1970Zombie's page

As to the Oathbound Paladin, it may have been in character to destroy the fiend but it would have been smarter to find a way that would allow it to be accomplished while it was safely contained, even if this would have required an Atonement. Facing a threat beyond your ability usually results in death and rightly so. It could have also meant the death of fellow party members or the escape of the fiend.

Something mentioned in the Way of the Kirin scenario (GM using wrong statblock) made me wonder. If creatures have the ability to remove/dispell conditions in the scenario, should we, as GMs, have the PCs take advantage?

Nightmarch scenario.
** spoiler omitted **
Well the outsider in the scenario has raise dead and restoration memorized. I decided she'd use them on the paladin.

Is that a fair use of resources? I mean it is a case where the player made a (really) stupid mistake, based on a veteran player's actions.

Thoughts?

I think you may have been overly generous. Both those spells require costly material components (6,000 GP worth which are not listed as available in the scenario). The only spell that is mentioned is Banishment which the NPC is too weak to cast and imbues a PC with the power to do so. I do not think she is intended to help the party beyond that.

It would help if the scenario spelled out what resources she had remaining but I think it is safe to assume that she cannot provide those services during the scenario.

I don't think rangers can get bears, although correct me if I'm wrong.

A straight Ranger, no. One with the Beastmaster archetype, yes.

So are the boosters going to be $3.99 or $2.99 each? The product page is currently showing $2.99 each. I think I like that price better. :)

The beastmaster ranger, beast rider cavalier, and mad dog barbarian all spring to mind. What I want to avoid are falconer rangers suddenly gaining a "bird," huntmaster cavaliers suddenly breaking the archetype due to having an unintended "dog," and other such wonkiness. Higher level Chronicle sheets and capstones to short series are all fun places to include these more potent expansions of the animal companion list. For a level 3 module designed for wacky fun, I'd rather include something that is wacky but does not expand a list of options that was likely limited for class balance purposes.

Thanks. Just wanted to make sure that my players understood which characters this could apply.

Adam Mogyorodi wrote:

Wow, that chronicle. I am so glad I'm applying the credit to my paladin. Just to double-check, you either need the ability to get a bear companion OR a mount, not a bear mount, right?

Sorry, Adam.

One must:
A) have the ability to gain an animal companion (likely through an ability called "animal companion" or "mount")
and
B) Have the ability to choose "bear" as an animal companion choice.

Classes with limited animal companion lists that do not include "bear" cannot make use of this boon. That's what balances this against <spoiler>, which involves a three part series just to gain access to a standard animal companion option.

** spoiler omitted **

So this is only useful to Druids and Clerics with the Animal domain? Bear is not on the Ranger, Paladin or Caviler lists. There is the Ranger Beastmaster archtype. Are there prestige classes which have different lists?

Did I miss something. Ultimate Campaign is not listed in Additional Resources. It is ATM not a book used for PFS.

Agreed. Mike said it would not have Ultimate Campaign content approved , if any qualifies, for PFS play until the new GtPFSOP comes out in August. Link

Even then there are the issues related to if Ultimate Campaign and Animal Archive will be added to the core assumptions as they may change the way Animal Companions are played as laid out in the CRB.

I personally liked the Gen Con 2012 token method better than the Gen Con 2011 key method. As far as I recall, Gen Con 2009 and 2010 did not offer any boons to players.

The 2011 method gave you a chance to win something per game played plus there was a Tian Weapon Training boon that everyone got. I do not remember how many keys you received but I think it was two per scenario played and 1 per demo played. I think I played two scenarios and two demo. I would guess that was six keys. As it turned out, the Tian Weapon Training boon was the only boon I received.

The 2012 method was easier, had shorter administration (and lines) and guaranteed you something for every two games played. I picked up Translator and Varasian Weapon Training boons.

Assuming that Gen Con 2013 will be run the same as last year, I know that the four senarios that I am playing will give me a chance at two boons/product.

I have also participated at a local convention, U-Con. There they used a star method. Each table received two stars. One was for the players and it could be handed out by random determination or table vote. The other went to the GM who could keep it or hand it to the players. In 2011, I was lucky enough to receive 3 stars (out of three tables played) and received two boons and a flip map. I received Trained Eye and Extra Trait for the boons. In 2012, I was lucky to receive a star again (out of two tables played) and received copies of the first two Pathfinder comic books.

