Honestly, there's a lot of other things I would say are as strong, if not stronger, than what I list here. But you gotta stop somewhere, ya know? So this is your cue to tell me how I"m WRONG and I didn't mention XYZ things also! P.S. Don't get on me about being a curmudgeon who reins in my players and is anti-fun. I'm the guy who's been saying to buff Aid and Recall Knowledge! So shaddap. ADDITIONS: -People are pointing out that Protector Tree only protects against Strikes. Are we playing the same game? Strikes are how the vast majority of PCs are taken out of a fight in PF2! -I see that Protector Tree protects an "ally" so not the caster. Even if that's true, Timber Sentinel still too strong imo. But I don't see an official ruling saying it doesn't work for the caster which is strange ruleswise and flavorwise. You are the tree's ally, also. -Other things about Timber Sentinel I didn't mention: it doesn't have the manipulate trait, so it's easier to deploy than Protector Tree. Also, I have run it (because common sense) that it prevents rider effects on Strikes, like poisons or the monster ability Grab and Improved Grab, so it's MORE than just damage mitigation because it redirects the attack. Powerful stuff. (Grr.)
Honestly, the protector's is the most absurd one (since the nerf of the automatic prone crit spec). For the Gnome Flickmace, it is strong but not broken. Plus, the whip do exactly the same but better (except for damage). Tailwind is absurd, i agree. My players take it everytime.
@@zaka3709 Tailwind the spell isn’t broken at all. As for getting it on a wand, I mean it stacks with all 90 million other ways to get a status bonus to speed. The flickmace is Uncommon, so GMs can just say no if they are feeling particularly panicked.
When the kineticist first came out I was playing a champion as someone who wanted to protect their whole party and I lasered in on the support possibilities of wood earth kineticist. I could be ALMOST at tanky as my champion with more viable ways of protecting my party like timber sentinel and at will on cooldown healing, AND I was a kind of bender with a ton of flavor so I switched as soon as it came out and had a ton of fun. Yea timber sentinel is very strong, only downside is those who want to be protected HAVE to stay within a 5ft area and it only works to absorb specifically attacks not saving throws.
OBJECTION! if protector tree survives the encounter it becomes a normal little tree living its best little tree life and that is VERY cute and i like it a lot i rest my case
As silly as the whole "TRL is dry" comment was, it's kinda gotten me to throw in a dash of spice here and there. I just hope the original people who said it dislike it lol
@@TheOriginalCrustypeanut OMG the one time I was in Arizona they had a record-hot summer, with maybe 15 days at 110+ the month I was there. This was about 15 years ago... I don't know if it's gotten worse with global warming. Anyway no amount of undress there could've saved me!
One combo that's hilarious to me: beastmaster and summoner. Eidolons do not count as animal companions as they utilize unique mechanics for commanding and controlling them. (They don't even have the 'minion' tag). Ergo, you can get an animal companion without your Eidolon counting against any limits. So if you grab the beastmaster archetype, you now have your character, your eidolon, and your animal companion all on the field, for a total of 3. Act together allows you to control your eidolon, and command animal lets you control your companion, effectively giving you 5 actions on your turn, spread out amongst your entourage. AND if you can spare the feat or get it from an ancestry (or just wait for a second archetype), you can grab a pet or familiar as well for yet another entity. PFS even enforced a rule specifically for this, that you can only have two permanent player-controlled tokens on the field at one time.
To be fair, that's because it's annoying to deal with that many bodies/actions. It slows down play for others, it is not especially strong. 5 actions, yes, but they are fairly weak actions. 2 attacks from your eidolon +2 attacks from an animal companion aren't likely to do as much damage as a Barbarian or fighter just using 2 actions. If you don't have any other front liners though, it is very good for flanking (and body blocking, especially once your eidolon can get large.)
It's fun, but I don't know if it's actually particularly strong. If we presume that every class is relatively balanced in PF2, Beastmaster just adds another thing to command that costs 1 action to give it two. Also its accuracy will tend be subpar (even moreso if you don't invest feats into it as you level up) It isn't necessarily stronger to have 2 companions on the field I think. In general a Summoner will see their eidolon as their main attacker, while the animal is more of a flanking buddy that can make an okay Strike during your turn also (which is what Beastmaster adds for other classes as well) It does create a cool fantasy though while still being relatively balanced (in keeping with PF2 imo!) I think the PFS rule it's to avoid turns taking too long... a lot of PFS tables end up having 6 players and struggle to fit under 4 hours.
@@GuybrushTThreepwood Damage isn't the only metric that matters, getting more bodies on the field is its own big tactical advantage. My dnd 3.0 conjurer focused on spamming out low level summons to clog the battle map so nothing could get in melee with my ranged team at low level. Blocking off spaces in hallways or getting that flank in is big when you consider group dynamics.
the flickmace honestly just demonstrates the amount of funky shit you can do if you build for it. in dnd its usually jut i cast these 2 spells and you encounter is over.
@vezrabuto7496 less range doesn't matter since you need to be next to them to grapple. Item bonus to skills are available...you do know that...right? So there is no extra accuracy from runes. And you are claiming a crit is more likely to land over a NORMAL success trip attempt? Assuming you are of course keeping the skill ranked up, no, not even close. And the grab with the flickmace is gonna be done at -4 with very little to help that check. The free hand fighter's combat grab is done against off guard. With a fighter's natural +2 accuracy. And anything else to reduce AC. Normal hit means grabbed...no other checks. And all you need is normal success to have something tripped and grabbed.
@katarhall3047 kinda does since your claim is NO ONE is mounted all the time, and I gave you an example of one. Yes, the fleet is SUPER GOOD. And almost everyone should grab it. It's such a no brainer choice, it really should be removed.
Longstrider wasn't mid! It's a bread and butter spell. +10 speed for a whole dungeon at low levels and with minimal investment all day at higher levels is crazy good. AND that minimal investment can apply to a lot of other duration spells.
@@Pistonrager I probably found it mid because it was only available for a class I never saw played (Druid) or always saw played as an archer (Ranger), hence it never really came up in my campaigns. But it really gets overtaken rather quickly by an arcane caster casting Haste. Faster movement between combats is fine, but seldomly comes up in play outside of corner cases. I agree that it is very strong in PF2E.
@@magnuskno i could argue all day about the benefits of low power longer duration spells vs combat specific spells. But I won't here. My concern is the no Druids encountered. Druids were crazy powerful. My group had to put in an "only one druid at a time" rule when two druids ran roughshod over an adventure path module. It is not a lie to say that we said unironically the druids have class features stronger than most full classes. And yes, rangers being played as archers is 100% expected. But if they're allowed to be turret emplacements, that's a problematic combat dynamic.
@@Pistonrager I didn't see it as "problematic" but rather as expected. As for Druids, can't do much about people in my groups not being interested in the class.
Regarding the Protector Tree versus False Vitality (and similar): The tree can only absorb damage from strike actions, meaning any attack with a save roll bypasses it. Enemies can also attack the tree, likely scoring automatic critical hits, which halves its HP benefit. Additionally, it is stationary, so if an ally is no longer adjacent, it provides no benefit at all. Temporary HP, on the other hand, are far more powerful and offer a broader range of advantages, making them hardly comparable to the tree.
An attack on the tree is an attack not being used against the player. That's even better than only blocking a portion of the damage. And if they move, the kineticist can create another tree at their new location the next turn. They can do that every turn, potentially blocking much more damage than any temporary hp. And if the kineticist takes the wood impulse junction at level 5, they would also gain temp hp equal to their level every time they created a new tree, blocking even more damage. Throw in Hardwood Armor to create a shield, you could shield block, temp hp, and protector tree to become a pretty good tank.
@@MrRJPE A one-action attack from the enemy for the tree versus two actions for the impulse to create one is fine, however but it leaves you with little else to do in a round to change the state of the encounter. You could potentially be a good damage sponge with Tree + Raise Shield, but you won't move, and enemies could simply walk past you without concern. Why should they care? You pose as much threat as the tree. This tactic won't get you far unless the GM lacks creativity or agency. The 5 temporary HP for one round from the impulse junction is nice at level 5, but that's about it. A fireball or any other AOE attack would render all your efforts pointless. Don't get me wrong, the impulse isn't bad, but it's not as overpowered as it seems.
@@IlliDego I never said it was OP. Giving up two actions for the bosses one action is worth it. They use a fireball to kill your tree? Fantastic. They move, you make a new tree next to their new target. Those temp hp come every turn that you use an impulse matching your element. At level 10, that's 10 temp hp every turn compared to using a 5th level spell slot (out of 3 slots?) for 19 temp hp once using False Vitality. Sure, the GM might have them ignore you. Kineticists don't run out of impulses. Deal some damage. But if they do attack you, you'll survive for quite a while.
@@MrRJPEFalse Vitality is really not comparable at all given it isnt an encounter spell. It straight up loses to 2-action heal of the same rank, which is what you should be comparing Tree with.
Sentinel Tree is really powerful. For a fair comparison though, raising a shield gives you a +2 (usually) to AC. The tree does not do that. Also if you cluster around the tree AOE attacks are an issue.
I like that you explain things that might seem simple to you (+10 of ac to crit). As someone who's trying to learn pf2e, it helps a lot! Love the content.
My current campaign is a starfinder skin on PF2E (the DM didn't want to wait until starfinder 2E came out) and my next character is going to be a dual gate kineticist, air and metal. Level 4 get the air bubble and use metal to be able to rust metal. Space battle ensues, "That's it. I'm going outside!"
@@enggrapegia per the air shroud feat, my kinetic aura would have sufficient air to breathe, which would require it to be at a usable pressure. I'm not saying that the plane of air might not be annoyed at how much air I was bleeding out of the plane, but RAW, it technically works.
@@shirlot hum, yeah thats fair, but its a stance, so as long its an encounter mode you are safe, on exploration mode you would die, so try to finish the encounter inside i guess.
@@mateokirstine9782 In general, you can't enter or maintain a stance while outside of encounter mode. That being said, encounter mode doesn't end when combat ends. Encounter mode ends when you don't need to track turn by turn actions anymore. Someone outside the ship who might possibly die, would definitely constitute being in turn based mode still. Unless his party starts repairing the hole in the ship they made, or using medicine to heal (exploration activities), the GM should still allow encounter mode to continue.
If you notice one option being significantly better than the others, to the point where not choosing it makes your character a blatantly bad build in comparison, then the balance is off. Unoptimized characters should still feel fun to play as.
I consider the protection of Timber Sentinel (and the spell Protector tree) as strictly weaker than temporary Hit Points: - The tree only protects adjacent characters, which makes skirmishing or flanking troublesome at best - The tree's protection is considered first before any other forms of damage mitigation (it applies on hit, where shield block and resistance apply to the damage itself) Also to your specific example: false Vitality has a duration of 8 hours. This means it can typically be pre-cast and not cost actions during combat, so the primary cost is the spell slot used. It's interesting to note that Timber Sentinel also does not have the overflow trait. This was left as is when Paizo released errata for the book (Rage of Elements).
Protector tree is strictly worse than heal as well. If your ally is missing health, it's better to give it back than do some strange almost temp HP. If they're at full health, then the enemy can just not attack that target. Obviously if the ally needs to move, or the enemy uses an AoE attack or spell, it does nothing. That said, giving out unlimited use of a fully scaled spell for no extra action cost is crazy. Is protector tree strictly worse than heal? Obviously, but that can't be the bar. If wood kineticist could use unlimited 2 action heals no one would be defending it.
It's also forcing a one formation that is super prone to eating aoe attacks which are pretty common past level 5 and it's power decreases in mook-ish fights where enemies have actions to spare to either knock out the tree or hit the kineticist. Hell, a sufficient enough squad of archers could very likely out range you as you are forced to stride only once and up to the slowest party member.
