What Pathfinder Did Right

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Sun May 11, 2014 4:43 am

The most noticeable difference between Pathfinder and 3e is the addition of thousands of shitty, pointlessly specific options (e.g. backgrounds & favored class benefits) that a person has to slog through just to create a character. But I was surprised to find some genuine improvements over 3e.

Class skills, for example: All skills are bought at 1 rank per skill point, and class skill bonuses are increased by 3. That gracefully eliminates 3e's multiplication of skills at 1st level and the atrocious accounting for half ranks, both of which could make otherwise identical characters have wildly different numbers of skills. Say what you want about Flight, but the overall mechanics were improved. Also Concentration isn't a skill anymore (though they should have taken that sort of thing a lot farther).

That's the main one. The other things I appreciate are based on flavor alone. The Oracle's curse is a really nice way to introduce the 'cost of magic' without screwing anyone over. You gain an interesting RP hook that masquerades as a disadvantage, like a club foot or being magically bound to keep promises. I also like how the witch finds a use for the familiar; it feels more complete than a tacked-on and largely irrelevant wizard's familiar. Both of these do a lot to carry otherwise uninteresting classes.

I haven't found anything else to recommend it, but beating 3e should be elementary for the folks at Paizo. Are there any other gems---genuine improvements over 3e---hiding in there?

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Sun May 11, 2014 5:23 am

I do like the expanded options. Though I don't think wizards needed more I genuinely like that they gave the rogue, barbarian, and paladin more little things they could do. I do recognize that the options aren't that good for the most part but I think it was a step in the direction. I also never really like multiclassing or prestige classes so I'd have to say that I do like the idea of Archetypes instead. It has the same problem as the expanded class options though, in that they didn't go far enough (specifically with the non magic classes). I guess it'd be better to say that both of these were half steps in the right direction.

TiaC · Post by **TiaC** » Sun May 11, 2014 5:31 am

Paladin Smite actually matters now and makes them effective against demons. A properly archetyped monk is on par with the other melee classes. Armor types are a bit more balanced now.

Seerow · Post by **Seerow** » Sun May 11, 2014 5:36 am

TiaC wrote:Paladin Smite actually matters now and makes them effective against demons. A properly archetyped monk is on par with the other melee classes. Armor types are a bit more balanced now.

I'm curious, how did they balance armor types to make heavier armor any more desirable?

Josh_Kablack · Post by **Josh_Kablack** » Sun May 11, 2014 6:09 am

Damage from falling objects is a lot more sane and less potentially abusable in Pathfinder.

TiaC · Post by **TiaC** » Sun May 11, 2014 6:50 am

Seerow wrote:
TiaC wrote:Paladin Smite actually matters now and makes them effective against demons. A properly archetyped monk is on par with the other melee classes. Armor types are a bit more balanced now.
I'm curious, how did they balance armor types to make heavier armor any more desirable?

Oh, it's a small change, but medium and heavy armors give 1 more AC each. I didn't say they are truly balanced, but baby steps. Also, you still need the heavier proficiency to wear mithral armor.

rasmuswagner · Post by **rasmuswagner** » Sun May 11, 2014 8:32 am

Sorcerers being something other than retarded Wizards. Paladins being something other than extra-retarded Fighters. The Oracle. The Alchemist.

Shapeshifting is a lot saner.

MGuy · Post by **MGuy** » Sun May 11, 2014 8:34 am

Allowing the rules to be readily available for free, even a bunch from 3rd party sources. Big step in the right direction.

Rawbeard · Post by **Rawbeard** » Sun May 11, 2014 12:12 pm

Pathfinder has the Annihilator. Can't go wrong with a gargantuan scorpion robot wielding dual chain guns and a huge frikkin laser. Yes, I am easily impressed, why do you ask?

hogarth · Post by **hogarth** » Sun May 11, 2014 1:21 pm

I could have sworn that there was a thread on this subject a while back. I'll keep looking...

Scrivener · Post by **Scrivener** » Sun May 11, 2014 2:12 pm

Grapple shutting down casting is nice. You can't dim door out of a grapple without a concentration check.

Mask_De_H · Post by **Mask_De_H** » Sun May 11, 2014 6:22 pm

Having enough flavors of caster that you can play pretty much any character concept without feeling too small in the pants. This makes up for the increased caster/noncaster discrepancy.

Having all their material available for free.

The art direction in their books.

Archetypes to an extent.

Shapeshifting to an extent.

The Demon Lords are pretty interesting.

Smeelbo · Post by **Smeelbo** » Sun May 11, 2014 8:22 pm

Bards are much more playable, especially at the levels I actually play.
First, because maintaining a Bard Song takes a free action, allowing the Bard to act in combat and keep up the Happy Happy Joy Joy song.
Second, because of the feat Spell Song, which allows the bard to disguise his spell casting as part of his performance. So now the Bard can do something no other caster can--cast spells, like Charm Person and Hypnotism, right in front of a bunch of people and they will have no clue that spells are being cast.

