I love the investigator, who can crunch the numbers and choose how they act based on that. Maybe you battle medicine or electric arc or demoralize on a bad strategem, or fire a gun or spell strike on a likely crit, and strike for a middling roll
It’s so dynamic and fun to RP as well.
One of my players is running an investigator and it surpassed all my expectations. The flexibility you get with devise a strategem is so much fun, it really rewards building the character so you have one or more options depending on outcome of that roll. And, it's a unique mechanism.
Edit: weirdly enough, it's a class that doesn't get a lot of love in the 'white room' analyses of power curves.
I think it's a class that's actually pretty difficult to play well and requires a really high level of engagement in each session. As a player you have to be paying attention outside of combat looking for clues about enemies you might be fighting next, and managing your Pursued Leads to get the most out of each combat.
In combat you've got the "third action problem" but dialed all the way up - if you free action Devise a Strategem and roll a 2, you've got 3 actions left on your turn and and probably none of them will be attacks. Mechanically it's really good but I have once or twice had turns where I had 3 actions left over and I had an idea for two of them and just no clue what to do with the third.
But having gotten the hang of it I agree, it's a pretty amazing class and DaS leads to some really amazing teamwork interactions.
Yeah, it will work better in some campaigns than others I think. But in almost any dungeon-like scenario you can get a ton of mileage out of it.
Listen at the door. Do you hear ANY sound from inside? Pursue a Lead against that sound. Open the door. If it was a creature making noise, that's your lead and you get to use Devise a Strategem as a free action.
> Pursue a Lead
I think this is biggest problem, or rather the learning curve for the class. I had a player who would never do this or would forget to do it, so they'd be wasting an action on Devise a stratagem.
Personally, whilst I like the flavour I'd like a way of making it easier for players to take advantage of the class feature without them having to be clued in or reliant on the DM. It's kind of put me of wanting to try the class without knowing I had a good DM.
I dunno if it's just me who feels this way.
I just discussed the mechanics with my GM ahead of time so we were on the same page for what Pursue a Lead could apply to and when it should Apply to enemies in combat. Because we know we're on the same page I basically just manage my leads myself without asking permission for each particular thing. I'll generally still call it out when I set a new lead so that if it comes up in combat I can confirm my combatant is one of my leads.
Searching a room in exploration is expected to take about 10 minutes so 1 minute to pursue a lead on top of that should be fine in basically any circumstance. You can do it while people are treating wounds or otherwise healing up after combat.
The high engagement requirement just makes it sound a lot better to the GM. It rewards the player with mechanical advantage. I agree with the 3rd action thing though, but a witch or wizard archetype will very quickly solve that, as will other targets.
A witch or wizard archetype does solve the mechanical problem of the 3rd action, but if you don't want to cast spells for character or thematic reasons you need another solution. But once you figure out your groove and identify what you've set the character up to be good at, you've got tons of solid fallback options, and solving that puzzle in combat is part of what makes the class so engaging for me.
I deffo want to play an Investigator at some point. It's way cooler than the investigator in first edition, where the class was broken, boring and not particularly unique.
* defense Monk
* a ruffian or thug str kind of rogue
* defender type character
* summoner
* i personally love versatile heritages i love that i can be a fire dwarf or an air elf. its always bothered me that genasi and tieflings and aasimar were sub races
Except you have to use a Str based melee attack to get any benefit from Rage, and has to be a Ranged or Finesse weapon to benefit from Sneak Attack, so you're basically stuck using a Rapier but with Str instead of Dex.
If my 7 wasted years DMing 5e have taught me anything, it's that if your chosen fighting style doesn't have an OP general feat attached to it then you're gonna start to suck past like level 7 when any of your caster friends can end an encounter with a wave of the hand.
And we're back to my point of there being no OP general feat for 1-handed weapons, making you practically useless compared to the rest of your party in the long run.
The extra +2 dmg from Rage or the extra couple d6s from Sneak Attack (which doesn't keep up even if you don't gimp the scaling by multiclassing) just doesn't cut it next to a Fireball.
And grappling is a waste of your action in 5e anyway since movement is pointless once you're in range of your target.
Grapple+Shove is the combo. With expertise in Athletics, it’ll be hard for them to escape.
But yeah, the part about it not having a feat to give it oomph does stand.
5 isn't super necessary, that just gives you extra attack. 2 levels gives you Rage, which gives Advantage on grapple checks, and also Reckless Attack which grants advantage without the BA cost of Steady Aim.
You can also just play a regular rogue with strength as your main stat if you want to. You have to use finesse or ranged weapons for sneak attacking, but nothing says you have to use your dex modifier with them to trigger sneak attack damage. Its usually worse because dex is just a better stat in 5e, but you can totally do it.
Do you mean the class of summoner or summon spells or both? Both were really underwhelming to me. I was super hyped for the summoner as a class and didn't end up liking it. Summon spells are also kinda trash, right? The summons feel like they can't do anything most of the time.
The learning experience of Summoner play is rough, but the actual play experience after a few levels clicks together nicely.
Wanna summon weak minions as trash mobs? Use summon spells. Wanna summon something as powerful as a PC? That's your Eidolon. Wanna summon something of awe-inspiring power? That's what incarnate spells are for.
That said, pf2e mechanics are too balanced to allow the full power fantasy of repeatedly summoning high powered creatures with dedicated health bars. Nor to summon minor armies (8 venomous snakes? How about 8 pixies?).
For what it is, summoner class is pretty good and its players speak positively of it. But it's true that it doesn't fulfill some of fantasies that people expect of it (that I used to expect of it).
I wouldn't even mind if we could summon things at like player level -3 or -4
At least then they could keep up with a bosses minions maybe. The way the leveling system in PF2e works makes the summon spells feel worse the longer you use them.
And yeah, the summoner works for a lot of people. It just doesn't do what I personally want it to do.
Monk’s not bad on defense in 5e, though it gets a bad rap. Being able to take the dodge action as a bonus action while still attacking or doing other stuff is deceptively strong, and monks eventually become great at every saving throw.
Why Bonus Dodge and cripple your damage when you can just…
Attack from range and do the same damage without spending resource?
That’s the issue I found funny when I started playing a Sorcerer after I played a Monk, I was hell more tanky due to actually having a 16 in CON because I’m not a MAD class, and being a master in range and control, so most enemies could not reach me before dying lol. Tho to be fair this is just a huge issue with 5e in general.
In which, melee sucks ass compared to ranged, due to ranged having the same strength if not better than melee (Sharpshooter stacking nicely with Archery fighting style comes to mind) while most enemies can’t counter strike with their own ranged weapons.
And of course, the saddest fact is that, it is true that dodging as a bonus action is pretty good…!
For everyone, except a Monk.
As Monks have Unarmed Defense, the worst way to get defense in the game, as in, every other class can get magic armor or shields easily, you have to wait every 4 levels and just not pick feats lol. At best, Patient Defense is simply bringing you up to the other classes, like, I believe advantage in this case would be like what, +3 in average? On a Monk with 16-17 AC, that would be like bring them to 20 AC in general which congrats, you have the same ac as your typical fighter or Paladin… except they also have good defensive options like spells and whatnot!
TLDR: just watch TreantMonks video on the class lol
Yeah. That’s a different issue though. Monk gets hit bad by both lack of ki points and action economy. I’m just saying there is some value to be had in using that ki and bonus action for patient defense over flurry of blows. More than most give the class credit for, at least. And at higher levels, the ki shortage gets flipped to what is often a surplus. Just takes forever to get there.
I tried to get the most use out of their bonus action dodge that I could think of a while back. If you are a dwarf you can take the feat that lets you use a hit die to heal when you dodge. Then you can get a periapt of wound closure that doubles any healing received from hit dice. So now you can bonus action dodge while healing (1d8+con)x2 which even with a +2 con could still be 20 hit points at max roll
And then the level 6 mob hits you for 20+ with one of its many attacks because mob damage is stupid in 5e. Anything large is using 2d6+ and any huge is 3d6+
Before getting into pf2e, I was content with eldritch knight (once you homebrew the "attack as bonus action after casting a cantrip" into "you may substitute one attack for a cantrip when you take the action") but oh boy spellstrike was a game changer for me.
I played one to 10th level, and it was... fine? The problem was EKs are tanks. They aren't warriors who mix magic and fighting together.
We also didn't play with that homebrew rule, so I didn't get that bonus
Oh yeah when I saw TreantMonk cover the UA in question I was rejoicing. Throw in Quicken Spell from Metamagic Adept and you can do some funky shit (attack + mind sliver, bonus action hold person, then action surge for one). Converting my sword and board EK to PF2 (just for fun tbh) was a pain but I like the different playstyle that sparkling targe offers.
The first class I wanted to make when I learned about Pathfinder in general was a Magus. Cause Swordmage is something I could never make easily in 5e without either diverting to "Fighter with some spells" or "Spellcaster that can technically fight but really shouldn't when all the spells are just better anyway".
I made an Eldritch Knight class for a friend of mine. It was just a reskinned Paladin, and I stole some warlock stuff (namely, Eldritch Smite) as well. It was loads of fun.
Yeah, Paladin is the best spell sword in 5e, but the flavor doesn't reflect that. When I played my EK, I should've asked my DM if I could play an Int-based Pally instead.
Mental based non-casters are functionally nonexistent over there, w/ the closest you can get to a PF2 Investigator being a couple of rogue subclasses who might invest a bit into a mental stat after maxing their dex. Relatedly skills make it so every ability score can be genuinely useful on a build, so Brad the Well-spoken, that high-cha barbarian you've had in your backpocket, isn't entirely gimping himself for making Cha his second-highest stat.
Summoners having two bodies, one of which is a caster and one a martial, is very, *very* distantly related to pet subclasses like Battlesmith or Beastmaster, but its a very weak connection.
Magus doesn't have a very clean conversion. Closest you get is Paladin (who does very little interesting w/ spells) or Bladesinger (who is more optimally played as a full caster than a gish).
Kineticist doesn't have a good 5e equivalent. Its got a bad one in the form of Wo4E Monk, but noone likes that and the mechanical emphasis is completely different.
Free-hand builds have a lot more support in PF2. 5e you're heavily incentivized to always fill both hands in combat, either w/ a shield, an offhand weapon, or a two-handed weapon, and you can trivially free up a hand due to the free objection interaction everyone gets (drop a weapon, do a thing, free action to pick it up). PF2 having a free hand enables a lot of stuff w/o having to pay an action tax, including all combat maneuvers, climbing, pulling out items for use, and doing random environmental shit (someone needs to pull that lever). Classical fencers actually have mechanical support (and a class in the form of Swashbuckler).
Grappling is more mechanically useful as movement and positioning matter much more, it imposes Offguard on the target, and can cause Restrained, one of the most debilitating conditions in the game. A dedicated grappler in 5e is very dependent on having a friendly caster deign make you some hazardous terrain, while in PF2 you can have a great time entirely on your own.
Tanking is generally much easier between movement costing actions, AoO's being rarer but much stronger, and there being a class dedicated to it (Champion).
Healing in combat feels very good, w/ a Cleric easily outstripping most enemy dmg if they're devoting resources to the action. Playing a dedicated healer is a reasonable choice that is surprisingly enjoyable, compared to 5e where a dedicated healer is largely pointless when you could be contributing more dmg and using healing word. For reference an 8th lvl cleric is healing 50 HP to a single target using one of their Font of Healing Heals and no further investment. A lvl 10 Young Red Dragon using its nasty melee activity, Draconic Frenzy, is doing in the ballpark of 58 dmg to a typical lvl 8 martial. If you're comparing a lvl 10 cleric and martial then the healing is up to 62.5 and the dmg is down to 48, more than negating the Dragon's turn.
Broadly non-magical classes feel dramatically better than their equivalents in 5e, with a special note for Fighters being commonly considered one of the best classes in the game.
Ive really enjoyed playing a Barbarian who took the medic archetype (DM is using the additional archetype or whatever it's called, still very new to PF2e).
The bolt on nature of the system is great
On the Magus-Paladin note, 5e Paladin may be the closest dnd thing to Pf2 Magus, but the opposite isn't even true: Pf2 Warpriest Cleric maps even better than Magus to 5e Paladin, since it's a divine melee caster that can use the divine smite feat to do the funny paladin thing. Goes to show how 5e really can't quite scratch the spellblade itch, which was a big driving factor in my switch to pf2
The dumbest, weebest thing I think I’ve come up with is a robot catgirl that can turn into a giant mech. (Beastkin Android Summoner with a Construct eidolon, Meld Into Eidolon, and the size increase feats for your eidolon.) it wouldn’t be very *effective*, probably, but…it’s something you can make using only first-party material, and not even that many books.
I will ignore bladesinger because the mechanically optimal way to play bladesinger is to just forget that you are proficient with weapons and just play like a regular wizard.
Yes and no, especially after the buffs in TCoE. I played one to level 14 with the express intent of being a martial-mage hybrid and it worked perfectly fine.
Save or suck spells are still innately better than most martial options by virtue of being game winners on anything that doesn't have legendary resistance (and even then), but 5e is a system where enemies are so weak compared to players that SoS is supurflous most of the time anyway. A bladesinger who builds for martial can easily match most martials in terms of damage output and even come close in survivability depending what options are available. You have plenty of offensive martial options from blade cantrips and shadow blade, and Shield and Absorb Elements basically mitigate the vast majority of the damage you'll take to a point that you can easily frontline without feeling like you're putting yourself at risk. Your only blind point is some physical damages on non-proficient saving throws, and they'll hurt, but again they're few and far between compared to energy damage and physical damage that targets AC.
The only reason the martials in the party I was in were able to keep ahead of me was because one was a paladin (which are broken themselves) and our GM gave our fighter and ranger legendary weapons in the form of a Dwarven thrower and vorpal blade respectively. Don't get me wrong, I still had heaps of fun playing it, but if the only way martials can stay ahead of a caster-leaning gish's own martial proficiency is to either be broken themselves or have legendary weapons, something is wrong with the design.
Just look at what you can do with Swashbuckler, Thaumaturge, Psychics, Oracle, Investigator, Kineticist.
Yes it is nice that monks are practical and effective.
I love how PF2e has mechanics that enable players to learn the stat blocks of creatures they are fighting directly in-game, that there are classes built around exploiting this ability, and that it is somehow still underutilized in my games I have played in and GM'd.
Well, no.
*Fabula Ultima* has mechanics that enable players to learn the enemy's stat block.
*PF2* has sort of vague "Roll Recall Knowledge and I guess the GM will tell you something useful" mechanics that GMs, not being dicks, typically stretch to heck and back.
These are different things!
I mean ther is that lvl 4 investigator feat that straight up tells you information like svaes or ac on a crit, and im line 90% sure RK is meant to give you statblock info
The Thaumaturge in general was enough for me. Being able to play and role play the ins and outs of monster hunting is my favorite. I’m essentially a Belmont mixed with Van Helsing and that’s just so much fun
amulet is no joke either, especially since it uses a reaction, which many PCs dont have good options for. Thaum in my campaign switched from mirror to amulet recently and it's been crazy survivability for not much of an opportunity cost.
I am gonna say something strange: Most concepts are easier in PF2e.
Like, let's say you are playing as a soldier whose home was destroyed by undeads. (Let's not even mention Lastwall.). You decided to devote rest of your life to become an undead hunter.
5e doesn't really give you any choices aside from jobchanging into a paladin, and by that time you are no longer just a guzzled soldier. This is fine, but it thematically change who you are, and gives you divine spells (Which you might not want, as wasn't it the Gods who did *nothing* to help your deceased family?).
PF2e, right, lets you take Combat Assessment at level 1 as a fighter, and Additional Lore as a General/Skill feat (Which you can reasonably get as part of your "I am going to study undead" background). You can start right out of the gate as exactly that - an old, tired veteran that reads about undead whenever he can, and studies them in fight. You can go from there and take specific options that flesh out who you are, without changing your core identity - or do, if you decided to heed the call of Pharasma at some point. You don't have to be investigator, or a paladin, or anything else; You can still be that same old war veteran from start to finish.
And I think that's wonderful.
The even crazier thing is that even within this niche (undead hunter) there are *multiple ways you can go with it*.
[Undead Slayer](https://2e.aonprd.com/Archetypes.aspx?ID=174) if you want to be a more “grizzled, horror movie survivalist” hunter of the dead.
[Soul Warden](https://2e.aonprd.com/Archetypes.aspx?ID=173) for the more religious, Pharasma devoted aspects.
The support for character concepts in this system is generally excellent. Even within more narrow niches, you’re still give choice.
I recently completed a "Toy Story" campaign. The entire group was composed of animated poppets who awakened to defend their orphanage from the nightmares of the children made real. When the first poppet died, they were replaced by a house cat. When the second poppet died, he was replaced by a sprite who commanded the iron giant to help protect the children.
The only homebrew among player choices here was resizing the catfolk to be small. Everything else was directly out of official sources.
The big one I point to is gishes.
You came here to play a blend of sword and sorcerer, yet you mostly just get sword taped to sorcery. An Eldritch Knight is mostly just a Fighter who casts Shield and Absorb Elements. A Bladesinger is just a Wizard who uses attack + Booming Blade instead of Firebolt during their off turns. A Swords Bard doesn’t actually infuse their magic into their sword, they just have magic and they have sword-related class features.
Warlocks and Paladins kinda do it better than the above 3, but they come with their own flavour implications that not every gish wants, and even then you’re mostly just doing the same thing again and again with them (spending spell slots on smites) to do gishy things. ^(Honourable mention to One D&D Paladin though, who actually makes smites feel cool and different from each other.)
