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  1. - Top - End - #1
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    TotallyNotEvil's Avatar

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    Default Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    So, inspired by the other two threads that discuss things more generally, I think a dedicated thread for this would be interesting.

    The question is as the title says: how do the classes stack up against each other?

    It seems there is a strong consensus towards casters, at least before a certain level, which seems to vary from 5 to 9, being very underwhelming to play, especially compared to martials.

    But how do the various casters compare to each other? I hear the Bard and Druid are somewhat decent, even at low levels? And the opinions on the Sorcerer seem to range from being absolute trash to actually pretty good. Do hexes save the witch? Are Oracle curses too bad? I want to hear your take on that, and more!

    And as for those who are apparently the star of the show, how do the martials compare to each other? Fighter seems to be the golden child of the edition, can the many other martials keep up?

    Is the Monk good out of the box, now?

    Are Swashbuckler and Gunslinger more than 5 levels long?

    One of my favorite things from PF1 are the 6/9 casters, I find they hit the perfect sweet spot between being interesting, distinct, fun and powerful. Yet, it would seem to me that they were done really dirty with the bounded caster model? Four spells a day! The Magus in particular used to have a beautiful action economy, and now it's not only incredibly tight, but Spell Combat got severely downgraded into mere Spellstrike fodder.

    On the other hand, they do get up to 9ths now. Does that make up for having four slots a day?

    How did the other 6/9 people fare? Alchemist seems seriously bad-mouthed.

    For myself, I'm looking at the Ranger and just lamenting that Hunter is no more, and even then, the chassis feels so stripped that it seems hard to make a "complete" Ranger, with even bloody Wild Empathy turned into a feat. Feels like a Beastmaster Fighter could be better at damn near everything.

    Discuss!
    Last edited by TotallyNotEvil; 2023-01-19 at 12:01 AM.

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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    I'll probably elaborate more tomorrow, but for now, here are the broad strokes. Keep in mind that with the heavy nerfs that hit utility spells AND most of those spells being uncommon or rare, and therefore unavailable except through gm fiat or cleric domains, classes are evaluated almost entirely on combat potential and common options.

    Martial
    S: Fighter, Starlit Span Magus, Thief Rogue
    A: most everything
    B: melee Magi, unoptimized gunslinger, inventor
    C: swashbuckler
    D: investigator
    F: alchemist

    Caster
    S: bard, heal font cloistered cleric
    A: most everything
    B: divine sorc, staff or familiar thesis wizard
    C: witch
    D: divine witch, oracle

    There's some variation on the caster side, mostly moving clerics and druids up or down.
    Last edited by gesalt; 2023-01-19 at 02:33 AM.

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    Kurald Galain's Avatar

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    I've noticed that several classes work on a "risk vs reward" principle, but marginalize both the risk part and the reward part. Like, the point of the oracle is that it should have powerful "revelation" abilities that have the major drawback of triggering your "curse", but in practice they aren't actually powerful and the drawback isn't actually all that noticeable, so these abilities go largely unused and unnoticed. Likewise, swashbuckler should have powerful "finisher" abilities that have the major drawback of losing your to-hit bonus, but in practice these finishers aren't worth it and sticking with your boring little bonus is just better. So the oracle and swashbuckler fall flat.

    Magus has a similar problem, in that it has a "powerful" spellstrike ability that's extremely complicated to set up and to recharge, but again tihs ability is nowhere near powerful enough to deal with all this complexity. So you end up pulling a lot of tricks with cascade and getting in position and so forth, and as the result you end up... still less effective than a fighter is by default. Yeah, that sucks.

    Witch hexes are no longer at-will abilities like in PF1, and instead work like any other focus power. This essentially means there's no point to having the witch as a separate class; it has a big "why does this exist" vibe.

    Fighters are amazing. They have some of the best damage due to their higher to-hit bonus, and they are basically the only class that can reliably use all those special effects that weapons get on a critical hit.

    Clerics are good, because you really really need a healer in this edition and clerics are decent frontliners in addition to that. I've been in situations where some party members just couldn't continue an adventure because they were wounded and had no way to heal; so parties need to deal with healing. Of course they can invest in medicine skill instead but there's no comparing against an actual cleric.

