Brother Mortimer's page

Care Baird wrote:

Usually (again, in my limited experience) if the scenario doesn't provide a combative challenge for 6 players, it doesn't provide one for 4.

Now that you mention it, I'd have to agree (in my even more limited experience). I recently played in a scenario that I had already GM'd. As I recall, when I GM'd it I had a table of about 6 players, and they cakewalked it (including my not-really-a-gamer wife).

When I played it, it was me, my brother, his not-really-a-gamer wife, and a pregen. We still cakewalked it.

Was this due to the level of the characters? Would the advanced monster template have made a difference?

Are you saying that some scenarios are so weak that the suggestions you and others have made for GM adjustments are not powerful enough to make a difference?

Are there a significant number of scenarios that are just so easy that people looking for a challenge should avoid playing them?

Bob Jonquet wrote:

The group may just have the "perfect" character to essentially nerf the challenges. Maybe it's an undead-based scenario and you have a mix of channeling cleric/s and paladin/s.

Or if the player with a scythe happens to roll an early crit, or the wizard shuts down the encounter in round 1 with a spell?

These things are part of the game.

In fact thinking of the fringe character that gets his 'perfect storm' chance to shine, you could easily be robbing him of that without even realizing it.

That's part of the dangers of trying to scale all the encounters for a given party, you rob the players of random chances to shine and memorable, genuine moments where things came together.

Bob Jonquet wrote:

What we're looking for are quantifiable ways to make the scenario adjustable for large/small groups and perhaps those adjustments can be made at the player's request to accommodate power-builds.

I can't imagine that there is an easy 'one size fits all' solution that can be applied blindly to adjust ALL the scenarios out there that won't cause a problem or two with some specific ones.

Rather just let the table choose play out of tier if the other tier is more appropriate for them. That way you're running something that's been vetted and doesn't require any alteration of the scenario in question.

As far as 'easy solutions' I think that will work in a limited scope, but after all when you consider the parameters and a motto of 'first, do no harm' it seems a reasonable one.

-James

Sometimes playing up works, often it doesn't. This thread is about finding a more fine grained solution.

This idea is to create an option short of playing up when the GM and all players so wish it. It is intended to "do harm," in other words to make a more challenging game with increased resource expenditure and chance of death.

Those who have posted specific suggestions do not advocate blindly applying one size fits all changes to ALL scenarios, rather they advocate for GMs using judgment within a narrow range of choices.

I very much agree with the opening part of the post - just because a party starts off well and walks over the first encounter is not a reason to upgrade the difficulty of a scenario.

Since we can't change the scenario as written, we just need the advice of some of the veteran GMs on how to optimize the encounters with the tools that are given. Though I've never sat at one of the tables of the esteemed "killer GMs of PFS", I am sure that I could definitely benefit from their advice. I was under the impression this is what the GM's Advice Forum was for. Maybe that is the tool we should be using first.

Note the opening post. The purpose of this thread is to discuss GMs making changes in scenarios. This has been encouraged by Mark part way through the thread. I would be very interested in your thoughts regarding specific suggestions made by myself and others.

I think it would also be a fine thing to have a thread on "optimizing the tools" that the GM is given.

Every time I'm aware of.

I suppose people would get away with it more often if I didn't judge as much.

Feral, no one is proposing that judges make changes on the fly. Some people are proposing limited guidelines that allow consenting GMs and players to increase scenario difficulty in a limited, organized way. Specific proposals are posted above.

I would be interested to know where you are on some of the specific, limited ideas expressed by myself and other posters.

Brother Mortimer wrote:

I suggest allowing the GM the option of adding mooks to a solo boss fight. Possibly at the maximum number equal to the number of players minus two.

This could add all of a third sentence to the rules change proposed to Mark. But don't you think a change of this magnitude is worthy of more than two sentences?

It would take much more than that, IMO. What are the mook's stat block? Are they human warriors? Bestiary creatures? GM choice?

Usually the answer is obvious from the scenario. Otherwise if we are restricting ourselves to an extremely short rule it would have to be GM choice. I would be in favor of a longer set of guidelines - something between a half and a full page.

Bob Jonquet wrote:

I was just saying that to introduce some mooks so that the bbeg would have time to overcome the imbalance in economy of actions would be a bit more complicated that a two line entry into the Guide.

Unless I've been misunderstand, I don't think anyone was suggesting adding mooks to a "solo" fight. Only adding more where some already exist.

I suggest allowing the GM the option of adding mooks to a solo boss fight. Possibly at the maximum number equal to the number of players minus two.

