Pathfinder 2nd edition: I skip nearly four hundred pages in search of answers

Yes I am aware the formatting has screwed up the image. It will be fixed at some nebulous point in the future.  

Disclaimer: I was not a fan of the PF 2e dev diaries, or of the play-test. This does not mean I'm going to do nothing but bash this book, and I legitimately hope to be pleasantly surprised, but keep in mind this read-through is likely to be very biased. A fair bit of it is also for comedic purposes. It is by no means a declaration that people should not play PF 2e, that people are wrong for enjoying it, or anything along those lines

Chapter 9

Saithor, where is the Human? What did you do? Why did you skip almost four hundred pages? SAITHOR!

Okay, so yes, I am skipping ahead massively to this chapter, for one simple reason. Because I can't understand anything about what I'm reading. The entirety of the racial chapters mechanics are filled with terms that I either don't understand or can only guess at the meaning of thanks to my experience with 1e. This is because Paizo in their everlasting glory and wisdom decided to actually put the rules of their new game almost three-fourths of the way through the book, after almost every others mechanics section, including the process of making a character, thereby achieving their consumer friendly goal of making new players create characters that they have no idea behind the rules for except for whatever bits are explained along the way. Genius!

Anyway, since I am not spending the next few weeks, months, semesters, however long this takes, stumbling around in the dark trying to guess whatever the new version of Black Tentacles does because the grappling rules are covered over ninety pages later. In a sub-heading. Hidden inside of a basement.  In the bottom drawer of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused bathroom with a sign on it saying "beware of the leopard". So anyway, here we are, page 442, several weeks early at minimum, and given the Halfling's situation I'd say he wasn't ready either.

Anyway, art opens, two-person party. I wish I could say I'm surprised, but frankly I'm not. I think as time goes on and this read-through progresses, we will reach one and eventually no-man parties. Although, the entire party being invisible and having summons deal with their enemies would be closer to high-level play than any fantasy artwork I've seen before. Anyway, Seoni and Random Halfling Bard Iconic (Give me a break, I only know half of these because they were NPC's in some campaign I was in) Are fighting a water and fire elemental. On a bridge in a cave, usual dungeon terrain. The water elemental is in the shape of a whale (Thematic!) while the Fire one is in the shape of a Lion (Thematic?). The hafling is being dragged off, not hinting well at Bard's status when we get to it, while Seoni is attacking the fire Elemental with what appears to be a ray of frost, confirming that Sorcerer's dump stat is Int once again.

Anyway with that done, onto the rules! Ready to help me burn them Mr. Dragon?

Rawr!

Remind me to get some Horn-growth serum, that stumpy horn is going to bug me till the end of time.

Anyway, Chapter 9 opens up by saying that you have your character ready and now it is time to learn how to play Pathfinder.....Are you kidding me? I was joking about how they intended people to construct character without knowing the rules! Not telling the future! Okay, so after you reach here with your blindly constructed character at best constructed from your memories of 1e at best. It also says that if you are a GM you are probably here to read this before you run your first adventure. I'm frankly surprised they aren't advocating the opposite.

Anyway, the first section is defining the three modes of play, Encounter, the most complicated and mechanically defined. The next is Exploration, which is more freeform, and handles everything else not concretely defined, including social situations, which I suppose makes this their attempt to avoid the Diplomancer. The third is Downtime, which is Downtime. Anyway, next is a brief sub-heading called General Rules telling me there are General Rules of Play that we need to know. Since there is no difference in heading font size for the next section, I have no idea how many of the next sections they mean or if someone just accidentally deleted the lot before the PDF's were made.

Anyway, the next section is about how the player makes choices that have consequences which are determined by the DM and how the DM also makes choices that matter and how they can have far, long-reaching consequences that don't become apparent for sessions later. I think besides the DM bit I saw this entire thing on a New Vegas review somewhere. Frankly this should have been at the start of the book, not at the beginning of chapter 9.

Anyway, the next section is on making checks, and to start with not much has changed from PF 1e, it's still a D20 roll system against a DC that you pass or miss. We get definitions of each proficiency rank, which adds two to your roll per level. Okay. There are also three other common types of bonuses, Status, Item, and Circumstance, and they do not stack. Apparently we are collapsing bonus types to prevent number stacking, which on the one hand yay no number stacking, on the other hand no I liked their being multiple bonuses for RP reasons and also because Verisimilitude. In many cases it makes no in-universe sense why some bonuses wouldn't stack, if things are kept from 1e. We will see. Anyway, Status is Magic, Items is Item, Circumstance is Circumstance. Don't know if the wisdom penalty from Halfling leaf smoking is either Item or Circumstance at this time.

Anyway, also in this section, is the second major change, the new critical rules, where you have a critical success on rolling 10 above your DC, and a critical loss on rolling 10 below. I don't like this rule for a few reasons. A) It encourages min-maxing. B) It encourages Number Stacking. Let's look at 1e. Say your are making a check vs a fixed number, a skill check, saving throw, attacks roll, etc. A simple +1 bonus gives you a +5% chance of success. However, in 2e that same +1 bonus not only gives a +5% chance to hit, but a +5% chance of a critical success, and a -5% chance of a critical loss. That same +1 bonus has suddenly tripled in values. And it's confusing with the bonus changes, which seems to be trying to fight that number stacking of 1e.

This change really doesn't make sense since they also keep the nat 20 and nat 1 rules as well, so they have two different methods of critical success/loss achievement. All this change seems to do is encourage min-maxed number stacking as it's worth thrice what it was in 1e, since it affects three categories instead of 1 now. So it not only encourages min-maxed players who stack their bonuses in order to maximize critical success and minimize critical losses, it encourages the more boring part of min-maxing, the mindless number stacking bit that goes for higher and higher numbers instead of abilities that at least do something different and interesting. In short, the new critical system encourages Number Stacking while the changes to Bonus Types discourages it.......Genius!

Next Up: Attacks