worlds or Fate, when I want rules to describe a world that makes sense. But it any case, D&D hit points were perfectly workable prior to 4E, being a very reasonable mixture of "easy to use" and "makes enough sense as to not drastically alter how the world works"; it's just that, as PF2 demonstrates, traditional (slow healing) hit points cannot be reconciled with a balanced skirmish game.