VanceMadrox's page

Ultimate Rulership for PF2e from Legendary games is now available but it doesn’t look like it has an entry in Paizo’s store. As such I thought I’d create a thread for discussion. I was fortunate enough to be able to help with the editing and development of this book some and even got my name in it!

The book has a lot of ideas and systems for use with the 2e Kingdom Building Rules. It has so much that Legendary Games actually needed to split it into 2 books, with Ultimate Cities likely out sometime this fall. I thought I’d share my initial thoughts on the various sections. Please note that Ultimate Rulership is very Modular, it’s designed for you to be able to use whatever parts you want. That said, let’s dive in!

Kingdom Basics (Page3):
Most of the basics don’t change. I’m personally glad to see Alignment for Kingdoms back. I’ll talk about Focuses in their own section. I’m not sure having a treasury measured in GP instead of RP is really needed.

Attribute checks: (Page 5)
Just a note that PF2e normally doesn’t have attribute checks (which are just untrained checks really), so Ultimate Rulership defines it.

Resource Dice and Resource Points (Page 5):
Unlike the base rules, UR’s Resource System has 4 RP pools, one for each attribute. You assign Resource Dice to each Attribute then roll them. The RP in each of the 4 pools can only be used for Focuses based on that Attribute. You can also hold some Resource Dice in reserve, which can be used for any Focus. The advantage of assigning dice to Attributes is that every single resource dice assigned to an attribute adds the attribute’s modifier to the die roll. So if you have 3 Economy Resource Dice and a +3 Economy modifier, you’re rolling 3dx + 9.
This is quite different from the base system and I’m not sure that I like it. Having to divide Dice into 4 different pools seems like it could take up a lot of real-world time as players debate how to allocate the dice. It’s also a lot more RP than the base system, I’m very worried it will make RP costs trivial. I need to playtest it to be sure though. Also not being able to increase your RP over what you actually rolled for the turn seems unnecessary to me.

Kingdom Abilities (Page 6):
Most of the new Kingdom abilities are related to the new turn sequence and action economy. The abilities are neat. I also like that Kingdoms can now have General feats in addition to regular feats. It makes the Kingdom feel even more like its own PC.

Gaining Kingdom XP (Page 7): Slow leveling of the Kingdom is one of the biggest issues in the base rules, it’s nice to see UR address it. I don’t actually know if UR’s system here provides enough XP in practice, I still need to playtest this. I do know that Ultimate Cities will have more ways of gaining Kingdom XP.

The Kingdom Turn (Page 8):
UR offers a new turn sequence, replacing the Commerce and Activity Phases of the base rules with an Activity Phase with just one step. Leadership, Regional, and Civic are still traits but there’s no set number of actions of each type. Instead, the new system is based on the 3 Actions plus a reaction idea of the base rules. The group as a whole does get more than 3 actions though, don’t worry.
I’m very excited about the new turn sequence and action economy. Having only 1 activity phase instead of a whole bunch of different steps has the potential of removing a good amount of the tediousness of the base rules. It also flat out removes the big issue of there simply not being enough useful leadership actions that the base rules have. I’m not entirely sure how well the number of actions the system gives will work out but I’m eagerly looking forward to playtesting and finding out. Reactions as presented are barely worth using though.

Taxes (Page 9): The taxes system here is similar to how UR did it in PF1e, a welcome return.

Expanded fame and Infamy (Page 10):
The new Fame/Infamy system looks interesting but without playtesting it I can’t tell how well it works in practice.

Leadership Roles (Page 12):
UR offers a new system where a PC’s skills can give them a bonus on Kingdom Skill checks. This is a much-requested feature that was lacking in the base rules. I’m not entirely sold on the exact distribution of Relevant Skills between the 8 roles and will need to playtest it to see if it needs tweaking. Of note here is that the Leadership bonus is a new type of bonus, which has me a bit wary as adding new Bonus Types in Pathfinder 2e throws off the math. This Leadership bonus replaces the Status Bonus for Invested Leadership from the base Kingdom rules though so it might work out ok. It also has the added benefit of fixing the major issue from the base rules of Feats not working right due to Status Bonuses from feats not stacking with Status Bonuses from Invested Leadership. Also of note, each leader (outside of the Ruler) can only make checks in their 2 Key Focus areas. This will make it feel like a given leader is really in charge of their chosen area but does limit what PCs can do some.

