What triggers some people about Pathfinder?

[Segev]

One day I will actually play Exalted. The main point of all my GMs refusing to run it is "I don't know what's there to play, it seems like an unabashed power fantasy".

What do they think D&D is?

I, personally, find Exalted works best with a bit more of a sandbox approach than D&D typically needs, though I know you can run it with a more traditional plot-thread style. Exalted, at its best, is a game where the consequences of HOW you go about winning are the main challenge. Either changing them, avoiding them, or directing them to be the consequences you want. Yes, there's power fantasy. That's not a problem, though, as long as the problems you face are real and extend far enough that your power has to be leveraged appropriately.

Your Solar socialite can probably rewrite the entire social mores of a large town in a day or few, turning them into anything he wants, purging them of ideas and prejudices he dislikes, giving them moral compunctions he thinks are necessary, and even making them all consider him to be the best possible leader they could have.

The Dragonblooded Noble who believes this town to be his rightful property will object, and start leveraging his power not, most likely, by initially coming after your Solar with a handful of his buddies (though he might just go that route and declare a Wyld Hunt if he suspects what you are), but also by leveraging his own vast reach and political power to make life difficult for your town. Your town is no longer racist towards Djala and is ending the slave trade there? He sends Djala soldier-slave assassins to try to take you out (which probably fails) and to take out beloved leaders of the town (especially NPCs you care about, personally). Your town is refusing to engage in or support the beastman conscription? He conscripts your farmers and other support structure into his army to send them to losing battles to die, and doesn't provide support for the lost food production or lost manpower.

He stops merchants from trading with your people. He imposes heavy taxes. And, yes, he sends troops to harass your people and escalating supernatural warrior threats to deal with the Anathema (you) that has corrupted the town.

[stoutstien]

Godbound is another relative super high level of PC power game option.

[kyoryu]

What do they think D&D is?

There's different types of "power fantasy". Sounds like he meant it in the "I'm just a literal god and smoosh everything i go just because I'm that powerful" way.

D&D can be that, but isn't necessarily.

[Pex]

I'm coming around to the idea that the mechanical "goodness" of a system matters less than a lot of us (myself included) think it does. You can have the best balanced, most expressive and elegant system...and it will fall utterly flat if it comes across as soulless or doesn't excite people. On the reverse, you can have utterly janky systems that people really enjoy, at least in part because of the sense of "wonder" or "fun" that they encourage. It's almost as if the key is getting people hooked for long enough that they are able to overlook/compensate for any jank.

And this sense of excitement/wonder/awesomeness generally comes when the system is designed by people excited about that particular thing. Where you can see things and you know someone put that in because "dude, wouldn't that be cool?" Pure focus-group development (a corporate-design specialty), number-obsessive balancing, and "super elegant systems" (usually the brain-child of a solo developer) can all fall short because they focus on the mechanics, not the game.

The game is more than the mechanics. The "fluff" and getting a good feedback loop between fiction and mechanics, letting people feel like they're actually doing cool things (and not having to wade through piles of crap to get there)--these seem to matter more than a lot of us would like to admit.

This isn't to say that mechanics don't matter...just that they don't matter as much as is often presumed.

In other words, players don't know what they want? Perhaps they need to be tricked into it?

That sounds familiar.

[Ignimortis]

In other words, players don't know what they want? Perhaps they need to be tricked into it?

That sounds familiar.

Nah. Players know what they want, they just have difficulties enunciating it and reconciling expectations between people who understand the same words differently.

What do they think D&D is?

*snip*

That it's a somewhat power-fantasy-ish game, but in a way that still provides methods to challenge the characters with a real chance of them losing and failing.

There's different types of "power fantasy". Sounds like he meant it in the "I'm just a literal god and smoosh everything i go just because I'm that powerful" way.

D&D can be that, but isn't necessarily.

Pretty much, yeah. I guess my gushing about White Reaper Style and high-skill feats of prowess like jumping over mountains might have left some skewed impressions...

[Snowbluff]

That being said, I do think that in this particular case, this ease comes at a heavy cost of player expression and player ability to feel like they're getting away with something (which I consider almost integral to making a good game, perhaps as a subclause to the Snowbluff Axiom).

Yeah, basically. Like you said, being able to make yourself into something is important. There probably should be some rules, but at the same time the restrictions shouldn't be so tight that you feel like everything is gated off from eachother. This is something I like a lot about 3.5. A lot of 3.5 feats aren't mutually exclusive with each other. When someone finds a new combination, this can help them individualize their character.