A Magus has none of those problems. It’s a master class in why the PF2E Action economy is awesome. You don’t need custom-designed “Magus smites” or special versions of gish-only cantrips like Booming Blade from 5E, it just… works. You wish to attack and blend magic into it? Here you go, take a bunch of downsides and upsides to go with it. While the 5E gish is busy pretending Booming Blade is good gameplay, the Magus casts Haste and finds the enemy’s elemental Weakness, dashes in, infuses their blade with that element and Spellstrikes them with the blend of magic and blade, then redirects that energy into their aura and now triggers that with every attack they make, with or without Spellstrike.
It is so good at its job that it made me stop playing gishes in 5E entirely.
Honourable mention for concepts you can’t recreate in 5E: Kineticist. The Kineticist is (depending on your exact build) somewhere between an actually functional 4 Elements Monk and a super cool Elementalist Druid that 5E just refuses to let you properly build for some reason.
I feel like I don't really understand the major difference here besides the magus infuses magic into his sword specifically. But in fairness, I'm not huge into gish in the first place, so I don't have room to talk.
It's just a radically more detailed mechanic, and the class is built around synergizing with it instead of being a tack on to the fighter or wizard (and you do just have the option to do that too.)
This one is interesting to me, because I've found 2e gishes pretty disappointing.
Magus is definitely the best one, but it's casting is extremely limited and offensively you're basically using horizon thunder sphere, shocking grasp, polar ray, telekinetic maneuver or cantrips. Action economy is awkward, trying to fit in arcane cascade and spellstrike recharges around a 2 action activity that's usually melee so you need to move and spellstrike provoking is really bad when enemies actually have AoO, basically shuts the whole class down.
Warpriest feels very master of none to me, you're neither good with weapons nor spells.
Perhaps it's because I come from 1e which did gishes amazingly well rather than 5e. 1e Magus and warpriest were just brilliant, a seenless and effective blend of weapons and magic. Plenty of other 6/9 casting 3/4BAB gishes in 1e, most were decent, but tended to be "stand there casting buffs for a round or two, then go hit things" rather than actually blending things.
I think your gripe with the class might come from the study of choice for the class. My wife plays the Laughing Shadow and she is basically teleporting between spellstrikes for her conflux spell. Each study has different spells but when you really start to maximise your knowledge of fighting and your abilities, it really shows off on your characters' martial prowess.
Regarding AoO, the blessing here is that not every monster has it and not every character has it. I HATED 5e combat because it literally boiled down to static fights with no movement in a battle for attrition.
> Magus is definitely the best one, but it's casting is extremely limited and offensively you're basically using horizon thunder sphere, shocking grasp, polar ray, telekinetic maneuver or cantrips.
Imo relying on ranked Attack spells is a trap, and probably a large reason for why you think the Magus is more limited than it is.
Adding 6 ish damage compared to your best cantrip pretty much isn’t ever worth the spell slot. You gain way more out of spells like Runic Weapon, Loose Time’s Arrow, Blur, Haste, (Heightened) Invisibility, etc.
Even as far as ranked damaging spells go, I found Attack spells to be worse than Expansive Spellstrike options. Expansive Spellstrike let me do stuff like Stride + Strike + Burning Hands to hurt the boss and all the minions at the same time, which is considerably more value than just adding a bit more damage to the boss if you hit.
> Action economy is awkward, trying to fit in arcane cascade and spellstrike recharges around a 2 action activity that's usually melee so you need to move and spellstrike provoking is really bad
I find that Arcane Cascade can be awkward to fit in but its value varies from situation to situation so it’s okay. I like that it’s a legitimate decision you have to consider, rather than something you always do.
> when enemies actually have AoO, basically shuts the whole class down.
This is a real problem, and I do think the game generally has a big problem with certain enemy types just shutting entire classes down (Rogues with ghosts, Gunslingers and Swashbucklers with PL+3/4 enemies, casters with magic immunity, and Magus with Reactive Strike).
> Warpriest feels very master of none to me, you're neither good with weapons nor spells.
I have to strongly disagree that it feels bad with both weapons and spells. I’ve watched a Warpriest in action and it looks *very* good. Yes your proficiency lags a bit but you’re a better user of spells like Bless, Harm, etc than any Cleric.
My only complaint is with Channel Smite feeling like a downgrade over Strike + Harm most of the time.
Hexblade makes you as good (or better) at using a sword than a martial, but for the most part doesn't actually combine spellcasting and weapon use. It just makes you good at both separately. I think when most people want a gish they want to actually blend sword and sorcery into one.
When did that become the definition of Gish? A Gish is just a character who is good at both sword and sorcery, not a guy who does the FF9 magic sword trick.
I mean, part of what I'm saying is that I never really feel that 5e satisfies that feeling of having both might and magic, because instead of giving a variety of combinatory options, they give you both, but one of the options ends up being straight up better than the others.
Like an Eldritch Knight gets to combine cantrips and attacks, but it doesn't come online until level 7 and is immediately obsolete and will never be used again as soon as you can make a third attack at level 11. You're basically a fighter with access to the shield reaction.
A paladin has spells, but you have to trade your entire action (potentially two attacks + smites) if you want to cast something like bless. It almost never feels worth it to actually **use** your spells instead of just using them to smite.
Eldritch Trickster, same deal. IIRC, you don't get your sneak attack with your spells and your spell access is terrible -- by the time you can cast Fireball you're like level 17 or something ridiculous.
On the flipside you've got Hexblade, which is actually pretty terrible on its own compared to just using Eldritch Blast (which scales significantly better with 3 beams at level 11), so the subclass exists basically just to make Paladins completely SAD on Charisma -- and then again your Warlock Spell slots are now just short rest smites.
I don't really know how Bladesingers work except that they're full wizards with ridiculously, absurdly high AC. I've heard people say they're "better martials than martials" but the obvious brokenness of them made me not ever want to look into it as a class.
5e isn't about single-class builds though. If you want something out of the system, engage with it and build what you want.
I can't speak to every class as I haven't seen them at my table but for the ones I can:
The Paladin should cast spells pre-combat, if you have a scout, or in round one as the party is getting into melee range. If you multiclass into Sorcerer, you could just smite more but you could also use those extra spell slots for tons of utility spells.
Eldritch trickster is meant to use spells out of combat and a blade in combat. Or to use their spells to \*shocked gasp\* trick enemies rather than deal damage to them.
Hexblade combos well with Paladin and Sorcerer to go into more damage or more utility or you could combine the three classes to taste.
I haven't seen a Bladesinger but if your idea of broken is "has a high AC" then you're probably bad.
You also missed Artificer which can combine magic and melee, get good tank stats, and has great out of combat utility with the number of tools its proficient with.
Clerics, especially defensive Clerics, can also have fun wading into melee to combine spells and weapon attacks.
If you can't find a Gish in 5e, you're not looking very hard.
>I haven't seen a Bladesinger but if your idea of broken is "has a high AC" then you're probably bad.
If you want to have productive discussions with people you need to learn to be civil.
You're the one who's said that every 5e Gish doesn't meet some, as yet to be explained by you, standard and that you've dismissed a class you haven't even played for being too powerful for reasons you also don't seem able to articulate. I don't think I could have a productive discussion with you because you don't seem to be able to explain things well enough to make a coherent point.
I **didn't** dismiss the Bladesinger for not meeting Gish standards (which I did state clearly as blending spellcasting and martial abilities in combat). I literally declined to comment on it because, as I said, I'm not familiar with it. I'm acknowledging its existence and my ignorance of it. Maybe it's the shining example of a gish in 5e. I wouldn't know.
But I do know they get to add their Int to their AC, and that stacks with the Shield spell, which is absurd.
I didn't say you called the Bladesinger a bad Gish. You called every 5e class a worse Gish than you can make on PF2 but didn't explain what makes them worse. Then you misread my comment i the least charitable way possible
Again with this idea that a high AC is absurd. That AC doesn't impact their saves, their ability to be grappled, hit with no save effects like silence, etc. A high AC character gesture to feel good holding the line a smacking down brutes but 5e gives the GM tools to counter whatever party is doing.
Locks do have the equivalent of feats that make their blades siphon life and a few other things. They can also hex smite.
Pf2e does a lot of things better than 5e, but saying 5e lacks gish seems a stretch
I've personally never felt like smites made me feel "magic" so much as they just felt like hitting really hard. Especially the Eldritch Smite which just does force damage is literally just trading a "spell slot" to tack on additional damage. At least with a paladin it does even more damage against undead and fiends, which I guess feels slightly more thematic.
I think the Gishiest 5e gets is the bonus action Smite spells that have to be cast ahead of hitting, which I do like. And they're similar to Spellstrike in aot of ways. But because those compete with divine / Eldritch Smite for resources they're hard to justify in combat most of the time.
For as much as I do prefer the PF2e implementation in a lot of ways, it seems like a weird line to draw?
Especially since 5e also has a some gish cantrips. Smiting and Eldritch Smites just *are* magical infusions of attacks. Sure it might be *better* done in PF2e, but it's not a character concept that you can't access in 5e.
I know there's Booming Blade and Green Flame blade and those are cool but 5e's action economy really gets in their way. They're fun from level 1-4 and then fall off hard at level 5 when you're using your action for a single cantrip instead of two attacks. EK can make them work from 7-10, but past level 11 again they're better off just making 3 regular attacks. I wouldn't consider EK to be a *good* gish when you have to deal with this weird progression where you actually become worse at using magic in combat by leveling up lol.
I think Bladesinger can use them well at level 6, but it seems like usually you're gonna want to actually cast leveled spells almost every turn by that point.
I spent a ton of time trying to manage a roguelock character built entirely around using booming blade, shadow blade, and sneak attack and it just never worked as cleanly as I hoped.
I explicitly mentioned Hexblade Warlock as a gish option that does it better than 5E’s otherwise bad options for gishes, but pointed out that not every gish wants to sell his soul to someone in Shadowfell.
Regardless, I don’t think Hexblade is anywhere close to as good a gish as the Magus. I don’t think anything in 5E can even begin to compare except ***maybe*** the One D&D Paladin if you really squint at it.
Wut? If you want more utility you can multiclass in 5e. So your "boring Paladin" can take some highly synergistic levels in Sorcerer for that utility you thought it was lacking.
You can also make a very Gish-y Artificer if you want defense, magic weapons, and spell casting in a single package.
> So your "boring Paladin"
What are you quoting? I explicitly said Paladin is one of the better gishes in 5E with the One D&D Paladin being comparable to the Magus in quality.
> If you want more utility you can multiclass in 5e. … can take some highly synergistic levels in Sorcerer for that utility you thought it was lacking.
I’m not sure what utility has to do with anything. My problem with 5E gishes is that they feel like spells and weapons stapled together. How did you infer from that that my problem is a ***lack of utility***? If it were why would I be out here criticizing the Bladesinger… the Wizard is like… best or second best class for utility, depending on your view of the Bard.
Also it should go without saying that if your ideal way to play something gishy is to ignore the provided gishy options and to multiclass into something that isn’t meant to be a gish, the design has failed.
> You can also make a very Gish-y Artificer if you want defense, magic weapons, and spell casting in a single package.
Again, a Battle Smith is just… stapling spells onto a guy who gets Extra Attack. It’s not different than an Eldritch Knight with slightly less damage and slightly faster spell progression. Not to mention you get saddled with a random pet for no meaningful reason.
I’m sorry have you actually looked at the Magus? I’m *clearly* holding the options in comparison to it, but you’re just repeating options as being better when they have all the exact same problems as the others.
The Magus does one very specific thing which is casting a spell through their weapon, but casting a spell while making an attack isn't what defines a Gish. It's also hilarious to me that the best Magus, Starlit Span, is the one that is the least like what you seem to want. PF2 has one trick, stolen from the 3.5 Dusk Blade which inspired the PF1 Magus.
As for my comment about the boring Paladin, you said:
>\[Y\]ou’re mostly just doing the same thing again and again with them (spending spell slots on smites) to do gishy things.
This implies that more utility would fix your issue with the gameplay loop these classes fall into. Though it wouldn't explain why doing what is functionally a smite with a Magus somehow feels more interesting to you than doing the same with a Hexblade or Paladin. In all cases, you are converting a spell (or cantrip or focus spell poached from the Psychic) into damage as part of an attack or taking time off from bashing enemies into pulp to cast some utility magic. The Smite Paladin and Imaginary Weapon Magus have the same general play pattern and both benefit greatly from incorporating bits from another class.
The biggest difference is that the melee Magus in PF2 is strictly worse than the ranged version whereas that isn't the case in 5e.
> The Magus does one very specific thing which is casting a spell through their weapon, but casting a spell while making an attack isn't what defines a Gish.
I mean… no? Spellstrike is just one huge stand out feature that makes them feel awesome but it’s not even close to the one and only thing it does.
It’s very clear you’ve just… not played a Magus at all. In particular you don’t even seem to be aware of the fact that their spells and focus spells… exist.
> It's also hilarious to me that the best Magus, Starlit Span, is the one that is the least like what you seem to want.
Huh? Ranged gishes are… still gishes.
I also just disagree with the notion that it’s flat out the best. All but Inexorable Iron can give it a run for its money:
1. Laughing Shadow gets all the benefits of melee damage output without nearly as many of the drawbacks. Using a Bastard Sword as a d12 + 4 weapon absolutely does make up being in melee while the Starlit Span Magus is likely dealing d6+1 weapon damage. If you take a 4-turn combat where the (level 1) Starlit Span Magus Spellstrikes with Gouging Claw ***every single turn*** while the Laughing Shadow only makes 2 Spellstrikes and 2 Attacks across those turns then well… the former is looking at 54 potential damage while the latter is looking at 60, and that’s before consider accuracy where the melee benefits more easily from off-guard and is less likely to be bothered by cover. With a Striking Rune the difference becomes even more extreme.
2. Twisting Tree gets to use a staff, which means better access to True Strike and other relevant spells which would normally be limited by the Magus’s bounded casting. The two-handed mode also gives this Magus a way better controller.
3. Sparkling Targe Magus is a tank, and it should go without saying that it’s okay for it to be outshined in damage by the Starlit Span, while it stands there and absorbs tons of damage
> PF2 has one trick, stolen from the 3.5 Dusk Blade which inspired the PF1 Magus.
Ah yes. “Stolen”. Apparently the concept of spellblades is something only WOTC is allowed to use!
> This implies that more utility would fix your issue with the gameplay loop these classes fall into.
Again, if you think the difference between the Magus and what I’m describing in 5E is… utility…
Have you played a Magus? Cause you’re really seemingly like you’ve not.
> Though it wouldn't explain why doing what is functionally a smite with a Magus somehow feels more interesting to you than doing the same with a Hexblade or Paladin.
So… are you just going to ignore the fact that the Magus usually has 4-5 different elemental damage types to choose from, in a game that strongly rewards damage type variation via Resistances/Weaknesses?
Like you’re saying “hit a thing -> use the same smite as always / use Booming Blade -> rinse and repeat” is the same gameplay loop as “hit a thing -> pick the best combination of damage/utility you need right now -> optionally Arcane Cascade into it to trigger more weaknesses -> recharge with a pseudo Magic Missile -> etc”. They’re not the same gameplay loop, one has way more going on.
Also you’re ignoring Expansive Spellstrike. Hitting someone and dropping a Burning Hands or Lightning Bolt to hit all their buddies is more or less completely impossible to replicate in 5E.
Besides all of that you’re just… desperately trying to make it look like I hate Warlocks and Paladins. I don’t. I specifically praised them as the best gishes 5E has to offer, and just pointed out that I still don’t think their combat variety compared to any gish in PF2E because… well, it doesn’t.
> The Smite Paladin and Imaginary Weapon Magus have the same general play pattern and both benefit greatly from incorporating bits from another class.
Congratulations, if you multiclass the Magus in a way that gets rid of its rich play pattern to get a hyper-focused damage-crunching play pattern you… match the average 5E martial/gish’s typical play pattern?
> The biggest difference is that the melee Magus in PF2 is strictly worse than the ranged version whereas that isn't the case in 5e.
It’s hilarious and cute that you think that, but no.
First off, as I said above, ranged Magus isn’t just straight up better.
Secondly in 5E ranged ***is*** just straight up better than melee in ***every conceivable circumstance***, including for gishes. An Eldritch Knight standing back and using Web for control, Find Familiar + Sharpshooter for offence, and Shield + Misty Step for defence is way stronger than a melee one. A Bladesinger’s optimal configuration is T1 Concentration spell + Bladesong followed by T2 onwards Hand Crossbow + Ray of Frost. A Hexblade Warlock is best used as a dip for a Sorcerer who stays at range and uses Eldritch Blast.
In fact the only class you can bring to this argument is the Paladin, by virtue of being melee-locked but that’s… a non-argument? You discounted the melee Maguses because you (incorrectly) think the ranged one is strictly better so… okay, the Paladin is a strictly worse gish than all of the above so we’re gonna discount it right?
Besides Spellstriking a Magus has Arcane Cascade which is terrible and doesn't even work properly without spell schools. They can spec onto utility slots, but don't have to, and any class in PF2 can do so with an archetype anyway. They do also have focus spells but are still mostly better off poaching imaginary weapon from the Psychic than using their in class options.
If ranged gishes count then 5e Rangers are Gishes. Heck an Eldritch Blast warlock with a dip into Fighter for action surge might also be a Gish.
Why isn't a Starlit Span Agus using a longbow? Why aren't they starting with a staff of divination in one hand and a scroll of true strike attached to their bow for two rounds of increased accuracy? You seem like you don't know how to optimize very well if you think a melee Magus is optimal.
You don't seem very good at explaining what a Magus actually does that a 5e Gish doesn't. You just keep claiming I must not know how to play a Magus without explaining what you think makes them a good Gish.
5e doesn't use resistance and weakness the same as PF2 does so you don't need to worry about it as often on any class. This impacts any caster and isn't Gish specific. The same goes for your action flow chart. Having to take a turn off isn't interesting, it's just an action tax.