On top of the weaknesses you list here, there's the fact that the AC is 10. If any enemy can easily reach it, they may as well knock it out with a MAP-10 attack or whatnot. So you traded two of your actions for an enemy's MAP-10. And this thing is very vulnerable to AOE damage.
@@GuybrushTThreepwood Let alone the Shove action exists, it only protects in a 5ft radius around the tree, and yes it would ultimately lower the targets chance to hit, but in the case of boss enemies, their second hit is just as likely to land as the first one. I've had a Wood Kineticist in two of my games so far, and yeah they're pretty good at what they do, but the cost vs effect of Protector Tree isn't as crazy as people say it is on paper. It's one of those things that 'mathematically' checks out but in practice actually has some inherent flaws. It's kinda the same kind of issue I have with everyone saying that the Resentment witch is broken--as if pretending like being able to sustain a spell every turn isn't costly on their action economy, either potentially keeping yourself in harms way (which any logical gm would likely have the squishy Witch be the target of enemies ire if they are just sitting their constantly making people consistently debuffed, uncontested), or sacrifice their means to cast a spell that turn.. let alone you're also keeping your VERY squishy Familiar in harms way to do this as well, and if your familiar dies you don't have it for the rest of the day, and it locks you out of regaining your Focus Points for the rest of the day. These things are undoubtedly strong, but a popular consensus of them being unbeatable/winning tactics is a little silly in my opinion when they have flaws in their tactics.
@pirosopus9497 an easier solution is a tale as old as time. Enemy wizard: "Ah, I see you're all clumping around that protective tree. How kind of you to add kindling to my fireball" Give them an incentive to spread out by punishing clustering up (sparingly ofc)
well the tree cannot protect people from saves and related effects, and it encourages grouping so fireball. The mace, you can either not give out the components or just drop it one dice level, make it a commitment. For the familiar, you could set an arbitrary cap on the number of debuffs extended, it's still going to be very good, or you can be more picky about what it can extend.
As a GM with plenty of experience none of these things are overpowered. There’s no reason to overcome any of them and certainly no reason to ban them. This is why I hate when Ronald whines about these things because then people just assume it’s true and the next thing you know you have people freaking out over nothing and Paizo overreacting. These things are strong but not unbalanced. There are multiple ways to pick up a +5 or +10 status bonus to speed, for example. Tailwind doesn’t invalidate those choices. While I understand his concern with the Monk, the solution isn’t to ban an external resource, the solution is to fix the Monk. Because its speed is baked into the class chassis, just make the Monk’s bonus untyped. Some initially hear this and panic because that means the Monk can also take Tailwind. So? Is it really so bad that the class known for being a speedster gets a bit faster? There are diminishing returns on faster speed as it is. Super fast speeds tend to be more of a bragging right than anything else at higher levels. And letting Monks accomplish their schtick a little bit earlier helps decrease the “PF2 problem.”
Something else to look out for to add to the pile: Starlit Span Magus, taking Psychic Dedication, using Imaginary Weapon. They pump out really high, consistent damage at range, using a cantrip that was balanced around the idea it'd be used in melee, and get even sillier when they can eventually start amping it to give it double the damage bonus per spell rank.
When they're standing still, at range and no monsters are attempting to give them atomic wedgies. Point being, the monsters should be trying to get in the snipers face and not let them snipe undisturbed.
@@jon9828 One would hope your front liners are doing their job to keep those monsters at bay. But even if they do get up to you, it's not like you are caster squishy either. You get 8 hp per level and have normal martial armor proficiency.
@@ColdNapalm42 For more than half the levels (14/20 levels to be precise) your proficiency will be the same as the wizard. I will concede that the wizard likely has difficulty maximizing dex early on but that door even out fairly quickly. Magus is ahead of wizard in armor proficiency at levels 11-12 and 17-20. Magus has the same armor proficiency track as fighter but doesn't get armor specialization (which is fairly minor tbf). That and 2 more hp/level does make you sturdier than the wizard, but that's not saying much. Magi are absolutely squishier than frontline martials (fighter, champion, monk, swashbuckler etc) and it is very noticeable. Source: Playing a twisting tree magus in a party of: TT Magus (me) Monk (Bullet dancer/grappler) Cleric (Melee warpriest) Bard (max buffs/debuffs/utility, don't know the exact details). Glass cannon has been my experience so far (lvl 11 atm) I'm hoping that AC bumb will be as noticable as I think. Sorry for the long winded reply. I was bored :). TLDR: Proficiency in AC for magus isn't ahead of full casters nearly as much as I thought. Same goes for fighters actually.
@@jon9828 ah fond memories of my starlit span magus player crit failing a save to a point blank behir breath because he called it a dragon. we play a casual table so I wasn't actually going to let him die but he volunteered to because he missed about 95% of all of his shots since he made that character.
@jon9828 that dex does not even out as you say. Adventurers clothes you enchant as unarmored has max dex cap of 5. The earliest you hit that is 15 if you started with 16 dex. Armor is important in not getting squished. So yes, casters are below a magus in AC for pretty much all levels...with 15 and 16 being the exception IF you started with 16 dex. Otherwise it's all levels.
I’m just trying to learn pathfinder, it’s confusing to me… but I would NOT call it unbalanced. I’m mainly an OSR person who has been playing for over 3 decades of mainly pre 3e D&D, and the mindset is that it isn’t supposed to be balanced. Basically the mindset was if you got into a big fight, you have made a mistake somewhere. Players *needed* to know when to nope out. Very different mindset that actually gives me trouble understanding modern players having issues of not being balanced.
Please check out bola shot (5th level ammunition). You make a strike to hit, then compare the result of the attack roll to the target’s reflex DC, with a success knocking the target prone and a critical success knocking the target prone and stunning 1. Unlike other magical ammunition, this scales to higher levels automatically even while the GP cost becomes inconsequential. Also because it uses one roll, anything that helps you fish for a critical hit like true strike or a hero point makes the ammunition even better. Finally a creature’s reflex DC is often lower than their AC, meaning that almost any hit will automatically inflict prone.
The flip in the other direction, where that Clumsy 3 from the Synesthesia means they're 15% less likely to make their reflex save against being knocked prone by that gnomish flickmace...
Did not realize how strong timber sentinel was until it hard carried me through my first playthrough of Dawnsbury Days, the damage mitigation is INSANE. In actual play I assume it'd be a little bit less strong, since enemies can target the tree (and with AC 10 they have a very high crit chance, especially at later levels), but still.
I had the opposite experience (perhaps because I play at the highest difficulty). I wouldn't say it was useless, but the positioning requirement is quite limiting. Flanking, dealing with ranged enemies, receiving AoEs, etc. For that matter, killing the weaker enemies was usually better damage prevention, so Hail of Splinters was usually the more effective impulse.
I believe Timber Sentinel is what actually makes a Wood kineticist very fun. They have some offensive options, but they are nowhere near the damage of fire, they have a similar armor to metal, but metal has more defenses and damage, earth has the highest AC, and basically all the other ones have more AoE. Wood has some healing, but it's very limited. Basically, wood is a support that doesn't have a very reliable heal and has some very mid damage, but Timber Sentinel makes them very special. I've played with a friend using Timber Sentinel, it's very good, but we didn't feel it trivialised anything.
Great video as always. I haven't banned any spells from my games even in 5e but I also had players that didn't abuse any of them. These are very interesting use cases.
Great video Ronald! At my table, Tailwind only lasts a minute normally, and the heightened version lasts 10 minutes, which pretty much solves how overpowered it is. It's very surprising that Paizo left the spell as-is in the remaster... It's clearly a little broken.
The Flickmace is a Martial Weapons stats with the COST of an Advanced Weapon. How can it be anything except nerfed? Asp Coil: d6 S/P, 1h, reach, martial, sword. Breaching Pike: d6 P, razing, reach, martial, spear. Chain Sword: d6 S, finesse, reach, sweep, advanced, sword. Flickmace: d6 B, reach, sweep, advanced, flail. The flickmace has the SAME number of traits as the Asp Coil & Breaching Pike and costs an Ancestry or Class Feat to use! The Flail Group has been nerfed you can't act like it's just "better" and needs a take down otherwise the Warhammer needs the same nerf.
7:35 I'd grab gauntlet and doubling rings Now we can put a crushing rune on the gauntlet and give the buff to flickmace Then we add another buff to flickmace (that would replace the spot that crushing took) Fighters are OP
I believe you may have missed a line, an honest mistake. I've made an excerpt from the description of greater doubling rings on AoN for your convenience (Emphasis is mine). "/.../ The weapon in the iron-ringed hand gains the benefits of those runes. ALL ITS OWN RUNES ARE SUPPRESSED/.../"
Honestly, my thing with tree sentinel is that it just tends to matter very little. Maybe it's just my DMs (as in all of them I've had with PF2e), but we still get frequently crit even with our frontline optimizing for AC. Even on regular hits, it's pretty common to get hit for 30 damage from a single strike at level 4. The tankiest NPCs are 2 hits from 0 hp, the backline is just 1, and that's just from a single opponent. The tree sentinel, at least for us, tends to get vaporized. Those 2 actions, generally speaking, would have been much better suited to me putting out damage instead to reduce enemy numbers instead of soaking up most of a singular regular hit. For Tailwind, I want Tailwind as a player because I do not see it as a bonus or benefit. I see it as fixing a fundamental issue of movement. Simply put, the standard speeds of most PCs is too low. At least in my experience, most fights tend to start somewhere around the 40 foot mark PCs to monsters. Grabbing Fleet and Tailwind and you can properly engage with a single action. Not having it means you need 2 actions to get in, leaving only 1 action to actually start anything (and the fact that many classes need a single action at the start of combat to do various things, you don't really get to act at all). Getting there in 1 action gives you an action for whatever your setup is, and 1 action to actually hit something. You're already giving the opponents the benefit of being able to go second, and in pf2e getting to be on the team that goes second when there's some distance between you is honestly the best thing. Without Tailwind, the actual correct option for the start of combat is to make sure everyone starts the fight with a quality ranged option be that spells, cantrips, blasts, bombs, bows, guns, whatever. If you make sure it's clear to your opponents that trying to get their enemies to move in just results in them dying, they'll have to rush in, and that uses up THEIR first turns instead. So the correct thing to do with the current movement without something like Tailwind is to actually NOT MOVE in the first place. My hot take? Give everything in the game an extra +5 or +10 to its base movement. That, IMO, is the fix. Throw the spell out, but now everyone is faster, including all the monsters. For crit monsters, honestly, I've never felt the builds are really monster-y. The added conditions are definitely nice, no argument there. But at least in my experience playing PF2e over the last year or two, crits are still pretty rare. Monsters tend to fall into one or two categories, either you're meant to nuke them into oblivion, at which point they're easy to crit and will just fall over, or monsters have insanely high AC, and a fighter going toe-to-toe straight up still needs a 20 on the die to crit. Sure, stacking +1s from fear and bless and other things can help, but also things that affect enemies also tend to not really work most of the time so you can only control your own +1s (which also means buffing is WAY more powerful than debuffing on average). I don't see it as a huge issue that one can build into crit effects when they happen so rarely for players. Which leads me to the Resentment Witch. I really don't have an issue with very specific spell combinations being extremely effective. Most of the time those debuff spells just do basically nothing. Monsters that are lower level than your party you generally can take care of them easy enough so you might as well throw out Electric Arc or something. For the above you level enemies, you have like a DC of 19 while the enemy has a save of +17. A 2 is a success. A 12 is a crit success. It can barely crit fail, and that's legit only on a 1, and it can't really regular fail at all. And yes, I know, you should be doing things like debuffs to reduce its saves, except these ARE the things to reduce the saves and they don't even land. There's also doing recall knowledge and targeting weak saves. The issue that I have found there, having played at least one character in 2e for each magic type, is that the actually GOOD spells for each magic type all tend to be for the same saves. So you end up with a character with several good spells but they all target Fort for example, or Reflex. So yeah, a guaranteed way to use and maintain a debuff sounds fantastic. Also, a big struggle for the Witch is also action economy. Sure, you can sit there and extend debuffs forever. But usually you can't even do it turn 1 because you have to maneuver yourself and spend an action moving your familiar, then next turn you get the spell active (if it lands) and sustaining it, then the next turn the enemy dies anyway so the sustain was meaningless, then the turn after that you have to spend actions on repositioning again. PF2e is a very tightly balanced game, that is absolutely true. But that balance is built around the idea that at least half the party fails the thing they're trying to do every turn. That's great for game balance, but sucks for a player experience, like the remastered Witch I played in a recent 1-6 campaign. I saw my hex cantrip I was casting every turn actually LAND on a target 3 times the entire campaign. I felt really clutch when I landed Slow on a boss who ONLY got a success turn 1, and kept it on the boss 2 more turns. Most of the time I felt literally useless.
