"The fact of the matter is that [Pathfinder 2 and D&D 5E] are branches of the same tree to some degree; the design goals that they had with D&D 5th Edition were "4th didn't really work, how do we take the basic 3.5 rules, or really going back to 1st Edition, and evolve those into today", and they had a set - I assume - of design goals. We're doing the same thing in the sense of we had Pathfinder, which is an off-branch of 3.5, and now we want to make Pathfinder the best version of Pathfinder, and so there's going to be some things that are similar but in no way is there an intent to make this 5.1. Quite frankly, we're so busy playing Pathfinder, which we enjoy, that we're not experts at 5th edition. We wouldn't dream of making "an even better versions of 5E!"; that's not the goal. The goal is to make a better version of Pathfinder, and it may be that some of the solutions we come up with are similar to some of the solutions that they came up with, and frankly some of the solutions that they came up with are very similar to Pathfinder in the first place!"

Some people ask is this a versions of 4E or 5E. It's neither of those, it's a version of Pathfinder. Still crunchy, still expansion-heavy. The things our fans love, like more options and more stuff they can dig deep into. 5E is a little simpler, a little more loose, a different play style than Pathfinder. We want to maintain a similar play style while smoothing down some of the rough edges. (Bonner)

"Streamlining", "proficiencies", "background" are three words in the publicity people have associated with 5th Edition D&D, and the implantation is significantly different. (Mona)

If you're concerned we're dumbing down the game or making it too simple, really that is not the case. Core foundation in the core rules designed to allow for more choice and more customization. We want tons of depth of character options. (Mona)

Tactical complexity. Pathfinder is the customisable complex game. I love the grid, miniatures. It's not just an excerise in roleplaying or acting. Pathfinder is a tactical roleplaying game. Were not changing that. (Mona)