Pathfinder 2E Regarding the complexity of Pathfinder 2

[CapnZapp]

If that is aimed at me, I am not sure what argument you think I was making in that post? I stated a few facts, and then gave a couple of opinions. That said, do you really disagree that working to get the maths to work is something that RPG designers should be doing?

_
glass.

That kind of questioning isn't going to lead anywhere worthwhile. What I mean is that I would like to invite you to engage directly with the specific examples I have brought up. Just pick one for starters.

 

[MaskedGuy]

What I'm telling you is that the complexity quickly - too quickly - snowballs to ridiculous extremes. To me, Pathfinder 2 comes across not only as a game where the dev team is fighting to rein in system complexity but lost control - but as a game where the dev team is completely oblivious as to the negatives of system complexity, and in fact is pushing hard to exploit every single little design nook or rules cranny.

I would have hoped that the dozen examples already posted would be enough to convince you but maybe I have to go deeper into the scary rabbit hole that is PF2 rules exceptions and things that should work identically but merely works similarly.

Umm, its mostly the subjective opinions and experiences. Like I don't have enough 2e experience to say for sure, but my experience from playtest was that high level 2e wasn't much different than low level in terms of complexity. Examples about opening doors and gripping on weapons and crafting still being annoying doesn't really change much.

I mean, unless you are again comparing it to 5e which is super milktoast simple(except when it isn't, 5e is annoying hybrid between "Oh, there aren't rules for this, GM decides what happens and what you roll" and "Oh, there IS rule for this small thing), I haven't had that experience by level 8. PF 1e is complicated to GM because every single NPC is built like pc and changing small thing changes two other things, where 2e npc creation is "they have stats you want them to have" without need to reverse engineer them to basic root or search for feats you need for the monster. Player side it is complicated because at high levels it becomes matter of tracking dozen buffs and calculating them into stats.

What I mean is, I have read your examples earlier in thread and while you weren't trying to convince me(as I wasn't part of conversation), I wasn't really convinced by your arguments and on some of them I had reaction of "I don't see that as issue" or even "I prefer that to 5e or 1e". What I get from your arguments is that you believe you have discovered method to be surefire market success based on 5e and assume same works in PF 2e and that because paizo isn't following your ideas, they are going to fail eventually. Meanwhile I see that as "If the system was too similar to 5e, the players would play 5e anyway"

ON sidenote since scenarios were discussed earlier, there is one thing that annoys me about encounter design in 1e and 2e PFS scenarios: Besides the apparently having quota of how many encounters there are in the adventure, I feel like the encounters try too hard to be tactically difficult. Like having complicated hazards/terrain unique to the adventure, meanwhile AP encounters tend to be more of "And here is cool monster/scene". Its mostly thing in higher leveled scenarios, but I'm also kinda tired of every scenario(especially in 2e) having boss fight that feels like "end of ap book or campaign final boss" level difficulty

 

[CapnZapp]

I actually recognized that in one of my other posts when I brought up skill feats. I think it’s a good idea, but it screws up the simplicity.

When I say the framework is consistent with few exceptions, I mean the framework. You get three actions and a reaction, and you don’t have various exceptions written into the framework. We don’t need to have discussions about how many times a paladin can smite in a round or whether under some circumstances we can cast two spells because the action economy handles that. We also don’t need to memorize a table of situations where something provokes an AoO, but we also don’t have to give up the richness that 3e and PF1 had by simplifying it down to one or two events. Yes, there are traits like [Flourish] and other traits, but if you’re not dealing with those, you can ignore them. If you are, they’re explicit about what they do.

The same goes for making rolls. Everything is a check. Everything works on a same scale. If you can justify rolling a Reflex attack versus an Attack DC, the math will work. Something modify Strength checks? Then yes it affects your attack roll. They restate that in conditions like enfeeble, but I think that’s just to accommodate people who are used to attacks and saves and checks all being distinct things.

This is true.

Had Paizo been able to resist cluttering this down to the point where this clean design is entirely obscured by fiddly exceptions I would agreed. Now I merely see myself some 15-20 levels ago, before I got disillusioned.

After all, we're not playing the framework. We're playing the full game.

Let's take an analogy from the computing world, just because people here seems to be itchin' for a computative dick-measuring contest!

PF2 comes across as if a competent programmer (let's call him "Kenada") went down the basement and came back up a year later with a elegant core engine that just hums, across all levels. Pressing F11 gets you consistent results, just stronger as you level up. Then you have the sales force that just say "yes" to every customer, no matter how ridiculous or incompatible their demands, forcing this "Kenada" to create all sorts of subroutines and overlays. You press F11 to do this, except you can't if these three circumstances are in play (but do press CTRL+L to allow F11 even when that middle circumstance has happened!), and if you've installed this thing over here, it actually does the reverse of what you want it to do, but you'll have to remember that yourself.