    Investigators are a class that people really really like, and I haven't really figured out why yet (because all they appear to do is "make a scheme, attack, attack" every turn). There's probably something good that I have overlooked there.

    HTH.
    Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.

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    WhiteWizardGirl

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Fighters are the best at dealing damage, since they have better to-hit than every other class (except gunslinger). They have strong feats and get some nice damage boosts from them.

    Champion has some incredible defensive abilities, and can share those defensive abilities with the rest of the party. I'm partial to Redeemer, myself.

    Clerics are good at healing and have some pretty good focus spells, but they suffer from the fact that the divine list is pretty bad. The Herbalist archetype is honestly plenty of healing, to the point where it more or less covers for a lack of a cleric in a lot of ways.

    Speaking of archetypes, I've found that Investigator multiclass archetype is incredibly good for a crit-fishing build. I took it on a sniper gunslinger, and it was amazing. Since I knew the result of my roll ahead of time, I could choose to either pick a different target, or do a non-attacking action instead. Also, since guns tend to be very, very powerful when they crit, and Gunslinger has Fighter-level attack bonuses with guns, including access to a feat that gives them +2 to hit on a shot, they can really pull crits out of nowhere, especially if they can stay in stealth for another +2 to hit from the enemies being flat-footed. Another useful thing about stealth is, if you have the ability to choose when to engage, you can just wait until you know you are going to get a crit, and start the combat off with a massive crit to the enemy boss.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Treasure Vault should help out alchemists a bit.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Fighter is the golden standard to which all other martials are measured, and found wanting.

    Fighter has 6 primary setups:
    2h
    1h+shield aka Fake Champion
    1h+gauntlet/free-hand
    Dual-wield
    Pure range
    Switch-hit

    The best 2h weapon is the meteor hammer. Reach, trip and auto-prone on crit. Bludgeoning is also the least resisted physical damage type.

    The best 1h weapon is the gnome flickmace (yes, even after it got nerfed). Reach and auto-prone on crit beat whatever other weapons can deliver.

    For dual-wielding, you have two setups. Pick+light pick for maximum dpr or hammer+light hammer for, you guessed it, auto-prone on crit.

    The best ranged weapon is a tossup between the shortbow, longbow and hornbow. Use whichever you like.

    The switch hitter is probably dex primary. In this case, your melee weapon should be the bladed scarf for reach, trip, finesse and auto-prone on crit.

    For the fake champion build, you take champion archetype feats until level 6 or 8 (if you want divine ally). Offense is far more important than defense, so a fighter that steals the champion's special class abilities ends up better than an actual champion.

    Your typical goal in melee should be to exploit your attack of opportunity for MAP-less attacks. Prone is how you do this as you have the str to land trips and the innate superior accuracy to land crits often with support like fear/dirge of doom, one for all/fake out, flanking/flat-footed and heroism/inspire courage.

    At range, you perform well enough. At 10+ you spike by getting debilitating shot for at-will no-save slow as a two action attack and the option to archetype into monk to flurry with monastic archer stance.

    Fighter has good feats, but also doesn't need many of them. This leaves them in a good place to archetype into a spellcaster, archer/mauler, beastmaster, blessed one, soulforger, rogue, champion, or whatever else you might want.

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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Starlit Span Magus is the current best ranged build the system offers.

    Unlike its melee counterparts, it's action economy isn't nearly as constrained by movement and arcane cascade does nothing for it so there's no reason to enter it.

    Prior to the psychic, the magus would archetype into cleric for powerful focus spell blasts like fire ray. However, psychic gives the magus access to amped imaginary weapon which is bar none the best focus spell a magus can use to spellstrike with. Between magus's innate focus point, psychic dedication's focus point and the level 6 feat that gives you imaginary weapon, you effectively have two extra spellslots and one that renews between encounters exclusively for spellstrike. Add a familiar for familiar focus for another focus point. All you need is a staff of divination for more true strikes, just start the fight with bow and staff in hand and drop it after you cast it the first time.

    Other cantrips let you hit all manner of weaknesses and adaptive cantrip off a human ancestry feat (either be Human or use adopted ancestry) lets you grab divine lance to hit alignment weaknesses as well.

    You might have liked arcane slots, but that's plenty of extra battle support on your off turns when you need to recharge spellstrike.

