Free archetype does work pretty well for running the APs. The power boost seems to counter the difficulty problem people had with the APs without completely destroying fights and making it a joke. Obviously this isn't applicable to every group but i do think this is (at least partially) why free archetype has become the norm.
They did turn down the APL+3 fights in the newer ones, which really helps players that aren’t as tactically savvy. And I personally think APL+3 (and 4) ought to be extremely rare, simply because of their unsatisfying math.
@@Evenus that's fair, I've been stuck on kingmaker since it dropped so I haven't kept up. Still assuming that people that started using free archetype for things like extinction curse, age of ashes or just tried it in Strength of Thousands have now made it the default. I mean from a GM perspective it's easier to give a small bump in power than to identify and nerf encounters that are too hard and could TPK the party if you fail to identify it. It just seems like free archetype has become the "lazy GM" answer to APs, or atleast that's how i use it. I may try to convince players to try an AP without free archetype if encounter balance seems better lately.
@ThePandaReaper SoT is a special case since the FA isn't unlimited. I actually really like the idea of limited FA specifically for the campaign. Generally, I'm not a fan of unlimited FA.
From one caregiver to another, I understand what you are going through. One of the big things with free archetype is table size. If you have three characters, then giving them a bmp is good. If you have six characters with free archetype, then that is a lot of resources available. For people coming to PF2 from D&D 5e, they already get a lot more mechanical choices. fA might be a bit too much.
@@pugking4518 Ancestry paragon is only good if you have one of the better-supported races or you are using a versatile heritage. Some races just don't have enough useful feats. Heck a couple of them literally don't have enough feats.
I as a new player used free archetype because people said i should. It ultimately was clunky, unnecessary, and really overwhelming. People can run it and have fun but it needs to stop being considered the default.
I fully agree! Its a fun variant rule for people that know the system and want more versatility but I think it harms the game by being the default mode of play (especially for new players)
@SwingRipper Hell, as new players, I had a player who just wanted to be a goblin rogue. A scrappy underdog goblin thief. And now I was telling him he needed an archetype that he didn't want. Ultimately, I just let him take extra rogue feats with the FA because that was what he wanted. I had the same thing happen with a halfling cleric I made where ultimately I had to just take druid even though I didn't really want an archetype.
Yeah, my experience is that FA is awesome levels like 2-6, but it *quickly* overwhelms people The last FA game I ran, people didnt even remembered their extra feats like 90% of the time
@@nicholasromero238 It has taken two months for my new Champion player to get used to being able to use his Reaction every round. There is a log going on and FA just adds more options that new players do not need to worry about.
I regretted using Free Archetype for a couple campaigns. Some players would know exactly what they wanted, others would be like... "I really don't know what to pick for my archetype feat, there's nothing I want..." And it muddled the specialties of the characters a bit.
As for new players argument, there's a fair number of posts by new players asking which archetype is the most synergistic with their class on reddit. it's basically like someone new netdecking in a precon group
I'm not suggesting that Paizo balanced things around that, but are you sure players have enough levels to pick this feat beforehand? The 7th level should be relatively late for most campaigns.
@@quban234 It's a 16th level adventure, and there's more to it than getting into the party, so i don't think players would actually just speedrun the thing. But I do think it creates more work for GM than perhaps intended for a common feat and I personally would feel bad for shutting it down when it would come up.
@@artkrei That's fair. If it was me in the GM place, I would try to weave parts of the story players were supposed to go through, into their means of access to that party. If they are disguised as cooks, then something will go wrong in the kitchen before they have the chance to proceed into the party itself. Optionally, if there isn't really an easy way to mix those stories together I would maybe try to move parts of the story into a private social meeting without a guestlist, and throw players a bone with more info about that second secret meeting just so that it feels like the progress is being made. Either way, I agree this shouldn't be a common feat.
My solution for free archetype is I usually give the players a couple options for a choice if we are starting at level 2+. I always make my players make it make sense character wise. If I know a player isn’t going to game the system I have no problem governing them a power archetype. If we are making a higher level character I usually give them the archetypes based on what fits the character story wise and background wise. It’s all about adding flavor in my game over power.
I'd really hate if the FA mindset spread to paizo and became the norm, I see people saying that without it it leads to flavorless characters and that's just... Not true at all, you can still pick an archetype, just not for free, ffs, my table is playing under normal rules and their characters are so flavourful and cool. You just grown used to the extra options, but their just that, extra, in a game where the base rules already offer enough....
Personally the best advice I got on this was from another game entirely: Blades in the Dark. It basically says: don’t obsess about the maths, minmax for flavour, because that’s more fun. Plus minmaxing for stats is not cool (for many of the balance reasons you listed). And since in PF2 as long as you max your key stat and don’t make egregious build errors you’re fine, this mindset works for PF2. The real problem as I see it is not ‘how do I balance these pesky free archetype options’, and rather ‘how as a GM do I deal with a group that doesn’t minmax evenly’. If you were joining my table with players that had minmaxed for flavour, and you said (as you did in the last video), ‘well i’m going to minmax for power, deal with it’, well…. I would say: no. Get over yourself and make a character that fits the group. And if you said ‘no’ then that would be a personality issue not a game design issue imho. Interesting topic by the way.!
Yea uneven minmaxing can cause A LOT of friction and sometimes there may be cool flavor for minmaxed options... IE a Sorcerer / Champion that is following a god of redemption so they may forgive themselves for their burning power is a COOL CHARACTER and just happens to fall along a broken build. Its perfectly possible for a cool concept to run along the "minmax line"
One point that I didn't see anyone mention, without FA, I feel like a huge part of the system just gets ignored. People can still take archetype feats instead of class feats, I'd totally do that with a paladin barbarian, but some feats are just not worth trading for your class feats, this also applies to some entire archetypes that are just flavorful. I feel like FA is so popular because people just wouldn't take archetypes otherwise. At this point, and with all the cool new archetypes Paizo releases, I feel like they should just make FA the standard.
That's fair, I think that there is room for flavorful Free Archetype that is heavily curated down to 5 or fewer archetypes. I think that many archetypes can actually be justified as class feats (especially when looking at casters like Sorcerer or Wizard who have weaker feats). I generally find that the archetypes people find "weak" are passives and thus can fit naturally on casters who already have a lot of actives from class chassis (spells)
I hope with every fiber of my being that Paizo never treats this misbegotten variant rule the officially supported default. Fortunately for me they’ve said they have no intention to.
@@SwingRipper the curation kind of puts more Weight on the GM, só I don't like this idea, and it might generate some attrition with players, because it will be hard to define what is acceptable, and as a DM, I'd not like to say "you guys cannot pick powerful options". Howl of the Wild has some flavorful archetypes, but they are also strong. One of my players was perfect for Wild Mimic, she was a character that ate monster parts and became more monstrous in her lore, but Wild Mimic is strong and would not be allowed just for flavour.
@@kyros905 “the community as a whole” is a lie. The majority of the Reddit community? Sure. But pathfinder society is huge, and lots of tables play the game as intended besides.
You touched on it in your Dual Class section, but my personal gripe after having played without FA is that, necessarily, it becomes more restrictive on character fantasy. Just as I create a character via backstory or art or roleplay, the mechanical build is a big part of creative expression for me. I COULD, as my GM once challenged me, roleplay any of my character concepts without touching a single archetype and just using base feats or even an iconic's character sheet... but that pales in comparison to splashing in this or that archetype and making the character feel mechanically different. Beastmaster archetype vs Cleric archetype vs Eldritch Archer archetype vs no archetype are not merely different roleplay, but different mechanical flavor. But I'm being unfair in my argument. I'm comparing FA to no archetypes at all. I can just use class feat slots for archetypes, right? Lemme give two examples of me attempting that in actual play: Elemental Barbarian excited me with its potential to mix in Kineticist impulses. Finally, flavor similar to the Bloodrager from PF1e. So let's build this up without FA, with a specific eye towards getting an aura feat like Thermal Nimbus. Dedication at 2 for a very small (but better than literally nothing) ranged option. Since my damage type is a point of failure, I probably want Elemental Evolution from Barbarian, for versatility. I need a lv1 Kineticist feat before I can take the lv4 aura, so maybe Burning Jet. Also Elemental Explosion from Barbarian for a nice AoE option. Then Thermal Nimbus, though I probably also want Safe Elements somewhere in there... Oops, if this is a 1-10 AP, I already have too many feats selected. The build is basically locked due to my concept, and there's no room to customize with other Barbarian class feats outside of my concept. Is getting a permanent damage aura on a Barbarian worth this much restriction? It might be! But it feels claustrophobic when I don't have space for any feats outside of that core concept. For another personal example, I played a Sprite Summoner with a humanoid-shaped Devotion Phantom Eidolon. Basically, I'm Navi and my eidolon is Link. Very fun character and flavor, only got to lv4 and would love to go further with them. Initially suspecting that we might be playing with FA, I had my eye on Spell Trickster. As a Summoner with very limited spell slots, this would give a ton of versatility to my cantrips, plus feeling flavorful as a mischievous little fey. Well, we run Session Zero and I learn that we're not using FA in that campaign. Okay, so I go over to Pathbuilder and look at what class feats I can skip to make room for Spell Trickster. Should I skip Ranged Combatant? Tandem Movement? Eidolon's Opportunity? In the end, it felt like I was comparing buffs to my eidolon who was performing the bulk of my power in combat, versus some neat cantrips... I couldn't rationalize that tradeoff, so I took the safe build rather than the flavorful one. Free Archetype is not without its problems. You've spent two videos now pointing to those problems. But it does provide enough "canvas space" that I can draw out these character builds without feeling like I'm doing something frivolous or suboptimal with my feat selection. Without FA, I personally feel incentivized to skip all archetypes, just take base class feats, and whether or not it's true, I at least FEEL like I'm being told to be less creative.
@@pavfeira you are listing a lot of WANTS. And being mad that the base game makes you choose instead of you can have all your wants. If you are running an AP, the base class chassis is good enough power wise for it. Everything else is wants. Having to make choices is a good thing in game design.
+ you can still use Free Archetype if you want to have everything, I just enjoy having to make the hard choices and want that type of play to be seen as more legitimate (the NOT REAL PATHFINDER sentiment)
@SwingRipper yeah the FA entitlement is getting really bad. Like I said elsewhere, I saw somebody demand that they be allowed FA for their PFS character. If you like it, sure find games that use it and just play those. But throwing a hissy fit in the middle of a game store because you can't have FA in PFS. No.
I absolutely agree that it shouldn't be the default for new players, but as an experienced player, I feel like any character concept I come up with would be unnecessarily strangled by a lack of Free Archetype. Mechanically, Free Archetype is take it or leave it, but the amount of flavor you get feels like it changes a one dimensional character into a two dimensional one. You still need to work hard as a player to get the third one, but I actually don't want a strictly contained role.
I'm a relatively new player to PF2; I came over from 5e for the appeal of the customization (and waiting for the updated system rules, lol). My group was initially interested in running a variant of FA, just because a huge appeal for *some* of our players in the complexity and decision making the system allows. We initially discussed only allowing curated, non-class archetypes which had relatively low power levels. That being said, after some more discussions and referring to your previous video, we're more on the fence about it now; while there is absolutely the appeal for a new group to get all the goodies of the new system and really play around in it, it also creates somewhat of a divide among players, which I see knowing that I myself will optimize the hell out of my character, to what I see within reason. FA in a new player game absolutely has the potential to create even more stress for more casual players in creating and designing characters, on top of the fact that those characters may already be relatively "unoptimized" in the scheme of their abilities and play at the table. Allowing FA for us would mean this gap expanding even more. I personally find that at my table, none of us who really optimize our characters do so to be "the best" at the table, as it isn't a competition; we want to be able to overcome challenges that seem impossible, and feel like our decisions led us there. Adding more decisions, which can be "right or wrong," will only serve to potentially further increase the power gap at the table, which just isn't fun. Just wanted to put this discussion out there, as a new player who really liked the idea of FA to start with, but I think I'm more so interested now in experiencing what the "base" game rules and balance has for us. Thanks!
New players who are fresh to the game shouldn’t use FA unless they have veteran players in the party who can sit down with them to explore it all. In general. Individual groups can always be different. The problem with these videos here is that they are from the perspective of someone who plays the game A LOT, and in an extremely tactical group. His DM’s youtube channel is literally called “The Rules Lawyer” (check it out, tho, the guy makes great videos). Most tables do not play at the same level and with the same expectations as these guys (from what I’ve seen of RLs uploaded games). There is nothing wrong with playing so tactical, and if your group is like that you will get more out of the game if you follow his advice! But the average party won’t. When he says that there can be huge power differences between free archetype builds, you have to understand he’s saying that “for pathfinder 2e”! A huge power difference here is 20%. And that’s a difference mostly obtained through options, not direct stat boosts. So when you hear “FA is more powerful”, don’t think of it in terms of minmaxed 5e multiclassing. Or even 5e good vs bad subclass. The difference is much more subtle. Which is why people tend to say “FA isn’t any more powerful”. It isn’t. …relative to what other systems people might be more familiar with do. Your DM will have to do some slight adjustments. Essentially treating the party as if they were one person larger, and use that difference in encounter budget to add low level critters to the combats. Which sounds complicated, but takes like 10-30 seconds.