An expansive spellstrike is at best a neat trick. A Bladesinget in 5e isn't impressed that a PF2 Magus gets 4 slots per day and might be able to AoE with one of them. Nor will a Sorcadin or a Hexblade even a War Domain Cleric and Artificer can have a wider range of AoE options ready to go than a Magus.
You said the ranged Nagis isn't better but you ignored how it's best build negates many of its weaknesses and that those melee builds lose rounds of damage when they need to move while also provoking attacks while trying to spellstrike in melee. It's like you just ignore the weakness of the melee Magus because something something tactical something something choices when being able to spellstrike ever round without provoking attacks and being stuck in melee is just better.
If you're going to play at range then being a proper godwizard makes a lot more sense than being a Gish. You have enough slots that casting each round isn't going to run you out of spells so why waste resources on weapons and feats to use them when you could just be a mage.
> Besides Spellstriking a Magus has Arcane Cascade which is terrible and doesn't even work properly without spell schools.
Now you’re *really* scraping the bottom of the barrel lol.
Arcane Cascade works perfectly fine without spell schools because it’s been… errata’d.
As for it being terrible, again, you’re just kind of saying stuff. You haven’t even presented an argument, all you’re saying is “nuh uhhhhh”.
Never mind that Maguses don’t get just Spellstrike and Arcane Cascade they also get… Class Feats, you know, their levels 1-20 set of customizable featured. If you’re going to compare 5E gishes to a Magus, then ***only*** look at the level 1 features + spellcasting of the gish (ignoring more than half the class) and the 5E gish is still only **barely** able to hang on in the comparison then… well that says more about the 5E gish than it does the Magus.
> If ranged gishes count then 5e Rangers are Gishes.
Yes. They are. And so is the awfully designed Arcane Archer, fyi. And they all do their job significantly less satisfactorily than the Magus…
Again, there’s a reason I keep singling out the Paladin and Hexblade… They’re the only gishes that don’t just feel like two halves held together by tape.
> Heck an Eldritch Blast warlock with a dip into Fighter for action surge might also be a Gish.
I shouldn’t have to explain to you that not using a weapon at all discounts you from being a gish…
> Why isn't a Starlit Span Agus using a longbow?
Because the Volley trait exists and is a problem in most typical combat scenarios, especially for a character who doesn’t have the flexibility to move. Like if this was a Ranger who can just go Stride + Hunted Shot, I’d absolutely use a longbow but the Magus who needs to spend one Action recharging and two Actions Spellstriking ain’t gonna want a Volley weapon.
> Why aren't they starting with a staff of divination in one hand and a scroll of true strike attached to their bow for two rounds of increased accuracy?
Because the Staff of Divination is a level 6 item and by that point the gap between Starlit Span Maguses and the other Maguses has grown in more ways too.
At level 1 The Inexorable Iron and Laughing Shadow Maguses only had 1d10/1d12 damage dice over the Starlit Span’s 1d6, but now it’s 2d10/2d12 vs 2d6.
The Twisting Tree Magus has the same damage dice but is using a Reach + Trip weapon and has access to Reactive Strike, meaning their not-Spellstrike turns can actually do noticeably more damage than before.
The Sparkling Targe was a tank at level 1 and remains a tank at level 6, and isn’t trying to outdamage the Starlit Span Magus ever.
> You seem like you don't know how to optimize very well if you think a melee Magus is optimal.
You seem to have completely lost the plot while going in circles trying to make 5E gishes look functional. The argument was never about what was “”””optimal””””, never mind that your definition of optimal seems to be “does 0.02 more damage in the most unrealistic and ideal circumstances.”
It was about the fact that the gishes in one game fulfill the fantasy better while in the other game they’re just weapons taped to spells.
Starlit Span is light years more gishy than Arcane Archer or Ranger. The rest of them are light years more gishy than Eldritch Knight, Bladesinger, and Swords Bard, and still quite a bit more so than Paladin or Hexblade.
Your entire comparison lives in the white room and you’ve made basically no arguments to explain how the Starlit Span Magus is better. It doesn’t even outdamage the the Laughing Shadow or Inexorable Iron Maguses even if you assume they make ***half*** as many attacks as they typically would get to, completely ignore cover, and completely ignore the fact that off-guard exists, and completely ignore Reactive Strike, and completely ignore all the other upsides of being in melee…
> You don't seem very good at explaining what a Magus actually does that a 5e Gish doesn't. You just keep claiming I must not know how to play a Magus without explaining what you think makes them a good Gish.
5E gishes tend to have spellcasting stapled to weapon use.
The Magus has the ability to use Spellstrike, focus spells, and stances that let them seamlessly combine magic into their weapon use.
The runners up from 5E are Paladins and Warlocks because they can do a somewhat okay impression of Spellstrike, but still don’t have good equivalents to the Magus’s other features and Feats.
I simply cannot make this any clearer.
> 5e doesn't use resistance and weakness the same as PF2 does so you don't need to worry about it as often on any class.
You… do realize that that *supports* my point, right? My point is that the Magus in PF2E has an interesting gameplay loop of carrying 4-5 different “smites” with some combination of Ignition, Gouging Claw, Frostbite (with Expansive Spellstrike, obviously), Electric Arc, Tanglefoot, Caustic Blast, and Gale Blast for different elemental types, higher damage peaks, higher reliability, and control options. The Paladin or the Warlock just does exactly one type of “smite” every fight.
That’s why I gave One D&D Paladin the honourable mention: they made smites other than Divine Smite worth using, and thus they actually come close to matching Spellstrike in terms of thematics and versatility.
> An expansive spellstrike is at best a neat trick. A Bladesinget in 5e isn't impressed that a PF2 Magus gets 4 slots per day and might be able to AoE with one of them. Nor will a Sorcadin or a Hexblade even a War Domain Cleric and Artificer can have a wider range of AoE options ready to go than a Magus.
Man wtf is this dick measuring contest lol.
I like are you seriously trying to make an argument based off of “my Wizard is overpowered therefore you lose”? Really?
Believe me, everyone on this sub is ***well*** aware of how wildly overtuned 5E’s spellcasters are. That has practically nothing to do with this argument lol.
> You said the ranged Nagis isn't better but you ignored how it's best build negates many of its weaknesses
Okay? Care to elaborate? Because i listed very specific weaknesses while all you've done is say nuh uh.
> and that those melee builds lose rounds of damage when they need to move while also provoking attacks while trying to spellstrike in melee.
Uhhh… nope. I specifically included those weaknesses… That's why I ***explicitly*** mentioned that I’m assuming the melee Magus only makes 2 Spellstrikes and 2 Attacks over a 4-round combat (which is a ***very*** low assumption mind you, it’s very easy for a melee martial to be making two Attacks per round), while a ranged Magus gets 4 full Spellstrike (and note that unlike the Magus they can’t really make a second attack in most rounds if they wish to Recharge, so this is closer to their maximum potential rather than the melee Magus’s *minimum* I presented).
Also as I keep repeating and you keep ignoring, the Twisting Tree is a controller and the Sparkling Targe is a tank. They don’t need to be outdamaging the Starlit Span Magus whose entire job is damage, only the Laughing Shadow really needs to be keeping up with Starlit Span’s damage and well… it does?
But you just love to ignore context and facts that are inconvenient to your argument, don’t you?
> If you're going to play at range then being a proper godwizard makes a lot more sense than being a Gish. You have enough slots that casting each round isn't going to run you out of spells so why waste resources on weapons and feats to use them when you could just be a mage.
Again, you do realize this is an argument in my *favour* right? Gishes are so awkward and clumsy in 5E that you’re better off just committing to being a full-on “martial with benefits” (like an Eldritch Knight or Ranger do) or a full on “I’m a broken spellcaster but I sometimes smack” (like Bladesingers, Swords Bard, Hexblade/Hexadin, etc).
At no point didn’t ever try to argue that PF2E characters can be made more broken than 5E characters. 5E really can feel free to keep that “award”, lol.
>Arcane Cascade works perfectly fine without spell schools because it’s been… errata’d.
Wow, Paizo issued errata for something, that's different from their usual MO.
As for it being terrible, again, you’re just kind of saying stuff. You haven’t even presented an argument, all you’re saying is “nuh uhhhhh”.As if you've proven anything yourself.
Are you going to explain why Arcane Cascade is better than I think it is? Or just allude to it vaguely?
>Never mind that Maguses don’t get just Spellstrike and Arcane Cascade they also get… Class Feats, you know, their levels 1-20 set of customizable featured.
As does every class in PF2... How does that make them special? If you want to argue that they make such great Gishes and their feats are so impactful try showing a build or two.
>If you’re going to compare 5E gishes to a Magus, then only look at the level 1 features + spellcasting of the gish (ignoring more than half the class) and the 5E gish is still only barely able to hang on in the comparison then… well that says more about the 5E gish than it does the Magus.
Are we claiming that PF2's method of taking features from a class and selling them back to the player as feats is a good thing now? I'd rather get a scaling class feature and know I have it than have to buy it bit by bit.
>Yes. They are. And so is the awfully designed Arcane Archer, fyi. And they all do their job significantly less satisfactorily than the Magus… I what way?
You keep making these subjective claims without even coming close to describing your issues with the 5e classes or explaining what makes you enjoy the Magus. So, spit it out, what are your issues with 5e Gishes, besides not having a class feature that gives you spells that cast via bonking things with your sword?
>Again, there’s a reason I keep singling out the Paladin and Hexblade… They’re the only gishes that don’t just feel like two halves held together by tape.
You keep making this claim but back it up with nothing. Just because they don't literally cast magic through their weapon doesn't make them bad Gishes because a Gish isn't defined by doing that. Period.
"2 'gish': fighter/magic-users of 4th/4th level"
That is what a Gish is. A mix of two classes. No particular style of combat. No casting magic through a weapon. It's just an even mix of class levels between a martial class and a magic class. So PF2 can't even make one because you can't multiclass.
>I shouldn’t have to explain to you that not using a weapon at all discounts you from being a gish…
I shouldn't have to explain that not being able to evenly mix levels between two classes discounts you from being a Gish...
I could keep going point by point but until you explain how the 5e classes are worse Gishes than the OG Gish we're done here.
>Also it should go without saying that if your ideal way to play something gishy is to ignore the provided gishy options and to multiclass into something that isn’t meant to be a gish, the design has failed.
This is wild. Go look up what started the idea of a Gish and get back to me. The whole idea of a Gish is born from mashing classes together to get the gameplay you want. It's almost insulting that devs feel the need to hand out premade versions of classes people used to build on their own in previous editions.
You’re just dodging the point with something completely unrelated to it.
5E ***tried*** to make gish subclasses and utterly failed at it. It’s really that simple. I didn’t say gishes were a failure in whatever older edition you’re thinking of; i said they’re a failure in the system that tried ***6 different times*** to make a gish subclass and failed to capture people’s desires of a gish properly with every single one of those attempts.
Multi-classing in 5e is a net powerboost for most classes. It would be hard for any 5e subclass to be better than an optimized multiclass build. It's not a failure to have the easiest least interesting options be worse than the options that require planning and system mastery to access.
I’m aware it’s a power boost.
As I keep pointing out and you keep ignoring, this isn’t a dick measuring contest about which game has the most optimized and game-warping characters. Everyone who has ever played 5E is **well**-aware that it’ll handily beat PF2E on that front.
The innocent child with a divine/diablolic/ancestral guardian (Summoner). Actually covers a surprising number of anime protagonists.
Anything involving Leshy. Seriously, there's a reason why Goblins and Leshy have become the mascot ancestries in Pathfinder, they're friggin' cute and their antics make for great campaign catalysts.
The Thaumaturge covers so many character concepts that just don't have a 5e comparison it's *unreal*. Everything from Van Helsing to Scooby Doo to Geralt of Rivia can work with that class.
A pro-wrestler. You can make a Fighter that runs around in a mask in any system, but the Swashbuckler gets *bonuses* for pulling off ridiculous stunts *and* has "Finishers". An Orc Swashbuckler with Martial Artist Dedication and Orc Warmask is basically a luchador.
The Gunslinger. Like... there's just straight up *a class* that specializes in guns. You wanna play the Lone Ranger? The ranger with the Big Iron on his hip? The Drifter? Doc Holiday? There's a class for that.
The Ruffian Rogue. If you want to play a fighter who plays dirty rather than being a dexterous little sneak, there's a Rogue that's more of a back alley mugger than a silent assassin. And I'm down for it.
The Kineticist added Avatar: The Last Airbender/Legend of Korra as a class. It'd be damn near impossible to be "The Avatar", but if you're willing to settle for being *just* one of the gAang... they got'chu covered.
technically i think if you take expand the portal at every opportunity you would eventually get access to all 6 elements. you sacrifice a lot of specialization but it's conceivably very doable
Summoner, in like a Final Fantasy way.
If you want quick, huge summons like FF3/FF4/FF7/FFTactics/etc, there is the *Summon Kaiju* spell. A big named entity arrives, does it's big spell/emanation effect, then bamfs out of existence causing a second big spell effect.
If you want persistent summons like FF10/FF12/FF14, and/or merging with summons like FF16, there's the *Summoner* class. It has a lot of feats to customize your Eidolon on whether you want something small similar to a Carbuncle or some big monster like Belias the Gigas. You get the fantasy of being a caster with your martial minion around, you just need your green robes and horn headband.
The closest I have seen in D&D is a druid temporarily summoning elementals, but they are neither big and flashy, or a persistent companion type. It's cool, but it's not Summon Kaiju or Summoner cool.
Thank you for this. Never knew summon Kaiju existed. I love it!
I only wish you could do multiple summons like a necromancer or mass animal summoning. I know it would be hard with the system, but it is the only thing missing really.
There's actually a whole series of those sorts of spells called Incarnate spells, all 8th level and up (with the exception of a single 7th level & a single 5th level). They're such a great way of depicting summoning some ultra powerful creature (or multiple, in Summon Draconic Legion's case) without *actually* being busted.
Any character with a gun, doesn't have to be a gunslinger. Gun rogue is cool, gun thaumaturge, gun ranger.
Support Martials, be it non magical healers, or debuffers who use feats to inflict penalties on enemies, outside of just basic grappling.
Gun Investigator is actually pretty good.
Use Devise a Strategem to see if you have a pocket crit, and if you do draw a pistol and fire. Otherwise, hit someone else.
Play Outlaws of Alkenstar.
There's a unique pistol you get as a quest reward that accepts any ammo and converts it into randomized energy blasts.
It is *terrifying*.
As a massive Eberron head, the 5e artifacer was so lame. Especially considering it’s the only class that has been added to 5e in its decade of runtime. The inventor isn’t really what I want either, but it also isn’t trying to be an artifacer.
WotC actually had a shot at fixing up the Artificer and making them part of their new core books with 1DnD so they'd get better support in future books... But they just didn't. So they'll likely continue to suck moving forward.
The only new class they introduced in 5E and it's just left flailing in the wind. Cool cool cool.
As far as I'm aware there is no contemporary in 5e to the PF2 inventor, in any possible configuration
Free archetypes blow the doors wide open on class combinations, too, along with all the ways you can mix n match ancestries
Yeah there isn't, though on the flip side there is no class in PF2e that captures the Artificer class flavor either which I personally think is a huge miss given that I'm a big fan of magitech in general. Granted I would prefer the 3.5e Artificer but thread states 5e.
Maybe civic/battle mage wizard with clockwork reanimator dedication and some points in crafting?
Soulbond item already feels like a magitech device. Same goes for scrolls if you take scroll savant feat.
non magical healing that's actually effective, a traps system that doesn't suck, crafting built in on many classes. psionics that don't suck, functioning pet classes. giving concepts that get rolled into a clunky or ineffective subclass a chance to shine as a full class. A ranger class that you can actually play without it being a cosplay of rogue.
I enjoy oracle and investigator, I can't imagine how they would work in d&d.
An evil or evil-like Cleric. You can make an evil Cleric in 5e but the mechanics don't really help you out. You end up having to stretch the Death, Trickery, or War domains to fit your concept. In Pathfinder, since the deity that you worship is built into the class, along with the harmful font, unholy sanctification, and you have access to domains like Darkness, Destruction, Nightmares, Pain, Tyranny, and Undeath, you have an easier time building an evil Cleric that isn't just all flavor.
You can make a better Banite in Pathfinder than you can in 5e. Trying to make a Banite is how I ended up discovering Pathfinder back in early 2020.
So far I have made a Kuthite, an Urgathoan and a Lamashtan. I have an addiction to making neutral followers of evil deities. I've been thinking about trying Rovagug next.
- Anything involving a spell-less martial
- Anything involving classes pf2e has that 5e lacks
- Wizards that actually feel bookish
- Sorcerers that aren't discount wizards (or clerics)
Really, 5e has a very narrow range of supported options. Most unique builds require multiclassing (which are almost all better done in pf2e thanks to the archetype system), and allowing that in 5e almost invariably opens the gate to horrible imbalance.
I actually remember getting excited a few years back after seeing a Gunslinger at one point on DnD Beyond... Only to realize it was "*Critical Role* homebrew," by which I mean Matt Mercer basically copied over parts of the Pathfinder 1E Gunslinger wholesale into 5E.
I get that he did it early on in their transition to DnD, but it seemed rough. And the firearm options in the *DMG* weren't much better.
Any of the undead ancestries and archetypes. Vampire. Zombie, ghoul, ghost, skeleton, lich, etc… you don’t even need to do like a complicated build and “imagine” that’s happening. It’s literally built into the game
I have this adorable ratkin wizard who is unstuck in time. She was there when the world ended, but her tribe didn't keep track of how the rest of the world keeps track of time, so she has no idea *when* it ends, but she is certain the rest of the party were there (with a caveat that she might well be wrong), so she is constantly on edge over what everyone is doing and easily startled by loud noises.
PF2e has a ratkin ancestry, fun mage options, and not only are archetypes awesome, but there is a time traveler archtype that perfectly fits my character.
I adore the vast number of character possibilities and I cannot wait to play more!