I run the occasional 3.5 one shot with this in mind, and I'm usually pretty excited with what the team comes up with but I roll terribly as a DM I would feel bad to fudge all of my 4s into 16s so my monsters get totally squished.

[Segev]

That it's a somewhat power-fantasy-ish game, but in a way that still provides methods to challenge the characters with a real chance of them losing and failing.

Then the same is true of Exalted. It's just that the challenges are of greater scope. You're protecting entire towns, cities, or nations, not your own life. You aren't facing an empire where attacking the big boss by himself is an option. You need to use your powers to project power beyond yourself and your location, which is nontrivial. And that kind of thing.

[kyoryu]

Nah. Players know what they want, they just have difficulties enunciating it and reconciling expectations between people who understand the same words differently.

This is one of the main reasons I try to get specific when talking to people. So long as everyone is working in good faith and trying to understand each other (rather than shoot each other down) it is almost always the fastest way to get to an understanding. Specific examples that can lead to the general principle.

"I want a balanced game" tells me nothing.

"I think it's jacked that a druid can out-do a fighter using just one of its class features" tells me something.

"So, what do you feel about a highly optimized fighter doing three times the damage of kind of an 'obvious path' fighter?" "That's a bit much, I kinda feel like maybe optimization should give you like a 50% bonus" Again, more info.

[Psyren]

There's different types of "power fantasy". Sounds like he meant it in the "I'm just a literal god and smoosh everything i go just because I'm that powerful" way.

D&D can be that, but isn't necessarily.

Yeah - while D&D CAN hit Exalted power levels (especially in 3.5/PF1) it doesn't have to. People looking for one won't necessarily enjoy the other just because their ceilings can be in the same ballpark.

Nah. Players know what they want, they just have difficulties enunciating it and reconciling expectations between people who understand the same words differently.


That it's a somewhat power-fantasy-ish game, but in a way that still provides methods to challenge the characters with a real chance of them losing and failing.

Right on both counts.

This is one of the main reasons I try to get specific when talking to people. So long as everyone is working in good faith and trying to understand each other (rather than shoot each other down) it is almost always the fastest way to get to an understanding. Specific examples that can lead to the general principle.

"I want a balanced game" tells me nothing.

"I think it's jacked that a druid can out-do a fighter using just one of its class features" tells me something.

"So, what do you feel about a highly optimized fighter doing three times the damage of kind of an 'obvious path' fighter?" "That's a bit much, I kinda feel like maybe optimization should give you like a 50% bonus" Again, more info.

I'll add too that most games don't even need to get to this level. If everyone is happy (say, the Fighter player doesn't expect to have as many levers to pull as the Druid, nor do they want to) then there's nothing really to fix.

[Ignimortis]

Then the same is true of Exalted. It's just that the challenges are of greater scope. You're protecting entire towns, cities, or nations, not your own life. You aren't facing an empire where attacking the big boss by himself is an option. You need to use your powers to project power beyond yourself and your location, which is nontrivial. And that kind of thing.

Actually, I did drop your explanation to one of my more amenable GMs, and it seems to have gotten through. He said that perhaps if one treats it as something along the lines of Dynasty Warriors mixed with a 4X strategy game wrapped in roleplay, it might work. So thanks!

Yeah, basically. Like you said, being able to make yourself into something is important. There probably should be some rules, but at the same time the restrictions shouldn't be so tight that you feel like everything is gated off from eachother. This is something I like a lot about 3.5. A lot of 3.5 feats aren't mutually exclusive with each other. When someone finds a new combination, this can help them individualize their character.

And that is generally the main point of contention between people who like PF2 and who don't. It is, ultimately, a question of values - what do you want from a TTRPG most, and what you're willing to sacrifice for it?

For instance, I've had an extensive discussion with the author of the Reddit post linked by Psyren before in this thread, and a part of the impression I got is that Killchrono considers the freedom of expression of 3.5 to do more harm than good, since it enables people who are out to "win D&D" or "powergame" to do so, and PF2's tight reins were necessary to stop that sort of thing, so that the DMs in particular could do their thing in peace. I posited that to be more of a player problem than a system problem - new players don't know how to powergame and will struggle quite a bit with most fights, whereas experienced players either can stop themselves at some point everyone in the group deems acceptable, or have something to learn about not being pricks. They argued that gentlemen's agreements don't work and that often someone "cheats" anyway. I won't go further on that, my comments are in the second thread there, so if you're curious, you can wander over and take a look (fair warning, I tend to ramble).