    Probably want to use a shortbow or hornbow. You don't have point blank shot to ignore the volley on longbow like fighter does.

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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Thief Rogue has dex to damage, legendary perception scaling and can progress more skills since they get more skill boosts.

    In melee, you combine opportune backstab, gang up and preparation to get a bunch of MAPless attacks. At range, you hope you have a bard in the party so that enemies count as flat footed through dirge of doom inflicting frightened + dread striker.

    Skill checks to perceive traps, disarm them, unlock doors, and disable haunts actually have minimum proficiencies required to be allowed to succeed. The rogue leans into this by having that legendary perception and the capacity to boost more skills than most other classes. That they're good in melee or at range as well is what elevates them above other skill-monkey classes.

    Their closest competition is the thaumaturge which is slightly worse at combat but doesn't rely on precision damage but also lacks that legendary perception for traps.

    I'll do bard, cleric and maybe thaumaturge later.
    Last edited by gesalt; 2023-01-19 at 05:46 PM.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    One thing I've noted is that a lot of optimization... Kind of isn't. Which is to say, I've sketched out a few builds for a woodsman-y archer with a pet bird, and nearly all of them seem to come to, more or less, the same values. The Starlit Span Magus has too tight of an action economy to play well with a pet.

    Everybody talks up Fighter and Beastmaster. Do they together make for a better archer Ranger than a Precision Ranger, without dropping utility? You'd need +2 INT mod to match the starting skills, and some wouldn't be as high as those points probably came from what would have been WIS.

    But the pet getting Precision + the two shots in one action feat seems to compensate almost perfectly for almost every other build- such as cantrip Spellstrike damage- or was I merely mistaken?
    Last edited by TotallyNotEvil; 2023-01-19 at 06:06 PM.

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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Thaumaturge is the other sorta skill monkey class that matters. They get an autoscaling lore skill, the typical skill boosts and Tome implement gives them two more skills they can change daily.

    Typically they're built for melee as it lets them use implement empowerment to boost the damage without any sort of rules arguments. The weapon implement is also pretty good. Usually you grab the weapon and tome implements, diverse lore at 1 and champion archetype from 2-6 for plate armor, lay on hands (psuedo chalice implement) and champion reaction (psuedo amulet implement) and then sentinel archetype and mighty bulwark to let your heavy armor scale and to maximize your reflex saves.

    You can instead go for a ranged build and go into the sleepwalker archetype for vision of foresight, which effectively gives you advantage on most non-combat skill checks. You still go tome implement, but instead of weapon something like amulet will be more valuable

    Unfortunately, they lack rogue's legendary perception and have cha as their key ability score meaning you can't start with an 18 in your attacking stat, resulting in an accuracy penalty at levels 1-4, 10-14 and 20. On the other hand, being able to change skills daily is pretty solid as is being able to recall knowledge on literally any subject using Diverse Lore. I'd say they're only a little behind a Thief in a vacuum and better if your gm likes to throw precision immune targets at you.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by TotallyNotEvil View Post
    One thing I've noted is that a lot of optimization... Kind of isn't. Which is to say, I've sketched out a few builds for a woodsman-y archer with a pet bird, and nearly all of them seem to come to, more or less, the same values. The Starlit Span Magus has too tight of an action economy to play well with a pet.

    Everybody talks up Fighter and Beastmaster. Do they together make for a better archer Ranger than a Precision Ranger, without dropping utility? You'd need +2 INT mod to match the starting skills, and some wouldn't be as high as those points probably came from what would have been WIS.

    But the pet getting Precision + the two shots in one action feat seems to compensate almost perfectly for almost every other build, or was I merely mistaken?
    Pets are good right up until the mid levels at which point they fall off a cliff. Mostly, they're used as an independent mount for a free move or to provide a flanker. Rangers actually have slower pet progression compared to the beastmaster archetype as well. The real draw of ranger is hunted shot which is flurry of blows with a bow but targeting their hunted target. It should also be noted that, due to DC scaling, trained skills eventually become obsolete as your success rate won't be high enough and you might not even qualify to pass the check in the first place because of proficiency gates.

