A while ago I had reviewed the Starfinder role-playing game from Paizo Publishing, mentioning at the time that it was part of a design process that Paizo was using for a new edition of its signature game, Pathfinder, which was originally based on Dungeons & Dragons 3rd Edition. Well, Pathfinder Second Edition is now out. A friend of mine tipped me off to a sale at Barnes and Noble and I picked up the last available hardcopy that was 20% off sales price. That still made it over 50 dollars with tax, by the way. I’m not quite sure if it was worth it.
The hardcopy is a large book, 642 pages. Wayne A. Reynolds (‘WAR’) is still the signature artist for Pathfinder, but more of the pieces (including the cover) are painted rather than inked, and I don’t think the results work as well somehow. The text is is larger print than the original (PF1) and includes sidebars and explanations, but I don’t think the font is easier to read.
Overview
Chapter 1 (Introduction) is actually very important, because it reviews the basic premises of game play. There are three modes of play in Pathfinder Second Edition (PF2): long-term travel and negotiations with non-player characters are the exploration mode. Combat (or non-combat situations that can lead to combat) are in encounter mode. Even more long-term descriptions of game time, in which characters train, build things, and develop their craft, are in downtime mode. These concepts were already implicit in earlier D&D paradigm games, but PF2 makes them explicit game terms, which is in keeping with the rest of this book.
Encounters work similarly to PF1. The main difference is a clarification of the “action economy.” Characters get 3 actions in a 6-second round. It’s not quite as simple as that, of course; some things are “free actions” that don’t count against your allowance, while other actions are “activities” (such as casting a spell or doing another activity that could take two actions or more. Each character also gets one reaction that they can perform per round, but only in response to another activity, and only if it’s part of their abilities. For instance only Fighters get an Attack of Opportunity at 1st level, and other warrior-types don’t get it until at least 5th level. That simplifies combat right there.
One critical part of this whole setup is on page 17 with the Format of Rules Elements. This includes a sidebar with the various little symbols used in the rest of the book, with “reaction” being represented by an arrow circling on itself, and a single action being a black arrowhead. A “Three-Action Activity” is three black arrows atop each other and a Free Action is a clear arrowhead. This is simple enough once you grok the symbol format, but you NEED to grasp the symbol format to grasp this game.
The Introduction chapter likewise goes over the format of the various skills, feats, etc. These show what the ability is, what category it belongs to (Feat, etc.), what level you are eligible to get it (e.g. Feat 2) and other aspects of the ability. For instance, reactions and some free actions operate on a “Trigger,” like an Attack of Opportunity, which is allowed only when another character within your reach takes a move action or a “manipulate” action like casting a spell. The stat block format also includes various traits that the ability belongs to. Some skills, for instance, have certain traits like Downtime, such as where most Craft abilities can only be used in downtime. Again, this can be quickly learned, but if you obtain or get to read a copy of this book, you need to learn the text block format in Chapter 1, because this is what ALMOST THE ENTIRE REST OF THE BOOK looks like.
After the Introduction, Chapter 2 gets into the first steps of making a character, Ancestries & Backgrounds. There was of course some grousing from older gamers that they replaced the term “race” with “ancestry.” I’m not sure what difference it makes, except that in the premises of fantasy the term “race” is a bit more clear than it is in the real world where “race” really is a misnomer in that we’re all the same species. If there’s any oldthink game term that really ought to be adapted, it’s “class.” Character class has nothing to do with class in a psuedo-medieval world; a Fighter could be either a peasant or an aristocrat. In “meta” terms, your class is the role you play in the group, like your position in a football team. The concept would be more accurately defined as “profession”, “role” or “to be what one is not and to not be what one is,” but I’m not sure most gamers read Sartre.
