I'm glad you had good things to say about Investigator, because I've really enjoyed getting to decide whether I'm attacking or not based on my luck without having that really big disappointment of rolling my one decent attack and getting like a 3. If I see that 3, I can decide "okay, we don't attack this round, let's demoralize instead to help an ally". And that feels GREAT in my opinion. It lets you adjust on the fly in a way that feels better than a straight miss. Like functionally it's the same, but the FEEL is better.
And the other fun thing is that when you Devise a Strategem you only know you shouldn't attack *that enemy*. If you attack somebody else, you get to roll normally.
Unless you are fighting the subject of your investigation, then its literally one of the best abilities in the game imo. Unfortunately thats up to the GM a lot of the time and I don't think many people know how the investigator works.
@@PlatonicLiquid I haven't played an investigator yet, but I was thinking the same thing. Things like Pursue a Lead feel a bit iffy and dependent on the GM or the type of game you're playing. But again, haven't played one, so I wouldn't know too well.
@@warlock1080 I think while that's true, I have a feeling a lot of GMs do everything short of banning the Investigator from games which don't heavily feature investigation and mystery, and I think thats a shame. They are a very unique class and a fun playstyle for a martial. Pretty much any campaign is going to have a mystery or story to uncover, and therefore there should always be room for one. Players should also not be afraid to advocate for themselves within reason. I know there's a culture that anything the GM says in their game goes (I say this as a forever GM), but that in my opinion goes against rule 0. If you play something like an Investigator and the GM is preventing you from using basically all your class features almost the entire game, thats not going to be fun for anyone. After all, even if they always have their Pursue a Lead up, a +1-2 on specific checks and not-even-advantage on one attack per turn with a max d8 weapon + slightly better sneak attack is not going to break the game. Unfortunately none of players have ever wanted to play one, but I have played one. If I ran a player with Investigator, I'd basically straight up say that they can and should Pursue a Lead once per room/encounter, and I'd try and match at least one point of interest to a creature they'll encounter later if I can. There's a reason the cooldown is the same as a focus spell, and in this way the Investigator becomes basically a master tracker that's able to learn about creatures before they fight them, which I'm about 85% certain is how the developers intended them to be played.
As someone who plays as a Construct Eidolon in a game and reached Level 9, I can say that yeah, Summoners are pretty hard to play as, but they do have a better reward than you are giving out to. Sure, you have less spells to work with and your Eidolon is just a diet martial, but the amount of things you can do with both is quite high. Battle Forms aid this a lot, since with them you can be sort of a martial and aid your Eidolon with flanks, but nothing stops you from casting Boost Eidolon and move your Eidolon with your Act Together, do a boosted attack to beat him up and, as the last action, step back just for the melee enemy to waste an action getting into you. Add that with your cantrips (I personally prefer Scatter Scree to force the enemies close to my eidolon to stride instead of step and trigger an attack of opportunity), the spells for emergencies and the utility for out of combat, and you get a very clunky, but quite satisfying Rude Goldberg machine where everything in motion does things well.
Agreed, my brother played a wrathful phantom Eidolon and it's undeniable how effective it was. The fatal attacks of his boosted eidolon were spectacular, while he was having fun putting people away with Maze, or terrifying everything around him. It's complicated, but it can definitely pay off
They're also great for tripping or grappling since you can get the Knockdown or Grab trains on your natural attacks, meaning you only need one hit to land your nasty debuff. Gods forbid there's an Archery Fighter somewhere in the party throwing out Debilitating Shot at whatever you trip or grab.
I played a summoner and I just plain hated it. It is just worse than martials and worse than casters with no spike coolness like Magus which is already as strong as other martials. If you like it that is fine, but it is incredibly weak.
Ray, your doing such good job. I think you're kinda selling the witch a little short. Yes, basically they're just a prepared caster of any tradition but with ALL the hexes and all the upgrades that familiar can give to your spellcasting. I'm playing one in Age of Ashes, we're near the end and I have had so much fun.
I waited so long for you to realize they were in reverse alphabetical order, and the one you said was Druid was actually Ranger. Hahaha so happy when you finally saw it!