I feel protector tree can be balanced for in encounter design. A second enemy goes a long way, and stringing out the party a bit will also mean its a choice which party member to protect and an enemy can go after a different one, cleave feat may trivialize it, and any AoE. I'd also consider asking "does a tree fit in this room, and is there additional consequences to the floor/walls/ceiling" though careful with that one, because it fast becomes a new use for the spell. I let my players feel strong in what they build for, and let it be effective a lot, but I also think they generally dont want to be a tree bot every single round.
I genuinely got super worried when one of my players brought a resentment witch to the table. Luckily for me, they didn't really seem to use the main feature a whole lot, and unluckily for them, I was not aware that the Barbazu was one of the few pre-remaster pf2e monsters to be overtuned for their level...
I am doing pathfinder 2e Drakkenheim and my group I kinda gave them some good items, but I just throw more monsters or increase the monsters stats a bit. and everyone is just having a blast. I really love pathfinder 2e compared to 5e. I had 20 monsters swarm and attack and i just stream lined them into group rolls and it worked out well! I got a great group of players who enjoy my combats I bring to the table as a GM.
Honestly I don't consider Timber Sentinel to be that OP, a simple change fixes it. Part of the problem IMHO is that a lot of folks make heavy assumptions about Protector Tree, imagining it as this big tree that provides heavy cover, can be climbed to gain concealment, etc. But it has to be a tree that fits into a 5 ft. space, which to me, suggests its much more likely a large shrub or small decorative tree, such as a young Japanese maple. In my own games I apply the Overflow trait to the feat, which makes it less easy to spam, while still being extremely useful.
My level 16 Ranger has a speed of 50 feet. Fleet (5’,)Scout Archetype (permanent status bonus 10’ to speed), and Boots of Bounding (Item bonus 10’ to speed) Feels good.
Heal is a lot stronger than timber Sentinel. Reactive healing is generally better than proactive defense in a game. There's exceptions, but I'd much rather give 12.5 health to an ally that needs it than a tree that might not even help. AoE attacks bypass the tree by destroying it first, spells aren't effected by it, enemy might not even hit that ally, and if they're at full health why would they? Being able to spam it endlessly is wild though. No idea who thought that was balanced.
I don't know that I agree with your conclusions about these things being overpowered or broken. They're definitely all strong options, but having extensive experience with 3.5e and PF1 I have experienced much more powerful versions of all of these things.
I was going to point out the whips, but you mentioned it in the video already. I just wish the classic greatsword wasn't complete and utter garbage. The Bastard Sword and the Guisarme are both simply so, so much better. Players cheesing the market by stocking up on 'Longstride Wands' or whatever has convinced me to NOT just let players, by default, buy whatever they want. I'm approaching this like I did 5e; buying items is an 'event' (with roleplaying), and only specific lists of items will be available for purchase; some random, some curated, some custom made. Same with crafting. Great thing about PF2e, is that the GM core even gives specific advice in regards to this. Ie, if you're going to restrict what items players can buy, then make sure a higher proportion of permanent items they find are 'core' (ie essential) items. It's nice to have toolboxes!
I was a bit worried about the Greater Crushing rune at first, but someone pointed out to me that its probably marginally worse than the Greater Fearsome rune, which inflicts a -2 to everything and lasts longer (since it ticks down by 1 per round rather than going away entirely).
Seems pretty well balanced out by the difference in cost/item level - greater crushing starts to feel more like a stepping stone to greater fearsome when you put it like that (technically the crushing rune also gets to debuff damage rolls where fearsome doesn't, but that doesn't sound particularly relevant lol)
Honestly, if these are the worst "broken" builds that you can come up with, PF2e is in pretty good shape. You know, compared to D&D 5e and by all accounts D&D 5e 2024 that was meant to fix all the problems but hasn't (and instead made matters worse). No 5e, has way more fundamentally game breaking holes that aren't restricted to a singular class or only accessible at pretty high levels.
Honestly I hard disagree on trick magic item Tailwind being op. Especially with the argument about stepping on other classes toes which first off the fact that 3 classes all can get bonus speed AND 2 of those are core classes and the last is apg is a pretty large significant portion of the classes and on top of that I'll expand that list the Bard can get "triple time composition" which can give everyone in your party the same speed bonus for 1 action and can be extended to last 4 rounds as just a core rulebook option! AND air kineticists can make their kinetic aura give a 10 foot bonus to speed as well as fly speed which is effectively permanent for them and their close allies. Oh yeah and alchemists can make cheetah elixirs. So thats 6 different classes that get bonus speed as a feature thats 1/4 of the system on top of that if we include all the arcane and primal casters thats 6 more. More than half the classes in the system can very easily get access to a speed boost from just their class! While having more speed is powerful its very clearly intended to be a widely available ability that all players can get access to. So I don't really understand why you would single out trick magic item as problematic.
You've just listed off a bunch of cool abilities... that are made irrelevant if people take Trick Magic Item/Tailwind It's even more egregious when it's the party buffs that you mentioned. It clearly comes off as an unintended consequence that makes the bard's Triple Time and the air kineticist ability less impressive It makes (1) those classes less special and (2) gives everyone a permanent boost that was clearly intended to be situational
The Kineticist in general is really inconcsistently designed. Rebirth in Living Stone is also a silly feat with the crit immunity, at least that only shows up at Level 18. Kineticist in general breaks with a lot of the design conventions and is basically a class that is fully self sufficent to a degree other classes just aren't. The more I read and hear about it the more I dislike. Especially with how being a single element Kineticist is basically actively handicapping yourself, which I find a really weird direction for them to have taken with how the class is structured.
It's the combination of things. This is still very strong without a Fighter. One of the strongest PCs in any of my games (I've run for about 30 PF2 groups) was a Champion with a gnome flickmace with a greater crushing rune, who took Retributive Strike (more Strikes), the feat gave Reactive Strike and the feat giving him an extra reaction for Retributive Strike. He crit VERY often, and his crits knocked enemies prone. And their standing up triggered his Reactive Strike. Granted, this was before the crit spec got nerfed to require a saving throw, but this was also before Treasure Vault brought us the phantasmal doorknob. The fact that the flickmace was one-handed allowed him to take a Sturdy Shield, with the Shield Ally class feature, and he took a feat that gave him a bonus reaction per turn for Shield Block. He was an offensive and defensive powerhouse.
off the top of my head one thing that wasn't mentioned is provocator archetype's Pin to the Spot feat(if you hit and deal damage, target is Restrained as if you had critted a grapple) sure you can only get it at lvl 14, and in PFS you need a silly requirement, but once you get that feat you just win the game also RAW you can get Loremaster Lore or Bardic lore, then get Additional Lore and Kreighton's Cognitive Crossover for universal Legendary Scaling combat recall knowledge. if you fail the bardic check, try cooking lore instead(or your favorite flavor of funny)!
Echo Receptors / Major Saurian Spike Spring Heel (Wand of) Air Walk Wand of Heroism 3rd/6th (have some extras to justify having it up as a prebuff for most/every fight with some wasted) Sneak Adept Wands of Invisibility so everyone can start combat Hidden The list goes on and on
sentinel tree is really powerful, literally just smoke out dungeons and lairs using your infinite tinder. Literally won't need to do any encounters except with non-breathing things, stake out the dungeon for about a week until the smoke has probably killed everything (smoke them out for a couple of days, then let the smoke eventually settle after a few more).
To push back a bit on the Resentment Witch's familiar ability, not to say it isn't very strong but that it isn't unhealthy for the game: picking the Resentment Patron locks you into the Occult spell list. Now the Occult list is great - and the familiar ability synergies well with the list - but the spell list you get is a huge factor when considering which patron to pick. That is to say, the Resentment Patron isnt an auto pick for Witch players who may prefer a different spell list for their character.
I’m fine with how powerful RW is. My problem is it’s clearly better than pretty much all the other Witch types. I consider that bad game design. I agree with you that spell tradition is clearly an important part of making this choice. But it’s still frustrating to pass up on clearly the coolest, most unique class option simply because they don’t have the spell list you want. I’m all for making tough choices, but when it’s “I have to take the clearly weaker class options just to enjoy the spells I want to use”, then you’ve entered the “feel bad” area of the pool and it’s time to get out. My solution would be to actually make the other Witch options more competitive with the RW. Comment Edited to eliminate my whining about Ron’s whining.
discussions on player character preference don't really matter when it comes to discussions of power levels because yeah at the end of the day if i want to play a bard or a monk and not a witch, i will do that. but somewhere out there someone will play a resentment witch and when they do that character will have access to a ridiculous power multiplier on their familiar that is relatively easy to maintain especially if your dm is a cute animal or loved by the party, the kind of thing which GMs are actively discouraged by the GM guide to target during battles if i remember correctly
I used to dislike the crushing rune but really it is if anything weaker than the Fearsome rune for any enemy that is not mindless or otherwise immune to mental effects so I've changed my view on it a bit. The Phantasmal Doorknob is definitely awful though, and is the one item that I ban in all my high-level games.
The thing about strong combos is remember if your a gm you can use them too. Make the party fight a bunch of gmones with flickmace and all those items 😂 give all npcs tailwind scolls make witch npcs.
I'd personally house rule that Trick Magic Item doesn't take an action and is, instead, part of the action or actions needed to cast an item's spell, requiring a roll to determine if the spell is cast successfully. Regardless of the result, the item is treated as having been used. A wand or staff uses its charge, a scroll is consumed, etc. This would add risk to Trick Magic item, alleviate the associated action economy tax and allow for more in combat flexibility, and prevent cases of out of combat abuse as mentioned in the video.
Kineticist came out halfway through my first ever campaign, and I allowed a player to switch to it from Bard (thinking this might be a reduction in overall party power). He chose to focus on Protector Tree and Winter Sleet (pre-errata, obviously). Now, looking back, its obvious to me that this combination actually ruined the campaign. I nerfed Winter Sleet after he used it the first time and I saw its full effects, but it was still way too strong and stepping on too many toes (the monk and fighter had built to cause off-guard a lot, which became useless). The combination of extremely powerful enemy movement control with Winter Sleet along with the damage mitigation of the Protector Tree made it so nobody ever went below half health in any right for the rest of the AP. I even started buffing all the combats to Extreme (without purposefully countering the party's abilities), and I couldnt pose a challenge. Getting absolutely shitstomped in every combat for 4-5 months actually burnt me out on PF2e super hard, and I haven't run the game in almost a year now.