I like the idea. It is an extra something nice for the players and the GMs. Those who play a lot will have a better chance of receiving something. Those who play infrequently might receive something which could encourage them to play or GM more. It sounds like a low cost and fun solution.

I think that this is a win across the board. I do not see that the playerbase should have any reason to complain. It is like someone buying you a free lottery ticket.If you win, great. If you do not, it did not cost you anything.

I like the idea of a window of 3 to 4 months to qualify for a chance to receive the boon. I like the idea of a greater chance for playing the scenario earlier in the window. Maybe something like 10% month 1, 10% month 2, 5% month 3 and 5% month 4. It could also be something like 15%/10%/10%/5% or 20%/15%/10%/5%.

How would the boons be distributed? Would they be sent to each GM and player via their e-mail address listed on their Paizo account? Would they be put in their downloads page like the Emerald Elixir boon from the kickstarter? Would these boons somehow be watermarked or contain the player's/GM's PFS number so as to prevent boon trading?

Thanks. That is helpful and pretty much what I expected the answer to be.

I buy all the sources and use Hero Lab to make my characters. The program does not set off warnings if you are about to select a racial item or spell that is not for your race.

Can you buy wands of racial spells? I was loking at spells that my paladin might want to get on a wand and came across veil of heaven. It is a paladin only spell but it is also an aasimar only racial spell.

The Additional resources page says "Alternate racial traits, racial archetypes, racial evolutions, racial feats, and racial spells are only available for characters of the associated race. Racial equipment and magic items can be purchased and used by any race as long as the specific item permits it."

Dose a wand, scroll or potion of a racial spell count as a magic item that can be purchased? The assumption being that the creator had to be of that race.

The list of shirts and rules about free rerolls can be found on page 28 of the current Guide to Pathfinder Society Organized Play (V4.3).

If shirt size is an issue, I would suggest getting a Character Folio. I have a friend that requires large tee shirts to be comfortable and none of the Pathfinder shirts have fit the bill. The Character Folio works for him.

I am very excited about this product. My boyfriend and I have signed up for the seminar at Gen Con and will be bringing back the rules and teaching others down here in Florida to play it.

We will also be running a slot at our convention in October. About how long does one of the adventures last (we need to know for planning purposes)? Would you be willing to release any tips for explaining it to people at conventions?

Based upon the playtest, the length of time it takes to play will depend upon the number of players that you have. In round numbers, I think that it is safe to say that each scenario takes between 1 hour and 2 hours to play. Each adventure has 5 scenarios so it will take between 5 and 10 hours to play. I think it will be closer to 10 hours because of the setup and between game deck maintenance. You may also need to replay a scenario that you initially fail.

So exactly how many scenarios and adventures are in the base set?

"Perils of the Lost Coast" is a 3-scenario adventure. How many scenarios make up "Burnt Offerings"? 5?

I believe that is correct based upon the card list from the playtest. After the starter box, I think each chapter will have 5 scenarios.

Are there plans to eventual publish the Ruins of Bonekeep megadungeon and the "new adventures never before offered for Beginner Box characters of 3rd level"?

If you play and/or run frequently, you can run out of material fast. Been playing since the start of season 1 and started running a few months after that. After our session tomorrow, there will only be 4 tier 1-5 scenarios, 2 tier 3-7, 0 tier 1-7, and 2 level 1-2 modules that I have not played or run.

There are plenty of tier 5-9 and tier 7-11 which I have not played or run yet. There are modles and APs above first. Some have been played and others have not. The biggest challenge is getting all the players in our home group to an appropriate level to be able to run those on a consitent basis. We were getting close but lost a few players and have recently added some new ones starting from 1st level.

First Steps, Part III is very much a wilderness adventure. Only the last encounter takes place in a town.

Fixed. It was a copy/paste error.

During the playtest there was also talk about how to construct your own scenarios and adventures. I am not sure if the base rules will contain any suggestions or if that may come later.

The game looks to have a fair amount of flexibility and re-playability. Our 6 player group playtested the last two chapters of the adventure path but I also did solo play with the basic set scenarios and the chapter 5 and 6 ones.

I look forward to seeing the final version. I expect that it will play better with real cards and have a richer experience with the final artwork and flavor text.

It seems to me that the design assumptions should already take into account if an adventure is balanced for a party of a certain level. We have to trust that the appropriate CRs are being presented in the tiers of the scenarios.

