SIX HOURS AND 13 MINUTES of video, researched, scripted, prepared, recorded, and edited in 16 days! I need a drink. ADDITIONS/ERRATA: -Monk Dedication already gives the Witch a Class DC. Class DC comes up other ways that I haven't thought of, however! -Ceremonial Knife doesn't prevent you from hoarding a bunch of enchanted knives! Probably missing language of "this lasts until you make another" that I'm guessing will be errata'd. -I misunderstood the benefit of Witch's Broom - it is the daily anointing of any appropriate item! And so the +10 status bonus to Speed for an already existing Broom of Flying makes sense. (Btw, another example of why Tailwind is a poorly balanced spell!) -The Blood Ward hex spell, protecting its target from a creature type for up to 1 minute has been buffed (no more 10 minute cooldown). -Absorbed Familiar is a renamed (and now more versatile) version of Tattoo Transformation from Grand Bazaar

Witch's Broom lets you create a temporary flying broomstick daily by anointing an item. It also lets you craft a permanent flying broomstick. If the item you choose to anoint in any given day happens to be a permanent flying broomstick, it gets a +10-foot status bonus to its Speed. There is no language that specifies that that permanent flying broomstick can't be one you crafted.

The most shocking comparability between the Witch and Wizard is how practice of either class makes your hair turn white (just look at the iconics)!

TIL Pinocchio is a Poppet Witch. The Blue Fairy is the patron (Faith's Flamerkeeper, or Spinner of Threads) and Jiminy Cricket is the familiar.

"But I hope it's been fruitful, for you" No lie these videos have been incredibly helpful for me, as someone that GMs in PFS and won't get the actual texts until day of the next meeting. Not only have them been very informative, but they served as nice little hype pieces to see how the adjustments are.

So... last half of November is rules lawyer vacation, right?!? 🏝️

Absorb Familliar is the old Tatoo Transformation ability from the grand bazaar, just with more flexibility in terms of flavor

0:00-0:20 Wow, you're not bitter.... HAHA! :-P That was a great intro Ron, and yeah, these reviews have helped a lot. Thank you.

I havent watched this one yet, but wanted to thank you for all the effort you went through to give those of us interested a thorough look into what to expect in the upcoming changes.

Thanks for all the reviews, congrats on the milestone of going through all classes! :)

Excited to hear these changes, I'd previously written off the Witch for mechanical reasons, but the theme behind it is very popular (as I recall, when Ronald was trying to convert some DND youtubers, in a group of five - two were witches...)

I would take your lunch money for being a nerd, but then I remembered you're a lawyer, so I better don't. On the other hand, you're a lawyer, you probably have sweet lunch $$$. Hard choice. Love your content man, stay awesome.

Which is in a really interesting state now. Hex cantrips no longer having the immunity for the most part and the Refocus changes are huge, as is their Hexes and feats being brought up to snuff. Resentment is annoyingly stronger than the rest, especially with how good the Occult list is for Witch, but at least it is “high risk” in that the familiar needs to be at risk and will be a primary target of the Witch themselves isn’t prioritized. Coven Spell is also amazing, probably my favorite Witch feat, though Sympathetic Strike is arguably the most “important”. Where things get interesting is Witch’s everything economy. In order to use the Familiar abilities, you need to position the familiar and pull off a Hex. Most Hexes has 30ft range and are Sustain, so you have to be in danger range as well, unless playing back with the Divine one. You can still dip Psychic or even Wizard for some focus spells, but they are awkward to use with the need to Hex. Plus, your familiar is now a major resource, as if it’s killed, you lose a major part of your kit. In a boss only day or a mostly low and trivial encounter day, this doesn’t matter as your familiar can put in a ton of work on a single boss (familiar abilities either offer a benefit or force the boss to burn actions and maybe MAP to kill it) and isn’t needed or at much risk in low encounters. In a day with multiple moderate and severe encounters though, it’s familiar reliance quickly becomes more of an issue, since losing it is a massive power loss but keeping it safe means you aren’t benefiting from it. Honestly, Champion dip looks like a good option for both Heavy Armor and Champion Reaction to protect the familiar. I also think that it isn’t an issue when compared to Wizard. Wizard does run out of gas harder, but it still has a ton of slots and other Thesis still give a ton of power. Plus, the extra slots mean that going Flexible Caster is much less painful on Wizard, and not needing to do the familiar and Hex dance means a Psychic dip is very easy to use.