Summoners essentially get 4 actions per turn thanks to Act Together. That helps a lot. I've had good results with a beast Eidolon by playing it like a front line fighter that can self buff.
This is something I think he misunderstood the power of, and also the level of focus on the Summoner itself vs the Eidolon. There are probably some builds that you can make work that are more Summoner-centric, but for my current campaign that we've played from level 1 to 14, my Summoner has mainly been there just for a couple of big utility and battlefield control spells like Haste, Wall of Wind, Ice Storm, Coral Eruption, etc, while my Dragon eidolon is up in the frontlines and an absolute battlefield bully. Once we hit level 10 especially, my dragon's been even more of a threat, because he is now a Large creature, with 10 foot reach on attacks, that upon landing a hit, can then spend an action to auto-prone the target with no save through the bestiary Knockdown action. I think summoner really isn't there for its own spellcasting. The core of a summoner is its eidolon, and those eidolons can bring so much unique versatility to a group depending on how you want to build them.
@@DeadlyNightshade128 I totally agree. I think the best way to play a summoner is to use their spell slots for buffing effects and longer lasting saving throw spells. That way you burn through them slower. And then you move on to electric arc + 2 actions for your eidolon to fight in combat or 3 actions for your eidolon and your summoner boosts them. I've also really enjoyed having archetyped into bard. That way I can use inspire courage / defence with the left over action the summoner has. Feels really nice. It's cool to have more actions than every other class.
@@docopoper For sure, that level of versatility on how you want to divide your actions is a great feeling. My campaign is running the Free Archetype rule, and since the archetypes sadly don't seem to give much if anything to the eidolon, I've gone all-in on making my Summoner himself a support, by taking Oracle for more spell slots and support spells, and Blessed One for some added healing and cleansing support. But if you wanna talk "More actions than any other class," a buddy and I just theorycrafted a Summoner who, in tandem with the eidolon, can efffectively cast and maintine Sustaining three different Summoning spells at once, effectively giving you 8 actions to work with per turn, with two each for all of your summons for 6, and then 2 remaining between your summoner and eidolon. Y'know, just in case you wanted to get your Tactical RPG fix all by yourself in the middle of your Pathfinder session.
Yeah the 4 actions are the most obvious thing about the summoner that give the class so many tactical choices. I don't think this guy has ever played one.
Witch was my first class and still is a favorite. I set my spells to be entirely curses and healing spells, alongside Cauldron, you have an amazing amount of team utility, and the enhanced familiar can do a lot more than people initially think possible.
out of pure curiosity: what do you think about the recent Witch changes in the remaster? (tell me when you actually can read through it I'm aware it isn't out yet lol)
I have to disagree with Summoner being so low. One of my players switched to one from Rogue and was using tandem abilities to full effect to get out all kinds of nonsense in one turn. Two strikes and a damage cantrip are pretty great as a standard combat routine, and between Evolution Surge focus spell and the other spell slots there is enough tactical versatility within the Summoner to deal with a variety of situations.
I'm playing a summoner right now and I agree that it shouldn't have such low results. 1) they start with act together so you have 4 actions instead of 3. Getting more actions than every other character at level 1 is already kinda nuts. 2) eidolon is dope. mine got grapple and d10 fatal on its basic starting attack at level 1 which is nuts. Later I can just give it trip or grab or disarm. No athletics check. Just a free trip after succeeding on a strike. So now I'm taking 4 actions and the opponent loses one because they have to stand up. 3) round 1 position, round 2 cast a summoning spell (eidolon gets to attack with 4th action since they are already in position). Now I get and +1 action because for a concentrate the summon gets 2 actions. And when I get the feat to let boost eidolon affect summons, my turn includes 4 attacks (2 of which have no MAP) that get boosted damage. And that ignores all the potential cool stuff you can do with the eidolon out of combat. And it ignores the ability to teach your eidolon magic which is also cool. And it ignores that I can have max ability score stats for both my melee attack and demoralize without sacrificing my abilities associated with saving throws.