I think the level of difficulty swings by the types and mix of characters that make up the party. What might prove helpful in “rating” adventures is a scale that measures the level of certain aspects of the adventure. This might help the player determine if they are bringing the right character to the party.

Adventure Type: Urban, Wilderness, Dungeon Crawl
Combat: rate 1 to 3 (with 3 being the highest)
Puzzles/Role Play: rate 1 to 3 (with 3 being the highest)
Skills/Investigation: rate 1 to 3 (with 3 being the highest)

The scale can be larger (say 1 to 5) but ultimately there would be a way to calculate the values based upon the content of the adventure. I expect that this will work best for scenarios and likely be different for other content like modules and adventure paths.

Here are some examples of what I was thinking:

You can still earn PFS credit playing the AP in "Campaign mode". Just play it how you normally would with non-PFS characters and assign the credit to an appropriately level PFS character. (This is what I am currently doing with Rise of the Runelords.) That could result in more fun/challenge and help advance your PFS characters.

Having a spead of characters that allows you to play at the appropriate sub-tiers seems to be the ideal for PFS.

I am the primary GM for our local gaming group. We have been playing PFS frequently for the last 3 to 4 years. We do play other games as well. Between my local group, local games days and conventions our group looks like this:

Obviously players come and go but each time we play we seat a table between 3 and 7 players. Everyone tries to make sure that they have a character that will fit the planned adventure. Right now we have two new players and have to play low tier stuff until they get a couple of levels under their belts. We have yet to play much high tier (7-11) scenarios, but have started to play some 5-9, as we have not gotten eveyone to 7th level or higher.

The reason I am asking is that the first one starts characters at 1st and expects them to get to 6th. The next one is for 12th through 16th. I guess that I am expecting these to be like mini APs and there will likely be sections of the content playable for PFS credit. Best case it is something like Thornkeep where each level provides a chronicle.

With the advent of changes to the module format starting in July with The Dragon's Demand, I assume that the sancationing of modules will change for PFS. As the new format calls for longer, multi-level advancement adventures, I would expect that if sanctioning continues that it would be more like what has been done for Adventure Paths or Thornkeep. Has anything been announced or discussed?

The URL is actually:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/dwarvenforge/dwarven-forges-game-tiles- revolutionary-miniature

There was an extra space in the one above.

I also believe that a light card stock would work. They will not be a thick as the Paizo pawns but they will be more sturdy than paper.

While the APG is not listed as a Core Assumption, the Guide to Pathfinder Society Organized Play and Pathfinder Society
Field Guide both are. Both documents conatin traits. The free online document is also listed under the trait section of the Guide to Pathfinder Society Organized Play. I do not see where a player would need to have anything to have access to those traits.

I would not read too much into that. As First Steps is about to be retired and we also have the Level 1 retraining rules which allow the total rebuild of a character with 3XP or less before they are played at 2nd level.

Our home group has 3 PFS GMs. I have 3 stars and we have another with 1 star and a third which has 0 stars but is fast approaching his 1st star. None of us have run for a convention or gameday but rather for our local group with about 7 core players and 10-12 sometimes players.
It has taken me three years to get to three stars. In that time I have run 48 scenarios, 4 modules and 3 AP sections. As the primary GM for our home group, that is where I have picked up all of my credit. I started playing at the beginning of Season 1 at Gen Con. Most of my player credit has come from there and a few local cons and sometimes with the home group.

The first year with PFS, starting in April 2010, was getting the feet wet with organized play and getting my players to accept the concept. I only ran 9 scenarios during those first 12 months.

The next 12 months I ran 25 scenarios (1 online) and a module. We also had a second GM run We Be Goblins! and 4 scenarios.

These last 12 months I have run 14 scenarios (1 online), 3 modules and 3 AP sections. The second GM has run a module and 2 scenarios and a third GM has run 7 scenarios.

It will likely take another year or probably closer to two to make it to 4 stars. By that point my other two GMs may make two stars. We also play other non-PFS games, both Pathfinder and other systems. It just seems like 5 years is a long time to wait to feel any incentive for reaching 4 stars. Any reward system seems like it would be better that what is in place currently.

Regardless of any change to the reward systemwe will still keep playing but it would be nice if there was sometime more for the efforts of the GMs which make it so folks can play.

