Should I get Pathfinder?

[Helldog]

Is choosing +2 over +5 a penalty? Depends on your perspective. LordBlades (and I) say yes, Helldog disagrees.

Please, don't put words in my mouth, thank you.

[sonofzeal]

19 Classes with 272 Archetypes, and 46 Prestige Classes.

That's quite a lot!

By contrast, I make 3.5 at.... 72 base classes, 498 PrCs, and 253 variants (many of which, like Archetypes, can be taken at some level but not others if the player wishes).

By my math, 3.5 still wins by an order of magnitude... many orders of magnitude once you figure in the crushing disparity in easily-playable races.

Please, don't put words in my mouth, thank you.

That was... pretty much your entire argument for two whole pages, wasn't it?

[Helldog]

That was... pretty much your entire argument for two whole pages, wasn't it?

That was your imagination. Nowhere did I say that half-orc is the best option. That's the non-existant argument you guys are trying to refute, remember? All I and Psyren are saying is that half-orc is better, because without the penalties that the 3.5 version had, it is more viable for more fluff concepts and obviously better then the 3.5 half-orc. Remember that we are talking about those two versions of a race, not about comparing the half-orc to other races, not about balance. That are all strawmen that you guys brought up. not to mention that this whole argument is probably too off-topic.
I'm tired of repeating myself. I leave the rest to Psyren, if he's even still interested in this debate.

[sonofzeal]

Assume each character only multiclasses once (or never), and only takes one PrC (or none at all, and ignoring entry restrictions since they affect both systems and most can be finagled anyway)....


Pathfinder:
20 races * (19+272) class paths * (19+272) multiclass paths * 46 PrCs = 77,906,520


3.5:
172 races * (72+253) class paths * (72+253) multiclass paths * 498 PrCs = 9,047,415,000


Also note that these figures don't include the various non-standard options like Racial Paragon classes, or Bloodline levels, or the dozen other tools 3.5 gives you to mix things up - some of which are powerful, some are weak, but all increase the expressiveness of the system and the potential variety it gives you.

But even without that, for every PF build, there's over a hundred 3.5 builds. You may argue that the number of options in PF is more than anyone would need, but when you're trying to do something unusual, something the designers didn't expect, that ridiculous wealth of options in 3.5 becomes a major plus.

That was your imagination. Nowhere did I say that half-orc is the best option. That's the non-existant argument you guys are trying to refute, remember? All I and Psyren are saying is that half-orc is better, because without the penalties that the 3.5 version had, it is more viable for more fluff concepts and obviously better then the 3.5 half-orc. Remember that we are talking about those two versions of a race, not about comparing the half-orc to other races, not about balance. That are all strawmen that you guys brought up. not to mention that this whole argument is probably too off-topic.
I'm tired of repeating myself. I leave the rest to Psyren, if he's even still interested in this debate.

But.... I didn't say you thought +2 was better than +5. I just said you don't consider it a "penalty". That was your exact argument, that it's better than it was before (+2 compared to -2), and shouldn't be compared to the alternative human baseline (+0 for the one and +5 for the other).

In any case, no offense was meant, I was attempting to represent your argument as accurately as I could. If I failed, I do apologize.

[Psyren]

I'm not; I'll leave one last note for the OP:


Play Pathfinder if you enjoyed 3.5 and want to continue it. Look through paizo's races, classes and adventure paths to choose what suits you.

If you didn't like 3.5 because it was unbalanced, Pathfinder won't satisfy you either.

Finally, you should give Legend a try regardless of how you feel about Pathfinder, simply because it looks interesting enough to be worth a shot and community projects should be supported.

---

There, I'm done; the rest of you can wrangle about humans and half-orcs to your heart's content, but nothing in this thread is worth me getting infracted over.

[Helldog]

But.... I didn't say you thought +2 was better than +5. I just said you don't consider it a "penalty". That was your exact argument, that it's better than it was before (+2 compared to -2), and shouldn't be compared to the alternative human baseline (+0 for the one and +5 for the other).

No. I said that I don't care about your alleged stealth penalties. And if one of my posts gave you that assumption then sorry for confusing you. I though I was quite clear by saying "I don't care" instead of "You are wrong."

[KnightDisciple]

I will bow out with this statement:


While numerically, 3.5 has a greater number of classes and prestige classes to choose from, in my year+ of playing Pathfinder so far, I have felt satisfied with the choices I could make from the smaller pool it possessed. I have enjoyed my Pathfinder characters more than my previous 3.5 characters, feeling more successful with them.