Disagree with summoner on output. Act together gets you to essentially 4 actions a turn. To my knowledge only spells with multi targeting like electric arc can hit the summoner and his eidolon. I know on AOE effects I'd you both would be hit you both make the saving throw and take the worse result. Then you only take damage once. They are more complicated but I would say my results are on par with the other classes. I agree with the rest of the list, especially with alchemists. In my opinion it's just another caster that is more complicated with in my opinion worse results
Alchemist was the first class I played in Pathfinder 2e, back during the playtest. I accepted the fact I wasn't the biggest damage dealer or tank, but I made up for it in the fact there was almost nothing I couldn't do. Heading into a dungeon with Freezing or Burning hazards, adapting to enemies with different elemental resistances and weaknesses, taking advantage of science and alchemy to turn situations on their heads, the sheer versatility of alchemist is not to be scoffed at.
I think your initial reaction to the Magus was pretty spot on. Yes if you don't hit you lose a ton of damage. But that is true for all classes. And while wizards in close quarter combats are going to get destroyed and fighters aren't as useful in ranged combat(unless setup for that) the Magus brings the versatility to not drop it's damage off a cliff in either situation balancing out the bigger loss of damage from a missed strike.
The way I look at it, the rogue, investigator, and swashbuckler (in that order) go from less flexible to more flexible in combat (the rogue requires flat-footed and gets bonus damage, the investigator can choose to do something else if the screw up a Stratagem roll, the swashbuckler can hold onto their bonus damage until they want to use it) but the continuum is flipped for out of combat flexibility. Swashbucklers do very little out of combat and rogues have all the skills. Its a good example of Paizo's class creation paradigm
Officially starting my first PF2 campaign!!! We had session zero on Saturday and are going to start meeting weekly next week. Since we are starting with the Beginner Box and all my players are only experienced with 5E, they ultimately decided to go with the Pre-Gen characters in the box. Before making the decision to use these characters, one of my players was considering the Alchemist. She is already struggling with the difference between PF2 and 5E, so now that I've watched this video I am even more thankful that they went with the pregens this time around. Going to have to go back now and watch some of your videos on running the game. Already watched through most of How It's Played and got super excited to see your crossover video with him.
Congrats man! Hope you guys have fun! One thing that the pre-gens will help with is helping your players know how to play the game before doing their own character creation. I also want to say that the Alchemist is actually really good and fun. It's just really different. Most alchemists I've found become kind of the "mom" of the party as they distribute alchemical items. If a player is into that I'd recommend it.
Great comment! Also, good call on the pregens. After all, nothing stops you guys from retconning the characters into whatever you like as soon as your players feel ready for more. Turns out that cleric was life oracle, or a divine sorcerer after all :D
Hardest disagree on the Summoner. At least middle of the "results" - And I'm assuming the results is just damage, most of the time. Because otherwise the Ranger and the Rogue put the Fighter to shame in exploration and they can hold their own in damage vs the fighter. I dont agree on the Oracle as well. But its all super subjective, depends much on table experience. In my opinion the easiest to play while doing the most in the whole game is the Rogue. If we are talking pure damage, then is the Barbarian
Personal opinion: Bad take on the summoner. They don’t seem very difficult, and playing two linked characters at once (cause why wouldn’t you give personality and character to the eidolon) is extremely enjoyable! Maybe they’re difficult to keep up with later in levels, but they more than make up with flavor and fun factor. Also, sure my summoner mostly casts spells with his actions. He also focuses heavily on medicine checks, keeps his sister (twin sister reincarnated as a fey eidolon) boosted or defended, and does good stealth reconnaissance in the wild. He’s more than “just a wizard”.
I definitely disagree with the placement of the summoner. It's very hard to play, but it has some very good payoff. You're a caster with on-level spells and you're a martial with actual martial attack proficiencies.
This is a really neat concept and really helpful to use alongside the intro to the classes video to give new players a vague idea of where they might want to focus their attention to learn more about potential classes they want to play! Punching a Kelpie with a fistful of salt is baller, I freakin' LOVE the thaumaturge! Also hi Ray, great job editing the video!
