Paizo Tells You About the PATHFINDER STRATEGY GUIDE

The Pathfinder Strategy Guide releases next month, and Paizo has posted an article entitled "10 Things You Didn't Know Were in the Strategy Guide". The 160-page book is a teaching tool for optimization, with detailed walkthroughs of the 11 core classes. "Unlock the secrets of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game! Whether you’re a new player eager to jump into the action or an experienced roleplayer looking for insights and a convenient teaching tool, this 160-page guide is your new advisor at the gaming table. Unsure which feat to choose or spell to prepare? Detailed walkthroughs of all 11 core classes help you create and customize exactly the characters you want to play, and continue to offer advice as you take your adventurers all the way to the heights of power. At the same time, this book provides a quick and easy introduction to combat and advanced rules options, tips for battlefield domination and better roleplaying, and more!"

The ten things you didn't know are described in detail on Paizo's site, but here's a quick list:

1. Themes
2. Character quiz
3. Class specific introductions to spellcasting
4. Tactical advice for combat
5. Overview of non-combat roleplaying situatons
6. How to start running your own games
7. Character sheet help
8. Beginner's guide to reading spell descriptions and other mechanics text
9. Detailed instructions for levelling up
10. Pointers toward further exploration on nearly every page

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[Mournblade94]

First Lyle Spade awesome Avatar.

This is a sign of jumping the shark. I stopped paying attention to the books released. Pathfinder is now crystalized hard candy in a glass of Kool Aid when all you wanted was a drink.

I love pathfinder. I am glad it was released, but it has gone too far with rules bloat. It is at maximum saturation and the value for the rules gain is going down with each new book except a bestiary.

 

[Dykstrav]

A little back-of-the-envelope math reveals that Pathfinder doesn't push out nearly the amount of hardcovers that 3E/3.5 did.

A quick glance at my own bookshelf reveals ninety-seven 3E/3.5 hardcovers published over approximately eight years and twenty Pathfinder hardcovers published to date. If we assume an eight-year history of publication (not exactly but close) we get over twelve 3e/3.5 hardcovers per year, right at one a month. Pathfinder, with about five and a half years of publication history (again, not exactly but close) works out to a little over three and a half hardcovers per year.

3E/3.5: Approximately one hardcover per month.

Pathfinder: Approximately one hardcover every three months.

These hasty figures are interesting but subject to opinion. Things would look different if the divide between which splats are intended for players versus intended for DMs/GMs were addressed, or the fact that much of Paizo's material covers adventures whereas Wizard of the Coast published very few of them. (To be truly accurate, I think someone would need to do a page-by-page breakdown of every product, sorting them by core content/optional content/new rules, and getting total page counts for comparison... But we all have lives, unfortunately. ) I think Pathfinder is far more manageable in terms of "system bloat" than 3e/3.5 was, especially since Pathfinder tends to add new options more than new rules.

I do think it's telling, however, that Paizo feels that an optimization guide is marketable enough to warrant development and publication. I don't see it as an admission that the rules are too complex because I've never seen an expectation for the game's learning curve stated anywhere... It does indicate that Pathfinder players expect a certain degree of system mastery, however, and expect other players to roughly equal to their ability in that regard.

 

[lyle.spade]

First Lyle Spade awesome Avatar.

Up the Irons! Did you hear about Bruce's cancer treatment? I guess even the giants are human.

Anyway, thanks for the nod - Aces High is a great piece of art...Stranger in a Strange Land, too.

 

[Koloth]

One advantage to both players and GMs, if a weird but effective combination of feats/skills/classes is listed in the Strategy Guide, that is admission by Pazio that said combination is both legal and approved. Many a discussion/argument has happened around gaming tables over character feature combinations and whether the game publisher really intended them to be combined that way.

 

[Jvirtue55]

I think this book is the link from the beginners box and the core book its to help people catch up with players who have been playing since 3.5 days.
And yes Paizo produces a large amount of books (they are a publishing company and thats how they make money) but when you look at rules new classes and that sort of thing for the Core Pathfinder Game its not nearly as bad as WOTC. Alot of what they print is for Golarion and the Adventure Paths. Just my 2 cents

 

[DMZ2112]

One advantage to both players and GMs, if a weird but effective combination of feats/skills/classes is listed in the Strategy Guide, that is admission by Pazio that said combination is both legal and approved. Many a discussion/argument has happened around gaming tables over character feature combinations and whether the game publisher really intended them to be combined that way.

Where I come from the dungeon master is the final arbiter of legal and approved content; designers' opinions about their own teetering Rube Goldberg engine of a 15-year-old bastard splatfest be damned.



I exaggerate for effect. I really do love Pathfinder, and while it is a unsteady beast, I think the game has gotten progressively better, not worse, since D&D3.5. But this Strategy Guide is not a dungeon master's tool. At best it is Pathfinder for Dummies, and at worst it is the Gospel of Player Advantage.

 

[Zil]

I think this book is the link from the beginners box and the core book its to help people catch up with players who have been playing since 3.5 days.
And yes Paizo produces a large amount of books (they are a publishing company and thats how they make money) but when you look at rules new classes and that sort of thing for the Core Pathfinder Game its not nearly as bad as WOTC. Alot of what they print is for Golarion and the Adventure Paths. Just my 2 cents

This. I wholeheartedly agree that this book looks like a great bridge from the Paizo Beginner Game to the Core game or as a crutch for otherwise new players to get them going if joining a much more experienced group. The bits I've seen from the book in the preview do remind me quite a bit of the beginner game rulebooks. I wasn't planning on picking this book up, but now I think I might in order to have for new players down the road.

As for the amount of rules/books in Pathfinder compared to 3.0/3.5, when I look at my bookshelves the Pathfinder material is certainly catching up to the amount of space that 3.0/3.5 takes up. However, more than half of the Pathfinder material is setting or adventures; that's not something that can be said for the 3.0/3.5 era books.

 

[Jessica Price]

Just to set expectations correctly, this *isn't* an optimization guide. It's more of a beginners' guide/bridge from the Beginner Box to the Core Rulebook.

 

[Wolf72]

Glut? rules bloat? it's the nature of the beast and economics. 5e will do this one day, too.

I like PF, the core rules work fine. The online resources give you a good taste of what is out there, and most of it is optional. Buy and use what you want.

I'm going to wait and see what the review are for this new beginner's guide. I'm old (basic then AD&D ... or 1e) and cranky when (not if!) I get back into DMing I'd like some published back up material to help out.

 

[turkeygiant]

I would really like to see Paizo take everything they have learned about rpgs since Pathfinder came out and make their own system from the ground up, perhaps one that is set in its own unique world. Something like Exalted, Anima, Alpha-Omega, or Rifts where it is their own sandbox to play in, no need to meet the themes and rules expectations of players looking to them to fill the void left by 3.5