    Strictly speaking, there is little to no mechanical reason to play most martials instead of a fighter flavored to your purpose. Monk is the exception until level 10 because it takes until level 4 to get a stance on a fighter and until level 10 to steal monk's flurry of blows.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    The bard is, for the moment, the best caster the system has to offer. Armor to ensure its early game AC isn't behind. Lingering inspire courage or dirge of doom for a strong buff/debuff that doesn't rely on spell slots or enemy saves. Cha key stat to dip into swashbuckler archetype for the one for all feat for more slotless buffing and a use for your reaction. Cha also enables feats like bon mot to reduce enemy will saves. Some actually good class feats like the ability to have a spellbook to supplement your repertoire or eventually swap a spell out daily. And of course, the occult spell list, the current best list in the game.

    Casting in pf2e has different considerations from 3.5 or pf1. In the first place, spells have been nerfed pretty massively on both the combat side and non-combat side. Most "plot" spells also got locked behind gm fiat. Due to the game math, the most effective spells in combat will be those that give +x to your friends and -x to your enemies as well as anything that hampers enemy action economy. The +/- 10 crit system also means that every +1 or -1 you apply increases your party's crit rate on attacks. Fear reduces everything, so it actually weakens enemy saves too.

    The occult list has a healing spell, commonly used buffs in magic weapon, heroism, haste, invisibility and fly, and common debuffs in calm emotions, hideous laughter, slow, fear, silence, maze, etc. It also packs illusions. Now, arcane has most of these too, but occult has a few unique spells, like synesthesia and its -3 debuff that make it the stronger list. Wall of stone is missed though.

    All that together is what makes bard the best caster in the system at the moment. Particularly the lingering inspire/dirge. That kind of mostly resourcesless ability makes its 3 spell slots go farther than a wizard's or sorcerer's 4 slots.
    Last edited by gesalt; 2023-01-20 at 10:20 AM.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    The cleric is the other big caster. Their heal font gives them a swiss army knife of condition removal with channel succor and effectively more top level spell slots than any other caster in the system. The heal spell itself is powerful enough that it effectively undoes 2 enemy actions worth of damage. The high cha needed for font also lends itself to the bard archetype to steal lingering inspire/dirge and swashbuckler for one for all or psychic archetype for good focus spells. They also have the cast down feat which can turn low level prepared harm spells into an easy source of prone on turns you don't have anything else to do.

    That said, the divine list is pretty weak overall. You have some good buffs, some debuffs in cast down harms, calm emotions, roaring applause, etc and healing, obviously. Pick yourself a good diety with spells you want to supplement this.
    Last edited by gesalt; 2023-01-20 at 10:19 AM.

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    WhiteWizardGirl

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    This is some interesting stuff. I'm somewhat out of touch with the wider PF2 community's consensus on things, so it's interesting to see the comparison between their analysis and mine.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by TotallyNotEvil View Post
    One thing I've noted is that a lot of optimization... Kind of isn't.
    This was apparent as early as the playtest, but for some reason people decided that it couldn't be said until the game had been out for years. "Theorycrafting" isn't valuable lol.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by AsuraKyoko View Post
    This is some interesting stuff. I'm somewhat out of touch with the wider PF2 community's consensus on things, so it's interesting to see the comparison between their analysis and mine.
    Yeah, I'm really digging the class-by-class analysis going on here. Very illuminating.

    Of course, more opinions would make the thread even better

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by TotallyNotEvil View Post
    Yeah, I'm really digging the class-by-class analysis going on here. Very illuminating.

    Of course, more opinions would make the thread even better
    Do you have any requests? I've covered the classes I find most important, but I can write up a quick blurb on whatever.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by gesalt View Post
    Do you have any requests? I've covered the classes I find most important, but I can write up a quick blurb on whatever.
    I'm curious on Champion, Gunslinger, and Inventor.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by TotallyNotEvil View Post
    One thing I've noted is that a lot of optimization... Kind of isn't.
    That came up in the recent thread as well. PF2 has a lot of decisions and fiddly bits, both in character building and during combat, that don't (or don't noticeably) affect the outcome of anything.

