My Final Thoughts on The Pathfinder 2nd Edition Playtest

As most everyone knows, Paizo put out a playtest for their second edition of Pathfinder a while back. When I first heard it was coming out, I made some predictions in What Pathfinder 2.0 Means For Me Personally, and Professionally. Then after I downloaded my own copy of the playtest rules, I gave my thoughts on them over at High Level Games in the post 5 Red Flags in Pathfinder's 2nd Edition Playtest (And What They're Pointing At). Now that I've played through as many of the modules as I and my group could stomach, I wanted to give you my final autopsy on what's going on here, and why this Frankenstein's creature is a flawed, barely-functional attempt that Paizo should be ashamed of.

Let's get started, shall we?

Part One: What This Playtest Is

I said this in my High Level Games review, but this playtest is pretty nakedly an attempt to give 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons the same treatment Paizo gave 3.5 when it was dropped in favor of 4th Edition. And while it is true that the two are not the same game, it is quite clear what popular game Paizo had its sights set on with this playtest. Everything from switching to a proficiency-based system, to altering the way death saves work, to adopting things like weapon attributes shows that the base component of this smoothie is Wizards' extremely popular RPG.

It's not the only thing, but it's the biggest thing.

What Paizo added to that base was an attempt to mix in some of their signature flair and complication. For example, you still have a flat-footed status condition, which is something 5th Ed lacks. In this playtest, your proficiency also adds to your armor class, allowing you to maintain scaling defenses as you level rather than arbitrarily sticking you with lower numbers the way 5th Ed does. They altered the basic actions in combat so that instead of Action, Bonus Action, and Movement, you now just have three Actions to do with as you please. They even tied that to spellcasting so that different spells would have different effects the more Actions you dedicated to them.

Now, before we move onto the next section, I'd like to point out some things that I believe were good ideas, that were not directly lifted from Wizards, or from Pathfinder Classic.

- Racial Hit Points: Depending on your creature's ancestry, you gain a number of bonus hit points at creation. This allows you to avoid accidentally TPKing the whole party at level one, and is generally smart.

- Anathema: Laying out specific things your god does not allow you to do makes for fewer arguments over whether or not your broke a tenet, and should be punished.

- Scaling Paladin Code: Paladins are still LG, and their code explicitly scales now. So if a DM tries to put a player in a Catch-22, the paladin simply upholds the most important tenet, allowing that to guide them. If protecting the innocent is above obeying legal authorities, then you are completely within your right to kick the crap out of that slave owner to stop him from beating his slave, even if that breaks the legitimate slavery laws of the country you're in.

And that's about it.

Part Two: Why It Doesn't Work

The basic idea behind a second edition, if you believe the hype, was that Pathfinder Classic had grown too complex. There were dozens of base classes and prestige classes, hundreds of archetypes, and just so much stuff that it was easy to get overwhelmed by it all. Not only that, but the 3.5+ rule set needed to be slimmed down and adjusted to get rid of some of the unnecessary complication.

I don't buy it, but that was what the claims were.

It ain't broke, but we're gonna fix it anyway!

This wasn't an inherently bad idea. After all, the whole reason behind 5th Edition's much-touted success is its sheer simplicity. To paraphrase a fellow at my table, it's a beer-and-pretzels RPG. The rules are there, but they're so simplified that you can teach anyone to play this game in maybe half an hour or so. That kind of broad appeal, and its pick-up-and-play simplicity, is why 5th Edition is riding high when it comes to market share. Period, full stop, end of story.

The problem with this playtest is that it doesn't simplify Pathfinder in any meaningful way. It's not even the same game, any more than 5th Edition is the same game as DND 3.5. Worse, it only adds complication that has no actual meaning, and which doesn't offer you tools to create additional character depth or customization.

What does that mean in layman's terms? Well, let's look at feats. In Pathfinder Classic there are hundreds of feats for you to choose from, but the point is that feat is a category that means something very specific. In this playtest you have ancestry feats, you have class feats, and you have... uh... feat feats? In Classic you get a feat every odd level. In the playtest you get different feats of different types at different levels. Why? What does this add other than giving you three different lists of stuff to remember when you could previously just pick what you wanted when you qualified for it?

