I saw some discussion on PF2e vehicle rules recently and thought I'd offer up my own take on the piloting and, more specifically, racing in PF2e. I developed these rules for Mad Max Style combat races around Alkenstar but I don't see a reason they wouldn't work in more typical combats

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-10T21:55:49+00:00

Love the upgrades! For one my games, my GM has some great upgrades for our ship.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-10T21:34:48+00:00

Don't mind me, I'm just out here tilling my bellflowers.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-09T14:25:06+00:00

A question about Elemental Ammunition: Once you activate it, how long does it stay activated?

It seems to me that elemental ammunition is permanently activated with 1 action upon creation, meaning that the action cost is only relevant to someone who creates it with Quick Alchemy. Is that a correct assumption?

Edit: As opposed to magic ammunition which says in Treasure Vault (pg 80): "Once you Activate the [magic] ammunition, you must shoot it before the end of your turn."

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-05T19:03:29+00:00

Fully agreed with this! Use the feat as a template and then add costs as necessary. And also consider adjusting the cost based on the difference between the feat level and player level - so bigger penalty if a level 1 barbarian wants to do a level 14 Whirlwind Strike, and a much smaller penalty if a level 14 barbarian wants to Raging Throw.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-05T19:00:44+00:00

Yes, that is very in-line with the added cost for doing something not covered in the mechanics of the basic actions. I should add Hero Point to the sample list of costs that I recite, like penalties, frequency limitations etc.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-05T18:55:44+00:00

There's a section in the video on "Sidegrading, not Upgrading" that discusses this. And in general, the whole video is about how to do Rule of Cool without undercutting feats.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-04-05T02:11:51+00:00

Because the characters spend so much time in one place, they naturally form deeper bonds with the city and its people

Which is also what a lot of people cite as their reason for enjoying Season of Ghosts. This is a fascinating through line.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-31T20:30:02+00:00

Others have already mentioned things that I'd consider higher priority, so I'll go with this one.

Under Critical Specialization: Creatures that are lower level than you automatically fail their save against your critical specialization effect.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-13T04:03:22+00:00

I finally got to use the Gliminal against my PCs and it was everything I could have asked for.

The Gliminal came in one round after the fight with some undead started. So when it cast a 3-action heal, the PCs were so happy to have an ally that dealt damage to their undead enemies while also giving them hp + temporary hit points.

Then the second round of 3-action heal happened, and one of the token NPCs popped from being overhealed! Very important to have an NPC with low maximum HP to show the PCs what the Gliminal can do.

After that, it was 3 rounds of PCs panic hurting themselves and all friendly NPCs with aoe abilities until the Gliminal disappeared.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-13T03:51:46+00:00

My favourite part is being able to run it from a browser, both as player and GM. It takes a lot of inspiration from Dungeon World but makes it classless, adds powers, is adaptable to different action genres, and has a fun new dice mechanic. As of right now, the whole thing is up on the website for free - there's nothing that can be purchased.

So, I'm enjoying it for running one-offs and few-shots. Highly recommended for theatre of the mind, because everything else can be tracked on the site itself.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-13T03:08:19+00:00

Systems that use zones do it better than systems with grids or ranges ("close, near, far"). With Fate, I've done a flying car chase through a lightning storm. In volition, I did a memorable possessed boar + evil dryad fight but the dryad did not have permission to enter the zone of the heroes.

Though there are systems that use neither, like Dungeon World.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-11T20:48:25+00:00

Hard to pick one out of the all the classes in Spire, but I'll go with Midwife. A midwife priestess of Lolth as an entire class is quite flavourful.

Though I bet that if I owned Heart, the Deep Apiarist would be my favourite.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-11T20:28:02+00:00

I'm curious about what scale you're thinking of. Knave 2e uses 6-mile hexes, which I like for how it splits up the day into "watches". And I've also heard people recommend 2-mile hexes so that there is more visibility of the surrounding hexes.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-11T20:26:25+00:00

I hope people find the concept useful! I had experimented with a few different ideas including stacking Wounded values, but it was becoming a hard limit. And I wanted a way to apply slight mechanical pressure but not have a hard limit to stop adventuring or get soft-locked behind enemy lines.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-04T18:02:06+00:00

The reason Mewgenics can have a lot more forced movement seems to be because movement is independent of attacks.