@@mylostisaac6452 I mean, that's when you pick a skill archetype like wrestler or acrobat, which just adds options to the things you already normally do.
@@zerg0s what if I'm not a wrestler? What if I'm not an acrobat? I'm just saying, limitation also leads to interesting choices in the lore of your character, and the trade off between a class feat and an archetype dedication is IMO more satisfying because it feels more purposeful, in a way, less is more.
I don't get how dual class is better than fa. Fa gives more option to characters and therefore create more choices in gameplay itself. Dualclass sometimes would give option boost, but more often than not it would be just free numbers boost like taking fighter, champion or rogue (if you are not planning to use twohanders, sneak attack is overall better than having d8 weapon without feat tax i think). Even monk could be used to just boost numbers
I really appreciate that you're doing intercommunity commentary aimed at the common "Free Archetype is the default" paradigm that PF2 fan communities often seem to assume. It's not the default, it's a variant rule, and it's a variant rule for good reasons. Thank you for this!
I'm a typical example of beginner player who leaned into FA watching guides (yours), and started at level 11 (Fist of the Ruby Phoenix) 😂 Loving your cleric :)
I like playing with the archetypes, even when I don't get it for free. I really like sticking a rogue archetype (light armor and some increased skills being the focus) on a spellcaster. And I feel like casters often have a number of levels with not many good feats
Great follow up, i feel in some cases it's true, but most eat up action economy, or they allow for story beats to hit correctly, but i do debate moving kingmaker to be without free archetype
This is true as many feats are actives, but if you are mindful about this you can take archetypes that give "limited use but powerful" abilities or passives to make this less of an issue. If you are on the fence about including Free Archetype consider "how much do my players need help to build characters", if your gut answer was "just about every level up" they don't need Free Archetype yet! I would suggest giving them more power from loot drops if you want to make the game easier
I've played in some games with FA and some without, and like both, but I definitely get where you're coming from talking about choice in character design. The feel is very different when building a character with FA; there's a lot less looking back and forth, imagining what I might look like after a few levels, and general agonizing over my feat choices when I'm using FA. And, you know, sometimes I want that agonizing. It feels good when I'm participating in the char-op game in those moments. Playing without FA makes the stakes feel a little bit higher, which can help me get excited about the campaign. There are also some times when a character just feels super awkward to try cramming into the typical class feat budget, or I'm just looking to throw something together that can handle stuff and let us get on with story things. Then FA's great. I'm, not entirely sure where I was going with that. Uh, PF2E is a really good game and I like playing it lots of different ways, and just lots in general.
I feel like Free Archetype is to PF2e what "You get an extra feat" is to 5e. Not always balanced for every class (*cough cough* Monks), often times just lets you get a character concept online pretty early, generally enhances character strength, feels great to have.
Thoughts on living vessel? Im a new player in a no free archtype game where another player took it on an iron magus. He goes down, activates the ability, goes down again, gets magically healed, and then uses the ability again during the same fight! We have a new DM who allowed it, but the magus is the only one with rare features. What should I do?
I think the archetype is fine, but I would think that they would also have the entity taking control still tick up wounded like Ferocity style features. I think its a neat archetype for a cool character concept and is fair... I think that is the type of fantasy that in order to "balance" it the entity needs to be less *friendly* to the party so there is a cost associated with tapping into the "Super Powered Evil Side" starting with "the entity does not count as an ally for any of your abilities" and scaling from there the more the player leans on it. Its a rare archetype designed to be more powerful with a cost based in flavor text, so the GM needs to work with that player and the table to make the flavor matter! (That extra work is why the archetype is Rare)
I heard neet idea about free archetime from someone, this rule good when gm wants a common feature between characters for example we are on pirate ship so every body get free pirate archetype ) so yea I belive this rule mainly about gm to give you spesific archerype
Good boy for looking after family. Audio came over fine. Looking forward to seeing what you say about PC2 when I get back from holiday. Your comments about reading all the options on AoN is one of the reasons I restrict my players to the core rulebook(s). Converting my D&D groups I said no to Psychic (from the only player that had played before) and held fast on making it a basic game. For my second group I built 4 of the 5 characters and gave them a build plan to level 10 to help them learn the game. All of them have an Archetype but it just replaces a class feat or two to help make the (D&D) Character Concept they had. We have: Bard/Rogue; Champion/Cleric; Monk/Acrobat; Sorcerer/Blessed One. The final character is a pure Cleric (war priest).
In my experience, my interest in this FA thing is to complement my original class. especially in the early-mid game. Some classes just need past level 6 to start to shine. But with double class, it kinda looks like by level 6 you've already in a better place with both. E.g. I tried a toxicology and a mutagen alchemist.. and both couls use dual class with rogue and fighter, respectively. So I ended with a bomb 💣 alchemist, which was OK-ish. Now, with the remaster, it could be different... in particular, alchemists got the chance I was kind of looking for (I just thought they would move the class feat to free craft things a level 1 or 2, instead of reworking the whole thing with wildcard vials.. which kind of gets the same result)
Free archetype at my table is just, extra flavour with benefits for people's characters. Currently it is a kingmaker campaign, The treasurer, whom is a witch has a homebrew chef archetype, since in the early days of the kingdom. most of the taxes were food and produce. The Viceroy, Alchemist, has the investigator archetype so they could be a health and safety inspector. The Inventor which doesn't entirely have a proper role in the kingdoms rulership has a homebrew merchant archetype, because that's what they are, they are a merchant within the kingdom. The Magister Psychic has the dandy archetype, purely because they have the brevic noble background, so it's supposed to be their psychic abilities combined with their courtly graces allowing them to be very charismatic when the situation calls for it, but in reality they do shut themself into a library and study. (they'll soon get a new archetype, either Carthic mage, or eldritch researcher. Carthic mage is mainly because two other PCs are their siblings, namely the witch. and a champion which died at the final battle before the kingdom started. them being able to harness their emotions to protect their last sibling)
Something you didn’t touch on but is hugely important to the discussion is now free archetype interacts differently with different classes. Not all classes benefit the same amount from having extra feats; champions famously love to take archetypes at 2 because of a dip in class feat quality there so they benefit less, while fighters are so feat hungry that it’s often hard to find room for an archetype. With free archetype the fighter gets the best of both worlds while the champion just gets more of something it was already interested in doing, and is now stuck with those less powerful class feats. I’m this subtle way, the free archetype rule undermines the balance between classes. I believe this is where a LOT of the “fighters are OP” sentiment comes from; they aren’t when you play PF2e as written but everyone insists on playing a variant rule that unfairly favors the fighter.
@Lockfin oh yeah. Very true. Most casters as well archetype because of lackluster class feats. But, even with those classes, FA means cramming more archetypes into your build. So you can have a Magus that has access to 1-8 level spells in all traditions AND 9th level arcane spells.
As a GM, I love running Free Archetype. AND Dual Class. Together! Characters being overpowered has never really be an issue for me. I tend to run very specific games, though - for small tables (1 to 3 players), who want to do Weird Shit. I like to say yes when they want to dual class Magus and Wizard and take Staff Acrobat to be the Most Quarterstaff Fighting Wizard Ever. The solution isn't to shove your head in the sand about the power of the options. It's to assess your table, assess your ability as a GM to provide the level of challenge your PCs want and you'll enjoy running, and to tailor those challenges to them. I am even confident I could run a challenging campaign for the Party that Can't Lose that would make them feel like they were fighting for their lives and barely holding on - you literally just introduce occasional time pressure to a slow-rolling party, for example, to force them into taking risks. You give them options in the environment to risk putting themselves in danger to get advantages that will let them meet the time pressure...or let them face the consequences of failing to get things done in time. The first time they fail and it's *bad*, they'll be scared next time and take the risks. It's okay for strong options to exist as long as we all act like adults and tailor our games. This is why PFS doesn't have Free Archetype.
I run with Free Archetype and also give them custom feats and abilities, which ends up making my players a lot more powerful. Which allows me to toss more dangerous encounters at them, using the rules of the system they get more XP which allows for faster progression which we all love. So for our group it's a win win, but Foundry as a system takes care of the interactions which makes it a lot simpler to play. In another similar game I'm playing we use Free Archetype, Ancestral Paragon AND Gradual Ability boost, which has been real fun, making each level feel even more like a power bump.
Dual Class mentioned. Video good. But yeah, I kind of regret letting my players do FA on my first big campaign. While half of them were really excited for more power and customization, the other half were overwhelmed and confused. I personally much prefer character building without it, and think Dual Classing is a lot more fun when you want super strong, overly complicated characters. Also, archetypes are a lot more interesting when you have to sacrifice a class feat to get them, imho. Makes for spicier decision-making.
I agree. I like FA because I play in a game with only two players. But in a normal party it really isn't necessary. Plus it's intention was always to be thematic in a game full of Pirates or where everyone needs to be a magic user (SoT), not just a free for all pick whatever min max build you want. I've ran games with FA where I'm the one to assign the archetype they get. The party Rogue has been favoring her now. Boom, now you're archetype archer. Your Thaumateurge is a merchant? I'm giving you Talisman Dabbler. Etc.
That's an overly narrow interpretation of the rule's intent in my opinion. The original GMG printing mentioned that you could implement it as a light version of Dual-class, and both versions have a line abour running it unrestricted for high-powered games. I admit, this is still a far-cry from the advocates who champion the ✨𝓿𝓮𝓻𝓼𝓪𝓽𝓲𝓵𝓲𝓽𝔂 ✨and ✨𝓯𝓵𝓪𝓿𝓸𝓻 ✨it brings (which for the record I do largely agree with, as a hobbyist character builder FA really makes some of my concepts pop), but I don't think Paizo did mean for it to _only_ be used in metaphorical pirate or magic school campaigns.
The GM should, based on the character's ancestry, class and backstory suggest what archetypes are available. This will give the new player some guidance and reign in the power gamers somewhat.
Alot of people seem to be extremely angry in the comments/replies for or against free archetype, pathfinder's first rule says to have fun and modify rules to have the game you want to run, so personally both are fun ways to play.
I agree that regarding new players, free archetype adds to the workload of building and leveling up characters, and could still create balance issues if they find the overpowered options despite being new. I would add that free archetype can also quickly bog down play at the table, as the additional options per turn could result in analysis paralysis. This game is crunchy to begin with, and turns and rounds are not as fast-paced as in some other games. Having a bigger toolbox will not make decision-making any easier--or faster--for new players.
As a GM, I use FA, AP, GAB, and ARP. I balance encounters as though there was one more character than there are. Doesn't increase the raw numbers but allows for more versatility and options.
@pirosopus9497 FA = Free Archetype AP = Ancestral Paragon ARP = Automatic Rune Progression (Auto Bonus but just fundamental runes) GAB = Gradual Ability Boost (edited)
I find the system already have problems with unique or flavor to some characters when I play as a caster. So many spells are just not as good or useful as some spells. There is a reson many pick spells like Slow and Fear. To have battleforms or buffs that last shorter than I hold my breath do not open up for many ideas out of combat. And I have found many tricks of some casters can be done by a character with a Wand/Scroll and the Trick magic item feat. I kind of liked Archetype. Gave some extra fluff and ways to build. Becuse I found it more fun to make a Martial using spells than trying to make a Spellcaster using weapons. But I agree, not all Archetypes are as good as others.
I like FA - BUT I think it should be limited to thematic options tied to a campaign, and the GM should have veto if they detect it’s being used for min-maxing in a way that’s likely to outshine other party members
Thank you for the two videos. I'm likely going to run games without Free Archetype unless they're lower than 4 players or running an Adventure Path as written. Dual Class seems neat for those high fantasy games, will consider that too.
Isn't it a good thing if more feats like party crasher are taken? I feel like players tend to take class and archetype feats that always come up, or are active activities, by fear of situational feats not being useful to them. This might be from an aura of adversity between the player and GM, and the misconception that a GM is only a referee, when they're writers and designers. It seems completely within the GM's control to bring up a couple scenaris where the party might want to infiltrate a royal party, making the player who took this feat shine. I feel like there's very few feats that completely override challenges, most of them being uncommon, so I think it's good if free archetype encourages player to take situational and narrative feats like this while not feeling like they're missing out on potential power in forgoing a class feat, and the adaptations on the side of the GM seem identical in workload as altering a loot table to fit with a party's PC classes. I believe versatility in pf2 isn't something that's gonna break a campaigm because it's possible to control how strong this versatility is when writing and encounter building, making it as much of a wildcard as tactical missplays, over/underpowered on-the-fly rulings, or average dice rolls above or below average. Admittedly, this is only the impression I have on this situation, as someone who doesn't run/play premade adventures or PFS, and migrated to PF2 mostly because shiny character options serving narrative, and neither of my groups of players are really into the "top 10 character builds that will BREAK your GM" (hyperbole) side of ttrpgs
Its totally table dependent (many of the archetype out of combat feats such as Party Crasher are still Skill Feats). It can totally work for some tables and makes the game significantly better for those groups! I just don't think it makes the game better for every group
@@SwingRipperabsolutely! I'm personally really grateful for free archetype helping me flesh out my character's theme and discovering options outside of my class feats that already seemed too cool to pass up on
69th comment.... nice! The one thing that I don't like about free archetype is that it means you cannot play as an ancient elf or an Eldritch trickster Rogue unless you get the GM to make some changes to the archetype system to allow you to make a selection at level two
@@ColdNapalm42 that sounds like a house rule to me. A dedication feat says that you have to take two other archetype Beats from the archetype before you can take another dedication feet unless the DM makes a change or if you're using the optional variant free archetype rules which allow you to ignore the prerequisites or other special rules in archetype feats
@@undrhil It's kinda sorta is...but it is how it's handled in SoT. And a lot of tables adopt it. Mind you that one is a curated FA, so it's a bit different than applying it to an unlimited FA. Hence the kinda sorta.