So I’m cool with “ancestry.” I’m also okay with Half-Elves and Half-Orcs being simply variant “heritages” of the Human ancestry, given that they were mechanically presented as such in PF1 anyway. What I didn’t like was turning Goblins into a player character race. Uh, ancestry. Yes, I know that in their First Edition products, Paizo made Goblins their cute little mascot characters, but transitioning them from joke villains into potential heroes strains my sense of disbelief. I also don’t like when producers take loathsome creep characters and try to give them a “face turn” by suddenly making them as sympathetic as possible. Sorta like Andrew in Buffy Season 7.
In any case, Ancestry is the start of the character creation process, and that includes the mechanics. See, characters start with a string of 10 in the six “D&D” attributes. Each ancestry starts with two “ability boosts” for +2 in two specified attributes, and a free boost in a third attribute of choice. Each also has an “ability flaw” that reduces one stat to 8 (except Humans, who get two free boosts where they choose with no flaws). Goblins get a boost to Dexterity (which makes sense) a flaw to Wisdom (which makes sense) and a boost to Charisma (which makes no sense at all).
In this section you also get Backgrounds, which in combination with ancestry and class can create interesting character premises. Your background gives you another assigned ability boost and another free boost, plus at least one relevant skill and one feat. The Warrior Background, for instance, gives a boost to either Strength or Constitution, a free ability boost, Trained in Intimidation and Warfare Lore skills, with the Intimidating Glare skill feat (a feat that modfies a skill, in this case Intimidation).
However, the Ancestries & Backgrounds chapter also displays the real emphasis in creating a character in PF2: the selection of feats. If you look at the options of ancestral feats, you can only pick one at 1st level. Comparing to the first edition Pathfinder, some of these abilities are what used to be considered default racial features. A Dwarf, for instance, used to have both familiarity with Dwarven weapons and Stonecunning ability by default. In PF2, these are both feats, so you have to choose. You also get an additional ancestry feat at every 4 additional levels (5th, 9th, 13th and 17th), but there are also higher level ancestral feats for 5th, 9th, and 13th level, some of which have prerequisite ancestral feats.
Chapter 3 is for Classes. There are now 12 “core” classes in Pathfinder, which is much reduced from where PF1 was after all its various sourcebooks came out with supplemental classes. One of those supplemental classes, the Alchemist, is one of the PF2 core classes, perhaps because the “iconic” example Alchemist in the game is a Goblin. Which does make sense, given that both Goblins and Alchemists like to mix chemicals, play with fire, and blow shit up. The other big change in PF2 classes was with the Paladin, which is now generically referred to as the Champion, on the quite logical basis that deities of other than Lawful Good alignment would have their own champions. In PF2 core rules, Champions are limited to Good alignment, which is probably for the best. You can still play a standard Paladin (lawful and militaristic), but you can also be a Chaotic Liberator, who can help other characters break restraining effects, or a Neutral Good Redeemer, who actually takes an oath to try and redeem evildoers before killing them. (!) Also, they’ve decided that since Sorcerers can get their powers from non-arcane sources (like fey and demons) they can draw power from non-arcane sources, such that a Sorcerer could cast divine (‘cleric’) spells if they have the right bloodline.
The structure of how classes are written shows an even greater reliance on feats than ancestry abilities. And again, these sometimes replace what were class abilities. The Paladin’s Divine Health ability, for instance, is now a Feat 4. In addition, most characters get a class feat every even level, a skill feat every even level, and a general feat at 3rd level and every 4 levels thereafter.
Notably, this chapter includes Archetype options, which are similar to where older Pathfinder sourcebooks would offer options to characters in certain classes by trading off some of their class features. What’s significant about the PF2 approach is that Archetypes (or archetype feats) are now the only way your character can multi-class. For example, Alchemist Dedication is a Feat 2 that gives some of the basic Alchemist abilities. Taking it requires using a class feat. Once taken, the character is then eligible to use class feats to take other feats in the archetype tree, which allow the non-Alchemist to pick Alchemist feats or increase the potency of Alchemist abilities. To me, this is the part of the game that most resembles D&D 4th Edition; whereas D&D 3rd Edition was extremely liberal with multiclassing (such that every time you leveled you could add a different class and simply add each class level together, such that a 2nd-level character could be a 1st-level Fighter and 1st-level Wizard, for example), D&D 4 simply assumed that you always stayed in the same class and could only simulate branching out using a feat system very similar to this one. This kills a lot of the class flexibility that Pathfinder had allowed, and given that you have to cross-reference your secondary abilities via the main class, I’m not sure that the result is less complicated than multiclassing in PF1.
