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I think the aging of the market just means people have less time to play, and/or burn out. But it’s a strange attitude in the light of PF2e. In that game it’s apparent that they’re really trying to avoid adding anything too powerful in the supplements, but all that means is that the big power builds are in the core book and don’t change so power gamer groups stagnate, while non power gamer groups never cared about them anyway.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:14
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I think it's just sort of inevitable that after a while a game that's got a lot of stuff built up around it will probably be on a downslide trajectory since invested players will get tired/get burned out/find new hobbies/no longer have the time to do stuff/etc and drift away, while newer players are more likely to find a hobby with what is going to essentially seem like a lot of "required reading" to catch up on to be intimidating or offputting or just like too much of a hassle. That is to say that while I think Tuxedo Catfish raises some well considered points, I think that PF1 trailing off probably just had more to do with the inertia running out than the audience suddenly getting way more discerning (though given that the original d20 bubble burst for this reason, I also can't discount the possibility out of hand). And also just at a certain point, even in a game that isn't built on as much of a foundation of jank as PF1 was, once you start wanting to make more extensive changes and additions to a game going forward it does start to raise the question of whether it's better to try and hammer the existing game into a new configuration or start from a fresh foundation. As someone who finds it fairly ridiculous the lengths people will go to try and shoehorn every sort of game and genre they can into a D&D-shaped hole, I'm sympathetic to anyone who decides that a clean-ish break is actually the better way forward.
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Jun 2, 2022 03:57
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hyphz posted:I think the aging of the market just means people have less time to play, and/or burn out.
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Jun 2, 2022 05:10
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Terrible Opinions posted:So exactly the same as 3.5 and PF1? That seems to happen with a lot of games that expand their option pools later, not always but enough to be a thing for sure.
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Jun 2, 2022 05:22
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hyphz posted:I think the aging of the market just means people have less time to play, and/or burn out. There is a massive range of groups that fall between the groups that do not give a poo poo about power at all and "power gamer" groups. For example, personally I really like Pathfinder 2 and for me it's important that the balance is good enough. I don't really care if a couple of super specialized builds or groups can edge out 30% more DPR or whatever, as long as most of the options available in the game are fun and can mechanically good enough to accomplish their goals. PF2 isn't perfect in that regard (paizo is a bit too conservative with power level in newer releases imo) but it accomplishes it fine.
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Jun 2, 2022 05:38
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:
Tuxedo Catfish posted:
I don't disagree with anything in your post, especially this last part, but I think you might be focusing on aging out more than the reliable customers. D&D manages to suck all the air out of the room by having an associated, purchasable identity. When WotC tried to out-grog Paizo, they arguably knew what they were doing: For all of 5e's faults, it had the ampersand on the cover and organized play. People switched to PF1 because they were Dungeons and Dragons players, and Paizo promised to keep making that game under a different title. I'd suggest that what drove players in Paizo's direction initially was the culture war-esque branding of product as identity. D&D players followed D&D to its "reign in exile" at Paizo after 4e was rejected as a tabletop MMO cash-grab for babies. The shoe didn't stopped fitting. The customers never outgrew it, but now the name brand was catering to them again. Classic Coke was back, so the Coke superfans put down the Pepsi and RC they'd been telling themselves was "real Coke" in the interim. What happened culturally with PF and 4e and Next and 3.x had very little to do with each games' rules and design. PF1 players had consumed enough PF1 products to affirm that they were D&D players, and now the pathway to affirming that identity had shifted.
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Jun 2, 2022 07:43
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PF2e has PC Skeletons as an option so clearly it is the superior system
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Jun 2, 2022 10:39
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Froghammer posted:PF2e has PC Skeletons as an option so clearly it is the superior system
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Jun 2, 2022 11:14
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What, do you get +2 to CON and don't need to eat or sleep? :V
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Jun 2, 2022 11:36
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sasha_d3ath posted:What, do you get +2 to CON and don't need to eat or sleep? :V
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Jun 2, 2022 11:53
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Terrible Opinions posted:So exactly the same as 3.5 and PF1? 3.5 and PF1? Pfft. You didn't get MoMF and Synthesist in the core books.
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Jun 2, 2022 16:28
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Neither of those are even remotely as powerful as base wizard.
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Jun 2, 2022 16:38
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Terrible Opinions posted:Neither of those are even remotely as powerful as base wizard. I'm not familiar with that prestige class. Is that from the Plants vs. Zombies adaptation?
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Jun 2, 2022 16:51
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Absurd Alhazred posted:I'm not familiar with that prestige class. Is that from the Plants vs. Zombies adaptation? It's the counterpart to the acid cleric and alkali sorcerer
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Jun 2, 2022 17:27
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Xelkelvos posted:It's the counterpart to the acid cleric and alkali sorcerer The druid is once again required to be neutral.
