The sheer number of options is the best thing about Pathfinder. It's also the worst.

[Kichae]

No, archetypes are not subclasses. They’re a whole system of character modifications, most of which can be taken by any character as long as they meet the prerequisites. They usually modify some base element of your class (eg the Flexible Spellcaster archetype changes how casters select their spells, use their spell slots, and how many spells they get). There are a subset of archetypes (Class Archetypes) which are locked to specific classes, and which more deeply alter the class’s base abilities. The changes can be quite significant. This is where the presteige classes are rearing their heads.

[supernovastar@lemmy.blahaj.zone]

Just play a fighter/rogue. Best way to learn pathfinder 2

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

the fun thing is, you could literally just do everything completely randomly and your build will still be good

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

what spells are those

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

*if you have donated/bought the premium version

[tyler@programming.dev]

Can you link the app? I cannot find it.

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

you do not have to worry about anything other than what you’d like to play. you could do everything randomly and you’d still make a pretty good character

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

what are prestige classes? (i only play pf2e)

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

what’s paladium? (i only play pf2e)

[Kichae]

It’s not available yet on iOS (though an iOS port is in development). You can find it on the web at pathbuilder2e.com. Mobile and web apps don’t sync, though. The paid versions allow you to save characters to Google Drive, which you can use to sync them.

[vespair@lemmy.zip]

Sounds like they’re actually similar to archetypes and I’m just dumb, tbh, but basically in 3.0+ D&D there were classes you could multiple class into without multiple penalty if your character met specific qualifications (different for each prestige class, usually ability score minimum and knowledge of a feat, spell, or spell level, but sometimes specific race or language or whatever). These classes were usually much more specialized and specific than the general core classes, but also gave your character great powers and flair in that specific niche. Or at least that’s the idea when they were well-implemented, which was not always the case, and prestige bloat is often cited as one of the worst parts of 3.0+ as nearly every single sourcebook would include at least a couple new ones (but I never saw this a problem, personally).

[professorowl_phd@hexbear.net]

PF1e archetypes are similar to subclasses - many functionally are - but are more about using one class as a base and replacing the parts you don’t want with parts of other classes you do want. Each archetype is linked to a specific class (which contributed to PF1e’s bloat), but you can stack any that don’t affect the same class features, and most classes have equivalent archetypes - for example, nearly all the non-companion classes have an archetype to replace something with an animal companion, most of the casters have a martial archetype and the martials a caster archetype etc. You can still multiclass on top and add archetypes to the new class(es), but they’re not quite class agnostic so I guess I can see why you wouldn’t like them.

PF2es archetypes/dedication feats are fully class agnostic replacements for PF1e archetypes/3.x prestige classes/multiclassing in general - you take them in place of class feats, and have to take a certain number from the same archetype before you can choose a new one. Medic is very popular because feats like battle medicine and ward medic lets any character replace a dedicated healer. Because of PF2es feat-centric design your initial choice of class gives you quite a loose framework of abilities to choose from, which you can then expand with dedications in more agnostic directions, like healing, duel wielding, archaeology, or becoming a lich.

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

yeah sounds a lot like pf2e archetypes.

you take a feat that gives you stuff related to other classes (multiclass archetypes) or just more specialized stuff.
some of them require certain things, like the wrestler dedication feat requires you to be at least trained in athletics, or like the new necrologist, that requires you to be a spellcaster that can cast summon undead

and then there are class archetypes (not to be confused with multiclass archetypes), which are subclasses you take at level 1 and at 2nd level you have to take the archetype’s feat

and like prestige classes, they seem to add a bunch of archetypes every new book they release, which is not at all an issue because that means MORE OPTIONS! and i love that

[zakobjoa@lemmy.world]

Okay, cloud saving, custom items and companions for a single payment of 4.50 EUR. But you can completely disregard the rules and freely give skills, spells and feats with the free version. The app is very well maintained, gets updates at least monthly. They were so fast with the implementation of the remaster. I’d love to gift the app to people in my group, who are struggling a bit more financially, but Google doesn’t have a functionality like that unfortunately.

[zakobjoa@lemmy.world]

I have a new player in my group who plays a rogue and tbh she still struggles a lot with all the different ways to get enemies off-guard. But it’s her first TTRPG overall and Pathfinder is not the best choice for that. Unfortunately for her no one in the group wanted to go back to Hasbro.

[festnt@sh.itjust.works]

only 4.5 EUR… it’s 20.99 BRL

i hate money (or maybe i just hate inflation)

[Kichae]

Try explaining things to her in more intuitive terms. She gets to do more damage when her opponent has significant trouble defending themselves. That happens when they have to split their attention across a wide distance (flanked), when they’re on the ground (prone), when they can’t see where they’re being attacked from (hidden), or when you fake them out (feint).

Old hats tend to boil away the actual roleplay from combat, but the rules usually directly support a roleplay-based view of battle. Presenting the game this way had my then-9-year-old picking the game up really quickly.

[vinesnfluff@pawb.social]

I wouldn’t know

I make all my choices based on sheer Rule of Cool-ness – I start with a vibe and build for that.

BUT. None of my GMs are tryhards, so maybe if I brought my characters to a tryhard session they’d get wiped.

[sad_detective_man@leminal.space]

so today I realized this meme is about 2e which so far hasn’t fallen into the same pattern of content bloat (give it time, we live in a society). so my point is moot, even if I wasn’t exaggerating two complaints simultaneously .

but in 1e after years and years of releasing content to keep the business alive, Paizo ended up with spells like False Age, Wizened Appearence, Youthful Appearence, False Face, Transplant Visage, Disguise Self and probably some others that all did the same thing with slight changes. There’s a similar abundance of spells to just help your character not read books like Skim, Memorize Page, Perusal, Commune With Texts, and Explode Head (the most redundant spell of all)

Then there’s ones with mild bonuses to hyper-specific use cases. Polypurpose Panacea has 5 different effects that are all +1 to sleeping or digestion. Cultural Adaptation is similar but for every check that isn’t speaking another language. I can’t remember the name of it but there’s one that just gives you +1 to checks made to be a Sailorman. Most of these are superseded by other spells that will just give bonuses to entire groups of skills like Crafter’s Fortune but still have specific use cases

[tyler@programming.dev]

oh, it’s just pathfinder 2? darn. Would love to switch off of PCGen, but there isn’t much for just character sheets for pathfinder 1e from what I’ve found.