Thanks Ronald. Your videos are why I am going to make PF2 my main TTRPG system. Once I watched your videos and delved deeper into the game system, I found it to be far easier to use than 5e and I've been playing D&D since 1st edition. The ambiguity in so many elements of 5e make the game just a chore to play. The 3 action system is simple. For 99% of the game, you get 3 actions.. choose 3. I don't have to ask if player is done.. the DM doesn't have to ask me. If they payed attention, they know when I am done. Love it, so thanks for all you do!

the witch's hut's leap is huge what the hell (love it)

Something I noticed while looking at the familiars is that there is a new feat called Pet. This first level general feat makes for great roleplay for a character that intends to take a multiclass dedication (especially to Witch) and wants the pet before they get the power.

Thanks for all the coverage videos! Helped convince me to switch over to PF2E from 5E. Excited to get my own copies of the remaster books.

Unless I missed you calling this out, there was actually a noteworthy buff in the Basic Lesson options. The Lesson of Protection hex spell, Blood Ward, had its 10 minute immunity removed.

Congratulations on finishing the classes coverage! Thank you, they've been very useful :D

Loved all the work man this has been so helpful for sussing out the differences! Really appreciate all the hard work.

Awesome coverage Ron. Was waiting for this one.

The starless shadow seems like the lowest risk offensive familiar ability, since you can blond the target before sending the familiar in.

Thank you for all the coverage. I’m loving these videos

I know it was a ton of work, but i really appreciated how thorough you were in the presentation of all these bideos

Well done for such an exhaustive review of the Remaster - really appreciated and as ever your assessments are detailed and sharp.

Been looking forward to this one! Thanks for the remaster break down

Thanks for your hard work man, we apriciate it

Amazing videos! Also thank you for always bringing up the fact that people should really take into account what a class does in actual play, their action economy, or sheer fun of a class. Ive seen my fair share of Min-Maxers that only crunch number when discussing the viability of a class or build. So its great to hear an experience player talk about more than just spread sheets about crits and damage.

This was very helpful, thank you.

Would love to hear the rest of the one liners for each class, Ronald. Thanks for the video.

Ronald, Can't tell you enough how appreciative I am of how thorough, exact, and contextual your videos on the remaster has been. As a long time 3.5/PF1e player, looking for a better game, your videos have convinced me to pick up the 2e Remasters with CONFIDENCE. Genuinely some of the best RPG overview content I've seen on KZfaq. Cheers!

Thank you for the remastered video content. It was a great resource for condensing and streamlining what content my group and I do and do not want to take from it in our games going forward.

Very helpful video!

Thanks for the explanation.

Your point near the end about action economy and more rechargeable resources being mitigated by that limiter, is the same point I've made with regards to houserules I implemented to give casters much more recharging resources. I implement a rule whereupon spell casters get 1 spell at each spell rank they can cast, that they can treat effectively like a cantrip. This ends up giving them more castings of more powerful spells (like a cantrip meaning not just repeated casts, but scaling casts). And it initially sounds really OP to people I have shared this with, but in practice the action economy really is an effective limiter.

Thanks for the thumbnail without a reaction face, and the great rundown of the witch. 😅 Hope the algorithm is ok with that.

The modern Witch is really cool. When the book first came out, my favorite class was the Wizard, but now I’m starting to really love the Witch too. I’m already crafting a Nephilim Starless Sky Witch.

The Pet Feat has a line at the end stating that if your pet dies you can retrain the feat to get a new one... which takes a week of downtime to do on average. So the line about needing a week of downtime to get your Familiar back is effectively still there since Familiars stuff says it gives you the Pet Feat and then adds extra stuff on top for them to use.

I'd probably houserule that that a fungus form familliar could also take the "plant form" ability, just turning into a mushroom of tiny size instead.

Spending three familiar abilities for a fast flying independent familiar seams like your buff/debuff turret will mostly be in position (40 feet per turn without actions and a single action if it needs to move the full 80). If there are reach 15 creatures the wich might want to employ an invisibility spell so that the familiar can sneek on it's turns instead, as it does not use the triggered hex effect it won't break the invisibility. But that can depend on adventures ofc, if the GM often says "across a thusand feet feald you see 5 balista crewed by skeletons" the wich, beastmaster and cavalier all cry in max two moves per turn.