Correct me if I am wrong but as far as I know, the only GM reward for stars is access to run the Season's Exclusive Scenario upto a year before it is released if you have 4 or 5 stars.

It would be cool if there were more Exclusives available based upon your start level. I could see maybe 4 scenarios a year. One for 1 Star GMs (likely a Tier 1-5), one for 2 Star GMs, one for 3 Star GMs and one for 4 and 5 Star GMs. The more stars that you have, the more Exclusive Senarios you have access to run each Season. I know that this would require development resources to make happen so there is a cost involved but I would hope that would be off set by the GMs purchasing the scenarios.

I think that any reward would have to have minimal cost to Paizo. I like the idea of GM chronicles with boons but it would need to be something fair and not overpowering. As most GMs do not get to play as much as most of the player base, maybe they should be things like a free faction change or a character respec after 1st level rather than something like a race boon.

I have been doing some more thinking regarding this issue. It seems that there is a mixed problem that the campaign leadership is trying to solve. The first issue is WBL and the second is playing within sub-tier. If everyone played within their sub-tier all the time there would not be a perceived issue. (Though I could argue that you could do so and still end up significantly over the WBL curve if you plotted your scenarios appropriately.) The second issue appears to be scenario difficulty. Low level characters playing up are at more risk and seem to suffer bad ends more frequently. High level characters playing down tend to stomp the adventure and diminish the experience for all involved.

Based upon what I heard in the podcast, I take it that the campaign leadership is trying to find a solution to both issues with a single change.

Reading through this thread and looking at the issue more closely, I have gathered the following:

The perceived problems today with playing up:

• Playing up awards more GP and throws off the WBL curve
• Creates pressure for lower level characters to play up so as not to penalize higher level characters.
• Creates pressure for lower level characters to play up when there is a large table and the APL places the group on the cusp and the table needs to choose up or down.
• Playing up leads to more character deaths and TPKs

The perceived problems today with playing down:

• Playing down awards less GP and throws off the WBL curve
• Higher level characters throw off the challenge of the scenario as they breeze through or stomping the encounters.
• Playing down leads to boring and dissatisfied play for all players and GM.

Expected problems with the Podcast proposal if implemented:

• Will make table mustering more difficult as most players with higher level characters will refuse to play down and most players with lower level characters will refuse to play up.
• Wealth lost to playing down will be harder if not impossible to recover by playing up in the future.
• No extra reward for the extra risk when playing up.
• Does nothing to prevent the higher level characters from breezing through or stomping the encounters if they do play down.
• Will only adjust WBL curve for new characters. Characters made before the rule change may still be well above the WLB.

Here is another proposal which tries to deal with the play up/play down problem:

Prior to Season 4, playing up was used to provide more challenge to the party. The Season 0-3 scenarios were designed with 4 players in mind. Playing up was sometimes a function of having out of sub-tier characters and sometimes as a result of having large tables with 6 or 7 players. It was the only way to scale the adventure. The +1 to APL for table of 6 or more could dictate that a table must play up. There were only two options for difficulty.

Now scenarios are designed with 6 players in mind. There are now guidelines for scaling back the adventure for 4 players within the sub-tier. There are now four options for difficulty.

If you have one or more players with characters out of tier playing up, the table must play the soft option for the higher sub-tier. If you have one or more players with characters playing down, the table must play the hard option for the lower sub-tier. Characters which fall between sub-tiers do not sway the hard or soft option, only the out of sub-tier characters would.

Essentially we have the following:

• low-tier soft – Used by in sub-tier groups with 4 characters
• low-tier hard – Used by in sub-tier groups with 5 or more characters or groups of 4 or more characters with an out of sub-tier character playing down
• high-tier soft – Used by in sub-tier groups with 4 characters or groups of 4 or more characters with an out of sub-tier character playing up
• high-tier hard – Used by in sub-tier groups with 5 or more characters

Prestige/Fame would not be impacted. Gold awards could be left alone but if you wanted to make a change, the fairest way would be to set a GP award value per sub-tier and difficulty which is at the end divided by the number of characters who participated. If there were four characters, each would receive 1/4th of the scenario award. If there were seven characters, each would receive 1/7th of the scenario award. This would more accurately compensate reward for risk. It would mean less treasure for larger groups but would mean the greatest chance for success.

For scenarios before Season 5, this might require an addition of GP Awards to the reference document which was talked about for the replacement of faction missions.

