Pathfinder Second Edition

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Second Edition
RPG published by Paizo
Authors	Jason Buhlman
First Publication	2019

Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Second Edition is, as you'd expect, the second version of the D&D clone that is Pathfinder. That said, however, there is a lot changed here from the original's framework, going for a significantly more feat-centric playstyle. Though this is still a d20 game at its core, the mechanics being a good deal less complicated, and focused on a different direction than what was originally accomplished - as if they were trying to make their own game that shed its old identity.

This has, of course, brought about all sorts of reasonable and eloquent discussion in regards to the identity of Pathfinder itself. Most glaringly, there is the obvious outcry from the loyalists who have now wasted about ten years of their life and several hundreds, if not thousands, of dollar in books upon a single system and are now bemoaning that now Paizo's cutting off all support for it. While this is all true, it's also not something that's forcing people to play this new edition (Though that hasn't stopped neckbeards from screeching before). The second was how much this new system was pretending to become a lot more "tactical" in a manner similar to 4E, the sort of thing Pathfinder was straying away from and even opposed. Similar to this is the claims this to be a competitor to 5E because they claim things are getting dumbed down. This is true, but it's nowhere near the pick-up-and-play simplicity of 5E.

Noted Changes from 1E to 2E (As Gleaned From the Playtest)

The Second Edition Playtest took place between August and December 2018, wherein players had access to a free CRB, Bestiary, and several adventures to play them in (Split between five Pathfinder Society scenarios and Doomsday Dawn, a pseudo-Adventure Path that was more like a clip-show between several unconnected plots.) There's also the option to buy these books as physical merch, but doing so pretty much meant that your brain was nonexistent. All of the feedback was directed towards Paizo's surveys and forums, which could be a good centralizing point - if Paizo knew which comments to sift through in the avalanche of slush, salt, and general idiocy that comes with such a community. To their credit, they did at least release errata in a semi-regular fashion as well as some alternatives.

Needless to say that the playtest was quite contentious. Between a lot of features that people just outright hated, imbalance that took several months before addressing, if at all, and the simple need to adjust to a brand-new system, there was plenty to hate about this system. However, there was also some points that people respected, chiefly the streamlining of skills, the ease of making characters, and the improvements to healing outside of the cleric.