I don't care for how powerful some archetypes are, my problem is how some archetypes (oozemorph) are terrible, some (oozemorph) even worse than nothing 99% of the time
@@3_14pie By raw in 1e oozemorph deleted your movespeed, unless you used the limited duration, limited use per day transform-back-into-human ability it came with. xD
New players shouldn't have free archetype because they already have a lot of stuff to learn in the system and you shouldn't throw even more stuff at them to pick from. I've found it causes problems with new players because its "this is class feats but follow different rules on what you can take an here is this huge list of stuff to pick from". People either ask me what they should take or go google a guide. Let new players learn the system without the added complexity. You can add it on for experienced players that already understand the basics.
God I don't get the people who recommend it for new players. The system is overwhelming enough as it for new players, why make it worse. I can see it as a solution for people who feel they don't have enough options, but I tend to find even players who think that get overwhelemed just tracking mechanics, let alone their own character sheet. I'm not really sure I agree about champion + it's archetype. The base class definitely needs some love as far as feats and what I've seen of the revamp is looking amazing, but I don't think the reaction actually needs huge buffs. It's already incredibly strong on it's own and with things like smite and exalts, it doesn't really need much more. And I don't think the archetype is untouchable to a point where it will break existing builds; it doesn't need huge changes, it just needs its reaction tuned to not just outright be as good as a baseline champion's. Whether that's adding a spellstrike archetype-esque cooldown or the amount of damage resisted, I think that could keep it in check without needing to nerf-bat it to the ground. Psychic I think they just need to bite the bullet and make the base cantrip gains only grant the psi cantrip effect, with a separate feat to unlock cantrips later. It's just too egregiously powerful for a dip and imposes on the class's niche too much when others can access it. Not enough to make psychic useless (I adore psychic, it's one of my favourite classes and I think it's great), but it's still frustrating to see people just write it off because there's a whole lot of JuSt GeT tHe ArCheType around. And I think they could do that without breaking existing builds, it just keeps the base investment in check so it's not hexblade-level too good and requires a further investment to get the best of it. I think the other thing for me is that champion and psychic are particularly egregious because I feel class archetypes should be less impactful both mechanically and thematically compared to classless archetypes. Not completely useless, but there's both a matter of niche protection and flavor that bothers me. I have no problem with things like wrestler, medic, marshal, dandy, etc. being popular because to me, they almost fit that 'secondary profession track' feel a lot of archetypes fit. It makes sense wrestler is holistically awesome for lots of classes, or someone can dip medic if your group needs a clutch healer. It's different when suddenly everyone for some suspicious reason has taken up worshipping a deity and is wearing heavy armor, or unleashed psychic potential that gives them awesome cantrips. It's very 5e hexblade in both mechanics and flavor, while I feel an archetype like wrestler or medic will never feel like it's overshadowing the flavor to the egregious degree. They enable cool flavor while everyone being a champion or psychic is both problematic from a gameplay standpoint and just kind of tacky narratively. Ala power levels, I understand the point you're making ala power levels, I just feel the level of power FA gives me is very suitable to my groups. I really enjoy the horizontal versatility it gives, without overtly breaking the number scaling in the way something like dual class does. That doesn't mean I don't understand why people don't like it, and in fact I feel people who think 2e is too low power should really consider dual class as an alternative to go ham if they really wanna do some cheese. That said - to end on a positive note - I think you bring up a fair point about 'good stuff piles', and it's something I feel the community tends to neglect at a meta level. PF2e is ultimately a role-based game that encourages characters to have a focus and not just dominate in everything. One of the things I hated about other systems like 3.5/1e and 5e is how easy it was to make omnicharacters that could individually cover all bases and make parties mish-mashes of mechanically optimized PCs that had no real thematic identity. I don't think FA is that egregious because the power is more horizontal and characters aren't able to or encouraged to build a mixed fighter/wizard/cleric/some obscure prestige class all with unique archetypes, but I do think you're right that it means by higher levels you can have a party that has very few gaps and holes to fill in terms of combat and non-combat roles, and the fact people miss that to me shows just how narrowly focused the community is in terms of the gameplay scope. There's a holistic design that is missed when people optimize in a particular way that isn't how the game expects and tangibly rewards you for optimizing.
Champion reaction actually did get some minor buffs in Remaster funnily enough (I have the PDF open on a second monitor)... Psychic Archetype MAY be that egregiously over the line and deserve the errata hammer. I think that not giving Amp until you take the level 6 feat and then effectively just being one focus point would make it fair! And I think your group is not alone in the extra power FA gives being *fun* and *freeing*, I again just don't want that to be the Absolute Default lol. "Good Stuff Piles" is something I have trained myself to be vigilant against and is something I realized applies to this game when building my Strongest Party (look at how DIFFERENT those characters are without FA and how so many of them reach for the same answers with it)
Which buffs did champion get? I'm looking at the Remaster compatability errata and I can't see anything apart from the usual alignment to spirit damage. Which I guess is technically a buff either way. And yeah, I think it's very telling when about FA being prone to good stuff piling. It's funny because I feel you can really use that to catch out the people who aren't engaging in good faith or inflicting an Illusion of Choice problem on themselves. If people say their character doesn't have enough meaningful options and then you bung on FA, it's very hard to suggest by no later than level 10 that you don't have so many options you don't know what to do with. Anyone who unironically thinks that is either playing some really lame encounters with no interesting mechanics, or just refusing to understand the game.
I have the actual book in front of me, all the champion reactions get a new line of text starting at level 11 for Champs... Justice for instance lets all their allies ALSO strike for a reaction (albeit at a -5 to hit). All the champions get SOMETHING for free at level 11 now
It’s really interesting, you haven’t convinced me because I love players being able to broaden into random directions because it fits their backstory. A ranger who wants to play as someone dedicated to desna, they get benefits from that. There is the Living Vessel archetype, which is much more flavour focused and allows the player and gm to give mechanics to a possessed character. If you’re playing normal rules you can homebrew it, sure, however that’s not following the framework set out be the archetype rules
I think that FA is a fun addition to most campaigns since the extra budget allows more versatility which means a player could also explore more alternative paths for their character. I agree it's easy to try and minmax but that is an issue time old with any table top and some players in general. I agree that it's easy to try and find the best choices online and with the crazy amount of choices on the Archetypes (and more come every campaign/settings book) it makes sense to a degree if you don't have a decent picture on what looks fun to add unto your creation. Often enough people just look for a fun synergy amongst the mountain of choices. Of course it's easy to find that in something like a Clerical Champion as they both follow a deity and a set of rules, but you also limit yourself severely to your deities rules/anathema and tenets. Besides that I don't think I ever seen a campaign promoted with dual classing or anything but it honestly sounds decent since I did see campaigns limiting FA to dual classing (essentially the same?) I personally also don't think the balance change on the Clerics font budget shifting away from Charisma is a bad thing. You are practically forced to 2 primary stats if you become a support. You don't need to be charismatic to cast a healing font in my opinion. You can also gain the same knowledge from get wiser.
Dual class lets you get the ***class features*** from both classes so a fighter / wizard gets Fighter's HP, armor, weapon progression, Reactive Strike and full Wizard spellcasting. Dual class makes POWERFUL characters and I think that variant rule does not get the love it deserves... The change to Cleric was a good thing for the game overall, but Cleric as it stands is a bit overtuned (particularly early game)
Everyone I had talked to who had run PF2e had recommended Free Archetype to me saying they had used it in their games. I had accepted it as just the "right" way to play the game. In the foreseeable future (probably sometime later this year) I will be running my first PF2e game, with a group that has never played PF2e before, and these videos have drastically changed my outlook on what I had previously accepted as just a given.
As I said in the other vid, I still think free archetype is ok. It might be "OP for PF2", which I kinda disagree, but everything is so balanced here that even the "OP" seems so ok to me, I'm used to OP meaning bosses being defeated with one spell or someone making 6 to 12 attacks in a turn. FA will make the characters much more versatile, but that will not break the game. I'm playing Kingmaker right now, and we had so much trouble dealing with a blizzard and a bear boss, and all the players are veterans using FA and even Paragon ancestry. Also, some of the players are explicitly mini maxing as hard as they can, and it was still so hard to deal with the challenges. When I look at this, it seems that even though characters are more versatile, the game keeps being balanced and challenging.
I agree with your perspective on balance. I think once there are more classes and subclasses, I would feel like free archetype wasn't necessary for lots of concepts. For example, one of my favorite character concepts is Sorcerer-Magus. It was called the Eldritch Scion archetype in pf1e, and it is completely absent from pf2e. If i want to build that without FA Need to build a Magus and dump INT, get 14 charisma and use most of my feats to get sorcerer spellcasting, or I just pretend that I'm charisma based and have Vancian casting etc. Free archetype allows you to actually have Magus abilities while still being roughly on par with a Raw Magus and much weaker than a Magus-Wizard/Witch. To me, free archetype is a band-aid until they can fill out more class concepts.
I can totally see that, some concepts that are not very mechanically supported need FA to feel *good*. Most of my arguments are talking about ways the extra archetype is used as a way to grab at more power!
I don't think that one player outshining the others is a problem in pf2e, bc power discrepancies in general are much smaller in this system and power often also more subtle. Unless you are playing a Psychic Archetype Magus you aren't gonna completely outshine all other player in a numerically very obvious way, so I feel like a player "accidentally" taking Wrestler or Psychic is that big of a deal.
I mean... What if a player DID get psychic archetype magus then... I think that FA can expand the gaps between skill levels, it may still be a smaller gap than other games, but it is still a point that can cause friction
@SwingRipper Maybe, but i think you overestimate the degree to which that is the case. To be clear, I agree with your point of maybe rethinking whether Free Archetype should be the standard, but in general, for most groups, I think the pros heavily outweigh the cons. It allows you to realize far more creative concepts, and it makes the strengths of pf2e shine far brighter. The cons are very limited bc of how fundamentally balanced the system is, even when considering the more powerful options. Your points stand, but imo they are not super relevant for most tables (Especially if those tables have good communication skills). One way of solving potentially the problems you point out, is to define "Limited Archetypes", with you only being allowed to take feats of "Limited Archetypes" using your class feats instead of your free Archetype feats. You can then make the Archetypes you are concerned about limited. That way, you could get the best out of both worlds.
Why do many Table top gamers (Game Masters and Game Developers) think that their players are stupid? In most games you get to play level 1-4 (these are the hardest levels and the most boring). This is a place new players repeat over and over until getting into the rare long term campaign. At that point, even the casters don't have that many different options compared to characters in games like World of Warcraft. If a newb in an MMO can figure out how to manage 15+ abilities and talent trees (or the equivalent), they will be able to manage the 4-6 options they might have as a martial character in a TTRPG. In PF2e frequently you have a basic rotation you use 90% of the time, with rare exceptions for things like AID, Demoralize, or Recall Knowledge.
Have you never played with that person that still doesn’t know what to do on their turn or what number to add to their roll 6 months into the campaign? I envy you
@dillonkaseysmith Those people are disrespectful to everyone else at the table, and one month in you tell them to shape up or get out. People have this problem in 5E! Pathfinder not using the Arxhetypes isn’t gonna do any better! They are just lazy, disrespectful players who treat the game like a tv show they tune in to be entertained, rather than a collaborative story.
I'm sorry...but if you are doing the same thing 90% of the time, either you have no idea what you are doing in this game or your GM has no idea how to make encounters or both. Try that in ANY publish AP and you WILL TPK. Just like Cody's table did. If aid, demoralize and recall knowledge is rare...yeah...don't blame the game system for playing the system badly. Especially aid. People go on about how every +1 matters...but considering that aid gives a 95% chance of +4 on a level 13 fighter or gunslinger and the same at level 15 for other classes...but nah, don't need to use aid. And the point about the player that Dillion mentioned isn't that they are not being mentored. It's that they WILL NOT learn. It doesn't matter how much you mentor these people. Consider yourself lucky that you have not run into one of these players yet.
I've been gaming since 1985. You cannot legislate good roleplaying or good strategy, and dumbing the game down won't fix the problem. World of Darkness learned this the hard way and lost their audience. Also, your level 13 anecdotes are outliers if most games are run at the 1-4 level. If the game is boring at the entry level, you will lose your audience.
Yes as a new PF2 DM i haven't even introduced arch type to my players. but i can guarantee 100% of them WILL min max arch types if I allow them to do such a thing when I first heard of the free arch type variant rule I immediately became afraid of all the ways my players will min max and how it will take them even longer to figure out how to level.