So Killchrono and other people on the PF2 subreddit consider PF2's straightjacket-tight balancing to be an overall positive feature, while I and most of us here think it to be overly restrictive without adding that much to the game. Both stances are valid, but mine is more valid because it's mine.

This is one of the main reasons I try to get specific when talking to people. So long as everyone is working in good faith and trying to understand each other (rather than shoot each other down) it is almost always the fastest way to get to an understanding. Specific examples that can lead to the general principle.

"I want a balanced game" tells me nothing.

"I think it's jacked that a druid can out-do a fighter using just one of its class features" tells me something.

"So, what do you feel about a highly optimized fighter doing three times the damage of kind of an 'obvious path' fighter?" "That's a bit much, I kinda feel like maybe optimization should give you like a 50% bonus" Again, more info.

For sure. I do want a balanced game, but I don't want PF2. "Isn't PF2 a balanced game?" Yes, but not to my standards. Talking is the only way people can understand each other, until someone makes a perfect human-to-human universal translator operating off neurons firing or whatever.

[Snowbluff]

And that is generally the main point of contention between people who like PF2 and who don't. It is, ultimately, a question of values - what do you want from a TTRPG most, and what you're willing to sacrifice for it?

For instance, I've had an extensive discussion with the author of the Reddit post linked by Psyren before in this thread, and a part of the impression I got is that Killchrono considers the freedom of expression of 3.5 to do more harm than good, since it enables people who are out to "win D&D" or "powergame" to do so, and PF2's tight reins were necessary to stop that sort of thing, so that the DMs in particular could do their thing in peace. I posited that to be more of a player problem than a system problem - new players don't know how to powergame and will struggle quite a bit with most fights, whereas experienced players either can stop themselves at some point everyone in the group deems acceptable, or have something to learn about not being pricks. They argued that gentlemen's agreements don't work and that often someone "cheats" anyway. I won't go further on that, my comments are in the second thread there, so if you're curious, you can wander over and take a look (fair warning, I tend to ramble).

So Killchrono and other people on the PF2 subreddit consider PF2's straightjacket-tight balancing to be an overall positive feature, while I and most of us here think it to be overly restrictive without adding that much to the game. Both stances are valid, but mine is more valid because it's mine.

What I find kind of odd about this is that I'm not sure if any system options really remedies any of the issues that one would have at a table anyway. A cheater would ruin a PF2 game just as much as they would a 3.5 and 5e game. If the people in your game aren't mature enough to handle playing fairly and treating each other well, that'd be a game breaker regardless of system. A DM who is inexperienced will fumble rules and mess up encounter design in any system. Any of these can be a deal breaker for me in any system, and I think if you're trying to force a game system on the basis that it will solve your table problems, your issues are worse than you realize.

So as a result I do end up thinking of such efforts on the part of the designers to be obstacles rather than aids. I can see how some people might fit into PF2's very narrow appeal, or at least in some small way comforted by Paizo's efforts to protect them from themselves, but the kinds of games you get out of that will be more limited without modifying the system further.

[Ignimortis]

What I find kind of odd about this is that I'm not sure if any system options really remedies any of the issues that one would have at a table anyway. A cheater would ruin a PF2 game just as much as they would a 3.5 and 5e game. If the people in your game aren't mature enough to handle playing fairly and treating each other well, that'd be a game breaker regardless of system. A DM who is inexperienced will fumble rules and mess up encounter design in any system. Any of these can be a deal breaker for me in any system, and I think if you're trying to force a game system on the basis that it will solve your table problems, your issues are worse than you realize.

So as a result I do end up thinking of such efforts on the part of the designers to be obstacles rather than aids. I can see how some people might fit into PF2's very narrow appeal, or at least in some small way comforted by Paizo's efforts to protect them from themselves, but the kinds of games you get out of that will be more limited without modifying the system further.

I think what Killchrono meant was that "cheaters" are people who are still staying within the rules and aren't like, throwing weighted dice - just people who would've agreed to a table's decision on power level and then would break it at some point. I dunno, that doesn't happen to me much anymore, so I can't really say if that is sorely needed. It's also potentially rather helpful for pick-up tables where you are never sure who's going to show up with what - with PF2, you know there won't be anything gamebreaking, the worst you're gonna get is a Dual Light Pick Fighter who does...maybe 25% more damage than a different Fighter.

