Derek Schubert's page

"During combat, the zombies mindlessly shamble toward the nearest target, retaliating against any aggressors. The clacking skull swarm makes use of more involved tactics." ... but the swarm is Mindless just like the zombies are.
Maybe we say that the swarm has been given more complicated programming for fighting alongside zombies, but it isn't actually thinking and adjusting tactics on the fly.

Does a character with the skill feat Powerful Leap get any different results out of an Emerald Grasshopper talisman, compared to one without the feat?

The Emerald Grasshopper talisman gives a benefit when a typical character succeeds at an Athletics check to High Jump, but a character with Powerful Leap gets the same result as a success without rolling. The talisman doesn't seem to account for that. (Rules quotes below.)

If I'm GMing and a character has the feat and the talisman, here are some options I could see for myself:
(A) RAW, ignore Powerful Leap and make them roll the DC 30 Athletics check
(B) also RAW as in the High Jump wording, make them roll Athletics at a lower DC "due to the situation" (the feat and/or the talisman)
(C) make them roll Athletics but treat the result as one better because they effectively succeed at a DC 30 High Jump without rolling: a 21-29 "failure" would become a success and grant the 50ft Grasshopper leap, or a 30+ "success" would become a critical success and grant the 75ft leap
(D) not make them roll for an automatic 50ft leap, but they can roll and try for the 75ft critical success
(E) house-rule Emerald Grasshopper before this situation even comes up, and say that it enhances all vertical Leaps to be 10x higher than normal.

Thanks for looking.

...Trigger You attempt a High Jump but haven’t rolled yet ...

... When you activate it, if you succeed at the Athletics check, you Leap up to 50 feet vertically and up to 10 feet horizontally. If you critically succeed, you can Leap up to 75 feet vertically and 20 feet horizontally.

You Stride, then make a vertical Leap and attempt a DC 30 Athletics check to increase the height of your jump. If you didn’t Stride at least 10 feet, you automatically fail your check. This DC might be increased or decreased due to the situation, as determined by the GM.

Critical Success Increase the maximum vertical distance to 8 feet, or increase the maximum vertical distance to 5 feet and maximum horizontal distance to 10 feet.
Success Increase the maximum vertical distance to 5 feet.
Failure You Leap normally.
Critical Failure You don’t Leap at all, and instead you fall prone in your space.

The Leap basic action is used for High Jump and Long Jump. Leap lets you take a careful, short jump. ... If you make a vertical Leap, you can move up to 3 feet vertically and 5 feet horizontally onto an elevated surface.

When you Leap, you can jump 5 feet up with a vertical Leap, and you increase the distance you can jump horizontally by 5 feet.

Developers &/or editors: Would you please look at the questions by @andreww from December 2020 in the GM Discussion Forum (https://paizo.com/threads/rzs439ri?PFS2E-210-In-Burning-Dawn), and respond in that thread and/or revise the scenario PDF? I downloaded the PDF in late June but it still had the errors and omissions that @andreww mentioned. Thanks!

How long is a character enfeebled by the golem's Altered Alchemical Chambers result 1-2? Since the stat-block doesn't give a duration, it seems to be permanent until cured by something like a Restoration spell.

Has anyone run this for a group that proposed using ropes to make the initial "Dangerous Descent" less dangerous?

The briefing-letter says the site is "on a seaside cliff". I would take the hint and bring extra ropes and grappling hooks. Then my team could rappel down the cliff (not free-climb) and affix the rope-ladder on the way down. The wind and the sea-slick rock might make someone fall off and dangle at the end of a rope a few times, but there should be virtually no risk of falling into the sea and taking damage.

This may trivialize the climb, or maybe it's a valid reward for a creative solution.

The hazard in Encounter B (Spitting Acid "Bushes") is the first complex hazard like this that I've run in 2e.
Is this the right way to run it?:
A few PCs were Searching in exploration mode, and my secret Perception checks for them beat the hazard's Stealth check (DC 20 at subtier 5-6), so I tell them that the PCs are going into an area with a hazard.
The encounter begins and we roll initiative.
I already decided on the specific squares for the dangerous "bushes" on the map, according to the Challenge Points.
To the PCs who were Searching and beat the DC 20, I reveal the 1 dangerous square that is within 10 feet of a Searching PC as they arrive on the map.
(The rogue's Trap Spotter feat doesn't apply, because this hazard isn't a trap.)
I tell the players that it looks dangerous for their PCs to get close to that square -- i.e. it would trigger the hazard's reaction and activate the hazard -- but then they could try to disable a square while standing adjacent. (Is this the right amount of detail for a DC 20 success on the Search?)
I also explain that the hazard has more squares on the map that are dangerous, but I don't reveal them unless a PC takes a Seek action, and a dangerous square is in the 10-foot square that the PC chooses.
The PCs carefully plot their movement so they never go into a square adjacent to a dangerous hazard square. The hazard never takes its reaction, never activates, and never spits acid, even though the PCs are well within the 30ft range of the spitting.