    I'm thinking of a good metaphor here... maybe it's like debating in what order of colors you eat your skittles or M&Ms, and then wondering if that affects your calory intake? Perhaps the best term here is "illusory complexity"; the closest trope I can find is Morton's Fork.
    Guide to the Magus, the Pathfinder Gish class.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by Kurald Galain View Post
    That came up in the recent thread as well. PF2 has a lot of decisions and fiddly bits, both in character building and during combat, that don't (or don't noticeably) affect the outcome of anything.

    I'm thinking of a good metaphor here... maybe it's like debating in what order of colors you eat your skittles or M&Ms, and then wondering if that affects your calory intake? Perhaps the best term here is "illusory complexity"; the closest trope I can find is Morton's Fork.
    Yeah, my experience with PF2 made me feel like a lot of the early feats you picked from felt like ribbon abilities. A situational +2 is not useful if you're not going to remember that +2, and I'm personally pretty bad at remembering situational modifiers.

    All of this makes me wonder how a system that combined Pathfinder 2's level progression structure and archetype feats would go when combined with 3e's generally more powerful general feats, split into what feat types make sense for Pathfinder 2e. Especially removing the level caps on feat selection.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    The champion is pf2's implementation of the paladin, antipaladin and their counterparts for the rest of the good and evil alignments. There are no LN, N or CN champions at this time.

    The champion's exclusive feature is legendary proficiency scaling in heavy armor, much like the fighter has legendary scaling in a weapon type. I say exclusive, because champion reaction, lay on hands and divine ally can all be accessed through archetype feats.

    There are three main build paths for the champion:
    2h blade ally
    1h+shield
    Throwing weapon blade ally

    Blade ally gets you the returning property rune for free so it's the only real choice you have for a throwing weapon build aside from Fane's Fourberie as a rogue. On melee characters it'll mostly give free ghost touch and later give flaming (or an alignment damage rune) for more damage. As with fighter, meteor hammer is the weapon of choice for the passive chance to prone on crit.

    Shield ally makes your shield better. Since shield ally champions don't get access to crit spec, you don't need a flickmace, but unless your gm gives you access to the uncommon asp coil, you should still get one. The only shield worth using if you intend to use shield block is the sturdy shield. If you don't plan to ever use shield block, there's spellguard shield.

    Lay on hands and the champion reaction are the defensive tools you have. Each has their perks, but LG's is also an attack so that's the usual one you see people take.

    The champion's biggest sticking point is their lack of damage. Unlike other martials, they have no damage booster aside from the smite evil/good feat and the extra damage rune that comes at level 10.

    It should be noted that evil champions are pretty bad and have less feat support. Their blade ally and reactions are also worse.

    It's also unfortunate that legendary AC isn't all that great. Enemies in pf2e are designed to hit the champion. The end result is that legendary AC is more about not getting crit than not getting hit. This is good, obviously, but offense is what stops the monster from trying to kill you and legendary AC doesn't help with that.

    Ultimately, the question is if you really want legendary AC since lay on hands and the reaction can be grafted onto anyone else and good offensive tools aren't really available like that.

    Still, at the end of the day it's mostly fine. It doesn't have any random accuracy issues like thaum or inventor. Plate is still the best AC in the game, moreso with legendary scaling. 10 hp is good and isn't prone to getting crit like the barbarian. And it can be the most natural switch hitter with a thrown weapon given the cost of trying to progress two different weapons.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by Kurald Galain View Post
    That came up in the recent thread as well. PF2 has a lot of decisions and fiddly bits, both in character building and during combat, that don't (or don't noticeably) affect the outcome of anything.

    I'm thinking of a good metaphor here... maybe it's like debating in what order of colors you eat your skittles or M&Ms, and then wondering if that affects your calory intake? Perhaps the best term here is "illusory complexity"; the closest trope I can find is Morton's Fork.
    Optimization in pf2e is a party effort rather than an individual one. A swashbuckler, witch, investigator and alchemist are going to be vastly inferior to a fighter, rogue, magus, bard party for example.

    There's also a difference between parties/players that chase those +/- 1s. It's trivial to get a fighter up to a 45/50 hit/crit rate against an equal level opponent without expending a single spell slot with good party composition and build choices. It's just no longer a game system where a good player can put the team on their back and carry them.