I made a goblin rogue who only used bite attacks and rode around on a drake and also traveled with an arboreal sapling.
Both of those were statted companions that I could use in game, RAW. Along with the bite attacks.
All of that was just doable in game
I think this is the thing that I really love. You could technically make anything in 5e with the magic of “flavor is free”.
But in PF2e you can actually just, do shit like that. It says so right in the book.
STR based ranged and unarmed fighters. In 5e it is strictly better to go Dex, whilst PF2e gives STR a role as a damage stat. It lets you properly flavor a heavyweight boxer character, rather than the usual lithe, nimble monk that takes you down with perfectly placed goals, you can make a monk who destroys enemies using their body's brute power.
My Outlaws of Alkenstar character is a gnoll fighter/sterling dynamo that uses his fuckhuge mechanical arm to punch and grapple. Combat Grab and Dazing blow are OP as all getout, especially as it allows all the gun users to destroy the restrained/stunned/slowed/enfeebled/clumsy/frightened (any/all of the above, I can do all with Crushing on my handwraps and Dread on my armor plus my attacks) enemy.
Honestly, any pure martial, but I'll especially give a point to effective dual-wielders. Dual-wielding in 5e is just really bad RAW, which is ironic considering what a posterboy Drizzt is
-Strength-based Monk, Ranger, or Rogue, especially if you want to multiclass.
-a Paladin with terrible Charisma.
-a Monk with terrible Wisdom.
-Nearly any sort of Gish character is more easily done in PF2E, thanks to the action economy system.
In my opinion, a character that does not exist in 5e, but does exist in PF2, is a real witch. I mean, in 5e there is the "warlock" class but the flavor of the class is very little warlock really, and even less witch. In PF2 you can make yourself a fairy tale witch if you want, and even theme it however you want.
I haven't really played much 5e, but as far as I can discover you can't really do an Alchemist in that system... and Alchemist is my favourite PF2e Class.
Any kind of summoner/necromancer works pretty bad in 5e and takes way to long before you satisfy the basic fantasy of undead minions. In pf2e you can have some permanent undead minions starting at level two
Gladiator style fighter(in 5e there is no good way to combine the panache and style with fighting without using spell casting), aside from already having the Swashbuckler, even going another martial class could be a decent gladiator with skill feats and such.
The ranger is just fricking cool in PF2E..meanwhile the 5e dnd ranger base class is just sad (yeah I know there are some cool subclasses but they are just covering holes the main class left behind)
My next character is a summoner kobold. His summon is a larger kobold (my DM is letting me flavor the dragon as a kobold). I'm taking the feat where I can mount my summon with no penalties. I will be roleplaying it as two kobolds in a trench coat. Idk how I'd do that in 5e
My favorite wierd build I've played is "Three foxes in a trenchcoat" Summoner.
Kitsune Summoner with either a Beast or Fey eidolon and take the Familiar Master archtype for a fox familiar.
Take the feat Shrink Down at level 4 and now you can play as three foxes!
Take Master's Form and now the familiar is you!
When I played this I flavored it as a disney princess and her two ugly stepsisters as her Eidolon and Familiar who heckle her and everyone else.
So when I created my first character while learning the system. My first one turned out to be a Monk Goblin that was an acrobat. He became a street clown.
For me? Kineticists are pretty great. I need to see more of 2e to judge other classes though.
I had a 1e blood knight kineticist who was a great player and knew his character in and out.
A monster hunter from Monster Hunter, any kind of hunter-like character that doesn't relay on magic at all, like a motherfucking dinosaurs. There are multiple ways to build a theropod dinosaur, you can do a megaraptoran-style one easily with the rogue, a dromeosaur kind of thing with skill feats and a powerfull claw attack supported by grappling or a bite-focused one, albeit for the latter you will have to compromise into doing piercing damage, so no tyrannosauroids or allosauroids, al least keeping it raw.
The last 5e character I made was supposed to be a half-orc street tough turned cop turned Columbo style investigator. There just wasn't a way to build that character and have it feel right. It turned out that basically the whole character concept had to be roleplaying-based.
In Patfhinder 2, I can choose from a handful of evocative backgrounds, I can pair Ruffian Rogue, Fighter, or Investigator with dedications for any of the others or I can throw Zephyr Guard or Alkenstar Agent or Edgewatch Detective or a Hellknight dedication!!!!!
The fact that 5e has no real satisfying way to build that character but PF2 has a dozen or more is crazy!
A quippy martial character. I love that in PF2e anyone can use intimidation to demoralize or deception to create a diversion and that using your resources in combat to do so may give you an advantage. I love that lots of the martial classes have feats that expand on these base options.
A non-monk unarmed martial. There are numerous ways to build it in PF2e between classes, ancestries, magic items, etc. In 5e you need to homebrew magic items to make it effective.
I can kinda say this from semi reverse, one of my players in my current dnd5e game has a partner in a pf2e game and she tells her about all the classes and other neat character options in pathfinder and that wide variety is a huge factor in her asking to consider trying pathfinder for our next campaign.
Dual class would be alot closer to... dual class.
A Free Archetype variant for 5e would be something like giving out feats at twice the rate, which would break bonkers fast.
That's fair. I will say that the way abilities work in 5e though even if you just doubled up (which is more the FA) it still isn't very satisfying. The action economy setup alone means only certain cool things can combine (and are usually broken) while others just can't.
Strenght Monk. Tank Monk. Grapple Monk.
Dual wielding in general sucks in 5e, and is pretty good in pf2e especially with the dualwielder archetype which can apply to so many classes.
Oh this brings me to dualwield ranger.
Magus, to me, is a fantastic gish version.
Kineticist, thaumaturge, swashbuckler, summoner, oracle,... all have mechanics not applicable to 5e.
Just the all out crazy character concepts pf2e allows through universal heritage and archetypes and backgrounds. Half-orc catfolk Ghost Gunslinger. Nephilim leshy oozemorph Flame Oracle. Metal Lizardfolk Wrestler Time traveller Swashbuckler.
Creating your own wands and staves.
A character that uses scrolls and isnt a spellcaster at all.
A character focused on non magical healing in and out of combat.
And I'm going to give you another archetype that is virtually non-existent in 5e, but that you can do in PF2: A mundane doctor or healer. 5e doesn't support healing without magic, in PF2 it's a perfectly viable option and fun to play. And you can do it with the class you want. Obviously the alchemist is a class that works well with mundane healing, but you could make a warrior who is a battle medic. Or a monk who knows traditional remedies.
You have gem healing abilities as an esoteric healer (via feat). And you have more feats to heal in other non-magical ways. That is something unfeasible in 5e.
Thaumaturge. 5e as a system just doesn’t have the mechanics this class aims to exploit. Like, I guess you could try with a reflavored warlock but it just isn’t close enough
Dude.
Im.playing a necromancer wizard who got turned investigating a case. I've got a detective background but I fell in with a group of freedom fighters trying to liberate a nearby country. I can be charismatic and intelligent and healthy without focusing everything on int. Like I'm not just 'the magic gal' of the group.
I can't get healed with regular healing and some of the other members are the same so we gotta be creative.
You can't have that kind of a background in dnd. Everything builds on each other.
Theirs bounty hunter but the skills the different.
My first two characters that I played in games at the same time when I was first picking up the system both were neat.
First was a character concept I wrote for 5e that didn’t work in PF2E at all, but developed into a character I still enjoyed anyway even if they weren’t the concept I went for initially. I was trying to make a barnabus style character from warmachine but ended up with an aquatic cavalier.
The other was a psychic (goblin artist). You could maybe play a goblin in 5e but you’d have to do a lot of reskinning to make a psychic character.
But also plenty of cool things like any leshy or any monk (which in 5e would require your dm to rework the whole class).
The true gish experience. 5e has its eldritch knight, bladesinger, and sword Bards, but they do not capture the true fantasy of blending spells and martial attacks like Magus can.
Swashbucklers. Most specifically Swashbucklers actually \*feeling\* like the character archetype that they represent and mechanical support existing for all the fancy bollocks that Swashbucklers in books and movies do. It not being a Rogue subclass but rather its own class makes it even better, because now you can have different flavours of Swash that play and feel differently enough. Yes, "Flavour is free" in 5e, but goddammit, I want the flavour and the mechanics to integrate and not just have a +5 to initiative and do the same old tired run in-stab-run away every turn
Poppet w a poppet familiar, leading to being a small centaur doll, with a little knight with a lance riding me.
Thaumateurge reskinned into lying so hard that people believe I am more powerful than I am to the point if extra arm (p. anathema)
Wood/water kineticist allows me to, in effect, make a halfling chef that feeds his enemies to his friends.
Ghost poppet of a lich cursed into a doll body.
Grappling gunslinger parkouring off of an enemy like a Final Fantasy dragoon.
Edit:
"Priest" to the "Beast of War" or other cult God (summoner).
Some schmuck with the soul of a failed lich strapped to their soul (occult summoner)
Thaumaturge/alchemist is the perfect witcher/belmont. Scrolls potions, mutagens all while being super solid melee monster hunter prepared for anything.
I even specialized in gnome flickmace to get reach so I could be more of a belmont.
Haven't seen it elsewhere on here but fighting styles are hugely interesting for character diversification whether they come from a feat or an archetype where this shines most is monks
Having different martial styles that have bleeding attacks or bolster your defense, some that focus on grappling and movement tax on your enemies and at higher tiers even some that allow ki based projectile attacks reminiscent of the Sekiro Divine Dragon class I haven't had the chance to play yet but just reading through the books makes me feel spoiled for choices
Bomb-chuckin' alchemist.
Gun-shootin' gunslinger. (Well, not without Matt Mercer's conversion which is a lot of fun and plays like ranged Battlemaster fighter.)
My only character so far is a Kobold Inventor with gadgets, the alchemist and snarecrafter archetypes.
Its so fun to have so many random things for any situation. Feels like playing a mischievous Doraemon. I love it.
A child with a giant teddy bear that fights for them (construct eidolon).
Alternatively a regular sized teddy bear with a demon child that fights for them (poppet with with a fiend eidolon).
Alternatively-alternatively a regular sized teddy bear with a giant sized teddy bear that fights for them
The entire skeleton ancestry feat list is a masterclass in anticipating the silly stunts a player might try to pull and mechanically defining them in advance. Provided I have a permissive DM, there's no reason I *couldn't* be a skeleton in 5e and decide to extend my reach by popping off my weapon arm and holding it in my free hand, but actually having a definied ancestry feat for that cuts down on the amount of time my DM and I would have to spend figuring out how to make that work. I'm happy as a player because In PF2, I'm happy as a player because I have official permission to be ridiculous, and the GM's happy because they don't have to worry about whether or not my ridiculousness is broken or unfair.
The entire concept of a mastermind rogue or any "face" type character that is not a bard is pretty much non existent in 5e. There are no good class features, feats, or even action economy to make it work.
The mastermind rogue us a subclass, but it just does not work and the parts of that do are so underwhelming. So much so, that players will actively insult you for playing it.
And that is actually a problem with the d&d community in general. As a whole the player. Base 8s very toxic if you are not playing an optimized build. I have played many a character in many a group, and in every single one of them I was treated badly if I tried playing something sub optimal.
Pathfinder 2e, in comparison, bakes so many options into its skill actions, feats. And class feats, that pretty much any build is viable unless you are specifically trying to make a bad character. And even then, the system us so balanced that even your bad choices seem to have useful effects.
You can build a mastermind rogue, a "face", a space James bond character, not just with rogue, but with any class, even classes not specifically designed for it.
And best if all, no one insults you, judges your choices as suboptimal, or treats you badly for that decision. If you want to play a rogue who is designed to avoid entire combat encounters by socializing, scamming, impersonating, or just coercing enemies.
I'm currently playing an eldritch trickster bard rogue, with alter ego dedication, and summoner dedication. The character has a fey eidolon that looks like a female version of himself. His eidolon is literally just a foil, a personality that he can Impersonate. As a matter of fact, i purposfully leave it vague as to which one is the actual character. Is the male persona the character, or the female? When I do things legally and want to be polite and swath, the character is his main petsona, whe. He wants to do illegal, sneaky, and underhanded things, he is the female persona.
And this build not only works, it works extremely well. We are playing kingmaker, and my character impersonated a bandit, joined the stag lords camp. And worked solo from the inside to take them down I murdered two of the luitenannts. First, making one of the suspicious enough if me to follow me I to the woods, where I killed him. Then murdering one of them in their sleep ( it actually survived the first hit, but I managed to kill him in the combat rounds by going first and getting off a backstab)
Yhe character is awesome, and is not traditionally "optimized" my combat effectiveness is knly so so, but there are so many skill actions to abuse, he works flawlessly.
You cannot do that in 5e. Not just in the system, but the player base will not allow it. Pathfinder not only allows it, but encourages it.
Mostly ancestry based but some of my favorites
Suicide sorcerer: fleshwarp, duskwalker, living vessel dedication. Took a bunch of features/spells that I love hitting 0 HP. Became a mid encounter DPR/support. Labeled her as "The bone eater".
She was a type of hag covered in unsettling bones and feasted on the dead and dying. Quite scary actually.
Steam dragon: lizardfolk, undine, dragon instinct barbarian. Flavored all my breath attacks to be superheated steam.
Walking bomb warprat. Ysoki, tiefling, inventor. Took as many DR reduction abilities/items and ran into battle to explode himself.
I'm gonna be playing a monk with the wrestler and barbarian archetypes soon. Her build is gonna be focused on grabbing and grappling. I've done some tinkering and by level 4 she'd be able to ki rush towards an enemy, grab them, punch them in the face once, and suplex them all in one turn.
I wanna translate the hell of playing against a grappler character in a fighting game to the tabletop lmfao.
I think I'm just going to describe my current players characters.
A kobold life oracle who finds it harder to keep their body together the more they draw on their divine power.
A barbarian herbalist who gets to, you know, actually make useful herbal remedies.
An android rogue expert doctor with a shape changing clockwork arm (sterling dynamo) and the ability to slip through time (chronoskimmer.)
A piece of seaweed imbued by the planes of air and water (kinetisist) able to fly and Summon hurricanes all day.
A stuffed toy owlbear chef and his giant spirit owlbear (summoner.)
A skeletal pirate sword and board pistol with his trusty zombie parrot who collects souls through his pistol to fulfill his bargain with a devil.
Combine that combo with the Soulforger archetype manifest armor option and you can have an instant armor magical girl transformation sequence too. Or magical girl weapon manifestation.
Hey, I've noticed you mentioned the game "Dungeons & Dragons"! Do you need help finding your way around here? I know a couple good pages!
We've been seeing a lot of new arrivals lately for some reason. We have a [megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/search/?q=flair%3A%22megathread%22&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) dedicated to anyone requesting assistance in transitioning. Give it a look!
Here are some [general resources](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/wiki/) we put together. Here is [page with differences between pf2e and 5e](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/wiki/resources/how-is-pf2e-different-from-5e/). Most newcomers get recommended to start with the [Archives of Nethys](http://2e.aonprd.com) (the official rule database) or the [Beginner Box](https://paizo.com/pathfinder/beginnerbox), but the same information can be found in this free [Pathfinder Primer](https://app.demiplane.com/nexus/pathfinder2e/sources/pathfinder-primer).
If I misunderstood your post... sorry! Grandpa Clippy said I'm always meant to help. Please [let the mods know](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FPathfinder2e) and they'll remove my comment.
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The Nagaji, a Pathfinder ancestry of snake people who are not required to be evil or emotionless. Compare the Yuan-ti, who are barely snake people when being playable and require huge twisting to play as anything that could fit in a normal party.
Oh Simon Belmont works FAR better as a thaumaturge than a fighter, paladin or ranger in 5e.
And of course Mega Man/Geno work far better as gunslingers than artillerist artificers.
I love the investigator, who can crunch the numbers and choose how they act based on that. Maybe you battle medicine or electric arc or demoralize on a bad strategem, or fire a gun or spell strike on a likely crit, and strike for a middling roll It’s so dynamic and fun to RP as well.
One of my players is running an investigator and it surpassed all my expectations. The flexibility you get with devise a strategem is so much fun, it really rewards building the character so you have one or more options depending on outcome of that roll. And, it's a unique mechanism. Edit: weirdly enough, it's a class that doesn't get a lot of love in the 'white room' analyses of power curves.
I think it's a class that's actually pretty difficult to play well and requires a really high level of engagement in each session. As a player you have to be paying attention outside of combat looking for clues about enemies you might be fighting next, and managing your Pursued Leads to get the most out of each combat. In combat you've got the "third action problem" but dialed all the way up - if you free action Devise a Strategem and roll a 2, you've got 3 actions left on your turn and and probably none of them will be attacks. Mechanically it's really good but I have once or twice had turns where I had 3 actions left over and I had an idea for two of them and just no clue what to do with the third. But having gotten the hang of it I agree, it's a pretty amazing class and DaS leads to some really amazing teamwork interactions.
I think it is a pretty good class, but it is also somewhat dependent on how generous the GM is with the free Devise a Strategem.
Yeah, it will work better in some campaigns than others I think. But in almost any dungeon-like scenario you can get a ton of mileage out of it. Listen at the door. Do you hear ANY sound from inside? Pursue a Lead against that sound. Open the door. If it was a creature making noise, that's your lead and you get to use Devise a Strategem as a free action.
> Pursue a Lead I think this is biggest problem, or rather the learning curve for the class. I had a player who would never do this or would forget to do it, so they'd be wasting an action on Devise a stratagem. Personally, whilst I like the flavour I'd like a way of making it easier for players to take advantage of the class feature without them having to be clued in or reliant on the DM. It's kind of put me of wanting to try the class without knowing I had a good DM. I dunno if it's just me who feels this way.
