Jhavhul

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Organized Play Member. 39 posts. No reviews. No lists. 1 wishlist. 2 Organized Play characters.



Scarab Sages

Well, everything is in the title...

PF1 Beginner Box was great, and I still can find newbies that can be corrupted converted into RPG Players and make them discover the great world of Pathfinder.

I'm quite sure a Beginner Box will come one day or antoher, but when ?

Scarab Sages

We've already had this discussion years ago, but there'is something new !

I've just seen that the next Starfinder AP will be a 3 volume AP. OK it's not Pathfinder, but still it's a Paizo AP... So I start to hope again for a Pathfinder Campaign with less than 6 volumes.

Personnally, I would love a 4 Volume AP starting around level 5. That format would suit best my rythm and level preferrences as a DM.

Like many groups I think, I've experienced many campaign starts form level 1 to level 1d6+1, ending by a TPK. But not so many campaigns have run to the end. I'm not the only one :
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2utzn?APs-Suitable-For-HigherLevel-Starts

I Know I could take a 6 Volume AP and skip the first volume, and maybe some part of the second, but that's not the same as having an AP designed that way : I requires some work, and worst of all it usually requires to skip one of the best volume in the serie. Again, I'm not the only one thinking that way :
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2uq9t?Best-AP-to-start-with-book-2

Years ago when a discussion about this subject arose, I remember that one argument against changing the traditionnal 6 volume format was the need to announce the future Campaigns in summer, at GenCon.

Well I can understand that, but still, it doesn't prevent to have other formats, as long as they fit in a 12 month year.

So with 12 volumes, instead of having two 6 volume campaigns, we could have for example :
One 4 volume campaign plus an 8 volume one. The 8 volume campaign would be a good way to satisfy those wanting a full 20-level campaign without mythic :
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2uiuo?More-level-20-andor-mythic-APs

But that's not the only solution. Maybe there can be 3 APs in one year.
That could be three 4-Volume APs !
But also one 3-Volume plus a 4-Volume plus a 5-Volume.
And Why not ?
I'm sure there are plenty of customers for shorter campaings :
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2ul1b?Some-thoughts-on-AP-length

Oh yes, one could says there are probably more customers for the traditionnal 6-Volume APs. Yes, Maybe that's right. But those customers already have lots of choices ! From Rise of the Runelords to Ruins of Azlant, that's 21 campaigns so far, I bet most of 6-Volume customers haven't played all these 21 campaigns...

Edit : Making the links good.

Scarab Sages

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I've read the new playtest, and I'm quite disappointed.

I haven't been able to read a single class to the end, I've stalled before the end for each of the 6 new classes.

I have the feeling that my game is becoming more and more bloated, and I'm unhappy with that.

I cannot give feedback about how they play because I've been unable to create a single character using the playtest. I really tried to but I felt overwelmed by the number of things to take care of before making my choices.

That was about 3 days ago.

I steped back and didn't open again the playtest until today. Today I decided to give it another try. But still I found those new classes to complicated. I really love the description of the classes.

I read this :
Mediums channel spirits into themselves, using their
own bodies as vessels for astral entities. Whether the
spirits represent the souls of the departed, mental
archetypes, or disembodied outsiders, the medium
balances his need for the spirits’ power with the danger
of allowing such beings inf luence over his mind.

And I say "Yes, that's cool, I want to create a medium character !"

I read, role, alignement, hit die, starting wealth, class skills, weapons & armors, everything id OK, until :
CLASS FEATURES.

Damn, that's way too long and complicated !!! And still I have only 18 spirits instead of 54 (I know these are the 54 cards of my harrowing deck - cool idea by the way).

So I step back again and think : Is that me getting too old ?
I open my CRB and compare :

Barbarian : 3 pages
Bard : 4 pages
Cleric : 10 pages
Druid : 7 pages
Fighter : 1 page
Monk : 4 pages
Paladin : 4 pages
Ranger : 3 pages
Rogue : 3 pages
Sorcerer : 7 pages
Wizard : 6 pages

Kineticist : 13 pages
Medium : 11 pages
Mesmerist : 6 pages
Occultist : 12 pages
Psychic : 6 pages
Spiritualist : 9 pages

In the CRB, all classes have a beautiful picture that takes up some space but still, most classes are shorter than Occult Adventures playtest.

So it's not only me getting older !

Well, it looks that for me, a class description shouldn't exceed 4 pages before I get bored.

I know that some classes in the CRB exceed this limit, but :
- I already knew these classes from D&D 3.5, so I guess it's easier to understand.
- A cleric only chooses 2 domains, a sorcerer has only one bloodline, a wizard can only choose 1 specialisation school.