I will openly admit to not being 100% pleased with the system. I don't like the fundamental imbalances it possesses in many places. But for all of that, I find it notably easier to both play in, and to build characters in. I enjoy myself more, and that's probably the most important thing, at least comparatively speaking.

As others have said, if you at least somewhat enjoyed your experience in 3.5, Pathfinder offers a similar, and, in my personal opinion, a better experience with a much, much richer pre-built world (Golarion) to back it up.

If you enjoy D20-based systems, and enjoy fantasy, at least give Pathfinder a look.

[Shadow Lord]

Welllll, it's only two weeks old. But we have outsold the Dresden Files RPG.

Yeaaaaah, you're gonna have to bring some proof to the field before I believe you about something like that. As is, I'm finding myself to not believe that, y'know, what with all the awards that the Dresden Files RPG has gotten.

[navar100]

Sure, there were tiers. But those same tiers are still there in pathfinder. They didn't fix the problems with spellcasting, they just nerfed a handful of individual broken spells, leaving plenty behind.

What switching to pathfinder does is cut off access to most of the T3 classes - the ones that were the most balanced and most enjoyable in 3e, since those classes tended to be from later expansions, built on years of learning from and improving what came before. Caster archetypes like beguiler and dread necromancer that took the edge off with limited spell /ability lists, while adding a ton of fun thematic flavor. Warrior archetypes like the duskblade and warblade, and crusader that ramped up the power into the 'worth existing' territory, while moving the combat options out of the 'I full attack ... again' ghetto. Just fun, weird stuff like binders and factotums and totemists.

Pathfinder's still stuck with fighters and wizards, and they didn't change nearly enough to bring them into the same range. The Summoner is a cool, fun, and interesting class that occupies that sweet spot of fun and effective but not game shattering, but there's really nothing else there right now.

If you want to play a beguiler, dread necromancer, or warblade with Pathfinder you are perfectly free to do so. Paizo does not have a goons squad to beat you up when attempting to play 3E material with the Pathfinder rules. Pathfinder even tells you to go ahead to use 3E material with the game. You can use them as is or you may want to change them a little to look more like Pathfinder. For example, if you are playing a warblade and want to use Diamond Mind you are probably better off changing all reference of Concentration to some other skill. I suggest Sense Motive.

In any case, Tier 3 classes are not the "best". They may be your personal favorite, but they are not better or worse than classes of the other tiers. Pathfinder, no one, is "stuck" with wizards and fighters. As I've written, if a person hates 3E, Pathfinder will not satiate them. In your case, it's because the only thing you like about 3E are Tier 3 classes. You "hate" to be "stuck" with wizard or fighter. Other people have different opinions as to what the "sweet spot" of fun is.

[Psyren]

If you want to play a beguiler, dread necromancer, or warblade with Pathfinder you are perfectly free to do so. Paizo does not have a goons squad to beat you up when attempting to play 3E material with the Pathfinder rules. Pathfinder even tells you to go ahead to use 3E material with the game. You can use them as is or you may want to change them a little to look more like Pathfinder. For example, if you are playing a warblade and want to use Diamond Mind you are probably better off changing all reference of Concentration to some other skill. I suggest Sense Motive.

Autohypnosis works too; it's not like it really matters when even cross-class skills cost 1 point each.

(I love the "paizo goon squad" )

[sonofzeal]

Random question - are there any hidden dangers to using PF Bestiaries in an otherwise 3.5 game? That looks to be some of their best work in terms of fixing actual problems, and the easiest to export into a non-PF game.

[Helldog]

Random question - are there any hidden dangers to using PF Bestiaries in an otherwise 3.5 game? That looks to be some of their best work in terms of fixing actual problems, and the easiest to export into a non-PF game.

Not that I put any real thought into it, but in my opinion PF monsters would be easier to kill in 3.5. Or rather they would be more balanced?
What I mean is that in PF monster CR and HD aren't that much apart, like in 3.5. Some monsters gained more HD, but many have less. And some monsters, like animals or giants, have slightly more HD then CR, but just because HD is their only strength.

[Doc Roc]

Yeaaaaah, you're gonna have to bring some proof to the field before I believe you about something like that. As is, I'm finding myself to not believe that, y'know, what with all the awards that the Dresden Files RPG has gotten.

Best estimate I can pull together for their sales is 6500 or so. For a point of reference, Burning Wheel has moved about 10k. Legend has moved just past 8.2k. Now, our average price per book is about 75 cents, so we aren't in the same prestige league as DFRPG or BW. And they have supplements and organized play. But on strict numbers, regardless, we are doing extremely well.