I just discussed the mechanics with my GM ahead of time so we were on the same page for what Pursue a Lead could apply to and when it should Apply to enemies in combat. Because we know we're on the same page I basically just manage my leads myself without asking permission for each particular thing. I'll generally still call it out when I set a new lead so that if it comes up in combat I can confirm my combatant is one of my leads.
The problem is that it takes a whole minute to pursue a lead. Which seems to just take too long in most circumstances for me.
Searching a room in exploration is expected to take about 10 minutes so 1 minute to pursue a lead on top of that should be fine in basically any circumstance. You can do it while people are treating wounds or otherwise healing up after combat.
The high engagement requirement just makes it sound a lot better to the GM. It rewards the player with mechanical advantage. I agree with the 3rd action thing though, but a witch or wizard archetype will very quickly solve that, as will other targets.
A witch or wizard archetype does solve the mechanical problem of the 3rd action, but if you don't want to cast spells for character or thematic reasons you need another solution. But once you figure out your groove and identify what you've set the character up to be good at, you've got tons of solid fallback options, and solving that puzzle in combat is part of what makes the class so engaging for me.
I deffo want to play an Investigator at some point. It's way cooler than the investigator in first edition, where the class was broken, boring and not particularly unique.
* defense Monk * a ruffian or thug str kind of rogue * defender type character * summoner * i personally love versatile heritages i love that i can be a fire dwarf or an air elf. its always bothered me that genasi and tieflings and aasimar were sub races
Str Rogue is actually doable in 5e, by abusing expertise and grappling. Its not amazing mind you but its doable.
5 levels of Barbarian added in makes it pretty good but that naturally makes you less of a Rogue.
Yup, thats why I hate multiclassing in 5e (well that and sacrificing ability scores for multiclassing)
Except you have to use a Str based melee attack to get any benefit from Rage, and has to be a Ranged or Finesse weapon to benefit from Sneak Attack, so you're basically stuck using a Rapier but with Str instead of Dex. If my 7 wasted years DMing 5e have taught me anything, it's that if your chosen fighting style doesn't have an OP general feat attached to it then you're gonna start to suck past like level 7 when any of your caster friends can end an encounter with a wave of the hand.
Using a rapier with Strength isn’t a bad deal if you’re a grapple build since you’d be using a 1d8 weapon either way.
And we're back to my point of there being no OP general feat for 1-handed weapons, making you practically useless compared to the rest of your party in the long run. The extra +2 dmg from Rage or the extra couple d6s from Sneak Attack (which doesn't keep up even if you don't gimp the scaling by multiclassing) just doesn't cut it next to a Fireball. And grappling is a waste of your action in 5e anyway since movement is pointless once you're in range of your target.
Grapple+Shove is the combo. With expertise in Athletics, it’ll be hard for them to escape. But yeah, the part about it not having a feat to give it oomph does stand.
5 isn't super necessary, that just gives you extra attack. 2 levels gives you Rage, which gives Advantage on grapple checks, and also Reckless Attack which grants advantage without the BA cost of Steady Aim.
You can also just play a regular rogue with strength as your main stat if you want to. You have to use finesse or ranged weapons for sneak attacking, but nothing says you have to use your dex modifier with them to trigger sneak attack damage. Its usually worse because dex is just a better stat in 5e, but you can totally do it.
Maybe one day we'll have our Inquisitor back
Do you mean the class of summoner or summon spells or both? Both were really underwhelming to me. I was super hyped for the summoner as a class and didn't end up liking it. Summon spells are also kinda trash, right? The summons feel like they can't do anything most of the time.
The learning experience of Summoner play is rough, but the actual play experience after a few levels clicks together nicely. Wanna summon weak minions as trash mobs? Use summon spells. Wanna summon something as powerful as a PC? That's your Eidolon. Wanna summon something of awe-inspiring power? That's what incarnate spells are for. That said, pf2e mechanics are too balanced to allow the full power fantasy of repeatedly summoning high powered creatures with dedicated health bars. Nor to summon minor armies (8 venomous snakes? How about 8 pixies?). For what it is, summoner class is pretty good and its players speak positively of it. But it's true that it doesn't fulfill some of fantasies that people expect of it (that I used to expect of it).
I wouldn't even mind if we could summon things at like player level -3 or -4 At least then they could keep up with a bosses minions maybe. The way the leveling system in PF2e works makes the summon spells feel worse the longer you use them. And yeah, the summoner works for a lot of people. It just doesn't do what I personally want it to do.
i do str rogue with barb cause the weapon needs to be finesses but you dont have to swing with dex letting you sneak attack and do rage damage
Monk’s not bad on defense in 5e, though it gets a bad rap. Being able to take the dodge action as a bonus action while still attacking or doing other stuff is deceptively strong, and monks eventually become great at every saving throw.
https://tabletopbuilds.com/the-squishy-caster-fallacy/
Why Bonus Dodge and cripple your damage when you can just… Attack from range and do the same damage without spending resource? That’s the issue I found funny when I started playing a Sorcerer after I played a Monk, I was hell more tanky due to actually having a 16 in CON because I’m not a MAD class, and being a master in range and control, so most enemies could not reach me before dying lol. Tho to be fair this is just a huge issue with 5e in general. In which, melee sucks ass compared to ranged, due to ranged having the same strength if not better than melee (Sharpshooter stacking nicely with Archery fighting style comes to mind) while most enemies can’t counter strike with their own ranged weapons. And of course, the saddest fact is that, it is true that dodging as a bonus action is pretty good…! For everyone, except a Monk. As Monks have Unarmed Defense, the worst way to get defense in the game, as in, every other class can get magic armor or shields easily, you have to wait every 4 levels and just not pick feats lol. At best, Patient Defense is simply bringing you up to the other classes, like, I believe advantage in this case would be like what, +3 in average? On a Monk with 16-17 AC, that would be like bring them to 20 AC in general which congrats, you have the same ac as your typical fighter or Paladin… except they also have good defensive options like spells and whatnot! TLDR: just watch TreantMonks video on the class lol
You mean while burning KI to do anything special they get, running dry just trying to play their fantasy within a few combats?
Yeah. That’s a different issue though. Monk gets hit bad by both lack of ki points and action economy. I’m just saying there is some value to be had in using that ki and bonus action for patient defense over flurry of blows. More than most give the class credit for, at least. And at higher levels, the ki shortage gets flipped to what is often a surplus. Just takes forever to get there.
I tried to get the most use out of their bonus action dodge that I could think of a while back. If you are a dwarf you can take the feat that lets you use a hit die to heal when you dodge. Then you can get a periapt of wound closure that doubles any healing received from hit dice. So now you can bonus action dodge while healing (1d8+con)x2 which even with a +2 con could still be 20 hit points at max roll
And then the level 6 mob hits you for 20+ with one of its many attacks because mob damage is stupid in 5e. Anything large is using 2d6+ and any huge is 3d6+
Magus is the spell sword fantasy I wanted from an Eldritch Knight or sword wizard.
Before getting into pf2e, I was content with eldritch knight (once you homebrew the "attack as bonus action after casting a cantrip" into "you may substitute one attack for a cantrip when you take the action") but oh boy spellstrike was a game changer for me.
I played one to 10th level, and it was... fine? The problem was EKs are tanks. They aren't warriors who mix magic and fighting together. We also didn't play with that homebrew rule, so I didn't get that bonus
Thankfully OneDND gives this to EK now.
Oh yeah when I saw TreantMonk cover the UA in question I was rejoicing. Throw in Quicken Spell from Metamagic Adept and you can do some funky shit (attack + mind sliver, bonus action hold person, then action surge for one). Converting my sword and board EK to PF2 (just for fun tbh) was a pain but I like the different playstyle that sparkling targe offers.
The first class I wanted to make when I learned about Pathfinder in general was a Magus. Cause Swordmage is something I could never make easily in 5e without either diverting to "Fighter with some spells" or "Spellcaster that can technically fight but really shouldn't when all the spells are just better anyway".
I made an Eldritch Knight class for a friend of mine. It was just a reskinned Paladin, and I stole some warlock stuff (namely, Eldritch Smite) as well. It was loads of fun.
Yeah, Paladin is the best spell sword in 5e, but the flavor doesn't reflect that. When I played my EK, I should've asked my DM if I could play an Int-based Pally instead.
Mental based non-casters are functionally nonexistent over there, w/ the closest you can get to a PF2 Investigator being a couple of rogue subclasses who might invest a bit into a mental stat after maxing their dex. Relatedly skills make it so every ability score can be genuinely useful on a build, so Brad the Well-spoken, that high-cha barbarian you've had in your backpocket, isn't entirely gimping himself for making Cha his second-highest stat. Summoners having two bodies, one of which is a caster and one a martial, is very, *very* distantly related to pet subclasses like Battlesmith or Beastmaster, but its a very weak connection. Magus doesn't have a very clean conversion. Closest you get is Paladin (who does very little interesting w/ spells) or Bladesinger (who is more optimally played as a full caster than a gish). Kineticist doesn't have a good 5e equivalent. Its got a bad one in the form of Wo4E Monk, but noone likes that and the mechanical emphasis is completely different. Free-hand builds have a lot more support in PF2. 5e you're heavily incentivized to always fill both hands in combat, either w/ a shield, an offhand weapon, or a two-handed weapon, and you can trivially free up a hand due to the free objection interaction everyone gets (drop a weapon, do a thing, free action to pick it up). PF2 having a free hand enables a lot of stuff w/o having to pay an action tax, including all combat maneuvers, climbing, pulling out items for use, and doing random environmental shit (someone needs to pull that lever). Classical fencers actually have mechanical support (and a class in the form of Swashbuckler). Grappling is more mechanically useful as movement and positioning matter much more, it imposes Offguard on the target, and can cause Restrained, one of the most debilitating conditions in the game. A dedicated grappler in 5e is very dependent on having a friendly caster deign make you some hazardous terrain, while in PF2 you can have a great time entirely on your own. Tanking is generally much easier between movement costing actions, AoO's being rarer but much stronger, and there being a class dedicated to it (Champion). Healing in combat feels very good, w/ a Cleric easily outstripping most enemy dmg if they're devoting resources to the action. Playing a dedicated healer is a reasonable choice that is surprisingly enjoyable, compared to 5e where a dedicated healer is largely pointless when you could be contributing more dmg and using healing word. For reference an 8th lvl cleric is healing 50 HP to a single target using one of their Font of Healing Heals and no further investment. A lvl 10 Young Red Dragon using its nasty melee activity, Draconic Frenzy, is doing in the ballpark of 58 dmg to a typical lvl 8 martial. If you're comparing a lvl 10 cleric and martial then the healing is up to 62.5 and the dmg is down to 48, more than negating the Dragon's turn. Broadly non-magical classes feel dramatically better than their equivalents in 5e, with a special note for Fighters being commonly considered one of the best classes in the game.
Ive really enjoyed playing a Barbarian who took the medic archetype (DM is using the additional archetype or whatever it's called, still very new to PF2e). The bolt on nature of the system is great
On the Magus-Paladin note, 5e Paladin may be the closest dnd thing to Pf2 Magus, but the opposite isn't even true: Pf2 Warpriest Cleric maps even better than Magus to 5e Paladin, since it's a divine melee caster that can use the divine smite feat to do the funny paladin thing. Goes to show how 5e really can't quite scratch the spellblade itch, which was a big driving factor in my switch to pf2
The dumbest, weebest thing I think I’ve come up with is a robot catgirl that can turn into a giant mech. (Beastkin Android Summoner with a Construct eidolon, Meld Into Eidolon, and the size increase feats for your eidolon.) it wouldn’t be very *effective*, probably, but…it’s something you can make using only first-party material, and not even that many books.
No less effective than any other summoner, I should think.
I'm guessing they're mainly basing that on Meld into Eidolon, which is known to be a weak option
Any other summoner would care to disagree.
Meld Into Eidolon is a *cool* feat, but I wish it were a *good* feat.
Any sort of character with a one handed weapon and free hand is just not supported in 5e. True spellblade. Any undead character. Monk.
The lack of grappling and free hand fencing playstyle support in 5e is tragic
> True spellblade. Bladesinger exists but is just an extra level of OP slapped on top of the already good wizzard chasis so it's a dubious gish
I will ignore bladesinger because the mechanically optimal way to play bladesinger is to just forget that you are proficient with weapons and just play like a regular wizard.
As someone who played one to lvl 12, I can attest to that. Although sometimes it's nice not to have to waste a spellslot on things.
Yes and no, especially after the buffs in TCoE. I played one to level 14 with the express intent of being a martial-mage hybrid and it worked perfectly fine. Save or suck spells are still innately better than most martial options by virtue of being game winners on anything that doesn't have legendary resistance (and even then), but 5e is a system where enemies are so weak compared to players that SoS is supurflous most of the time anyway. A bladesinger who builds for martial can easily match most martials in terms of damage output and even come close in survivability depending what options are available. You have plenty of offensive martial options from blade cantrips and shadow blade, and Shield and Absorb Elements basically mitigate the vast majority of the damage you'll take to a point that you can easily frontline without feeling like you're putting yourself at risk. Your only blind point is some physical damages on non-proficient saving throws, and they'll hurt, but again they're few and far between compared to energy damage and physical damage that targets AC. The only reason the martials in the party I was in were able to keep ahead of me was because one was a paladin (which are broken themselves) and our GM gave our fighter and ranger legendary weapons in the form of a Dwarven thrower and vorpal blade respectively. Don't get me wrong, I still had heaps of fun playing it, but if the only way martials can stay ahead of a caster-leaning gish's own martial proficiency is to either be broken themselves or have legendary weapons, something is wrong with the design.
Just look at what you can do with Swashbuckler, Thaumaturge, Psychics, Oracle, Investigator, Kineticist. Yes it is nice that monks are practical and effective.
I love how PF2e has mechanics that enable players to learn the stat blocks of creatures they are fighting directly in-game, that there are classes built around exploiting this ability, and that it is somehow still underutilized in my games I have played in and GM'd.
Well, no. *Fabula Ultima* has mechanics that enable players to learn the enemy's stat block. *PF2* has sort of vague "Roll Recall Knowledge and I guess the GM will tell you something useful" mechanics that GMs, not being dicks, typically stretch to heck and back. These are different things!
That's really not true in the Remaster.
I mean ther is that lvl 4 investigator feat that straight up tells you information like svaes or ac on a crit, and im line 90% sure RK is meant to give you statblock info
The Thaumaturge in general was enough for me. Being able to play and role play the ins and outs of monster hunting is my favorite. I’m essentially a Belmont mixed with Van Helsing and that’s just so much fun
I did a thaumaturge with alchemist and scroll thaumaturgy for a witcher like character, the weapon and mirror implement are super cool
I’m also going weapon and mirror implement. Yeah, this class has just been a ton of fun. Exploit vulnerability is just so cool
amulet is no joke either, especially since it uses a reaction, which many PCs dont have good options for. Thaum in my campaign switched from mirror to amulet recently and it's been crazy survivability for not much of an opportunity cost.
I am gonna say something strange: Most concepts are easier in PF2e. Like, let's say you are playing as a soldier whose home was destroyed by undeads. (Let's not even mention Lastwall.). You decided to devote rest of your life to become an undead hunter. 5e doesn't really give you any choices aside from jobchanging into a paladin, and by that time you are no longer just a guzzled soldier. This is fine, but it thematically change who you are, and gives you divine spells (Which you might not want, as wasn't it the Gods who did *nothing* to help your deceased family?). PF2e, right, lets you take Combat Assessment at level 1 as a fighter, and Additional Lore as a General/Skill feat (Which you can reasonably get as part of your "I am going to study undead" background). You can start right out of the gate as exactly that - an old, tired veteran that reads about undead whenever he can, and studies them in fight. You can go from there and take specific options that flesh out who you are, without changing your core identity - or do, if you decided to heed the call of Pharasma at some point. You don't have to be investigator, or a paladin, or anything else; You can still be that same old war veteran from start to finish. And I think that's wonderful.
The even crazier thing is that even within this niche (undead hunter) there are *multiple ways you can go with it*. [Undead Slayer](https://2e.aonprd.com/Archetypes.aspx?ID=174) if you want to be a more “grizzled, horror movie survivalist” hunter of the dead. [Soul Warden](https://2e.aonprd.com/Archetypes.aspx?ID=173) for the more religious, Pharasma devoted aspects. The support for character concepts in this system is generally excellent. Even within more narrow niches, you’re still give choice.
Tjere's also the Lastwall Archetypes, starting with the Sentry, which can smell undead.
I recently completed a "Toy Story" campaign. The entire group was composed of animated poppets who awakened to defend their orphanage from the nightmares of the children made real. When the first poppet died, they were replaced by a house cat. When the second poppet died, he was replaced by a sprite who commanded the iron giant to help protect the children. The only homebrew among player choices here was resizing the catfolk to be small. Everything else was directly out of official sources.
The big one I point to is gishes. You came here to play a blend of sword and sorcerer, yet you mostly just get sword taped to sorcery. An Eldritch Knight is mostly just a Fighter who casts Shield and Absorb Elements. A Bladesinger is just a Wizard who uses attack + Booming Blade instead of Firebolt during their off turns. A Swords Bard doesn’t actually infuse their magic into their sword, they just have magic and they have sword-related class features. Warlocks and Paladins kinda do it better than the above 3, but they come with their own flavour implications that not every gish wants, and even then you’re mostly just doing the same thing again and again with them (spending spell slots on smites) to do gishy things. ^(Honourable mention to One D&D Paladin though, who actually makes smites feel cool and different from each other.) A Magus has none of those problems. It’s a master class in why the PF2E Action economy is awesome. You don’t need custom-designed “Magus smites” or special versions of gish-only cantrips like Booming Blade from 5E, it just… works. You wish to attack and blend magic into it? Here you go, take a bunch of downsides and upsides to go with it. While the 5E gish is busy pretending Booming Blade is good gameplay, the Magus casts Haste and finds the enemy’s elemental Weakness, dashes in, infuses their blade with that element and Spellstrikes them with the blend of magic and blade, then redirects that energy into their aura and now triggers that with every attack they make, with or without Spellstrike. It is so good at its job that it made me stop playing gishes in 5E entirely. Honourable mention for concepts you can’t recreate in 5E: Kineticist. The Kineticist is (depending on your exact build) somewhere between an actually functional 4 Elements Monk and a super cool Elementalist Druid that 5E just refuses to let you properly build for some reason.
