Pathfinder 2E's New Death & Dying Rules; More on Resonance

It's another day, and that means another round of Pathfinder 2nd Edition News! Today's menu includes more discussion on resonance, followed by the main course -- the new rules for death & dying! All added, as ever, to the Pathfinder 2nd Edition Compiled Info Page!

Photo by Paizo

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• There are Pathfinder Playtest pro-order posters at the GAMA trade show. See above! And below...
• Gnome Stew reported on the Future of Pathfinder seminar at Gary Con. Mainly stuff we've heard before, but there are some new tidbits:
  • Shadow of the Demon Lord, white-box D&D, Magic: the Gathering, Tales from the Loop, and Star Trek Adventures were all referenced during development.
  • The item (shield) damage system has a name -- it's called "dented".
  • Some "signature gear" can level up with your character.
  • "Background will grant a specific Lore, which is similar to a specialized knowledge skill, such as Lore—Alcohol being granted to a character with barkeep as a background".
• Resonance proved divisive yesterday.
  • Jason Bulmahn weighed in on the heated discussion -- "Hey there all! Let's all just take a breath here before things get too heated. Resonance is a system that we knew was going to come with some controversy. It's really hard to give you a full sense of what the system allows us to do with the design space without going on a deep dive on magic items. This is a topic we are going to hit soon, so hang in there. I will say this before I go to run more demos at GAMA. Players have rarely run out of resonance in our games, and there is a lot more healing to go around than you might think."
  • Class features don't use Resonance -- "We avoided making class features that use Resonance Points unless they're directly tied to items. Resonance is a resource for items thematically and specifically. If you have abilities from a bloodline, you'll have to pay for those some other way..." (Bonner)
  • "...we've had some delightful occultist-based thought experiments based on some of these ideas as the "kings of resonance."[FONT=&amp] (Seifter)[/FONT]
  • Bulmahn commented -- "Hmm... I keep seeing posts that tracking one pool of points is too fiddly. It's odd, considering that it's meant to replace a system where everything had its own personal system of usage with times per day, total charges, and time based limits. Of course, I have plenty of reservations about this particular mechanic. We're definitely pushing the envelope here, but fiddly is not the complaint I expected to see so frequently."
• New Dying Rules! "RumpinRufus" reported on how they worked in the live streamed game at the GAMA trade show:
  • There are no negative hit points - if you take damage equal or greater than your HP, you go down to 0 HP and get the Dying 1 condition.
  • If a crit knocks you to 0, you gain Dying 2 instead of Dying 1.
  • Each round, you must make a save to stabilize. The save DC is based off the enemy - a boss may have a higher death DC than a mook, so you are more likely to be killed by bosses.
  • If you reach Dying 4, then you are dead.
  • If you make the stabilize check, you gain a hit point, but are still Dying. If you make another save at 1 HP, you are no longer Dying, and you regain consciousness.
  • If an ally heals you while you are Dying, you still have the Dying condition, even though you have positive HP. You still need to make a stabilize check to regain consciousness. But, once your HP is positive, you are no longer at danger of death from failing your checks - failing a stabilize check just means you stay unconscious.
  • The Stabilize cantrip puts you at 1 HP.
  • Mark Seifter further added -- "If you get well and truly annihilated by an attack, you die instantly. Even a 1st PC could probably insta-kill a kobold grandmother, even if the GM chose for full tracking of unconscious and dying NPCs."
• Erik Mona on monster books again, and how self-contained stat blocks will be -- "I don't think we've fully committed one way or the other yet. The playtest monster book is going to be mega stat block dump without a lot of description of what, say, a skeleton looks like or eats. As for special abilities and how they're formatted, while I know the design team has been hard at work on this stuff, I haven't interacted with it too much yet (I just finished going through magic items last night!)."
• Both Erik Mona and James Jacobs feel strongly about the presence of more outsider types on the summoning lists -- "No, actually, James Jacobs and I also feel very strongly about this. Very strongly."
• Logan Bonner comments on complexity, options, and the 'cognitive load' -- "We're keeping it in mind for sure. That's one reason we've rejiggered the number of bonus types, altered the action economy to make choice clearer, and (at least mostly) made it so you have options for static feats instead of only giving options to expand your list of actions. We'll see in the playtest whether that mix is right."
• Logan Bonner informs us that coffee and tea have been added to the Playtest Rulebook.
• Mark Seifter on how corruption could work "...gaining a corruption could unlock a new set of ancestry feats, as your fundamental nature has shifted."