This kind of needless complication happens all over the place in this playtest. You now have a bulk system instead of carrying capacity. So now you have to figure out your total item bulk, and run that through a formula to figure out how much bulk you can carry. In the Classic edition you just look at your Strength score, and that tells you how many pounds of stuff you can haul. Simple, straightforward, no problems. The playtest gives you resonance points that you now have to use in order to activate and use magic items, potions, etc. All this does is limit your ability to use magic items you find or buy, and give you yet another pool of points to keep track of for no reason. In the Classic edition your race gives you certain inherent characteristics (half-orcs can see in the dark, elves are immune to magical sleep, etc., etc.). These are things you are born with, and are an inherent part of you. In the playtest these abilities are parceled out to you as you gain levels... because I guess it takes a certain amount of combat before your half-orc's eyes spontaneously function in pitch blackness?

Also, half-elves and half-orcs are directly connected to humans in this playtest, which makes it clear in this edition those are the only possible races your parentage could have come from. Another limiting of your options and creativity for seemingly no real reason.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not shy about rules complexity... but those rules need to add an aspect to the game that is worth pursuing, or which adds to your options as a player. Practically every decision in this playtest is to take a simple system, chop it up into multiple pieces, and then present those pieces as if they are somehow easier, or more useful, than the single, functional, unified whole it was before. Or, even worse, new systems and point pools are introduced to limit your options.

Part Three: What Was The Goal?

The question that kept recurring to me as I read the book, built characters, and played through the modules was simple. What is this game trying to do?

The stated goal of the playtest in many corners was to simplify Pathfinder as a game. But when you compare the two editions core book to core book, the Classic edition is just a lot simpler to understand and explain. It gives you more options, things are less restricted, and there is just more you can do. Not saying it's a simple game, but compared to the playtest it's at least sensical, and easy to follow. Some of that is likely due to the playtest being a rough draft, but that can't explain all of it.

So the next question is did this playtest simply get carried away and fail in its goal to be a simpler, easier-to-play game? Personally, I don't think so.

I don't think the problem was, "Our game needs to be simplified." Paizo built their entire following on gamers who like 3.5, and who refused to pick up 4th Edition DND (and 4th Edition was super simple to play). Rather, I have a sneaking suspicion that the question was either, "How do we steal some of 5th Edition's thunder?" or, "How do we sell a whole crap ton of books?"

Wait, I've got it!

It's true that you could just download the free PDF of the playtest, read it, and play from your phone or tablet. But Paizo put up both softcover and hardcover copies of the Pathfinder Playtest Rulebook for sale. I'm going to repeat that. Paizo put out for-sale copies of a book that will never be used in official game play, and which is guaranteed to be obsolete as soon as the playtest is over and the actual edition rules come out.

That is not a good look for a company. It makes you look less like you're trying to provide your player base with the best product you can, and more like you're trying to make a quick buck off of their good faith effort to test your game. And I get it, publishing isn't cheap and there are costs involved... but game books are already a big investment. Selling a version that's going to be obsolete in less than a year? Why?

But let's talk about that other question. Because for a while there, Paizo was king of the heap while 4th Edition was a screaming garbage fire, numbers and popularity wise. But then Wizards regrouped, and they made a game that had broad appeal to a specific base. Their genuinely simplified game allows anyone to play, and it appeals more to players who want bare bones rules, ease of use, and who are more focused on the other aspects of the game. If you're a Pathfinder player, and you are one of those folks who genuinely prefers it over simpler systems, that isn't going to sell you! Because chances are good that you, like me, love the wealth of options and creative potential the 3.5+ engine offers you.

5th Edition already exists. It has a huge fan base. It has that fan base because it is simple, straightforward, and easy to play. It has lots of flaws and failings, but those are the strengths that make it popular. If you want to appeal to that fan base, and try to siphon off players from that game, more power to you. But that is a fundamental misunderstanding of what appeals to the audience you already have, the brand you've created, and what people playing your game expect in your product.

If I wanted to play 5th Edition, I would play 5th Edition. While I won't say that Classic is perfect and can't be improved, I can say with authority there is no reason for anyone to play this 2nd Edition as it stands over either the Pathfinder we know, or the current edition of Dungeons and Dragons. It gives you all the negatives of both, but without the strengths of either.

That's all for this Crunch installment. Apologies if I got any bile on you, but this is likely the last I'll have to say about this edition for a while and I wanted to be sure it was all out. For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or just go to my Gamers profile to see all my tabletop stuff. Also, you should check out the YouTube channel Dungeon Keeper Radio where I work with other gamers to make content for dungeon masters and players alike. To stay on top of all my releases be sure to follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. If you'd like to support my work, consider leaving a tip by Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or becoming a patron over on The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page.