Hard disagree on the Summoner, depending on build obviously, but when playing one with the Anger Eidelon and Transpose mixed with Shadowdancer's teleportation mine effectively gave me a barbarian I could teleport around the map whilst also having spell utility from the Summoner itself to back them up. Granted it was a PbP / Livegame server so the penalty of lack of spells didn't come up super often but I often went full games with only casting one spell slot spell thanks to focus spells and class abilities I never felt like I was short changed in what I could do. It was generally joked that encounters with summoners had to be balanced for an extra 0.5 of a player character.
Summoners have been powerrhouses since 1e once they released unchained for it. The point of the class if you want dmg output is not focusing on your character but, the eidolon so I'd say he's pretty wrong tbh even from a numbers standpoint. A few of the guys I play with when they dm will outright ban summoner because they can break encounters in 1e. 2e seems to have taken a less destructive route but, they are still powerhouses.
@@xezzee There are classes and archetypes that support it, Summoner has a set of feats that allow for more summons, there are a few Reanimator or Beastmaster Dedications that lets you raise undead and bring other undead under your control, or have animal companion options. Mechanically it boils down to spending one of your actions to give a minion 2 actions. (Iirc there are things to spend 2 to give a minion 3 or to command multiple at once in the various archetypes.) It is more complex than your standard to build and run with, but you can look at the spell on Nethys and it will list creatures that fit the summon constraints underneath it. Iirc Summoners can fairly easily have a chunky minion presence on the map - You, Eidelon, Summoned Minion, Animal Companion. (If you start getting summoning rituals involved you can add another 2 onto that number...)
This is the best way to lay out the classes in my opinion as it says so much more than ranking them from S-tier to F-tier. Thanks for trying this format out as it's been very insightful for me.
The Summoner at the lowest result is the biggest hard disagree, I gotta say. Act Together basically gives you 4 actions, and their output can be pretty damn good. They're at least at middle of the pack on results, if not a bit higher
I think you are underestimating how complicated managing 7 different attack options is as a 10th level fighter. Very few fighter feats are passive so their actually playstyle relies on making choices between possibly dozens of options.
If anything, watching you build this list really put into perspective why people think Marshall classes outshine casters in 2e. When taken in a vacuum it really feels that way particularly if all you're looking at is damage dealt/received. 2e pushed most casters into the force multiplier roll so no matter how good they are if the force they are multiplying is 0 they are useless. That also means that their complexity goes up and you need to understand what aspects of your party to enhance and compensate for.
In the old school D&D style, the ones in the lower right used to be defined to "npc classes" exactly because they're hard to play with low payoffs, not what you would think of as suitable for monster-killin' adventurer types. It might be different in other games, like WHFRP, for example, where non-traditional classes/careers are the thing, but they seem to serve no good player purpose unless you're really into flavor and rp and not much else.
Going to be one of the many that have already brought up your opinion of the summoner being low results was too focused on the spellcasting portion of the class, which isn't where it gets the payoffs to begin with. The eidolon and improving said eidolon is where the meat of the class is. I am currently playing one in Strength of Thousands AP and I fill the role of front-line tank with my eidolon and use the summoner essentially as a healer role through battle medicine and heal as my main prepared spell. With Tandem Movement, I can net effectively 5 actions per turn to keep my eidolon in the fight and my summoner available to execute their role.
Wow. I'm amazed you rated the summoner so low. I've been playing one and would rate them as middle of the pack power wise. I also feel like I have a huge amount of versatility outside of combat.
Alright. I wasn’t sure how easily understandable this would be but after Witch’s class descriptor of “the class of extra steps” I feel like this is an easily understandable video.
I just love how fighter ended up in the top left corner with no commentary whatsoever. Yes, @Nonat got distracted by the Ranger icon but to me it speaks to how obviously max effect for min cost they are. Good work, Ray.
I guess the conclusion we should make is that less complex classes are also easy to balance. So Paizo didn't screw any simple classes making them weak. But for complex classes this sweet spot is apparently much harder to hit.
Three things: "None of these classes are useless..." as the Oracle hangs on for dear life. This is a good intro video, at least for me. Now I want to see you make videos analyzing each of these classes. Also, for each class with below average results what would you alter to improve them?