TBH it is a powerspike that can be balanced around, so if EVERYONE is powergaming you as the GM can just throw more Severe / Extremes and its all good... I just prefer the FEEL of the scrappy everyone tries to make the best char they can with limited resource style of game
I dislike the Free archetype rule for all of the reasons you mentioned. I also dislike the false popular conception, that the Free archetype rule does not increase power. But we still have a problem, the archetype feature is one of the most beloved and well developed features in PF2. It's not easy to interact with the feature without some consideration and it will be a shame to just skip or mostly skip such a huge part of the game(This is why this variant rule which is more appropriate to, "higher-powered game", was normalized in the first place). I wish that the "normalized" archetype variant rule, would have been something like using your general feats to choose an archetype feat of one level lower(level 3 general feat can be traded for a level 2 archetype feat, for every general feat level) . This theoretical rule is not only giving you an additional opportunity to engage with the archetype feature, it also improves the general feats section which many find limited, repetitive and boring. I don't think this rule will increase power that much because some of the general feats are quite good so you have real trade-offs and also the archetype feats acquisition is one level slower.
FA or not, pretty much all my characters will have some archetyping. Because versatility is power in this game. Yes, it is fair to say that archetype feature is not eassy to interact with...but FA doesn't actually really help with that part of it. It could in some players...but it can also make it worse in others...so really, at best, it's neutral...with the added issue of balance tossed in. If you think archetyping is rare now, you want to make it require giving up fleet and toughness to get it? Yeah that will ABSOLUTELY make it so archetypes never happens.
At the end of the day, the power differential between a min max FA player and a non minmaxer pales in comparison to the caster / martial divide that has existed in 1e and 5e. Regarding the barrier to entry, I’d personally pick three archetypes that fit the player’s concept and let them pick. Choice paralysis is gone, and you have more control over party balance whilst still allowing player agency
You can totally do that, and that's what I do! I however have also noticed that just pushes back choice paralysis to when they are in game and have 6 abilities staring back at them rather than 3...
@@SwingRipper I would argue that is how ALL characters should be built. All my characters have at least 5 actions worth of stuff they want to use constantly and I pick the best 3 of those 5 depending on how the battle is going...with a few to dozens of silver bullet options in the wings for when they come up.
I agree that the Free Archetype can lead to too powerful characters if a player knows how to optimise. Also, it can be overwhelming for new players because of the sheer number of choices. But in my recent pf2e beginner box/abomination vaults campaign, my group plays with FA despite the fact that 3/5 players have not played any rpg before. Reason being the amout of possible character concepts that can brought to live. Because most players were not familiar with rpg, I help them (with the gm) create those characters that they wanted to play. For example, one player wanted to play a elvish veteran mercenary and be effective range and melee combatant (particulary a dual wielder) so I propose a precision ranger with dual warrior archetype, helped him with stats, and so far he and the rest had a blast. Although we kinda blitzed through the BB (said ranger did BIG numbers on final boss, but it should be expected performance), mostly cause of good teamwork, but the 2lvl archetype also helped a bit. Will see how the FA will impact futher the campaign goes but so far I think it will stay because my group is very much more oriented on roleplay than min-maxing and also my gm would probably give a stare if go with a crazy combo without a rp explation. But this my group so at others tables it may not work as fluently.
I generally run no FA. If I do run FA, it's a campaign limited one...like in the SoT. Like you can take linguist and archeologist because you all are archeologist in a mystery campaign. Or everyone is a werewolf because we are gonna play a werewolf game. Why? Because balance. I have players who can make teams and tactics that kill things 6 levels above them and players who make teams that can't beat things that are their level. Sometimes they play together. I'm not making that skill gap even worse with FA without it being EXTREMELY curated. The thing is, I GM PFS along with MANY home games. The number of people I have GMed are in the hundreds. That means I see a WIDE variance beyond most people and their friends. The last time I ran SoT, I ran into 2 players who complained that they were not given unlimited free archetype. One of them wanted unlimited free archetype on TOP of the one that the AP gives you. Honestly, the level of entitlement over FA that has taken over the PF2E community is getting annoying. I saw a guy come into PFS complaining that there is no FA and how the GM should just allow it because it's so much better. Like a PFS GM can even make that call. And good on you for taking care of the elders in your family. edit: You sound is not bad...but video is horrible.
Yea the video will be bad as I was using my laptop built in camera... I thought it would be good enough, but that combined with the lighting was killer
The free archetype variant rule set is not presented in the GM Core how most tables are using it. Namely, where every player gets to pick any archetype and just run wild with it. Rather, the GM Core presents it as a way to have every member of the party has some shared identity such as when "the story of your game calls for a group where everyone is a pirate or an apprentice at a magic school." The idea being that everyone takes the same free archetype to represent that story element. Yes, they do leave the door open for unrestricted free archetype "if you just want a higher-powered game" but note that this recommendation explicitly acknowledges that free archetype messes with game balance by making the characters overpowered. "Free-archetype characters are a bit more versatile and powerful than normal, but usually not so much that they unbalance your game." Anyone arguing that free archetype is "real Pathfinder" has fooled themself. It is a variant rule set for a reason and the GM Core makes a point to recommend constraints on its use.
I think a huge part of the problem is that even if you take away FA, the game is still very breakable, in fact your video on creating an entire party made me realize just how bad it is, as almost all of the characters took Ancient Elf. Free Archetype certainly highlights these issues, but the problems remain in the design of certain archetypes that are virtually must take for an efficient party/character. The only real solution is to make Archetypes themselves limited/optional, but that takes away a massive amount of narrative design space from players. Either way, I think it's a good conversation to have, but if as a DM you feel like your players are doing too well, you can always ramp difficulty up, or even create encounters to challenge their builds. Singular more crunchy players outshining other players in combat is going to be a problem as long as combat exists, the best you can do is compensate as a DM by presenting interesting non-combat challenges, and designing encounters around challenging the build of that player. All of this is to say I feel like the problem with FA is blown a little out of proportion here, as the narrative design space it creates imho outweighs the mechanical issues it presents.
I mean, the thing with that party was that I *needed* archetypes to cover holes in the strategy and cover for bad matchups. I could have done the same thing by playing a party of all Humans and getting the innate cantrips via spellhearts. When you start using *teamwork* the game becomes a lot easier and I think that's a good thing!
@@SwingRipper Absolutely, but it also highlights why, for example, a single player with Magus/Psychic is not enough to 'solve' every encounter, even if they seem extremely powerful on first glance.
@@doghead95 But what about a magus/psychic/wizard/witch/eldritch archer that has master spellcasting in occult through psychic, primal through witch, divine through eldritch archer and arcane with wizard. So up to 8th level spells in all types of magic and up to 9th with arcane. Because I do that with FA.
I agree tthat free archetype is not for every game. But I do belive that yoru arguement is not in good faith. The Free Archetype allows alot more flexibility and freedom when creating characters because you feel far less pressure to get what is standardly considered good and are more allowed to take the thing that fits yoru character theme. When players are given adequate tools and resources they will gernally pick thins that are cool over things that re powerful.
Free archetype costs as much freedom as it gives. It basically locks you out of any archetypes that aren’t part of the set your GM has allowed and any archetypes that don’t have a dedication feat at level 2 until level 6 at the earliest if you sacrifice your class feats to fulfill the special archetype rule. It also locks ancient elf out of the game.
@@Lockfin Free Archetype can not take away more freedom than it gives. At the very minimum it still gives the players the base line amount of choices they woudl have even if the variant rule were not to be excercised. This is becase the Freearchetype and the Class feats run seperately from one another meaning you could still take a archetype at level 2 or 4 or what ever level becasue the free archetyp your taken doesnt effect normal progression. It also does not lock out the ancient Elf. The ancient Elf would follow the same exact conditions as the Human Ancestroy Feat Multitalented. Its also assumed that your character has to meet the minimum requirements for any free archetype unlesss DM states otherwise or everyone is forced into that Archetype.
@@SwingRipper I think thats fine. I dont think Free Archetype works for every game or every table and your right it doesnt need to be the default way to play the game. My Issue was more wiht the bad faith arguements of players are natrually going to pick the most powerful options and throw off the whole balance of the game. WHen in reality most players often forget to use thier powerful skills and abilties a good chunk of the time.
I have already restricted my Free Archetype games to Multiclass archetypes which I view as "dual class light". But I'll now further restrict them to "one class only once per game" to avoid overlaps or shenanigans where 3 people have Champion reactions and such (and potentially combinations like Magus+Psychic). It's still a decent power boost (which is okay for me) but also still makes the players think about which class feats they want to give up when taking "regular" archetypes with their main class feats. Also a restriction of maximum one additional archetype (in addition to the free archetype).
I still stand that the whole argument is being held up by people who might as well claim that Free Archetype kidnapped their family and is being forced down their throats rather than being strongly suggested as a way to add variety AND flavor AND options AND, to a lesser extent, power to a character or build. With their opponents being knee-jerk reactionary responses that try to downplay any criticism against FA and say there is nothing wrong or exploitable about it. Problem is, You've probably had to deal with the people you describe being "Free Archetype or death!" just like I've had to deal with smarmy, arrogant and, due to the nature of Reddit, uncontested comments against the variant rule. I've heard your points here, but your points sound more like the edge cases for why you should take care about adding Free Archetype but still do it, rather than convincing me that it should be used with too much consideration. If the table has players that consider the extra options overwhelming, the wonderfully designed math thrown off course in an irreparable way while balancing encounters, gravitating towards broken options or find an issue with picking options for their mechanical utility in a system where that's the focus and such, then I'd rather not play at that table. I would quickly find myself out of place, thank the GM and players for their time, and explain that their game is not for me. I will continue seeing it as the best way to add options, flavor, options, versatility, presenting storytelling to the game and to think it should be the default way of playing the game. I will never force or push anyone to run their game under it, but I will also not describe it as anything more dangerous to balance and encounter design than "Keep X, Y and Z in mind". You can bet that people that speak against it will continue describing it as something that has no place in their tables and shouldn't in yours either, as they have before. Many thanks.
I'm sorry...what? Reddit has pretty much zilch on the don't use FA side and is almost entirely FA or death side. And while FA is a way to add options (that is not always a good thing BTW) and versatility (which is power in this system), that has NOTHING to do with flavor or storytelling. Flavor and storytelling is not tied to any mechanics. This is basically Stormwind fallacy light or adjacent. Despite what PF2E people might like to keep saying, you can have as much story and flavor with 5E characters as PF2E characters.
Free archetype is cool for low lvl games, but if you are planning to play a high level campaign the massive quantity of archetype feats become clunky after around lvl 12 in my opinion.
The funny thing is that if you mess around enough with making a character you will find out OMG if we use FA on top of this the everything is doomed good-luck beating the Sorcer mummy dragon with claw-dancer who can suck the life from you an change into a human form to sneak attack anyone XD
Definitely, min-maxing culture is ruining 😪 all games. Most players want to min-max and follow a guide, missing that big R part of a RPG game... just following the recipe and no role play. It happens on every game, every genre..the copycat era 😢 I like guides to further explain mechanics and show some interactions, and I usually stop (or skip) parts of mid and late game when I'm starting. And slowly read more into it as I also progress. Guides should help, not decide for the player 😊
I forgot to pack my camera for the trip and my laptop's built in camera has some significant lag (did not notice that until I actually tried recording as it seemed *fine* in discord)
Free archetypes are awesome! They allow for unique and interesting builds, and allow for more choices to flesh out a concept. Classes are really boring without FA variant rule.
I absolutely love your content, you're on par with the rules lawyer for the sheer quality of your analysis and reasoning regarding the game Your previous video avoit free archetypes was really insightful
Props for taking care of your fam, you're a good guy. The mic sound is excellent. And great topic for video too!
Free archetype does work pretty well for running the APs. The power boost seems to counter the difficulty problem people had with the APs without completely destroying fights and making it a joke. Obviously this isn't applicable to every group but i do think this is (at least partially) why free archetype has become the norm.
It also isn‘t applicable to every AP, i‘d say the more recent ones are on the easier side.
They did turn down the APL+3 fights in the newer ones, which really helps players that aren’t as tactically savvy. And I personally think APL+3 (and 4) ought to be extremely rare, simply because of their unsatisfying math.
@@Evenus that's fair, I've been stuck on kingmaker since it dropped so I haven't kept up. Still assuming that people that started using free archetype for things like extinction curse, age of ashes or just tried it in Strength of Thousands have now made it the default. I mean from a GM perspective it's easier to give a small bump in power than to identify and nerf encounters that are too hard and could TPK the party if you fail to identify it. It just seems like free archetype has become the "lazy GM" answer to APs, or atleast that's how i use it. I may try to convince players to try an AP without free archetype if encounter balance seems better lately.
@ThePandaReaper SoT is a special case since the FA isn't unlimited. I actually really like the idea of limited FA specifically for the campaign. Generally, I'm not a fan of unlimited FA.
From one caregiver to another, I understand what you are going through.
One of the big things with free archetype is table size. If you have three characters, then giving them a bmp is good. If you have six characters with free archetype, then that is a lot of resources available.
For people coming to PF2 from D&D 5e, they already get a lot more mechanical choices. fA might be a bit too much.
Agreed free archetype works really well if you only have three players at your table another good option to have is ancestry paragon
@@pugking4518 Ancestry paragon is only good if you have one of the better-supported races or you are using a versatile heritage. Some races just don't have enough useful feats. Heck a couple of them literally don't have enough feats.
I as a new player used free archetype because people said i should. It ultimately was clunky, unnecessary, and really overwhelming. People can run it and have fun but it needs to stop being considered the default.
