Into the Odd Remastered vs Pathfinder
Compare Into the Odd Remastered and Pathfinder side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.
| Into the Odd Remastered | Pathfinder | |
|---|---|---|
| Genre | Fantasy | Fantasy |
| Play Style | Rules-Light, Dungeon Crawl, Weird, Low-Prep, Attacks Always Hit, Open Source | Tactical, Crunchy, Character Building, High-Fantasy, Dungeon Crawl, Lore-Heavy |
| Core Mechanic | Three ability scores (STR, DEX, WIL) rolled on 3d6. No to-hit rolls: attacks always deal damage directly. Saves are d20 roll-under the relevant ability. Damage reduces HP first, then STR; at 0 STR you die. Arcana are unique magical objects that grant strange powers. | Roll d20 + modifier against a DC. Four degrees of success: critical success (beat DC by 10+), success, failure, and critical failure (miss by 10+). Each turn grants three actions to spend freely on strikes, movement, spellcasting, or other activities. Multi-attack penalty (-5/-10) discourages repeated strikes and encourages tactical variety. |
| Dice | d20, d4–d12 | d20 |
| Complexity | Very Low | High |
| Accessibility | Medium | Very High |
| Runnability | Medium | Very High |
| License | CC BY-SA 4.0 | ORC |
| Cost | $ | Free (ORC) |
| Publisher | Bastionland Press / Free League Workshop | Paizo |
| Year | 2022 | 2023 |
| Best For | Groups who want an ultra-streamlined OSR game where character creation takes minutes, combat is fast and deadly, and strange Arcana replace traditional spell lists. | Groups who want deep character customization, tactical grid combat with meaningful turn-by-turn decisions, and a richly detailed fantasy setting with free rules. |
| Highlights | Character creation in under five minutes, no wasted turns thanks to auto-hit combat, Arcana system offers wide creative options, fits in about 50 pages, spawned an entire design movement (Cairn, Liminal Horror, etc.) | The three-action economy gives every turn the same three actions to spend on strikes, movement, or spells, so each turn is a fresh tactical decision. Characters customize through ancestry, class, skill, and general feats gained at nearly every level, letting builds diverge sharply within a single class. Four degrees of success, set by beating or missing the DC by 10, turn each roll into a range of outcomes rather than a binary result. |
| Considerations | Very swingy random ability scores at creation, tightly coupled to its Bastion/Underground setting, no structured advancement beyond finding Arcana, auto-hit combat removes tactical decisions around accuracy | New players must learn the trait system, conditions, and four degrees of success before combat runs smoothly. Multi-attack penalty and numerous combat actions can slow turns for indecisive players. Character creation draws feats from ancestry, class, skill, and general pools at every level, making each build a slow step. |