Such great timing. I will be making Pathfinder 2e oneshots for my players after becoming frustrated with "One D&D", and as a new Pathfinder GM making a game for new pathfinder players, this video is great, thank you Nonat.
boy, when you got to the magus i immediately had flashbacks to my magus and his severe feast or famine combat loop and then you said exactly my experience with it which made me feel better abut it since now i know it's not just me. I love the Magus but boi, if you miss its like playing warlock in early 5e.
Not that it would change too much, but an observation on the Primal spell list (mainly affecting druids)- it does get a lot of the elemental damage types- Lightning Bolt, Fireball, etc. - a druid can get just as blasty as a wizard. The Arcane list just has access to the broadest variety of damage- both the classic stuff and the difficult-to-resist exotic ones (force and mental being the big two), combined with a really big menu of conditions they can inflict, whereas Primal might usually (not always, but usually) tilt the math less, but has good access to staple options in both damage and healing.
Hah, it took me a while to realize you weren't talking about the video games but the actual pen and paper. Still a very cool video and it gave me the desire to play some "the dark eye" with my brother again.
I agree for the most part, the Oracle and summoner are a ton of reading… the alchemist is too after CC… Oracle is weird for me because it’s cool and flashy but I note, this is not my game but I got to watch two sessions back to back of a friends 2e game and they had a Devotion Phantom Summoner with Reinforce Eidolon and Extend Boost. With the tuned action economy they got the results I normally see Champions get with tanking. I agree with your sentiments about the Champion we need to care about damage reduction in addition to damage per round. I do note; I do not mean this as a negative criticism, just an observation; that you give a lot of power to the classes like Fighter, Ranger, and Arcane casters, which are good in straight combats but often struggle in puzzle fights. Combats that include hazards or environmental elements which must be continuously managed or else combat advantage is drastically against the players. Where Druid, Investigator, Rogue, Alchemist, Summoner, and Primal/Divine Witch all excel more. To be fair these are harder to gauge but I find fighters and rangers struggle with these kinds of encounters, they are often losing turns just taking damage and giving aid.
I don't disagree with any of the placements I just feel bad for the oracle for having so much flavor for background with the curses but the mechanics of the game keep you from using them. (slips Ray a bundle containing a torch and some food)
I'm well on my way on building at least one of each class (15/22 "done") and I have to wholeheartedly agree on the Oracle. I tried and tried but I couldn't get it to work well, even though I went through all the different mysteries. Forget about powerful, sadly I couldn't even make it fun to play.
Hi Ray! Hope you'll have a good time :) I like the final graph. Also I would rate full spell list with preparing spells as more difficulty than the middle. But that's just my opinion :)
So… my problem with this is that the way you’ve got the graph set up implies anything that’s below the line on the ‘results’ axis is strictly mechanically below par in terms of power level. That’s simply not the case. All classes share a baseline effectiveness. The Oracle might be the most complicated class in the game, and they may not have a ‘huge’ payoff for that complexity… but they’re still a full caster with the best supporting spell list in the game. And even if you don’t engage with their focus spells they still are the only class with full native focus point progression in their features rather than their feats. Even the Psychic needs to take a feat for the top tier refocusing, oracles get it natively.
He explains his reasoning in that in order to do similar things as another class they have more complexity thus devaluing the overall score. I guess what I would then ask with your description how confident would you be others would be willing to pick Oracle over any other class.
@@truevenom97 Wrong question to ask: the Oracle is the first and only caster I’ve played so far this edition. It was also the first caster my BF played when he got the chance to be a player. Neither of us would get what we wanted out of our characters if we made them as divine Sorcs instead.
@@NuclearPoweredGinger im sorry i think there was some confusion with how i asked. For yourself it was appealing yes but if you could put aside your own feelings and honestly consider if for the public at large, that your description paints a favorable and compelling reason to choose Oracle
That's actually a bad sign. A game should have easy-to-use options that aren't that super strong, but still could keep up a bit, while the hard-to-use options should be potentially rewarding and have higher caps.
"Especially at low level where a lot of things can ne-shot an ally" Looks at my low level champion constantly getting one-shot by everything then just moving on to my ally.Yep haven't had any complications at level 1 thus far. I just lay there and bleed.