There's a kineticist in my Level 20 campaign on my side channel (Fists of the Ruby Phoenix). It's a bit exhausting as the encounter system doesn't work as advertised. I'd been presenting encounters as if they were one level higher, but I'm thinking two levels higher might be more where they're at. But to be fair it isn't just the kineticist but the accumulation of things, as the players are very good and are able to optimize in dozens of ways that add up.
Everyone always wants to talk about Timber Sentinel, they never want to talk about how an Earth Kineticist with Expanded Kinesis can single-handedly build a castle in a day.
so, i get that the real issue with timber sentinel is at-will with no other restrictions, but when you were comparing it to false vitality, it made me think: is the difference between the scaling of the two spells (protector tree and false vitality) due to false vitality being flat temp-hp (so any and all damage), while protector tree only protects against strikes (along with it being immobile)? now i wonder how late into development they made the timber sentinel feat... like, was it right before shipping to printing and they realized they needed one more wood themed feat and just threw it on the table and went with it, because they didn't have enough time to qa it or what?
That is a distinction, but since the vast majority of damage comes from Strikes in this game, it doesn't really justify it. Plus, over the course of an entire day almost certainly SOME of that caster's damage will be Strike damage if they ever get knocked out, so it doesn't really rise above Protector Tree in any way I love the kineticist, but at the same time I think the Balance Department(TM) said "have fun kids, I'm off the clock" when it came to some things they can do
My gut instinct is to waive off a lot of these as whiteroom concerns (whether or not my gut is correct). Flails were nerfed. It's easy find ways to tax actions of a Witch, forcing them to either drop their Resentment effect OR maintain it at the expense of casting a 2-action spell, both of which could sting. Your Guardian playtest showed the dangers of clumping the whole party together, such as around a tree. Etc etc. I can't find any defense for that damn doorknob though. Blindness might only be a 3rd rank spell and the Greater Doorknob is a 10th level item... but Blindness is an incapacitation spell. The game doesn't want you throwing that status willy-nilly when certain monsters are hard-countered by it. No other spellheart effects come anywhere close in power to the blinded condition, and a spellheart takes up the talisman "slot" on the weapon, so you can still apply the normal number of property runes in addition. It's wack.
Nobody ever uses protector tree since heal is always better. It simply isn't worth a spellslot, which is also why kineticists are allowed to get it at will. It also only protects against attacks. Dragon breath for example simply ignores it.
I like using the first three and the other two are not in the core rules so I can just ignore them! If I am being objective though Tailwind should probably only be a +5' speed increase for balance. For me the Flickmace is find now they lowered the damage to D6. You are giving up the higher damage and manoeuvres of a polearm to have a hand free for a shield. You can also put those runes onto any weapon.
Instead of the Flick Mace Dwarven Dorn-Dergar for lots more damage when they try to stand up. This with Fighters extra reactions has crushed the parties enemies (ie my monsters).
Ultimately, its OK for an RPG to be a little bit broken here and there. So long as the broken bits are not unavoidable, the players and GM can, and should decide what brokenish stuff they want to have in their game.
I had a player running a wood kineticist, and yes, that tree was a bastard. It was the tactical combat equivalent of thwarting a monster by putting a big stick in its mouth. Imagine one guy holding off an owlbear for like fifteen minutes with his happy tree friend while the rest of the party dealt with other baddies. It was VERY funny, but I could see that getting old after a while. 😂
The problem with the Resentment Witch is that the familiar has a really bad time with AoEs (and similar effects). As a result, while you can definitely get up to Shenanigans with them, they also can just be totally shut down by an AoE or two, which is a big problem for them, as unlike, say, planting a tree, having your familiar go down is an actual problem because if they die, you can't use them again for the rest of the day. The phantasmal doorknob's level 9 version is straight up broken, though. It should just be a dazzle.
No game is balanced. It's just impossible to truly balance a game the moment it has a minimum of complexity and choices. The truth is, it's not a problem within the game if players break it, because it's always going to be possible. It's a problem of the players for doing it.
I change Protector Tree into Protective Wood, a spell that does the same except it requires an existin tree or big implement og wood, as a table or wardrove, or a door
I have been trying to decide which system i want to try, and pathfinder might be the way to go. I have played the computer versions of pathfinder, and they are great. One of my favorite parta of the pathfinder crpg is attacks of opportunity, and how relevant they make martial classes. Full casters are still some of the best classes, but if I get a barbarian or a fighter in range when that caster starts mumbling to themselves and flashing gang signs I get to smack some sense into them.
When you were talking about broken kineticists, I thought you were going to talk about how out of combat, a wood/water kineticist is basically a god. They can produce unlimited food and water, heal anyone injured at will (and at 6th can cure diseases and poisons), can create the raw materials for clothing and shelter, and even craft wooden furniture and toys to entertain the kids. In combat they are fine, but out of combat their narrative power is almost unmatched, especially at low levels.
One of my players in Kingmaker made an awakened bear wood kineticist. He was so excited about its combat abilities, me and another player did not care about its combat abilities and only wanted to discuss the lore implications of a character who can summon wood out of this air at will.
For sentinel tree It can mitigate one instance of damage What about multiple instances like a boss monster looking to use multiple attacks on that same tree sentinel protected ally
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG What about if it becomes a regular tree Can the enemy target the player hiding behind it if it isnt an aoe? That and i am sure the tree cant last that long Also i got replied to! XD Thanks for the equivalent of the 'senpai noticed me' instance here lol
I have been theorizing a build around Timber Sentinel, but I feel like in practice it is going to disappoint. I have looked up online what people have to say about it. I have seen people arguing it is weak against AoE, especially if multiple stand next to the tree. Moreover, it costs two actions. So how are you going to advance a battle forward if you have only one action left when spamming this? The idea I came up with is a Fighter with the Ranger dedication to get Hunted Shot. In a boss fight you only need to target it once with Hunt Prey and after that you can use one action to do deal decent damage with a single action. If you have multiple Fighters with this setup each can spawn a Protector Tree for each other, staying out of AoE formation. I would also get Point Blank Stance to get a range from 0 to 100 feet (Composite Longbow). The range is important, because you won’t have actions left to move. You mentioned extending Slow is strong. The Fighter has a feat called Debilitating Shot, which is a reliable way of applying Slow at level 10, without any resources at 100 feet distance. The Fighter also has Crashing Slam on level 10 setting himself up for Reactive Strike and removing an action from the enemy. With a Gill Hook you can get an enemy Prone (0 MAP) and Grappled (-5 MAP) at 10ft reach in a single turn. I believe the above feats are one of the strongest in the game, especially because the Fighter has extra accuracy to reliably get it off. I don’t know why people never talk about these. Maybe because it is quiet high level. It seems much more reliable compared to fishing for crits to get a bunch of debuffs. I know it is at lower level and just an extra added benefit. However, I don’t think it is broken as it is not something you can rely on, unlike the feats I mentioned before. Healing seems more practical to use compared to Timber Sentinel. With Timber Sentinel you ideally want to have it next to someone. An enemy might instead target someone else. Or the person next to the Sentinel moves away from it, because his attacks aren’t in range of the enemy anymore. Healing doesn’t have these issues. You always know that you get the benefit from it directly the moment you cast it. It is very reliable. I believe the strongest feat in the game is Cyclonic Ascent from the Air Kineticist. Having a Fly speed is strong in this game. It helps against obstacles and it solves the main weakness melee martials have. At high level having flight seems almost mandatory. The earliest most characters can gain permanent flight is at level 17, but you need to have a Sylph or Nephilim Heritage. Cyclonic Ascent provides permanent flight for the Kineticist at level 8 and for the whole party at level 14.
Protector tree requires allies to remain adjacent to it... and seems to not be placeable in mid air if higher level considerations/scenarios are being considered.
The first example is even sillier when you take into account Scroll Thaumaturgy and Scroll Esoteria allowing characters to create second level scrolls for that 8-hour adventuring day boost.
I don't think it's necessarily overpowered, but Visions of Danger is like one of the strongest spells in the game, and easily the strongest 7th lvl spell on the occult list. Guaranteed 2 sets of 8d8 damage (8d8 when you cast the spell, and 8d8 at the start of their turn) to any creature in the area with a basic will save. I have wreaked absolute havoc with this spell
I wouldn't say it's 2 guaranteed saves, though it is virtually guaranteed against low-wisdom mooks who don't have anyone to tell them the spell is an illusion.
@@benknoodling3683even if someone does tell them, they still need to use a seek action on the spell to get a new save. Even a crit success only gives them a free seek action which they can still fail
Broken things in Pathfinder are slightly invalidating one other character option but even then its not so drastic that it matters if something else is more thematic to the character you want to make. Meanwhile broken things in 5e are more like "This one build can solo the entire pantheon while the rest of the party watches!"
Bah, gnome flick mace needs a crit to pull off. A free hand fighter can walk up trip on normal success athletic and then combat grab which on normal hit will grapple them.
Honestly, there's a lot of other things I would say are as strong, if not stronger, than what I list here. But you gotta stop somewhere, ya know?
So this is your cue to tell me how I"m WRONG and I didn't mention XYZ things also!
P.S. Don't get on me about being a curmudgeon who reins in my players and is anti-fun. I'm the guy who's been saying to buff Aid and Recall Knowledge! So shaddap.
ADDITIONS:
-People are pointing out that Protector Tree only protects against Strikes. Are we playing the same game? Strikes are how the vast majority of PCs are taken out of a fight in PF2!
-I see that Protector Tree protects an "ally" so not the caster. Even if that's true, Timber Sentinel still too strong imo. But I don't see an official ruling saying it doesn't work for the caster which is strange ruleswise and flavorwise. You are the tree's ally, also.
-Other things about Timber Sentinel I didn't mention: it doesn't have the manipulate trait, so it's easier to deploy than Protector Tree. Also, I have run it (because common sense) that it prevents rider effects on Strikes, like poisons or the monster ability Grab and Improved Grab, so it's MORE than just damage mitigation because it redirects the attack. Powerful stuff. (Grr.)
Honestly, the protector's is the most absurd one (since the nerf of the automatic prone crit spec).
For the Gnome Flickmace, it is strong but not broken. Plus, the whip do exactly the same but better (except for damage).
Tailwind is absurd, i agree. My players take it everytime.
The most BROKEN feat in the game is level 4 rogue feat SABOTAGE! =^D
@@SigurdBraathen Oh yeah this one is so stupid too. But at least dont work for everything
@@zaka3709 Tailwind the spell isn’t broken at all. As for getting it on a wand, I mean it stacks with all 90 million other ways to get a status bonus to speed.
The flickmace is Uncommon, so GMs can just say no if they are feeling particularly panicked.
@@Captainpigraven
I mean, The GM can ban anything they want, but that's not an argument in defence of the rules as written.
5e Broken: Player gets access to 5 reality warping spells in a single turn
Pf2e Broken: You can plant trees
Make a forest is one of the most broken mechanist in PF2e
Or build a stone wall, with a high level spell. :)
When the kineticist first came out I was playing a champion as someone who wanted to protect their whole party and I lasered in on the support possibilities of wood earth kineticist. I could be ALMOST at tanky as my champion with more viable ways of protecting my party like timber sentinel and at will on cooldown healing, AND I was a kind of bender with a ton of flavor so I switched as soon as it came out and had a ton of fun. Yea timber sentinel is very strong, only downside is those who want to be protected HAVE to stay within a 5ft area and it only works to absorb specifically attacks not saving throws.
OBJECTION!
if protector tree survives the encounter it becomes a normal little tree living its best little tree life
and that is VERY cute and i like it a lot
i rest my case
"I must apologize for my relative lack of dress today it's hot and I'm hot." Yes we know you're hot.
As silly as the whole "TRL is dry" comment was, it's kinda gotten me to throw in a dash of spice here and there. I just hope the original people who said it dislike it lol
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG no matter how wet your content is we're still thirsty
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG Have fun with it! I like the spice
It got up to 116 today in AZ, trust me, we understand.