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Jun 2, 2022 17:47
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Saline Druid.Tuxedo Catfish posted:that might be a more precise way to express it than what i said, or perhaps a way that more closely reflects the way they thought about it to themselves, but I mean -- it just sounds like you're describing them prioritizing D&D the brand over D&D the game, which doesn't seem that different from what I'm saying in any case I don't think 2e was a repudiation of Basic per se. Basic wasn't popular at TSR, but I haven't found, like, any digs at it in Dragon in the lead-up to 2e. And Zeb Cook wrote the Expert Set and some important Basic modules like Isle of Dread. There were business reasons for making 2e, but it was nonetheless a good-faith effort to reorganize and simplify the corebooks. I think the biggest similarity to 5e is the way they solicited feedback when they were planning it out. Cook even went out of his way to be provocative, kicking things off with the "Who Dies?" column about which classes would get the axe. (In the end, only the Assassin literally died.) Another key similarity was the decision to prioritize existing fans over new ones. The conventional wisdom was that a book can be either an instruction manual or a reference but not both at once, and they came down on the side of making it a handy reference for the existing fanbase. I guess what I wanted to tease out was what a game actually looks like when it's designed for "feel" and to feel "classic." So like, some rules are contradictory: combat is theatre-of-the-mind but precise distances are given. Some are pointless: there are costs for basic adventuring gear and supplies that will stop mattering after a few sessions at most. Some feel vestigial: there are rules for hunger and thirst, but little incentive to actually use them. Some sorta trail off into nothing: there are guidelines for tracking time, but no built-in incentive to put time pressure on the players. The funny thing is, I guess it does give new players the "Classic D&D Experience" from my POV. Because my initial experience with D&D is being confronted by all these rules and wondering why most of them exist. But D&D also wasn't one of the first five RPGs I ever played. We could probably also look across editions of e.g. Vampire or Shadowrun and the rift between what a new player probably expects, what the existing fanbase considers the Classic Experience, and what's actually in the books. I notice that discussions about what's best for new players tend to get heated, because new players are this blank slate we can all project onto, and then argue that our own preferences are objectively what's best for The Hobby. Mike Mearls isn't the only game developer to do stupid poo poo and claim that it's for the benefit of new players. Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 18:42 on Jun 2, 2022 |
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Jun 2, 2022 18:32
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I'm pretty sure base wizard is a PC class in Freebase
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Jun 2, 2022 20:59
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Splicer posted:It's the new lineages thing so you get +2 to whatever, +1 to whatever, a bunch of being dead stuff (like as you said no sleeping) then you write "skeleton" or "frankenstein" or whatever under species. I'm not really seeing how that's significantly different from, let alone "considerably superior" to, the skeleton ancestry in Pathfinder 2e.
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Jun 2, 2022 22:48
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Which game lets you be a skeleton bard and play your rib marimbas?
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Jun 2, 2022 22:58
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Bottom Liner posted:Which game lets you be a skeleton bard and play your rib marimbas? Maribmas was right there.
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Jun 2, 2022 23:00
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Bottom Liner posted:Which game lets you be a skeleton bard and play your rib marimbas? Got ya covered (not really)
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Jun 2, 2022 23:03
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PF2e's Skeletons can: - Fire their own ribs as arrows, dealing extra - Rip off the arm holding a weapon in order to wield that weapon-wielding arm as a weapon, giving themselves reach - Collapse into a pile of bones mid-combat, gaining AC but knocking them prone - Collapse into a pile of bones out of combat in order to disguise yourself as a pile of bones - Once per day become a skull floating in the center of a massive swirling vortex of bones
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Jun 2, 2022 23:41
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Froghammer posted:PF2e's Skeletons can: This is literally the first pitch for any version of Pathfinder that has genuinely peaked my interest.
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Jun 2, 2022 23:46
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Froghammer posted:PF2e's Skeletons can: I feel like it's also vital to mention this feat is called "Well-armed"
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Jun 2, 2022 23:49
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Xiahou Dun posted:Maribmas was right there. Boy, I really hope somebody got fired for that blunder.
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Jun 2, 2022 23:49
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Leperflesh posted:This is literally the first pitch for any version of Pathfinder that has genuinely peaked my interest. Same, that actually sounds rad.
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Jun 2, 2022 23:56
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Leperflesh posted:This is literally the first pitch for any version of Pathfinder that has genuinely peaked my interest. Pathfinder 2e is shockingly cool and good, it's a nearly complete reversal of course from 1e. Paizo's got problems and a closet full of skeletons and I trust their corporate wing about 0%, but the cool books they've been putting out combined with their unionization has been really nice to see.
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Jun 2, 2022 23:59
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Leperflesh posted:This is literally the first pitch for any version of Pathfinder that has genuinely peaked my interest. Same. That's the kind of goofy skeleton action I crave.
