Fantasy adventure with detailed character building, three-action turns, and tactical combat, where degrees of success and many options shape every fight.
From 46 firsthand play reports in 6 r/rpg threads. The threads alone average 6.3.
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1,215 r/rpg posts named it, October 2023 to October 2026.
Heavy. Hype 7.8 for its age.
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The reports come from GMs and players with anywhere from a year to several hundred hours of play, including finished campaigns. Most call the system balanced, tactical and reliable, and many say it takes real effort to learn. Opinion splits after that: some tables keep enjoying it, and others describe fatigue or flat turns.
Each thread is rated for the play it describes, from the firsthand reports in it. Load one here or read it on Reddit.
People who ran or played PF2e report a tight, balanced system with easy encounter building and fun monsters, after a real learning curve. A vocal minority found it too rules-heavy, with fiddly conditions, trap options and punishing play, and a few dropped it. 15 firsthand · 87 comments
Most of the people who actually played PF2e (one to eighteen months or more, several full campaigns) found it competent but flat. They called feats bland, casters like extra work, and fights a routine of flanking, debuffs and then attacking. A few players and GMs still enjoy it, but their praise is mostly for the structure and for fixing the older adventure paths, and one of them is ending their time with the system. 10 firsthand · 190 comments
People who have run or played Pathfinder 2e mostly enjoy it, and the OP has run it for 1.5 years and likes it overall. The recurring problems are slow combat, hard-to-tune boss fights (HP/AC/crit math), clunky skill challenges, and a tactical teamwork style that some players resist. Much of the thread is about alternative games (Daggerheart, Draw Steel, Shadow of the Weird Wizard, Savage Worlds), which were ignored. 7 firsthand · 43 comments
The thread mostly recommends other games. The few people who actually played PF2e say it works well and fixes 5e's problems, but it has left them bored or short of the high-fantasy feel they wanted. The OP stuck with it for two 4-year campaigns before burning out. 5 firsthand · 128 comments
The OP and a few commenters with long PF2e experience say the game is excellent for the first few hundred hours, then every fight starts to feel the same because the tuned math collapses each turn into one decision pattern. Campaigns were completed and enjoyed (a duet Kingmaker run was a 'huge success'), but veterans report fatigue and a lack of surprise, including at 20th level. 5 firsthand · 200 comments
The thread is mostly about community attitudes toward trying other systems and about D&D, not how PF2e plays. The few firsthand PF2e reports are positive: short campaigns ran well with mostly good players, and one GM finds encounter rebalancing relaxing. 4 firsthand · 276 comments