Important when comparing the Wizard and Witch is that the abilities for The Inscribed One (the only arcane option for witches) are pretty lackluster, and the Familiar wizard doesn't really compare to spell blending or spell substitution in my eyes (in no small part because of drain bonded item becoming drain familiar). And when comparing the arcane witch to those two theses, they instead neatly sort themselves into three categories: Lasting power (Witch), for when your party doesn't like to rest Straight power (Spell blending Wizard), super powerful for 1-2 encounters after which you'll be longing for bed Flexibility (Spell substitution), the truest swiss army knife that can solve any problem given a little time And that feels like a good spot to be in, in my opinion. Though it would've been better if the wizards other theses weren't so meh

It's still incredibly funny to me that they put both Intelligence based prepared spellcasters that start with W in the same book for some reason

Just saw how many options there are for magic spoons laddles, and cauldrons there are. Might be something worth looking into making a build around.

I think the Resentment's familiar ability means it can sustain negative effects that have a duration, for example one minute, not a value, for example Slowed 3. That is how I'm going to rule it until we get a clarification from Paizo. It can keep effects with a duration going on indefinitely, as long as you cast hexes that is. Not too OP.

20:07 absorbed familiar sounds like a name change from familiar tattoo

I love the witch. I've always prioritised theme over power in TTRPGs. I usually avoid the most powerful classes and mechanics because I want to play what I enjoy, and I rarely enjoy beibg the absolute best. But, yeah the witch definitely needed some tuning and I'm glad to see this

I think my biggest gripe with the Witch even now is that it feels like it has potential to be even more distinct by having fewer spell slots but ways to spellshape and hex for enhanced power. I feel like they really could’ve used the Witch to give the fantasy that D&D5E Warlock players wanted. Players transferring into PF2E don’t really get a really equivalent that lines up both mechanically and thematically (Witch, Sorcerer, and Psychic aren’t really that particular feel). And I know that may be an unfair want, but I feel it would also let sorcerer and wizard preserve their uniqueness more.

Honestly the possibilities for Coven Spell Conceal Spell are fucking awesome.

Now that you've done all the remaster class guides, could you do a video on how the remaster changes affect non-core classes?

I want my Cartomancer Witch back.

My guess is that the specialized familiars will show up in the Monster Core - as either a section or sidebars.

I would also point out if you want to play an arcane witch you can only choose one patron so less options to get the broadest spell list.

Absorb familiar seems really good in that you can turn it into a gem and put that gem into a ring on your party’s frontliner’s finger. Boom, your familiar is always near the enemy, and it looks like they are using those abilities, not you!

Yeah the witch has more options... While their familiar is alive. With the new effect you have to put it in harms way; risking to loose it and a bunch of the new class features along with it for the rest if the day ! The wizard doesn't have this risk during the very first combat of the day.

I am not really worried about Evil Eye, but The Resentment's familiar ability is potentially problematic. The issue is that you can make it so that spells like Slow basically last indefinitely even on a successful save - this makes it so that, in effect, monsters will *always* fail saves against certain status spells against The Resentment. This makes them hyper-effective against solo encounters. The Resentment is an occult caster, so it does have the drawback of having the second worst spell list, so it does make sense to have a slightly better familiar ability - but I feel like this is probably just so powerful it will become the defacto witch path. There are some significant party composition drawbacks here, though, which has always been the occult witch's (and occult sorcerer's) main weakness. The main issue is that occult witches are controllers, and the occult spell list has poor AoE damage options and Soothe is not as good at healing as Heal is; on top of that, with how action-strapped witches are, leaning into the Healer archetype is not as much of an option for them, so they can't just lean into being a leader the way some occult characters can. The psychic can either take a path that gives them AoE damage spells or use Shatter Mind to make up for this gap, while the Bard is a leader thanks to their composition cantrips so doesn't have to fulfill the role of AoE damage dealer, but The Resentment has neither of these things. As a result, if you are running a The Resentment witch, you really need a Primal caster like a Druid Primal Sorcerer in the party, or a Cleric or Oracle who leans into their AoE damage options, as otherwise you're going to have problems against larger groups of monsters, where your spell list and familiar ability are far less useful, especially prior to level 9 when you start getting stuff like Black Tentacles/Slither. I think this is something that will require actual at-the-table testing to determine how powerful it is; in a vacuum, this seems hyper-powerful, but the party composition drawbacks do give me pause.

Hex cantrips are definitely a lot better now, but I wouldn't say they are so good that they are overshadowing normal leveled spells. Most of the effects are balanced to where the enemy is not affected if it succeeds on a save, which technically is how spells with the incapacitation trait are balanced anyways. Of course, they are much more spammable now so its still so they are definitely good, just not so strong as to unbalance the classes, akin to a more debuff oriented bard. The familiar abilities seem better though, since you are just getting free effects on top of your already decent hexes. Its kinda funny, they feel like wizards that draw way more aggro to deal with. Like the best way to deal with them are to chase them around to put them at risk and force them to use extra actions, or to dedicated a few attacks to killing a familiar. More annoying wizards feels like an appropriate tag line for the witch.

