Pathfinder Player and GM Core Are Now Available

The new Remastered core rulebooks will serve as a fresh entry point for Pathfinder 2nd Edition under the ORC license.

Today, November 15th, Paizo released the first two books of their remastered line: Pathfinder Player Core and Pathfinder GM Core. They will continue the line in 2024 with Pathfinder Monster Core and Pathfinder Player Core 2.

These books serve as a fresh entry point into 2nd edition while removing any carried over OGL content and incorporating several years of errata and changes to the game. This comes as a response to the concerns brought about earlier this year with the shifting conditions of the Open Gaming License and the huge influx of new Pathfinder players. This explosion of new players saw Paizo selling out of Pathfinder Core Rulebook in Q1 and triggered an unexpected new and final printing of the book.

Paizo used this opportunity to pull content from many of the previous books, along with errata and feedback from the developers and players, to replace the OGL books as they are phased out of production. They also streamlined the organization of the books to make it easier to navigate for old and new players alike.

The design team also took this opportunity to introduce new rules, heritages, and feats, as well as overhauling spellcasting.

We did a review of both books earlier this month. They are available now in standard hardcover, Special Edition hardcover, and hobby-retailer exclusive Sketch Cover hardcovers.

If you want to find out more about the ORC license, you can find it on Azora’s website.

 

[Reynard]

I can't seem to find information on this magic "overhaul." The prior article just said that the spells were alphabetized/schools removed.

As I understand it, they rebalanced and rewrote a lot of spells, in addition to renaming some.

Unrelated: PF2 still strikes me as Pathfinder's 4e. Did I browse the rules too quickly, or is there a silent rebellion somewhere that I don't know about?

What does "Pathfinder's 4E" mean in this context?

 

[GMMichael]

What does "Pathfinder's 4E" mean in this context?

A DRPG designed to look and feel like World of Warcraft.

 

[Reynard]

A DRPG designed to look and feel like World of Warcraft.

How so? Will there be massive raids? Will adventures be built around collecting apples or wolf pelts? Do you have to have a bunch of different timers set to determine which abilities you are allowed to use? Will there be a monthly fee?

In other words: what are you on about?

 

[Velderan]

A DRPG designed to look and feel like World of Warcraft.

There are abilities that use focus points to use. You regain focus points by using the refocus activity which takes 10 minutes of downtime between encounters, so I guess that could be considered putting some of the game's design emphasis on encounter balance. I didn't play 4e and am vaguely aware of 4e having the AEDU concept for how mechanics work. Is that what you're referring to?

 

[Staffan]

I can't seem to find information on this magic "overhaul." The prior article just said that the spells were alphabetized/schools removed.

Since the remaster isn't released under the OGL, many spells have been renamed and tweaked. For example, cone of cold used to do 12d6 in a 60 foot cone. Now howling blizzard does 10d6 in the same area, but it can also be cast as a 30-foot burst at a range of 500 feet for three actions, and I think there's something in there about difficult terrain or something as well.

Unrelated: PF2 still strikes me as Pathfinder's 4e. Did I browse the rules too quickly, or is there a silent rebellion somewhere that I don't know about?

There are some things that are similar between 4e and PF2. This is not strange. 4e was, to some degree, written to fix perceived problems with 3e. To a large degree, those things are still problems in PF1, and it makes sense that some of the solutions would be similar (though not identical).

And my understanding is that there are still a fair amount of people who play Pathfinder 1 rather than 2.

 

[sevenbastard]

You know, I have a pretty wide potential player pool. That makes it only all the more frustrating when I can't fill a table to give PF2ER an honest go. "Let's just play 5E." UGH.

/rant

If you want a chalange try getting people to play B/X !

 

[Velderan]

If you want a chalange try getting people to play B/X !

Bait and switch.

I'm planning a game for some coworkers who have never played D&D. I didn't specify which version and the game I'm prepping is using Old School Essentials.

 

[Reynard]

I wonder how hard it will be to solo PF2ER using Fantasy Grounds? Like, could I run myself through an adventure to really get the rules of play down?

 

[Velderan]

I wonder how hard it will be to solo PF2ER using Fantasy Grounds? Like, could I run myself through an adventure to really get the rules of play down?

I found some interesting threads on Reddit of people running a solo adventure on Foundry for themselves to get the feel of the system down. These were also people new to Foundry so they wanted to get used to that too.

When I first started, I imported the PDF for one of the free RPG day adventures (Fistful of Flowers I think, which is a 10/10 adventure name btw) and used the basic icon PCs from the Beginner Box to build a party of 4. I ran a few combats to get the feel of the system and figure out how to navigate journal entries and such. No idea how feasible that scenario is in FG. Do they make the free RPG adventures available?

 

[Reynard]

I found some interesting threads on Reddit of people running a solo adventure on Foundry for themselves to get the feel of the system down. These were also people new to Foundry so they wanted to get used to that too.

When I first started, I imported the PDF for one of the free RPG day adventures (Fistful of Flowers I think, which is a 10/10 adventure name btw) and used the basic icon PCs from the Beginner Box to build a party of 4. I ran a few combats to get the feel of the system and figure out how to navigate journal entries and such. No idea how feasible that scenario is in FG. Do they make the free RPG adventures available?

I don't think so but I own a couple from my LAST attempt to get people to play PF2.