Paizo is more respectful of my back pack and pocket book. They only produce four hard covers a year, and most of these I can easily ignore. Pretty much all I need to carry when I play is the Core Rulebook and the Bestiary[/i]. Most of what they produce is support for GMs, adventures, who are going to buy most of the books any way.

Regardless of the overall quality of the rules, it is easier to find GMs, campaigns, and players for Pathfinder than any other RPG.

And lastly, Pathfinder customers are far more reliable customers than D&D. While the D&D Meet Up players were exchanging PDF's here in the store, whining about not enabling them via Wi-Fi, and not buying books and accessories, PF customers buy sufficient books to justify the shelf space.

I am not looking forward to 5E.

Smeelbo

Cyberzombie · Post by **Cyberzombie** » Sun May 11, 2014 8:59 pm

Mask_De_H wrote: Having all their material available for free.

This without a doubt. The number one reason pathfinder is so popular is that you can just point people to the fully stocked SRD and not have to worry about passing around books at all. So long as you've got a laptop, iPad or even a smartphone, you can pretty much have access to the rules both between game sessions and during the game.

radthemad4 · Post by **radthemad4** » Sun May 11, 2014 9:41 pm

The pfsrd is awesome. The guys maintaining it even add details the pf devs missed such as how burrowing works, and some info in the jump skill that pf itself never mentions (i.e. how high you go when jumping horizontally), etc.

Also filters. Sorting monsters by CR, type, etc. is incredibly handy.

Dogbert · Post by **Dogbert** » Sun May 11, 2014 11:15 pm

As mentioned in earlier reviews here, the skill system is a net gain: syncretized skills, simpler math.

K · Post by K » Sun May 11, 2014 11:38 pm

Sorcerers and PDFs.

Art direction is also better. It's like someone knows that DeviantArt exists or something.

K · Post by K » Sun May 11, 2014 11:39 pm

Dogbert wrote:As mentioned in earlier reviews here, the skill system is a net gain: syncretized skills, simpler math.

It's still a bad system, so it's like adding salad dressing to a turd.

hogarth · Post by **hogarth** » Sun May 11, 2014 11:42 pm

I finally found what I was looking for, starting here (but digressing away from the question pretty quickly):
http://tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=161582#161582

From that thread:

hogarth wrote:I like the idea that a 1st-level wizard can zap with minor magic all day instead of having to fall back on using a crossbow.

I like the idea (if maybe not the practice) of having a monk's flurry of blows work the same way as Two-Weapon Fighting.

I like eliminating the d4 for hit points and increasing the rogue's hit die to d8.

I like that polymorph effects involve less cherry-picking from the Monster Manual, and yet they aren't totally generic (e.g. "pick one ability from column A and one from column B").

I like the idea of eliminating the penalty for buying cross-class skill ranks.

I like the idea of barbarian rage powers and rogue talents, giving those two classes a bit of customisability.

I'm sure I can think of some more ideas I like, given enough time.

EDIT: The idea of sorcerer bloodlines (if not the execution), as above.

hogarth wrote:Oh, I thought of one more thing: getting rid of XP loss was a good idea.

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Mon May 12, 2014 1:06 am

K wrote:
Dogbert wrote:As mentioned in earlier reviews here, the skill system is a net gain: syncretized skills, simpler math.
It's still a bad system, so it's like adding salad dressing to a turd.

That's what we're talking about here: how the turd has been polished.

I didn't mention this in the first post, but I agree: The best part is definitely D20PFSRD.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Mon May 12, 2014 8:45 pm

Consistent Art by wayne reynolds

He's not my favorite, but it helps to create a distinct look for the series.

Neon Sequitur · Post by **Neon Sequitur** » Mon May 12, 2014 9:21 pm

The fact that the Inquisitor class exists makes it all better for me.

Dean · Post by **Dean** » Mon May 12, 2014 10:43 pm

The new Inquisitor class or the original writeup? I thought it looked great when they originally pitched it but the final version looks extremely bland and uninteresting to me.

OgreBattle · Post by **OgreBattle** » Tue May 13, 2014 1:57 am

deanruel87 wrote:The new Inquisitor class or the original writeup? I thought it looked great when they originally pitched it but the final version looks extremely bland and uninteresting to me.

How do they differ? I've only seen the current class and it strikes me as the kind of limitation and specialization a cleric should've had to begin with.

Dean · Post by **Dean** » Tue May 13, 2014 2:42 am

Oh, my mistake. I was conflating the Inquisitor and the Investigator. The Investigator is a new class they came out with in the same pack as the Arcanist and Brawler. It started out looking fantastic and then they debuffed it into bland pointlessness. The Inquisitor is an ok class, though in the one campaign I played in where someone played one it did struggle to keep up in the 10+ level range.