• Races
  • Goblins are now a default race.
  • Half-Elves and Half-Orcs were briefly racial ancestry feats that humans can take at first level. This was dropped in later stage of the playtest.
    • The 10/24 errata decided to offer all the other races a selection of subraces that gave particular perks based on racial variants. For some, this restored at least one racial feature, but others gained a bit of an environmental theming. This also includes half-elves and half-orcs, whom are now under humans.
  • Each race now adds +2 to two stats, -2 to one stat, and a +2 to any stat you want so long as it wasn't mentioned before. Humans just grab two floating stat boosts.
  • HP is now added between a racial HP value and the Class HP value, which includes Con. Just like Starfinder, but without any stamina to buffer out.
  • Many of the key features of each race has been cut out and moved into ancestry feats that you gain at level 1 and every 4 thereafter. All that remains before factoring in subrace is just their types and whether or not they have darkvision.
• Classes
  • Alchemists are a core class now. However their pseudo-casting is now replaced with the ability to learn and slap together whatever alchemical items they want by spending their Int-dependent Resonance special resources.
    • The 11/05 errata realized just how crippling using resonance for everything was and instead gave a whole separate pool made just so alchemists can make their things.
    • The 11/05 errata also finally divorces the bombs from the class' progression and gives a choice between four subclasses: bomber, poisoner, medic, and mutagenist. Each gains improvements as the class levels up, including the ability to infinitely produce certain low-level items.
  • Barbarians no longer have a pool of turns per day with which they can rage, but now they can spend it infinitely...for three turns before needing to cool off for a turn. It's...strange to adjust to, and it especially hurts animal totem barbs, who need to rage for their natural attacks.
    • The 11/05 errata made this even weirder by replacing the flat 3 turns with an ongoing save. See, every turn after the first, the barb has to roll an increasingly difficult save to continue raging or run out of fuel instead. This method is contested for the fact that it offers little better for the number of turns to rage (especially when 5E's barbarians could rage for an entire minute without any need to save) while now painting the funny image of all barbarians being asthmatic or running the risk of throwing out their backs with each turn.
      • Well actually it does make sense fluffwise. Barbarians are effectively redlining their bodies through their rage to pull off superhuman feats. As they grow stronger they can handle doing this for longer periods of time.
    • Totems (a popular addition to Barbarians due to adding new and fantastical abilities) are now a default feature, giving various features from hauling fuckoff-huge weapons to turning into an animal, as well as granting a special damage resistance while raging. They also force a taboo that strips any special rage powers if broken, with the exception of the Fury Totem (essentially the vanilla barbarian which instead gives a free extra class feat).
  • Bards get full spell progression.
    • The three main deals of bards (lots of utility in knowledge skills, performance to replace skills, and magical music) into three separate subclasses. The 11/05 errata gated some feats to certain subclasses and adds a feat to enable multi-subclassing.
  • Cleric domains don't grant spells anymore, only powers (which are just spells that require Spell Points to cast). Instead, clerics get extra spells determined by what god they worship (no word on how this'll work with original settings).
    • There are multiple forces that have managed to dethrone the cleric's undisputed rule as healmaster, from the Medicine skill actually being not-shit in healing, healing potions being rather cheap, Alchemists, and errata reducing the uses of channel energy.
  • Druids get subclasses based upon Orders: Canadian Leaf (Casters with Leshys for familiars), Storm (Blaster druids), Wild (Wildshape-focused), and Animal (Pets)
  • Paladins pretty much get three things guaranteed to them: a reaction (giving an ally protection from an attack and striking back), Lay on Hands, and the ability to infuse holy spirits to one thing (weapon, steed, and the newcomer shield). However, the issue with this is that due to how the action economy is, this means that shield-users are trapped every turn between blowing their reactions on their reaction power or using their shields. Forutnately, the 11/05 errata gave a few feats that grant bonus reactions explicitly for reaction powers and shield users (if you decided for some reason to use your divine bond on shields).
    • As of the 11/05 errata, Paladins are no longer forced into being Lawful Good. While the LG types retain the reactive strike power, the Neutral Good and Chaotic Good paladins gain new powers and different laws to enforce (NG can penalize the attack or weaken future ones that turn, CG allows for saves against grappling). Meanwhile, there's nothing known about how they'll do Antipaladins, if at all.
  • Rangers are pretty much gutted. All they really keep is the ability to hunt down targets (replacing the oft-loathed Favored Enemy with something more universal) and their ability to walk through terrain like nobody's business. The only fighting styles they have for them so far are dual-wielding, crossbows, and (as of the 10/26 errata) archery
    • The 11/05 errata enables rangers to do a few things to targeted foes: spam multi-attacks with reduced penalties (the original version), snipe for extra damage, screwing around.
  • Skill ranks have been done away with completely for proficiency ranks that ring more similar to games like Dark Heresy mixed with 5E: Untrained penalizes you for trying a skill, Trained lets you roll with the requisite stat with no penalties, and Expert, Master, and Legendary are bonuses to the roll in question. This proficiency system even spills over to your armor proficiencies, weapon proficiencies (so as to replace BAB), and saves.