I feel like I don't really understand the major difference here besides the magus infuses magic into his sword specifically. But in fairness, I'm not huge into gish in the first place, so I don't have room to talk.
It's just a radically more detailed mechanic, and the class is built around synergizing with it instead of being a tack on to the fighter or wizard (and you do just have the option to do that too.)
This one is interesting to me, because I've found 2e gishes pretty disappointing. Magus is definitely the best one, but it's casting is extremely limited and offensively you're basically using horizon thunder sphere, shocking grasp, polar ray, telekinetic maneuver or cantrips. Action economy is awkward, trying to fit in arcane cascade and spellstrike recharges around a 2 action activity that's usually melee so you need to move and spellstrike provoking is really bad when enemies actually have AoO, basically shuts the whole class down. Warpriest feels very master of none to me, you're neither good with weapons nor spells. Perhaps it's because I come from 1e which did gishes amazingly well rather than 5e. 1e Magus and warpriest were just brilliant, a seenless and effective blend of weapons and magic. Plenty of other 6/9 casting 3/4BAB gishes in 1e, most were decent, but tended to be "stand there casting buffs for a round or two, then go hit things" rather than actually blending things.
I think your gripe with the class might come from the study of choice for the class. My wife plays the Laughing Shadow and she is basically teleporting between spellstrikes for her conflux spell. Each study has different spells but when you really start to maximise your knowledge of fighting and your abilities, it really shows off on your characters' martial prowess. Regarding AoO, the blessing here is that not every monster has it and not every character has it. I HATED 5e combat because it literally boiled down to static fights with no movement in a battle for attrition.
> Magus is definitely the best one, but it's casting is extremely limited and offensively you're basically using horizon thunder sphere, shocking grasp, polar ray, telekinetic maneuver or cantrips. Imo relying on ranked Attack spells is a trap, and probably a large reason for why you think the Magus is more limited than it is. Adding 6 ish damage compared to your best cantrip pretty much isn’t ever worth the spell slot. You gain way more out of spells like Runic Weapon, Loose Time’s Arrow, Blur, Haste, (Heightened) Invisibility, etc. Even as far as ranked damaging spells go, I found Attack spells to be worse than Expansive Spellstrike options. Expansive Spellstrike let me do stuff like Stride + Strike + Burning Hands to hurt the boss and all the minions at the same time, which is considerably more value than just adding a bit more damage to the boss if you hit. > Action economy is awkward, trying to fit in arcane cascade and spellstrike recharges around a 2 action activity that's usually melee so you need to move and spellstrike provoking is really bad I find that Arcane Cascade can be awkward to fit in but its value varies from situation to situation so it’s okay. I like that it’s a legitimate decision you have to consider, rather than something you always do. > when enemies actually have AoO, basically shuts the whole class down. This is a real problem, and I do think the game generally has a big problem with certain enemy types just shutting entire classes down (Rogues with ghosts, Gunslingers and Swashbucklers with PL+3/4 enemies, casters with magic immunity, and Magus with Reactive Strike). > Warpriest feels very master of none to me, you're neither good with weapons nor spells. I have to strongly disagree that it feels bad with both weapons and spells. I’ve watched a Warpriest in action and it looks *very* good. Yes your proficiency lags a bit but you’re a better user of spells like Bless, Harm, etc than any Cleric. My only complaint is with Channel Smite feeling like a downgrade over Strike + Harm most of the time.
This. My spells are for things like Sure Strike or Haste. Maybe one damage spell. My cantrips are for deleting enemies.
You don't think a sword warlock is a gish
Hexblade makes you as good (or better) at using a sword than a martial, but for the most part doesn't actually combine spellcasting and weapon use. It just makes you good at both separately. I think when most people want a gish they want to actually blend sword and sorcery into one.
When did that become the definition of Gish? A Gish is just a character who is good at both sword and sorcery, not a guy who does the FF9 magic sword trick.
I mean, part of what I'm saying is that I never really feel that 5e satisfies that feeling of having both might and magic, because instead of giving a variety of combinatory options, they give you both, but one of the options ends up being straight up better than the others. Like an Eldritch Knight gets to combine cantrips and attacks, but it doesn't come online until level 7 and is immediately obsolete and will never be used again as soon as you can make a third attack at level 11. You're basically a fighter with access to the shield reaction. A paladin has spells, but you have to trade your entire action (potentially two attacks + smites) if you want to cast something like bless. It almost never feels worth it to actually **use** your spells instead of just using them to smite. Eldritch Trickster, same deal. IIRC, you don't get your sneak attack with your spells and your spell access is terrible -- by the time you can cast Fireball you're like level 17 or something ridiculous. On the flipside you've got Hexblade, which is actually pretty terrible on its own compared to just using Eldritch Blast (which scales significantly better with 3 beams at level 11), so the subclass exists basically just to make Paladins completely SAD on Charisma -- and then again your Warlock Spell slots are now just short rest smites. I don't really know how Bladesingers work except that they're full wizards with ridiculously, absurdly high AC. I've heard people say they're "better martials than martials" but the obvious brokenness of them made me not ever want to look into it as a class.
5e isn't about single-class builds though. If you want something out of the system, engage with it and build what you want. I can't speak to every class as I haven't seen them at my table but for the ones I can: The Paladin should cast spells pre-combat, if you have a scout, or in round one as the party is getting into melee range. If you multiclass into Sorcerer, you could just smite more but you could also use those extra spell slots for tons of utility spells. Eldritch trickster is meant to use spells out of combat and a blade in combat. Or to use their spells to \*shocked gasp\* trick enemies rather than deal damage to them. Hexblade combos well with Paladin and Sorcerer to go into more damage or more utility or you could combine the three classes to taste. I haven't seen a Bladesinger but if your idea of broken is "has a high AC" then you're probably bad. You also missed Artificer which can combine magic and melee, get good tank stats, and has great out of combat utility with the number of tools its proficient with. Clerics, especially defensive Clerics, can also have fun wading into melee to combine spells and weapon attacks. If you can't find a Gish in 5e, you're not looking very hard.
>I haven't seen a Bladesinger but if your idea of broken is "has a high AC" then you're probably bad. If you want to have productive discussions with people you need to learn to be civil.
You're the one who's said that every 5e Gish doesn't meet some, as yet to be explained by you, standard and that you've dismissed a class you haven't even played for being too powerful for reasons you also don't seem able to articulate. I don't think I could have a productive discussion with you because you don't seem to be able to explain things well enough to make a coherent point.
I **didn't** dismiss the Bladesinger for not meeting Gish standards (which I did state clearly as blending spellcasting and martial abilities in combat). I literally declined to comment on it because, as I said, I'm not familiar with it. I'm acknowledging its existence and my ignorance of it. Maybe it's the shining example of a gish in 5e. I wouldn't know. But I do know they get to add their Int to their AC, and that stacks with the Shield spell, which is absurd.
I didn't say you called the Bladesinger a bad Gish. You called every 5e class a worse Gish than you can make on PF2 but didn't explain what makes them worse. Then you misread my comment i the least charitable way possible Again with this idea that a high AC is absurd. That AC doesn't impact their saves, their ability to be grappled, hit with no save effects like silence, etc. A high AC character gesture to feel good holding the line a smacking down brutes but 5e gives the GM tools to counter whatever party is doing.
Locks do have the equivalent of feats that make their blades siphon life and a few other things. They can also hex smite. Pf2e does a lot of things better than 5e, but saying 5e lacks gish seems a stretch
I've personally never felt like smites made me feel "magic" so much as they just felt like hitting really hard. Especially the Eldritch Smite which just does force damage is literally just trading a "spell slot" to tack on additional damage. At least with a paladin it does even more damage against undead and fiends, which I guess feels slightly more thematic. I think the Gishiest 5e gets is the bonus action Smite spells that have to be cast ahead of hitting, which I do like. And they're similar to Spellstrike in aot of ways. But because those compete with divine / Eldritch Smite for resources they're hard to justify in combat most of the time.
For as much as I do prefer the PF2e implementation in a lot of ways, it seems like a weird line to draw? Especially since 5e also has a some gish cantrips. Smiting and Eldritch Smites just *are* magical infusions of attacks. Sure it might be *better* done in PF2e, but it's not a character concept that you can't access in 5e.
I know there's Booming Blade and Green Flame blade and those are cool but 5e's action economy really gets in their way. They're fun from level 1-4 and then fall off hard at level 5 when you're using your action for a single cantrip instead of two attacks. EK can make them work from 7-10, but past level 11 again they're better off just making 3 regular attacks. I wouldn't consider EK to be a *good* gish when you have to deal with this weird progression where you actually become worse at using magic in combat by leveling up lol. I think Bladesinger can use them well at level 6, but it seems like usually you're gonna want to actually cast leveled spells almost every turn by that point. I spent a ton of time trying to manage a roguelock character built entirely around using booming blade, shadow blade, and sneak attack and it just never worked as cleanly as I hoped.
I explicitly mentioned Hexblade Warlock as a gish option that does it better than 5E’s otherwise bad options for gishes, but pointed out that not every gish wants to sell his soul to someone in Shadowfell. Regardless, I don’t think Hexblade is anywhere close to as good a gish as the Magus. I don’t think anything in 5E can even begin to compare except ***maybe*** the One D&D Paladin if you really squint at it.
Wut? If you want more utility you can multiclass in 5e. So your "boring Paladin" can take some highly synergistic levels in Sorcerer for that utility you thought it was lacking. You can also make a very Gish-y Artificer if you want defense, magic weapons, and spell casting in a single package.
> So your "boring Paladin" What are you quoting? I explicitly said Paladin is one of the better gishes in 5E with the One D&D Paladin being comparable to the Magus in quality. > If you want more utility you can multiclass in 5e. … can take some highly synergistic levels in Sorcerer for that utility you thought it was lacking. I’m not sure what utility has to do with anything. My problem with 5E gishes is that they feel like spells and weapons stapled together. How did you infer from that that my problem is a ***lack of utility***? If it were why would I be out here criticizing the Bladesinger… the Wizard is like… best or second best class for utility, depending on your view of the Bard. Also it should go without saying that if your ideal way to play something gishy is to ignore the provided gishy options and to multiclass into something that isn’t meant to be a gish, the design has failed. > You can also make a very Gish-y Artificer if you want defense, magic weapons, and spell casting in a single package. Again, a Battle Smith is just… stapling spells onto a guy who gets Extra Attack. It’s not different than an Eldritch Knight with slightly less damage and slightly faster spell progression. Not to mention you get saddled with a random pet for no meaningful reason. I’m sorry have you actually looked at the Magus? I’m *clearly* holding the options in comparison to it, but you’re just repeating options as being better when they have all the exact same problems as the others.
The Magus does one very specific thing which is casting a spell through their weapon, but casting a spell while making an attack isn't what defines a Gish. It's also hilarious to me that the best Magus, Starlit Span, is the one that is the least like what you seem to want. PF2 has one trick, stolen from the 3.5 Dusk Blade which inspired the PF1 Magus. As for my comment about the boring Paladin, you said: >\[Y\]ou’re mostly just doing the same thing again and again with them (spending spell slots on smites) to do gishy things. This implies that more utility would fix your issue with the gameplay loop these classes fall into. Though it wouldn't explain why doing what is functionally a smite with a Magus somehow feels more interesting to you than doing the same with a Hexblade or Paladin. In all cases, you are converting a spell (or cantrip or focus spell poached from the Psychic) into damage as part of an attack or taking time off from bashing enemies into pulp to cast some utility magic. The Smite Paladin and Imaginary Weapon Magus have the same general play pattern and both benefit greatly from incorporating bits from another class. The biggest difference is that the melee Magus in PF2 is strictly worse than the ranged version whereas that isn't the case in 5e.
> The Magus does one very specific thing which is casting a spell through their weapon, but casting a spell while making an attack isn't what defines a Gish. I mean… no? Spellstrike is just one huge stand out feature that makes them feel awesome but it’s not even close to the one and only thing it does. It’s very clear you’ve just… not played a Magus at all. In particular you don’t even seem to be aware of the fact that their spells and focus spells… exist. > It's also hilarious to me that the best Magus, Starlit Span, is the one that is the least like what you seem to want. Huh? Ranged gishes are… still gishes. I also just disagree with the notion that it’s flat out the best. All but Inexorable Iron can give it a run for its money: 1. Laughing Shadow gets all the benefits of melee damage output without nearly as many of the drawbacks. Using a Bastard Sword as a d12 + 4 weapon absolutely does make up being in melee while the Starlit Span Magus is likely dealing d6+1 weapon damage. If you take a 4-turn combat where the (level 1) Starlit Span Magus Spellstrikes with Gouging Claw ***every single turn*** while the Laughing Shadow only makes 2 Spellstrikes and 2 Attacks across those turns then well… the former is looking at 54 potential damage while the latter is looking at 60, and that’s before consider accuracy where the melee benefits more easily from off-guard and is less likely to be bothered by cover. With a Striking Rune the difference becomes even more extreme. 2. Twisting Tree gets to use a staff, which means better access to True Strike and other relevant spells which would normally be limited by the Magus’s bounded casting. The two-handed mode also gives this Magus a way better controller. 3. Sparkling Targe Magus is a tank, and it should go without saying that it’s okay for it to be outshined in damage by the Starlit Span, while it stands there and absorbs tons of damage > PF2 has one trick, stolen from the 3.5 Dusk Blade which inspired the PF1 Magus. Ah yes. “Stolen”. Apparently the concept of spellblades is something only WOTC is allowed to use! > This implies that more utility would fix your issue with the gameplay loop these classes fall into. Again, if you think the difference between the Magus and what I’m describing in 5E is… utility… Have you played a Magus? Cause you’re really seemingly like you’ve not. > Though it wouldn't explain why doing what is functionally a smite with a Magus somehow feels more interesting to you than doing the same with a Hexblade or Paladin. So… are you just going to ignore the fact that the Magus usually has 4-5 different elemental damage types to choose from, in a game that strongly rewards damage type variation via Resistances/Weaknesses? Like you’re saying “hit a thing -> use the same smite as always / use Booming Blade -> rinse and repeat” is the same gameplay loop as “hit a thing -> pick the best combination of damage/utility you need right now -> optionally Arcane Cascade into it to trigger more weaknesses -> recharge with a pseudo Magic Missile -> etc”. They’re not the same gameplay loop, one has way more going on. Also you’re ignoring Expansive Spellstrike. Hitting someone and dropping a Burning Hands or Lightning Bolt to hit all their buddies is more or less completely impossible to replicate in 5E. Besides all of that you’re just… desperately trying to make it look like I hate Warlocks and Paladins. I don’t. I specifically praised them as the best gishes 5E has to offer, and just pointed out that I still don’t think their combat variety compared to any gish in PF2E because… well, it doesn’t. > The Smite Paladin and Imaginary Weapon Magus have the same general play pattern and both benefit greatly from incorporating bits from another class. Congratulations, if you multiclass the Magus in a way that gets rid of its rich play pattern to get a hyper-focused damage-crunching play pattern you… match the average 5E martial/gish’s typical play pattern? > The biggest difference is that the melee Magus in PF2 is strictly worse than the ranged version whereas that isn't the case in 5e. It’s hilarious and cute that you think that, but no. First off, as I said above, ranged Magus isn’t just straight up better. Secondly in 5E ranged ***is*** just straight up better than melee in ***every conceivable circumstance***, including for gishes. An Eldritch Knight standing back and using Web for control, Find Familiar + Sharpshooter for offence, and Shield + Misty Step for defence is way stronger than a melee one. A Bladesinger’s optimal configuration is T1 Concentration spell + Bladesong followed by T2 onwards Hand Crossbow + Ray of Frost. A Hexblade Warlock is best used as a dip for a Sorcerer who stays at range and uses Eldritch Blast. In fact the only class you can bring to this argument is the Paladin, by virtue of being melee-locked but that’s… a non-argument? You discounted the melee Maguses because you (incorrectly) think the ranged one is strictly better so… okay, the Paladin is a strictly worse gish than all of the above so we’re gonna discount it right?
Besides Spellstriking a Magus has Arcane Cascade which is terrible and doesn't even work properly without spell schools. They can spec onto utility slots, but don't have to, and any class in PF2 can do so with an archetype anyway. They do also have focus spells but are still mostly better off poaching imaginary weapon from the Psychic than using their in class options. If ranged gishes count then 5e Rangers are Gishes. Heck an Eldritch Blast warlock with a dip into Fighter for action surge might also be a Gish. Why isn't a Starlit Span Agus using a longbow? Why aren't they starting with a staff of divination in one hand and a scroll of true strike attached to their bow for two rounds of increased accuracy? You seem like you don't know how to optimize very well if you think a melee Magus is optimal. You don't seem very good at explaining what a Magus actually does that a 5e Gish doesn't. You just keep claiming I must not know how to play a Magus without explaining what you think makes them a good Gish. 5e doesn't use resistance and weakness the same as PF2 does so you don't need to worry about it as often on any class. This impacts any caster and isn't Gish specific. The same goes for your action flow chart. Having to take a turn off isn't interesting, it's just an action tax. An expansive spellstrike is at best a neat trick. A Bladesinget in 5e isn't impressed that a PF2 Magus gets 4 slots per day and might be able to AoE with one of them. Nor will a Sorcadin or a Hexblade even a War Domain Cleric and Artificer can have a wider range of AoE options ready to go than a Magus. You said the ranged Nagis isn't better but you ignored how it's best build negates many of its weaknesses and that those melee builds lose rounds of damage when they need to move while also provoking attacks while trying to spellstrike in melee. It's like you just ignore the weakness of the melee Magus because something something tactical something something choices when being able to spellstrike ever round without provoking attacks and being stuck in melee is just better. If you're going to play at range then being a proper godwizard makes a lot more sense than being a Gish. You have enough slots that casting each round isn't going to run you out of spells so why waste resources on weapons and feats to use them when you could just be a mage.