Also, the phase of picking a class also affects one’s ability scores in the character generation process; each class has a key ability score, which is usually fixed but sometimes variable. For instance, Intelligence is the key ability for Alchemist. A 1st-level Alchemist therefore gets an ability boost to Intelligence. Once ability adjustments are made for ancestry, background and class, a character gets four boosts in different abilities, meaning no more than +2 in any one stat. If you follow the process, you’ll see that it is possible for a character to have exactly one ability at 18 to start – 10 base, +2 from an ancestry, +2 from a background, +2 from a class and +2 from the last set of four free boosts. And given that (as with multiclassing) the new game prefers specialization to generalization, the results tend to favor characters with one excellent stat and a few fair ones, or maybe 2 scores of 16 and the rest more like 12. And after this point, the real number-crunching begins.
Class 4 is Skills. The base works like other d20 System games: Roll a d20, apply modifiers (such as an ability score) and try to beat a Difficulty Class (DC), with higher numbers representing greater difficulty, so you always want to roll high. The previous version of Pathfinder gave characters a certain number of skill ranks per level based on class (modified by Intelligence). These applied directly as a modifier to the skill roll, and you could only have 1 rank in a skill per character level (a 5th-level character could only have 5 ranks in Stealth, for instance). You also got a +3 “class skill” bonus if that skill was one of the ones approved for your class (Stealth being a Rogue skill, for instance). This is simpler than the D&D 3rd Edition skill points system but still requires keeping track of the points.
Pathfinder Second Edition changes this system in at least two significant ways. Characters get a certain number of skills per class. These are not point-based, these are proficiency ranks. You are Untrained in a roll unless otherwise skilled. An Untrained roll only allows the character to add their ability modifer and they can only perform minimal actions with that skill no matter how high they roll. Selecting a skill during character creation places it at the Trained level, which is a bonus of character level +2 (so a 1st-level character’s skills will be at +3). In some cases a skill may be raised to the next level, Expert (level +4). At 3rd level and every 2 levels thereafter, a character gains a skill increase. This can be used to take a previously unselected skill to Trained rank or raise the rank of a previously bought skill. At 7th level one can use a skill increase to take an Expert skill to Master rank (level +6) and at 15th level one can raise a Master skill to the Legendary level, which is level +8 bonus.
The other change is that this skill mechanic is how pretty much every d20 roll works in Second Edition. For instance, d20 games usually have 3 categories of saving throws, Fortitude, Reflex and Will. Instead of a class providing a certain bonus to these, each class describes the skill rank that the element is trained to. For instance the Ranger starts at 1st level as Expert in Fortitude and Reflex and Trained in Will. This is also the system used for skill proficiency with weapons and unarmed attacks, which stands to reason, but it also includes proficiency with armor, including unarmored defense. For instance, the Monk starts as Untrained in all armor but Expert in unarmored defense. Also, each class has certain abilities with a “class DC” that is the number the opponent rolls to resist the effect. Characters start as Trained in their class DC. Each class describes at which level the proficiency ranks for saves, attacks, class DC and defense increase; these do not require skill increase picks.
There is also a third element in this d20 system, which is varying degrees of effect. Almost all rolls (not just combat) can have a critical success (‘hit’) or critical failure (‘fumble’) and this is not necessarily a natural 20 or natural 1 but a margin. When a check meets a DC by 10 or more that is a critical success. When a check misses by 10 or more that is a critical failure. Needless to say, this can cause a certain variation in results if either the skill bonus or the DC are extremely high. (And at some point in the game, both will be the case.)