As for inexperienced DMs, well, PF2 does work rather well with its' CRs (since that's a huge part of the point behind its' general design anyway), so as long as you just drop enemies onto players as instructed (1 level X monster = adequate and challenging for level X party) instead of going "I've played 5e, I know that CR X means they'll beat it down in two turns and won't have any issues" and dropping a level+3 encounter on them, they should be fine.

To sum it up, I think that yes, people adopting PF2 for their cordial home game with people they know and trust is...somewhat pointless, I think, unless their DM is spectacularly unsure of their mechanical ability.

[Segev]

Actually, I did drop your explanation to one of my more amenable GMs, and it seems to have gotten through. He said that perhaps if one treats it as something along the lines of Dynasty Warriors mixed with a 4X strategy game wrapped in roleplay, it might work. So thanks!

Glad it helped! I hope it leads to some thing fun for your group.

[Chauncymancer]

I think that there's a different, specific issue P2 was approaching than just poor sportsmanship in Pathfinder Society.
There's a specific kind of player who simultaneously wants the certain knowledge that they've made the most powerful character the game will allow them to (sometimes the most powerful example of some specific class, race, or gimmick) but at the same time doesn't enjoy adventures or campaigns where a character above a certain power level is appropriate. And thus it becomes necessary, to prevent this player from reasoning themselves out of their own fun, to introduce a game where the power ceiling is lowered.

[Segev]

I think that there's a different, specific issue P2 was approaching than just poor sportsmanship in Pathfinder Society.
There's a specific kind of player who simultaneously wants the certain knowledge that they've made the most powerful character the game will allow them to (sometimes the most powerful example of some specific class, race, or gimmick) but at the same time doesn't enjoy adventures or campaigns where a character above a certain power level is appropriate. And thus it becomes necessary, to prevent this player from reasoning themselves out of their own fun, to introduce a game where the power ceiling is lowered.

You don't have to trick them, though. Tell them the power level is lower and therefore they can make the strongest thing the rules allow and they'll still be weak enough for the adventure they want.

And certainly don't try to tell others who li?e higher power games that they are he problem that needs to be solved by lowering the power level of systems they like to compel the power level those who prefer lower powered games want to play.

[Tanarii]

You don't have to trick them, though. Tell them the power level is lower and therefore they can make the strongest thing the rules allow and they'll still be weak enough for the adventure they want.

And certainly don't try to tell others who li?e higher power games that they are he problem that needs to be solved by lowering the power level of systems they like to compel the power level those who prefer lower powered games want to play.

Seems like this is the kind of thing that M&M used Power Level to address. Similarly Gurps and other games use point total limits.

The Devil is in the Details as to if that works or doesn't work of course.

[MonochromeTiger]

And that is generally the main point of contention between people who like PF2 and who don't. It is, ultimately, a question of values - what do you want from a TTRPG most, and what you're willing to sacrifice for it?

For instance, I've had an extensive discussion with the author of the Reddit post linked by Psyren before in this thread, and a part of the impression I got is that Killchrono considers the freedom of expression of 3.5 to do more harm than good, since it enables people who are out to "win D&D" or "powergame" to do so, and PF2's tight reins were necessary to stop that sort of thing, so that the DMs in particular could do their thing in peace. I posited that to be more of a player problem than a system problem - new players don't know how to powergame and will struggle quite a bit with most fights, whereas experienced players either can stop themselves at some point everyone in the group deems acceptable, or have something to learn about not being pricks. They argued that gentlemen's agreements don't work and that often someone "cheats" anyway. I won't go further on that, my comments are in the second thread there, so if you're curious, you can wander over and take a look (fair warning, I tend to ramble).

So Killchrono and other people on the PF2 subreddit consider PF2's straightjacket-tight balancing to be an overall positive feature, while I and most of us here think it to be overly restrictive without adding that much to the game. Both stances are valid, but mine is more valid because it's mine.

It's interesting how many of their posts there boil down to accusing whoever disagrees of making an attack or being intellectually dishonest then proceeding to insult them and completely misinterpret what they say just to repeat the same arguments of "players can't be trusted not to break it." Nothing says debating in good faith and giving as much respect to others as you expect from them like declaring the systems they don't like were "explicitly made to appeal to the most basement dwelling of nerds through intentional Ivory Tower design" or how the only reason to not like PF2 is "you can't powergame the probability out of the game."