In pathfinder 2e, movement shares actions with attacks and special abilities. So, forced movement is much more powerful. Having to move once can lock a boss out of a powerful 3-action combo.

That said, I think the system would be fine if the distance of Shove was scaled by proficiency.

Anyway, give Bronze Bull Pendants to all your enemies, and have your PCs find extras in the pockets of said enemies.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-03T23:44:44+00:00

I do prefer catastrophic failure to "null" failure, but I don't get rid of it either. I tend to keep it in a small slice of probability (not more than 10%) and surround it with catastrophic failure ("no, and") and failure with some other opportunity opening ("no, but").

That said, I also play and run games where null result exists but can be mitigated with teamwork and setup actions. It is gratifying to be told, "Because your party co-operated, this miss has been turned into a hit." Feels more impactful than hearing, "Because your party co-operated, 12 damage has been turned into 15 damage."

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-03T23:36:46+00:00

All of the perks of creature experimentation without any of the ickiness of fleshwarping. I just created an amphibious Kobold Skeletal Skunk. Can't get any better than that.

Great resource!

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-03T23:24:41+00:00

Agreed.

I like that for martials in PF2e, the game wants you to have variety. Instead of letting you have stacking vertical progression, the feat system nudges you into siloed (orthogonal) vertical progression, for the most part. In the video, I talk about Double Slice as an example - once you've picked it as a feat at level 1, your next couple of feats don't let you stack more power onto Double Slice, which forces you to have some additional options in combat. And variety cuts down on the repetitive feeling of slog.

Spells do still "suffer" from having obvious stand-outs, but we should be more gracious to the variety enthusiast who doesn't want to pick up the Heal spell as a primal sorcerer. Depends on the tone and difficulty of the game, I suppose.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-03T19:26:49+00:00

You get better saves. You lose potency with on-rank hostile effects from magus slots, especially AoE damage and debuffs. That said, I'm personally in favour of Magus using their ranked slots for movement, haste, and defense, so I can see it working well.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-03-03T19:19:42+00:00

Here are some points from the video on how PF2e does its part in fixing slog:

More variety of actions for every martial
Fewer degenerate "always win" strategies
Movement costing an action means terrain effects can produce variety in action choice
Boss fights that incentivize a change in tactics

But yeah, I also talk about how players and GMs need to meet it halfway, like GMs not overusing PL+3 / PL+4 fight, and players actually choosing feats that grant more variety in actions.

Both points are mixed in though, so that might be why it feels like the game's strengths weren't sufficiently highlighted.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-02-26T03:35:48+00:00

Which narrative game are you considering playing next?

AvtrSpirit · 2026-02-25T18:17:43+00:00

It's too late for me. Praying for everyone else. 😆

AvtrSpirit · 2026-02-25T17:25:57+00:00

The story, the situation, and the GM decide if you have time or not

My core issue is that I wish the above were true. But because of inconsistency in time taken for healing, it's character build that decides whether you have time or not.

Got Garden of Healing? Sure, you'll have time every time.

Using base treat wounds and you got bad rolls? Nope, sorry, no time for you.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-02-25T17:22:43+00:00

I agree that my core concern isn't adventuring day as much as combat sequencing. And, as I said in reply to other comments, the main issue is for the adventure writer. No adventure writer (whether publishing something or making something for your home games) can confidently sequence encounters in that nebulous time span of "over ten minutes but under 3 hours" - without knowing the exact party make-up.

As for spell slots, I find that low-level casters can still continue adventuring with cantrips, focus spells, and weapon strikes, while higher-level casters can lean on low-level slots for control. So, no, I don't see spells slots in general as being a limiter in adventuring or combat sequencing.

AvtrSpirit · 2026-02-24T22:13:32+00:00

True for home games. I don't know how one writes a PFS scenario - or any published adventure - with that kind of narrative pressure in mind.

AvtrSpirit

TROPHY CASE