Just a note on Oracle; I've been playing one since level 6 or so? You probably don't hit Major Curse drawbacks as often as you'd think. More often than not, you're a fullcaster with superior saves and - depending on the Curse - some very potent emergency buttons. Life Oracle is obviously high output and some of the easiest mitigation (don't get hit, turbo boost allies), but Flames Oracle in particular functions very well as an off-sorcerer and has saves comparable to a Monk while having access to 8hp/lvl and light armor. (Expert Fort, Master Reflex, Legendary Will).
Played Agents of Edgewatch with a Cosmos Oracle. Let's say it started an inside joke within my group about oracles being secretly tanks. Also, yes, Oracles are amazing for RP.
The problem with magnus is that it's a bit more complicated to play and build but most importantly the class heavily relies on recall knowledge and that ability is heavily dependant on your dm who might not realize just how impactful it can be.
I love how you subconsciously moved fighter to the top left corner and immediately forgot about it Honestly, the most fighter thing you could have possibly done
I agree with your assessment of the cleric, having access to free heal spells makes your results higher, and I actually think in that sense makes the class easier to play - you know that you're going to cast heal, and then probably forbidding ward and shield. the loop is easier to navigate and honestly lets you have more utility fun with your spell slots. Someone else mentioned that you really undersold the complexity of building spontaneous casters. What spells you choose matter so much, and getting stuck with bad spells with no real back-up options as a sorcerer can make it a little underwhelming. (for example, you can pick bad spells as a bard, but your composition cantrips make up for having a small list of spells). Also, the utility of having a familiar should boost any class higher than you have it, familiars (and companions) add complexity and results. Imo, of course. I like your champion take, but I'd add that it gets more difficult to play one the bigger your encounter maps are. A lot of space makes it hard for them to close the distance on their group and be fully effective. Something to consider, placement is really important for them
While I don't disagree with anything you said about the Magus, I think your initial placement is a little closer to an accurate reflection of what kind of damage they do in combat. I've got one to level 5 so far, and seen one up near level 20, and the hits they dish are astonishing. You also observed that the alchemist can play into elemental weaknesses -- well so can the magus. Mine, at level 5, hits for 2d10 + 4 + 3d6 + 4 damage, averaging 29.5 on a hit. He could drop anyone in the party on a crit. Misses hurt, but they hurt a psychic throwing an amped TKP just as much, or a crossbow ace ranger, or a gunslinger, or a fighter using power attack. That argument made, I think your list is otherwise pretty good. I'm struck by how the martials are almost all very high performing -- this not what I am used to from TTRPGs, but I think Paizo did a pretty terrific job buffing martials to the point that they dish really reliable and strong damage.
I'm glad to see comments supporting Summoner. As a newbie, I can see where the wrong combat scenarios can hurt, but the 2+1+1 actions with act together are my bread and butter. I have the benefit of having a fey Eidolon so electric arc can come from them while I use a protect/boost option. Not to mention the out of combat perks like having them be a look out while the party is focused on healing with medicine checks, or using them for a guidance bonus, etc. Personally it gives me so much RP fun too. My character is a cursed fey gumiho who had most of their connection to their fey essence severed. Eidolon is a menu tailed fox and the embodiment of that severed self.
If I may offer a different perspective. I don't see certain classes in PF2E as complex or simple. Instead, I see them as options for different types of players. I have players who enjoy PF2E because there are classes they can choose that fits their style of play, whether it's something more "classic" like a fighter or something more creative like the Inventor. GMs should definitely help new players so they don't become confused or overwhelmed, but the variety of options is a great thing.
on the Oracle- i think your rating for output is fair for the Battle Oracle in particular, but that one is... definitely underpowered compared to other Oracle mysteries, at least imo. i would point to Cosmos, Flames, and Life Oracles as being much, much stronger than Ancestors, Battle, or Bones (honestly not sure what to make of Lore, Tempest or Time tho)
Gonna be playing a cosmos oracle soon; honestly I didn’t find it that hard to wrap my head around - but I think it helps hugely that I’m really into the concept.