Impacts if this were implemented:
• Lower gold for playing down but not the lowest gold.
• Higher gold for playing up but not the highest gold.
• Raised level of challenge when higher level characters play down.
• Lower level of difficulty when lower level characters play up.
• Reduced gold for each character when large groups succeed at an adventure.

I think that this solution would address the WBL issue somewhat by lessening the rewards for playing up and lowering the penalties for playing down. It can also address the level of difficulty issues for groups with characters mixed between the legal sub-tiers.

Is it perfect? Unlikely but it is another option.

@1970Zombie: With what you're proposing, someone could sign up for a scenario in a tier they could legally play in, but show up and find out everyone else wants to play in the wrong subtier for him, and he legally can't play with anything other than a pregen. I think that's something we want to avoid.

I would suggest advertising scenario signup by sub-tier. That way everyone knows ahead of time.

I really think the problem that everyone is trying to fix is the huge level gap. If one 5th level character plays at a table with 5 1st level characters, I expect the scenario will be a cakewalk and no one will really have much fun. If it is the other way around, one 1st level and five 5th level characters, it seems likely that the 1st level character will not survive.

Pre-gens should not be a dirty word. They are a tool in our tool box. We should not be afraid to use them. They are not super optimized but they function as a solid character.

The object is to play and have fun. I think I would much rather play a pre-gen which is closer in level to the reset of the party than to have a large level difference between the party members. I expect it will make the session less fun for all parties (players and GM) involved.

Also what I am proposing gets rid of the APL calculation. Since all scenarios are now designed with an assumption of six players, scalability within the sub-tier is already determined by the party size and not character level.

(I apologize if this has already been suggested but there are a lot of posts in this thread already …)

I think we need to stop trying to reinvent the wheel. Every change proposed has some major downside in regards to enforcement, bookkeeping and reporting technology. I do not expect any change that requires different levels of XP based upon playing up/down to be viable. Backwards compatibility with older scenarios also needs to be considered.

I think the unbalancing effects of wealth and power are caused by too much swing in the levels allowed in the scenarios. Each PFS scenario is now designed to cover 5 levels of characters with no real restrictions about playing between sub-tiers. (There used to be rule back when there were 3 sub-tiers in the Tier 1-7 scenarios. )

I think the proposed wealth changes are fair but I propose taking it a step further. I think that we need to tighten the requirements on the level of characters that can play in a sub-tier:

Sub-tier 1-2 should only be open to characters 1-3. 3rd level characters are considered to be playing down and receive the awards of the lower sub-tier.

Sub-tier 4-5 should only be open to characters 3-5. 3rd level characters are considered to be playing up and receive the awards of the higher sub-tier.

Sub-tier 3-4 should only be open to characters 3-5. 5th level characters are considered to be playing down and receive the awards of the lower sub-tier.

Sub-tier 6-7 should only be open to characters 5-7. 5th level characters are considered to be playing up and receive the awards of the higher sub-tier.

Sub-tier 5-6 should only be open to characters 5-7. 7th level characters are considered to be playing down and receive the awards of the lower sub-tier.

Sub-tier 8-9 should only be open to characters 7-9. 7th level characters are considered to be playing up and receive the awards of the higher sub-tier.

Sub-tier 7-8 should only be open to characters 7-9. 9th level characters are considered to be playing down and receive the awards of the lower sub-tier.

Sub-tier 10-11 should only be open to characters 9-11. 9th level characters are considered to be playing up and receive the awards of the higher sub-tier.

This would make the character levels similar to the way modules and Adventure Paths are currently set up.

Because of the tiered nature of PFS scenarios, players should be encouraged to have a stable of characters which can cover the sub-tiers that they wish to play. If not, pre-gens could allow for legal tables in 7 of the 8 sub tiers; every time. (Currently there are many options for 1st and 7th level pre-gens. If the 4th level ones could also be fleshed out there should be a reasonable selection. )

Will this make mustering tables more difficult? Likely. Will it lead to more balanced, level appropriate play, challenges and rewards? Absolutely.

So for the example of the party of two 3rd level, two 6th level and two 7th level characters, I would suggest that the two 3rd level characters should either play 7th level pre-gens or be moved to another scenario, tier 1-5, where they will fit better. The higher level character will have a legal table without the lower level characters and will be playing something appropriate to their level. The lower level player (playing pre-gens) would still get a level appropriate playing experience and would likely get credit to be applied at a later date to their 3rd level characters or to a brand new character if that is what they decide.

