One subset of the folks I play with regularly is excited about trying new things, and this started when we decided to try Pathfinder 2nd edition. I never played D&D 3.5e, or PF1e, so it was new to me—it’s also a different fork of history, since Pathfinder branched from D&D after 3.5e. Now it’s evolved on its own, been refined on its own.
There are a lot of interesting things from PF2e that I think are potentially worth stealing. The XP system is, I think, a distinct improvement if you want to use XP. Thinking about class and subclass features as a bit more of a grab bag is a great way to allow a little more customization. Breaking out background biology and culture is a good step—though ultimately I prefer the even more open version in Tasha’s.
Ultimately—and this is absolutely a personal preference—I was somewhat underwhelmed. One thing that I was nervous about going in, and that I did find to be true, was that it’s breadth might actually be limiting. If there are rules for everything, where do you find the blank spaces around them to make it your own?
5e simplifies a number of things with Bounded Accuracy that let you as the DM lean into the blank spaces. Setting DCs is easier when there’s a global scale of difficulty. Granting Advantage and Disadvantage is easier than calculating circumstance bonuses. There are a lot of moving parts, but still far fewer than 3.5e and its Pathfinder progeny.
In one of Colville’s videos, he describes making up abilities for notable enemies on the fly, picking saves and DCs on the spot. I believe it’s this one (spoilers for his Chain of Archaron and for Critical Role campaign 1):
Is this improvisation good? I don’t know. But I do think that 5e allows a certainly level of system mastery that I don’t think PF2e permits, and that enables this kind of spur of the moment building. You still can’t, and don’t need to, hold every detail of every rule in your head, but you can hold the underlying system and assumptions.
James DM 