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Jun 3, 2022 00:03
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FishFood posted:Pathfinder 2e is shockingly cool and good, it's a nearly complete reversal of course from 1e. Paizo's got problems and a closet full of skeletons and I trust their corporate wing about 0%, but the cool books they've been putting out combined with their unionization has been really nice to see. Yeah I just pretty much am done with every form of D&D, forever. Probably. Maybe I'll change my mind. But there's so many interesting RPGs that aren't basically some flavor of D&D, y'know? But poo poo. Spooky Scary Skeleton Time sounds rad.
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Jun 3, 2022 00:05
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PF2e's got all sorts of good stuff in it if you scratch the surface and get used to the concept of eight hojillion keywords
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Jun 3, 2022 00:14
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It's also got the digest-sized core books I crave.
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Jun 3, 2022 00:37
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Getting drafted into the Pathfinder 2e skeleton war
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Jun 3, 2022 00:50
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gradenko_2000 posted:Getting drafted into the Pathfinder 2e skeleton war Drafted? They can't keep up with the volunteers!
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Jun 3, 2022 00:55
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:Sayre talks about players "aging out of being reliable customers," which is a pretty weird thing to say if you're not talking about, like, LEGOs or something; adults generally have more money to spend on a product that isn't outright for children. There are two obvious things going on here. First any hobby has attrition as people's time and interests changed. I don't do all the same things I did ten years ago. Do you? And kids are a big reason. The second is that new publications, especially ones involving character options are frequently more and more niche because the obvious ones have already been produced. To use a 3.X example the initial Forgotten Realms supplement sold pretty well as people wanted the realms. The seventeenth? Not so much. And Pathfinder 1 was deep into the point of diminishing returns. (I also think that pre-essentials 4e had filled out most of the obvious design space by Martial Power 2 and needed some twist on the basic formula). quote:And depending on exactly how highly you think of Pathfinder 2E and how much of this stuff it actually changes, it also suggests that new players are an appealing demographic not because some other sophisticated and self-aware taste has achieved greater popularity than the desire for system mastery -- but rather because they're younger, less literate, and not as critical. At least PF 2e allowed for resetting the supplement treadmill, first so newbies weren't overwhelmed (but then they went for absurd numbers of feats) and second so the concepts being sold were relatively basic and thus appealing to a lot of people.
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Jun 3, 2022 01:21
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Froghammer posted:PF2e's Skeletons can: Before anyone starts thinking that Pathfinder 2 came up with something cool you could actually use without jumping through a whole lot of hoops that should have read "PF2e's skeletons with the right feats can:", with at least one of those abilities requiring not just a feat but being level 17 before you can take the feat. And in case anyone was under the impression that Pathfinder 2 wasn't a clunky system full of traps that gates all the cool stuff behind feats there's a feat required for you to "lay prone and pretend to be a regular skeleton"
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Jun 3, 2022 01:37
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I mean, in Pathfinder 2e literally everything is a feat, that's just the term used for "different options from a list".
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Jun 3, 2022 01:48
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neonchameleon posted:Before anyone starts thinking that Pathfinder 2 came up with something cool you could actually use without jumping through a whole lot of hoops that should have read "PF2e's skeletons with the right feats can:", with at least one of those abilities requiring not just a feat but being level 17 before you can take the feat. And in case anyone was under the impression that Pathfinder 2 wasn't a clunky system full of traps that gates all the cool stuff behind feats there's a feat required for you to "lay prone and pretend to be a regular skeleton" That's disingenuous because these feats don't compete with anything but themselves. And you get them automatically. So, yes, you don't get every cool skeleton thing all at once, but Ancestry feats are largely low-power, high-flavor options that you use to differentiate yourself from, say, other skeletons in your party. They aren't traps by any sane metric.
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Jun 3, 2022 02:04
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Tuxedo Catfish posted:
quote:I dunno, that read as "we hosed up and wanted to change to me." MadScientistWorking fucked around with this message at 03:37 on Jun 3, 2022 |
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Jun 3, 2022 03:15
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Toshimo posted:That's disingenuous because these feats don't compete with anything but themselves. And you get them automatically. But it is fiddly faff - especially when (as I pointed out) at least one of them is things you can't do. quote:[So, yes, you don't get every cool skeleton thing all at once, but Ancestry feats are largely low-power, high-flavor options that you use to differentiate yourself from, say, other skeletons in your party. You mean that things like, oh I don't know, your class, don't differentiate you from each other in the rare event that you have a theme party. And they are low-power, high-faff although I will accept that at least some of them are very flavoursome. quote:They aren't traps by any sane metric. The one I linked, Play Dead, is an "air-breathing mermaid" feat. If it didn't exist I would assume any skeleton was capable of lying down and playing dead. But because it does exist it implies most skeletons can't play dead and pretend to be an inanimate skeleton otherwise the feat does nothing. That's a definite system trap right there even if it's not a trap in the way e.g. 3.X Toughness was.
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Jun 3, 2022 03:37
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neonchameleon posted:
MadScientistWorking fucked around with this message at 03:46 on Jun 3, 2022 |
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Jun 3, 2022 03:43
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