Pathfinder 2E Regarding Competence

[Retreater]

You want to feel progress, so your ability numbers go up. Then the DCs have to go up because you need to feel like you are using your heightened abilities. It's really a part of the same treadmill of fighting monsters with higher AC/more HP/etc.
We can't stay at 1st level forever in this genre of game, so I understand it, even if it breaks verisimilitude.
So why does it now take a DC 35 to climb a wall or break down a door? Well, that door or wall has been magically enchanted - I guess?

 

[Philip Benz]

Sure, that treadmill is one possibility.

But what if the DM keeps most DCs on the static DC scale, based on the guidelines from the individual skills, and only uses enhanced DCs now and then, or when you are actually offensively using a skill against a specific creature or NPC adversary? That really disrupts the treadmill.

For example, my 11th-level players recently went running around an underground cave system, and ran across several 50' or 60' cliffs. I kept the base DCs to climb fairly low (DC20, "wall with small handholds") and dropped it to DC15 once they'd put in a rope to climb. At that level, they would only fail on a nat 1. But when somebody did fail, they ended up scrabbling with "grab an edge", and it was pretty funny. Even though the DC had become routine for everyone. OF course, the wizard kept a few feather fall spells prepped, which go off as a reaction, so he saved some of his teammates from a 25-30 hitpoint fall.

Of course, that doesn't prevent the DM from having that one, magically enchanted door that is really hard to open, with a killer lock on it that is really hard to pick. It's just not every door that has the enhanced DC.

 

[The-Magic-Sword]

Yeah largely I think the problem is that the treadmill argument is only meaningful if difficulty becomes this entirely abstract thing-- if all of the things in my dungeon for level 5 characters, and all the things in my level 15 dungeon are level 5 and 15 challenges respectively, and there isn't even flavor difference between them, you're going to see a treadmill. But obviously, there's serious problems with the fiction if that's happening-- If you're immediately replacing Young Dragon statblocks with Adult Dragon statblocks, you're gonna get that sense, but let them fight a bunch of young dragons? they'll feel how much more powerful they are.

The relative power level of challenges should be reflecting their relative difficulty in the fiction of the game world-- you should not be leveling basic zombies or something up with the players, their stationary power level should serve as a measuring stick for the concept of growth. Players feel great when they're decimating hordes of creatures that used to challenge them as solos or small groups, not using the players level to pick DCs can mean that non-maxed skills can be important, particularly if you're running exploration mode correctly and everyone has a set activity they're doing as you move through the environment, so things can't always be covered exclusively by specialists.

If there can be said to be an issue, its that what we call the 'game' is really a rules engine, and therefore a lot continges on the adventure design, a GM who makes all the DCs standard DCs of the parties level is naturally going to create that feeling, while a GM who respects that a simple door is a low dc, or that they can let the PCs encounter monsters weaker than them they've seen before to telegraph their growth, really won't have that problem.

 

[Staffan]

My problem with high-level DCs are mostly with things that naturally scale with PCs, but aren't a matter of active opposition – things like Recall Knowledge (because you're facing higher-level monsters, you now know less about them), Identify Magic (because you now find more powerful items, you are worse at IDing them), Craft/Repair (same), and the like.

Oh, and I really really dislike things like lingering composition that has you make a Performance check against "a standard-difficulty DC of a level equal to the highest-level target of your composition". If you want an ability that wants you to invest in a skill, have the effect based on your proficiency level instead.

 

[kenada]

I miss having more interaction with the skill system. Each level you can pick which skills to focus on or learn in 3E/PF1. You can also boost your stats and find magic items to help improve your ability. Everything is so tightly wound in PF2 that it often feels like there is little you can do for the sake of variety. You go off the path just a bit, and the system punishes you harshly with ineffectiveness. I do like moving away from the gonzo nature of 3E/PF1 skill math, but I feel PF2 design choices were often an overreaction.

That’s one of the complaints my group has about post-3e systems. There’s a skill points variant in the GMG, which adds a bit more flexibility. We used it in my PF2 game, but (of course) my players ended up more or less following the normal progression.

 

[kenada]

Bounded Accuracy blows. It incentivizes you go with skills that match your stats, otherwise you have to wait a dozen levels to equal someone who specializes in that stat. A fighter who takes History but doesn't have good intelligence is going to pale to a Wizard who didn't touch the skill. Why have Animal Handling on a Ranger when a Paladin is going to have the Charisma to outstrip you on it?

This is the problem with small numbers, especially on a linear die roll. There's just no benefit to simply having the skill, you have to have the stats to really use it. It's why in my game I split uses into "Trained" and "Untrained", where people who have the skill are at Advantage on Untrained checks and people who don't have the skill are at Disadvantage on Trained checks.

Isn’t that more of a problem with how 5e implements it? Even with an ability score cap, most people are going to get more out of their modifiers than they are out of their proficiency bonus. Additionally, there’s no way to specialize and make yourself better because everything increases at the same rate (unless you can gain expertise in a skill, which seems to have turned into a hack to work around this problem). If higher ability scores were more rare, or you got more out of your training, it might be different. I think PF2 does a better job here than 5e with the Proficiency Without Level variant because: you are penalized using a skill untrained, and you get more out of training.