    • In a bit of a turn from its sci-fi cousin, Level 3 doesn't automatically grant 1/2 character level to damage with every weapon group they're trained in, but now only certain characters can get a specialization boost that raises the proficiency rank for attacking with a single weapon group as well as gain access to crit effects with them. Casters can raise the proficiency ranks for spellcasting, but that's usually at level 10 on. Barbarians also lack this system, though level 3 gives them access to all special crits and then gain a rank up for weapons at a later level.
    • Because of how mandatory Perception was as a skills, every class now gets some sort of training in it. It's now also the default skill check needed to roll for Initiative. Funnily, Fighters and Rangers (Two of the classes considered most shat upon by 1E) are now ultra-badass at this skill.
    • Each class also has a selection of "Signature Skills", which permit the player to advance their training in a particular skill to even higher levels for bigger feats.
      • As of the 9/10 errata though, Paizo seemed to get the memo about how pigeonholing this was and just scrapped Signature Skills, letting any skill reach the top-level and gave every class a few default-trained skills as compensation.
  • The spell pool is now drastically shrunk down to 4 types: Arcane (Wizards), Divine (Clerics), Primal (Druids), and Occult (Bards, because Paizo really wants to redo Occult Adventures but doesn't want to make a new spell list just for the bard). Sorcerers are the only casters that are wild-cards, their bloodline feature dictating which spell list they can take.
    • As one can notice, Rangers, Alchemists, and Paladins aren't on the list. Rangers and Alchemists make do by making items (Traps for Rangers, Alchemical Items for Alchemists) while Paladins and Monks (and the other casting classes to a lesser degree) utilize a spell point pool and specific feats to gain new powers.
    • Spellcasters no longer get more spells per day by just getting a high casting stat.
    • Spells now have a rarity, which might be an attempt to limit the rarity of certain really powerful spells. On a similar note, some of the known campaign-ending spells (Wish, Time Stop) are now reserved for 10th-level spellcasting, which is available ONLY if you select a single feat at level 20 for the primary casting classes and you might still need to find them thanks to rarity. Expect this to work out like Paranoia's security clearances played straight.
    • Caster Level no longer affects spell strength. Instead, there are now multiple leveled versions of the same spell, meaning that they have to be "learned" at that level if you want to cast a spell at a "heightened" strength (making it sound like diet metamagic, but in reality just gimping spontaneous casters)
    • Spontaneous casters and Prepared Casters have the exact same spells per day progression (Sorcerers get extra bloodline spell slots, but Wizards get school spell slots, so there's no real difference except Sorcerers have a very finite spell repertoire).
• Similar to SF, backgrounds are now a mandatory feature. Each gives a boost to two stats (one chosen from a set of two, the other to any stat so long as it's not the same stat as before), a skill feat, and training in a related Lore skill (the new name for Profession, though now only tied to Int rather than being multi-stat).
• Feats are given practically every level now, split between class feats, general feats, ancestry feats (racial), and skill feats. Expect the feat bloat to explode even harder than fuck.
  • Multiclass feats make a return. In addition to the ones that grant features from established classes, there are some archetypes (Gray Maiden, Cavalier, Pirate for the playtest) for new perks. You need to sacrifice class feats to make use of this, and once you multiclass, you need to take at least two other feats from that class' list before you can multiclass elsewhere (with exception to one human ancestry feat).
  • Skill feats at least add some new uses for the skill, mostly because of how feats and actual abilities are built off the same format.
• Perhaps the most controversial feature made in the playtest so far is Resonance: a pool based off Level+Charisma (except for Alchemists who use Int for this), this allows folks to make items and allows anyone to use any magical items, either triggering a power or just allowing you to use an item's passive perk. The contention is that you need to spend this crap every day, meaning that those loaded with magical items are stuck having to figure out what items they want to use every day and traps Alchemists who want to make stuff into focusing on a particular set of items/elixirs/mutagens.
  • Magic Weapons now add an extra die of damage per + instead of just adding +1, making them a lot more reliable. The properties are now included in runes, which every weapon has an allotted limit to fill.
  • Magic armor now adds their enhancement value to all saves.
    • Weapon and Armor properties are still tied to fixed slots, but now they don't threaten to absorb than one slot because of their power.
  • There was an alternative playtest that tried another method to dealing with Resonance, but it only provided preset characters to work with, and this was generally as derided as the original concept.
• Another controversial feature is the action economy: Rather than the typical Standard, Move, Swift action with Free actions sprinkled on, you now get three actions, and everything, from moving to casting, takes an action. In fact, multicomponent spells (Somatic, Verbal, Material, etc.) eat an action for every component the spell needs. Even Metamagic eats up an action to cast with it.
  • While not in itself an issue, some of the things tied to it are indeed stupid. Chief among them are shields, which you need to raise every turn to get their fucking AC bonus. You can then spend a reaction to have this shield block a single attack, likely damaging the shield - and shields break pretty easily if they absorb enough damage on top of only absorbing a limited amount of it before just being overwhelmed and landing on you.