This could add all of a third sentence to the rules change proposed to Mark. But don't you think a change of this magnitude is worthy of more than two sentences?

There are specific encounters where increasing the NPC quantity to 2 (from 1) will make for a huge swing in encounter difficulty (Heresy of Man Pt 1 wine cellar?, Rebel's Ransom main NPC?, really want me to go on?).

There are specific encounters where increasing the number of mooks will provide spacing challenges (i.e. the mooks already mostly fill the room or have difficulty fighting in the space given).

This is even true for one or two bad guy situations where they use the terrain to their advantage.

Yes please do. Or rather explain more to those of us lacking the fullness of your experience in Pathfinder. I am familiar with neither scenario.

Are these single enemy encounters mooks or closer to boss level encounters? I don't think anyone advocates increasing the number of main NPC enemies.

I don't understand the spacing problem. If two more mooks literally do not fit than I suppose the GM can't use them. Is this a common occurrence? What percent of modules do you see this happening in? Do we need an explicit rule saying "you can't use additional mooks if they don't fit," or can we figure that GMs will figure it out?

Brother Mortimer wrote:

sometimes insufficient to create a challenge

Which is a far better option than the other end of the spectrum.

I disagree with not providing a standard "always" requirement. PFS is a shared experience and I should expect the same quality of scenario no matter where I play. (yes I know this is impossible. no, i don't want to debate it)

Anyone interested in getting back to the issues raised by the OP? Or the post by Mark, inviting suggestions and specific critiques?

Kyle, do you see something specific in the suggestions made that leads you to fear "the other end of the spectrum?" If so, is there a way to fix it? Mark has suggested looking at specific scenarios for examples.

In time I think there could be an "always" formula for increasing monsters or stats. It doesn't seem doable in the short run, as there is too much scenario variation. I can see the attraction to "always."

All the proposals I have seen involve choice. I believe it should be a consensus decision to allow the GM to upgrade the scenario. Does your desire for standardization lead you to oppose this? Are you telling me that if my table wishes to play using the relatively small changes proposed above, and accept the consequences, that this is a problem for you? or for PFSOP?

Why would the bad guys need to hit harder or save better if there's more PCs? That doesn't make any sense. The only thing they need is more actions. This is accomplished in two ways, more bad guys or more rounds of life. Since encounters and bad guys vary so much in both quantity, quality, and terrain, always adding additional bad guys is very hard to implement. Adding hit points is much simpler and buys the bad guys more action(s).

I must say that I like the chart ideas posted up thread (if encounter has X bad guys, at 6 player tables use Y bad guys. It would probably be very complicated to pick the right numbers, but warrants looking into.

Hitting harder which leads to knocking down opponents makes sense as it will allow the bad guys to last for more rounds, hence generating more actions. Increased saves and ac will also, on average, increase the life span of the bad guys, leading to more actions.

The rule should never be to "always" do anything, rather it should provide some options the GM may implement, if the table wishes to so empower the GM.

Adding hit points has the virtue of simplicity, but considering the variation in encounter quantity, quality and terrain is sometimes insufficient to create a challenge. This is especially the case with some solo or nearly solo big boss battles - where additional numbers to stop the boss from being immediately swarmed is more to the point.

I certainly agree with you that a chart suggesting additional numbers warrants looking into, and that in many instances additional hit points could be part of the solution.

It looks like a lot of people are forgetting/ignoring Mark's "just a couple of lines" request.

I'll toss my idea into the ring:

"If the players request an increased challenge, the GM may increase enemies' armor class, saves, attack bonuses and damage bonuses by +1 each. Additionally, she may grant enemies an extra 2 hit points per hit die."

How about that? Simple, clean, low-word count, and is similar to what a lot of GMs say they typically do. Not much room to be botched because we've got numbers in there (so no "bad judgment calls" getting people killed), and it all starts with "if the players request".

Eh?

Jiggy, I would suggest the following amended version:

If all players vote for an increased challenge, the GM may increase an enemies' armor class, saves, attack bonuses and damage bonuses by +1 or +2 each, and increase hit points by an extra +2 or +4 per hit die. In addition the number of low level monsters in an encounter may be increased by up to +1 for every player over four.

Still two sentences, allows for a few extra mooks which can make all the difference in a scenario.

I still prefer my original version with six two sentence rules, and I think a change of this nature justifies the expenditure of more than two sentences. I thought what Mark meant was a set of guidelines, each expressed succinctly. But in any case it can by done as you have already demonstrated in two sentences.

