Playing Pathfinder
We had our first game of Pathfinder on Friday - the "spiritual successor" to Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition. Well, it was the first for most of us - a couple of people in our group have already been playing it for a little while.

I'm playing a gnomish illusionist (wizard w/ illusion school speciality), rather than my usual rogue preference. So it'd be new to me either way. I mean, an illusionist is like the rogue of wizards, isn't it?

At first blush - after playing 3.x for several years (both pen & paper and in Neverwinter Nights) - I felt that the game feels like a continuation of 3.5. The differences were small but definitely "gotchas" if you weren't paying attention. A few changes that stood out in a 1st level game:

#1 - Everybody seemed to have a lot more non-combat skills to do stuff with. I think this was principally due to the consolidation of skills (for example, "Spot", "Search," and "Listen" are all "Perception" now). And the elimination of certain "skill point taxes" like Concentration (Concentration checks are level-based, now, effectively giving it to you for free).

#2 - As a specialist wizard (especially given a gnome's special abilities), I never seemed to run out of spells. Besides once-per-day gnomish abilities for Prestidigitation, Dancing Lights, and Ghost Sound, I also had three cantrips, one first-level spell due to my level, one additional first-level spell due to my intelligence score, and an additional Illusion-only 1st level spell slot due to my specialization. Then - because of my specialization - I had six uses per day of a Blinding Ray. Oh, and there's an option (which I chose) to have a bound object rather than a familiar, which results in one more daily spell of any (available) level that doesn't even need to be prepared in advance. This is a far cry from the old 1st edition days when a first-level magic-user had Magic Missile and Light.

#3 - A cleric's Channel Energy + Selective Channeling... WOW! At lower levels, at least, this really makes a huge difference in the game. I'd say this is game-imbalancing, but frankly D&D has always been a meatgrinder at low levels, and this may bring the low-level game more in-line with the mid-level games in terms of survivability and party stamina. More significantly, clerics are allowed to cast something other than Cure Light Wounds at the very low levels. I think this also places a greater burden on clerics, as charisma is a very, very important secondary stat (as it was already becoming for clerics in 3.x)

#4 - Making characters was no less complex than it was in 3.5. Except skill selection. Skill selection was definitely easier as there was no need to divvy up 4x points at level one anymore. But otherwise, it's still a pretty detailed (and, unfortunately, error-prone) process.

Overall, it was a very positive experience. The system retains 3.5's level of complexity and detail, though it makes some effort to streamline things a bit more so things like grappling and tumbling and disarms aren't all completely custom rules. For the most part, we felt at home with the system, but the differences kept us on our toes.

My question is: Will we see official Pathfinder CRPGs? Shamus may argue that we might not really want to. But I think I have a higher opinion of the other D20-based games (and earlier D&D versions) that made their way to the computer.

Labels: Roleplaying Games

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