[Infernalbargain]

Random question - are there any hidden dangers to using PF Bestiaries in an otherwise 3.5 game? That looks to be some of their best work in terms of fixing actual problems, and the easiest to export into a non-PF game.

Really the only danger I know of is regarding natural attacks since in PF there's a handy universal table for natural attacks whereas in 3.5 whether something is primary or secondary seems a little voodooish to me.

The really nice thing about PF is that casters are weaker. Metamagic reducers are nowhere near as prolific (there are exactly three last I checked, magical lineage, spell perfection, and generalist wizard), polymorph stuff got a big hit with the nerf-bat, a lot of the early batman spells got nerfed, virtually no CL boosters, and stuff like celerity is gone. A level 20 PF wizard cannot claim to be able to beat a level 1000 monk. The little school perks are just there to make it look better. Only the divination one has any kind of teeth to it. Honestly, you only need PHB 1&2 to utterly crush anything in PF. Just go celerity + time stop + doomsday du jour.

The gap between the tiers has shrunken in PF. Argue all you may about Power Attack and Improved Trip, the fact remains that casters got taken down a notch. Do they still have cosmic power? Yes, but not vast immutable cosmic power. Now it is only about 2-3 dozen spells that were ported over in core that really need a looking over.

I've really taken a liking to the various medium casters. The magus is what the duskblade wants to be. He fights well and has enough utility to be useful outside of combat, particularly the Kensai archetype which rewards you for raising your int to compensate for losing the slots.

Now to deal with the monstrous races issue. The advanced races guide playtest, despite its numerous flaws which are for another thread, did indicate that races like the drow noble are acknowledged and are clearly shown to be more powerful than the core races (noble clocking in at about 22 points IIRC compared to the human's 10).

[Curious]

Now to deal with the monstrous races issue. The advanced races guide playtest, despite its numerous flaws which are for another thread, did indicate that races like the drow noble are acknowledged and are clearly shown to be more powerful than the core races (noble clocking in at about 22 points IIRC compared to the human's 10).

Why does everyone do this? The Drow Noble is powerful, yes. That's because it is +1 LA. If you check the bestiary entry, you will note that the Noble Drow cleric provided has a CR equal to its class level, rather than it's class level -1, as every other race does. Thus, LA +1.

[Blisstake]

Best estimate I can pull together for their sales is 6500 or so. For a point of reference, Burning Wheel has moved about 10k. Legend has moved just past 8.2k. Now, our average price per book is about 75 cents, so we aren't in the same prestige league as DFRPG or BW. And they have supplements and organized play. But on strict numbers, regardless, we are doing extremely well.

Well, you said "outsold." If you're making an average of $.75 per "sale," then what you said is incredibly misleading.

[sonofzeal]

Well, you said "outsold." If you're making an average of $.75 per "sale," then what you said is incredibly misleading.

Not really. I understood what he meant perfectly well. "Outsold" means "sold more than", which is literally accurate in this case. I can see how you might misinterpret it, but reading it in terms of money is indeed a misinterpretation. If he meant that, he should have said "out-grossed".

[Blisstake]

It's a bit misleading in the sense that I (and I'm sure I'm not the only one) don't consider someone downloading the book for free (which is allowed for Legend) to be counted as a "sale."

[sonofzeal]

It's a bit misleading in the sense that I (and I'm sure I'm not the only one) don't consider someone downloading the book for free (which is allowed for Legend) to be counted as a "sale."

I can see that... but on the other hand, the relevance of the figure is in how widely-spread the system is. If I got into DFtRPG, there's only ~6500 other people who have it. If I got into Legend, my chances of finding someone else with the system are marginally better, and likely to increase at a faster rate going forward. Semantic ambiguities aside, that's valuable information for a potential recruit. Heck, ubiquity is the main reason D&D's been dominating the landscape for so long.

[Infernalbargain]

Why does everyone do this? The Drow Noble is powerful, yes. That's because it is +1 LA. If you check the bestiary entry, you will note that the Noble Drow cleric provided has a CR equal to its class level, rather than it's class level -1, as every other race does. Thus, LA +1.

And I was pointing out that the races guide did explicitly show it as opposed to relying on a CR argument.