Ok folks, I'm interested in hearing some proposals for what the guidelines should be, specifically, for what a GM should be permitted to change. This means one or two sentences explaining how to adjust an encounter up or down that would apply to all scenarios.

I'd also like for everyone to put your powergamer hats on tight and try to find examples in existing scenarios where the proposed changes could have unforseen or nonstandard effects.

1. GM's are allowed to make the following scenario modifications as they wish, if every player at the table votes for a more challenging game.

2. Weaker creatures may be increased in number by one for every player above four. GM's need not increase numbers the full amount.

3. Solo boss monsters may be reinforced by appropriate weaker creatures at a rate of no more than the number of players minus two.

4. If APL, not including +1 for size, equals or exceeds the top tier allowed (ie 2 in a tier 1-2), more powerful creatures may be assigned the quick rules advanced monster template.

5. If a party is playing down some or all monsters may be assigned full hit points.

6. GMs using these options may have difficulty completing a scenario on time. To compensate lesser "speed bump" combats, or the second half of combats already essentially won by PCs, may be "handwaved" and declared to be finished.

The above proposal gives GMs some leeway. It is similar to what many GMs have been doing before it was made clear that such changes were not legal. It provides a ceiling as to the maximum change allowed, and a mechanism for GMs to complete a scenario on time.

There will be "unforseen or nonstandard effects." How could there not be? Some GMs would screw this up, just like some GMs screw things up without these rules. However I don't see this as a problem, as per #1 above only those who vote for a harder game would be effected.

One positive effect I believe would be less civil disobediance, or "cheating", on the part of GMs who have become accustomed to increasing scenario difficulty.

I understand the logic of using the forum to debate rules changes. I would suggest, however, that the only good test is a playtest. I propose that if a Venture Captain were interested in testing a proposal such as the one above he be allowed to do so for a limited number of games, ten perhaps, and then report back to Mark, with all involved in playing or GMing encouraged to post their opinion on the forum.

I go to McDonalds with six people from organized play. I offer them a choice: We can eat here, and you know what you will get. Or across the street is this nice diner, where the food will be much better. But it is up to you, we will only get the diner burgers if we all vote to do so.

This is the better analogy. It would be an agreement between consenting adults. At this point it is not legal. But for the sake of many of the older scenarios I hope it eventually becomes legal.

OK, allowing GMs to make any modification that comes to mind is too much, I see the problem. But add one additional mook for each player above four, and use the advanced template for monsters if the group is playing down - rules of this nature would be an easy way to add to difficulty. I would love to see organized play develop rules guidelines of this sort. And if as a GM that is what my players want, I fail to see where there is a problem.

My impression is that Mike and Mark have given this problem plenty of thought, and at this point don't see a good way to create such guidelines, and have plenty of more pressing deadlines to meet. However part of the purpose of the forums is to air issues like this, in the hope that they will pay off in the future.

And for those of you arguing that PFS should be like fast food, ie of dependably mediocre quality, is that truly all you want for the society? I find it unlikely, and I suggest that there is perhaps a middle position in between the chaos of unlawful, rule breaking GMs and the rigidity of zero flexibility.

Presuming that you have the skill, and are not in combat or otherwise distracted, is it legal to take 20 on knowledge rolls?

In PFS I am occasionally playing with a summoner, who I presume is the master summoner arch-type, who swarms the enemy with packs of dogs. He summons multiple dogs in the same summoning, appearing and attacking at once. I believe as many as five. At one point he had nine on the board at once. He is currently third level. I can't figure out how he does this.

I will inevitably be his GM at some point. I want to hold him to the rules, but I don't want to be obnoxious about it. But I am concerned that his dog pack will overwhelm many encounters in many scenarios.

So I am looking for any rules I should be sure to enforce, and any tactical advice suitable for PFS scenarios or modules.

Thanks!

Euan wrote:

For season 0-3 mods: When you have 6 or 7 player tables, what about allowing the judge to add the advanced template? I'm not talking about changing the scenarios in any other way - just ramping up the difficulty slightly to account for the large number of players.

How would you apply the advanced template to a creature that advances with character levels (ie. a 0 HD creature), a trap, or a haunt or other hazard? I'm not being facetious, just raising some of the development questions that come up when trying to scale adventures up using a simple set of guidelines across the board.

Answer - You wouldn't. There is no simple and elegant method to improve the balance on all of the scenarios equally across the board.

However Euan's suggestion sounds workable, and I would certainly like to have the option to use it when I GM larger tables with the season 0 - 3 scenarios.