I'm not sure because I haven't been able to keep my concentration to read everything on the medium, but it seems to me that a medium can take absolutly any spirit in the book over his career. 18 spirit to choose from every day is quite too much. And tomorrow 54 spirits to choose from ??? Woaw.

I said that de spirits matching the Harrow deck is a good idea, but every spirit is too complicated by it's own.
I think each spirit should only give 1 bonus, 1 boon, or 1 spell, and it's description shouldn't be more than 5 or 6 lines.

Also, a character should be restricted to only some spirits, using for example the cleric's 1 step alignement rule.

So I have only one feedback fo this playtest : Make it simpler.

I want to add a quote for a conclusion :

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900 - 1944)

Scarab Sages

I was re-reading Part Five in the House of the Beast, preparing for my gaming session tonight. And I suddently realized that my players are totally unable to gain access to the Pit of Screaming Ghosts !

The problem lies in the earth-elemental animated cage in J4.

It can only be activated by one of 3 means :
- Talking in Terran
- Casting an [Earth] spell
- Casting an [Air] spell

None of my players have access to any of these !
None of them know the Terran Language.
None of them have access to a spell that can make them speak that language.

I knew this for a long time, but I thought they could rely on spellcasting.

However :
- The fighter cannot cast spells.
- The Paladin of Sarenrae can only cast 1st level spells. I cannot find any 1st level paladin spell with [Earth] or [Air] descriptor.
- The Inquisitor of Iomedae has only a handfull of spells no higher than 2nd level, and none of them has the [Earth] or [Air] descriptor.
- The Witch knows quite a lot of spells, but I cannot find any with the the [Earth] or [Air] descriptor.

I can solve that problem by adding a scroll in the treasure they found last time. Last game finished late, and I didn't told them exactly what they looted.

Tonight's session should be started by an inventory of the looted material.

So, I've been looking for a spell with [Earth] or [Air] descriptor, on their spell list. But I'm unable to find any !

Can anyone help me finding a spell with [Earth] or [Air] descriptor in those lists :
1st level Paladin
1st or 2nd level Inquisitor
1st to 3rd level Witch

Or any other idea ?

Thanks !

Scarab Sages

I run Howl of the Carrion King, and my players did quite well so far. However half of them never played Pathfinder or D&D before, and last session was not so brillant.

During last session, they made a few poor choices, and now Kardswann is aware of them.

Here is what they did after installing in the monastery :

They manage to save Oxvard, and to kill a group of 6 gnolls near the pesh field, they escaped the dust digger and let it devour the freshly dead gnolls.

This first step was brillant, Kardswann has no idea why his 6 gnolls disappeard, and he didn't know about Oxvard's rescue. Oxvard gave them some informations about the village, and how he was captured by the gnolls and their demon ally (Kezurkian).

Next day (the 4th after the Monastery's liberation) they went on another hit & run raid against the village. They were able to kill the Peryton, but not without raising the alarm. However the guards from B9 and their hyenas took a long time to go from B9 to the other side of the bridge.

And they split the party !
Some characters went to search the watermill, and others to explore the other building (Undrella's Tannery).

I made Undrella appear then, she proposed them to cover their track if they gave her the peryton's horns, heart and fangs. She wanted to use these components for her potions. She also asked for a future service (but had no time to ask for the snake's head). She talked passionatly with the seductive Paladin.
The players in the tannery agreed, but the others in the mill didn't know about it. One of them found the magical longsword in the watermill, and wanted to kill some gnolls. This player has the "Gnoll Killer" campaign trait.

As Undrella began to talk with the gnolls, he went out of the mill and attacked them (insulting the gnolls and ignoring the harpy).
Meanwhile, the rogue robbed some stuff in Undrella's home.
Undrella fled to her tannery, and the other characters went out from the tannery to help the gnoll killer. They killed on gnoll and some hyenas, but on gnoll was able to flee to the battle market. Kezurkian showed up to block the bridge, and the PCs fled from him.

They went to the monastery to recover.

We stopped the session at this point.

Now, the gnoll and Kezurkian can explain Kardswann about the PCs, and they should prepare for another attack. However, they cannot send the peryton spying on the monastery.
What do you think they should do to prepare ?

I don't know what to do with Undrella.
I think Kardswann could believe she is a traitor, but maybe she could come up with a good explaination and save her head. Maybe she could do the spying mission on the monastery on day 5, and defenitivly side with Kardswann, she was robbed and ignored after all.
Or maybe she could flee from Kelmarane, to see that handsome paladin again ?