[Blisstake]

I can see that... but on the other hand, the relevance of the figure is in how widely-spread the system is. If I got into DFtRPG, there's only ~6500 other people who have it. If I got into Legend, my chances of finding someone else with the system are marginally better, and likely to increase at a faster rate going forward. Semantic ambiguities aside, that's valuable information for a potential recruit. Heck, ubiquity is the main reason D&D's been dominating the landscape for so long.

Semantic ambiguities is all I was arguing here, I mostly agree with you

[LordBlades]

No. I said that I don't care about your alleged stealth penalties. And if one of my posts gave you that assumption then sorry for confusing you. I though I was quite clear by saying "I don't care" instead of "You are wrong."

So you don't care about a penalty unless the system clearly tells you 'this is a penalty'? If so I think further discussion on the topic is useless.

[Doc Roc]

Semantic ambiguities is all I was arguing here, I mostly agree with you

For the record, I didn't intend any ambiguity. It's important to remember that even if we were selling it for 30$ a pop, we still wouldn't see any of that, since all proceeds from the core book go to Child's Play forever.

[navar100]

I will say it was probably a mistake for Pathfinder to give human sorcerers the option of one new spell known per level. To allow the concept it should have been fractional spell known like a human rogue can learn fractional talents. When the fraction reaches a whole number, the human sorcerer learns a new spell. Still strong but not as overwhelming.

Why they chose one spell known per level I don't know, but one logic to be ok with it is the sorcerer still has his set number of spells per day and despite knowing more spells wouldn't be casting more spells in general. Shrug.

[Shadow Lord]

Best estimate I can pull together for their sales is 6500 or so. For a point of reference, Burning Wheel has moved about 10k. Legend has moved just past 8.2k. Now, our average price per book is about 75 cents, so we aren't in the same prestige league as DFRPG or BW. And they have supplements and organized play. But on strict numbers, regardless, we are doing extremely well.

You do realize that in July last year, the Dresden Files RPG: Your Story had sold 5000 copies? That's around 200,000 dollars of income, before we take out the price to print the copies. And that's before we account for the spike in sales they would have had for all the awards they got for the ENNies, the Origin Awards, and the Golden Geeks.

So, no, I'm rather certain you're not pulling near as much as the Dresden Files is.

[Doc Roc]

You do realize that in July last year, the Dresden Files RPG: Your Story had sold 5000 copies? That's around 200,000 dollars of income, before we take out the price to print the copies. And that's before we account for the spike in sales they would have had for all the awards they got for the ENNies, the Origin Awards, and the Golden Geeks.

So, no, I'm rather certain you're not pulling near as much as the Dresden Files is.

::snaps:: So.... they've moved what... 8k copies of the handbook? Which is less than the 8.5k we've moved in two weeks?

Do you know why we aren't in their class? Because we opted to do something charitable. Because we are a small shop. We've moved, roughly, as many copies as they have of the core book. We can't compete on supplements because we have no supplements. We can't compete on multiple core books, because we have one core book.

I'm tired of this, {scrubbed}. Every time Legend comes up, you trash us for who we aren't. Do you have any idea how hard it is to even get someone to look at your RPG? Without getting dismissed as "not pathfinder?" {scrubbed}

[Shadow Lord]

::snaps::
Do you know why we aren't? Because we opted to do something charitable. Because we are a small shop. We've moved, roughly, as many copies as they have of the core book. We can't compete on supplements because we have no supplements.

**** you. I'm tired of this. Do you have any idea how hard it is to even get someone to look at your RPG? Without getting dismissed as "not pathfinder?"

Exactly when did I dismiss your game as "not pathfinder?" Hmm? I have no problems with the system, and in fact like what I've read of it, but if you make baseless claims like what you made, then yes, I am going to ask you to provide proof, and yes, I'm going to retort with something that disproves what you've said. Sure, you've donated 8000 dollars, but you claim that you've outsold DFRPG, and that isn't true.

And, not to be rude, but the only reason that you've moved so many copies is that your game is available for however much you want to pay for it. If you were to charge even as much as $20, then you would find yourself with a drastically lower amount of moved product. It's a great game, but claiming that it has moved more copies than another game, when yours is available for free, just isn't true. Especially when it, honestly, hasn't moved more.

[Blisstake]

Okay! Well, this has certainly gotten off topic and hostile just like every single other "Is Pathfinder Any Good" topic to ever show up on these forums.

[Doc Roc]

Okay! Well, this has certainly gotten off topic and hostile just like every single other "Is Pathfinder Any Good" topic to ever show up on these forums.

And it's my fault... crap. I've gone ahead and reported my own post, and I'm stepping out of this.