Thanks for directing me there Doug Miles!

I'll be running this scenario Saturday. I see that the three reviews of this scenario are very critical. Yet when I read it through it seems like it would be a fun scenario.

Those of you who have GMed or played this scenario, what advice do you have for me?

So the party is beating on this Bearded Devil. The alchemist is down, after taking massive hit point damage from 2 claws and the beard. The two party clerics heal him back up a bit above zero. The alchemist, staying down, elects to stab at the Devil with a silver dagger. The Devil fights back, hits with a claw, knocks the alchemist back unconscious, at which point the player helpfully suggests to the GM that the Devil could attack a different character with the second claw attack - which the Devil in fact does.

Next round, same thing - Clerics bring alchemist back to above zero, alchemist stabs at Devil, Devil hits with one claw, and elects to use second claw against a different character.

Now consider the Devil's position. He knows he is not going to win the fight, in a round or two he will be defeated and returned to hell. He is evil. Wouldn't it be more evil, (especially considering that the alchemist isn't doing total defense or playing dead) to hit the alchemist with the second claw, which then activates the beard attack, most likely killing the alchemist outright? In other words wouldn't an evil outsider prefer to kill rather than randomly spread ineffectual damage around different party members?

On the other hand this was a PFS game, does the alchemist in this case "deserve" to die? What would you do if you were the GM?

Agreed. I'm not an adventure designer, but I imagine it is incredibly difficult to design something that would pose a challenge to 5 level 3 characters that wouldn't mop the floor with 4 characters at level 1. Chances are they just target a sweet spot, say 4-5 level 2 characters.

In my (admittedly limited) experience, characters of extremely different levels playing together causes more problems than a table of optimized, or gimped, characters of the same level.

It appears to me - and I am interested in what others thing - that the tier 1-2 is designed to be difficult but doable by four first level characters.

Certainly it is more difficult to design a scenario allowing more variations to account for party size and level, but I am not sure it need be "incredibly difficult." I gather that some GMs already do so, unlawful though it may be. But that might be a discussion for another thread.

Just adding to your point Brother Mortimer, but I believe there are several factors that lead to some imbalance between character power and the challenge level of the scenario.

They include (copied and edited from a previous post):

1) Lots of new, less-than-playtested content is released on a regular basis, creating more options that leads to power creep; plus...
2) Boons and related quirks (like T-shirt rerolls and the nice boons from the Grand Melee, book boons, etc.) that increase the power level; plus...
3) A wealth curve (that includes purchases via PA) that can lead to most character being above the WBL (especially in cases of playing up); plus...
4) A growing community of players who are consistently getting better, sharing tricks, and playing at a higher level with every passing day; plus...
5) The basic nature of some players to want to maximize their character's effectiveness within the rules; plus...
6) Little or no leeway given to judges to disallow 'broken' content (however anyone defines it) within their playgroup (like a GM might do for their home campaign); plus...
7) Scenarios/Modules written for 4 players often being played by 5, 6, or even 7 players; plus...
8) Alex Draconis' Excellent Point about the nature of groups, feedback, and competition. (I wish I had wrote that, it's a brilliant observation.) This can really depend on your playgroup.

However, Mike Brock knows this and has asked for patience while he works to improve the campaign. I'm happy to give it to him.

-Pain

Painlord, I certainly agree that there are many factors at work. What I am suggesting is that the single most important factor is the number and level of PCs compared to the scenario.

As a corollary to this I would suggest that on a tier 1-2 scenario four optimized first level characters would work just fine, while five average third level characters would reduce the combats to a boring slaughter of the bad guys.

I noticed last night that I was annoyed at the summoner with the arch-type allowing him to run multiple dogs. But when I thought about it I realized that it didn't really matter, even without the dogs we had the monsters so outclassed that we would have mopped the floor with them anyway. I wonder if we are distracted by the trees (meaning the optimized combat characters), and missing the bigger picture (scenario combats becoming boring due to high numbers and levels of PCs).

So my question is, of all the factors, what is most important in creating the problem of unchallenging combats in scenarios?

There seems to be an ongoing discussion/argument claiming that overly optimized characters are too powerful and are damaging to organized play. Some posters argue that it is not that optimized players are too strong, it is that PFS scenarios are too weak.

My admittedly limited experience differs. I find the most important variable to be the size and level of the party relative to the tier being played.