I had fun playing this at Subtier 3-4 and now I'm GMing it at Subtier 5-6.

It was very tough when I played it, and I'm concerned it was because of anomalies in the stat blocks, especially when higher-level creatures were downgraded to lower-level ones.
Could Dustin, James, or Linda (or another appropriate Paizo developer or editor) please review these questions?:

Thanks for checking.

Not to necro, but can I get an interpretation of the hazard in Encounter B's crit fail result. It says the PC loses 1d4 actions worth of air, but suffocation seems to be a round by round action, and the actions you take on your turn determine how many rounds you lose

Would I shave it off the end (lose 3 actions=lose 1 round, but nothing before that) or would I deny them actions on their next turn?

I would read it as a loss of 1d4 *rounds* of air.

Thanks for the quick response!

The second wave of Encounter A "rushes in from the southwest corner of the map," but there are only 2 squares to stand in at the extreme corner, because of the bend in the ravine.

Advice, please, from those of you who have GMd this?...

Did you start them at the literal corner, so they had to spend 2+ Stride actions off the map to arrive at the larger area north of that first bend?
Or did you start them along the western edge, 8-10 squares north of the southern edge -- roughly the corner but not literally?
The bilokos prefer to be in melee, but I don't know how much more dangerous this encounter becomes if they start closer to the PCs.

Good discussions.
I hope more readers will weigh in, crowd-sourcing more data from real tables with 6 PCs and 19-21 CPs (high tier with mostly low-tier PCs), to notice any trends. Please share your real-table experiences.

Please note, again, that the encounter that stopped my table was the second-to-last one with 7 enemies, not an overtuned single boss.

I agree that the CP method is new and may need further fine-tuning ... and the campaign staff, writers, and developers probably won't know what changes to make unless we players and GMs share our experiences.
Adjusting the 16-18 CP threshold was one change. Did feedback from players drive it?
The next change may be adjusting what to do with 6 PCs and 19-21 CP. Maybe it's shifting them to low tier, or keeping them at high tier with more level-bumps and mentor boons, or something else.

Or if someone's idea of fun is running statistical simulations of battles or skill-challenge encounters at the 19-21 CP high subtier from various published PFS2 scenarios, with various parties of 6 PCs, 5 PCs, and 4 PCs ... well, have at it!

Hello again, Eliandra! Thanks for GMing, for recognizing when we were getting frustrated, and for offering options. You gave us the initial warning about the scaling (which I brashly brushed off, I know), and reminded us (with Wisdom checks) when we had our primary objective and could retreat.

Yes, I've played most of the PFS2 scenarios and quests (including one that Nicole ran at PaizoCon Online, a 5-PC table with 17 CPs), and GMd several of them.
This was the first time I had a 6-PC table with 19-21 CPs. Other tables in the high subtier have all included more than one 3rd- or 4th-level character.
So I have an observation and a hypothesis to test! ;^)

(I haven't played in many 6-PC tables since the shift to online play in March, anyway. Most of our local Venture Agents, including Pirate Rob, have recruited additional GMs so our online tables have had 5 players at most.)

I agree, the CP system generally results in a fair challenge, sometimes erring on the easy side.
Since CP adjustments allow more nuance than PFS1's subtiers, I didn't think I had to be worried about "playing up" like I did in PFS1.

Testing the hypothesis...
Other players and GMs: If you have you played or GMd a 6-PC table with 19-21 CPs -- in a variety of scenarios and party compositions -- has the game seemed harder than when you played with other numbers of PCs and CPs?
If it isn't an isolated case, then it might warrant adding the extra step between low and high subtier. Thanks.