Photo by Paizo
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[Lanefan]

But what happens when you run out of resonance? Well nothing really unless you want to drink another healing potion in which case all of a sudden the magic stops working.

And that is what makes it the worst rule, it just exists to stop your fun. Hey look at all your cool magic items you got there, too bad that you cant use them all. Sucks to be you I guess.

One of the intents of the Resonance idea seems to be to move people away from "all your cool magic items you got there" and toward a lesser number of even cooler ones...which if it works will be good, but the designers will have to put some "cooler" items into the game to make it so.

Because why do you "want" to spam your wand of cure? Because you dont want to go into your adventure injured.

This is something I don't mind at all - forcing a choice onto the players/PCs as to whether to stop and rest (and let the foes rest also, and set up better defenses) or press on even though some characters are a-hurtin'.

So if you cant use your healing then the obvious solution is to just go home and rest for the day which means it naturally feeds into a 5 minute work day.

It can, if the DM lets it. A good DM will mix it up - sometimes the party can quite safely pack it in for the day after one good fight while other times if they pack it in they're just going to keep getting attacked and disturbed; and the PCs will never know the safety level until they try it...at which point it's too late.

I would say that this is just a classic example of unexpected consequences except of course that we already saw this exact problem in 4e and do we really need to touch that burning hot fire again? No, just No.

I think we need to see what PF2 is going to do with rest rules and hit-point recovery first. If PF2 stays away from complete recovery on a long (or overnight) rest then this might not be so bad. But if they go with the 4e-5e model then yeah, it'll be messy.

Lanefan

 

[Shasarak]

One of the intents of the Resonance idea seems to be to move people away from "all your cool magic items you got there" and toward a lesser number of even cooler ones...which if it works will be good, but the designers will have to put some "cooler" items into the game to make it so.

That is true we have not seen much in the way of magic items yet.

This is something I don't mind at all - forcing a choice onto the players/PCs as to whether to stop and rest (and let the foes rest also, and set up better defenses) or press on even though some characters are a-hurtin'.

It can, if the DM lets it. A good DM will mix it up - sometimes the party can quite safely pack it in for the day after one good fight while other times if they pack it in they're just going to keep getting attacked and disturbed; and the PCs will never know the safety level until they try it...at which point it's too late.

Ah, yes I have seen that suggestion of the "good" DM mixing it up and on the other hand game theory would suggest that if Players can not reliably rest then instead of the 5 minute work day they just default to the 4 minute work day just in case they get that "wandering monster' showing up.

I think we need to see what PF2 is going to do with rest rules and hit-point recovery first. If PF2 stays away from complete recovery on a long (or overnight) rest then this might not be so bad. But if they go with the 4e-5e model then yeah, it'll be messy.

Lanefan

Ha yes, lets see if ol [MENTION=6779196]Charlaquin[/MENTION] gets to freak out or not.

 

[lightblade]

So, I was listening to the Glass Cannon playtest podcast last night, and I thought I heard that wielded items didn't require resonance; only worn items and consumables did. Anyone else catch that tidbit?

 

[Charlaquin]

Ha yes, lets see if ol [MENTION=6779196]Charlaquin[/MENTION] gets to freak out or not.

...Huh?

 

[Blue]

If you think that wand healing is cheesy then I just have to assume you have a very limited experience with cheese.

