Pathfinder 1E What are the advantages to Pathfinder -- for DMs?

Mallus

Legend
I'm going to be running a new-ish (we played one session before the holidays) Pathfinder campaign after 1.5 years of running AD&D. Let's just say as I've been prepping I've been experiencing a bit of system shock...

I've never run Pathfinder before. In fact, I've only played one Pathfinder PC, for a few levels at the tail-end of a long-running campaign. But I am familiar with running 3.0/3.5, but it's been awhile since I've done it -- I've only run 4e, and then AD&D, since 2009.

I liked playing PF... but it left me with a strong impression that the system is really better for the players (like 3e before it). There's a ton of bell and whistles and widgets and gizmos for the player to build their character with... which can be a bit much for the person on the other side of the screen.

Help me wrap my mind around the benefits of Pathfinder for a DM. I'm not asking to be talked into using PF (because I'm going to), or talked out of using it (because I'm going to -- it's the group's consensus and I'm fine with that).

I'd just like some help seeing what I'm missing.
 

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delericho

Legend
As far as I can see, there are two:

- It's basically 3.75e. What that means is that most of your experience running 3.5e is immediately transferable. Of course, if you didn't like running 3.5e, you're unlikely to enjoy running PF!

- The designers put quite a lot of work into dealing with the 'problem areas' of 3.5e, notably the higher-level spells and magic items. As such, there are a lot of fairly subtle fixes that go a long way to smoothing out the issues with the game.

However, in the interests of full disclosure, I have to note that I myself decided to stick with 3.5e rather than moving to PF - on my read-through I felt that while it was an incremental improvement over 3.5e, it wasn't "better enough" to persuade me to switch. The biggest issue (for me) was that it added a fair chunk of additional complexity on top of an already over-complicated game.

So, what I'm basically saying, is: take what I've said above with a suitable measure of salt.
 

TerraDave

5ever, or until 2024
the two approaches taken for 4E and PF to support the DM are interesting.

At its core, 4E is a lot easier to DM then past D&D editions. The "wider sweet spot" delays high level issues (though they are still there), and the approach to monster math and encounter building can dramatically reduce prep time. One side affect of this approach is that 4E can be a little more cookey cutter and less flexible for a particular campaign or particular circumstances: its not really a tool-kit approach like 3E or PF. And the adventure support was so-so, at best.

PF has great, great adventure support. With those, experienced DMs should be fine, though if some 3E legacy issues bug you too much, well, that could be a problem. And its more toolkit in style: want to do some very elaborate custom NPCs or pull your campaign in some totally non standard direction, you can certainly do that. It will take a lot of work, but you can.
 

What level are you starting at?

You have run 3.x, so as long as you were fine with that, you should be fine with Pathfinder. At 1st-level, wizards are stronger, which is cool, due to specialists getting X 1st-level-equivalent spells (as spell-like abilities) per day, finally fixing that "wizards using crossbows" problem.

The standard point buy seems to be different. I'll illustrate an experience you may wish to watch out for. It's not necessarily a Pathfinder-specific thing, but could happen more easily in PF. At 8th-level, one of our players retired his rogue character and showed up with an elf necromancer. In an act of "no social skills" (very surprising for the player, who is an amazing DM, although not of D&D) he brought in a character without any sort of preview on our mailing list or wiki. It was a core-only elf necromancer. In 3.0, the standard point buy was 25 and a typical PC was expected to start with a high stat of only 15. There were no races at the start with any mental stat boosts. (I seriously doubt any group ever played a wizard with starting Int 15, they'd nerf Strength and Charisma and even Wisdom to start with a high stat. Playtesting is supposed to catch stuff like that!) Our DM has us playing the equivalent of 32 point buy (I forget what this is called in Pathfinder). The player's character started with Int 18, +2 for being an elf, and then of course +2 for levels and a +4 item, giving him an Int of 26 and having save DCs of 18 + spell level, plus had Dex and Con scores high enough to not suck. Said PC started curbstomping any and all encounters viewed. Said player is always paranoid of their PC getting hurt and so took all the best defensive spells (always either invisible or mirror image'd, the latter getting a buff it didn't need in PF)... and if they'd been more familiar with 3.x/PF rules and had taken Spell Focus once or twice, would have been even more overpowered.