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The Worst Call of Cthulhu Game I Ever Played

Even though the spooky season is technically over for another year, I have one last chilling story to tell. A tale of player expectations laid low, and of a game that began with such potential, but which lost layer upon layer of intrigue and complexity to reveal the staring, wide eyes of madness. A game that still sends shudders down my spine whenever I think on it.

This was the first Call of Cthulhu game I ever played. Learn from my woes so that your eldritch horrors stay where they should, and bring the terror they were intended to.

There but for the grace of Yog-Sothoth go I.

It All Started Well...

Early in my gaming career, before I had experience with anything other than the third edition of Dungeons and Dragons, I got invited by my then-roommate to play a Call of Cthulhu game. I was a fan of Lovecraft's work, and of his contemporaries like Robert E. Howard, and the idea of switching genre, setting, and system struck me as a welcome change to my gaming schedule. The pitch was that characters would all be members of a relatively small, but prestigious, college community.

You know, your standard Lovecraft protagonists.

Like a slasher movie cast, but with graduate degrees.

Early on, I realized the DM was serious about this game. He gave all the initial players (four or five, I can't rightly recall now) only the starting points to spend, and we had to roll our stats in order. Old-school style. My dice didn't betray me entirely, and I ended up with a character who was slightly above average in intelligence, a little higher on charisma, and who, despite being a college student, rolled max on income. And thus was born Victor Black, a fellow who had more aptitude for investments than for most of his other courses, and whose family was largely responsible for the grants that got prominent buildings on campus funded.

Joining Victor was a fellow student majoring in languages and cultures, and one of her sorority friends who worked off-campus at a local strip club, and who for reasons unknown to anyone but the player, carried a katana around in a gym bag. Rounding out the initial party was a local private detective, who was sniffing around campus because someone was paying him to dig up dirt on one of the professors. Aside from the influence of Joss Whedon's work on one of the PCs, everyone else fit the tone, feel, and general setup for what I expected from a Call of Cthulhu game.

Not only did character creation go well, but so did the first few sessions. We ran into each other at a campus party, and ended up chatting with a student about how they couldn't seem to find their history prof. He wasn't keeping office hours, and there was a stack of mail piled up at his on-campus house. He wasn't answering email or calls, and they were worried it was going to mean they couldn't get the help they needed by the end of the semester. So, being good Samaritans, we offered to do our part to look into it. We found the professor's house empty, and ransacked. Something bad had clearly happened, but we didn't know what. So we called the cops, but that just got us stuck further in, rather than pulled out.

You Miss One Session, And It All Goes To Hell

I was working two jobs around this time, and since I got called in to work an odd shift, I missed a game session. The DM told me the session I missed went well, and that some other players had shown interest. He'd run it no problem, and he thought it was going well. That sounded promising, so when I showed up to the next session I was not prepared for what I ran into.

What the hell? My game was just here... I swear it was!

In my absence, the game had swelled from a handful of players, to twelve people. And while we'd had mostly average, normal people (the sort of folks who get roped into Lovecraft plots), it seemed that none of the new players had any interest in maintaining that trend. We had a loose canon police detective, convinced there was a drug-ring conspiracy going on who kept waving her gun around and threatening to arrest anyone who looked at her funny. We had a local survivalist and nutter who had more weapons on his person than he had teeth. And so on, and so forth as we went through the stereotypes of gang members, prize fighters, road warriors, and others.

This shift in player base, and character concepts, had also transformed the game's tone. What had been a mystery plot, where a handful of investigators were trying to find a disappeared professor while trying to get a sense of the strange relics and manuscripts he'd left behind (one being a copy of Unspeakable Cults in the original German), we now had a rag-tag group of door-kicking thugs whose only goal was to find anyone who knew more than they did, and beat/intimidate the answers out of them.

That shift in tone wouldn't have been entirely bad on its own. There is a precedent for Delta Green games, if that's your bag. However, it was a shift that pretty much jettisoned any subtlety, and which had no concern for the world lore, or the plot as it was set up. Worse, the new characters were prepped for war out of an entirely meta concern that they were playing an RPG, rather than because something had actually made their characters believe they were in danger. If you've ever played a World of Darkness game where players decide to just load up on hardware and start building pipe bombs because, hey, this is a WoD game and that means there's bad shit coming their way, then you've seen this before. They were paranoid and heavily armed not because they knew of the horrors of the mythos (none of them had a Cthulhu Mythos skill), and not because they'd experienced anything out of the ordinary for this setting, but because the players didn't get the memo that if you start combat in a Call of Cthulhu game, you've pretty much already lost. You're squishy, the antagonists are squamous beings from the outer reaches of the cosmos... you lose.

