Hey howdy my friends, it’s time for yet another PAIZO REVIEW! Today we’re cracking into a very exciting new product for all you Pathfinder 2E fans: it’s the Pathfinder Advanced Player’s Guide! Stuffed to bursting with new ancestries, backgrounds, classes, archetypes, and more, this new supplement offers excited players a truly staggering number of customization options. Let’s dig in!
One of the most interesting themes that you might find throughout the APG is that a lot of the new options presented here have the “uncommon” keyword. Nominally, this means that they’re only available to characters with certain prerequisites, but in most of these cases these options are character-generation choices. In this case, GMs will have to decide if the options are appropriate for their campaign.
Amusingly, there is a sidebar on the first page discussing this issue! Interestingly enough this sidebar mentions how some ancestries normally considered Common are only thus in certain areas of Golarion – the halfling and dwarf ancestries have an Uncommon keyword in Tian Xia, for example. That said, rarer toys are always more exciting – how soon do you think it’ll be before you’re in a group, organized play or not, where everyone at the table has an uncommon ancestry, background, or both?
Also the GM in me is eternally grateful to the writers for including a reminder to readers that while yes, your new and shiny character is unusual and outcast in the typical Pathfinder world, you still need to work together as a party. Honestly, some players need a little bit more reminder in that lane regardless!
Onto the ancestries! I won’t go into too much detail here – each of the ancestries and backgrounds are fairly well-balanced and usually have interesting and thematic ancestry feats, so I’ll be focusing mostly on what really sticks out to me. For example, catfolk (and who’s surprised that catfolk are the first new ancestry available, really?) have a few feats that functionally amount to “what do we say to the god of Death? mmmmmmeeeeeyooow!”
The Kobold ancestry provides an example of an interesting and exciting character option I want to see more of. One of their ancestry feats gives them critical success if they roll success on certain saves, but also critical failure if they roll a failure on the same saves. I love the risk-reward aspect to feats like this, and I want to see more of that going forward!
The APG also provides new options for the ancestry options in the Core Rulebook. Some of these options seem…more powerful than others? Dwarves, for example, have feats that let them either a) see in magical darkness or b) add a pretty consistent flat bonus to their melee strikes? One of these seems more useful than the other. Humans get access to a feat that just begs to be used for a “you and what army” scenario, and goblins continue to be my favorite thing in Pathfinder with the description they get for loud singing.
There’s also a whole new bevy of backgrounds to choose from, both Common and Rare to choose from. I have to admit I’m rather amused by the Barber and Cultist background from the Common section, and of course we have Amnesiac to complete the “OC do not steal” bingo board that the rest of the book fills out.
Let’s move on to the new class options! Investigators get a special shout-out from me because they are now officially the top dog when it comes to being the party skill monkey. They get a skill increase every level! Honestly, a lot of their kit seems like a big pile of GM-frustrating nonsense, and I can tell it will require more cooperation with said GM or else it will feel like a lot of your kit is less than useful.
The Oracle class is a perfect example of the risk-reward gameplay I was talking about earlier! In first edition, the oracle curse was a bit of a static partner that only got less and less present as you get more powerful. Here, the curse is the source of the oracle’s power AND the resource they spend to cast focus spells. More debilitating, yes, but also more powerful! Whoever was working on the Oracle was having a lot of fun and is doing some serious flexing as a game designer.
Here is also where we finally find the option for evil champions, or for those of us stuck in earlier editions, blackguards (or antipaladins). These guys are some pretty hard-line dudes, though, so I don’t see them sticking in anything other than an evil campaign.
Finally, the last layer of customization is Archetype, and the APG has plenty to choose from. Honestly, by the time we get to archetypes, I’m a little exhausted by the incredible diversity of options that come through combining this with the already-full Core Rulebook. That said I’m morbidly curious to see how ridiculous a campaign it would make to have a party that takes more than just one feat per customization option – like, several ancestry feats, class feats, archetype feats in addition to rather than instead of class feats, so on. That way lies madness. That way lies gestalt.