The Wildling Steward familiar ability is unusual because Point Out requires you to be able to speak or else your party members need to make a perception check. Seems you need to take the Speech familiar ability to make full use of it.

I agree that the Resentment is going to be cookie cutter build due to the insane strength of evil eye & the freebie effect. It will always be useful since it can work on ally debuffs, even to the point that allies would totally defend a familiar to perma-gimp a boss. Only one choice for Arcane and the free effect is pewp... like foul, stinky pewp 😢

I assume this is what your "Strongest Feat in the Game?" Video is going to cover, but Ceremonial Knife is absolutely broken as written. The feat has no language that limits you to a certain number of daggers, only language that limits you to making one per day. In addition there is no limit on the duration of time the dagger remains magical. This is very odd considering other similar "free item each day" feats such as Cauldron do contain this limiting language. This seems completely unintentional, but I do think it's a bit funny to imagine a witch running around with a trench coat full of free daggers loaded with up to 8th rank spells.

I will have to completely rework my witch... i can't wait. 😊

There's also now a disclaimer on valet saying that it doesn't work with independent explicitly. Regardless, can you also talk about the state of the poisons in player core? They have nerfed the damage of every single poison

Wouldn't the stunning fist feat gained from the monk archetype in the current edition already use the monk class DC since the dedication feat mentions becoming trained in it?

Ceremonial knife doesnt state that the knife's magic is gone when spell charing a new knife That and it doesnt state any duration except the number of times you can use the spell imbued in the knife So theoratically, if one has many knives, you can make them all spellcharged one day at a time Especially during downtime

Do Familiars still have the same HP as normal? If so I'm concerned that all the new witch features are gonna result in a tidal wave of dead familiars because those things are entirely too frail to be anywhere on the battlefield. I played with a character that archetyped into Witch before and all the familiar did after level 5 was ride around in pet cache, give me an extra spell, and give an extra focus point when out of combat. Anything else was too dangerous for it.

Hey ron to the end point on witch action economy i feel as if you forgot that patreon's puppet exists allowing you to move your familiar as a free action. So positioning isnt that bad.

My favorite class being sorcerer I'm not quite thrilled to see the witch in the player core instead.

For Evil Eye, wouldn’t the Sickened condition disappear at the end of your next turn if you don’t Sustain it via Sustain rules? A Sickened condition without a duration doesn’t go away on it’s own, yeah, but this one does have a sustained one, so it follows those rules. I think it’s similar to how Frightened from Dirge of Doom goes away on its own normally via Frightened rules. However, it is must also follow composition spell rules, which means casting a new composition will end all ongoing effects of the previous composition. In this case, Frightened ends through composition rules instead of Frightened rules.

witches seem much stronger now but not much for going for a dedication from another class... though they get a real nice familiar

Feed the Algorithm. It is hungry. Another enjoyable video.

27:23 I'm assuming that you mean there's less need to sustain Evil Eye because you can just reapply it to a target on subsequent turns? Because the language states "while the spell is active and you can see the target", and given the duration is "sustained up to 1 minute" I would assume that it drops off if you do not sustain. I'd rather keep the condition active if I've already made my save instead of having to fish for it again.

So the witch has originally been the same as the warlock, but what is the origin and reason for the renaming?

Potions in the mornin' Potions in the evenin' Potions at suppertime! When Potions' on the Double, you can have Potions any time!

That's an easy solution for me. I simply don't allow them for players. Along with other bad classes like bards and monks. A rare NPC antagonist can be one, but that's it. You don't have to allow anything in your game that you don't like. Nothing is lost.

Let's go WITCHES. Sad no updates for Baba Yaga patron but I guess I can reflavour one of the base ones.

I'm a little disappointed you didn't elaborate on the Patron's Presence feat and how hard it will be to set it up.

I think the only reason balancing the new The Resentment Patron's ability is the fact that Familiars are easy to kill. Maybe Paizo evaluated it wouldn't be all that strong because of that, but it is definitely a cut above all the rest. The new meta now will be making your familiar invisible and improve its chances of survival through that.

There is another book coming!

Isn't Cackle limited by the number of Focus points you have?

while it looks likea a lot of changes once you select them not much has changed. The witch I currently play is level 6 with cleric dedication to an ocean deity so the winter patron was the closest one, I did not had a lot feat that I really wanted to take that I could not because of the amount of choice, Now there is a lot of them that I know I won't be able to take them all After the change It got one more new language because of human change, patron puppet replace phase familiar, my oddity identification is now broader, my familiar has a new ability of doing an ice zone , cauldron now produce potion every day and the spells have changed a lot . I never had to use the phase familiar and I did not had results from cauldron yet, I began a batch of 5 potions at level 4 which is not finished yet. So the big change is 2 things that were never used to something I will use all the time.

