Meet Pathfinder 2's Cleric; Plus Spellcasting Basics!

On the Paizo comments a lot of people are annoyed that classes get less than PF1, less class features and have to pay feats to get them back. The counter argument is that you get those feats instead of class features, just meaning you can chose how you want your class - rather than stuck with what is written. The same applies to races/ancestries. Either argument aside it does seem that all classes and races are nerfed, you don't have enough feats at level 1 in PF2 to get all the features to equal level 1 PF1. We haven't seen what backgrounds and Archetypes exactly do yet tho. I think this is a good thing, spread the power - but people don't like having things taken away I guess.

Secondly a lot of comments about only getting, max, 3 spells memorised per spell level. Another good thing IMO, to lower the power of casters vs mundanes; and also casters won;t have the spell to do automatically what other classes roll skills etc for all the time. There is the concern about 15 min adventure day tho, but that is partially offset by scaling cantrips.

These things mostly look good to me, as a DM normally I don't care about PC's having less than PF1. As long as they are better balanced against each other and opponents, it's irrelevant - but there is a lot of the Endowment Effect going on

Very interested to see the entire Playtest tho, very hard to get a feel with these tiny titbits - not that it hasn't released the rage on Paizo!

 

[Sunseeker]

The designers have basically suggested that they took the most radical/controversial option for any particular decision and went with that in the Playtest, believing they can always inch backwards from that if its not well received.

I could probably find those citations.

Presumably things inch back towards a more reasonable system for PF1e-to-PF2e conversion as they roll back a lot of the systems that will end up being rejected by playtesters as it becomes too cumbersome to convert an in-progress Carrion Crown (or what-have-you) campaign over.

So much of their adventure material for PF1e has adversaries with class levels, a huge change to class-based mechanics makes it really hard to run those. If it was all mostly monsters who stayed in CR bands, then it's easy to run.

I'm gonna be "that guy" for a moment and say this: everything you see in the pre-release is final. Nothing will change. What you see is what we'll get.

 

[houser2112]

I'm gonna be "that guy" for a moment and say this: everything you see in the pre-release is final. Nothing will change. What you see is what we'll get.

I'm also skeptical of their "nothing is set in stone" stance. I believe small tweaks here and there based on the playtest might be possible, but major design elements aren't going anywhere.

 

[TwoSix]

I'm also skeptical of their "nothing is set in stone" stance. I believe small tweaks here and there based on the playtest might be possible, but major design elements aren't going anywhere.

Yea, they've already said they've been working on this project for multiple years and have already tested multiple iterations. They're not going to radically change anything at this point.

 

[Morrus]

If some third party were to jump in at this point and pick up the torch and ship a 3.85e set of books, I can guarantee they'd end up with $100 of purchases (assuming 2 $49 books) from over a dozen gamers who are wondering what their 2019 and beyond gaming looks like.

$1200? That won’t go far.

 

[wakedown]

$1200? That won’t go far.

Ha! That's just from the gamers I'm gaming the most with in 2018, who so far their only purchases in the current year include a copy of Xanathar's and some missing packs of Paizo's Adventure Card game.

So at least among my closest circle, that'd be a 24X increase in spending.

 

[Morrus]

Ha! That's just from the gamers I'm gaming the most with in 2018, who so far their only purchases in the current year include a copy of Xanathar's and some missing packs of Paizo's Adventure Card game.

So at least among my closest circle, that'd be a 24X increase in spending.

Well that’s the cost of the covers sorted. Just 700 pages of art and text and editing and layout to go!

 

[Yaarel]

It seems that the rules are baking in the flavor that every religion has to be a polytheistic religion. That is unfortunate.

Please, keep the rules setting neutral − especially the cleric class. Allow the cleric to make sense in other kinds of settings.

Clerics of philosophies and abstract forces are part of D&D tradition, especially 3e.

Please word the rules in a way that invites the diversity of ways of human spirituality: monotheism (as an abstract compassionate ethical force), animism (like shamanism), philosophy (like Buddhism), force (like the ‘dao’, ‘love’, ‘light’, ‘lifeforce’, or so on).

Put the Golarion setting in a sidebox that explains its objective polytheism and the placement of clerics there in the Golarion setting.

Keep the core rules usable for nonpolytheistic settings.

 

[Yaarel]

Yeah, I'm not too fond of the small = charismatic equation. There should be un-charismatic smallfolk, especially for those who like Hobbit-like characters and I'm not sure whether Goblins should have a baseline Cha bonus. Also, I'm a bit afraid that this leaves the medium sized or larger ancestries with no high-cha option which would be really sad.

Yeah, goblins are pretty much the opposite of charisma. They are simultaneously unappealing and not taken too seriously.

Going by folklore, make the goblin stats inferior to a human − weaker, dumber, more frail, more obtuse − but then give them magic ability to compensate.

 

[Yaarel]

On topic, it is interesting to see that Pathfinder 2 is definitely going with a life path character generation for abilities: Ancestry, Background and Class for abilities rather than point buy.

I like linking stats to narrative, and visaversa, so for me it is a plus to generate scores via choices. At the same time, I hope customization is easy to do within this system.

 

[Lylandra]

Yeah, goblins are pretty much the opposite of charisma. They are simultaneously unappealing and not taken too seriously.

Going by folklore, make the goblin stats inferior to a human − weaker, dumber, more frail, more obtuse − but then give them magic ability to compensate.

They even had a CHA flaw in PF1, so I don't think it makes too much sense to give them a boost now. If they wish to include the Goblin in PF2 core, I guess they'll need to fit the +2 to 2 stats (one mental, one physical), -2 to 1, +2 flex pattern. So why not +2 to Int to make them better alchemists?