    I will agree that most abilities/feats are pointless situational ribbons though. Just need to sift through the weak and trap options. Same as always.
    Last edited by gesalt; 2023-01-20 at 01:42 PM.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by pabelfly View Post
    Yeah, my experience with PF2 made me feel like a lot of the early feats you picked from felt like ribbon abilities. A situational +2 is not useful if you're not going to remember that +2, and I'm personally pretty bad at remembering situational modifiers.

    All of this makes me wonder how a system that combined Pathfinder 2's level progression structure and archetype feats would go when combined with 3e's generally more powerful general feats, split into what feat types make sense for Pathfinder 2e. Especially removing the level caps on feat selection.
    I really like the structure of PF2's character creation/progression, but I'm not a huge fan of the implementation. I think that having essentially a menu of class features to pick from every other level is a good idea, and I like the idea of archetypes and multiclass feats as options in that menu selection (though I think that a lot of the multiclass feats are underwhelming).

    Unfortunately, a lot of the class feats (especially for casters) are rather underwhelming, or they follow along one of a few obvious chains/thematic groups, so that once you pick one group you might as well just take the rest of it. Archetypes, on the other hand are brilliant. you can take an archetype that gives you a nice suite of abilities that lets you do the thing the archetype is based on, and many of them are basically just better versions of the multiclass dedications.

    When I'm looking to make a caster, I usually just scan through the feat list to pick out the ones that I actually want, then start looking at archetypes to fill out the rest of the slots.

    EDIT: One thing that I really like about the structure of the system is how most of the problems I have with the implementation are easily solved by them just adding more content. They can (and already have) just put out new class feats that are better/more impactful, which makes things much, much nicer.
    Last edited by AsuraKyoko; 2023-01-20 at 01:46 PM.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by AsuraKyoko View Post
    I really like the structure of PF2's character creation/progression, but I'm not a huge fan of the implementation. I think that having essentially a menu of class features to pick from every other level is a good idea, and I like the idea of archetypes and multiclass feats as options in that menu selection (though I think that a lot of the multiclass feats are underwhelming).

    Unfortunately, a lot of the class feats (especially for casters) are rather underwhelming, or they follow along one of a few obvious chains/thematic groups, so that once you pick one group you might as well just take the rest of it. Archetypes, on the other hand are brilliant. you can take an archetype that gives you a nice suite of abilities that lets you do the thing the archetype is based on, and many of them are basically just better versions of the multiclass dedications.

    When I'm looking to make a caster, I usually just scan through the feat list to pick out the ones that I actually want, then start looking at archetypes to fill out the rest of the slots.

    EDIT: One thing that I really like about the structure of the system is how most of the problems I have with the implementation are easily solved by them just adding more content. They can (and already have) just put out new class feats that are better/more impactful, which makes things much, much nicer.
    That's a good point, tho I will say that both ancestry and class ought to have a little more meat on their bones. I like ribbon abilities, they are flavorful and pretty neat when the occasion to use them comes up, my real problem is that I can either be good at fighting or have a cute ribbon. When more stuff was baked into the class and race chassi, I could have both.

    It feels like I have to sacrifice aspects which I would expect to have by default just to do the basics. For example, an Animal Companion eats up like half of your class feats.

    And even then, I understand making combat competency hard choices when building a character, but those choices should never compete with, say, Wild Empathy on a CHA-less class. If that sort of ability is going to be there, it damn well better offer the same oomph as, say, Hunted Shot.

    And for races, I could point to dwarf. They have, from a quick count on aonprd, fourty five racial feats, and what to they start with? Stat mods, darkvision, a language and a cute knife. A 1e Dwarf had seven, arguably eight if you count not being slowed by armor, racial traits beyond this.

    I feel the way to have your cake and eat it, through this system, would be to start with a package of racial feats that you can swap around. As the system likes uniform tags, there could be a certain number of "combat/adventuring" feats, and a number of "flavor/utility" feats, so a person doesn't trade like +1 to stonecutting for greater darkvision or something silly.a
    Quote Originally Posted by gesalt View Post
    Do you have any requests? I've covered the classes I find most important, but I can write up a quick blurb on whatever.
    Ranger and Druid. I rarely get more on those than "they are alright", and almost everything is about Flurry melee rangers.
    Last edited by TotallyNotEvil; 2023-01-20 at 03:17 PM.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by Kurald Galain View Post
    That came up in the recent thread as well. PF2 has a lot of decisions and fiddly bits, both in character building and during combat, that don't (or don't noticeably) affect the outcome of anything.