I’m very impressed by the Advanced Player’s Guide. Paizo packs a lot into the 265 pages of content here and nearly everything in here sparks interest if not excitement for a new character or build. Definitely worth your time if you want to make a splash at your next table.
One of the most interesting themes that you might find throughout the APG is that a lot of the new options presented here have the “uncommon” keyword. Nominally, this means that they’re only available to characters with certain prerequisites, but in most of these cases these options are character-generation choices. In this case, GMs will have to decide if the options are appropriate for their campaign.
Amusingly, there is a sidebar on the first page discussing this issue! Interestingly enough this sidebar mentions how some ancestries normally considered Common are only thus in certain areas of Golarion – the halfling and dwarf ancestries have an Uncommon keyword in Tian Xia, for example. That said, rarer toys are always more exciting – how soon do you think it’ll be before you’re in a group, organized play or not, where everyone at the table has an uncommon ancestry, background, or both?
Also the GM in me is eternally grateful to the writers for including a reminder to readers that while yes, your new and shiny character is unusual and outcast in the typical Pathfinder world, you still need to work together as a party. Honestly, some players need a little bit more reminder in that lane regardless!
Onto the ancestries! I won’t go into too much detail here – each of the ancestries and backgrounds are fairly well-balanced and usually have interesting and thematic ancestry feats, so I’ll be focusing mostly on what really sticks out to me. For example, catfolk (and who’s surprised that catfolk are the first new ancestry available, really?) have a few feats that functionally amount to “what do we say to the god of Death? mmmmmmeeeeeyooow!”
The Kobold ancestry provides an example of an interesting and exciting character option I want to see more of. One of their ancestry feats gives them critical success if they roll success on certain saves, but also critical failure if they roll a failure on the same saves. I love the risk-reward aspect to feats like this, and I want to see more of that going forward!
The APG also provides new options for the ancestry options in the Core Rulebook. Some of these options seem…more powerful than others? Dwarves, for example, have feats that let them either a) see in magical darkness or b) add a pretty consistent flat bonus to their melee strikes? One of these seems more useful than the other. Humans get access to a feat that just begs to be used for a “you and what army” scenario, and goblins continue to be my favorite thing in Pathfinder with the description they get for loud singing.
There’s also a whole new bevy of backgrounds to choose from, both Common and Rare to choose from. I have to admit I’m rather amused by the Barber and Cultist background from the Common section, and of course we have Amnesiac to complete the “OC do not steal” bingo board that the rest of the book fills out.
Let’s move on to the new class options! Investigators get a special shout-out from me because they are now officially the top dog when it comes to being the party skill monkey. They get a skill increase every level! Honestly, a lot of their kit seems like a big pile of GM-frustrating nonsense, and I can tell it will require more cooperation with said GM or else it will feel like a lot of your kit is less than useful.
The Oracle class is a perfect example of the risk-reward gameplay I was talking about earlier! In first edition, the oracle curse was a bit of a static partner that only got less and less present as you get more powerful. Here, the curse is the source of the oracle’s power AND the resource they spend to cast focus spells. More debilitating, yes, but also more powerful! Whoever was working on the Oracle was having a lot of fun and is doing some serious flexing as a game designer.
Here is also where we finally find the option for evil champions, or for those of us stuck in earlier editions, blackguards (or antipaladins). These guys are some pretty hard-line dudes, though, so I don’t see them sticking in anything other than an evil campaign.
Finally, the last layer of customization is Archetype, and the APG has plenty to choose from. Honestly, by the time we get to archetypes, I’m a little exhausted by the incredible diversity of options that come through combining this with the already-full Core Rulebook. That said I’m morbidly curious to see how ridiculous a campaign it would make to have a party that takes more than just one feat per customization option – like, several ancestry feats, class feats, archetype feats in addition to rather than instead of class feats, so on. That way lies madness. That way lies gestalt.
I’m very impressed by the Advanced Player’s Guide. Paizo packs a lot into the 265 pages of content here and nearly everything in here sparks interest if not excitement for a new character or build. Definitely worth your time if you want to make a splash at your next table.
