Craig Stokes's page

Greetings Pathfinders! Pathfinder Society will be invading MOBICON in Mobile, Alabama May 17-19. Come take part in three days of awesome nerdtastic fun! Experienced GMs from at least four states will be on hand ready to provide YOU with a fantastic gaming experience.

Register for scenarios at Warhorn

Learn more about MOBICON here.

MOBICON will once again be held at the Ashbury Hotel & Suites. Check out their awesomely cheap con rates here.

In a Facebook post to me, a local game store owner wrote:

Also, do you know how we could go about getting some Pathfinder signage or at least posters? Everyone else just sends tons of junk but I don't think we have ever received any pop from Pazio.

How does a game store acquire PFRPG/PFS promotional material? This particular FLGS has a beautiful store and a very nice Pathfinder selection. I've been running PFS there for two months and the owner is amazingly supportive.

How should I answer him?

Please welcome Brian Hatch as the newest member of the Venture Officer team! Some of you may know him on the forums as Jodokai.

Brian is active member of the PFS community in both Pensacola and Mobile, AL. He is going to be a great asset in helping to grow Pathfinder Society along the central Gulf Coast. I plan to work him like a mule until he drops! ;-)

Congrats, Brian, you deserve the appointment and I'm happy to have you on the team!

I am honored to announce that Sidney Kuhn has accepted the role of Venture-Lieutenant for Pensacola, Florida. Sidney has been an avid gamer for many years and has worked hard to build a Pathfinder Society presence in Pensacola. I look forward to working with him, and I'm excited to see how far PFS in Pensacola can grow under his leadership.

Congratulations, Sidney, and welcome aboard!

How do you encourage players to RP during combat? I'm interested in techniques that will get players to do more than just announce attack rolls and damage. Many of my players will do a little RP, and often describe their attacks and I encourage them to do so. I try to "lead by example" and always describe NPC attacks with a bit of flavor. However, there are a few players that just won't RP during combat at all.

Here's an example of a typical interaction with "Sam" during a combat encounter:

GM(Me): "...and the Goblin shrieks with rage after you deftly dodge his dogslicer attack at the last moment. Ok, Sam, you're up!

[Sam looks up from his laptop screen and rolls some dice.]

Sam: "23...16 points of damage."

GM: "OK...what are you doing?"

[Sam looks at the GM like he is stupid.]

Sam: "Attacking."

GM: "With what?"

[The look intensifies.]

Sam: "Longsword."
*************

You all get the point. No role-playing, no descriptions, just dice and damage. This player _is_ having fun. He keeps coming back and requests that I run more scenarios. The funny thing is that outside of combat, "Sam" is a pretty good role-player. I just can't find a way to get him, and a few others, to RP the combat.

Does anyone have advice that's worked for similar types of players?

So I just posted in a forum outside of the PFS area and noticed my GM star didn't appear next to my name. It's not a big deal or anything but i just thought it was weird. Is this normal behavior? If so, why?

I just wanted to post an open invite to any PFS players in Mobile, Alabama and surrounding areas of the Gulf Coast. We have a small but growing community of PFS players here that love to see new folks come out to our events. Our events are very newbie friendly so don't be shy!

Our next PFS event is Saturday, November 3rd at Gamers N Geeks in Mobile. Details for this event and any future events can be found here:

http://www.meetup.com/Mobile-Area-Tabletop-Roleplaying/

If anyone has any questions, needs assistance, or would like to GM at an event you can reach out to me through the Meetup.com group linked above or find me on Facebook. :-)

I'm a new PFS GM. I played/GM'd a lot of RPGs as a kid, then took a 20 year hiatus. I've been back at it for almost a year but only as a player. I started playing PFRPG about 6 months ago and PFS about 2 months ago (12 sessions). I have a pretty decent grasp of the various rules (I'm still learning) and am confident in my ability to overcome most obstacles during game play to keep the action moving.

I GM'd PFS for the first time last night. I ran Tide of Twilight for two different groups at my LGS. In addition to PFS (3 tables) there was a Magic tournament, some Warhammer folks, and people playing board games or just hanging out. It's an open gaming space so it was pretty loud but no big deal.

The first session went great. The players were engaged, smiles and laughter were prevalent throughout the entire scenario, and It looked like everyone had fun. I stumbled over mechanics a couple of times but we quickly moved past that and kept the action going. One player even thanked me for making his first PFS experience so much fun and told me he was hooked. AWESOME!

Then there was the second session. Same scenario, different group. I will forever refer to this session as the Tide of Distraction. Ages ranged from teenagers to 40ish. No one paid attention to the Venture Captain at the beginning of the scenario. No one took notes. I had to repeat the mission objectives several times. Two guys couldn't put their phones down for more than two minutes. One guy decided to leave mid-game to go get pizza. He was gone for 20 minutes. The two teenage girls at the table (through no fault of their own) were nothing short of guy magnets, attracting a constant influx of dudes that wanted to chat them up. Another player would get up to walk around every 15 minutes then want to know what he missed when he got back to the table. We also had a couple of guys hanging around that though PFS was a spectator sport. They constantly provided color commentary and advice to the players.

The ex-Army soldier in me was screaming to restore order to the game. But, as a brand new GM I decided to go with the flow, not piss anyone off, then think through how to better manage the situation next time. I think the players had fun, but I sure didn't.

How would you handle this type of situation?