Thanks for the quick replies.
Yes, this was a scenario whose reviews say the low-CP high tier is tough, as I read later. It might have been bad rolling, or just con fatigue (it was the final slot on Sunday), so that's why I'm asking for other players/GMs to weigh in:

I have a suggestion for revising the threshold between low and high subtier for Pathfinder Society 2nd Edition scenarios, based on the total Challenge Points:

8-15 CP: low subtier (no change)
16-18 CP: low subtier with 5 or 6 PCs, high subtier with 4 PCs (no change)
19-21 CP: low subtier with 6 PCs, high subtier with 4 or 5 PCs (new)
22+ CP: high subtier (raised the bottom value)

This would be a revision to Step 2 "Determine the Subtier" on the GM Basics page of the Pathfinder Society Guide to Play (Second Edition):
http://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/encyclopedia/pathfinder-2-0-gm-basic s/

My friends and I played a Tier 1-4 scenario at ConCurrent, in which the party had five 2nd-level and one 4th-level character, for 21 CPs (3+3+3+3+3+6). We played the high (3-4) subtier. We fled before the final encounter, mainly because the probabilities in combat were just too hard for the 2nd-level characters to overcome -- it was unlikely for us to hit our opponents or save against their effects, and very likely for them to hit us and save against our effects.
Under the 1st-edition scaling rules, our Average Party Level would have been 2.33, rounding down to 2.

Has anyone else found the high subtier too hard with a 6-PC party of mostly 2nd-level characters in Tier 1-4 scenarios, or mostly 4th-level characters in Tier 3-6 scenarios? If so, what do you think about this suggestion?
Thanks for reading.

I enjoyed playing this scenario.
I have a question about the boon, please, for Michael or others on the Organized Play staff:

Derek Schubert wrote:

Michael Sayre wrote:

Jib916 wrote:

Is there a link somewhere to the pregens? Not seeing them? (Or do we just use the 5th level Iconic pregens?)

Use the 5th level iconic pregens.

At GenCon, our party was Fumbus (Alc), Amiri (Bbn), Kyra (Clr), Valeros (Ftr), Merisiel (Rog), and Ezren (Wiz), since those were the only six pregens on the table.

I'm scheduled to run this at ReaperCon over Labor Day weekend.
I don't see the scenario prescribing which pregens to use.
Should I offer only these six to my players, or should I let them choose from all of the pregens?

Unless there is an update before then, those are still the only six pregens available at level 5.

Thanks for the quick reply.

Jib916 wrote:

Is there a link somewhere to the pregens? Not seeing them? (Or do we just use the 5th level Iconic pregens?)

Use the 5th level iconic pregens.

At GenCon, our party was Fumbus (Alc), Amiri (Bbn), Kyra (Clr), Valeros (Ftr), Merisiel (Rog), and Ezren (Wiz), since those were the only six pregens on the table.

Dear Campaign Staff:
Quick questions/suggestions for the next version of the guide:

1) Page 19, Evergreen Adventures. This paragraph describes only the Tier 1 and Tier 1-2 evergreens, which used to be the only evergreens available. Season 8 and Season 9 have Tier 3-7 evergreen adventures. Should the guide address them, such as by saying there is no limit to the number of times players and GMs can get credit for Tier 3-7 evergreen adventures for characters between 3rd and 7th levels (or according to the normal rules in Chapter 2 for playing a pregenerated character in the adventure and applying credit to a 1st-level character)?

2) Page 26, human ethnicities and languages. Should the list include "Vudrani (Vudrani)" at the end, after Varisian?

3) Page 37, Purchasing Guidelines. "Every item listed on any of your Chronicle sheets are always available for purchase." Grammar quibble: should this say "is" (agreeing with the singular "Every item"), instead of "are"? (Alternatively, say "All items" instead of "Every item"?)

Thanks!

Thanks for updating these cards!
Questions for the developers about the 4-goal Concordance benefit, Elemental Ray:
1) The damage is "1d6 x half your character level". So if a 5th-level character rolls 3 on the d6, does she deal 3 x (5/2, rounded down to 2) = 6 points? I don't know of other spells or class abilities in the game that involve multiplying; most add a die per two levels (such as a paladin's lay on hands) or +1 point per two levels (such as domain or bloodline abilities).
2) The card specifies a target within 30 feet and says "This is a touch attack...". Could you please confirm whether it should say "This is a *ranged* touch attack..."?

Amazing puzzlesmithing, Jason and Joe! Thank you.
I had a lot of fun solving the individual puzzles and the meta-puzzle. Even without the page to figure out Keskodai's word, I could guess what the missing letter had to be.
(Confirmed, now that I've solved Keskodai's puzzle. Thanks, Chris, for adding the missing page.)
The chance to solve a new set of puzzles is a good incentive to go to PaizoCon 2018!

Thanks for the post, MrVergee. Hmm, I can't attach photos so I guess I need to find a place to host them remotely and then I can provide links, so you and others can see.

Will you be GMing the end of Hell's Vengeance part 1 ("The Hellfire Compact") and do you want a set of maps/terrain to build the tree-fort in 3-D?