Was just about to make a comment on Cosmos specifically because it seems crazy. 2+1/2 your level resistance to all physical damage at level 1 - something Inventor has to wait until level 15 to achieve a lesser version of. And your curse's only downsides are making you bad at strength-based stuff (you don't care) and vulnerable to forced movement (but not grapple or trip, and you get bonuses against the latter), while it also gives you a bunch of free skill feats related to jumping. Just go Acrobat Dedication and you're fine!
I'm surprised you rate Swashbuckler so high. In my experience this class is quite bad. At least when it comes to fights that matter because anybody can dunk on Medium encounters. It's easy to fail your Panache gain, your damage isn't that great (your Finisher does about as much as a normal Greatsword hit from a Fighter/Ranger, but you can only do 1 of those per turn if you're lucky), you're relatively squishy and Tumble Through triggers AoO too, which can result in a surprise 1-shot against a boss.
you can actually only do one finisher per turn regardless. After using a finisher you can't use actions with the 'attack' trait for the remainder of your round.
@@TehSr0c I think by "you can only do 1 [finisher] per turn if you're lucky" they meant "you can do a maximum of 1 finisher per turn, if you're lucky enough to even actually GET to do your full finisher damage"
I agree with this. Ranking a setup-payoff class based on how much damage they do when they crit their payoff activity isn't reasonable. The swashbuckler needs multiple things to go right for them to do much of anything, and the final payoff isn't even that high. They're definitely several cuts below most of the other martial classes.
Maybe it's that I just like how they play compared to other classes, but I never felt the Summoner was either too difficult to play or not worth the effort. hell, I built an Eidolon based off of Valefor from Final Fantasy X and she worked out great. abridged version she was Avian, Large Size, Breath Weapon, claw strikes. sure, I couldn't get her 1:1 but that's just how it is with trying to convert one RPG to another. Aside from that, you just gotta remember Summoner themselves are support, but their Eidolons are meant to fill a role the Party may lack, kinda like a Factotum or Savant from D&D 3.5
Think reason summoner have its complications is the micromanaging of two characters one player play as and their abilities. But if get hang of it then you can do some cool/crazy stuff be in combat or rp wise.
Fighters rock! I usually play characters with magic and versatility. Many people who played fighters in the games I’d played in were just straight forward thugs, which, while often necessary, didn’t interest me personally from a role playing perspective. For several reasons I was “tasked to tank” by the party. I ended up playing a Gnome Fighter in PF2. Jurgen Junker was born. It was awesome. I built Jurgen with a little gnome-magic and gnome weaponry. He fought with a Flickmace, but later switched to a Gnome Hooked Hammer. He specialized in speed and mobility, utilizing his reach and distance to disadvantage baddies. He invested heavily in athletics, using trip and quick jump to devastating and frustrating (for the GM) effect. In short, the fighter is far more versatile than one might think coming from D&D or even PF1.
Summoner is incredibly strong. Is best scout in the game. So far my summoner has survived 3 ambushes/ traps that would have killed any other character. Sure, she got koed each time, but she was safe with the party in another room. The summoner is also effectively immune to death effects if eidolon taking the hits (just resummon eidolon next turn after party heals you up) as well as bleed, poison, etc (just unsummon eidolon and resummon it). Also, battle medicine twice as effective as summoner and eidolon separate for immunities.
@@jonispatented Fair point. Certainly safest. If it dies, it dies. Get it back next day. Although not sure how easy it is to give it water breathing to explore a lake, etc. But, yes, witch familiar likely best scout. Does mean you're playing a witch though...
I’m just now reaching lvl 8 as a barbarian, but so far I would rate it more complex and less effective than you currently rate it. The penalty to AC means you’re constantly worried about going down, and if you do go down you’ve lost rage. You’re less accurate than a fighter and until lvl 7 your bonus damage is very little. Also just due to the nature of rage you are most likely only attacking once per turn, making them like the magus in that if you’ve missed you’re far behind. Also not being able to do concentrate actions is a bigger detriment than most people thing imo. So many magic items have activation actions that have the concentrate trait meaning you can’t even use all the cool items you come across.