This framework you are speaking of is the core engine. The subroutines and overlays foisted upon it by the sales dept are the feats, and the items, and the individual skill actions.

The problem is that at level 1, you're mostly interacting with the core framework, easily compartmentalizing the odd feat rule, dismissing the weirdly limited skill rule as "we're just level 1" and probably not interacting with magic items at all. At this point I would not recommend making predictions about your future experience, at level 11 or 19... Just sayin'

 

[CapnZapp]

For example, I have my PCs carry bows in slings when they’re traveling. How long does it take to ready a bow? You need to Interact to take it off your back, Interact to remove it from the sling, Interact to brace it behind your leg, Interact to bend it forward, and Interact to put the string in place. Five actions! The system doesn’t have rules for that, but I was able to come up with something that just naturally fit in the action economy and actually makes sense realistically (just go watch some videos on Youtube and see how long it takes people to string a bow). No rulings, just applying the framework.

Not to sling mud on your house rules, but that would limit bows to only encounters where you know things are about to get real. I'm assuming we are in agreement this rule would be a poor fit as a general CRB rule, given the propensity for AP encounters to just begin with "the Ogre wins initiative, it charges forward and sinks its Club into your face!"

It's not a poor rule, I mean, just one that caters to a subset of campaigns (more realistic ones).

 

[CapnZapp]

Like I said before, skill feats are problematic. They muddle the framework. I don’t find your example problems compelling, but I agree with the basic premise: it should be possible to do something unusual with a skill at a higher DC than normal. If you want to Make an Impression to a group, it should just be possible to attempt that at a higher DC. Technically, that wouldn’t negate the benefit of Group Impression, but the rules aren’t clear on being able to do that, and we can’t trust that Paizo will never design skill feats that don’t mess up that approach.

I would be interested in your help coming up with more compelling examples. For starters: What about my examples aren't compelling?

 

[MaskedGuy]

On sidenote, why do you keep posting multiple posts in row instead of either putting everything in single post or just focusing on single issue at time? I notice that multiple posters in thread do that, so is that just common practice on this site?

 

[CapnZapp]

Full disclosure: I have a hard time believing anyone who likes the rule actually runs their game RAW.

On one hand I am struggling to see how you could use all the rules and not come away frustrated and emasculated (as a GM, as a player).

On the other, I can easily see the game engine humming if you just plain ignore every niggling exception and limitation. Of course it works then. But in that case, defending Paizo's CRB would in my mind be disingenuous, since what you're really selling is "Bob's Pathfinder 2" or "Sue Cherry-Picking What She Likes About The CRB".

 

[glass]

That kind of questioning isn't going to lead anywhere worthwhile. What I mean is that I would like to invite you to engage directly with the specific examples I have brought up. Just pick one for starters.

I reread your posts in the last two pages of this thread (which is already far more effort than this warrants), and I do not see any examples. The only one I recall from before that is surprise (or the lack thereof), which I already agreed with. I am not going to reread a 17 page thread chasing down examples if you cannot be bothered to reiterate or link back to them.

EDIT: As for "not leading anywhere worthwhile", I think that is more true of your cryptic one liners than my calling you on them.

EDIT2: When I ran PF2 (and 12th level one shot homebrew), I played everything RAW as far as I am aware (with the aforementioned possible exception of surprise). I obviously cannot rule out the possibility that I made mistakes along the way.

_
glass.

 

[MaskedGuy]

Full disclosure: I have a hard time believing anyone who likes the rule actually runs their game RAW.

You say that, but I don't know anybody who runs any system 100% by raw, even 5e

Joking aside, I don't really see big deal with grips and door opening? I mean, yeah, one of my players started to troll me about two handed weapon casting fiend until we noticed that you can actually cast somatic spells while having two handed weapon. Its kinda weird, but it seems to be mostly to give reason for "one hand free" character types to exist(such as saving hand free for shoving or tripping while having rapier)

But yeah, I... Don't really get what you mean with the middle sentence besides that its your personal opinions and I personally disagree with it and I've felt much more freedom playing and running 2e than running 1e?

 

[CapnZapp]

On sidenote, why do you keep posting multiple posts in row instead of either putting everything in single post or just focusing on single issue at time? I notice that multiple posters in thread do that, so is that just common practice on this site?

Honestly I feel multi-quotes aren't worth the trouble.

Right now I'm in front of desk, where a mouse+keyboard makes it easy-ish to construct longer posts. But half the time I'm accessing the site from my phone. Having to manually extract parts of long replies on a touch screen is a pain in the rear, so by avoiding multi-quotes, I'm hoping everybody else avoids them too. It's just too bothersome to reply without just leaving the full quote intact, so ideally that full quote is just a single thought from a single person.