First and Second Edition Differences

Races Ancestries

• Among the typical RPG fare (Humans, Elves, Dwarves, Halflings, Gnomes) are Goblins, Paizo's de-facto mascots for PF. As for the name? Well, the usual suspects claim that it's because their usual suspects say that calling them "Races" is problematic.In truth, it's more for a cheesy mnemonic device.
  • Races and classes have static HP values instead of Hit Die. Unlike Starfinder, there's no Stamina.
  • Each race has gives two fixed stat boosts and a fixed stat penalty as well as one stat bonus that can be assigned wherever you wish. Humans, being the snowflakes they are, just get two floating boosts.
  • Each race is divvied up into multiple subraces or "heritages". Each of these grants one specific benefit.
  • Racial Weapon Proficiency is now a feat.

• Dwarves
  • Gone is your ability to walk around in heavy armor like nobody's business. That is now a feat.
  • Your subraces give either a boost to resist magic, a better resistance to necromancy, resistance to heat, resistance to getting moved around, or a better resistance to poisons.
  • As befits a race with a lot of resistances, you have the highest racial HP.
• Elves
  • Your subraces give either resistance to cold, darkvision (which you no longer have natively), the ability to sense and identify magic without being a caster, or the ability to climb and run around in the forest.
• Gnomes
  • Your subraces give either chameleonic skin, a druid cantrip you can change, improved senses, darkvision, or another cantrip from the other lists that you can't change so easily.
• Goblins
  • Your subraces give either a resistance to fire and burning, the power to eat trash (and resist getting sick), a bite attack, a resistance to cold, and being incredibly tough.
• Halflings
  • Your subraces give either an improved resistance to fear, improved healing from sleep, extra languages, low-light vision, or the ability to walk through jungles without issue.
• Humans
  • Half-Orcs and Half-Elves are now subraces for mankind.
  • Your other subraces? One gives a free general feat, and the other gives training in a skill that scales with you.

Classes

• Alchemist is now a core class alongside the classic 3.X Roster (Barbarian, Bard, Cleric, Druid, Fighter, Monk, Paladin Champion, Ranger, Rogue, Sorcerer, Wizard).
• Like Starfinder, each class has a key ability score you focus on for class-related saves, and this DC improves in proficiency as you advance.
• Most classes have no out of combat utility. What does remain tends to be gated behind Skill Feats.