I would say take 15 point buy (that's the equivalent of 25 point buy), but the high point buy made PC concepts like my druid wildshaped-focused PC vastly more viable than would normally be the case... certain types of cheese are just easier or at least less costly in PF than in 3.x.

I have never run Pathfinder, but I used to run 3.x and have been in two Pathfinder campaigns. (Currently I'm in Kingmaker.) Do yourself a favor and don't allow a lot non-core books, classes or archetypes into the game. Our DM lets us play anything, and there's been quite a lot of cheese, not counting the necromancer all-core example above. We have a barbarian/alchemist, the latter synergizing scarily with the former (especially with the ragechemist archetype), since they're all similar but differently-typed bonuses, plus the barbarian is the armored hulk archetype, taking away the barbarian's only real weakness compared to the fighter. He's dishing out more than a hundred damage as round, and has an incredibly high attack bonus due to the three or so different kinds of Strength bonus he can aamss. This was in stark contrast to the bard/cavalier, who wasn't even as good in combat as his horse. (The player switched to a magus, but using the same character, so he had to give up the horse. My druid then awakened it, terrifying said PC.)

Or perhaps talk to your players about what's crazy and what's not. Learn those first. Between all the new classes and the large number of archetypes, it's not possible to be familiar with all this stuff at start.

Last piece of advice, there's this nice product called the NPC Codex. I prefer 4e to Pathfinder, but Paizo has a much better understanding of their market than WotC, putting out adventure paths and the NPC Codex, which sell like hotcakes. Even though I don't run PF, I bought the NPC Codex anyway, and mine it for 4e NPC ideas. I'm jealous. Since WotC has stopped printing 4e, there's never going to be a 4e version of the product. (Well, not an official one anyway.) NPC generation takes a very long time in 3.x/Pathfinder, and sometimes you'll need an unexpected NPC right now.
 
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Mallus

Legend
And its more toolkit in style: want to do some very elaborate custom NPCs or pull your campaign in some totally non standard direction, you can certainly do that. It will take a lot of work, but you can.
That's what I remember from 3.5e: you could create some really interesting NPCs/opponents, if you spent time on it (I'm still proud of the ghost-ninjas I rained down on the PCs one evening). But I have to remind myself there's no need to do that for every encounter.

What level are you starting at?
2nd.

Last piece of advice, there's this nice product called the NPC Codex.
Thanks -- I'll check it out!
 

Ahnehnois

First Post
One interesting little PF-ism is the quick creation templates, which allow you to build certain monsters or characters on the fly without taking the time to stat them normally.
 



S'mon

Legend
I find 3.5e and Pathfinder work well for open-world exploration type games, much like AD&D but with more stuff. They are ideal for frequent encounters with solo or small group enemies, perhaps in a megadungeon - eg Lost City of Barakus worked great in 3.5 - or wilderness insterspersed with small dungeons. Random encounters work much better than in 4e I think, as long as you have the stats to hand - eg if you want random NPCs you better have something like the Gamemastery Guide, NPC Codex, or at least the Beginner Box NPC stats. PC Class balance in PF is slightly better than in 3.5, but generally barely enough to notice - PF Paladins got a good Will save and are now a pretty decent class, but most noncasters still suck pretty badly unless you routinely have many low-EL fights each day. In general the game works better the more its playstyle resembles AD&D or B/X D&D; it handles frequent 'trash mobs' very well.
 

Siberys

Adventurer
Depending on your plans for the campaign, I'd also recommend running it as an E6 game (IOW, pick a level, and stop advancement there). If I were to run another PF game, I'd do that - it neatly sidesteps a large amount of the character-side issues I (personally) have with 3.x systems while focusing on that sweet spot.

'Course, if you were planning on it being a higher-level game or following an AP, that may not be tenable.
 

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