If so, ask me and I will mail mine to you. This terrain has already provided me and my gaming group with several hours of fun, but I won't run it again and now they're just collecting dust. I would like to give them to someone who will use them.

I redrew each platform on a piece of mat-board (extra-thick cardstock), cut them out with branching edges, cut out additional pieces for stairs and bridges, and made "trunks" (rectangles that I rolled into tubes 4", 6", or 8" tall) to support each one. I'll mail the pieces in a flat envelope, so you'll have to re-roll the trunks and then tape them to the undersides of the platforms. You'll also have to draw out the ground-level map (tree trunks) for yourself, since I drew mine on a battlemat that has since been erased. But the upper-level parts and trunk-tubes should save you a few hours of effort, and I hope your players will enjoy having the 3-D setup as much as mine did.

--Derek

Should Vudrani humans get Vudrani as a bonus language, as the other ethnic groups do in section 7 of the Character Creation guidelines?
It was missing in the Season 8 version, and hasn't been added in the draft for Season 9 (I'm looking at page 26). Vudrani are in the Inner Sea World Guide, so I hope they also get their native language for free.

Can we use the boon for completing the recent PFS survey ("An Exchange of Secrets") to replay "Version A" of The Solstice Scar for credit, say at Origins and then at GenCon?

"An Exchange of Secrets" allows replaying scenarios of Tier 1-5, 3-7, 5-9, or 7-11, depending on how many PCs we reported. By the strict wording, The Solstice Scar is not eligible for replay using this boon, because it is a Tier 1-11 scenario. Is that deliberate? I reported enough PCs to qualify for replaying a 7-11 scenario; I am wondering whether I could play Tier 7-8 at Origins, and replay at Tier 5-6 at GenCon.

(This is a very nice benefit, in any case. Thanks, Paizo folks!)

This Chronicle sheet allows replaying scenarios of Tier 1-5, 3-7, 5-9, or even 7-11 if we report more PCs. What a great incentive; thank you! It doesn't mention scenarios with different tiering (such as multi-table specials for Tiers 1-11, or the ones with pregen PCs), so are those not eligible, even if we could replay a 7-11? For example, could I use this boon to replay #8-99 at GenCon if I've played it at Origins?

And I created a sheet to help GMs track the Respect Points.
I also posted it on pfsprep.com, as James wrote.

Are any of the combat encounters supposed to have 4-player adjustments?
I'll be one of the GMs at our local convention over Labor Day Weekend. Among the advance signups so far, there are only 7 players requesting to play with 10th- or 11th-level PCs (and a few with 9th-level PCs). I've read the scenario and noticed a few accommodations for 4-player tables, but not in the combats.

I'm planning to run The Harrowing soon, and I have some questions that I don't see answered in the module.

Anyone knowledgeable, can you help?

Thanks for any answers or advice.

We updated the PDF to the official version before Gencon, so most GMs had the official version. It sounds like your GM printed his or her Chronicle Sheets before the update. If you have an easy way to get a copy to the new sheet, then that would be ideal.
Otherwise, make a note about the correct action type on the Chronicle Sheet. I'll PM you the revised treasure list for the high Subtier.

I'll print the new sheet -- easy to do.

It was a cut and paste error, which was in the unofficial version of the PDF but which we caught before the official release.

Thanks for the response.

I played this scenario at Gen Con (July 30) and I am preparing to GM it locally. The Chronicle sheet from Gen Con, however, has some differences from the Chronicle sheet in the PDF (downloaded today, Aug 23):

<...>
** "Item access" spoiler omitted **

Did my GM at Gen Con print the Chronicle sheet from an earlier/unofficial PDF?

The erroneous list for Subtier 6-7 in #7-02 is the same as the list for Subtier 8-9 in #7-03, in case that helps the folks at Paizo understand the problem. Cut-and-paste error?

I played this scenario at Gen Con (July 30) and I am preparing to GM it locally. The Chronicle sheet from Gen Con, however, has some differences from the Chronicle sheet in the PDF (downloaded today, Aug 23):

Did my GM at Gen Con print the Chronicle sheet from an earlier/unofficial PDF?

And even the latest sheet has the wrong prices for some items:

I also posted this question under the Product Discussion for Pathfinder Society Scenario #6-11, "The Slave Master's Mirror", which uses some stats from the Monster Codex.

Is the damage calculated wrong in this stat block?:

I ran this scenario last week.
All players enjoyed it, but one character died.

I have been scrutinizing the stat blocks from that encounter.

Is this an error?: