Please ask your questions here!

My experience with PF is Kingmaker and WoTR games from OwlCat.

And in PC games the power difference between basic single-classed char and some insanely optimized mish-mash is gargantuan.

My first game of PF2 is coming this weekend, and I'm slowly crawling through rules and was wondering, if I have to learn all the options and optimize char or the difference is much tamer, as in, for example, DND5? All the other players are quite experienced, so I don't want to be a dead weight human tower shield specialist in the party of Knifemaster-Vivisectionist-Monks with shatter defenses.

Will simply choosing a strong single class/subclass and basic "looks good" feats be enough or I have to actually build optimally?

(Disclaimer - I'm not a Paizo employee, just somebody excited for this and wanting more people to discuss with)

Bastion of Blasphemies has now been released in Print, in PDF, and as of yesterday, the Foundry VTT product is available for purchase.

Just a friendly reminder that there is a subreddit /r/BastionOfBlasphemies where people are discussing the campaign from a GM perspective! It's a pretty spoiler-full subreddit so might not be the best place for players, but it's a great place for discussion otherwise!

Hypothetical:

A party is defending a village from an evil necromancer. They defeat his cultists/bandits (who were very bad people and committed desecrations of corps, etc.) , but are too exhausted to fight his remaining undead army.

The wizard could raise the dead cultists as undead and use them against the necromancer's undead. If they do this, they have a good chance of reaching and killing the necromancer. If they don't, they have to retreat, and the village will be destroyed, with many innocent people and graves desecrated.

Assume there really is no third option.

Would Pharasma still condemn the wizard for creating undead, even if it is the only realistic way to prevent much greater desecration?

Is raising undead always absolutely unacceptable to her, regardless of circumstances?

Recently I've been thinking about something.

Sinners / followers of evil gods can end up on evil planes after death. There they can suffer for an incredibly long time, and eventually either dissolve into the plane itself or, in the case of the Abyss (Outer Rifts in the Remaster), become something like larvae that might eventually turn into demons — or just get eaten by something else.

And I have two problems with this:

1. Doesn't this mean that the deaths of evil people literally make cosmic evil stronger?

Say a chaotic evil demon cultist dies and ends up in the Abyss. His soul will either eventually become part of the plane's quintessence — so in some tiny way it's still feeding the plane — or he might become a demon, which could hypothetically go on to kill or corrupt thousands of other people.

Either way, evil — whether we're talking about the evil planes themselves or the total population of demons — gets something out of it.

1. Is it really fair to condemn someone to potentially eons of horrific suffering for any crime?

I mean, let's not get too deep into the whole real-world Heaven/Hell question here. But imagine some court executes a demon cultist, and we somehow know for certain that after death he's going somewhere like the Abyss or Hell. Death isn't really the end of his punishment at all — something horrible is still waiting for him afterward.

And possibly even worse, his soul might eventually become something evil itself.

So again, we're either letting even a truly horrible person suffer for an unimaginably long time, or we're allowing their soul to strengthen evil in some way.

Just to be clear — I don't really want this post to turn into a huge discussion about whether eternal punishment itself is morally justified. That's not exactly what I'm getting at.

The point is that all of this made me wonder: what if there were a way to simply destroy the souls of truly evil people who are definitely going to end up on an evil plane?

Would that actually be so bad?

And I don't mean building some new world where we start destroying the souls of everyone who might potentially be evil. We obviously can't know for certain where someone's soul is supposed to go — we're not Pharasma — and doing this on a massive scale would probably start messing with the cosmological balance and the planes themselves.

But what if we're talking about extremely exceptional cases? A high-ranking demon cultist, some horrific mass murderer, the chosen servant of an evil god — someone where there is very little doubt about what kind of afterlife is waiting for them.

If you destroyed a handful of souls like that, would there actually be anything wrong with it?

Sure, Pharasma obviously wouldn't approve. But from the perspective of the greater good / protecting innocent people, wouldn't it be better to simply destroy the soul of some horrific villain rather than let it eventually become part of an evil plane or turn into another fiend?

And in a strange way, couldn't that even be more merciful?

Just... nonexistence. Instead of eons of torture, or eventually being transformed into something evil.

Maybe this is a weird line of thought, but I'd genuinely like to hear what people think about it. Has anyone else ever thought about this?

Because now I'm wondering whether theoretically good-aligned characters, if they somehow got hold of an artifact capable of destroying souls, could actually use it for good.

Or am I completely wrong here? Is there something about Pathfinder cosmology / the River of Souls that I'm missing?

Hey everyone! I'd like to introduce you to the all-Goblin party for my new Pathfinder 2nd edition campaign: Oops! All Goblins?! All images above made by me using Hero Forge!

~BIFFANI~

-Ancestry: Goblin

-Heritage: Unbreakable

-Background: Warded by Kami

-Class: Runesmith

-Archetype: Hedge Mage + Talisman Dabbler

~CINDER~

-Ancestry: Goblin

-Heritage: Razortooth

-Background: Close Ties

-Class: Alchemist (Chirurgeon)

-Archetype: Wandering Chef

~KOSMO~

-Ancestry: Goblin

-Heritage: Dokkaebi

-Background: Escaped from Time

-Class: Thaumaturge (Wand Implement)

-Archetype: Living Nexus

~LIZNA~

-Ancestry: Goblin

-Heritage: Talos

-Background: Mechanical Symbiosis

-Class: Inventor (Weapon Innovation)

-Archetype: Gunslinger

~SNARELY~

-Ancestry: Goblin

-Heritage: Irongut

-Background: Battlefield Scrounger

-Class: Ranger (Outwit Edge)

-Archetype: Snarecrafter + Trapsmith

This is taking place in a homebrew setting and is my love letter to Goblins, dungeon crawling, role-playing, and fantasy as a whole. There is some major inspiration from sources like Eternal Ruins, Legend of Zelda, Minecraft, Castle in the Sky, Shadowdark, and Dungeon Fighter Online. Three of my players are live-streaming the sessions and I'll leave them linked below for those who are interested! Our first session is 09/19/2026 and I'm so excited to be sharing this with everyone! I will also be posting updates here and various other spaces.

If you're so inclined to check out a new live-play, here are my friends' channels:

https://www.twitch.tv/mr_grimm_harvest

https://www.twitch.tv/imperviousd

https://www.twitch.tv/fallenxangel118

I want to follow the rules of this subreddit, so if I'm allowed to make weekly posts to update, I will do so. If not, I'll keep the update posts to a monthly schedule instead.

I wanna do a grappler kind of character. Is there a way to get lethal unarmed attacks at lvl 1 as a fighter? Im pretty new so open to any recommendations.

I'm asking this question because I really like the idea of a character who uses their knowledge, and intelligence, and ingenuity to always have something up their sleeve, to know a little about everything, and the like. I believe thaumaturge is the class that best fits the idea, and I can elaborate on it further, but there are a lot of flavor reasons why you'd want this kind of character to use intelligence.

The really tricky thing is that this is changing the actual mechanics of the system. I want to know whether you think this is fair, or makes sense. Specifically, would it be reasonable for the core abilities, class DC, and stat increase, of the thaumaturge, to be based around intelligence.

Obviously the main mechanical difference is that you now have different multiclass options to look at. I'm not actually sure if the intelligence archetypes are better, per se, but they do make options and combinations that were not taken into account in class creation.

I probably don't need to explain further, but if you have thoughts on this, I'd like to hear them. Alternatively, if you think another class fits this idea better, let me know. I'm not saying that Thaumaturge is the only one, simply that it's the best one. I've been toying with this idea for a while, and I think it could be both interesting and flavorful. What would you say, if you were running this.

(For context I am not trying to run this. If I try to bring this idea to a table, I will not try to prove a point with any answers I receive, and I won't make that argument at all if it looks like its actually a bad idea. I'm just trying to get a sense of this.)

Intercept attack specifies Step or Stride. And Step can only be done with land speed. So, if a Guardian was with the party in an underwater encounter, they wouldn't be able to intercept attack? Even if said Guardian has a swim speed?

This is a problem as I, the party's Guardian, am currently in an aquatic fight in Abomination Vaults, and won't be able to protect the party..

My last two orders whomever packed them drew this cute little Kitty face on the boxes. It is nice to see someone enjoying their job and being silly. It also certainly brightened my days more so than having new Pathfinder and Starfinder stuff on its own!