 

[kenada]

Yeah largely I think the problem is that the treadmill argument is only meaningful if difficulty becomes this entirely abstract thing-- if all of the things in my dungeon for level 5 characters, and all the things in my level 15 dungeon are level 5 and 15 challenges respectively, and there isn't even flavor difference between them, you're going to see a treadmill. But obviously, there's serious problems with the fiction if that's happening-- If you're immediately replacing Young Dragon statblocks with Adult Dragon statblocks, you're gonna get that sense, but let them fight a bunch of young dragons? they'll feel how much more powerful they are.

The relative power level of challenges should be reflecting their relative difficulty in the fiction of the game world-- you should not be leveling basic zombies or something up with the players, their stationary power level should serve as a measuring stick for the concept of growth. Players feel great when they're decimating hordes of creatures that used to challenge them as solos or small groups, not using the players level to pick DCs can mean that non-maxed skills can be important, particularly if you're running exploration mode correctly and everyone has a set activity they're doing as you move through the environment, so things can't always be covered exclusively by specialists.

If there can be said to be an issue, its that what we call the 'game' is really a rules engine, and therefore a lot continges on the adventure design, a GM who makes all the DCs standard DCs of the parties level is naturally going to create that feeling, while a GM who respects that a simple door is a low dc, or that they can let the PCs encounter monsters weaker than them they've seen before to telegraph their growth, really won't have that problem.

This touches on one of the key differences between “leveled” combat and “level” skill DCs. In combat, you’re fighting commensurately scarier creatures. They’re hitting harder and depleting more of your resources, there are more of them, and so on. In the skill scenario, the difference is entirely in the description. It makes me wonder if instead of using a “scaled” DC it might not be better to use skill challenges or the VP subsystem. That way, you get to feel how your skill proficiency lets you overcome the steps easily, but the overall challenge still matches the nature of the task.

 

[Justice and Rule]

Isn’t that more of a problem with how 5e implements it? Even with an ability score cap, most people are going to get more out of their modifiers than they are out of their proficiency bonus. Additionally, there’s no way to specialize and make yourself better because everything increases at the same rate (unless you can gain expertise in a skill, which seems to have turned into a hack to work around this problem). If higher ability scores were more rare, or you got more out of your training, it might be different. I think PF2 does a better job here than 5e with the Proficiency Without Level variant because: you are penalized using a skill untrained, and you get more out of training.

A lot of it is 5E's design, yeah. Very low BA makes things more difficult because we aren't working with, say, GURPS' 3d6, where you can gain really consistent results and having more skills largely increases your consistency in the face of complications. Being a d20 game makes having very low numbers way more difficult to create skill gaps. PF2 tries to get around this with their proficiency system by making the numbers consistently go up. But their Proficiency Without Level system also does it way better because of that -2 making an instant +4 gap between someone having a skill and not. To go back to my previous examples, a Fighter with 10 Int will be equally as good trained at History as a Wizard who has no knowledge of it isn't necessarily ideal, but in this system you also have way more chances for advancement: ASIs are handed out more and you can choose to upgrade a skill to exceed someone. This makes it much better compared to 5E, where that Fighter is going to be waiting half the campaign at least to even equal the Wizard.

 

[Staffan]

This touches on one of the key differences between “leveled” combat and “level” skill DCs. In combat, you’re fighting commensurately scarier creatures. They’re hitting harder and depleting more of your resources, there are more of them, and so on. In the skill scenario, the difference is entirely in the description. It makes me wonder if instead of using a “scaled” DC it might not be better to use skill challenges or the VP subsystem. That way, you get to feel how your skill proficiency lets you overcome the steps easily, but the overall challenge still matches the nature of the task.

The problem there is that your combat numbers increase more or less automatically. You get more hit points at each level, if you're a non-fighter martial you improve your attack proficiency at level 5 and 13, and get better magic weapons at level 2ish, 10ish, and 16ish, and probably get a bonus from increasaing your attack stat at level 10 (and maybe 20 – or 5 and 15 if your attack stat doesn't start at 18). You don't really have any control over those numbers.

But with skills, you have the choice of which ones to increase, and those you don't will fall behind what's expected. A 12th level party trying to fight a pair of 12th level creatures will be in for a Moderate fight more or less regardless of what choices they have made. Their feat choices might affect what approach they take to the fight, but it will still be a Moderate challenge. But if you're 12th level trying to negotiate a treaty, and haven't boosted Diplomacy, you're in for a rough time. On the other hand, if you have maxed your Charisma, become a Master Diplomat, and gotten a +2 item, and maybe you have some skill feat to help in a non-numerical way, you're (slightly) ahead of the curve.

 

[Philip Benz]

Exactly. Staffan summarized the customization possibilities in PF2, but it doesn't stop there. Your ability to use skills you are at least "trained" in does increase every level, since your level factors into the total bonus. Sure, you can also increase your proficiency from trained to expert and above (at later levels), you can lean on your stat bonus for a given skill, you can acquire item bonuses and sometimes you can apply situational bonuses such as spells or the assistance of another PC.

Very quickly most mundane tasks (those with fixed DCs or DCs based on the sample tasks for each skill) will become routine, nearly automatic for you.
Skill checks based on your level (or more likely your adversary's level, skill DC or save DC) will remain hard to meet, and will in fact get harder and harder to achieve unless you really put everything you've got into that skill.

I really enjoy this level of customization, but I also appreciate that it is greatly simplified compared to the fiddly skill point system we used in DD3.5 and PF1. Some folks claim that including your level in every skill, save and DC is a problem, but I maintain that's a matter of opinion. I see it as a feature.