I mean you only need to rage once per combat, so you’re only 1 action behind. Mighty Rage at 11 eradicates the action cost too which is another plus. Raging resistance at 9 is instinct-dependent but also fairly solid for survivability, and barb saves are strong. Their feats are also *really* good from basically level 6 onwards that I’d say it can almost be hard to choose which ones to fit in your build. This is all just my subjective opinion but I played a shark barbarian through levels 11-20 (Fists of the Ruby Phoenix) and felt very strong the entire time.
Great job Ray. Yeah, you did ok too NoNat. I'm loving my current goblin rogue character who is definitely the biggest damage dealer in the party. As you said, easy to play and super effective. I've been looking at building a new character for the next campaign and initially thought I would go with Summoner... but after reading up on it I completely agree with you. Way over-complicated and I just don't see the power or effectiveness that I was hoping for. Could be cool for character story and background... but I think Summoner would be a weak party member. So I fired the summoner before even building him. Instead I've chosen gnoll ranger. That was before seeing your video. I agree again - the ranger looks easy to build, simple to play, and both a heavy damage-dealer as well as useful member to any party. Gnoll with strength build, Precision, and goal of getting a composite shortbow and boar animal companion. Should be fun role-play as well as deadly and useful for the party. Keep up the good work NoNat. Keep making the videos awesome Ray!
Watching this with good headphones, at 4am because I can't sleep... You did what you did on the gunslinger, and I'm just about crying. What the fuck, dude
I think that people who don't play witch/wizard under estimate how complicated/difficult managing a spell book is. What other class has to manage gear vs class abilities?
From my point of view, having played a rogue from lvl 1 - 20 in the Age of Ashes campaing, I believe you have understimated the difficulty of the rogue. The fact that you AC raises slowly than other marcials and you only gain 8hp per level makes the positioning a very important and difficult thing to control, specially when you need to seek a flanking possition fighting a group of enemies, as you need to expose a lot yourself. In general, all martial classes with those characteristics should be ranked a little higher in difficulty.
What is that popping noise? Edit: it's cool to see so many people defending summoner in the comments section. And there are some cool stories mixed in.
One minor quibble about your section on Champions - you appear to have forgotten that the Redeemer isn't the only kind of Champion, because ALL of your comments about the class were in regards to that one specific variant.
I'm pausing this video after the summoner to tell you that you're wrong. The summoner basically gets 4 actions because of work together or whatever it's called and with boost eidolon and a beefy eidolon it can deal out massive damage.
With summoner, a lot of spell casters get that fabled wasted action due to a lot of spells costing 2 actions. An eidolon let's you at least guarantee no wasted actions.
Sorry to beat a dead horse here, but summoners are doing great, generally speaking. On paper it might not look like much, but in action, they really make that Act Together count.
It is wierd to me, how bard is always placed somewhere in the middle of the pack. Damnit their powerlevel is over 9000. 1) Best 3rd action in the game, hands down. Just try to compare Inspire courage to any one action focus spell, witch hex cantrip and psychic cantrips and you'll realize that what you get from the starting song is amazing. 2) Because of historical reasons, bards start with trained in bows. Most spell casters won't be dipping in to their MAP with spells, so shooting with a bow is another descent third action. If you have lingering composition, you have an easy way to use this. 3) Lingering composition... 4) Compared to a lot of other casters, bards have extremely useful feats, that wont be something you take and never use. Dirge of doom, inspire defenses and inspire competence are really great, and allows you to create create a bard that covers up any weaknesses the team might have. Aside from that they have access to great knowledge, spellscasting and focus spell feats. 5) The occult spell list has the best debuffs in the game. It also has a good mix of spells that are useful at low level and spells that remain useful at high levels. Finally it does have access to healing compared to the arcane list. 6) all of the above goes together to make the complete support machine. With the amount of statusbonuses and fear effects martials and even caster allies are going to have a field day. Aside from that, the bard allows for a lot of creativity in making a character concept.
Not much has been said about my favorite class the FFFigher But for anyone looking it's at 16:35-16:37 and 19:00-19:05 the best 7 seconds of the Vid show Nonats thoughts about this great class