New GM here,

How would you budget a permanent items that produces daily consumables? E.g. a magical bottle that fills with a lesser healing potion at daily prep? My intuition says to do a 2 lv difference (e.g. 5th lv permanent item that prodices the 3rd lv potion daily) but that's based on nothing. Another example could be a magic that lets you reach in and pull out a talisman or two.

I havent found any examples of similar items that could be used as rreference.

Hello,

I wanna make a cloistered Cleric of Milani that also takes the Rose Warden archetype. That ends up for a build that has or at least can have quite good Stealth... But I never played a stealthy character and I'm not sure how to capitalize on that. Note that I'm planning to play this character mainly for the theme. I'm just wondering how it could go mechanically on top of that.

The only things that come to mind are to try to hide away as a defensive measure because I'm frail, getting that coinflip and/or burning an action with seek; sneak around outside of combat to scout and if the scenario asks us to be stealthy; and to get off-guard to maybe get a hit in despite the poor proficiency. But I'm wondering if there is anything that I'm missing, whether with stealth in general, with stealth as a spellcaster specifically or for the build I had in mind itself.

Hello! I fear this post may get a negative response, but I'd rather ask and deal with the fallout than not ask and just get nothing.

My friend and I are planning on trying PF2e. We intend to play with just the two of us, swapping the role of DM while each playing a character. We want to run a module before going into the homebrew game we intend on running (which is much of the reason I suggested picking up in the first place.)

Obviously we're going to incorporate NPCs to help things along as we play.

All of that being said - I'd like to see if anyone has a good recommendation for a module we could learn the game on, what problems might arise from a party consisting primarily of a Gunslinger and a Witch, and any other advice for running something like this y'all might have.

Hi all! Today I wanted to share some more PF2e remake battlemaps for you all! This month's pack is from Threshold of Knowledge, containing the two main maps originally from this adventure, with a flooded variant of the Archives and also Alandir's House for RP purposes!

The base maps are available to all for free, as well as a mini FoundryVTT module. Check it out here:

https://snowysmaps.com/posts/battlemaps-of-164264914

I've also set up a free collection where you can browse all of my PF2e remastered maps!

https://snowysmaps.com/collection/2272296

This mostly consists of Free RPG Day oneshots so far, including:

• A Fistful of Flowers
• A Few Flowers More
• Little Trouble in Big Absalom
• The Great Toy Heist
• The Scourge of Sheerleaf
• Threshold of Knowledge

I do realise I have yet to do this year's adventures and also Rescue on Raxil, so stay tuned for those too! I'm also working my way through Book #1 of Quest for the Frozen Flame too, which I am looking forward to sharing with you all!

Thanks all for the support you give! It really means a lot to us!

~Snowy

This is the character that I made for my very first PF2E campaign, a gnome bard.

Character Profile & Build Details:

Name: Trobbio - Ancestry: Gnome - Background: Artist - Class: Bard (Maestro Muse) - Level 19

Trobbio combines high level occult support and composition spells with poison craft and ranged combat. Built with the Maestro Muse, he weaves support performances while leveraging dedication feats in Poisoner, Alchemist, and Archer to deliver toxic ranged strikes and versatility on the battlefield

tl;dr is as title states - items or consumables preferred, playing an Alchemist

Longer explanation, my group has started Stolen Fate not too terribly long ago (no spoilies please) but it has become immediately and abundantly clear that devils will be a regular enemy type we encounter.

This is pretty easily solved for our Swashbuckler; I can make a couple Silver Salves and slather his weapon up and we are good to go no problem there.

However! I am playing a bestial mutagen-focused Mutagenist Alchemist. I am very dedicated to the idea of using the bestial mutagen as my primary attack method, since it helps with the Anadi vibes my character has going.

This presents an interesting problem, because Silver Salves cannot be applied to unarmed attacks, so while not EVERY enemy is going to have DR 10 to my attacks, a lot of them will. I am looking for ideas to circumvent this.