Frankly, I like the concept of everything being somewhat viable, I can see the appeal of ensuring no one can outshine anyone else so much that they feel bad without also requiring someone to hamstring their character idea or put it off for a later game. The implementation in Pathfinder 2 however is just so lacking that I end up feeling like it keeps the game from making sense. How are any of the characters heroes when the solution to balance is to make them nearly useless individually and objectively less capable than what Pathfinder1's baseline heroes could manage? What's the point of boasting options when most of those options give some negligible effect resulting in almost the exact same thing as you'd have from nearly any other option? What's the point of even caring about trying to make a character interesting if all the highest point they'll really achieve is a very slightly safer success while the lowest is uncontested failure.

[Kurald Galain]

There's a specific kind of player who simultaneously wants the certain knowledge that they've made the most powerful character the game will allow them to (sometimes the most powerful example of some specific class, race, or gimmick) but at the same time doesn't enjoy adventures or campaigns where a character above a certain power level is appropriate.

Sure, but this kind of player is very uncommon. It seems strange to redesign an entire game (making other, more common types of player unhappy) just to accomodate this guy.

How are any of the characters heroes when the solution to balance is to make them nearly useless individually and objectively less capable than what Pathfinder1's baseline heroes could manage?

That's a good point actually. I keep hearing the justification/handwave "...but it's a team game", but that doesn't sound like it should justify making individual characters useless. After all, PF1 and 5E are already a team game and they do allow individually-competent characters.

[Ignimortis]

I think that there's a different, specific issue P2 was approaching than just poor sportsmanship in Pathfinder Society.
There's a specific kind of player who simultaneously wants the certain knowledge that they've made the most powerful character the game will allow them to (sometimes the most powerful example of some specific class, race, or gimmick) but at the same time doesn't enjoy adventures or campaigns where a character above a certain power level is appropriate. And thus it becomes necessary, to prevent this player from reasoning themselves out of their own fun, to introduce a game where the power ceiling is lowered.

I think that may have had an impact, yes. People I know who have actually made contact with PFS also have said that a lot of parties are unbalanced and at least one player brings an overpowered character. However, I don't think balancing a TTRPG around pick-up groups (which is what PFS is, by definition) is a good decision - it isn't a MMORPG.

It's interesting how many of their posts there boil down to accusing whoever disagrees of making an attack or being intellectually dishonest then proceeding to insult them and completely misinterpret what they say just to repeat the same arguments of "players can't be trusted not to break it." Nothing says debating in good faith and giving as much respect to others as you expect from them like declaring the systems they don't like were "explicitly made to appeal to the most basement dwelling of nerds through intentional Ivory Tower design" or how the only reason to not like PF2 is "you can't powergame the probability out of the game."

One learns to deal. At some point, it was pretty obvious that certain (non-universal, though) experiences with other systems have made a mark, and I deigned, having scarcely had any experiences with that particular brand of poor balance (despite spending considerable time with 3.5 and PF1), not to argue against it - it would've been a contest of "whose experiences are more true to life".

Sure, but this kind of player is very uncommon. It seems strange to redesign an entire game (making other, more common types of player unhappy) just to accomodate this guy.

I find that such players are far more common in places like AL and PFS, where you can come to play with strangers while bound only by the general rules of the game. I might speculate on why exactly players like these don't have their own group, but the answer seems to be rather obvious.

Frankly, I like the concept of everything being somewhat viable, I can see the appeal of ensuring no one can outshine anyone else so much that they feel bad without also requiring someone to hamstring their character idea or put it off for a later game. The implementation in Pathfinder 2 however is just so lacking that I end up feeling like it keeps the game from making sense. How are any of the characters heroes when the solution to balance is to make them nearly useless individually and objectively less capable than what Pathfinder1's baseline heroes could manage? What's the point of boasting options when most of those options give some negligible effect resulting in almost the exact same thing as you'd have from nearly any other option? What's the point of even caring about trying to make a character interesting if all the highest point they'll really achieve is a very slightly safer success while the lowest is uncontested failure.

That's a good point actually. I keep hearing the justification/handwave "...but it's a team game", but that doesn't sound like it should justify making individual characters useless. After all, PF1 and 5E are already a team game and they do allow individually-competent characters.

Because making characters relatively powerless on their own and forcing design to balance around the whole team is the second easiest way to balance a game (the first being "do whatever, players will figure it out"). It also allows the designer to consider most things that are usually the cause for the game's numbers breaking (buffs, debuffs, decent tactics, etc) as the baseline, and design around them being present rather than taking each character on their own and going "but what do they do if they don't have X?". Note that PF2 isn't balanced in a way that allows every party setup to clear a particular fight, but rather in a way that expects you to have particular tools that you can access in several ways.

