Pathfinder 2E Things You Love about a Game: Pathfinder 2E edition (+)

[Retreater]

With the edition warring, anxiety about revisions, etc., I wanted to take a break from that negativity in my life.
I've got an uneven history with Pathfinder 2E.
Stage One: I disliked it greatly during the playtest
Stage Two: I had a bad experience with the first campaign I tried with the full rules
Stage Three: Enjoyed some Pathfinder Society at a virtual con
Stage Four: Had a mixed bag on my second campaign and abandoned it
Stage Five: Players rage quit the third campaign I tried
Stage Six: Finally found a group that seems to like it

That seems like a lot of trials and a lot of bad experiences, but I think it's been worth it. I think that PF2 is one of the best TTRPGs on the market today.
Things I love about Pathfinder 2E.
1) Three action economy
It's simple to explain, gives lots of variety, and players feel like they can do things
2) Best online tools in the industry
From Pathbuilder to Archives of Nethys to its implementation on Foundry VTT, it has the most complete (and free) rules online
3) Lots of player options
Ancestries, classes, builds - every party can look unique and most players can find something they're excited to play.
4) The lore books are fantastic
The Mwangi expanse book, for example, is beautiful. It's creative, it's varied, and it's unique.
5) Published adventures can go to 20th level
High level play is usually ignored by other game companies. Pathfinder 2 hasn't shied away from it.
6) Magic item economy
7) Great downtime rules
8) Rules for Skill Challenges
(The victory point system is basically skill challenges from 4e, reworked.)
9) Make your own monsters
It actually presents rules for making monsters (instead of just altering existing ones).
10) Non-magical healing is effective

 

[Staffan]

I really like the way ancestries are handled in PF2. It avoids the "all gnomes are X" problem of yore, but still makes gnomes feel like gnomes. I feel that they manage to strike a rather delicate balance between biological essentialism and having ancestry lack all mechanical meaning. There are details I would have done differently (e.g. remove ancestry stat penalties and have all ancestries give three stat boosts, and have ancestry weapon proficiencies upgrade automatically with class proficiency), but overall it's really well done.

Other than that I agree with most of your points. I disagree somewhat on downtime (unless there have been expanded downtime rules somewhere, I feel like the ones in the core book are more of a placeholder) and non-magical healing (once you get it fully online with boosted Medicine skill as well as Continual Recovery and maybe Ward Medic it's great, but that's like 7th level if you focus on it without being a skill monkey or using general feats to take skill feats). But other than that I agree with your points.

 

[jdrakeh]

I've only played a bit of it, but I really like the three action economy. Like, a lot. I really wish D&D's action economy was this simple.

 

[Retreater]

Other than that I agree with most of your points. I disagree somewhat on downtime (unless there have been expanded downtime rules somewhere, I feel like the ones in the core book are more of a placeholder)

Lots of more options in the Gamemastery Guide. Flipping through it is actually what inspired my OP.

 

[Staffan]

Lots of more options in the Gamemastery Guide. Flipping through it is actually what inspired my OP.

From what I can tell of the GMG, it's just more flavor to the two or three things you can do in downtime in the core rules: Earn Income, Craft (which is basically the same as Earn Income), and Retrain. When I'm thinking detailed downtime rules, I'm thinking along the lines of PF1's Ultimate Campaign which had downtime activities including running actual businesses and building both buildings and teams, doing research, recovering, or scheming to prepare for upcoming adventures. There's some support for that in the Infiltration subsystem, but not for overall "base building".

 

[W'rkncacnter]

as someone fairly new to pf2e (i've been playing it for the first time with a group i played 4e with and we got to level 4 recently), aside from what OP mentioned, i REALLY like the proficiency system. i think it strikes a very good balance between 3.x's skill ranks/attack and saving throw bonuses and 4/5e's on/off proficiency. the crit system is also neat though i don't really know how much i like it yet.

i also greatly appreciate that feats are split up by their source, so you're not stuck choosing between, say, untrained improvisation to become a better skill monkey or knockdown to bully people. it also means you get at least one important decision at every single level, which feels really nice (if potentially a little overwhelming - i don't know if i'll ever play a caster in this system).

 

[Catolias]

Things I like:
1. Options. Ancestry, Background Class - the ABC - give so many options for characters that allow players scope to be who they want
2. 3 action economy works sooo well and it’s great to see fighters get more strategic with how they get in and fight
3. The glossary/index - let’s face it the CRB is big and the glossary / index makes life easy and fast when you need to remember a rule, a condition, etc
4. I agree with the online tools. My fav is pf2easy and pathbuilder2e. Both make GM-ing simpler (certainly more so than when I did the ttrpg that shall remain nameless.

From what I can tell of the GMG, it's just more flavor to the two or three things you can do in downtime in the core rules: Earn Income, Craft (which is basically the same as Earn Income), and Retrain.

I don’t agree. Certainly there is a bit of that, but the GMG gives some common NPCs, which help with quick games and when players go somewhere you hadn’t planned out that well. Also, it gives different ways of managing xo awards or swapping it out altogether.

 

[Staffan]

I don’t agree. Certainly there is a bit of that, but the GMG gives some common NPCs, which help with quick games and when players go somewhere you hadn’t planned out that well. Also, it gives different ways of managing xo awards or swapping it out altogether.

I meant regarding downtime specifically. It has lots of other cool stuff, but the downtime section was mostly help with flavoring the existing downtime activities.

 

[Jahydin]

My party is about to hit Level 3 and I just can't say enough great things about this game.

Off the top of my head:

• Non-random attributes that are shaped by race, class, and background.
• Perfect combat math! Seeing a single +1 bonus result in a "crit" time and time again is so satisfying.
• Nerding out on all the different weapons and how each one works just a little differently.
• Challenging! So many encounters would lead to TPKs if the party just fought them head on like 5E encourages.
• System Mastery. Every time we play we slowly discover how some seemingly worthless action is a perfect one under the right circumstances.
• Awesome accessories. The cards, miniatures, map tiles, etc. are all of good quality and incredibly useful.
• Not afraid of taking risks. I mean, they put out a freaking Baphomet miniature complete with inverted pentagram; that's metal AF!

 

[W'rkncacnter]

Nerding out on all the different weapons and how each one works just a little differently.

oh man yeah i completely forgot about that. the weapons and armor are actually mechanically detailed and varied. it's great.