When you can't defend against the message, attack the messenger. *sigh*

Since Cure Light Wounds wands were specifically the abuse that Paizo brought up to discuss the need for Resonance, are you saying that you have a better idea, in aggregate, how the game is played and what complaints they have heard?

 

[Shasarak]

When you can't defend against the message, attack the messenger. *sigh*

Since Cure Light Wounds wands were specifically the abuse that Paizo brought up to discuss the need for Resonance, are you saying that you have a better idea, in aggregate, how the game is played and what complaints they have heard?

Yes, I have better ideas but what exactly are the complaints they trying to address with Resonance? If it is just healing wands they dont like then why not simply just remove healing wands as an option?

Say what you will about 5e but there is something about their idea of Story first that is much more appealing then gamist mechanics like Resonance. Have you ever read a story where someone drank a healing potion which did not work because they were too resonanced out? No, of course not nobody has. Instead we have a mechanic which works better if you are more attractive because obviously magic works better for good looking folk and frankly you were just too fat to heal, sorry Ugly Joe no offense.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Say what you will about 5e but there is something about their idea of Story first that is much more appealing then gamist mechanics like Resonance.

That is the most ridiculous thing that anyone has posted in these forums all week. Fifth edition is highly Gamist, to the point where the Story is rendered incomprehensible. That is the entire reason why PCs have Hit Dice to heal up between fights, and why everyone heals up to full overnight - it's all for the sake of making the game easier to play. If they cared about the story at all then getting hit by an ogre's club is not something you would be able to brush off after a nap.

Have you ever read a story where someone drank a healing potion which did not work because they were too resonanced out? No, of course not nobody has.

Nobody is stupid enough to drink a healing potion if they know it's not going to do anything. What does happen in stories is that characters are injured to the point where magical healing can't help them anymore, so it's nice that we might actually have to deal with something like that in-game.

 

[Shasarak]

That is the most ridiculous thing that anyone has posted in these forums all week.

Surely in a thread talking about Resonance it must only be the second most ridiculous thing that anyone has posted in these forums. And yes I did call you Surely.

Fifth edition is highly Gamist, to the point where the Story is rendered incomprehensible. That is the entire reason why PCs have Hit Dice to heal up between fights, and why everyone heals up to full overnight - it's all for the sake of making the game easier to play. If they cared about the story at all then getting hit by an ogre's club is not something you would be able to brush off after a nap.

In 5e PCs do not actually get hit by Ogre clubs which is why they can fully recover over night and why they can walk it off between fights. If you were using the 5e mechanics to tell the correct story then you would not be suffering from such severe cognitive dissonance right now.

Nobody is stupid enough to drink a healing potion if they know it's not going to do anything. What does happen in stories is that characters are injured to the point where magical healing can't help them anymore, so it's nice that we might actually have to deal with something like that in-game.

You know I have never ever seen a story where people dont get given healing potions unless they are already dead and never ever seen a story where someone does not heal from a healing potion.

I mean how does a character even know that the healing potion is not going to do anything for them? There is no way for them to tell without the totally gamist mechanic of the Player knowing how many resonance points they have left to spend.

And really if you just want Characters to die because they have run out of healing then why not just let them run out of healing and then die? Rather then having healing available that somehow, dont know why exactly but if I was an Elf I would not be having this problem, does not work.

 

[Charlaquin]

You heal Level x CON Mod HP when you rest, by the way. That came up in the podcast.

 

[lightblade]

4E solved the cheap consumables problem with requiring Healing Surges to trigger potions. A low-level potion would heal a flat 10 hp, instead of your surge value (1/4 your HP, rounded down). This was a good deal at low levels, but absolutely terrible later on. This provided the incentive to not use cheap healing at high level. (Though the CLW spam happened after PF encounters; in 4E a player would just spend surges during the short rest). Interestingly, Starfinder sort of sidesteps this with its separate tracking of HP, Stamina, and Resolve.