And if you want a system that is primarily geared towards pre-written adventures and pick-up group play (Paizo sells a ton of adventures, and PFS is clearly important to them), you probably do want the individual characters to have as little power as possible to avoid them going off the rails too much.

[Zuras]

Frankly, I like the concept of everything being somewhat viable, I can see the appeal of ensuring no one can outshine anyone else so much that they feel bad without also requiring someone to hamstring their character idea or put it off for a later game. The implementation in Pathfinder 2 however is just so lacking that I end up feeling like it keeps the game from making sense. How are any of the characters heroes when the solution to balance is to make them nearly useless individually and objectively less capable than what Pathfinder1's baseline heroes could manage? What's the point of boasting options when most of those options give some negligible effect resulting in almost the exact same thing as you'd have from nearly any other option? What's the point of even caring about trying to make a character interesting if all the highest point they'll really achieve is a very slightly safer success while the lowest is uncontested failure.

Fundamentally, any system with lots of player build choices either becomes impossible to balance or overly same-y. 5e contains the imbalance with Advantage/Disadvantage not stacking, Concentration limiting the best buffs, and attunement slots preventing magical Christmas trees, so optimizers are allowed to win the race but not lap the field. Pathfinder 1e has no guard rails to prevent you from lapping the field.

Point based games are particularly prone to this, but even GURPS incorporates diminishing returns into its combat skills system, so it takes roughly twice as many points to be excellent at a combat skill as to be merely competent. GMs also know that some combinations of advantages can end up excessively effective and the system gives you a wide variety of tools to tone things down without outright nerfing the problematic character. I can’t imagine running pick-up games assuming everyone’s 125 point characters will be equally challenged by my pre-made adventure unless I give them pregens, though.

I think PF2e just disappointed a lot of PF1e fans because the resulting system was even less spiky than D&D 5e, as I’m pretty sure the Pathfinder fans who stuck with it are the ones who liked the rough edges.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Fundamentally, any system with lots of player build choices either becomes impossible to balance or overly same-y. 5e contains the imbalance with Advantage/Disadvantage not stacking, Concentration limiting the best buffs, and attunement slots preventing magical Christmas trees, so optimizers are allowed to win the race but not lap the field. Pathfinder 1e has no guard rails to prevent you from lapping the field.

Point based games are particularly prone to this, but even GURPS incorporates diminishing returns into its combat skills system, so it takes roughly twice as many points to be excellent at a combat skill as to be merely competent. GMs also know that some combinations of advantages can end up excessively effective and the system gives you a wide variety of tools to tone things down without outright nerfing the problematic character. I can’t imagine running pick-up games assuming everyone’s 125 point characters will be equally challenged by my pre-made adventure unless I give them pregens, though.

I think PF2e just disappointed a lot of PF1e fans because the resulting system was even less spiky than D&D 5e, as I’m pretty sure the Pathfinder fans who stuck with it are the ones who liked the rough edges.

I agree with this. "Tightly balanced" is a bit of a trap in my opinion. At least for a cooperative game. Sure, completely imbalanced isn't all that great (for one it's a lot harder to hit the sweet spot of "challenging but not overwhelming"). The sweet spot for me is close to 5e's take on it. Not exactly there, but not all the way toward a 4e/PF2e. But I understand people will differ on that.

But yes, having a wide array of options either means a) it's likely to be unbalanced and not really possible to balance in more than a loose way or b) that variety is actually an illusion and everything's the same with different colors of paint (the MMO option). Ok, there's the third option of both, but let's avoid that.

I'm fine with a middle ground where there are a decent number of options, but not "build anything you want" and where it's sorta balanced, but loose enough that you can make a group with just about any composition and without having to plan everything out in advance to synergize.

One thing I dislike about PF2e is it seemed to take "high system mastery" as a baseline. Effectively, it put the assumed floor near the system ceiling...without actually raising the actual floor. That is, you can fall short of the system's expectations (by a number of means), but you can't really exceed them very far. Sure, you can't fall as short as, say, the 3e commoner or some of the other T6 classes. But unless you built it "to spec", you'll be much less effective than feels good. Conversely, 5e set the system baseline down near the actual floor so that it takes active anti-optimization to really fall significantly short of the floor. The ceiling is much higher, even if it's not nearly as high as the 3e/PF1e ceiling. Did it get everything right? Nah, not close. But it's generally easier to adjust encounters upward than downward while still maintaining interest. At least in my opinion.

[skyth]

I actually don't consider PF2 to be Pathfinder...It's SO different than 1E.

