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[Cruxador]

Ehh, I'd assume aspects fill the role of both life paths and beliefs/instincts.
Which could be a pain.

General advice, not just for game design but for life: If one of the potential ways it could be done would be a pain, don't do it that way.

[Tack]

Ehh, I'd assume aspects fill the role of both life paths and beliefs/instincts.
Which could be a pain.

General advice, not just for game design but for life: If one of the potential ways it could be done would be a pain, don't do it that way.

GO TELL BEN FRANKLIN THAT.
MURICA

[Andres]

Is Pathfinder just supposed to be Dungeons and Dragons except more difficult?

[BorkBorkGoesTheCode]

Is Pathfinder just supposed to be Dungeons and Dragons except more difficult?

Pathfinder is supposed to be a continuation of Open Game Dungeons and Dragons.

[Jimmy]

Pathfinder fills two or three niches in the gaming world:

First, it's a system built around 3.5e Dungeons and Dragons, arguably the most popular of all tabletop rules systems. It aims to maintain the spirit of the system after WotC moved on with their newer versions and stopped publishing official 3.5e content.

Second, it aims to balance the game power creep to a moderate degree. It revised a bunch of rules that made 3.5e easily exploited, especially for spellcasters. It buffed the utility of a lot of combat maneuvers for melee types and gave them access to heaps of new tricks. It also introduced disincentives for creating the horribly mutant multiclass builds that were popular flavours of the month for 3.5e.

Finally, it makes the majority of its content open source, so it draws a big crowd of players simply because they can access the rules they need for free without buying a million splat-books, unlike 3.5e.

As a system Pathfinder still has all the crunchy-ness that 3.5e veterans love, but also a simplistic front-end that's not so intimidating for new players. It's not perfect and can still be terribly broken by the right wrong player, but overall it's a fun way to spend a weeknight with friends.

[scriver]

More specifically, it aims to be a continuation of 3.5th Edition d&d (WotC released the backbone ruleset to the public, so they're able to use the same game system). While balance and difficulty probably have changed some over the years, I don't think they expressively try to be "more difficult" as a rule. That said, a lot of players have been using these rules for a long time and thus become very familiar with the mechanics. The consequence of this demographic seeking challenge may very well have led to a "difficulty escalation", as it were.

In practice, I think the expectations on your characters' abilities is a bit higher in pathfinder than 3.5, but not as much as "like 3.5 but harder" makes it sound like in my head.

Pre edit: ninja'd, but I don't care! I'll post if I want to!

[Sergius]

You also get optional extra customization for classes called Archetypes, which I don't think existed in 3.5 as a mechanic. Basically trading class abilities at certain levels. Wizards get those on top of schools, which already grant unique powers rather than simply affecting spell memorization.

[RedWarrior0]

You also get optional extra customization for classes called Archetypes, which I don't think existed in 3.5 as a mechanic. Basically trading class abilities at certain levels. Wizards get those on top of schools, which already grant unique powers rather than simply affecting spell memorization.

Not in core 3.5, but Unearthed Arcana had alternate class features, and I'm pretty sure several other books did, as well.

[Tawa]

Yeah, there were variant classes in 3.5, but they were pretty esoteric. Almost nobody used them outside of more specialized builds IIRC.

[MrRoboto75]

Dungeonscape had a handful of them

Alongside vats of acid filled with sharks that breathe acid

[Gentlefish]

Yeah, there were variant classes in 3.5, but they were pretty esoteric. Almost nobody used them outside of more specialized builds IIRC.

One of my favorites, though, gave up Druid's wildshaping for Monk's bonus to AC and ranger's favored enemy

[Culise]

Yeah, there were variant classes in 3.5, but they were pretty esoteric. Almost nobody used them outside of more specialized builds IIRC.

One of my favorites, though, gave up Druid's wildshaping for Monk's bonus to AC and ranger's favored enemy

And Cloistered Cleric was also not necessarily specialized, but was a major staple for most optimization in that class that wasn't specialized in getting into the thick of battle and whacking everyone with a mace or the like.  Not that clerics really needed a power boost, mind.  I suspect any lack of popularity for Cloistered Cleric was simply because everyone had Core, while not everyone had Unearthed Arcana (even with it included in the SRD). 

Outside of that, though, yeah.  I don't think most class variants saw much use outside of either flavour-oriented builds or highly-specialized melee builds (I'd have to look more into optimized barbarian builds, but I think one of the totems saw a lot of use in chargers).

[Jimmy]

There was the Fighter variant that gave you Sneak Attack dice in place of bonus feats. Good for squeezing out a prestige class entry without deep investment in Rogue.

[RedWarrior0]

Yeah, there were variant classes in 3.5, but they were pretty esoteric. Almost nobody used them outside of more specialized builds IIRC.

One of my favorites, though, gave up Druid's wildshaping for Monk's bonus to AC and ranger's favored enemy

And Cloistered Cleric was also not necessarily specialized, but was a major staple for most optimization in that class that wasn't specialized in getting into the thick of battle and whacking everyone with a mace or the like.  Not that clerics really needed a power boost, mind.  I suspect any lack of popularity for Cloistered Cleric was simply because everyone had Core, while not everyone had Unearthed Arcana (even with it included in the SRD). 

Outside of that, though, yeah.  I don't think most class variants saw much use outside of either flavour-oriented builds or highly-specialized melee builds (I'd have to look more into optimized barbarian builds, but I think one of the totems saw a lot of use in chargers).

Funny thing about barbarians, there were two sets of totem ACFs. One of them, the lion totem granted pounce, which is indeed very effective on a charger.

Edit: It was normal totems, in Unearthed Arcana, and Spirit Totems, in Complete Champion.

[Cruxador]

it's a fun way to spend a weeknight with friends.

People have had fun with FATAL. Saying you can have fun with friends isn't really a quality of the system, it's a quality of spending time with your friends.