I fully agree! Its a fun variant rule for people that know the system and want more versatility but I think it harms the game by being the default mode of play (especially for new players)
@SwingRipper Hell, as new players, I had a player who just wanted to be a goblin rogue. A scrappy underdog goblin thief. And now I was telling him he needed an archetype that he didn't want. Ultimately, I just let him take extra rogue feats with the FA because that was what he wanted. I had the same thing happen with a halfling cleric I made where ultimately I had to just take druid even though I didn't really want an archetype.
Yeah, my experience is that FA is awesome levels like 2-6, but it *quickly* overwhelms people
The last FA game I ran, people didnt even remembered their extra feats like 90% of the time
@@nicholasromero238 It has taken two months for my new Champion player to get used to being able to use his Reaction every round. There is a log going on and FA just adds more options that new players do not need to worry about.
I regretted using Free Archetype for a couple campaigns. Some players would know exactly what they wanted, others would be like... "I really don't know what to pick for my archetype feat, there's nothing I want..." And it muddled the specialties of the characters a bit.
As for new players argument, there's a fair number of posts by new players asking which archetype is the most synergistic with their class on reddit. it's basically like someone new netdecking in a precon group
I know at least one official adventure where Party Crasher as written would just allow you to skip a chapter, and that is very funny to me.
I'm not suggesting that Paizo balanced things around that, but are you sure players have enough levels to pick this feat beforehand? The 7th level should be relatively late for most campaigns.
@@quban234 7th level isn't actually that late for APs. 11/16 of them hit level 7 at or before the halfway point
@@quban234 It's a 16th level adventure, and there's more to it than getting into the party, so i don't think players would actually just speedrun the thing. But I do think it creates more work for GM than perhaps intended for a common feat and I personally would feel bad for shutting it down when it would come up.
@@artkrei That's fair. If it was me in the GM place, I would try to weave parts of the story players were supposed to go through, into their means of access to that party. If they are disguised as cooks, then something will go wrong in the kitchen before they have the chance to proceed into the party itself.
Optionally, if there isn't really an easy way to mix those stories together I would maybe try to move parts of the story into a private social meeting without a guestlist, and throw players a bone with more info about that second secret meeting just so that it feels like the progress is being made.
Either way, I agree this shouldn't be a common feat.
My solution for free archetype is I usually give the players a couple options for a choice if we are starting at level 2+. I always make my players make it make sense character wise. If I know a player isn’t going to game the system I have no problem governing them a power archetype.
If we are making a higher level character I usually give them the archetypes based on what fits the character story wise and background wise. It’s all about adding flavor in my game over power.
Honestly, the audio is completely fine.
I'd really hate if the FA mindset spread to paizo and became the norm, I see people saying that without it it leads to flavorless characters and that's just... Not true at all, you can still pick an archetype, just not for free, ffs, my table is playing under normal rules and their characters are so flavourful and cool.
You just grown used to the extra options, but their just that, extra, in a game where the base rules already offer enough....
Sound is great, thanks for the follow-up!
Swingripper the goat for this incredible criticism handling
Personally the best advice I got on this was from another game entirely: Blades in the Dark. It basically says: don’t obsess about the maths, minmax for flavour, because that’s more fun. Plus minmaxing for stats is not cool (for many of the balance reasons you listed). And since in PF2 as long as you max your key stat and don’t make egregious build errors you’re fine, this mindset works for PF2.
The real problem as I see it is not ‘how do I balance these pesky free archetype options’, and rather ‘how as a GM do I deal with a group that doesn’t minmax evenly’. If you were joining my table with players that had minmaxed for flavour, and you said (as you did in the last video), ‘well i’m going to minmax for power, deal with it’, well…. I would say: no. Get over yourself and make a character that fits the group. And if you said ‘no’ then that would be a personality issue not a game design issue imho.
Interesting topic by the way.!
Yea uneven minmaxing can cause A LOT of friction and sometimes there may be cool flavor for minmaxed options... IE a Sorcerer / Champion that is following a god of redemption so they may forgive themselves for their burning power is a COOL CHARACTER and just happens to fall along a broken build. Its perfectly possible for a cool concept to run along the "minmax line"
We prefer to save FA for occasional campaigns. If it’s just the default expectation to have it, it’s less exciting.
One point that I didn't see anyone mention, without FA, I feel like a huge part of the system just gets ignored. People can still take archetype feats instead of class feats, I'd totally do that with a paladin barbarian, but some feats are just not worth trading for your class feats, this also applies to some entire archetypes that are just flavorful.
I feel like FA is so popular because people just wouldn't take archetypes otherwise. At this point, and with all the cool new archetypes Paizo releases, I feel like they should just make FA the standard.
That's fair, I think that there is room for flavorful Free Archetype that is heavily curated down to 5 or fewer archetypes. I think that many archetypes can actually be justified as class feats (especially when looking at casters like Sorcerer or Wizard who have weaker feats). I generally find that the archetypes people find "weak" are passives and thus can fit naturally on casters who already have a lot of actives from class chassis (spells)
I hope with every fiber of my being that Paizo never treats this misbegotten variant rule the officially supported default. Fortunately for me they’ve said they have no intention to.
@@SwingRipper the curation kind of puts more Weight on the GM, só I don't like this idea, and it might generate some attrition with players, because it will be hard to define what is acceptable, and as a DM, I'd not like to say "you guys cannot pick powerful options". Howl of the Wild has some flavorful archetypes, but they are also strong. One of my players was perfect for Wild Mimic, she was a character that ate monster parts and became more monstrous in her lore, but Wild Mimic is strong and would not be allowed just for flavour.
@@Lockfin I'm happy that the community as a whole treats this as the default, I hope one day Paizon changes their mind because of this.
@@kyros905 “the community as a whole” is a lie. The majority of the Reddit community? Sure. But pathfinder society is huge, and lots of tables play the game as intended besides.
You touched on it in your Dual Class section, but my personal gripe after having played without FA is that, necessarily, it becomes more restrictive on character fantasy. Just as I create a character via backstory or art or roleplay, the mechanical build is a big part of creative expression for me. I COULD, as my GM once challenged me, roleplay any of my character concepts without touching a single archetype and just using base feats or even an iconic's character sheet... but that pales in comparison to splashing in this or that archetype and making the character feel mechanically different. Beastmaster archetype vs Cleric archetype vs Eldritch Archer archetype vs no archetype are not merely different roleplay, but different mechanical flavor.
But I'm being unfair in my argument. I'm comparing FA to no archetypes at all. I can just use class feat slots for archetypes, right? Lemme give two examples of me attempting that in actual play:
Elemental Barbarian excited me with its potential to mix in Kineticist impulses. Finally, flavor similar to the Bloodrager from PF1e. So let's build this up without FA, with a specific eye towards getting an aura feat like Thermal Nimbus. Dedication at 2 for a very small (but better than literally nothing) ranged option. Since my damage type is a point of failure, I probably want Elemental Evolution from Barbarian, for versatility. I need a lv1 Kineticist feat before I can take the lv4 aura, so maybe Burning Jet. Also Elemental Explosion from Barbarian for a nice AoE option. Then Thermal Nimbus, though I probably also want Safe Elements somewhere in there... Oops, if this is a 1-10 AP, I already have too many feats selected. The build is basically locked due to my concept, and there's no room to customize with other Barbarian class feats outside of my concept. Is getting a permanent damage aura on a Barbarian worth this much restriction? It might be! But it feels claustrophobic when I don't have space for any feats outside of that core concept.
For another personal example, I played a Sprite Summoner with a humanoid-shaped Devotion Phantom Eidolon. Basically, I'm Navi and my eidolon is Link. Very fun character and flavor, only got to lv4 and would love to go further with them. Initially suspecting that we might be playing with FA, I had my eye on Spell Trickster. As a Summoner with very limited spell slots, this would give a ton of versatility to my cantrips, plus feeling flavorful as a mischievous little fey. Well, we run Session Zero and I learn that we're not using FA in that campaign. Okay, so I go over to Pathbuilder and look at what class feats I can skip to make room for Spell Trickster. Should I skip Ranged Combatant? Tandem Movement? Eidolon's Opportunity? In the end, it felt like I was comparing buffs to my eidolon who was performing the bulk of my power in combat, versus some neat cantrips... I couldn't rationalize that tradeoff, so I took the safe build rather than the flavorful one.
Free Archetype is not without its problems. You've spent two videos now pointing to those problems. But it does provide enough "canvas space" that I can draw out these character builds without feeling like I'm doing something frivolous or suboptimal with my feat selection. Without FA, I personally feel incentivized to skip all archetypes, just take base class feats, and whether or not it's true, I at least FEEL like I'm being told to be less creative.
@@pavfeira you are listing a lot of WANTS. And being mad that the base game makes you choose instead of you can have all your wants. If you are running an AP, the base class chassis is good enough power wise for it. Everything else is wants. Having to make choices is a good thing in game design.
+ you can still use Free Archetype if you want to have everything, I just enjoy having to make the hard choices and want that type of play to be seen as more legitimate (the NOT REAL PATHFINDER sentiment)
@SwingRipper yeah the FA entitlement is getting really bad. Like I said elsewhere, I saw somebody demand that they be allowed FA for their PFS character. If you like it, sure find games that use it and just play those. But throwing a hissy fit in the middle of a game store because you can't have FA in PFS. No.
Hard choices... like choosing between having a competent flavorless character, or an incompetent flavorful character.
@rod4309 I'm sorry, but I have plenty of flavorful characters that are quite competent in play without using FA.
I absolutely agree that it shouldn't be the default for new players, but as an experienced player, I feel like any character concept I come up with would be unnecessarily strangled by a lack of Free Archetype. Mechanically, Free Archetype is take it or leave it, but the amount of flavor you get feels like it changes a one dimensional character into a two dimensional one. You still need to work hard as a player to get the third one, but I actually don't want a strictly contained role.
Wooo background wall of funky artwork
I'm a relatively new player to PF2; I came over from 5e for the appeal of the customization (and waiting for the updated system rules, lol). My group was initially interested in running a variant of FA, just because a huge appeal for *some* of our players in the complexity and decision making the system allows. We initially discussed only allowing curated, non-class archetypes which had relatively low power levels.
That being said, after some more discussions and referring to your previous video, we're more on the fence about it now; while there is absolutely the appeal for a new group to get all the goodies of the new system and really play around in it, it also creates somewhat of a divide among players, which I see knowing that I myself will optimize the hell out of my character, to what I see within reason. FA in a new player game absolutely has the potential to create even more stress for more casual players in creating and designing characters, on top of the fact that those characters may already be relatively "unoptimized" in the scheme of their abilities and play at the table. Allowing FA for us would mean this gap expanding even more.
I personally find that at my table, none of us who really optimize our characters do so to be "the best" at the table, as it isn't a competition; we want to be able to overcome challenges that seem impossible, and feel like our decisions led us there. Adding more decisions, which can be "right or wrong," will only serve to potentially further increase the power gap at the table, which just isn't fun.
Just wanted to put this discussion out there, as a new player who really liked the idea of FA to start with, but I think I'm more so interested now in experiencing what the "base" game rules and balance has for us. Thanks!
New players who are fresh to the game shouldn’t use FA unless they have veteran players in the party who can sit down with them to explore it all. In general. Individual groups can always be different.
The problem with these videos here is that they are from the perspective of someone who plays the game A LOT, and in an extremely tactical group. His DM’s youtube channel is literally called “The Rules Lawyer” (check it out, tho, the guy makes great videos).
Most tables do not play at the same level and with the same expectations as these guys (from what I’ve seen of RLs uploaded games). There is nothing wrong with playing so tactical, and if your group is like that you will get more out of the game if you follow his advice!
But the average party won’t. When he says that there can be huge power differences between free archetype builds, you have to understand he’s saying that “for pathfinder 2e”! A huge power difference here is 20%. And that’s a difference mostly obtained through options, not direct stat boosts.
So when you hear “FA is more powerful”, don’t think of it in terms of minmaxed 5e multiclassing. Or even 5e good vs bad subclass. The difference is much more subtle. Which is why people tend to say “FA isn’t any more powerful”. It isn’t. …relative to what other systems people might be more familiar with do.
Your DM will have to do some slight adjustments. Essentially treating the party as if they were one person larger, and use that difference in encounter budget to add low level critters to the combats. Which sounds complicated, but takes like 10-30 seconds.
Also, some people just want to be their class and don't want to archetype at all, FA kinda makes you feel like you're behind if you do that
@@mylostisaac6452 I mean, that's when you pick a skill archetype like wrestler or acrobat, which just adds options to the things you already normally do.
@@zerg0s what if I'm not a wrestler? What if I'm not an acrobat? I'm just saying, limitation also leads to interesting choices in the lore of your character, and the trade off between a class feat and an archetype dedication is IMO more satisfying because it feels more purposeful, in a way, less is more.
@@mylostisaac6452 There's dozens upon dozens of archetypes, you'll find something that fits with your idea of a character concept.
I don't get how dual class is better than fa. Fa gives more option to characters and therefore create more choices in gameplay itself. Dualclass sometimes would give option boost, but more often than not it would be just free numbers boost like taking fighter, champion or rogue (if you are not planning to use twohanders, sneak attack is overall better than having d8 weapon without feat tax i think). Even monk could be used to just boost numbers
I really appreciate that you're doing intercommunity commentary aimed at the common "Free Archetype is the default" paradigm that PF2 fan communities often seem to assume. It's not the default, it's a variant rule, and it's a variant rule for good reasons. Thank you for this!