Another way points-based system balance is with active point limits. Champions uses this where characters may be 250 points, but any power has a max limit of say 50 points before applying limitations (The limit is decided by the GM. It's not hard coded in the rules).

[Kurald Galain]

And if you want a system that is primarily geared towards pre-written adventures and pick-up group play (Paizo sells a ton of adventures, and PFS is clearly important to them), you probably do want the individual characters to have as little power as possible to avoid them going off the rails too much.

I don't believe that. Paizo has a full decade of experience writing adventures and PFS in PF1, where characters had a ton of individual power, and I've never seen them having any problem with that.

Fundamentally, any system with lots of player build choices either becomes impossible to balance or overly same-y.

This I agree with. And I also agree that 5E does a (much) better job of hitting the middle ground than PF2.

[kyoryu]

You don't have to trick them, though. Tell them the power level is lower and therefore they can make the strongest thing the rules allow and they'll still be weak enough for the adventure they want.

Defining that is often tricky, however, and then you still have the fact that they'll make the most power they can within those limits.

And certainly don't try to tell others who li?e higher power games that they are he problem that needs to be solved by lowering the power level of systems they like to compel the power level those who prefer lower powered games want to play.

I don't think anyone is saying that. I think people are saying that it's useful for people to be at the same power level within a campaign.

Seems like this is the kind of thing that M&M used Power Level to address. Similarly Gurps and other games use point total limits.

The Devil is in the Details as to if that works or doesn't work of course.

Every GURPS campaign I've ever been part of has had a GM review of the character as a mandatory step. I'd go so far as to argue it's actually more important than staying within the point budget. Most Champions games also put maximums on various attack/defense values as well.

Sure, but this kind of player is very uncommon. It seems strange to redesign an entire game (making other, more common types of player unhappy) just to accomodate this guy.

I don't think that's really the reason. When I think about optimizations, I think about it in a few levels:

1. The newbie who does things that look like they make sense, and knows enough of the mechanics to see obvious things (D&D Fighters should choose strength, etc.)
2. The person that has played a bit, and does "on-the-fly" leveling, but with an eye towards their mechanics understanding.
3. The person that has played a lot, and plans out a build in advance, making choices that still seem "reasonable" to the outside observer.
4. The person that dives every book and plans out a build in advance, making apparently nonsensical choices that end up making more power in the long run.
5. The TO player that wants to break the game.

Even if you exclude the fifth category, i think keeping the first four within a band that is playable makes a lot of sense. I'd hate to see the category four player be five times the effectiveness of the category 1 or 2 player.

I find that such players are far more common in places like AL and PFS, where you can come to play with strangers while bound only by the general rules of the game. I might speculate on why exactly players like these don't have their own group, but the answer seems to be rather obvious.

Lots of reasons.

Toxicity is absolutely one of them, but not necessarily the primary one for all AL/PL players.

I agree with this. "Tightly balanced" is a bit of a trap in my opinion. At least for a cooperative game. Sure, completely imbalanced isn't all that great (for one it's a lot harder to hit the sweet spot of "challenging but not overwhelming"). The sweet spot for me is close to 5e's take on it. Not exactly there, but not all the way toward a 4e/PF2e. But I understand people will differ on that.

Yup. I think about gross balance and fine balance.

For gross balance, if you say fighters take damage better than wizards, but wizards do more damage, those things should be true. And it should be hard to optimize out of this.

For fine balance, look at my categories above. If you assume 'competent player making choices as they go' (#2) as a baseline, I'd rather see #1 be 90% as effective, generally, #3 be like 115% or so, and #4 being like 120%. Maybe a bit more on the latter two, but not too too much. We can debate the percentages, but what I don't want to see is a HUGE gap (#4 being 500%), and really, I'd prefer to keep the #3/#4 gap as tight as possible - which gets rid of the "what the heck" builds.

[Kurald Galain]

I find that such players are far more common in places like AL and PFS, where you can come to play with strangers while bound only by the general rules of the game. I might speculate on why exactly players like these don't have their own group, but the answer seems to be rather obvious.

At least in my area, the most common reason why people play AL/PFS are (1) they do have a fixed group but want to play more often, or (2) they like the grand overarching story that a shared campaign offers and that many fixed groups do not, or (3) they are new to the game and don't have a fixed group yet, or (4) they have a friend who is one of the above, and want to play with that friend.

Usually, players that are just too toxic for a regular group don't last long in organized play, either. It absolutely does happen, but it is nowhere near the primary reason people join AL/PFS (because let's be real, if AL/PFS was primarily toxic people, it would not have lasted nearly as long).