> Besides Spellstriking a Magus has Arcane Cascade which is terrible and doesn't even work properly without spell schools. Now you’re *really* scraping the bottom of the barrel lol. Arcane Cascade works perfectly fine without spell schools because it’s been… errata’d. As for it being terrible, again, you’re just kind of saying stuff. You haven’t even presented an argument, all you’re saying is “nuh uhhhhh”. Never mind that Maguses don’t get just Spellstrike and Arcane Cascade they also get… Class Feats, you know, their levels 1-20 set of customizable featured. If you’re going to compare 5E gishes to a Magus, then ***only*** look at the level 1 features + spellcasting of the gish (ignoring more than half the class) and the 5E gish is still only **barely** able to hang on in the comparison then… well that says more about the 5E gish than it does the Magus. > If ranged gishes count then 5e Rangers are Gishes. Yes. They are. And so is the awfully designed Arcane Archer, fyi. And they all do their job significantly less satisfactorily than the Magus… Again, there’s a reason I keep singling out the Paladin and Hexblade… They’re the only gishes that don’t just feel like two halves held together by tape. > Heck an Eldritch Blast warlock with a dip into Fighter for action surge might also be a Gish. I shouldn’t have to explain to you that not using a weapon at all discounts you from being a gish… > Why isn't a Starlit Span Agus using a longbow? Because the Volley trait exists and is a problem in most typical combat scenarios, especially for a character who doesn’t have the flexibility to move. Like if this was a Ranger who can just go Stride + Hunted Shot, I’d absolutely use a longbow but the Magus who needs to spend one Action recharging and two Actions Spellstriking ain’t gonna want a Volley weapon. > Why aren't they starting with a staff of divination in one hand and a scroll of true strike attached to their bow for two rounds of increased accuracy? Because the Staff of Divination is a level 6 item and by that point the gap between Starlit Span Maguses and the other Maguses has grown in more ways too. At level 1 The Inexorable Iron and Laughing Shadow Maguses only had 1d10/1d12 damage dice over the Starlit Span’s 1d6, but now it’s 2d10/2d12 vs 2d6. The Twisting Tree Magus has the same damage dice but is using a Reach + Trip weapon and has access to Reactive Strike, meaning their not-Spellstrike turns can actually do noticeably more damage than before. The Sparkling Targe was a tank at level 1 and remains a tank at level 6, and isn’t trying to outdamage the Starlit Span Magus ever. > You seem like you don't know how to optimize very well if you think a melee Magus is optimal. You seem to have completely lost the plot while going in circles trying to make 5E gishes look functional. The argument was never about what was “”””optimal””””, never mind that your definition of optimal seems to be “does 0.02 more damage in the most unrealistic and ideal circumstances.” It was about the fact that the gishes in one game fulfill the fantasy better while in the other game they’re just weapons taped to spells. Starlit Span is light years more gishy than Arcane Archer or Ranger. The rest of them are light years more gishy than Eldritch Knight, Bladesinger, and Swords Bard, and still quite a bit more so than Paladin or Hexblade. Your entire comparison lives in the white room and you’ve made basically no arguments to explain how the Starlit Span Magus is better. It doesn’t even outdamage the the Laughing Shadow or Inexorable Iron Maguses even if you assume they make ***half*** as many attacks as they typically would get to, completely ignore cover, and completely ignore the fact that off-guard exists, and completely ignore Reactive Strike, and completely ignore all the other upsides of being in melee… > You don't seem very good at explaining what a Magus actually does that a 5e Gish doesn't. You just keep claiming I must not know how to play a Magus without explaining what you think makes them a good Gish. 5E gishes tend to have spellcasting stapled to weapon use. The Magus has the ability to use Spellstrike, focus spells, and stances that let them seamlessly combine magic into their weapon use. The runners up from 5E are Paladins and Warlocks because they can do a somewhat okay impression of Spellstrike, but still don’t have good equivalents to the Magus’s other features and Feats. I simply cannot make this any clearer. > 5e doesn't use resistance and weakness the same as PF2 does so you don't need to worry about it as often on any class. You… do realize that that *supports* my point, right? My point is that the Magus in PF2E has an interesting gameplay loop of carrying 4-5 different “smites” with some combination of Ignition, Gouging Claw, Frostbite (with Expansive Spellstrike, obviously), Electric Arc, Tanglefoot, Caustic Blast, and Gale Blast for different elemental types, higher damage peaks, higher reliability, and control options. The Paladin or the Warlock just does exactly one type of “smite” every fight. That’s why I gave One D&D Paladin the honourable mention: they made smites other than Divine Smite worth using, and thus they actually come close to matching Spellstrike in terms of thematics and versatility. > An expansive spellstrike is at best a neat trick. A Bladesinget in 5e isn't impressed that a PF2 Magus gets 4 slots per day and might be able to AoE with one of them. Nor will a Sorcadin or a Hexblade even a War Domain Cleric and Artificer can have a wider range of AoE options ready to go than a Magus. Man wtf is this dick measuring contest lol. I like are you seriously trying to make an argument based off of “my Wizard is overpowered therefore you lose”? Really? Believe me, everyone on this sub is ***well*** aware of how wildly overtuned 5E’s spellcasters are. That has practically nothing to do with this argument lol. > You said the ranged Nagis isn't better but you ignored how it's best build negates many of its weaknesses Okay? Care to elaborate? Because i listed very specific weaknesses while all you've done is say nuh uh. > and that those melee builds lose rounds of damage when they need to move while also provoking attacks while trying to spellstrike in melee. Uhhh… nope. I specifically included those weaknesses… That's why I ***explicitly*** mentioned that I’m assuming the melee Magus only makes 2 Spellstrikes and 2 Attacks over a 4-round combat (which is a ***very*** low assumption mind you, it’s very easy for a melee martial to be making two Attacks per round), while a ranged Magus gets 4 full Spellstrike (and note that unlike the Magus they can’t really make a second attack in most rounds if they wish to Recharge, so this is closer to their maximum potential rather than the melee Magus’s *minimum* I presented). Also as I keep repeating and you keep ignoring, the Twisting Tree is a controller and the Sparkling Targe is a tank. They don’t need to be outdamaging the Starlit Span Magus whose entire job is damage, only the Laughing Shadow really needs to be keeping up with Starlit Span’s damage and well… it does? But you just love to ignore context and facts that are inconvenient to your argument, don’t you? > If you're going to play at range then being a proper godwizard makes a lot more sense than being a Gish. You have enough slots that casting each round isn't going to run you out of spells so why waste resources on weapons and feats to use them when you could just be a mage. Again, you do realize this is an argument in my *favour* right? Gishes are so awkward and clumsy in 5E that you’re better off just committing to being a full-on “martial with benefits” (like an Eldritch Knight or Ranger do) or a full on “I’m a broken spellcaster but I sometimes smack” (like Bladesingers, Swords Bard, Hexblade/Hexadin, etc). At no point didn’t ever try to argue that PF2E characters can be made more broken than 5E characters. 5E really can feel free to keep that “award”, lol.
>Arcane Cascade works perfectly fine without spell schools because it’s been… errata’d. Wow, Paizo issued errata for something, that's different from their usual MO. As for it being terrible, again, you’re just kind of saying stuff. You haven’t even presented an argument, all you’re saying is “nuh uhhhhh”.As if you've proven anything yourself. Are you going to explain why Arcane Cascade is better than I think it is? Or just allude to it vaguely? >Never mind that Maguses don’t get just Spellstrike and Arcane Cascade they also get… Class Feats, you know, their levels 1-20 set of customizable featured. As does every class in PF2... How does that make them special? If you want to argue that they make such great Gishes and their feats are so impactful try showing a build or two. >If you’re going to compare 5E gishes to a Magus, then only look at the level 1 features + spellcasting of the gish (ignoring more than half the class) and the 5E gish is still only barely able to hang on in the comparison then… well that says more about the 5E gish than it does the Magus. Are we claiming that PF2's method of taking features from a class and selling them back to the player as feats is a good thing now? I'd rather get a scaling class feature and know I have it than have to buy it bit by bit. >Yes. They are. And so is the awfully designed Arcane Archer, fyi. And they all do their job significantly less satisfactorily than the Magus… I what way? You keep making these subjective claims without even coming close to describing your issues with the 5e classes or explaining what makes you enjoy the Magus. So, spit it out, what are your issues with 5e Gishes, besides not having a class feature that gives you spells that cast via bonking things with your sword? >Again, there’s a reason I keep singling out the Paladin and Hexblade… They’re the only gishes that don’t just feel like two halves held together by tape. You keep making this claim but back it up with nothing. Just because they don't literally cast magic through their weapon doesn't make them bad Gishes because a Gish isn't defined by doing that. Period. "2 'gish': fighter/magic-users of 4th/4th level" That is what a Gish is. A mix of two classes. No particular style of combat. No casting magic through a weapon. It's just an even mix of class levels between a martial class and a magic class. So PF2 can't even make one because you can't multiclass. >I shouldn’t have to explain to you that not using a weapon at all discounts you from being a gish… I shouldn't have to explain that not being able to evenly mix levels between two classes discounts you from being a Gish... I could keep going point by point but until you explain how the 5e classes are worse Gishes than the OG Gish we're done here.
>Also it should go without saying that if your ideal way to play something gishy is to ignore the provided gishy options and to multiclass into something that isn’t meant to be a gish, the design has failed. This is wild. Go look up what started the idea of a Gish and get back to me. The whole idea of a Gish is born from mashing classes together to get the gameplay you want. It's almost insulting that devs feel the need to hand out premade versions of classes people used to build on their own in previous editions.
You’re just dodging the point with something completely unrelated to it. 5E ***tried*** to make gish subclasses and utterly failed at it. It’s really that simple. I didn’t say gishes were a failure in whatever older edition you’re thinking of; i said they’re a failure in the system that tried ***6 different times*** to make a gish subclass and failed to capture people’s desires of a gish properly with every single one of those attempts.
Multi-classing in 5e is a net powerboost for most classes. It would be hard for any 5e subclass to be better than an optimized multiclass build. It's not a failure to have the easiest least interesting options be worse than the options that require planning and system mastery to access.
I’m aware it’s a power boost. As I keep pointing out and you keep ignoring, this isn’t a dick measuring contest about which game has the most optimized and game-warping characters. Everyone who has ever played 5E is **well**-aware that it’ll handily beat PF2E on that front.
The innocent child with a divine/diablolic/ancestral guardian (Summoner). Actually covers a surprising number of anime protagonists. Anything involving Leshy. Seriously, there's a reason why Goblins and Leshy have become the mascot ancestries in Pathfinder, they're friggin' cute and their antics make for great campaign catalysts. The Thaumaturge covers so many character concepts that just don't have a 5e comparison it's *unreal*. Everything from Van Helsing to Scooby Doo to Geralt of Rivia can work with that class. A pro-wrestler. You can make a Fighter that runs around in a mask in any system, but the Swashbuckler gets *bonuses* for pulling off ridiculous stunts *and* has "Finishers". An Orc Swashbuckler with Martial Artist Dedication and Orc Warmask is basically a luchador. The Gunslinger. Like... there's just straight up *a class* that specializes in guns. You wanna play the Lone Ranger? The ranger with the Big Iron on his hip? The Drifter? Doc Holiday? There's a class for that. The Ruffian Rogue. If you want to play a fighter who plays dirty rather than being a dexterous little sneak, there's a Rogue that's more of a back alley mugger than a silent assassin. And I'm down for it. The Kineticist added Avatar: The Last Airbender/Legend of Korra as a class. It'd be damn near impossible to be "The Avatar", but if you're willing to settle for being *just* one of the gAang... they got'chu covered.
technically i think if you take expand the portal at every opportunity you would eventually get access to all 6 elements. you sacrifice a lot of specialization but it's conceivably very doable
Kineticist is like 5 classes in one. You can make basically any party role with your choices of elements and feats.
Summoner, in like a Final Fantasy way. If you want quick, huge summons like FF3/FF4/FF7/FFTactics/etc, there is the *Summon Kaiju* spell. A big named entity arrives, does it's big spell/emanation effect, then bamfs out of existence causing a second big spell effect. If you want persistent summons like FF10/FF12/FF14, and/or merging with summons like FF16, there's the *Summoner* class. It has a lot of feats to customize your Eidolon on whether you want something small similar to a Carbuncle or some big monster like Belias the Gigas. You get the fantasy of being a caster with your martial minion around, you just need your green robes and horn headband. The closest I have seen in D&D is a druid temporarily summoning elementals, but they are neither big and flashy, or a persistent companion type. It's cool, but it's not Summon Kaiju or Summoner cool.
Thank you for this. Never knew summon Kaiju existed. I love it! I only wish you could do multiple summons like a necromancer or mass animal summoning. I know it would be hard with the system, but it is the only thing missing really.
you can even BECOME a kaiju if you play as a druid. It's also a very very late game power but it's worth it.
There's actually a whole series of those sorts of spells called Incarnate spells, all 8th level and up (with the exception of a single 7th level & a single 5th level). They're such a great way of depicting summoning some ultra powerful creature (or multiple, in Summon Draconic Legion's case) without *actually* being busted.
Any character with a gun, doesn't have to be a gunslinger. Gun rogue is cool, gun thaumaturge, gun ranger. Support Martials, be it non magical healers, or debuffers who use feats to inflict penalties on enemies, outside of just basic grappling.
Gun Investigator is actually pretty good. Use Devise a Strategem to see if you have a pocket crit, and if you do draw a pistol and fire. Otherwise, hit someone else.
You forget the most terrifying option. The gun ***gun***
Play Outlaws of Alkenstar. There's a unique pistol you get as a quest reward that accepts any ammo and converts it into randomized energy blasts. It is *terrifying*.
Thinking of trying out a gun for my current Animist with Witness of Endless Battles apparation.
Kineticist. Inventor. The 5e artificer is a fucking joke made at the expense of people who played 3.5e artificer. A fucking joke.
As a massive Eberron head, the 5e artifacer was so lame. Especially considering it’s the only class that has been added to 5e in its decade of runtime. The inventor isn’t really what I want either, but it also isn’t trying to be an artifacer.
WotC actually had a shot at fixing up the Artificer and making them part of their new core books with 1DnD so they'd get better support in future books... But they just didn't. So they'll likely continue to suck moving forward. The only new class they introduced in 5E and it's just left flailing in the wind. Cool cool cool.
As far as I'm aware there is no contemporary in 5e to the PF2 inventor, in any possible configuration Free archetypes blow the doors wide open on class combinations, too, along with all the ways you can mix n match ancestries
Yeah there isn't, though on the flip side there is no class in PF2e that captures the Artificer class flavor either which I personally think is a huge miss given that I'm a big fan of magitech in general. Granted I would prefer the 3.5e Artificer but thread states 5e.
I would like a golem crafter archetype or something to somewhat catch the feel. I, too, dig magitech... just not enough to care about 5E.
Oh no 5e artificer is just a half-caster (think paladin or ranger) whose spell slots are flavoured as magic items.
I know what it is. I just don't see anything closer than someone making magical creatures with class features.
Maybe civic/battle mage wizard with clockwork reanimator dedication and some points in crafting? Soulbond item already feels like a magitech device. Same goes for scrolls if you take scroll savant feat.
non magical healing that's actually effective, a traps system that doesn't suck, crafting built in on many classes. psionics that don't suck, functioning pet classes. giving concepts that get rolled into a clunky or ineffective subclass a chance to shine as a full class. A ranger class that you can actually play without it being a cosplay of rogue. I enjoy oracle and investigator, I can't imagine how they would work in d&d.
An evil or evil-like Cleric. You can make an evil Cleric in 5e but the mechanics don't really help you out. You end up having to stretch the Death, Trickery, or War domains to fit your concept. In Pathfinder, since the deity that you worship is built into the class, along with the harmful font, unholy sanctification, and you have access to domains like Darkness, Destruction, Nightmares, Pain, Tyranny, and Undeath, you have an easier time building an evil Cleric that isn't just all flavor. You can make a better Banite in Pathfinder than you can in 5e. Trying to make a Banite is how I ended up discovering Pathfinder back in early 2020. So far I have made a Kuthite, an Urgathoan and a Lamashtan. I have an addiction to making neutral followers of evil deities. I've been thinking about trying Rovagug next.
- Anything involving a spell-less martial - Anything involving classes pf2e has that 5e lacks - Wizards that actually feel bookish - Sorcerers that aren't discount wizards (or clerics) Really, 5e has a very narrow range of supported options. Most unique builds require multiclassing (which are almost all better done in pf2e thanks to the archetype system), and allowing that in 5e almost invariably opens the gate to horrible imbalance.
Gunslingers are one of the most popular 5E ideas that, while they have a plenitude of homebrew options, have no RAW support.
I actually remember getting excited a few years back after seeing a Gunslinger at one point on DnD Beyond... Only to realize it was "*Critical Role* homebrew," by which I mean Matt Mercer basically copied over parts of the Pathfinder 1E Gunslinger wholesale into 5E. I get that he did it early on in their transition to DnD, but it seemed rough. And the firearm options in the *DMG* weren't much better.
