Jason_Firewalker wrote:Alright this is a semi-dead thread, but since I am a huge fan of Pathfinder I had to put in my 2 cents to Hotfoot's complaints.
1. Multiclassing sucks, especially for spellcasters
Answer: Multiclassing has been fixed, considering that the XP penalty has been entirely removed and with the rework of the Favored Class system it really renders the need to multiclass almost unnessecary.
That has nothing to do with my complaint at all, actually. Favored Class and XP penalty had nothing to do with it, character effectiveness at a given level is. Special ability progressions and spellcasting progressions are still gimped by the multiclassing system. Meanwhile, Saga edition, by having smaller special ability trees, managed to resolve this issue.
2. Skill system sucks, too many skills, not enough points, you are only ever going to be good at a handful of things.
Answer: A whole ton of skills have been grouped together. No longer do you have to put points into Spot Listen and Search, you only have: Stealth (which covers Hide and Move Silently), and Perception (which covers Spot, Listen and Search). Disable Device covers Open Lock as well. Linguistics also covers Decipher Script as well as teach you more languages. And if its a class skill and you put only 1 point into it, you get 3 bonus free ranks. Makes life a ton easier. And it does not have to be a class skill for the class you got the rank from. Say you are a Rogue/Wizard and with a rogue level you toss a rank into Know(planes), but you had no ranks there before, but since you have it as a class skill as a wizard, you get a +3 in addition to the 1 rank you put in. There is no more cross class bullspit super spending. A rank is a rank.
It helps the lack of skill points, but it does far from solving the issue, there are still far too few, and it's a lousy solution to the problem overall. Moreover, there are STILL too many skills, even with their excuse at folding.
3. The magic system sucks. Save or die spells suck, the spell level system sucks, since later one level 1 spells are rarely used except in last ditches.
Answer: Not really any answer there, that is a personal preference. Personally I like the thrill of save or die.
Never mind that other classes do not have abilities that force you to make a save or die, making spellcasters unduly powerful at higher levels and completely fucking up any notion of class balance the game tries to have.
4. Martial classes fall far behind mages in overall utility later on.
Answer: All the martial classes have been worked over almost entirely. Fighters become CRAZY good with one type of weapon (such as 1 handed axes or polearms) Plus the Rogue and the Bard are worked over to a point that they are actually competitive classes in the long run.
Really? They get save or die special attacks that can bypass armor class? Because if not that's completely missing the point.
5. Combat rules are insanely overcomplicated, with feats being necessary not to such at certain maneuvers. Grapple, anyone?
Answer: Already answered. The CMB and CMD is all based on a MUCH more simple calculation.
Doesn't change that you still need feats to NOT SUCK at basic combat maneuvers. Even in Saga this bugs the hell out of me, where you need feats to do what other RPG rulesets take for granted as combat options.
6. Broken Prestige Classes, look no further than the broken mage my buddy Will made.
Answer: Very limited prestige class access. Right now there are less then a dozen of them. And honestly if you use them you can, if improperly applied, actually short change you over the base classes.
Oh no, there are prestige classes that are useless. It doesn't change the ones that are ridiculously overpowered. Remember that Pathfinder still uses stuff from 3.5, since they're basically the same rules, repainted.
7. The jump from level 1 to level 4 is massive and by far the biggest shift in the game, which means the game changes massively in this time period.
Answer: I can understand that, the access to second level spells and literally in some cases over tripling your HP in 2 to 3 levels in massively life changing but really, at start your supposed to be a weak ass barely seasoned at all adventurer, are you not supposed to learn some BIG ass lessons at that time? Make some huge leaps in your power because its do that or DIE LIKE A BIZNATCH?
Sigh, really? This is your argument?
You know what good game design is? When at the beginning of the game, you show players what sorts of cool stuff they can do, so that as they face tougher challenges, they can use their abilities to greater effect and make use of new tricks. Introduce a new player to D&D at level 1, and watch what happens. It's a lot of confusion over the mess of rules they have to learn, especially if they're a spellcaster, and frustration about their cool mage/cleric/rogue/fighter going down like a dog to, well, a dog.
Imagine Conan the Barbarian where Arnold gets gacked in his first pit fight. Not very compelling.
Now, I understand the desire to work your way up from nothing into a badass of epic proportions, hell I still love Mechwarrior 2: Mercenaries when you start with nothing but a weak-ass Commando and by the end of the game you're rolling with two full lances of tricked out clan assault mechs and air support, but I also remember Baldur's Gate, and I remember the first one where you were doing such heroic feats as killing rats in the library's basement. Yeah, not compelling. Baldur's Gate 2? Escaping from a made mage's secret lair? Fucking awesome.
It's just massively disconcerting when you are a pussy one minute and superman the next. It's one thing to be tougher, but it's another thing to take dozens of blows that would be otherwise lethal to you a day ago.
8. Oh yes, and because this is a particular sticking point for me, increases in INT do not give retroactive skill points, but CON increases give retroactive hitpoints. I'm tired of every justification I've heard, and yes, I've heard them all. None of them hold up, and it's just lousy game design because it means that for skills, you need to get as high an INT score from the word go as you can, or you get fucking hosed for skill points, which are already a precious resource.
Answer: Pathfinder fixed that... INT gains later add to your skills.
No, not in the books I saw last year at Gencon it sure as hell didn't, and believe me, I looked. That was a major sticking point for me. Now maybe that's been errata'ed or something since, but I doubt they made a new printing in under a year to change that one thing.
And to clarify, I'm talking about RETROACTIVE skill point gains, not the "the next time you level you'll get more skill points". When your Con increases, you get extra hitpoints for your new level, and for every previous level. When you increase Int, you only get new skill points for every level after that one, not for every previous level.
9. As an addendum, D20 sucks ass for modern styled games, and I really don't understand the love some people have for D20 modern and the variations thereof. It works well for more cinematic styled games, but not grittier ones.
Answer: I can understand but d20 is different then 3.5. It is also a hell of a lot different then Pathfinder. d20 product such as Spycraft and d20: Modern have their place for cinematic style of play but I tend to agree they are not suited for more common modern gaming. I prefer the gritty realism of the Battlelords system but thats my personal take.
3.5 is based on the d20 architecture dude, there are some minor rules that are different, but the core mechanics are the same. They're both OGL d20, and so is Pathfinder.
10. Oh yes, and while this is more the fault of WotC, but the CL and ECL system is broken-ass garbage. One look at a Pixie should confirm that, especially if you consider that as a PC rogue.
Answer: WotC sat there with its thumbs up its butt on CR/ECL... But thats easily fixable. I tend to use their monster creation rules provided in MM:I to double check their CR ratings before throwing them at the players, also I tend to know the limits of my players fairly well after a few sessions and I can gauge how hard a fight will be for them. As for ECL, I throw it out the window half the time. I tend to force the use of Savage Species on the players that want to play something other then a ECL 0 character, and since 99% of my games start under level 5... it tends to take away the issue of overpowering monster characters.
If you HAVE to doublecheck a monster against the party's capabilities to make sure it won't end in tears, you've just proven that the system is utterly broken and useless. It's not "easily fixable" if the "fix" is to go over everything with a fine tooth comb. That's just lots of busy work. You don't mind it? Fine. Doesn't mean you should defend a waste of time as anything but.