    I'm thinking of a good metaphor here... maybe it's like debating in what order of colors you eat your skittles or M&Ms, and then wondering if that affects your calory intake? Perhaps the best term here is "illusory complexity"; the closest trope I can find is Morton's Fork.
    And that, in my mind, is the worst form of complexity. I can see the benefit if the complexity brings noticeable power. Or is optional. But having to wade through mandatory complexity...for minimal differences in outcomes or opportunities? No thanks.

    That alone is enough to turn me off of PF2e.
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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by PhoenixPhyre View Post
    And that, in my mind, is the worst form of complexity. I can see the benefit if the complexity brings noticeable power. Or is optional. But having to wade through mandatory complexity...for minimal differences in outcomes or opportunities? No thanks.

    That alone is enough to turn me off of PF2e.
    What feels really bad is that it could have been quite awesome.

    It might be that the Foundry character sheet is out of this world, at least for a roll20 peasant like me, and it's coloring my opinion, but the process of making the character feels very natural. The background and ancestry feat make a lot of sense.

    It just could use some extra meat on its bones, is all. A bit of rum to spike the punch.

    Perhaps playing with Free Archetype, it feels much better? I have a strong impression that it helps a lot towards actually giving you some choice.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Most of the stuff you probably like about PF2e's character creation was done better in Starfinder TBH.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    The pf2e ranger is a weird class. Like the thaumaturge, it requires you to first spend an action locking onto a target before any of your class features begin to work. From there you can either swing for the fences with flurry or get some precision damage in. Outwit is...bad. Let's just ignore it. Precision is passable, at best.

    A flurry ranger attacks at +0/-3 (-2)/-6 (-5) if spending 3 actions to attack. A fighter attacks at +2/-3 (-2) /-8 (-7). A level 10+ agile grace fighter can attack at +2/-1/-4. To even begin to get value out of this you need to make lots of attacks which is where the animal companion usually comes in. Unfortunately, that thing descales HARD going into the double digits. At that point it either exists to flank, carry you, yolo hallways to trigger traps or to use its support benefit, some of which are pretty ok. Flurry eventually comes back around at 17-18 with the edge upgrade. Now, this IS a dual-wielding build since you really need twin takedown to get to the number of attacks needed to make this at all worthwhile. You could also consider going into dual weapon warrior to open with double slice and finish with twin takedown for +0/+0/-6 (-5)/-6 (-5) for your 3 actions until level 18 when you can impossible flurry for -2 (-1)/-2 (-1)/-2 (-1)/-2 (-1)/-2 (-1)/-2 (-1). Still, its very action intensive which can make it hard to work in practice in melee especially if you need to keep switching targets in combats against large groups.

    At range, you don't need to move as often so you're more likely to have actions free to command an animal companion for extra attacks. However, bows aren't agile which hits your accuracy. Of course, you can just switch hit if you've got the money for it.

    Precision ranger is a weird one. I'm pretty sure you still go dual-wield and twin takedown to maximize your action economy and odds at landing your one precision attack, but you aren't married to that playstyle unlike the flurry ranger. Ultimately though, an extra 1-3d8 precision on your first hit per round (important, because it doesn't also apply to disrupt prey) is pretty anemic compared to what a rogue is doing with d6s on every hit including reactions.

    Oh right, it also gets legendary perception, just like a rogue. That's always nice to have.

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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    Quote Originally Posted by AsuraKyoko View Post
    I really like the structure of PF2's character creation/progression, but I'm not a huge fan of the implementation ... Unfortunately, a lot of the class feats (especially for casters) are rather underwhelming,
    My impression is that the designers are so utterly terrified of making anything slightly overpowered, that they end up barely any feats/powers/items that rise above mediocrity. I can think of earlier examples of the same fear in PF or 4E or Starfinder, and those are by-and-large the most disliked parts of their respective system.

    Frankly, they should hire a designer from Exalted to design their feat chains.
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    Default Re: Pathfinder 2: How do the classes stack up?

    The main advantage of precision ranger over rogue is that rangers get to use much better weapons.

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