[Ignimortis]

Lots of reasons.

Toxicity is absolutely one of them, but not necessarily the primary one for all AL/PL players.

At least in my area, the most common reason why people play AL/PFS are (1) they do have a fixed group but want to play more often, or (2) they like the grand overarching story that a shared campaign offers and that many fixed groups do not, or (3) they are new to the game and don't have a fixed group yet, or (4) they have a friend who is one of the above, and want to play with that friend.

Usually, players that are just too toxic for a regular group don't last long in organized play, either. It absolutely does happen, but it is nowhere near the primary reason people join AL/PFS (because let's be real, if AL/PFS was primarily toxic people, it would not have lasted nearly as long).

I certainly did not mean that most players who play AL/PFS/similar setups are toxic. What I meant is that toxic players are more common there than in your average established group, for about the same reasons you're more likely to find toxic players in an online game lobby rather than in your old-timey LAN party.

I don't believe that. Paizo has a full decade of experience writing adventures and PFS in PF1, where characters had a ton of individual power, and I've never seen them having any problem with that.

Perhaps, but I've heard more complaints about PF1 from two kinds of people:
1) People who genuinely have to force themselves away from optimizing about as far as the system allows (they do exist).
2) People who have played a lot of PF1 in pick-up groups, including PFS.

So I'd assumed that maybe PFS did have something with PF2's design.

[Kurald Galain]

Perhaps, but I've heard more complaints about PF1 from two kinds of people:
...
2) People who have played a lot of PF1 in pick-up groups, including PFS.

I definitely agree that PFS had something to do with PF2's design (in fact, continuing PFS is one of the few explicit design goals it has), and that PFS players complain a lot. I just don't think that "oh, characters in PFS have so much agency that it's hard to write adventures for them" is a common complaint.

If anything, my experience is the opposite, i.e. that PFS players complain if the adventure is too railroady and/or doesn't allow them agency to tackling the plot in different ways. And of course, PFS players complain a lot about rules minutae, but then don't all forum users tend to do that?

But don't take my word for it... Paizo has a whole searchable database of every PFS adventure ever, and all the feedback they got on each.

[Zuras]

At least in my area, the most common reason why people play AL/PFS are (1) they do have a fixed group but want to play more often, or (2) they like the grand overarching story that a shared campaign offers and that many fixed groups do not, or (3) they are new to the game and don't have a fixed group yet, or (4) they have a friend who is one of the above, and want to play with that friend.

Usually, players that are just too toxic for a regular group don't last long in organized play, either. It absolutely does happen, but it is nowhere near the primary reason people join AL/PFS (because let's be real, if AL/PFS was primarily toxic people, it would not have lasted nearly as long).

My AL scene always has a few more challenging individuals in it, but most aren’t problematic. I will say that the most common reason for someone to be a regular AL player seems to be that they are a DM for their regular group and can’t commit to a second (or third) regular weekly time slot. I would say the players are more build-focused, but mostly in a “what can I do with combination X” fashion, rather than trying to break the game. Lots of builds that fit in the “powerful but eclectic” category.

[skyth]

My AL scene always has a few more challenging individuals in it, but most aren’t problematic. I will say that the most common reason for someone to be a regular AL player seems to be that they are a DM for their regular group and can’t commit to a second (or third) regular weekly time commitment. I would say the players are more build-focused, but mostly in a “what can I do with combination X” fashion, rather than trying to break the game. Lots of builds that fit in the “powerful but eclectic” category.

When I GM'd Pathfinder, I would use these builds as enemies for the players to fight, especially since I liked using humanoids with class levels as my primary enemies.

[kyoryu]

I certainly did not mean that most players who play AL/PFS/similar setups are toxic. What I meant is that toxic players are more common there than in your average established group, for about the same reasons you're more likely to find toxic players in an online game lobby rather than in your old-timey LAN party.

100%, and I was entirely agreeing with you. The floor for toxicity is much, much lower in public games than private, for multiple reasons.

If anything, my experience is the opposite, i.e. that PFS players complain if the adventure is too railroady and/or doesn't allow them agency to tackling the plot in different ways. And of course, PFS players complain a lot about rules minutae, but then don't all forum users tend to do that?

But don't take my word for it... Paizo has a whole searchable database of every PFS adventure ever, and all the feedback they got on each.

Weird to me, since any OP game must, almost by definition, have fairly limited agency.

And, yeah, I have noticed that OP games tend to focus far more on rules minutae and optimization, as that's really where the players have agency.