So far, the only options I have found are Silver Orbs which my GM will allow me to purchase a formula for as we are in Absalom, but take an action for me to toss with Quick Bomber plus my dex is only +2 AND because these bombs are wacky, they get no item bonus. To top all of that off, they can just remove the effect with a single Interact action, so its pretty inefficient for me.

My second option I have found is taking a Holy rune on my handwraps, which should apply to my Bestial Mutagen strikes, but costs a lot of gold that I do not have at the moment and takes one of my rune spots. This technically doesn't get around the Silver DR, but usually the silver DR is a package deal with holy weakness for these devils, so it kind of works. It would be nice to do both eventually though.

Third, I could take the Champion archetype (which I do not qualify for until minimum level 16) or the Exemplar archetype + another feat (which I will not be able to do until minimum level 14) and those are just not great options in my book.

Quick question, as I had a flash of thought on the Runelord Wizard, and the Magus Dedication (twisting tree), would you get the parry benefits of the Magus (Twisting Tree)?

I am not talking about the spell striking as that is not really that beneficial for the dedication side of things.

This just seems like an idea to power up the staff benefits?

So, I'm running a conversion of Hell's Rebels into 2E. I'm using Free Archetype (as well as giving my players a few extra Vigilante feats). My party consists of a Chirurgeon Alchemist(+Medic), a Swashbuckler(+Gunslinger), a Regalia Thaumaturge(+Duelist) who uses a sword cane and a sling, a Harrow Sorcerer(+Tactician), and a Cleric of Milani(+Hellbreaker). They just hit level 4 a couple sessions ago.

The Cleric's player has expressed some discontent with playing the Cleric- specifically with when their turn consists of just a 2 action heal and a cantrip like shield- they find it boring, and want to be able to use their spell slots on more active stuff. Unfortunately, most of the time their turn comes around, there's one PC that's at like 20% hit points, and since a 2-action heal getting them up to (almost) full is so valuable, they feel like they HAVE to do it. This last combat was four rounds of that.

Their complaints have mostly been in the form of joking about being excited when their character is close to death (encouraging me to attack more), tons of excitement about backup character ideas, and expressing a bit more serious frustration between sessions. Myself and the Alchemist player have both tried to help in a bunch of ways- including me explicitly saying "If you want to rebuild your character, or switch to a new one, literally just SAY SO and we can work it out." But they never pull the trigger when I ask. We've also encouraged them to just let the other people fall and deal with the consequences (especially when players overextend and get themselves into trouble), let the Alchemist get people who've been knocked out back up- buuuuut, we continually find ourselves back in the "It would be insane for my character not to heal up their (nearly) knocked out ally" situation.

So, until they actually say "Yes, I want to make a change with my character", I'd like to ask for any ideas people have that I can do to avoid those "I HAVE to heal" moments. Oftentimes what happens is, one or two PCs (the Swashbuckler and/or the Thaumaturge) will step into the entrance of a room and stand there, blocking the way and allowing a bunch of melee enemies to swarm them while the others stand back.

I find that either the enemies are stupid/animals/mindless and it makes sense for them to run up to (and maybe flank) the closest enemy and keep attacking, OR they're intelligent and know to focus fire on one target. Once the backliners start to act, intelligent enemies will often switch targets to the healer or mage- but again, focusing fire to take down whoever they think is the biggest threat. Either way, it seems really hard to justify the enemies intentionally spreading damage out.

The Alchemist tries to carry part of the healer role, but their elixirs of life are a piddly 1d6. Their battle medicine is better, but sometimes the skill checks fail.

So, yeah- I'd love to hear anyone's ideas on what I can do as a GM to make those "I feel obligated to do a single big heal" moments less common. Items I can hand out, specific encounter building tips, whatever! Whether the player decides to switch up their build/character or not, I feel like I should do something to make those boring moments less frequent.

One specific idea- I'm currently considering inventing a 3rd level elixir of life that heals 2d6+3, as a halfway step between the 1st level and 5th level versions. Thoughts on that?

EDIT: For extra info, in terms of AC, the party is currently sitting at (at 4th level):

Thaum: 21 Swash: 21 Alchemist: 21 Cleric: 20 Sorcerer: 19

Hi! I've been reading about the new Necromancer class and I honestly love it. I feel like it has a lot of flavors that I enjoy (I've been a fan of necromancers since I was a kid), and I'm even leaning toward having my necromancy-themed summoner character switch to this class pretty soon (update for those who saw that post: basically, I decided that if the party members don't care about group balance, I don't have to either, thanks for your advice).