I'm a typical example of beginner player who leaned into FA watching guides (yours), and started at level 11 (Fist of the Ruby Phoenix) 😂
Loving your cleric :)
I like playing with the archetypes, even when I don't get it for free. I really like sticking a rogue archetype (light armor and some increased skills being the focus) on a spellcaster. And I feel like casters often have a number of levels with not many good feats
Great follow up, i feel in some cases it's true, but most eat up action economy, or they allow for story beats to hit correctly, but i do debate moving kingmaker to be without free archetype
This is true as many feats are actives, but if you are mindful about this you can take archetypes that give "limited use but powerful" abilities or passives to make this less of an issue.
If you are on the fence about including Free Archetype consider "how much do my players need help to build characters", if your gut answer was "just about every level up" they don't need Free Archetype yet! I would suggest giving them more power from loot drops if you want to make the game easier
Well rn for reasons beyond our control our campaigns went from 5 to 2 and we are already really commit lol so we using dual class and free archetype
Free Archetype has worked well in my games. Your last two videos brought up interesting points though.
I've played in some games with FA and some without, and like both, but I definitely get where you're coming from talking about choice in character design. The feel is very different when building a character with FA; there's a lot less looking back and forth, imagining what I might look like after a few levels, and general agonizing over my feat choices when I'm using FA.
And, you know, sometimes I want that agonizing. It feels good when I'm participating in the char-op game in those moments. Playing without FA makes the stakes feel a little bit higher, which can help me get excited about the campaign.
There are also some times when a character just feels super awkward to try cramming into the typical class feat budget, or I'm just looking to throw something together that can handle stuff and let us get on with story things. Then FA's great.
I'm, not entirely sure where I was going with that.
Uh, PF2E is a really good game and I like playing it lots of different ways, and just lots in general.
I feel like Free Archetype is to PF2e what "You get an extra feat" is to 5e. Not always balanced for every class (*cough cough* Monks), often times just lets you get a character concept online pretty early, generally enhances character strength, feels great to have.
Thoughts on living vessel? Im a new player in a no free archtype game where another player took it on an iron magus. He goes down, activates the ability, goes down again, gets magically healed, and then uses the ability again during the same fight! We have a new DM who allowed it, but the magus is the only one with rare features. What should I do?
I think the archetype is fine, but I would think that they would also have the entity taking control still tick up wounded like Ferocity style features. I think its a neat archetype for a cool character concept and is fair...
I think that is the type of fantasy that in order to "balance" it the entity needs to be less *friendly* to the party so there is a cost associated with tapping into the "Super Powered Evil Side" starting with "the entity does not count as an ally for any of your abilities" and scaling from there the more the player leans on it.
Its a rare archetype designed to be more powerful with a cost based in flavor text, so the GM needs to work with that player and the table to make the flavor matter! (That extra work is why the archetype is Rare)
I heard neet idea about free archetime from someone, this rule good when gm wants a common feature between characters for example we are on pirate ship so every body get free pirate archetype ) so yea I belive this rule mainly about gm to give you spesific archerype
Good boy for looking after family. Audio came over fine. Looking forward to seeing what you say about PC2 when I get back from holiday.
Your comments about reading all the options on AoN is one of the reasons I restrict my players to the core rulebook(s). Converting my D&D groups I said no to Psychic (from the only player that had played before) and held fast on making it a basic game.
For my second group I built 4 of the 5 characters and gave them a build plan to level 10 to help them learn the game. All of them have an Archetype but it just replaces a class feat or two to help make the (D&D) Character Concept they had.
We have: Bard/Rogue; Champion/Cleric; Monk/Acrobat; Sorcerer/Blessed One. The final character is a pure Cleric (war priest).
In my experience, my interest in this FA thing is to complement my original class. especially in the early-mid game. Some classes just need past level 6 to start to shine. But with double class, it kinda looks like by level 6 you've already in a better place with both. E.g. I tried a toxicology and a mutagen alchemist.. and both couls use dual class with rogue and fighter, respectively.
So I ended with a bomb 💣 alchemist, which was OK-ish.
Now, with the remaster, it could be different... in particular, alchemists got the chance I was kind of looking for (I just thought they would move the class feat to free craft things a level 1 or 2, instead of reworking the whole thing with wildcard vials.. which kind of gets the same result)
Free archetype at my table is just, extra flavour with benefits for people's characters.
Currently it is a kingmaker campaign,
The treasurer, whom is a witch has a homebrew chef archetype, since in the early days of the kingdom. most of the taxes were food and produce.
The Viceroy, Alchemist, has the investigator archetype so they could be a health and safety inspector.
The Inventor which doesn't entirely have a proper role in the kingdoms rulership has a homebrew merchant archetype, because that's what they are, they are a merchant within the kingdom.
The Magister Psychic has the dandy archetype, purely because they have the brevic noble background, so it's supposed to be their psychic abilities combined with their courtly graces allowing them to be very charismatic when the situation calls for it, but in reality they do shut themself into a library and study. (they'll soon get a new archetype, either Carthic mage, or eldritch researcher. Carthic mage is mainly because two other PCs are their siblings, namely the witch. and a champion which died at the final battle before the kingdom started. them being able to harness their emotions to protect their last sibling)
My main complain with free archetype is that if every character have all or most of the skills, then none are special.
Something you didn’t touch on but is hugely important to the discussion is now free archetype interacts differently with different classes. Not all classes benefit the same amount from having extra feats; champions famously love to take archetypes at 2 because of a dip in class feat quality there so they benefit less, while fighters are so feat hungry that it’s often hard to find room for an archetype. With free archetype the fighter gets the best of both worlds while the champion just gets more of something it was already interested in doing, and is now stuck with those less powerful class feats. I’m this subtle way, the free archetype rule undermines the balance between classes. I believe this is where a LOT of the “fighters are OP” sentiment comes from; they aren’t when you play PF2e as written but everyone insists on playing a variant rule that unfairly favors the fighter.
@Lockfin oh yeah. Very true. Most casters as well archetype because of lackluster class feats. But, even with those classes, FA means cramming more archetypes into your build. So you can have a Magus that has access to 1-8 level spells in all traditions AND 9th level arcane spells.
I wonder how much that will be improved with the remastered Champion.
@@AnaseSkyrider Seems quite a bit. Champions got some really nice lower level class feats.
As a GM, I love running Free Archetype. AND Dual Class. Together! Characters being overpowered has never really be an issue for me. I tend to run very specific games, though - for small tables (1 to 3 players), who want to do Weird Shit. I like to say yes when they want to dual class Magus and Wizard and take Staff Acrobat to be the Most Quarterstaff Fighting Wizard Ever. The solution isn't to shove your head in the sand about the power of the options. It's to assess your table, assess your ability as a GM to provide the level of challenge your PCs want and you'll enjoy running, and to tailor those challenges to them. I am even confident I could run a challenging campaign for the Party that Can't Lose that would make them feel like they were fighting for their lives and barely holding on - you literally just introduce occasional time pressure to a slow-rolling party, for example, to force them into taking risks. You give them options in the environment to risk putting themselves in danger to get advantages that will let them meet the time pressure...or let them face the consequences of failing to get things done in time.
The first time they fail and it's *bad*, they'll be scared next time and take the risks.
It's okay for strong options to exist as long as we all act like adults and tailor our games. This is why PFS doesn't have Free Archetype.
I run with Free Archetype and also give them custom feats and abilities, which ends up making my players a lot more powerful. Which allows me to toss more dangerous encounters at them, using the rules of the system they get more XP which allows for faster progression which we all love. So for our group it's a win win, but Foundry as a system takes care of the interactions which makes it a lot simpler to play. In another similar game I'm playing we use Free Archetype, Ancestral Paragon AND Gradual Ability boost, which has been real fun, making each level feel even more like a power bump.
This also makes total sense, as long as everyone is on the same page do what you want with the rules!
Valid points all around, but I somehow managed to tolerate 5es imbalance for years, so small balance issues are very acceptable for more fun options
Hey perfectly reasonable!
Dual Class mentioned. Video good.
But yeah, I kind of regret letting my players do FA on my first big campaign. While half of them were really excited for more power and customization, the other half were overwhelmed and confused. I personally much prefer character building without it, and think Dual Classing is a lot more fun when you want super strong, overly complicated characters.
Also, archetypes are a lot more interesting when you have to sacrifice a class feat to get them, imho. Makes for spicier decision-making.
I agree.
I like FA because I play in a game with only two players. But in a normal party it really isn't necessary.
Plus it's intention was always to be thematic in a game full of Pirates or where everyone needs to be a magic user (SoT), not just a free for all pick whatever min max build you want.
I've ran games with FA where I'm the one to assign the archetype they get.
The party Rogue has been favoring her now. Boom, now you're archetype archer.
Your Thaumateurge is a merchant? I'm giving you Talisman Dabbler.
Etc.
That's an overly narrow interpretation of the rule's intent in my opinion. The original GMG printing mentioned that you could implement it as a light version of Dual-class, and both versions have a line abour running it unrestricted for high-powered games. I admit, this is still a far-cry from the advocates who champion the ✨𝓿𝓮𝓻𝓼𝓪𝓽𝓲𝓵𝓲𝓽𝔂 ✨and ✨𝓯𝓵𝓪𝓿𝓸𝓻 ✨it brings (which for the record I do largely agree with, as a hobbyist character builder FA really makes some of my concepts pop), but I don't think Paizo did mean for it to _only_ be used in metaphorical pirate or magic school campaigns.
The GM should, based on the character's ancestry, class and backstory suggest what archetypes are available.
This will give the new player some guidance and reign in the power gamers somewhat.
I love this idea.
Alot of people seem to be extremely angry in the comments/replies for or against free archetype, pathfinder's first rule says to have fun and modify rules to have the game you want to run, so personally both are fun ways to play.
I agree that regarding new players, free archetype adds to the workload of building and leveling up characters, and could still create balance issues if they find the overpowered options despite being new. I would add that free archetype can also quickly bog down play at the table, as the additional options per turn could result in analysis paralysis. This game is crunchy to begin with, and turns and rounds are not as fast-paced as in some other games. Having a bigger toolbox will not make decision-making any easier--or faster--for new players.
Very true!
As a GM, I use FA, AP, GAB, and ARP. I balance encounters as though there was one more character than there are. Doesn't increase the raw numbers but allows for more versatility and options.
Might keep that in mind. My players just reached lvl 5
Could anyone teach me these acronyms?
@@pirosopus9497 FA = Free Archetype, AP = Ancestry Paragon, GAB = Gradual Ability Boost, ARP = Automatic Rune Progression
@pirosopus9497
FA = Free Archetype
AP = Ancestral Paragon
ARP = Automatic Rune Progression (Auto Bonus but just fundamental runes)
GAB = Gradual Ability Boost (edited)
@@americannerdinnz GAB = Gradual Ability Boost.
I find the system already have problems with unique or flavor to some characters when I play as a caster. So many spells are just not as good or useful as some spells. There is a reson many pick spells like Slow and Fear. To have battleforms or buffs that last shorter than I hold my breath do not open up for many ideas out of combat. And I have found many tricks of some casters can be done by a character with a Wand/Scroll and the Trick magic item feat.
I kind of liked Archetype. Gave some extra fluff and ways to build. Becuse I found it more fun to make a Martial using spells than trying to make a Spellcaster using weapons. But I agree, not all Archetypes are as good as others.
I like FA - BUT I think it should be limited to thematic options tied to a campaign, and the GM should have veto if they detect it’s being used for min-maxing in a way that’s likely to outshine other party members
Great way to look at it!
Thank you for the two videos. I'm likely going to run games without Free Archetype unless they're lower than 4 players or running an Adventure Path as written. Dual Class seems neat for those high fantasy games, will consider that too.
Isn't it a good thing if more feats like party crasher are taken? I feel like players tend to take class and archetype feats that always come up, or are active activities, by fear of situational feats not being useful to them. This might be from an aura of adversity between the player and GM, and the misconception that a GM is only a referee, when they're writers and designers. It seems completely within the GM's control to bring up a couple scenaris where the party might want to infiltrate a royal party, making the player who took this feat shine. I feel like there's very few feats that completely override challenges, most of them being uncommon, so I think it's good if free archetype encourages player to take situational and narrative feats like this while not feeling like they're missing out on potential power in forgoing a class feat, and the adaptations on the side of the GM seem identical in workload as altering a loot table to fit with a party's PC classes. I believe versatility in pf2 isn't something that's gonna break a campaigm because it's possible to control how strong this versatility is when writing and encounter building, making it as much of a wildcard as tactical missplays, over/underpowered on-the-fly rulings, or average dice rolls above or below average. Admittedly, this is only the impression I have on this situation, as someone who doesn't run/play premade adventures or PFS, and migrated to PF2 mostly because shiny character options serving narrative, and neither of my groups of players are really into the "top 10 character builds that will BREAK your GM" (hyperbole) side of ttrpgs
Its totally table dependent (many of the archetype out of combat feats such as Party Crasher are still Skill Feats). It can totally work for some tables and makes the game significantly better for those groups! I just don't think it makes the game better for every group
@@SwingRipperabsolutely! I'm personally really grateful for free archetype helping me flesh out my character's theme and discovering options outside of my class feats that already seemed too cool to pass up on
69th comment.... nice! The one thing that I don't like about free archetype is that it means you cannot play as an ancient elf or an Eldritch trickster Rogue unless you get the GM to make some changes to the archetype system to allow you to make a selection at level two
@undrhil one of the common methods for FA is separate tracks, which don't need any adjustments for ancient elf or arcane trickster.