Knowledge is how you defeat them. And no one was using their brains at this table.

The best example of this is what I would call the culmination of this plot arc. The professor, you see, had found a statuette of Tsathoggua, and had secreted himself inside the access tunnels beneath the library to begin a summoning ritual. You know, the sort of thing mad cultists do in a CoC setting. We had an idea of where he was, but no clue about what he was doing. We'd seen no mythos creatures, been subject to no magic, and except for finding a few unexpected bloodstains, hadn't had to make that many sanity checks. Despite that, to go track down one rogue professor who we thought had simply gone a little bonkers but who was otherwise harmless, every member of the party (excluding my PC) armed themselves with guns, blades, and actual body armor as if they were a SWAT team getting ready to raid a Mafia stronghold.

Eleven heavily-armed nutters kicked in the door, and found one old man in tattered clothes, his beard grown long, standing over a makeshift altar. It was absurd. He held a ritual knife in his hand, and when he didn't drop it (after it was established he was speaking gibberish and and looked like he hadn't slept in days), the firing squad opened up on him. He was dead after three shots, but they kept going just in case. In case of what I couldn't say, other than he was clearly a bad guy in a Call of Cthulhu game, and you get XP and rewards for killing bad guys, right? Just like how vigilante justice always goes down swimmingly in the real world?

That was around the time the self-proclaimed occultist, and the only guy who looked like he had half a clue despite being dressed like Chris Angel's mopey second-cousin, picks up the bloody ritual dagger. A dagger that is now part of what could very likely be a murder scene, and that is both ancient, and creepy looking. But hey, what harm can it do? So he picks it up... and immediately loses his character as he's possessed by the spirit of one of Clark Ashton Smith's greatest additions to the mythos.

Then, just as he was going to do his very best to bring a knife to a gun fight, a squad of campus police officers showed up, and all failed their sanity checks. They shot at the possessed occultist, they shot at the spirit hovering over him, and at things only they could see. Victor survived because as soon as this nonsense started going pear-shaped, he took to his heels and bolted out of there. He was one of the only PCs to survive with marginal sanity intact, and with no wounds.

Don't Forget The Ambiance!

Right, how could I forget that?

So, in addition to a bunch of players taking what was established as a mythos-classic game, and trying to turn it into Buffy The Vampire Slayer with more guns, there was something else that happened. A complete and total erosion of any ambiance and atmosphere.

Part of that was where it was played. The sheer number of people meant we needed a big venue, so we had a long table set up at two of the players' house. It was in the dining room, so it was brightly lit, and all the curtains were open to let in the afternoon sunshine. And, of course, because they had a wee one, there was the sound of children's cartoons and singing from about fifteen feet away from the game table.

That's bad enough, but what are you going to do? Some gamers get kids, and kids need to be entertained. The problem was that no one other than three of the original players made much of an effort to roleplay, to maintain the tone of the game, or to play sensical characters with realistic reactions to things. You know, the sorts of people who are more likely to believe that a college professor had a psychotic break due to stress and a deteriorating marriage when they find his house empty, as opposed to people who immediately jump to the conclusion that his erratic behavior is a sign he's possessed by demonic forces, and that he is now an agent of eternal evil who can be killed with impunity.

All in all, it was a game ruined by several things. One, that the DM didn't know how to say no, and stuffed a dozen people into a game he was (at least initially) trying to make a ground-level, slowly-ratcheting thriller that would tip into genuine cosmic horror. Second, the blatant metagaming of most of the players at the table, made somehow worse by little to no knowledge of the mythos lore they were supposed to be uncovering. And third, the long waits between turns, resolved actions, etc., which was filled largely by out-of-character chatter that made it impossible for anyone to hear what was supposed to be happening, much less to be scared by it.

In short, this game is the reason I helped Dungeon Keeper Radio put together an episode for running horror campaigns. Because this experience was many things, but scary it was not.

So, that's my rambling account of my first, and extremely poor, interaction with a Cthulhu mythos game. There have been others since, and I will say they were much more satisfying.

If you liked this story, check out my other Table Talk entries. If you've got some of your own, I'd be happy to shine a spotlight on you. If you're looking for more gaming content from yours truly, check out my Gamers archive. If you want to stay on top of all my releases, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. Lastly, if you'd like to help me keep Improved Initiative going, consider becoming a Patreon patron. Just head over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page, and toss some love in my tip jar.