@@TheOriginalCrustypeanut OMG the one time I was in Arizona they had a record-hot summer, with maybe 15 days at 110+ the month I was there. This was about 15 years ago... I don't know if it's gotten worse with global warming. Anyway no amount of undress there could've saved me!
✍🏾wood kineticist✍🏾 as a carbon✍🏾capture service✍🏾
got it, thanks Rules Lawyer!🤓👍
One combo that's hilarious to me: beastmaster and summoner. Eidolons do not count as animal companions as they utilize unique mechanics for commanding and controlling them. (They don't even have the 'minion' tag). Ergo, you can get an animal companion without your Eidolon counting against any limits.
So if you grab the beastmaster archetype, you now have your character, your eidolon, and your animal companion all on the field, for a total of 3. Act together allows you to control your eidolon, and command animal lets you control your companion, effectively giving you 5 actions on your turn, spread out amongst your entourage.
AND if you can spare the feat or get it from an ancestry (or just wait for a second archetype), you can grab a pet or familiar as well for yet another entity.
PFS even enforced a rule specifically for this, that you can only have two permanent player-controlled tokens on the field at one time.
To be fair, that's because it's annoying to deal with that many bodies/actions. It slows down play for others, it is not especially strong.
5 actions, yes, but they are fairly weak actions. 2 attacks from your eidolon +2 attacks from an animal companion aren't likely to do as much damage as a Barbarian or fighter just using 2 actions.
If you don't have any other front liners though, it is very good for flanking (and body blocking, especially once your eidolon can get large.)
Ah.. wait we can only have two tokens in pfs??
It's fun, but I don't know if it's actually particularly strong. If we presume that every class is relatively balanced in PF2, Beastmaster just adds another thing to command that costs 1 action to give it two. Also its accuracy will tend be subpar (even moreso if you don't invest feats into it as you level up)
It isn't necessarily stronger to have 2 companions on the field I think. In general a Summoner will see their eidolon as their main attacker, while the animal is more of a flanking buddy that can make an okay Strike during your turn also (which is what Beastmaster adds for other classes as well)
It does create a cool fantasy though while still being relatively balanced (in keeping with PF2 imo!)
I think the PFS rule it's to avoid turns taking too long... a lot of PFS tables end up having 6 players and struggle to fit under 4 hours.
@@GuybrushTThreepwood Damage isn't the only metric that matters, getting more bodies on the field is its own big tactical advantage. My dnd 3.0 conjurer focused on spamming out low level summons to clog the battle map so nothing could get in melee with my ranged team at low level. Blocking off spaces in hallways or getting that flank in is big when you consider group dynamics.
hi zedrin
the flickmace honestly just demonstrates the amount of funky shit you can do if you build for it. in dnd its usually jut i cast these 2 spells and you encounter is over.
Is it that? Or is it that plus the old crit spec being broken?
A free hand fighter can do the same thing...only easier because no need to crit anything.
@@ColdNapalm42 less range, less status effects being applied, the knock down is part of a normal attack, easier to crit casue of runes
@vezrabuto7496 less range doesn't matter since you need to be next to them to grapple. Item bonus to skills are available...you do know that...right? So there is no extra accuracy from runes. And you are claiming a crit is more likely to land over a NORMAL success trip attempt? Assuming you are of course keeping the skill ranked up, no, not even close. And the grab with the flickmace is gonna be done at -4 with very little to help that check. The free hand fighter's combat grab is done against off guard. With a fighter's natural +2 accuracy. And anything else to reduce AC. Normal hit means grabbed...no other checks. And all you need is normal success to have something tripped and grabbed.
Fleet TBH is one of those "how do you NOT take it?" type of feats.
You don't need it If your character mounted all the time
@@lemur_kf5992 No one is mounted all the time. And mounts get killed off quickly if they aren't companions. Even then.
@@katarhall3047I literally have a PFS character that is mounted all the time.
@@ColdNapalm42 That's nice and that doesn't replace my statement at all.
@katarhall3047 kinda does since your claim is NO ONE is mounted all the time, and I gave you an example of one. Yes, the fleet is SUPER GOOD. And almost everyone should grab it. It's such a no brainer choice, it really should be removed.
> its hot and I'm hot
Mhm
Yes, exactly.
This is why I entered the Comment Section.
Figure there should be merch soon with the motto:
Ronald "The🔥Hot" Rules Lawyer
Amazing that a spell like Longstrider (i.e. Tailwinds), which was strictly mid in 1E, suddenly becomes OP in 2E. ^^
Yep! The 3 action economy and not everyone having attack of opportunity changed things!
Longstrider wasn't mid! It's a bread and butter spell. +10 speed for a whole dungeon at low levels and with minimal investment all day at higher levels is crazy good. AND that minimal investment can apply to a lot of other duration spells.
@@Pistonrager I probably found it mid because it was only available for a class I never saw played (Druid) or always saw played as an archer (Ranger), hence it never really came up in my campaigns. But it really gets overtaken rather quickly by an arcane caster casting Haste. Faster movement between combats is fine, but seldomly comes up in play outside of corner cases. I agree that it is very strong in PF2E.
@@magnuskno i could argue all day about the benefits of low power longer duration spells vs combat specific spells. But I won't here.
My concern is the no Druids encountered. Druids were crazy powerful. My group had to put in an "only one druid at a time" rule when two druids ran roughshod over an adventure path module. It is not a lie to say that we said unironically the druids have class features stronger than most full classes.
And yes, rangers being played as archers is 100% expected. But if they're allowed to be turret emplacements, that's a problematic combat dynamic.
@@Pistonrager I didn't see it as "problematic" but rather as expected. As for Druids, can't do much about people in my groups not being interested in the class.
Regarding the Protector Tree versus False Vitality (and similar): The tree can only absorb damage from strike actions, meaning any attack with a save roll bypasses it. Enemies can also attack the tree, likely scoring automatic critical hits, which halves its HP benefit. Additionally, it is stationary, so if an ally is no longer adjacent, it provides no benefit at all.
Temporary HP, on the other hand, are far more powerful and offer a broader range of advantages, making them hardly comparable to the tree.
An attack on the tree is an attack not being used against the player. That's even better than only blocking a portion of the damage. And if they move, the kineticist can create another tree at their new location the next turn. They can do that every turn, potentially blocking much more damage than any temporary hp. And if the kineticist takes the wood impulse junction at level 5, they would also gain temp hp equal to their level every time they created a new tree, blocking even more damage. Throw in Hardwood Armor to create a shield, you could shield block, temp hp, and protector tree to become a pretty good tank.
@@MrRJPE A one-action attack from the enemy for the tree versus two actions for the impulse to create one is fine, however but it leaves you with little else to do in a round to change the state of the encounter. You could potentially be a good damage sponge with Tree + Raise Shield, but you won't move, and enemies could simply walk past you without concern. Why should they care? You pose as much threat as the tree. This tactic won't get you far unless the GM lacks creativity or agency. The 5 temporary HP for one round from the impulse junction is nice at level 5, but that's about it. A fireball or any other AOE attack would render all your efforts pointless. Don't get me wrong, the impulse isn't bad, but it's not as overpowered as it seems.
@@IlliDego
I never said it was OP. Giving up two actions for the bosses one action is worth it. They use a fireball to kill your tree? Fantastic. They move, you make a new tree next to their new target. Those temp hp come every turn that you use an impulse matching your element. At level 10, that's 10 temp hp every turn compared to using a 5th level spell slot (out of 3 slots?) for 19 temp hp once using False Vitality.
Sure, the GM might have them ignore you. Kineticists don't run out of impulses. Deal some damage. But if they do attack you, you'll survive for quite a while.
@@MrRJPEFalse Vitality is really not comparable at all given it isnt an encounter spell. It straight up loses to 2-action heal of the same rank, which is what you should be comparing Tree with.
Tonics better than false vitality
Sentinel Tree is really powerful.
For a fair comparison though, raising a shield gives you a +2 (usually) to AC. The tree does not do that.
Also if you cluster around the tree AOE attacks are an issue.
I like that you explain things that might seem simple to you (+10 of ac to crit). As someone who's trying to learn pf2e, it helps a lot! Love the content.
My current campaign is a starfinder skin on PF2E (the DM didn't want to wait until starfinder 2E came out) and my next character is going to be a dual gate kineticist, air and metal. Level 4 get the air bubble and use metal to be able to rust metal. Space battle ensues, "That's it. I'm going outside!"
and your character dies by decompression
@@enggrapegia per the air shroud feat, my kinetic aura would have sufficient air to breathe, which would require it to be at a usable pressure. I'm not saying that the plane of air might not be annoyed at how much air I was bleeding out of the plane, but RAW, it technically works.
@@shirlot hum, yeah thats fair, but its a stance, so as long its an encounter mode you are safe, on exploration mode you would die, so try to finish the encounter inside i guess.
@@enggrapegiathat’s stupid, if he can maintain it in combat why wouldn’t he be able to maintain it outside of it?
@@mateokirstine9782 In general, you can't enter or maintain a stance while outside of encounter mode. That being said, encounter mode doesn't end when combat ends. Encounter mode ends when you don't need to track turn by turn actions anymore. Someone outside the ship who might possibly die, would definitely constitute being in turn based mode still. Unless his party starts repairing the hole in the ship they made, or using medicine to heal (exploration activities), the GM should still allow encounter mode to continue.
If you notice one option being significantly better than the others, to the point where not choosing it makes your character a blatantly bad build in comparison, then the balance is off.
Unoptimized characters should still feel fun to play as.
Oh, this is what this mysterious doorknob is...
I consider the protection of Timber Sentinel (and the spell Protector tree) as strictly weaker than temporary Hit Points:
- The tree only protects adjacent characters, which makes skirmishing or flanking troublesome at best
- The tree's protection is considered first before any other forms of damage mitigation (it applies on hit, where shield block and resistance apply to the damage itself)
Also to your specific example: false Vitality has a duration of 8 hours. This means it can typically be pre-cast and not cost actions during combat, so the primary cost is the spell slot used.
It's interesting to note that Timber Sentinel also does not have the overflow trait. This was left as is when Paizo released errata for the book (Rage of Elements).
Protector tree is strictly worse than heal as well. If your ally is missing health, it's better to give it back than do some strange almost temp HP.
If they're at full health, then the enemy can just not attack that target. Obviously if the ally needs to move, or the enemy uses an AoE attack or spell, it does nothing.
That said, giving out unlimited use of a fully scaled spell for no extra action cost is crazy. Is protector tree strictly worse than heal?
Obviously, but that can't be the bar. If wood kineticist could use unlimited 2 action heals no one would be defending it.
It's also forcing a one formation that is super prone to eating aoe attacks which are pretty common past level 5 and it's power decreases in mook-ish fights where enemies have actions to spare to either knock out the tree or hit the kineticist. Hell, a sufficient enough squad of archers could very likely out range you as you are forced to stride only once and up to the slowest party member.
I'd say it would be weak to aoe attacks, but it is free, so even if they can nuke it down every turn...
On top of the weaknesses you list here, there's the fact that the AC is 10. If any enemy can easily reach it, they may as well knock it out with a MAP-10 attack or whatnot. So you traded two of your actions for an enemy's MAP-10.
And this thing is very vulnerable to AOE damage.
@@GuybrushTThreepwood Let alone the Shove action exists, it only protects in a 5ft radius around the tree, and yes it would ultimately lower the targets chance to hit, but in the case of boss enemies, their second hit is just as likely to land as the first one.
I've had a Wood Kineticist in two of my games so far, and yeah they're pretty good at what they do, but the cost vs effect of Protector Tree isn't as crazy as people say it is on paper. It's one of those things that 'mathematically' checks out but in practice actually has some inherent flaws.