@@ColdNapalm42 that sounds like a house rule to me. A dedication feat says that you have to take two other archetype Beats from the archetype before you can take another dedication feet unless the DM makes a change or if you're using the optional variant free archetype rules which allow you to ignore the prerequisites or other special rules in archetype feats
@@undrhil It's kinda sorta is...but it is how it's handled in SoT. And a lot of tables adopt it. Mind you that one is a curated FA, so it's a bit different than applying it to an unlimited FA. Hence the kinda sorta.
I don't care for how powerful some archetypes are, my problem is how some archetypes (oozemorph) are terrible, some (oozemorph) even worse than nothing 99% of the time
Poor oozemorph
oozemorph was a trap in 1e too T_T
@@rod4309 in 2e is not even a trap, because you get basically no benefit from the dedication except a cha decrease
@@rod4309 I honestly think is *THE* worst archetype in the game, worse than ghost
@@3_14pie By raw in 1e oozemorph deleted your movespeed, unless you used the limited duration, limited use per day transform-back-into-human ability it came with. xD
New players shouldn't have free archetype because they already have a lot of stuff to learn in the system and you shouldn't throw even more stuff at them to pick from. I've found it causes problems with new players because its "this is class feats but follow different rules on what you can take an here is this huge list of stuff to pick from". People either ask me what they should take or go google a guide.
Let new players learn the system without the added complexity. You can add it on for experienced players that already understand the basics.
God I don't get the people who recommend it for new players. The system is overwhelming enough as it for new players, why make it worse. I can see it as a solution for people who feel they don't have enough options, but I tend to find even players who think that get overwhelemed just tracking mechanics, let alone their own character sheet.
I'm not really sure I agree about champion + it's archetype. The base class definitely needs some love as far as feats and what I've seen of the revamp is looking amazing, but I don't think the reaction actually needs huge buffs. It's already incredibly strong on it's own and with things like smite and exalts, it doesn't really need much more. And I don't think the archetype is untouchable to a point where it will break existing builds; it doesn't need huge changes, it just needs its reaction tuned to not just outright be as good as a baseline champion's. Whether that's adding a spellstrike archetype-esque cooldown or the amount of damage resisted, I think that could keep it in check without needing to nerf-bat it to the ground.
Psychic I think they just need to bite the bullet and make the base cantrip gains only grant the psi cantrip effect, with a separate feat to unlock cantrips later. It's just too egregiously powerful for a dip and imposes on the class's niche too much when others can access it. Not enough to make psychic useless (I adore psychic, it's one of my favourite classes and I think it's great), but it's still frustrating to see people just write it off because there's a whole lot of JuSt GeT tHe ArCheType around. And I think they could do that without breaking existing builds, it just keeps the base investment in check so it's not hexblade-level too good and requires a further investment to get the best of it.
I think the other thing for me is that champion and psychic are particularly egregious because I feel class archetypes should be less impactful both mechanically and thematically compared to classless archetypes. Not completely useless, but there's both a matter of niche protection and flavor that bothers me. I have no problem with things like wrestler, medic, marshal, dandy, etc. being popular because to me, they almost fit that 'secondary profession track' feel a lot of archetypes fit. It makes sense wrestler is holistically awesome for lots of classes, or someone can dip medic if your group needs a clutch healer. It's different when suddenly everyone for some suspicious reason has taken up worshipping a deity and is wearing heavy armor, or unleashed psychic potential that gives them awesome cantrips. It's very 5e hexblade in both mechanics and flavor, while I feel an archetype like wrestler or medic will never feel like it's overshadowing the flavor to the egregious degree. They enable cool flavor while everyone being a champion or psychic is both problematic from a gameplay standpoint and just kind of tacky narratively.
Ala power levels, I understand the point you're making ala power levels, I just feel the level of power FA gives me is very suitable to my groups. I really enjoy the horizontal versatility it gives, without overtly breaking the number scaling in the way something like dual class does. That doesn't mean I don't understand why people don't like it, and in fact I feel people who think 2e is too low power should really consider dual class as an alternative to go ham if they really wanna do some cheese.
That said - to end on a positive note - I think you bring up a fair point about 'good stuff piles', and it's something I feel the community tends to neglect at a meta level. PF2e is ultimately a role-based game that encourages characters to have a focus and not just dominate in everything. One of the things I hated about other systems like 3.5/1e and 5e is how easy it was to make omnicharacters that could individually cover all bases and make parties mish-mashes of mechanically optimized PCs that had no real thematic identity. I don't think FA is that egregious because the power is more horizontal and characters aren't able to or encouraged to build a mixed fighter/wizard/cleric/some obscure prestige class all with unique archetypes, but I do think you're right that it means by higher levels you can have a party that has very few gaps and holes to fill in terms of combat and non-combat roles, and the fact people miss that to me shows just how narrowly focused the community is in terms of the gameplay scope. There's a holistic design that is missed when people optimize in a particular way that isn't how the game expects and tangibly rewards you for optimizing.
Champion reaction actually did get some minor buffs in Remaster funnily enough (I have the PDF open on a second monitor)... Psychic Archetype MAY be that egregiously over the line and deserve the errata hammer. I think that not giving Amp until you take the level 6 feat and then effectively just being one focus point would make it fair!
And I think your group is not alone in the extra power FA gives being *fun* and *freeing*, I again just don't want that to be the Absolute Default lol.
"Good Stuff Piles" is something I have trained myself to be vigilant against and is something I realized applies to this game when building my Strongest Party (look at how DIFFERENT those characters are without FA and how so many of them reach for the same answers with it)
Which buffs did champion get? I'm looking at the Remaster compatability errata and I can't see anything apart from the usual alignment to spirit damage. Which I guess is technically a buff either way.
And yeah, I think it's very telling when about FA being prone to good stuff piling. It's funny because I feel you can really use that to catch out the people who aren't engaging in good faith or inflicting an Illusion of Choice problem on themselves. If people say their character doesn't have enough meaningful options and then you bung on FA, it's very hard to suggest by no later than level 10 that you don't have so many options you don't know what to do with. Anyone who unironically thinks that is either playing some really lame encounters with no interesting mechanics, or just refusing to understand the game.
I have the actual book in front of me, all the champion reactions get a new line of text starting at level 11 for Champs... Justice for instance lets all their allies ALSO strike for a reaction (albeit at a -5 to hit). All the champions get SOMETHING for free at level 11 now
It’s really interesting, you haven’t convinced me because I love players being able to broaden into random directions because it fits their backstory. A ranger who wants to play as someone dedicated to desna, they get benefits from that. There is the Living Vessel archetype, which is much more flavour focused and allows the player and gm to give mechanics to a possessed character. If you’re playing normal rules you can homebrew it, sure, however that’s not following the framework set out be the archetype rules
That being said, I do recognise that you have some very good points
Yup, my goal is just top have people question it as the Default. It is still fun!
I think that FA is a fun addition to most campaigns since the extra budget allows more versatility which means a player could also explore more alternative paths for their character. I agree it's easy to try and minmax but that is an issue time old with any table top and some players in general. I agree that it's easy to try and find the best choices online and with the crazy amount of choices on the Archetypes (and more come every campaign/settings book) it makes sense to a degree if you don't have a decent picture on what looks fun to add unto your creation. Often enough people just look for a fun synergy amongst the mountain of choices.
Of course it's easy to find that in something like a Clerical Champion as they both follow a deity and a set of rules, but you also limit yourself severely to your deities rules/anathema and tenets.
Besides that I don't think I ever seen a campaign promoted with dual classing or anything but it honestly sounds decent since I did see campaigns limiting FA to dual classing (essentially the same?)
I personally also don't think the balance change on the Clerics font budget shifting away from Charisma is a bad thing. You are practically forced to 2 primary stats if you become a support. You don't need to be charismatic to cast a healing font in my opinion. You can also gain the same knowledge from get wiser.
Dual class lets you get the ***class features*** from both classes so a fighter / wizard gets Fighter's HP, armor, weapon progression, Reactive Strike and full Wizard spellcasting. Dual class makes POWERFUL characters and I think that variant rule does not get the love it deserves...
The change to Cleric was a good thing for the game overall, but Cleric as it stands is a bit overtuned (particularly early game)
Everyone I had talked to who had run PF2e had recommended Free Archetype to me saying they had used it in their games. I had accepted it as just the "right" way to play the game. In the foreseeable future (probably sometime later this year) I will be running my first PF2e game, with a group that has never played PF2e before, and these videos have drastically changed my outlook on what I had previously accepted as just a given.
As I said in the other vid, I still think free archetype is ok. It might be "OP for PF2", which I kinda disagree, but everything is so balanced here that even the "OP" seems so ok to me, I'm used to OP meaning bosses being defeated with one spell or someone making 6 to 12 attacks in a turn.
FA will make the characters much more versatile, but that will not break the game. I'm playing Kingmaker right now, and we had so much trouble dealing with a blizzard and a bear boss, and all the players are veterans using FA and even Paragon ancestry. Also, some of the players are explicitly mini maxing as hard as they can, and it was still so hard to deal with the challenges.
When I look at this, it seems that even though characters are more versatile, the game keeps being balanced and challenging.
I agree with your perspective on balance. I think once there are more classes and subclasses, I would feel like free archetype wasn't necessary for lots of concepts.
For example, one of my favorite character concepts is Sorcerer-Magus. It was called the Eldritch Scion archetype in pf1e, and it is completely absent from pf2e. If i want to build that without FA Need to build a Magus and dump INT, get 14 charisma and use most of my feats to get sorcerer spellcasting, or I just pretend that I'm charisma based and have Vancian casting etc. Free archetype allows you to actually have Magus abilities while still being roughly on par with a Raw Magus and much weaker than a Magus-Wizard/Witch.
To me, free archetype is a band-aid until they can fill out more class concepts.
I can totally see that, some concepts that are not very mechanically supported need FA to feel *good*. Most of my arguments are talking about ways the extra archetype is used as a way to grab at more power!
wrestler nerf incoming.
It actually was buffed ;)
@@SwingRipper i cry in gm.
I don't think that one player outshining the others is a problem in pf2e, bc power discrepancies in general are much smaller in this system and power often also more subtle. Unless you are playing a Psychic Archetype Magus you aren't gonna completely outshine all other player in a numerically very obvious way, so I feel like a player "accidentally" taking Wrestler or Psychic is that big of a deal.
I mean... What if a player DID get psychic archetype magus then... I think that FA can expand the gaps between skill levels, it may still be a smaller gap than other games, but it is still a point that can cause friction
@SwingRipper Maybe, but i think you overestimate the degree to which that is the case. To be clear, I agree with your point of maybe rethinking whether Free Archetype should be the standard, but in general, for most groups, I think the pros heavily outweigh the cons. It allows you to realize far more creative concepts, and it makes the strengths of pf2e shine far brighter. The cons are very limited bc of how fundamentally balanced the system is, even when considering the more powerful options. Your points stand, but imo they are not super relevant for most tables (Especially if those tables have good communication skills).
One way of solving potentially the problems you point out, is to define "Limited Archetypes", with you only being allowed to take feats of "Limited Archetypes" using your class feats instead of your free Archetype feats. You can then make the Archetypes you are concerned about limited. That way, you could get the best out of both worlds.
@SwingRipper I made a few important edits, I phrased my comment quite badly originally 😅 . Jsyk.
Why do many Table top gamers (Game Masters and Game Developers) think that their players are stupid? In most games you get to play level 1-4 (these are the hardest levels and the most boring). This is a place new players repeat over and over until getting into the rare long term campaign. At that point, even the casters don't have that many different options compared to characters in games like World of Warcraft. If a newb in an MMO can figure out how to manage 15+ abilities and talent trees (or the equivalent), they will be able to manage the 4-6 options they might have as a martial character in a TTRPG. In PF2e frequently you have a basic rotation you use 90% of the time, with rare exceptions for things like AID, Demoralize, or Recall Knowledge.
Have you never played with that person that still doesn’t know what to do on their turn or what number to add to their roll 6 months into the campaign? I envy you
@dillonkaseysmith Those people are disrespectful to everyone else at the table, and one month in you tell them to shape up or get out. People have this problem in 5E! Pathfinder not using the Arxhetypes isn’t gonna do any better! They are just lazy, disrespectful players who treat the game like a tv show they tune in to be entertained, rather than a collaborative story.
@@dillonkaseysmith As a storyteller/ game master, this is not hard to mentor the new player through.
I'm sorry...but if you are doing the same thing 90% of the time, either you have no idea what you are doing in this game or your GM has no idea how to make encounters or both. Try that in ANY publish AP and you WILL TPK. Just like Cody's table did. If aid, demoralize and recall knowledge is rare...yeah...don't blame the game system for playing the system badly. Especially aid. People go on about how every +1 matters...but considering that aid gives a 95% chance of +4 on a level 13 fighter or gunslinger and the same at level 15 for other classes...but nah, don't need to use aid.