Otherwise, within these premises, the skill system is pretty straightforward. Certain skills have a common use (like using X Lore to Recall Knowledge within the field of the Lore skill’s title). Others, like Craft, are used during downtime to make items, including magical items. Skills can sometimes be used in combat; in fact the Athletics skill is now used as an opposed roll to cover all the unarmed “Combat Maneuvers” from the first edition. No more Combat Maneuver Bonus? Well, there’s one reason to endorse this game right there!
Chapter 5 is Feats. As in, the general feats that aren’t in the separate lists of class feats and can be bought by all characters. There is also a separate category of skill feats; as mentioned above, characters get skill feats every even level. “When you gain a skill feat, you must select a general feat with the skill trait; you can’t select a general feat that lacks the skill trait.” This quote, incidentally, is a taste of what the text usually reads like. There are exactly 17 feats which are general feats that do not apply to skills (like Toughness, which increases Hit Points and durability). All the other general feats are applied to skills, and some have a prerequisite that you have to be at a certain skill rank (e.g. Expert in Lore). As mentioned, each Background includes an assigned feat in addition to background skills, which means you really want to shop for your Background, because (as in other d20 games) some of these feats are better than others, and in this game some can provide special benefits when selected for the creation of a 1st-level character. For example, Bargain Hunter (a skill feat for Diplomacy that requires being Trained in Diplomacy) not only allows you to earn income in downtime by hunting for bargains at the bazaar, if you take this feat at 1st level, you start play with an additional 2 gold pieces.
This leads to the subject of Chapter 6, Equipment. All characters, even those who don’t wear armor, start with 15 gold pieces (GP). Lest that seem piddly, Pathfinder Second Edition is a silver piece economy – 1 GP is actually worth 10 SP. Lest that seem generous, chain mail is 6 GP and a longsword is 1 GP. PF2 directly lifts the Starfinder system for Bulk to determine encumbrance – a character can freely carry up to 5 Bulk plus Strength modifier. This is on a scale where a small item (like a piece of chalk) is “negligible”, a dagger or similar weight is “Light” bulk (each set of ten light items equals 1 Bulk) and larger items like swords and suits of armor are whole numbers.
The benefits of armor are less than they were in PF1. For instance, chain mail only provides +4 to Armor Class. However the new player has to factor in the aforementioned armor proficiency bonuses. Most characters are considered Trained in at least one type of armor (or ‘unarmored defense’) so that a 1st-level character who is unarmored or just wearing clothing, with no Dexterity or other modifiers, is at AC 13 for Trained proficiency. (If it’s a Monk with Expert proficiency, the AC is 15.) Thus a character who is Trained in chain mail (Medium Armor proficiency) increases the base AC to 17, and it will go up further if the proficiency level is increased. It also goes up automatically with level. Certain armors create a specialization bonus, which a character can only take advantage of with a certain feat or class feature. Chain mail for instance can absorb some of the effects of a critical hit.
Likewise weapons have a whole bunch of specialty features in addition to just doing damage. For example “Deadly” adds an additional damage die on a critical hit. This is distinguished from “Fatal” which means that on a critical hit the weapon’s base damage die increases to the listed die code. (A Pick that does 1d6 has the trait Fatal d10, which means a critical hit does d10 instead of d6. A Rapier that does 1d6 has the Deadly d8 trait, so it does a d8 on a critical hit in addition to standard crit damage.) All this is in addition to critical specialization effects, which again vary by weapon type and require certain qualifications to use.
Very conveniently, page 289 features “class kits” showing what a character of each class would best spend their 15 GP on, although even heavy armor characters like Champions and Fighters end up with a lot of extra GP because they’re only using hide armor. Basic gear lists include consumables like alchemist bombs, potions, and short-term talismans.
NEXT: Overview of Chapters 7 through 11! No! This isn’t done!