War of Immortals Class Breakdown
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 4 พ.ย. 2024
- #paizopublishing #pathfinder2e #warofimmortals
Here's my breakdown of the two new classes in Pathfinder 2e from the War of Immortals book. The Animist and the Exemplar.
Word of warning. When I wrote this script, I was operating off of the playtest, leaks, and other youtubers. I didn't have access to a book I could use at the time, so I got a couple of things wrong in the video. A few names wrong, and one of the subclasses I said got 3 focus points, when they (base) only get two. Sorry for the confusion.
Having the animist change skill proficiencies and spell repertoire mid-combat via dispersal could open up some galaxy-brain plays in the right hands.
So, a few things about this video:
Most important: Great work as always, Psi Prime. I mostly agree with everything you've had to say regarding the Animist and Exemplar. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the Class Archetypes from WoI.
Second, this might be a personal thing, but the Animist really makes me think of Shaman King, if you've ever read/watched that. More so the early stuff, when it was more about spirit possessions, rather than oversouls. The Animist is also feels, conceptually, like the result of the Shaman and Medium classes from PF 1e doing a fusion dance.
Third, in regard to your ideas on how to reflavor the Exemplar to not just be 'I'm a demigod'... You familiar at all with D&D 3.5 edition? Because it had a book, 'Magic of Incarnum' that the more I think on it, the Exemplar reminds me of. They were basically martial classes who could create psuedo-magic items called soulmelds that were a bit similar to ikons.
...Now that I think about it, dnd 3.5 had a lot of experimental content...
Nothing new under the sun, right?
Exemplar kind of reminds me of Gunslinger or Magus. They have a lot of stuff that looks strong on paper but in practice their action economy is just to janky for them to constantly make use of that power. A good turn for them is way better than a good turn for a Fighter, but they only get a good turn every now and then while EVERY turn is a good turn for a Fighter. They also get the delayed Expertise for their armor that classes like Barbarian and Rogue have to put up with, which isn't that bad compared to them only getting Light armor like in the playtest, but should still be noted.
I think Exemplar is good and shows that Paizo learned some important lessons from Gunslinger, but I also think Exemplar is more "flashy" than outright "overpowered" and are more likely to cause issues by making other players *feel* overshadowed than they are to actually break anything.
1:00 Animist 12:41 Final thoughts
14:17 Exemplar 12:48
Best of luck out there
Thank you so much again, I really appreciate it.
On the issues you have with the exemplar: I think the main solution is to remember that pathfinder 2e is played in 3 modes: encounter, exploration, and downtime. Since transcendence abilities are actions, they were designed for encounter mode. I think the fix for a lot of these is to not allow them to be spammed outside of combat. If the exemplar wants to use a transcendence because it helps them get across an obstacle, fine. But if they want to gain infinite hp back or heal all statuses, I wouldn’t allow it to be done on encounter pacing. If we’re doing exploration mode in 10 minute segments, that transcendence is your exploration activity and you get 1 of it.
The archetype is strong. Im not sure if it’s too strong yet, but if it does end up being oppressive, I think there’s a good fix a gm could homerule in. First, make moving your spark back into the ikon action (forgot its name) take 1 minute, like the spellstrike recharge in the magus archetype. That turns the abilities into once per battle super moves, instead of an every/every other turn rotation. Once they have 2 Ikons from the archetype, they can transcend, move it into the second ikon like normal, but if they use that one, they’re done for that combat.
That's an option, but I know a LOT of players who hate 'encounter only' abilities because it breaks immersion. But yes, that would help.
Some things I would like to note about the ikons:
The Scar ikon heals only you. If the party has enough time to recover, how quickly one player recovers probably won't matter, at least in my head it doesn't. However, this ikon makes balancing back-to-back encounters a little more difficult to balance if one player is always at full HP and resources (since exemplars don't get many if not any limited resources). This also makes simple damage traps a nonissue in some situations (no initiative, and the trap doesn't do anything more than DMG, no alarms or trapping someone), as the party can just chuck their Exemplar at it. Assuming they have a minute (sometimes less) between encounters, obviously. Though there are epitaphs and feats they can pick up to heal the party too. Having a pseudo-immortal guy in the party is always gonna be useful and sometimes hard to balance around if you don't plan for it. Still, I personally think this ikon just leaves a ton of roleplay potential. Maybe I'm just biased, as I am defending an ikon that heals you for ~67.5 hp a minute at lvl 1 for no resources.