It's kinda the same kind of issue I have with everyone saying that the Resentment witch is broken--as if pretending like being able to sustain a spell every turn isn't costly on their action economy, either potentially keeping yourself in harms way (which any logical gm would likely have the squishy Witch be the target of enemies ire if they are just sitting their constantly making people consistently debuffed, uncontested), or sacrifice their means to cast a spell that turn.. let alone you're also keeping your VERY squishy Familiar in harms way to do this as well, and if your familiar dies you don't have it for the rest of the day, and it locks you out of regaining your Focus Points for the rest of the day.
These things are undoubtedly strong, but a popular consensus of them being unbeatable/winning tactics is a little silly in my opinion when they have flaws in their tactics.
The Resentment Witch and Color Spray can make foes be dazzled forever, blind forever, or stunned forever based on their save. “Taste the Painbow”
To quote another lawyer: "You really should come with a supply of cheese to match your vintage _whine."_
Great video as always! As a GM I'm interested in figuring out ways to counter some of these without necessary banning them
Every time someone pulls a tree from the plane of wood there's a chance something angry from that plane comes along
@pirosopus9497 an easier solution is a tale as old as time.
Enemy wizard: "Ah, I see you're all clumping around that protective tree. How kind of you to add kindling to my fireball"
Give them an incentive to spread out by punishing clustering up (sparingly ofc)
well the tree cannot protect people from saves and related effects, and it encourages grouping so fireball.
The mace, you can either not give out the components or just drop it one dice level, make it a commitment.
For the familiar, you could set an arbitrary cap on the number of debuffs extended, it's still going to be very good, or you can be more picky about what it can extend.
As a GM with plenty of experience none of these things are overpowered. There’s no reason to overcome any of them and certainly no reason to ban them. This is why I hate when Ronald whines about these things because then people just assume it’s true and the next thing you know you have people freaking out over nothing and Paizo overreacting.
These things are strong but not unbalanced. There are multiple ways to pick up a +5 or +10 status bonus to speed, for example. Tailwind doesn’t invalidate those choices. While I understand his concern with the Monk, the solution isn’t to ban an external resource, the solution is to fix the Monk. Because its speed is baked into the class chassis, just make the Monk’s bonus untyped. Some initially hear this and panic because that means the Monk can also take Tailwind. So? Is it really so bad that the class known for being a speedster gets a bit faster? There are diminishing returns on faster speed as it is. Super fast speeds tend to be more of a bragging right than anything else at higher levels. And letting Monks accomplish their schtick a little bit earlier helps decrease the “PF2 problem.”
Don't counter them, the classes are getting stronger with every update and Paizo is fine with that.
Something else to look out for to add to the pile: Starlit Span Magus, taking Psychic Dedication, using Imaginary Weapon. They pump out really high, consistent damage at range, using a cantrip that was balanced around the idea it'd be used in melee, and get even sillier when they can eventually start amping it to give it double the damage bonus per spell rank.
When they're standing still, at range and no monsters are attempting to give them atomic wedgies.
Point being, the monsters should be trying to get in the snipers face and not let them snipe undisturbed.
@@jon9828 One would hope your front liners are doing their job to keep those monsters at bay. But even if they do get up to you, it's not like you are caster squishy either. You get 8 hp per level and have normal martial armor proficiency.
@@ColdNapalm42 For more than half the levels (14/20 levels to be precise) your proficiency will be the same as the wizard. I will concede that the wizard likely has difficulty maximizing dex early on but that door even out fairly quickly.
Magus is ahead of wizard in armor proficiency at levels 11-12 and 17-20. Magus has the same armor proficiency track as fighter but doesn't get armor specialization (which is fairly minor tbf).
That and 2 more hp/level does make you sturdier than the wizard, but that's not saying much.
Magi are absolutely squishier than frontline martials (fighter, champion, monk, swashbuckler etc) and it is very noticeable.
Source: Playing a twisting tree magus in a party of:
TT Magus (me)
Monk (Bullet dancer/grappler)
Cleric (Melee warpriest)
Bard (max buffs/debuffs/utility, don't know the exact details).
Glass cannon has been my experience so far (lvl 11 atm) I'm hoping that AC bumb will be as noticable as I think.
Sorry for the long winded reply. I was bored :).
TLDR: Proficiency in AC for magus isn't ahead of full casters nearly as much as I thought. Same goes for fighters actually.
@@jon9828 ah fond memories of my starlit span magus player crit failing a save to a point blank behir breath because he called it a dragon. we play a casual table so I wasn't actually going to let him die but he volunteered to because he missed about 95% of all of his shots since he made that character.
@jon9828 that dex does not even out as you say. Adventurers clothes you enchant as unarmored has max dex cap of 5. The earliest you hit that is 15 if you started with 16 dex. Armor is important in not getting squished. So yes, casters are below a magus in AC for pretty much all levels...with 15 and 16 being the exception IF you started with 16 dex. Otherwise it's all levels.
I’m just trying to learn pathfinder, it’s confusing to me… but I would NOT call it unbalanced. I’m mainly an OSR person who has been playing for over 3 decades of mainly pre 3e D&D, and the mindset is that it isn’t supposed to be balanced. Basically the mindset was if you got into a big fight, you have made a mistake somewhere. Players *needed* to know when to nope out. Very different mindset that actually gives me trouble understanding modern players having issues of not being balanced.
You playing your usual outro was a nice touch
Please check out bola shot (5th level ammunition). You make a strike to hit, then compare the result of the attack roll to the target’s reflex DC, with a success knocking the target prone and a critical success knocking the target prone and stunning 1. Unlike other magical ammunition, this scales to higher levels automatically even while the GP cost becomes inconsequential. Also because it uses one roll, anything that helps you fish for a critical hit like true strike or a hero point makes the ammunition even better. Finally a creature’s reflex DC is often lower than their AC, meaning that almost any hit will automatically inflict prone.
The flip in the other direction, where that Clumsy 3 from the Synesthesia means they're 15% less likely to make their reflex save against being knocked prone by that gnomish flickmace...
Did not realize how strong timber sentinel was until it hard carried me through my first playthrough of Dawnsbury Days, the damage mitigation is INSANE. In actual play I assume it'd be a little bit less strong, since enemies can target the tree (and with AC 10 they have a very high crit chance, especially at later levels), but still.
They target the tree in dawnsburry as well, at least at the highest difficulty.
I had the opposite experience (perhaps because I play at the highest difficulty). I wouldn't say it was useless, but the positioning requirement is quite limiting. Flanking, dealing with ranged enemies, receiving AoEs, etc. For that matter, killing the weaker enemies was usually better damage prevention, so Hail of Splinters was usually the more effective impulse.
I believe Timber Sentinel is what actually makes a Wood kineticist very fun. They have some offensive options, but they are nowhere near the damage of fire, they have a similar armor to metal, but metal has more defenses and damage, earth has the highest AC, and basically all the other ones have more AoE. Wood has some healing, but it's very limited. Basically, wood is a support that doesn't have a very reliable heal and has some very mid damage, but Timber Sentinel makes them very special. I've played with a friend using Timber Sentinel, it's very good, but we didn't feel it trivialised anything.
IMHO Magus with Psychic's Imaginary Weapon seems to be more powerful than the rest of the options available to the Magus.
Pre errata winter sleet was insane
Our kinetisist was so mad when it was nerfed but its still very strong
Great video as always. I haven't banned any spells from my games even in 5e but I also had players that didn't abuse any of them. These are very interesting use cases.
Not really related to the actual content of the video, but I really enjoyed you playing your outro music!
Who cares how broken that stuff is. Im just happy your version of the outro is back!
Great video Ronald!
At my table, Tailwind only lasts a minute normally, and the heightened version lasts 10 minutes, which pretty much solves how overpowered it is. It's very surprising that Paizo left the spell as-is in the remaster... It's clearly a little broken.
Oh yeah, I also altered some spells like Slow and gave the Critical Failure effect the Incapacitation trait.
The Flickmace is a Martial Weapons stats with the COST of an Advanced Weapon. How can it be anything except nerfed? Asp Coil: d6 S/P, 1h, reach, martial, sword.
Breaching Pike: d6 P, razing, reach, martial, spear.
Chain Sword: d6 S, finesse, reach, sweep, advanced, sword.
Flickmace: d6 B, reach, sweep, advanced, flail.
The flickmace has the SAME number of traits as the Asp Coil & Breaching Pike and costs an Ancestry or Class Feat to use! The Flail Group has been nerfed you can't act like it's just "better" and needs a take down otherwise the Warhammer needs the same nerf.
Nice piano playing skills!! I prefer your rendition of the outro song better :3
Same here, it's so good!
7:35
I'd grab gauntlet and doubling rings
Now we can put a crushing rune on the gauntlet and give the buff to flickmace
Then we add another buff to flickmace (that would replace the spot that crushing took)
Fighters are OP
I believe you may have missed a line, an honest mistake. I've made an excerpt from the description of greater doubling rings on AoN for your convenience (Emphasis is mine).
"/.../ The weapon in the iron-ringed hand gains the benefits of those runes. ALL ITS OWN RUNES ARE SUPPRESSED/.../"
@@jon9828 damn, I always miss something lol
Thanks!
Honestly, my thing with tree sentinel is that it just tends to matter very little. Maybe it's just my DMs (as in all of them I've had with PF2e), but we still get frequently crit even with our frontline optimizing for AC. Even on regular hits, it's pretty common to get hit for 30 damage from a single strike at level 4. The tankiest NPCs are 2 hits from 0 hp, the backline is just 1, and that's just from a single opponent. The tree sentinel, at least for us, tends to get vaporized. Those 2 actions, generally speaking, would have been much better suited to me putting out damage instead to reduce enemy numbers instead of soaking up most of a singular regular hit.
For Tailwind, I want Tailwind as a player because I do not see it as a bonus or benefit. I see it as fixing a fundamental issue of movement. Simply put, the standard speeds of most PCs is too low. At least in my experience, most fights tend to start somewhere around the 40 foot mark PCs to monsters. Grabbing Fleet and Tailwind and you can properly engage with a single action. Not having it means you need 2 actions to get in, leaving only 1 action to actually start anything (and the fact that many classes need a single action at the start of combat to do various things, you don't really get to act at all). Getting there in 1 action gives you an action for whatever your setup is, and 1 action to actually hit something. You're already giving the opponents the benefit of being able to go second, and in pf2e getting to be on the team that goes second when there's some distance between you is honestly the best thing. Without Tailwind, the actual correct option for the start of combat is to make sure everyone starts the fight with a quality ranged option be that spells, cantrips, blasts, bombs, bows, guns, whatever. If you make sure it's clear to your opponents that trying to get their enemies to move in just results in them dying, they'll have to rush in, and that uses up THEIR first turns instead. So the correct thing to do with the current movement without something like Tailwind is to actually NOT MOVE in the first place. My hot take? Give everything in the game an extra +5 or +10 to its base movement. That, IMO, is the fix. Throw the spell out, but now everyone is faster, including all the monsters.
For crit monsters, honestly, I've never felt the builds are really monster-y. The added conditions are definitely nice, no argument there. But at least in my experience playing PF2e over the last year or two, crits are still pretty rare. Monsters tend to fall into one or two categories, either you're meant to nuke them into oblivion, at which point they're easy to crit and will just fall over, or monsters have insanely high AC, and a fighter going toe-to-toe straight up still needs a 20 on the die to crit. Sure, stacking +1s from fear and bless and other things can help, but also things that affect enemies also tend to not really work most of the time so you can only control your own +1s (which also means buffing is WAY more powerful than debuffing on average). I don't see it as a huge issue that one can build into crit effects when they happen so rarely for players.