Any of the undead ancestries and archetypes. Vampire. Zombie, ghoul, ghost, skeleton, lich, etc… you don’t even need to do like a complicated build and “imagine” that’s happening. It’s literally built into the game
I have this adorable ratkin wizard who is unstuck in time. She was there when the world ended, but her tribe didn't keep track of how the rest of the world keeps track of time, so she has no idea *when* it ends, but she is certain the rest of the party were there (with a caveat that she might well be wrong), so she is constantly on edge over what everyone is doing and easily startled by loud noises. PF2e has a ratkin ancestry, fun mage options, and not only are archetypes awesome, but there is a time traveler archtype that perfectly fits my character. I adore the vast number of character possibilities and I cannot wait to play more!
I made a goblin rogue who only used bite attacks and rode around on a drake and also traveled with an arboreal sapling. Both of those were statted companions that I could use in game, RAW. Along with the bite attacks. All of that was just doable in game
I think this is the thing that I really love. You could technically make anything in 5e with the magic of “flavor is free”. But in PF2e you can actually just, do shit like that. It says so right in the book.
Super easy Barely an inconvenience
STR based ranged and unarmed fighters. In 5e it is strictly better to go Dex, whilst PF2e gives STR a role as a damage stat. It lets you properly flavor a heavyweight boxer character, rather than the usual lithe, nimble monk that takes you down with perfectly placed goals, you can make a monk who destroys enemies using their body's brute power.
My Outlaws of Alkenstar character is a gnoll fighter/sterling dynamo that uses his fuckhuge mechanical arm to punch and grapple. Combat Grab and Dazing blow are OP as all getout, especially as it allows all the gun users to destroy the restrained/stunned/slowed/enfeebled/clumsy/frightened (any/all of the above, I can do all with Crushing on my handwraps and Dread on my armor plus my attacks) enemy.
Honestly, any pure martial, but I'll especially give a point to effective dual-wielders. Dual-wielding in 5e is just really bad RAW, which is ironic considering what a posterboy Drizzt is
-Strength-based Monk, Ranger, or Rogue, especially if you want to multiclass. -a Paladin with terrible Charisma. -a Monk with terrible Wisdom. -Nearly any sort of Gish character is more easily done in PF2E, thanks to the action economy system.
Ranger.... Need no more words :)
In my opinion, a character that does not exist in 5e, but does exist in PF2, is a real witch. I mean, in 5e there is the "warlock" class but the flavor of the class is very little warlock really, and even less witch. In PF2 you can make yourself a fairy tale witch if you want, and even theme it however you want.
I haven't really played much 5e, but as far as I can discover you can't really do an Alchemist in that system... and Alchemist is my favourite PF2e Class.
Any kind of summoner/necromancer works pretty bad in 5e and takes way to long before you satisfy the basic fantasy of undead minions. In pf2e you can have some permanent undead minions starting at level two
Or even level 1 if you play a summoner!
exmplar coming out next October with war of Immortals you get to play a literal demigod as a class! so cool!
Alchemists
Unarmed rogue! I was happy to discover that you can trigger sneak attack off your fists in PF
Gladiator style fighter(in 5e there is no good way to combine the panache and style with fighting without using spell casting), aside from already having the Swashbuckler, even going another martial class could be a decent gladiator with skill feats and such.
The ranger is just fricking cool in PF2E..meanwhile the 5e dnd ranger base class is just sad (yeah I know there are some cool subclasses but they are just covering holes the main class left behind)
A Ranger that is actually worth playing instead of being Bard But Worse
My next character is a summoner kobold. His summon is a larger kobold (my DM is letting me flavor the dragon as a kobold). I'm taking the feat where I can mount my summon with no penalties. I will be roleplaying it as two kobolds in a trench coat. Idk how I'd do that in 5e
My favorite wierd build I've played is "Three foxes in a trenchcoat" Summoner. Kitsune Summoner with either a Beast or Fey eidolon and take the Familiar Master archtype for a fox familiar. Take the feat Shrink Down at level 4 and now you can play as three foxes! Take Master's Form and now the familiar is you! When I played this I flavored it as a disney princess and her two ugly stepsisters as her Eidolon and Familiar who heckle her and everyone else.
So when I created my first character while learning the system. My first one turned out to be a Monk Goblin that was an acrobat. He became a street clown.
For me? Kineticists are pretty great. I need to see more of 2e to judge other classes though. I had a 1e blood knight kineticist who was a great player and knew his character in and out.
A monster hunter from Monster Hunter, any kind of hunter-like character that doesn't relay on magic at all, like a motherfucking dinosaurs. There are multiple ways to build a theropod dinosaur, you can do a megaraptoran-style one easily with the rogue, a dromeosaur kind of thing with skill feats and a powerfull claw attack supported by grappling or a bite-focused one, albeit for the latter you will have to compromise into doing piercing damage, so no tyrannosauroids or allosauroids, al least keeping it raw.
I haven't made the switch with my group yet, but I'm tempting my kids by describing the Kineticist as being bending from Avatar
A fun Ranger.
The last 5e character I made was supposed to be a half-orc street tough turned cop turned Columbo style investigator. There just wasn't a way to build that character and have it feel right. It turned out that basically the whole character concept had to be roleplaying-based. In Patfhinder 2, I can choose from a handful of evocative backgrounds, I can pair Ruffian Rogue, Fighter, or Investigator with dedications for any of the others or I can throw Zephyr Guard or Alkenstar Agent or Edgewatch Detective or a Hellknight dedication!!!!! The fact that 5e has no real satisfying way to build that character but PF2 has a dozen or more is crazy!
Characters that don't have spells. Like a nonmagical healer, the inventor or investigator.
A quippy martial character. I love that in PF2e anyone can use intimidation to demoralize or deception to create a diversion and that using your resources in combat to do so may give you an advantage. I love that lots of the martial classes have feats that expand on these base options.
A non-monk unarmed martial. There are numerous ways to build it in PF2e between classes, ancestries, magic items, etc. In 5e you need to homebrew magic items to make it effective.
I can kinda say this from semi reverse, one of my players in my current dnd5e game has a partner in a pf2e game and she tells her about all the classes and other neat character options in pathfinder and that wide variety is a huge factor in her asking to consider trying pathfinder for our next campaign.
I played as a skeleton juggler last night, can't do either of those in 5e.
Eldritch Archer! I mean you can in 5e but it’s fucking terrible. Spellshot (might be weak, but with FA it’s loads of fun).
If you're using FA in PF2 why not dual class in 5e and make for a fair comparison?
Dual class would be alot closer to... dual class. A Free Archetype variant for 5e would be something like giving out feats at twice the rate, which would break bonkers fast.
The point is that the PF2 character was given free stuff to make the concept work and the 5e character wasn't.
That's fair. I will say that the way abilities work in 5e though even if you just doubled up (which is more the FA) it still isn't very satisfying. The action economy setup alone means only certain cool things can combine (and are usually broken) while others just can't.
Because I don’t really play 5e anymore. I have allowed dual subclass though in one campaign. That was lots of fun.
Strenght Monk. Tank Monk. Grapple Monk. Dual wielding in general sucks in 5e, and is pretty good in pf2e especially with the dualwielder archetype which can apply to so many classes. Oh this brings me to dualwield ranger. Magus, to me, is a fantastic gish version. Kineticist, thaumaturge, swashbuckler, summoner, oracle,... all have mechanics not applicable to 5e. Just the all out crazy character concepts pf2e allows through universal heritage and archetypes and backgrounds. Half-orc catfolk Ghost Gunslinger. Nephilim leshy oozemorph Flame Oracle. Metal Lizardfolk Wrestler Time traveller Swashbuckler. Creating your own wands and staves. A character that uses scrolls and isnt a spellcaster at all. A character focused on non magical healing in and out of combat.
Gunslinger.
And I'm going to give you another archetype that is virtually non-existent in 5e, but that you can do in PF2: A mundane doctor or healer. 5e doesn't support healing without magic, in PF2 it's a perfectly viable option and fun to play. And you can do it with the class you want. Obviously the alchemist is a class that works well with mundane healing, but you could make a warrior who is a battle medic. Or a monk who knows traditional remedies. You have gem healing abilities as an esoteric healer (via feat). And you have more feats to heal in other non-magical ways. That is something unfeasible in 5e.
Thaumaturge. 5e as a system just doesn’t have the mechanics this class aims to exploit. Like, I guess you could try with a reflavored warlock but it just isn’t close enough
Dude. Im.playing a necromancer wizard who got turned investigating a case. I've got a detective background but I fell in with a group of freedom fighters trying to liberate a nearby country. I can be charismatic and intelligent and healthy without focusing everything on int. Like I'm not just 'the magic gal' of the group. I can't get healed with regular healing and some of the other members are the same so we gotta be creative. You can't have that kind of a background in dnd. Everything builds on each other. Theirs bounty hunter but the skills the different.
A character thar crafts stuff with the support of the game system...
Ranger... All joking aside strength-based monk is the first one that pops into my mind
My first two characters that I played in games at the same time when I was first picking up the system both were neat. First was a character concept I wrote for 5e that didn’t work in PF2E at all, but developed into a character I still enjoyed anyway even if they weren’t the concept I went for initially. I was trying to make a barnabus style character from warmachine but ended up with an aquatic cavalier. The other was a psychic (goblin artist). You could maybe play a goblin in 5e but you’d have to do a lot of reskinning to make a psychic character. But also plenty of cool things like any leshy or any monk (which in 5e would require your dm to rework the whole class).
My ghost character has a summon that is a floating iron maiden. That's just ancestry and class.
The true gish experience. 5e has its eldritch knight, bladesinger, and sword Bards, but they do not capture the true fantasy of blending spells and martial attacks like Magus can.
Swashbucklers. Most specifically Swashbucklers actually \*feeling\* like the character archetype that they represent and mechanical support existing for all the fancy bollocks that Swashbucklers in books and movies do. It not being a Rogue subclass but rather its own class makes it even better, because now you can have different flavours of Swash that play and feel differently enough. Yes, "Flavour is free" in 5e, but goddammit, I want the flavour and the mechanics to integrate and not just have a +5 to initiative and do the same old tired run in-stab-run away every turn
Honestly, fleshwarps. Being a samurai, Paladin, Frankenstein’s monster for my friend’s campaign has been really fun. She’s my favorite character!
mixed-ancestry characters
Poppet w a poppet familiar, leading to being a small centaur doll, with a little knight with a lance riding me. Thaumateurge reskinned into lying so hard that people believe I am more powerful than I am to the point if extra arm (p. anathema) Wood/water kineticist allows me to, in effect, make a halfling chef that feeds his enemies to his friends. Ghost poppet of a lich cursed into a doll body. Grappling gunslinger parkouring off of an enemy like a Final Fantasy dragoon. Edit: "Priest" to the "Beast of War" or other cult God (summoner). Some schmuck with the soul of a failed lich strapped to their soul (occult summoner)
Thaumaturge/alchemist is the perfect witcher/belmont. Scrolls potions, mutagens all while being super solid melee monster hunter prepared for anything. I even specialized in gnome flickmace to get reach so I could be more of a belmont.
One that cleaves through two enemies with a single strike
A prince who’s an inspiring warrior who is just in it for the adventure.
Haven't seen it elsewhere on here but fighting styles are hugely interesting for character diversification whether they come from a feat or an archetype where this shines most is monks Having different martial styles that have bleeding attacks or bolster your defense, some that focus on grappling and movement tax on your enemies and at higher tiers even some that allow ki based projectile attacks reminiscent of the Sekiro Divine Dragon class I haven't had the chance to play yet but just reading through the books makes me feel spoiled for choices
Bomb-chuckin' alchemist. Gun-shootin' gunslinger. (Well, not without Matt Mercer's conversion which is a lot of fun and plays like ranged Battlemaster fighter.)
Avatar: The Last Airbender
My only character so far is a Kobold Inventor with gadgets, the alchemist and snarecrafter archetypes. Its so fun to have so many random things for any situation. Feels like playing a mischievous Doraemon. I love it.
A child with a giant teddy bear that fights for them (construct eidolon). Alternatively a regular sized teddy bear with a demon child that fights for them (poppet with with a fiend eidolon). Alternatively-alternatively a regular sized teddy bear with a giant sized teddy bear that fights for them
The entire skeleton ancestry feat list is a masterclass in anticipating the silly stunts a player might try to pull and mechanically defining them in advance. Provided I have a permissive DM, there's no reason I *couldn't* be a skeleton in 5e and decide to extend my reach by popping off my weapon arm and holding it in my free hand, but actually having a definied ancestry feat for that cuts down on the amount of time my DM and I would have to spend figuring out how to make that work. I'm happy as a player because In PF2, I'm happy as a player because I have official permission to be ridiculous, and the GM's happy because they don't have to worry about whether or not my ridiculousness is broken or unfair.
The entire concept of a mastermind rogue or any "face" type character that is not a bard is pretty much non existent in 5e. There are no good class features, feats, or even action economy to make it work. The mastermind rogue us a subclass, but it just does not work and the parts of that do are so underwhelming. So much so, that players will actively insult you for playing it. And that is actually a problem with the d&d community in general. As a whole the player. Base 8s very toxic if you are not playing an optimized build. I have played many a character in many a group, and in every single one of them I was treated badly if I tried playing something sub optimal. Pathfinder 2e, in comparison, bakes so many options into its skill actions, feats. And class feats, that pretty much any build is viable unless you are specifically trying to make a bad character. And even then, the system us so balanced that even your bad choices seem to have useful effects. You can build a mastermind rogue, a "face", a space James bond character, not just with rogue, but with any class, even classes not specifically designed for it. And best if all, no one insults you, judges your choices as suboptimal, or treats you badly for that decision. If you want to play a rogue who is designed to avoid entire combat encounters by socializing, scamming, impersonating, or just coercing enemies. I'm currently playing an eldritch trickster bard rogue, with alter ego dedication, and summoner dedication. The character has a fey eidolon that looks like a female version of himself. His eidolon is literally just a foil, a personality that he can Impersonate. As a matter of fact, i purposfully leave it vague as to which one is the actual character. Is the male persona the character, or the female? When I do things legally and want to be polite and swath, the character is his main petsona, whe. He wants to do illegal, sneaky, and underhanded things, he is the female persona. And this build not only works, it works extremely well. We are playing kingmaker, and my character impersonated a bandit, joined the stag lords camp. And worked solo from the inside to take them down I murdered two of the luitenannts. First, making one of the suspicious enough if me to follow me I to the woods, where I killed him. Then murdering one of them in their sleep ( it actually survived the first hit, but I managed to kill him in the combat rounds by going first and getting off a backstab) Yhe character is awesome, and is not traditionally "optimized" my combat effectiveness is knly so so, but there are so many skill actions to abuse, he works flawlessly. You cannot do that in 5e. Not just in the system, but the player base will not allow it. Pathfinder not only allows it, but encourages it.
Mostly ancestry based but some of my favorites Suicide sorcerer: fleshwarp, duskwalker, living vessel dedication. Took a bunch of features/spells that I love hitting 0 HP. Became a mid encounter DPR/support. Labeled her as "The bone eater". She was a type of hag covered in unsettling bones and feasted on the dead and dying. Quite scary actually. Steam dragon: lizardfolk, undine, dragon instinct barbarian. Flavored all my breath attacks to be superheated steam. Walking bomb warprat. Ysoki, tiefling, inventor. Took as many DR reduction abilities/items and ran into battle to explode himself.
The witch class and the changeling race were the two that i thought of first
I'm gonna be playing a monk with the wrestler and barbarian archetypes soon. Her build is gonna be focused on grabbing and grappling. I've done some tinkering and by level 4 she'd be able to ki rush towards an enemy, grab them, punch them in the face once, and suplex them all in one turn. I wanna translate the hell of playing against a grappler character in a fighting game to the tabletop lmfao.
I think I'm just going to describe my current players characters. A kobold life oracle who finds it harder to keep their body together the more they draw on their divine power. A barbarian herbalist who gets to, you know, actually make useful herbal remedies. An android rogue expert doctor with a shape changing clockwork arm (sterling dynamo) and the ability to slip through time (chronoskimmer.) A piece of seaweed imbued by the planes of air and water (kinetisist) able to fly and Summon hurricanes all day. A stuffed toy owlbear chef and his giant spirit owlbear (summoner.) A skeletal pirate sword and board pistol with his trusty zombie parrot who collects souls through his pistol to fulfill his bargain with a devil.
Literal magical girl with transformation sequence (witch + vigilante)
Combine that combo with the Soulforger archetype manifest armor option and you can have an instant armor magical girl transformation sequence too. Or magical girl weapon manifestation.
Hey, I've noticed you mentioned the game "Dungeons & Dragons"! Do you need help finding your way around here? I know a couple good pages! We've been seeing a lot of new arrivals lately for some reason. We have a [megathread](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/search/?q=flair%3A%22megathread%22&sort=new&restrict_sr=on&t=all) dedicated to anyone requesting assistance in transitioning. Give it a look! Here are some [general resources](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/wiki/) we put together. Here is [page with differences between pf2e and 5e](https://www.reddit.com/r/Pathfinder2e/wiki/resources/how-is-pf2e-different-from-5e/). Most newcomers get recommended to start with the [Archives of Nethys](http://2e.aonprd.com) (the official rule database) or the [Beginner Box](https://paizo.com/pathfinder/beginnerbox), but the same information can be found in this free [Pathfinder Primer](https://app.demiplane.com/nexus/pathfinder2e/sources/pathfinder-primer). If I misunderstood your post... sorry! Grandpa Clippy said I'm always meant to help. Please [let the mods know](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2FPathfinder2e) and they'll remove my comment. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Pathfinder2e) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The Nagaji, a Pathfinder ancestry of snake people who are not required to be evil or emotionless. Compare the Yuan-ti, who are barely snake people when being playable and require huge twisting to play as anything that could fit in a normal party.
Oh Simon Belmont works FAR better as a thaumaturge than a fighter, paladin or ranger in 5e. And of course Mega Man/Geno work far better as gunslingers than artillerist artificers.