The shield ikon. Being able to set up a +1 to ac, reflex and 4 dmg types for 1 minute on 2 ppl for an action is definitely strong. It also doesn't state that you can't use this ability multiple times, meaning that in a few rounds, you can place this buff on the entire party, for an entire fight. If your DM doesn't call bullshit, then you can also just have this continuously active throughout exploration mode too. I think just adding one sentence that prevents you from stacking this ability would fix this ikon. I do think this one is too strong, and if your DM decides to adjust the stats of enemies to account for your ikon, then you might as well have never taken it.
Victor's wreath is just too much, for all of the reasons listed in the video. It's immanence also steps on the toes of bard a little bit. Maybe removing the last part, "even if that effect would not normally allow a new saving throw," could fix it, maybe not.
I think the main reason many people, myself included, think Exemplar is so strong is because many of their abilities may require the dm to plan or modify things around the Exemplar, such as the scar ikon in certain circumstances. 24:10 However, if you don't mind doing that or the ability doesn't tear apart your plot or encounters in some way, I think Examplar is fine. I believe this is another reason why they have the rare trait. I love exemplar, but it probably should've been worked on a little longer.
This is ignoring the archetype.
Regarding the scar Ikon, I’ve seen several encounters where the players have, like, 10 minutes to recover. That’s 1 medicine check, 1 refocus. Exemplar-full heal.
@@PsiPrimeProductions1 that's kinda what I meant by back to back, I haven't played enough to know how often back to back encounters come up.
I am super excited for this book, more than usual. So many great character options, now to find a game.
If you’re having trouble finding a game, try doing some VTT or play by posts with Pathfinder Society online. It’s not the same as in-person gaming I know, but it could scratch that itch until you find an in-person game.
Now I might be crazy for saying this, but when you pointed out Twin Stars for the Exemplar, my first thought was a character you could make for a Bloodborne style Campaign, akin to Eileen the Crow with her Blades of Mercy, being able to combine and split at a moments notice. Sorry for my ramblings. It just sounds really cool in my head.
"A Hoonta must hoont beasts, leave the hoontin of Hoontas to me..."
Are Wandering feats "strong and switchable" or "strong because you can switch them"? Because i got to say the idea of multiple feats you can retrain overnight worries me a bit.
The latter, but some are strong on their own.
People are way over reacting, if you are the GM & this looks to "break" your campaign, it's RARE, just don't allow it. Also to play devil's advocate, is it really that bad to have characters that are powerful and give the players a really good power fantasy experience?
Like I said, that’s not the problem. Of course it’s okay for the player to feel powerful. The issue is wrecking the power curve so that either you make a lot more work for the GM, or you overshadow the other players to the point where they say ‘why am I even here?’ Again, take victor’s wreath. How would the cleric feel taking a 4th level spell slot to MAYBE get rid of drained when an exemplar could do it for the whole party, at level 1, at no resource cost?
@@PsiPrimeProductions1how does powerful pc = more work for GM? I have never noticed any more or less work as the GM when the party has powerful or powerless PCs.
@@craigjones7343 Because a powerful PC means trying to make combat encounters where the other players get to do stuff. I disagree that Exemplars are OP since they can only do one transcendence per turn, but if you have one person who does all the things and everyone else just watches or buffs that characters, its gonna disengage most people.
You can do transendence more than once a turn. Up to 3 times actually, depending on your Ikons.
Transendence 1/turn was a part of the playtest, but it's gone now.
@@PsiPrimeProductions1 check the Key Terms sidebar on page 31. It's still there.
So, I've play tested the exemplar. First thoughts: it is incredibly strong. Its damage output is like absolutely nothing else. The support it gives eclipses most other classes, too, considering how little cool down they have. However, you don't need to rebalance encounters around them. They fall just like everything else to hard encounters. As a gm, you're just going to be focusing them down a bit more- but that’s what you should do anyway with a frontliner. Overall, it's absolutely a rare class for a reason. It's strong af. Holds up, though, so don't panic.