I want to play a pathfinder witch so badly. 😭

16:20 - Athame

Haven't the wizard class lost the achools of magic thing that comes from dnd? I think the fact that the witch gained a nice identity together with the wizard losing some makes it exceed the wizard class in the remaster

Great video! Definitely excited that the witch is getting some live. Still a little disgruntled the witch isnt a pure occult caster and is more like an Int-based sorceror, but thats an aside. One thing you sort of glossed over with the Resentment patron critique is it locks you into the Occult tradition of spells. Thats not inherently bad, but it is a very significant reason to not pick that patron. I still think Wizard overall has a good niche relative to the witch by focusing on the utility and versatility of having more lots both by default and through drain bonded object. And obviously if you pick a thesis thats not the familiar one you have a clear toolset the witch cant easily emulate.

33:53 the witch has a specific weakness that the wizard doesn't have: if the witches familiar then the witch has no spells, because the familiar is the source of the witches magic. Edit: from the book-"Rather than interacting with you directly, your patron works through a familiar-a mystical creature that teaches you, serves as the conduit for your patron’s magic[...]"

Can finally consider witch for dual class but with with class 🤔

Woof. Seeing the other Familiar ability bonuses compared to Resentment. Sure being in 15 feet of the enemy is problematic, but that's compared to familiar abilities that have to be in melee range for their ability to do something immediately. (Flank/Snow Emanation). Should have said 5 Foot emanation for the snow familiar. Since that seems to be what it's describing. A "Burst centered on the caster" is just an Emanation effect right?

It should be said I'm brand new to PF2E. I've been reading the Witch in the Remaster, and apparently I'm missing all information on WHAT a Familiar stats look like. There's a lot of vagaries on what they are and what they do. "Normal animal but better" isn't really much information. Saying you can have a cat, then showing a winged cat, just amplifies the problem. Not new to RPGs. I've played many and varied kinds since 1979. This needs clarification.

I love how Witch now looks and feels like an actual witch. As for Witch Vs. Wizard . . . Familiars are very, very, very, VERY squishy. If a Witch is going to throw their valuable resource into harm's way constantly then they shouldn't be surprised when they suddenly go the rest of the day without that resource. So, that's another choice they have to carefully consider. Is the benefit worth the risk? Wizards, meanwhile, have less risk involved and need not worry so much over possible choice paralysis.

I feel the Wizard is still the winner. All the DM"s I've played with will be quick to kill a pesky familiar. My dm's killed familiars when they could only scout. They going to slam them things now that they can do things in combat too. So wizard still wins.

Comment for the algorithm

Can I use cackle and patreon's puppet on the same turn?

20:55 - So no corals, then?

I'm not sure which class is better persay, but I do know which one is more interesting and fun... and it's not the Wizard.

Positive comment

Im pretty sure evil eye didnt let the frighten go away on its own either

The end…for now….next year…there will be…another book!

I think they way I am gonna balance The Resentment (My favorite Subclass of my favorite class btw) is by firstly making it that if you stop sustaining evil eye the sickend just also goes away no further checks required and secondly I would add a saving throw to Ongoing Misery. I think the best way of still making it rewarding while keeping it balanced is like this: Firstly, you have to choose what effect to extend Crit Fail: Extends the effect by 2 rounds instead (If thats too strong you could also instead say that you can extend two or maybe even all effects by 1 round) Fail: Extends by 1 round Success: It extends the effect by 1 round but the effect cannot be extended further by this ability Crit Succ: Doesn't extend The saving throw should probably be the saving throw the creature failed to be affected in the first place, or Will if there was no saving throw. I think this still make the ability rewarding while keeping it balanced. I would also house-rule that certain powerful spells like Slow also have to be sustained which further limits some OP combos

Cauldron is messy. It doesn't have a level cap, only that you must 'know the formula', but we don't need to know formula's for common items anymore though we CAN know them. It's unclear to me if this feat is implying that, for the purpose of the free potions you MUST have the formula, or if the feat was written before they removed the requirements to have common formulas for crafting. What's to stop a level 1 character from saving up 50 GP for a level 10 formula and making level 10 potions for free other than DM fiat.

0:32 Where is Barbarian??? WTH?

I wish they'd have added Baba Yaga as a patron for the witch. BUt otherwise I dig it.