Which leads me to the Resentment Witch. I really don't have an issue with very specific spell combinations being extremely effective. Most of the time those debuff spells just do basically nothing. Monsters that are lower level than your party you generally can take care of them easy enough so you might as well throw out Electric Arc or something. For the above you level enemies, you have like a DC of 19 while the enemy has a save of +17. A 2 is a success. A 12 is a crit success. It can barely crit fail, and that's legit only on a 1, and it can't really regular fail at all. And yes, I know, you should be doing things like debuffs to reduce its saves, except these ARE the things to reduce the saves and they don't even land. There's also doing recall knowledge and targeting weak saves. The issue that I have found there, having played at least one character in 2e for each magic type, is that the actually GOOD spells for each magic type all tend to be for the same saves. So you end up with a character with several good spells but they all target Fort for example, or Reflex. So yeah, a guaranteed way to use and maintain a debuff sounds fantastic. Also, a big struggle for the Witch is also action economy. Sure, you can sit there and extend debuffs forever. But usually you can't even do it turn 1 because you have to maneuver yourself and spend an action moving your familiar, then next turn you get the spell active (if it lands) and sustaining it, then the next turn the enemy dies anyway so the sustain was meaningless, then the turn after that you have to spend actions on repositioning again.
PF2e is a very tightly balanced game, that is absolutely true. But that balance is built around the idea that at least half the party fails the thing they're trying to do every turn. That's great for game balance, but sucks for a player experience, like the remastered Witch I played in a recent 1-6 campaign. I saw my hex cantrip I was casting every turn actually LAND on a target 3 times the entire campaign. I felt really clutch when I landed Slow on a boss who ONLY got a success turn 1, and kept it on the boss 2 more turns. Most of the time I felt literally useless.
"at least half the party fails at what they do every turn" -- is only true if your entire party involves hit-or-miss classes
I feel protector tree can be balanced for in encounter design. A second enemy goes a long way, and stringing out the party a bit will also mean its a choice which party member to protect and an enemy can go after a different one, cleave feat may trivialize it, and any AoE. I'd also consider asking "does a tree fit in this room, and is there additional consequences to the floor/walls/ceiling" though careful with that one, because it fast becomes a new use for the spell. I let my players feel strong in what they build for, and let it be effective a lot, but I also think they generally dont want to be a tree bot every single round.
I genuinely got super worried when one of my players brought a resentment witch to the table. Luckily for me, they didn't really seem to use the main feature a whole lot, and unluckily for them, I was not aware that the Barbazu was one of the few pre-remaster pf2e monsters to be overtuned for their level...
The amount of things you called out in this video that my group uses is kinda funny. I guess players naturally gravitate to strong combos.
I am doing pathfinder 2e Drakkenheim and my group I kinda gave them some good items, but I just throw more monsters or increase the monsters stats a bit. and everyone is just having a blast. I really love pathfinder 2e compared to 5e. I had 20 monsters swarm and attack and i just stream lined them into group rolls and it worked out well! I got a great group of players who enjoy my combats I bring to the table as a GM.
I was listening with headgear without looking, and the explosion sound effect almost killed me xD
Honestly I don't consider Timber Sentinel to be that OP, a simple change fixes it. Part of the problem IMHO is that a lot of folks make heavy assumptions about Protector Tree, imagining it as this big tree that provides heavy cover, can be climbed to gain concealment, etc. But it has to be a tree that fits into a 5 ft. space, which to me, suggests its much more likely a large shrub or small decorative tree, such as a young Japanese maple. In my own games I apply the Overflow trait to the feat, which makes it less easy to spam, while still being extremely useful.
My level 16 Ranger has a speed of 50 feet. Fleet (5’,)Scout Archetype (permanent status bonus 10’ to speed), and Boots of Bounding (Item bonus 10’ to speed)
Feels good.
Heal is a lot stronger than timber Sentinel. Reactive healing is generally better than proactive defense in a game.
There's exceptions, but I'd much rather give 12.5 health to an ally that needs it than a tree that might not even help. AoE attacks bypass the tree by destroying it first, spells aren't effected by it, enemy might not even hit that ally, and if they're at full health why would they?
Being able to spam it endlessly is wild though. No idea who thought that was balanced.
Legendary Sneak and Disappearance. Not even together, but especially together.
I don't know that I agree with your conclusions about these things being overpowered or broken. They're definitely all strong options, but having extensive experience with 3.5e and PF1 I have experienced much more powerful versions of all of these things.
I was going to point out the whips, but you mentioned it in the video already. I just wish the classic greatsword wasn't complete and utter garbage. The Bastard Sword and the Guisarme are both simply so, so much better.
Players cheesing the market by stocking up on 'Longstride Wands' or whatever has convinced me to NOT just let players, by default, buy whatever they want. I'm approaching this like I did 5e; buying items is an 'event' (with roleplaying), and only specific lists of items will be available for purchase; some random, some curated, some custom made. Same with crafting.
Great thing about PF2e, is that the GM core even gives specific advice in regards to this. Ie, if you're going to restrict what items players can buy, then make sure a higher proportion of permanent items they find are 'core' (ie essential) items. It's nice to have toolboxes!
I was a bit worried about the Greater Crushing rune at first, but someone pointed out to me that its probably marginally worse than the Greater Fearsome rune, which inflicts a -2 to everything and lasts longer (since it ticks down by 1 per round rather than going away entirely).
Seems pretty well balanced out by the difference in cost/item level - greater crushing starts to feel more like a stepping stone to greater fearsome when you put it like that (technically the crushing rune also gets to debuff damage rolls where fearsome doesn't, but that doesn't sound particularly relevant lol)
Honestly, if these are the worst "broken" builds that you can come up with, PF2e is in pretty good shape. You know, compared to D&D 5e and by all accounts D&D 5e 2024 that was meant to fix all the problems but hasn't (and instead made matters worse). No 5e, has way more fundamentally game breaking holes that aren't restricted to a singular class or only accessible at pretty high levels.
Honestly I hard disagree on trick magic item Tailwind being op.
Especially with the argument about stepping on other classes toes which first off the fact that 3 classes all can get bonus speed AND 2 of those are core classes and the last is apg is a pretty large significant portion of the classes and on top of that I'll expand that list the Bard can get "triple time composition" which can give everyone in your party the same speed bonus for 1 action and can be extended to last 4 rounds as just a core rulebook option! AND air kineticists can make their kinetic aura give a 10 foot bonus to speed as well as fly speed which is effectively permanent for them and their close allies. Oh yeah and alchemists can make cheetah elixirs. So thats 6 different classes that get bonus speed as a feature thats 1/4 of the system on top of that if we include all the arcane and primal casters thats 6 more. More than half the classes in the system can very easily get access to a speed boost from just their class! While having more speed is powerful its very clearly intended to be a widely available ability that all players can get access to. So I don't really understand why you would single out trick magic item as problematic.
You've just listed off a bunch of cool abilities... that are made irrelevant if people take Trick Magic Item/Tailwind
It's even more egregious when it's the party buffs that you mentioned. It clearly comes off as an unintended consequence that makes the bard's Triple Time and the air kineticist ability less impressive
It makes (1) those classes less special and (2) gives everyone a permanent boost that was clearly intended to be situational
Damn, remember when Flickmace was a D8.
And had the original crit specification
The Kineticist in general is really inconcsistently designed. Rebirth in Living Stone is also a silly feat with the crit immunity, at least that only shows up at Level 18. Kineticist in general breaks with a lot of the design conventions and is basically a class that is fully self sufficent to a degree other classes just aren't. The more I read and hear about it the more I dislike.
Especially with how being a single element Kineticist is basically actively handicapping yourself, which I find a really weird direction for them to have taken with how the class is structured.
Sounds like your problem with the Flickmace is actually the Fighter class. Can confirm that as a gnome Champion with the Flickmace, I rarely crit.
It's the combination of things. This is still very strong without a Fighter. One of the strongest PCs in any of my games (I've run for about 30 PF2 groups) was a Champion with a gnome flickmace with a greater crushing rune, who took Retributive Strike (more Strikes), the feat gave Reactive Strike and the feat giving him an extra reaction for Retributive Strike. He crit VERY often, and his crits knocked enemies prone. And their standing up triggered his Reactive Strike. Granted, this was before the crit spec got nerfed to require a saving throw, but this was also before Treasure Vault brought us the phantasmal doorknob. The fact that the flickmace was one-handed allowed him to take a Sturdy Shield, with the Shield Ally class feature, and he took a feat that gave him a bonus reaction per turn for Shield Block. He was an offensive and defensive powerhouse.
off the top of my head one thing that wasn't mentioned is provocator archetype's Pin to the Spot feat(if you hit and deal damage, target is Restrained as if you had critted a grapple)
sure you can only get it at lvl 14, and in PFS you need a silly requirement, but once you get that feat you just win the game
also RAW you can get Loremaster Lore or Bardic lore, then get Additional Lore and Kreighton's Cognitive Crossover for universal Legendary Scaling combat recall knowledge. if you fail the bardic check, try cooking lore instead(or your favorite flavor of funny)!
Echo Receptors / Major Saurian Spike
Spring Heel
(Wand of) Air Walk
Wand of Heroism 3rd/6th (have some extras to justify having it up as a prebuff for most/every fight with some wasted)
Sneak Adept
Wands of Invisibility so everyone can start combat Hidden
The list goes on and on
sentinel tree is really powerful, literally just smoke out dungeons and lairs using your infinite tinder. Literally won't need to do any encounters except with non-breathing things, stake out the dungeon for about a week until the smoke has probably killed everything (smoke them out for a couple of days, then let the smoke eventually settle after a few more).
To push back a bit on the Resentment Witch's familiar ability, not to say it isn't very strong but that it isn't unhealthy for the game: picking the Resentment Patron locks you into the Occult spell list. Now the Occult list is great - and the familiar ability synergies well with the list - but the spell list you get is a huge factor when considering which patron to pick. That is to say, the Resentment Patron isnt an auto pick for Witch players who may prefer a different spell list for their character.
I’m fine with how powerful RW is. My problem is it’s clearly better than pretty much all the other Witch types. I consider that bad game design. I agree with you that spell tradition is clearly an important part of making this choice. But it’s still frustrating to pass up on clearly the coolest, most unique class option simply because they don’t have the spell list you want. I’m all for making tough choices, but when it’s “I have to take the clearly weaker class options just to enjoy the spells I want to use”, then you’ve entered the “feel bad” area of the pool and it’s time to get out. My solution would be to actually make the other Witch options more competitive with the RW.
Comment Edited to eliminate my whining about Ron’s whining.
discussions on player character preference don't really matter when it comes to discussions of power levels because yeah at the end of the day if i want to play a bard or a monk and not a witch, i will do that. but somewhere out there someone will play a resentment witch and when they do that character will have access to a ridiculous power multiplier on their familiar that is relatively easy to maintain
especially if your dm is a cute animal or loved by the party, the kind of thing which GMs are actively discouraged by the GM guide to target during battles if i remember correctly
I used to dislike the crushing rune but really it is if anything weaker than the Fearsome rune for any enemy that is not mindless or otherwise immune to mental effects so I've changed my view on it a bit. The Phantasmal Doorknob is definitely awful though, and is the one item that I ban in all my high-level games.
The thing about strong combos is remember if your a gm you can use them too. Make the party fight a bunch of gmones with flickmace and all those items 😂 give all npcs tailwind scolls make witch npcs.
I'd personally house rule that Trick Magic Item doesn't take an action and is, instead, part of the action or actions needed to cast an item's spell, requiring a roll to determine if the spell is cast successfully. Regardless of the result, the item is treated as having been used. A wand or staff uses its charge, a scroll is consumed, etc. This would add risk to Trick Magic item, alleviate the associated action economy tax and allow for more in combat flexibility, and prevent cases of out of combat abuse as mentioned in the video.