And the point about the player that Dillion mentioned isn't that they are not being mentored. It's that they WILL NOT learn. It doesn't matter how much you mentor these people. Consider yourself lucky that you have not run into one of these players yet.
I've been gaming since 1985. You cannot legislate good roleplaying or good strategy, and dumbing the game down won't fix the problem. World of Darkness learned this the hard way and lost their audience. Also, your level 13 anecdotes are outliers if most games are run at the 1-4 level. If the game is boring at the entry level, you will lose your audience.
Great response video!
Yes as a new PF2 DM i haven't even introduced arch type to my players. but i can guarantee 100% of them WILL min max arch types if I allow them to do such a thing when I first heard of the free arch type variant rule I immediately became afraid of all the ways my players will min max and how it will take them even longer to figure out how to level.
TBH it is a powerspike that can be balanced around, so if EVERYONE is powergaming you as the GM can just throw more Severe / Extremes and its all good... I just prefer the FEEL of the scrappy everyone tries to make the best char they can with limited resource style of game
I dislike the Free archetype rule for all of the reasons you mentioned.
I also dislike the false popular conception, that the Free archetype rule does not increase power.
But we still have a problem, the archetype feature is one of the most beloved and well developed features in PF2. It's not easy to interact with the feature without some consideration and it will be a shame to just skip or mostly skip such a huge part of the game(This is why this variant rule which is more appropriate to, "higher-powered game", was normalized in the first place).
I wish that the "normalized" archetype variant rule, would have been something like using your general feats to choose an archetype feat of one level lower(level 3 general feat can be traded for a level 2 archetype feat, for every general feat level) . This theoretical rule is not only giving you an additional opportunity to engage with the archetype feature, it also improves the general feats section which many find limited, repetitive and boring. I don't think this rule will increase power that much because some of the general feats are quite good so you have real trade-offs and also the archetype feats acquisition is one level slower.
FA or not, pretty much all my characters will have some archetyping. Because versatility is power in this game. Yes, it is fair to say that archetype feature is not eassy to interact with...but FA doesn't actually really help with that part of it. It could in some players...but it can also make it worse in others...so really, at best, it's neutral...with the added issue of balance tossed in.
If you think archetyping is rare now, you want to make it require giving up fleet and toughness to get it? Yeah that will ABSOLUTELY make it so archetypes never happens.
At the end of the day, the power differential between a min max FA player and a non minmaxer pales in comparison to the caster / martial divide that has existed in 1e and 5e.
Regarding the barrier to entry, I’d personally pick three archetypes that fit the player’s concept and let them pick. Choice paralysis is gone, and you have more control over party balance whilst still allowing player agency
You can totally do that, and that's what I do!
I however have also noticed that just pushes back choice paralysis to when they are in game and have 6 abilities staring back at them rather than 3...
@@SwingRipper I would argue that is how ALL characters should be built. All my characters have at least 5 actions worth of stuff they want to use constantly and I pick the best 3 of those 5 depending on how the battle is going...with a few to dozens of silver bullet options in the wings for when they come up.
I agree that the Free Archetype can lead to too powerful characters if a player knows how to optimise. Also, it can be overwhelming for new players because of the sheer number of choices. But in my recent pf2e beginner box/abomination vaults campaign, my group plays with FA despite the fact that 3/5 players have not played any rpg before. Reason being the amout of possible character concepts that can brought to live. Because most players were not familiar with rpg, I help them (with the gm) create those characters that they wanted to play. For example, one player wanted to play a elvish veteran mercenary and be effective range and melee combatant (particulary a dual wielder) so I propose a precision ranger with dual warrior archetype, helped him with stats, and so far he and the rest had a blast. Although we kinda blitzed through the BB (said ranger did BIG numbers on final boss, but it should be expected performance), mostly cause of good teamwork, but the 2lvl archetype also helped a bit. Will see how the FA will impact futher the campaign goes but so far I think it will stay because my group is very much more oriented on roleplay than min-maxing and also my gm would probably give a stare if go with a crazy combo without a rp explation. But this my group so at others tables it may not work as fluently.
I love your arguments against Free archetype, not enough people on reddit agree.
I generally run no FA. If I do run FA, it's a campaign limited one...like in the SoT. Like you can take linguist and archeologist because you all are archeologist in a mystery campaign. Or everyone is a werewolf because we are gonna play a werewolf game. Why? Because balance. I have players who can make teams and tactics that kill things 6 levels above them and players who make teams that can't beat things that are their level. Sometimes they play together. I'm not making that skill gap even worse with FA without it being EXTREMELY curated. The thing is, I GM PFS along with MANY home games. The number of people I have GMed are in the hundreds. That means I see a WIDE variance beyond most people and their friends.
The last time I ran SoT, I ran into 2 players who complained that they were not given unlimited free archetype. One of them wanted unlimited free archetype on TOP of the one that the AP gives you. Honestly, the level of entitlement over FA that has taken over the PF2E community is getting annoying. I saw a guy come into PFS complaining that there is no FA and how the GM should just allow it because it's so much better. Like a PFS GM can even make that call.
And good on you for taking care of the elders in your family.
edit: You sound is not bad...but video is horrible.
Yea the video will be bad as I was using my laptop built in camera... I thought it would be good enough, but that combined with the lighting was killer
The free archetype variant rule set is not presented in the GM Core how most tables are using it. Namely, where every player gets to pick any archetype and just run wild with it. Rather, the GM Core presents it as a way to have every member of the party has some shared identity such as when "the story of your game calls for a group where everyone is a pirate or an apprentice at a magic school." The idea being that everyone takes the same free archetype to represent that story element. Yes, they do leave the door open for unrestricted free archetype "if you just want a higher-powered game" but note that this recommendation explicitly acknowledges that free archetype messes with game balance by making the characters overpowered. "Free-archetype characters are a bit more versatile and powerful than normal, but usually not so much that they unbalance your game."
Anyone arguing that free archetype is "real Pathfinder" has fooled themself. It is a variant rule set for a reason and the GM Core makes a point to recommend constraints on its use.
I think a huge part of the problem is that even if you take away FA, the game is still very breakable, in fact your video on creating an entire party made me realize just how bad it is, as almost all of the characters took Ancient Elf. Free Archetype certainly highlights these issues, but the problems remain in the design of certain archetypes that are virtually must take for an efficient party/character. The only real solution is to make Archetypes themselves limited/optional, but that takes away a massive amount of narrative design space from players. Either way, I think it's a good conversation to have, but if as a DM you feel like your players are doing too well, you can always ramp difficulty up, or even create encounters to challenge their builds. Singular more crunchy players outshining other players in combat is going to be a problem as long as combat exists, the best you can do is compensate as a DM by presenting interesting non-combat challenges, and designing encounters around challenging the build of that player. All of this is to say I feel like the problem with FA is blown a little out of proportion here, as the narrative design space it creates imho outweighs the mechanical issues it presents.
I mean, the thing with that party was that I *needed* archetypes to cover holes in the strategy and cover for bad matchups. I could have done the same thing by playing a party of all Humans and getting the innate cantrips via spellhearts. When you start using *teamwork* the game becomes a lot easier and I think that's a good thing!
@@SwingRipper Absolutely, but it also highlights why, for example, a single player with Magus/Psychic is not enough to 'solve' every encounter, even if they seem extremely powerful on first glance.
@@doghead95 But what about a magus/psychic/wizard/witch/eldritch archer that has master spellcasting in occult through psychic, primal through witch, divine through eldritch archer and arcane with wizard. So up to 8th level spells in all types of magic and up to 9th with arcane. Because I do that with FA.
I agree tthat free archetype is not for every game. But I do belive that yoru arguement is not in good faith. The Free Archetype allows alot more flexibility and freedom when creating characters because you feel far less pressure to get what is standardly considered good and are more allowed to take the thing that fits yoru character theme. When players are given adequate tools and resources they will gernally pick thins that are cool over things that re powerful.
It works for many groups, I just don't like it being the assumed default way to play
Free archetype costs as much freedom as it gives. It basically locks you out of any archetypes that aren’t part of the set your GM has allowed and any archetypes that don’t have a dedication feat at level 2 until level 6 at the earliest if you sacrifice your class feats to fulfill the special archetype rule. It also locks ancient elf out of the game.
@@Lockfin Free Archetype
can not take away more freedom than it gives. At the very minimum it still gives the players the base line amount of choices they woudl have even if the variant rule were not to be excercised.
This is becase the Freearchetype and the Class feats run seperately from one another meaning you could still take a archetype at level 2 or 4 or what ever level becasue the free archetyp your taken doesnt effect normal progression.
It also does not lock out the ancient Elf. The ancient Elf would follow the same exact conditions as the Human Ancestroy Feat Multitalented.
Its also assumed that your character has to meet the minimum requirements for any free archetype unlesss DM states otherwise or everyone is forced into that Archetype.
@@kemious9361 free archetypes absolutely effect normal archetype progression
@@SwingRipper I think thats fine. I dont think Free Archetype works for every game or every table and your right it doesnt need to be the default way to play the game. My Issue was more wiht the bad faith arguements of players are natrually going to pick the most powerful options and throw off the whole balance of the game. WHen in reality most players often forget to use thier powerful skills and abilties a good chunk of the time.
I have already restricted my Free Archetype games to Multiclass archetypes which I view as "dual class light". But I'll now further restrict them to "one class only once per game" to avoid overlaps or shenanigans where 3 people have Champion reactions and such (and potentially combinations like Magus+Psychic). It's still a decent power boost (which is okay for me) but also still makes the players think about which class feats they want to give up when taking "regular" archetypes with their main class feats. Also a restriction of maximum one additional archetype (in addition to the free archetype).
I still stand that the whole argument is being held up by people who might as well claim that Free Archetype kidnapped their family and is being forced down their throats rather than being strongly suggested as a way to add variety AND flavor AND options AND, to a lesser extent, power to a character or build. With their opponents being knee-jerk reactionary responses that try to downplay any criticism against FA and say there is nothing wrong or exploitable about it.
Problem is, You've probably had to deal with the people you describe being "Free Archetype or death!" just like I've had to deal with smarmy, arrogant and, due to the nature of Reddit, uncontested comments against the variant rule.
I've heard your points here, but your points sound more like the edge cases for why you should take care about adding Free Archetype but still do it, rather than convincing me that it should be used with too much consideration. If the table has players that consider the extra options overwhelming, the wonderfully designed math thrown off course in an irreparable way while balancing encounters, gravitating towards broken options or find an issue with picking options for their mechanical utility in a system where that's the focus and such, then I'd rather not play at that table. I would quickly find myself out of place, thank the GM and players for their time, and explain that their game is not for me.
I will continue seeing it as the best way to add options, flavor, options, versatility, presenting storytelling to the game and to think it should be the default way of playing the game. I will never force or push anyone to run their game under it, but I will also not describe it as anything more dangerous to balance and encounter design than "Keep X, Y and Z in mind". You can bet that people that speak against it will continue describing it as something that has no place in their tables and shouldn't in yours either, as they have before.
Many thanks.
I'm sorry...what? Reddit has pretty much zilch on the don't use FA side and is almost entirely FA or death side.
And while FA is a way to add options (that is not always a good thing BTW) and versatility (which is power in this system), that has NOTHING to do with flavor or storytelling. Flavor and storytelling is not tied to any mechanics. This is basically Stormwind fallacy light or adjacent. Despite what PF2E people might like to keep saying, you can have as much story and flavor with 5E characters as PF2E characters.
Free archetype is cool for low lvl games, but if you are planning to play a high level campaign the massive quantity of archetype feats become clunky after around lvl 12 in my opinion.
Meanwhile, Paizo blatantly nerfs Shield Ally for anybody willing to just buy a Sturdy Shield.
The funny thing is that if you mess around enough with making a character you will find out OMG if we use FA on top of this the everything is doomed
good-luck beating the Sorcer mummy dragon with claw-dancer who can suck the life from you an change into a human form to sneak attack anyone XD
Definitely, min-maxing culture is ruining 😪 all games. Most players want to min-max and follow a guide, missing that big R part of a RPG game... just following the recipe and no role play. It happens on every game, every genre..the copycat era 😢
I like guides to further explain mechanics and show some interactions, and I usually stop (or skip) parts of mid and late game when I'm starting. And slowly read more into it as I also progress. Guides should help, not decide for the player 😊
Voice is unsynced. Not that I really care. I think light quality might be the thing that does you in, since a good deal of lights cause video to suck.
I forgot to pack my camera for the trip and my laptop's built in camera has some significant lag (did not notice that until I actually tried recording as it seemed *fine* in discord)
@@SwingRipper Bro forgot to clap 💀
Free archetype is really great for playing Pathbuilder ;-)
I legitimately dont know why people would NOT allow free archetype. It is so much more flavorful and fun.
I'm not a fan of Free Archetype because it dilutes class identity too much.
Yea, it adds a major source of power from outside the normal class boundaries (hence my complaint about it making stuff feel samey)
You really won't like most of my PF2E characters then. Even without FA, I take archetypes...usually multiple.
Based take
Free archetypes are awesome! They allow for unique and interesting builds, and allow for more choices to flesh out a concept. Classes are really boring without FA variant rule.
I absolutely love your content, you're on par with the rules lawyer for the sheer quality of your analysis and reasoning regarding the game
Your previous video avoit free archetypes was really insightful