• Alchemist
  • Replaced those spell-like infusions that were totally jank anyways with just gaining access to the big list of alchemical items without needing an extra feat. Some of these items you can even make for free without needing to spend much time or any cash on resources. This is all managed by your daily resources.
  • Has the ability to instantly make some free lower-level alchemical things using that daily resource.
  • Split into subclasses for bombs, potions, and elixirs/mutagens. Alongside some other improvements, you do get the means of producing infinite numbers of certain lower-level items for free.
• Barbarian
  • Rather than the rounds/day nonsense of the past, now Rages last a full minute before needing a cooldown, just like in 5E. However, like last edition, going into a Rage does restrict what actions you can take and it initially needs a lengthy cooldown period that...just means you can't rage again. No penalties or anything.
  • "Instincts" are pretty much the replacements of Totems, granting a bonus effect to your rage, a bonus resistance to eventually develop while raging, and an anathema because everyone needs to fall.
• Bard
  • Bards are also subdivided into subclasses through "Muses". One gives prolonged spells, one gives Versatile Performance (Perform for social skills) and the third gives Bardic Lore (That game-breaking know-anything lore, now compacted to just a single proficiency to roll anytime you need to recall knowledge). Each also gives a free spell.
• Cleric
  • Clerics are billed between two different subtypes: The caster-focused "Cloistered" cleric and the combat-focused "Warpriest" cleric.
  • Domains now only give two spell-like powers. Nothing more, nothing less.
  • Cure and Channel Energy are now one and the same. The effect you'd typically call Channel Energy is now an extended-casting version of the heal/harm spell.
• Druid
  • Druids get subclasses based upon Orders: Leaf (Casters with Leshys for familiars and all the plant-stuff), Storm (Blaster druids), Wild (Wildshape-focused), and Animal (Pets)
• Fighter
  • Fighters possess an interrupting Opportunity Attack by default. For sake of gimping everyone else while uplifting the fighter, this is now an exclusive feature.
  • They took the Brawler's ability to take feats they don't have, though at a much slower rate.
• Monk
  • Start off with Flurry of Blows and aren't bound to Ki powers or Wisdom at all.
    • Alongside the classic Monk powers, your starting Ki powers are Ki Stride (Move twice in an action) and Ki Strike (Attack once, deal double damage of a certain type)
  • Your unarmored defense isn't locked to Wisdom and you still get all good saves.
  • Your styles switch up how much damage you do with your punches.
• Paladin Champion
  • See that thing up there? The rename? That's a big stride that, among other things, allows you to actually introduce Paladins that aren't Lawful Good without needing all the rehashing/archetyping/using another class. Again, a sacred cow is slaughtered, and again, much bile and salt spilled forth from it. That said, it might be a while before Antipaladins become a thing again.
    • Your alignment does influence your class power (a reaction that tends to protect your ally while inconveniencing an attacking enemy) as well as your starting spell.
  • Your dependence on Charisma is now completely severed, since your Devotion powers lack any riders based on stats.
• Ranger
  • No longer casters. Good, because they sucked at it anyways
  • Favored X is heavily scaled back. Hunt Prey echoes this by making it easier to locate a certain enemy, but this is universal. You have feats that make certain things easier to hunt and another for certain terrain benefits though.
  • Rangers are subclassed by Hunter's Edge, an action they get while using Hunt Prey. Your options are Flurry (slightly better multi-weapon attacks), Outwit (Bonuses to con prey and protection), or Precision (Extra damage on the first hit during a turn)
  • Though not an exclusive feature, rangers do have feats to make traps (here named "Snares") more convenient.
• Rogue
  • Subclassed by Rackets: Ruffian (The brutish one with better armor), Scoundrel (Deception and feint master), and Thief (Dexterity to Damage)
  • In a sort-of homage to Unchained's Signature Skills, Rogues get a couple more Skill Feats than anyone else.
• Sorcerer
  • Your bloodline now not only determines what bonus spells you possess, but also which of the four spell lists you can use. This is in addition to your bloodline spell-like powers, which are now the sole triggers for your arcana.
    • Unfortunately, this works against the Sorcerer, as there are several variations of the same feat for each spell list and thus limits your choices.
• Wizard
  • Bound items are now a constant that not even familiars can remove, but they can replace.
  • Wizards get twice as many spells as any other caster
  • Besides schools (Which only grant one school spell and power and then another with a certain feat), you also have a subclass in Theses, which focus on one aspect: Familiars, Metamagic, Spell Blending (Giving you 5E's means to combine lower spell slots for bigger ones), and Spell Substitution (Letting you hotswap spells)

• Companions are now effectively a chassis you add on by selecting a type of animal. Each has a special attack, each has a trained skill, and you can spend one action to give them two of their own.
  • The old archetypes (Before Ultimate Wilderness gave us all the gonzo things like robo-pets and dragon-pets) are now reclassed as Specialized Companions.
• Familiars have to select between two sets of powers: One grants it special properties (Which includes abilities the animal would normally have, like wings or speech), and the other has abilities made to support you.