So the two new classes are just for mythic lvl play so not for normal APs and PFS scenarios?
Normal APs too, but remember ejemplar es rare, so I think u cant play with him in PFS scenario and in normal games only if ur GM allow it
Exemplar is available in PFS, but the archetype requires a boon (costing twice as many points as other rare archetypes) and can only be purchased once.
I never said that. Animist is fine.
At 21:50 how dare you make a well informed opinion that I personally disagree with, I shall now downvote you into oblivion /j
Though more seriously, while I do agree the Exemplar is stronk, it's not that broken. Compare to the Fighter as an example, you get far less proficiencies into your defenses, and have to actively choose Reactive Strike instead of it being built in. Plus it's not like you're going to have ALL of your Immanence/Transcendence features free all the time, you need to carefully plan them out. see the Exemplar as more of a Divine Magus with less spells and more spell-like abilities.
I mean, yeah, all of that is true. I'm talking about the ability to heal up to full in a minute instead of hours (which comes up in some encounters). Or the ability to get rid of any negative status effect at no resource cost. Like, it takes a rank 8 spell (level 15) to have any kind of decent chance to get rid of a rank 9 curse. But a level 1 exemplar can do that, at no resource cost, at level 1. That's the kind of stuff I'm worried about.
@@PsiPrimeProductions1 I'd say that the healing thing feels somewhat warranted, people have been clamoring for a self-healing/restoring Fighter for a while now. I remember during the Exemplar playtest that players were praying Paizo didn't nerf it lol
The game made to be balanced didn't break when you tried to add unbalanced elements. ... isn't that kind of a win?
I disagree with your statement on adventure paths. From my experience, you have to optimize both with character builds and tactics if you even want a chance at survival. (Especially 2e Kingmaker. The fact it wasn't even playtested says a lot)
Granted. Said dm was sadistic as others has said. But once bitten. Twice shy.
Another rebuttal. I think Paizo making a class rare is terrible game design, I'd rather have exemplar be available if it was majorly rebalanced.
IIRC 2e Kingmaker wasn’t published by PAIZO but by a third party with PAIZO’s blessing. Could be wrong.
And yeah, I said most. Gatewalkers is also notoriously hard. But most others are not that bad.
@PsiPrimeProductions1 I'll take your word for it. I've been struggling to give 2e another chance after a god awful first campaign, but everyone uses foundry and or it starts at a time I can't join in on.
You are overeacting and exagerating a little, like you said try to play with few exemplars players and even test the archetype, you will see its just allow more player customization and abilities, they will feel nice with their new options, but i also agree they are strong but never broken, renember this is pathfinder.
Look, I'm all for player customization, but the fact that you can just, at no resource cost, get rid of conditions like drained with about a minute of downtime is a little much. Drained normally requires a rank 4 spell to have a chance of getting rid of it, and now it's just gone, kinda makes the cleric feel like a chump for taking sound body doesn't it?
Or, how about starting a campaign where the players are all cursed by a powerful wizard, and the campaign is about undoing the curse? Now that option just doesn't work because of Exemplar. And those are just ideas off the top of my head from a single Ikon.
Like I said, there is FOR SURE a way to play an exemplar that does not break the game. But there are some really concerning things in Exemplar that, at least in my mind, limit what kind of stories you can tell, and that's not fun. At least in my estimation. But like I said, I'm just using my experience to try and extrapolate what is possible.
2 untyped rarely resisted damage type per weapon damage die for a dedication is undeniably too strong. Makes it no different from increasing your weapon damage die by 2 step. Thats without even considering that you get Immanence and Transendance as well. Class is fine. Archetype is not.
Yeah... no offense, my dude, but there is an entire thread on the Paizo forums about how potentially easy it is to use an Exemplar to supercharge a martial build. Far easier and quicker than other means.
@@CL-jq1xs rare tag, just say no
@@charleswatson2605 Rarity used to not correlate to power but how easily it is used to tie into a story. Now that it means power, it opens up another can of worms for DM having to personally evaluate the mechanical benefis of options with rarity tags instead of just detemining if it suits their world. Very unfortunate as its simply more work for DM.