Recently I played 2 different tier 1-2 scenarios. In the first we had 2 first level characters and 2 second levels. It was the most exciting PFS game I have ever played. For several rounds I thought we were facing a TPK, and we all felt like heroes when we defeated the bad guys. In the next game we had 2 first levels and 4 third levels. Yes, we elected to play down. It was the most boring PFS game I have played. We massacred the bad guys without really trying.

Consider that the tier 1-2 scenario is supposed to work for anything from four first level characters to 6 characters of mixed levels one, two, and three, up to 5 third levels playing down. This is asking a lot.

Consider the difference between 4 players and 6, all of the same level. The group with 6 is 50% stronger, is it not?

Consider the difference in levels, would it not be fair to say that a second level character is roughly 50% more powerful than a first, and a third level twice as powerful?

If this very rough math is correct, then the "Power" the scenario must deal with ranges from 4 (4 first levels), all the way up to 10 (5 third levels). So the strongest party a scenario must handle is 2.5 x stronger than the weakest.

Is my math screwed up, or I am just arguing something that is already obvious? In any case it seems to me that this imbalance is the key problem in organized play, more so than optimized players.

Thanks for all of your thoughtful answers! You leave me much to consider, although I think I am still inclined towards allowing more info to PCs rather than less, especially at Society games, especially if there are new players.

Travis stares blankly into space, his mouth half open, displaying his few remaining teeth. He is a large, heavy man with small, piggish eyes.

"Beer is Dullen's choice, that is good enough for me, he can buy the first round."

Thank you all for your comments.

My problem is that in most combats it would seem to me that people would have an idea of how damaged fellow party members are. Aside from all the blood, characters would logically call out to the healer when their hit points got low. I suppose that could be role-played although it seems a little artificial when players are each tracking their own hit points. I guess the GM could secretly track hps, even rolls for stabilization, but I think many players would object as they are accustomed to keeping track themselves.

I see that such knowledge is metagaming information and inherently unrealistic - but it is a game which is not be any means realistic anyway.

As for "deathwatch" it always seemed a useless spell to me except in special circumstances, such as fighting in silence or perhaps when underwater makes communication impossible. I'm sure we could make a long list of other spells that are nearly useless, relative to others of the same level, except in special circumstances. In any case just because a light spell exists doesn't mean that we should assume that without it the world is dark.

It is one thing when I am GMing at home, where I can train players in a certain etiquette, such as not using numbers when in character, or whatever. It seems to me different in society play where I think there is an expectation of some uniformity from game to game, between a variety of GMs and players.

So since this is Pathfinder Society general discussion I am particularly interested in how people play in society games in relation to this issue.

I'm flexible with no big preferences. Eastern time zone.

I played at a table yesterday where the GM declared that PCs could not know how badly damaged a character was, and it was bad form to let the cleric know how many hit points the PC had remaining. This was in the middle of a combat. The ruling was that the cleric could only know if someone was wounded, whether it was one point of damage or one point remaining could not be known. I didn't ask but I think he meant only during combat, as once combat was done it would be simple enough to inspect the various wounds. He also argued that there was a clerical spell that tracked this information, which meant that normally the information was not available.

This struck me as kind of dumb. I don't think there is a rule, other than the spell he mentioned, that backs up his interpretation. Correct me if I am wrong. Or perhaps it is a sort of unwritten rule that many GMs follow.

My inclination is to play it his way when he is GM, and forget about it when I GM or with other GMs.

What do you think? How do you do it at your table?

I was the GM for a society game for the first time yesterday and nearly inflicted a TPK. I determined that the boss monster's wand was not fully charged to avoid this. So questions:

1) Was I a wimp? Should I have played it out without pulling punches? Two party members were still up, they still had a chance to win.

2) How common should it be for PCs to die?

3) How common should a TPK be in society play?

Thanks!

I will be happy to use Oxvard as is.

I'd like the cleric. Do you want him to be generated now, or wait until he is introduced?

Link is in profile.

I'll be Travis. Don't worry, I'm not attached to him a bit. What do you mean by flavor feats? All feats?

Merc is redone. I don't have the player's guide if it matters.

[url=http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=360567][/url]

A pretty basic warrior type.

I'll let Zeta have the Paladin, and I'll hold out for either the cleric or the ranger. I'll post a warrior later tonight.

Or if ZetaGilgamesh really wants the Paladin I wouldn't mind starting as a mercenary and then picking up the cleric or the ranger.

I'd love to play a Paladin. I could do a build in the next hour or two, or I can take a pre-gen, I don't have strong feelings one way or another. Let me know.

I assume you add up experience points and then divide by the number of characters.