Crushing is basically the same as Fearsome with just more specific penalties.
Listen Flail macing a creature and then witch resentment combo may be broken, but at least the party is working together.
Kineticist came out halfway through my first ever campaign, and I allowed a player to switch to it from Bard (thinking this might be a reduction in overall party power).
He chose to focus on Protector Tree and Winter Sleet (pre-errata, obviously). Now, looking back, its obvious to me that this combination actually ruined the campaign. I nerfed Winter Sleet after he used it the first time and I saw its full effects, but it was still way too strong and stepping on too many toes (the monk and fighter had built to cause off-guard a lot, which became useless). The combination of extremely powerful enemy movement control with Winter Sleet along with the damage mitigation of the Protector Tree made it so nobody ever went below half health in any right for the rest of the AP. I even started buffing all the combats to Extreme (without purposefully countering the party's abilities), and I couldnt pose a challenge.
Getting absolutely shitstomped in every combat for 4-5 months actually burnt me out on PF2e super hard, and I haven't run the game in almost a year now.
There's a kineticist in my Level 20 campaign on my side channel (Fists of the Ruby Phoenix). It's a bit exhausting as the encounter system doesn't work as advertised. I'd been presenting encounters as if they were one level higher, but I'm thinking two levels higher might be more where they're at.
But to be fair it isn't just the kineticist but the accumulation of things, as the players are very good and are able to optimize in dozens of ways that add up.
Timber Sentinel is definitely strong. It Needs Overflow or something to dial it in.
Everyone always wants to talk about Timber Sentinel, they never want to talk about how an Earth Kineticist with Expanded Kinesis can single-handedly build a castle in a day.
so, i get that the real issue with timber sentinel is at-will with no other restrictions, but when you were comparing it to false vitality, it made me think:
is the difference between the scaling of the two spells (protector tree and false vitality) due to false vitality being flat temp-hp (so any and all damage), while protector tree only protects against strikes (along with it being immobile)?
now i wonder how late into development they made the timber sentinel feat... like, was it right before shipping to printing and they realized they needed one more wood themed feat and just threw it on the table and went with it, because they didn't have enough time to qa it or what?
That is a distinction, but since the vast majority of damage comes from Strikes in this game, it doesn't really justify it. Plus, over the course of an entire day almost certainly SOME of that caster's damage will be Strike damage if they ever get knocked out, so it doesn't really rise above Protector Tree in any way
I love the kineticist, but at the same time I think the Balance Department(TM) said "have fun kids, I'm off the clock" when it came to some things they can do
False life is intended to be pre-cast. So yeah, the amount of temp HP is terrible, but for 0 actions it's not so bad.
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG yeah, good points, actually. really feels like qa was lacking here lol
My gut instinct is to waive off a lot of these as whiteroom concerns (whether or not my gut is correct). Flails were nerfed. It's easy find ways to tax actions of a Witch, forcing them to either drop their Resentment effect OR maintain it at the expense of casting a 2-action spell, both of which could sting. Your Guardian playtest showed the dangers of clumping the whole party together, such as around a tree. Etc etc.
I can't find any defense for that damn doorknob though. Blindness might only be a 3rd rank spell and the Greater Doorknob is a 10th level item... but Blindness is an incapacitation spell. The game doesn't want you throwing that status willy-nilly when certain monsters are hard-countered by it. No other spellheart effects come anywhere close in power to the blinded condition, and a spellheart takes up the talisman "slot" on the weapon, so you can still apply the normal number of property runes in addition. It's wack.
Nobody ever uses protector tree since heal is always better. It simply isn't worth a spellslot, which is also why kineticists are allowed to get it at will.
It also only protects against attacks. Dragon breath for example simply ignores it.
I like using the first three and the other two are not in the core rules so I can just ignore them!
If I am being objective though Tailwind should probably only be a +5' speed increase for balance.
For me the Flickmace is find now they lowered the damage to D6. You are giving up the higher damage and manoeuvres of a polearm to have a hand free for a shield. You can also put those runes onto any weapon.
I would just remove the heightened version of Tailwind. (and yes I also have a character who flies around with 3 wands for 24/7 tailwind)
Numbing Potion is a Life saver too
Instead of the Flick Mace
Dwarven Dorn-Dergar for lots more damage when they try to stand up. This with Fighters extra reactions has crushed the parties enemies (ie my monsters).
Ultimately, its OK for an RPG to be a little bit broken here and there. So long as the broken bits are not unavoidable, the players and GM can, and should decide what brokenish stuff they want to have in their game.
I had a player running a wood kineticist, and yes, that tree was a bastard. It was the tactical combat equivalent of thwarting a monster by putting a big stick in its mouth. Imagine one guy holding off an owlbear for like fifteen minutes with his happy tree friend while the rest of the party dealt with other baddies. It was VERY funny, but I could see that getting old after a while. 😂
Now I really want to make a wood kineticist
Personally I feel like "Pin To The Spot" is the most broken feat in this game.
A party that can NEVER LOSE? I always have to HOLD BACK>
The problem with the Resentment Witch is that the familiar has a really bad time with AoEs (and similar effects). As a result, while you can definitely get up to Shenanigans with them, they also can just be totally shut down by an AoE or two, which is a big problem for them, as unlike, say, planting a tree, having your familiar go down is an actual problem because if they die, you can't use them again for the rest of the day.
The phantasmal doorknob's level 9 version is straight up broken, though. It should just be a dazzle.
No game is balanced.
It's just impossible to truly balance a game the moment it has a minimum of complexity and choices.
The truth is, it's not a problem within the game if players break it, because it's always going to be possible.
It's a problem of the players for doing it.
I want to make a ruffian racket rogue using a gnome flickmace! (If GM allows a character to pick it up, even if it's not a gnome)
I change Protector Tree into Protective Wood, a spell that does the same except it requires an existin tree or big implement og wood, as a table or wardrove, or a door
fantastic vid! pointed out some rules that we have been doing wrong ahaha.
Confirmed, Ronald hates trees
Still think the Phantasmal Doorknob is the single strongest item- free Blinded on crits forever, no further investment or saves required.
The most amazing thing about this video is your correct pronunciation of Latin. I know, you're a lawyer, but I don't know of *any* that can do that.
But probably none of us are correct since it's a dead language! It's the modern way to pretend we know how it was pronounced back in the day =D
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG Just take the compliment, man. Gorram lawyers. :D
I have been trying to decide which system i want to try, and pathfinder might be the way to go. I have played the computer versions of pathfinder, and they are great. One of my favorite parta of the pathfinder crpg is attacks of opportunity, and how relevant they make martial classes. Full casters are still some of the best classes, but if I get a barbarian or a fighter in range when that caster starts mumbling to themselves and flashing gang signs I get to smack some sense into them.
I would say that Tailwind not stacking with class options makes it more balanced.
When you were talking about broken kineticists, I thought you were going to talk about how out of combat, a wood/water kineticist is basically a god. They can produce unlimited food and water, heal anyone injured at will (and at 6th can cure diseases and poisons), can create the raw materials for clothing and shelter, and even craft wooden furniture and toys to entertain the kids. In combat they are fine, but out of combat their narrative power is almost unmatched, especially at low levels.
Wood/water kineticist really is the best.
One of my players in Kingmaker made an awakened bear wood kineticist. He was so excited about its combat abilities, me and another player did not care about its combat abilities and only wanted to discuss the lore implications of a character who can summon wood out of this air at will.
For sentinel tree
It can mitigate one instance of damage
What about multiple instances like a boss monster looking to use multiple attacks on that same tree sentinel protected ally
It can mitigate all of them so long as it still has hit points.
@@TheRulesLawyerRPG
What about if it becomes a regular tree
Can the enemy target the player hiding behind it if it isnt an aoe?
That and i am sure the tree cant last that long
Also i got replied to! XD
Thanks for the equivalent of the 'senpai noticed me' instance here lol
I have been theorizing a build around Timber Sentinel, but I feel like in practice it is going to disappoint. I have looked up online what people have to say about it. I have seen people arguing it is weak against AoE, especially if multiple stand next to the tree. Moreover, it costs two actions. So how are you going to advance a battle forward if you have only one action left when spamming this?
The idea I came up with is a Fighter with the Ranger dedication to get Hunted Shot. In a boss fight you only need to target it once with Hunt Prey and after that you can use one action to do deal decent damage with a single action. If you have multiple Fighters with this setup each can spawn a Protector Tree for each other, staying out of AoE formation. I would also get Point Blank Stance to get a range from 0 to 100 feet (Composite Longbow). The range is important, because you won’t have actions left to move.
You mentioned extending Slow is strong. The Fighter has a feat called Debilitating Shot, which is a reliable way of applying Slow at level 10, without any resources at 100 feet distance. The Fighter also has Crashing Slam on level 10 setting himself up for Reactive Strike and removing an action from the enemy. With a Gill Hook you can get an enemy Prone (0 MAP) and Grappled (-5 MAP) at 10ft reach in a single turn.
I believe the above feats are one of the strongest in the game, especially because the Fighter has extra accuracy to reliably get it off. I don’t know why people never talk about these. Maybe because it is quiet high level. It seems much more reliable compared to fishing for crits to get a bunch of debuffs. I know it is at lower level and just an extra added benefit. However, I don’t think it is broken as it is not something you can rely on, unlike the feats I mentioned before.
Healing seems more practical to use compared to Timber Sentinel. With Timber Sentinel you ideally want to have it next to someone. An enemy might instead target someone else. Or the person next to the Sentinel moves away from it, because his attacks aren’t in range of the enemy anymore. Healing doesn’t have these issues. You always know that you get the benefit from it directly the moment you cast it. It is very reliable.
I believe the strongest feat in the game is Cyclonic Ascent from the Air Kineticist. Having a Fly speed is strong in this game. It helps against obstacles and it solves the main weakness melee martials have. At high level having flight seems almost mandatory. The earliest most characters can gain permanent flight is at level 17, but you need to have a Sylph or Nephilim Heritage. Cyclonic Ascent provides permanent flight for the Kineticist at level 8 and for the whole party at level 14.
LET ME REFOREST THE DESERET, RULES DADDY!
13:25 You can't blow up a Fire Kineticist! She eats flames for breakfast!
Protector tree requires allies to remain adjacent to it... and seems to not be placeable in mid air if higher level considerations/scenarios are being considered.
The first example is even sillier when you take into account Scroll Thaumaturgy and Scroll Esoteria allowing characters to create second level scrolls for that 8-hour adventuring day boost.
Nice Piano song
I don't think it's necessarily overpowered, but Visions of Danger is like one of the strongest spells in the game, and easily the strongest 7th lvl spell on the occult list.
Guaranteed 2 sets of 8d8 damage (8d8 when you cast the spell, and 8d8 at the start of their turn) to any creature in the area with a basic will save. I have wreaked absolute havoc with this spell
I wouldn't say it's 2 guaranteed saves, though it is virtually guaranteed against low-wisdom mooks who don't have anyone to tell them the spell is an illusion.
@@benknoodling3683even if someone does tell them, they still need to use a seek action on the spell to get a new save. Even a crit success only gives them a free seek action which they can still fail
Broken things in Pathfinder are slightly invalidating one other character option but even then its not so drastic that it matters if something else is more thematic to the character you want to make. Meanwhile broken things in 5e are more like "This one build can solo the entire pantheon while the rest of the party watches!"
Bah, gnome flick mace needs a crit to pull off. A free hand fighter can walk up trip on normal success athletic and then combat grab which on normal hit will grapple them.
I don't know why we haven't started calling the @TheRulesLawyerRPG + @SwingRipper combo "the law firm" yet
Love the confidence.