• Focus is a new-ish resource that lets you use spell-like abilities like Cleric Domain Powers, Ki Powers, and similar affairs. Playtesters might better recognize this as Spell Points. Fortunately, this recharges fairly quickly since it's no longer tied to a stat.
• Multiclassing (Labeled as 'Archetyping' for some asinine reasoning) is managed through feats, just like 4E. You have to take one entry feat instead of a class feat and then buy two associated feats before you can access another archetype.

Miscellaneous

• FEATS. FEATS EVERYWHERE. Indeed, Paizo decided that the only way to customize things is by making everything into a feat.

• Skills have been overhauled into a proficiency system akin to Dark Heresy, where being untrained gives no bonus but the various degrees of training lead to increasing bonuses. Similarly, there are also certain uses for each skill that can only be performed by someone trained in it.
  • The only ostensibly new skill is Lore, which covers knowledge of particular niches that wouldn't fit any other skill.
  • Combat Maneuvers have similarly been folded into skills rather than needing another number to figure out. Resisting has also been made into an opposing saving throw roll.
  • Everyone is now trained in Perception to some extent. Just as well, because this is now the default roll for Initiative (While some situations might let you use other skill) and everyone was already maxing out this skill to begin with.
  • DCs for all checks have four conditions: Success, Failure, Dramatic Success (Beating the DC by 10+, giving an extra benefit) and Dramatic Failure (Failing the DC by 10+, causing extra bad things to happen).
    • Natural 1s/20s don't seem to have a dramatic effect beyond just passing. If you roll a nat1, that's not automatically a miss, but it might make you miss when you could have hit someone regardless of what you roll.

• Spells have been drastically reduced to being only four lists: Arcane (Wizards), Divine (Clerics), Primal (Druids), and Occult (Bards, because...we don't want another Arcane caster?).
  • No more will casting stat influence how much you cast per day.
  • Spells no longer have numerations, instead merely just having their effects scale by level. That said, you do need to learn the spell in that level in order to cast it. Bards and Sorcerers have the means to auto-heighten certain spells at will.
  • 10th level spells now exist. This is generally restricted to the real game-breakers (Time Stop, Wish) and without a certain feat for the casters at level 20, you can only use one a day.

• The Combat System has been redone into a three-action system akin to the proposed system in Pathfinder Unchained. Everything has now been broken down into taking actions (Moves, Attacks, Spell Components/Metamagic), with Free Actions being a whenever deal and one Reaction per turn (Unless you have certain feats to override this).
  • Similar to 4E, your actions now focus a lot on various keywords. However, the concise formatting clearly labeling what you roll to hit and how much damage an attack does is not present.
  • A step further from SF, Touch AC and CMD are no more. The latter was replaced by saving throws against combat maneuvers, while the former no longer had a use. Spells (which normally hit Touch) instead go for Spell Attack rolls like 5E. Flat-Footed, meanwhile, just inflicts a flat -2 to AC.

• Weapons have crit effects like Starfinder, but these crits only work for those with weapon specialization (which is a class feature for martial classes).
  • Shields, for some idiotic reason, require spending an action to raise and confer their AC bonus. A certain feat also provides a degree of damage reduction before transferring the rest to the shield and, by extension, you.

• Take 10/Take 20 does not exist. You can blow a feat that lets you do it but worse with one skill. So now everyone has to be uber competent at their job or have a good chance to fail catastrophically.

• Magic Items involve investing into them, similar to how 5E has items work. However, your magic item limit is set at the more lenient 10.
  • Magic Weapons and Armor now have two base improvements. For weapons, these are the one for a bonus to hit, the other is to roll another die for damage. For armor, this is a bonus to AC and a bonus to saves.
  • The numerical bonus to the chief function also serves as a hard limit to how many properties you can add to a suit of armor. While it's good that now you don't need to worry about Vorpal hogging up an entire sword, the limit you have is exceedingly small.