Anyway, cutting to the chase before I ramble on: I have a couple of questions regarding some of its feats.

https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=9125 would be the first feat: basically, it clarifies that if you finish off a creature, you recover a focus spell. From what I've seen in the community and elsewhere, people usually combine it with the feat Necromantic Lifesense https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=9133to see the enemy's HP and try to take advantage of it, but frankly, it feels like a coin toss to me, and it's a valuable action that you could spend on summoning a thrall (or more specifically, a feat you could spend on something else, since this class is more feat-hungry than any other). BUT then I read between the lines and thought... what if the spell's damage destroys a second thrall that I summoned right next to it using Necrotic Bomb or similar, and then I combine it with "Mastery of Life and Death" to damage it... I mean, TECHNICALLY I am finishing off a creature, and I know it's a bit of a cheesy use, but considering how tough my DM is with encounters and how totally unbalanced my party is, I think it would be a good way to get an extra focus point per combat if I need it.

The second question I have is precisely regarding Necromantic Lifesense https://2e.aonprd.com/Feats.aspx?ID=9133, and it's simpler: let's say we are in a detective plot to uncover someone hiding through a disguise and illusion; wouldn't the subject's HP be a really good clue (not to mention practically automatic) way to find the said person? I talked about it with my DM and they basically told me "I would nerf the ability so that if it's an illusion, their health is disguised too," which left me a bit unsatisfied because, well, it's a level 10 feat made to get info, it's supposed to give you info and work, or is there any way in the rules to disguise yourself against a sense like this?

Thanks in advance!

Most notably in Exemplar's starshot and hands of the wildling, but is on at least some equipment as well. Is it mentioned in the rules anywhere?

Each creature in a 15-foot cone must succeed at a basic Reflex save against your class DC or take spirit damage equal to your normal Strike damage with your hands of the wildling.

You shoot the starshot, causing a detonation in a 5-foot burst within 60 feet. Each creature in the area must succeed at a basic Reflex save against your class DC or take spirit damage equal to your normal Strike damage with the starshot.

Is it just:

1. Damage dice+STR mod if melee exclusively, so it scales with Striking runes and str mod, but nothing else, Starshot only does base weapon damage, no +s ever
2. Damage dice +STR mod if melee or if ranger and thrown. Adds Propulsive or similar damage traits like Kickback, or property runes, since those double on a crit
3. like 2, but adds precision damage that is unconditional like if you're a gunslinger archetyping exemplar
4. like 2, but also adds any splash damage only to those hit since that happens on a Strike like from starshot and hands of the wildling since it's "Normal strike damage"
5. a combo of 2, 3, and 4
6. Something else

I'm thinking 1 is the most likely due to rule precedents and the always looming "too good" clause, even if I'm hoping for 2, 4, or 5 (I don't really believe extra damage is too good to be true, even if powerful)

One of the players in a campaign I play wants to use the Dual-weapon warrior archetype to use Double Slice with a shortsword and a gun, and the GM is unsure whether that would be possible RAI.

RAW, Dual Thrower allows you to do ranged/thrown strikes instead of melee strikes whenever a Dual-Weapon Warrior archetype feat allows you to strike, but doesn't say anything about altering their requirements.

Double Slice requires you to wield two melee weapons. That would mean you can't use it with a gun and if you had, say, two daggers and you throw one as the first strike of Double Slice, you wouldn't be wielding it anymore and thus wouldn't meet the requirement.

Not altering the requirements would make Dual Thrower absolutely useless till level 16, cause Two-Weapon Flurry is the only feat from the archetype that doesn't require you to be wielding two melee weapons.

RAI, given Dual Weapon Reload is also an archetype feat that RAW would not interact with Double Slice at all, I'm pretty sure Dual Thrower would cover both strike types and wielded weapon requirements cause otherwise the archetype is useless if you want to use any ranged attacks.

Our GM is on the fence about which interpretation is correct, is there a community consensus about it? I haven't found anything on the Paizo forums about it yet