CRobledo wrote:

Just remember you get only one per player, for one single character (unlike the novel boons). Not every character.

I am not trying to start something, but what are you basing this on?

That is the way all previous holiday and special event boons have been handled.

Plus it say in the boon

This Chronicle sheet may only be assigned to a Pathfinder Society character between April 15, 2013 and May 5, 2013.

The word "a" indicates a single character. If multiple characters were intended it would say something like "your Pathfinder Society characters".

I think it is meant to be a once only thing.

... you receive the effects of one spell determined by the tier of the scenario in which you’re playing at the time you use the boon.

If usable multiple times, it is clearly only usable once per scenario.

Just ran The Sanos Abduction #4-05 for sub-tier 3-4 with 5 PCs. We did it in about 3.5 hours with paperwork.

I think it just depends on the players and luck. I have 58 table credits and I have only permanently killed 3 characters. (As it happened, 2 were last night.)

I have also killed 4 characters which were later raised and 2 characters under the old module rules which only resulted in lower XP and PP on the final chronicle.

Also, this is not a straight card game. The game uses dice (d12, d10, d8, d6, d4). That was unexpected at the start but the mechanics seem to work.

Also there are mechanics for character growth. The character that you play at the beginning could be considerably different by the time you get to the end of the game.

Our group found the playtest version of the game to be very enjoyable. We had a six-player group playing the high end (chapters 5 and 6). We found that the game played well with a large group but it took a bit longer to play. I would say that we averaged 90 to 120 minutes per game including setup a cleanup.

I tried some solo play and really enjoyed it(at least with the basic scenarios). I wished that I had some of the earlier chapters to be able to continue solo play and get a feel for more characters.

A real boon for the game will be having actual playing cards. The card stock versions from the playtest were difficult to shuffle and sort. The card examples presented in this post look great.

I am also interested to see the card tray. Keeping the cards sorted is a must for this game.

Based upon what I have seen, I expect that this will be a quality product.

Anyone know if/when these updates will make it into Hero Lab?

Any idea how these measure up to a standard Pathfinder miniature? Does the base fit a standard 1 inch square?

To pick up where Doug left off ...

Tier 1-5
3-18 The God's Market Gamble 1st to 5th
3-19 The Icebound Outpost 1st to 5th
3-21 The Temple of Empyreal Enlightenment 1st to 5th
3-23 The Goblinblood Dead 1st to 5th
3-EX The Cyphermage Dilemma 1st to 5th
4-01 Rise of the Goblin Guild 1st to 5th
4-07 Severing Ties 1st to 5th

Tier 3-7

3-16 The Midnight Mauler 3rd to 7th
3-25 Storming the Diamond Gate 3rd to 7th
4-02 In Wrath’s Shadow 3rd to 7th
4-05 The Sanos Abduction 3rd to 7th

Tier 5-9

3-15 The Haunting of Hinojai 5th to 9th
3-24 The Golden Serpent 5th to 9th
4-03 The Golemworks Incident 5th to 9th
4-06 The Green Market 5th to 9th

Tier 7-11

3-17 Red Harvest 7th to 11th
3-20 The Rats of Round Mountain—Part I: The Sundered Path 7th to 11th
3-22 The Rats of Round Mountain—Part II: Pagoda of the Rat 7th to 11th
3-26 Portal of the Sacred Rune 7th to 11th
4-04 King of the Storval Stairs 7th to 11th
4-08 The Cultist's Kiss 7th to 11th

Special Events

4-PSS Race for the Runecarved Key 1st to 12th+

Sanction Modules

The Murder's Mark 1st to 2nd
The Midnight Mirror 3rd to 5th
Dawn of the Scarlet Sun 4th to 6th
No Response from Deepmar 7th to 9th
Ruby Phoenix Tournament 10th to 12th
Module Moonscar 15th to 17th

Was searching for something along these lines to answer the question "Which modules can be replayed for credit once for each of your level 1 characters?" And then again once for a level 2 character. And also run as a GM infinitely many times for credit, to be applied to a different character each time. Understanding that each character can only apply one chronicle from each of these scenarios, whether lvl 1 credit, lvl 2, or GM.

So, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems like the answer is:

PFS3-I1 First Steps, Part 1: In Service to Lore 1
PFS3-I2 First Steps, Part 2: To Delve the Dungeon Deep 1
PFS3-I3 First Steps, Part 3: A Vision of Betrayal 1
PFS2-WG We Be Goblins! 1
PFS1-MF Master of the Fallen Fortress 1
PFS2-GH The Godsmouth Heresy 1-2
PFS1-CEF Crypt of the Everflame 1-2

Also, bump to add season 4 scenarios to the above list, and to ask if there are any more of the replayable scenarios which have been released.

The new Murder's Mark can be added to that list of replayable for credit scenarios/modules.

If any PCs arguing against the arrest chose to resist arrest, ie fight, there is no need to have an improvised battle. The GM could just narrate the capture of the PCs in question and mark them as dead. Since attacking the local watch and probably killing some to make their escape would turn them into wanted fugitives from the Law. Thus making their characters no longer playable or at least no longer Pathfinders as they would be washed out of the Society. This could easily be accomplished under the irredeemably evil PC process.

Again I would object to this tactic by the GM. Marking a character as Evil, an thus unplayable, is an extreme reaction and should be reserved for the most heinous of acts. There are a few scenarios where there are options for the party to go up against the authorities.

There is usually some punishment for those actions but none of them result in expulsion from the Pathfinder Society.

A campaign ruling to standardize the response/penalty would remove the abiguity and put everyone on the same playing field. If the scenario does not specifically cover the situation, adding a condition gained like "caught stealing" or "resisting arrest" with predefined penatlies would be useful.

I think RainyDayNinja's comment was under the assumption that the PC stole just because they wanted the item - not as a faction mission, not to give to the poor, not to keep from starving; just because they'd rather not pay for it. And THAT would be an evil act, and should be marked on the chronicle sheet.

Why? If you faction head says that it is OK, will everyone look the other way? Stealing as an act is not evil. How you do it might be. Taking an unattended object likely is not evil. Taking the medicine that is needed to save a sick child and taking it knowingly might be evil. Killing someone and taking their stuff is evil, unless it happens to be an opponent/monster rather than an old lady or helpless shop owner. Raiding crypts and tombs is likely considered evil but Pathfinders do it all the time. It is sort of their thing.

The game is filled with situations that you can argue both sides for or against but some are more accepted than others.

How funny, that was exactly the one I was looking at when I browsed the modules earlier!

It sounded a tad unorthodox and I was kinda planning on advertising the event as "caution, deadly, no crying over dead PCs allowed". ;)

Are the modules balanced around four- or six-player groups?

I think 4 characters is the core assumption. This one is fun and is also tough at points. When I ran it the party was large and ran the level mix between 2nd and 4th.

theres something else i noticed, in the dormitory quarters, with all the Q's on the map.

** spoiler omitted **

Not sure what to tell you here. It is definitely not marked on the map. I believe that I did something similar.

There is also a strip of squares on the map which have no marked openings. I expect that could be used for the purpose.

I don't think you need to create new encounters involving lawmen, etc. But at the very least:

1. He doesn't get to keep the flask after the scenario, because he didn't pay for it, just like any loot he would have found in the course of the adventure.

2. It should be marked on his chronicle as an evil act, and if it becomes a pattern at all, his character should have his alignment changed to evil, and therefore marked as "dead," per the campaign rules. Make sure you warn him about this first, though.

Stealing from other players is not allowed. There is no PVP.

Stealing from NPC seems to have some legs. It could be an laternate way to complete a Faction mission or in scenario task. I agree that the stealing character should not be able to keep the item after the adventure but there is the question of how much mileage and risk should be involved. What happens if the character starts stealing consumables? i.e potions, oil, arrows, etc.What are the risks for getting caught?

I can see making a ruling but marking the act of stealing as "Evil" seems plain wrong. Marking it a "Greedy" or "Lazy" seems more appropriate. Robin Hood stole all the time and he was the good guy. I expect he was more "Chaotic" than "Lawful" but there was no question if he was "Good" or "Evil".

In the Additional Resources under Varasia, Birthplace of Legend it says that the all the equipment is legal except for Varasian Idols. The original Rise of the Rune Lords Player's Guide has an item of the same name which is the same as the Idolis vesion and is 50 GP instead of 75 GP. It still shows as legal for use.

I believe the answer is no to both questions. The first item is a weapon and the second is a rod. There is no upgrade path/progression to allow that.