Noble Titles and Forms of Address (Page 15):
There’s no mechanical options/rules here so not much to say. Pretty sure this section is a straight cut and paste from UR for PF1e. Still nice to have.

Focus Pool (Page 19): Focuses are the same as Kingdom Skills (but 3 are renamed). I like one of the renames, don’t like one of them, and am neutral on the third. The Focus Pool/Focus Bonus option is very different from the base rules. Essentially, you slowly raise a Skill by using that Skill to do things. You get a Focus Bonus which is another new type of bonus, and you need a certain threshold of Focus Bonus before you can use a Focus Increase (ie a Skill Increase) on that Focus. I like the basic idea but I’m very worried that introducing yet another new type of Bonus will make the math trivially easy. The math getting too hard at higher levels was one of the biggest issues with the base rules though. Ultimately, I need to playtest the UR system to see how it does.

Overspending (Page 22):
Overpsending lets you use RP (of which you’ll have way more than in the base rules) to get an untyped bonus to a Focus check. I think this will turn out to be flat out broken. 8 RP for an untyped +4 bonus to a Focus check is just going to be too much. I like the idea of being able to spend some RP for that check you really want to do, but it needs to be more limited in how often you can use it.

New Activities (Pages 23-25):
The new activities are fairly niche but welcome.

Kingdom Feats (Pages 27-37):
10 pages of new Kingdom Feats are worth buying UR on their own. Not every feat is a winner but there’s so many good new options every Kingmaker 2e campaign could benefit from them.

Advanced Rulership (Page 37):
The new systems for diplomatic relations and trade agreements seem neat. I’ll need to playtest to see if they’re worth the extra complexity over the base rules.

Kingdom Events (Page 44):
Having a different way to organize and generate random Kingdom events is quite useful.

Anyway that’s my thoughts, I’d love to hear yours!

And if anyone is interested in following along with my playtesting of UR shoot me a PM!

In our testing we found a minor issue with Terrain Features. The Kingdom Building Rules state that a single hex can only contain one Terrain Feature but this is clearly not the case for all of the features.

(as an example the hex that the PCs are encouraged to start their first settlement in is a Landmark hex, this shows you can have both a Landmark and a Settlement)

Our Solution:

These Terrain Features can overlap with any and all other features: Bridge, Landmark, Refuge, Resource

A hex can have at most one of these: Farmland, Freehold, Ruins, Settlement, Structure, Work Site.

A Settlement can be built in a hex that contains Ruins or a Structure. The Ruins/Structure are incorporated into the Settlement and once a Settlement is built the hex ceases to have the Ruins or Structure feature.

A Free Hold can be brought into your kingdom in which case it becomes a Settlement instead.

To switch between any of Farmland, Settlement, and Work Site, the existing Feature must first be removed with the Clear Hex Activity before the new Terrain Feature can be constructed.

Major Problem #5: Low Level Urban Grid Restrictions on the Capital:
Problem Analysis #5:

Like Major Problem 4, this is not an issue for any groups using automatic or Milestone leveling for the Kingdom can ignore this problem. As written Kingdoms cannot Build towns until 3rd level, Cities until 9th level, and Metropolises until 15th level. Our tests showed that this can easily result in a settlement filling all of its allowed lots long before reaching the level requirement to grow a higher category. Filling 4 lots in the Capital can easily be done after the 2nd Kingdom turn if the Capital starts with a Town Hall. This would leave the Capital unable to build any structures until 3rd level, which is simply not fun. Filling 4 lots can easily be done by Level 5, leaving 4 whole levels of being unable to build structures in the Capital. The issue wasn't too bad in later settlements, we only filled one up around level 8 so waiting until 9th wasn't too bad there.

Problem Analysis #4:

It's clear that the intent is for the Kingdom's level to be at most 1-2 levels behind the party. RAW, Kingdom XP is awarded so slowly that it will take multiple years for the Kingdom to level even at the earliest levels. While a lot of downtime can pass in game, the party is unlikely to wait years for the kingdom level to catch up. This is also an issue mechanically as the Kingdom Size modifiers to Control DC will come into play before the Kingdom's Status and Item bonuses can go beyond +1 to balance out the increased control DC. A group using automatic or milestone leveling for the Kingdom can ignore this and that’s the only reason this isn’t ranked as Major Problem #1. It’s a major problem for any group that wants to actually track Kingdom XP and use the system.

Problem Analysis #3:

Kingdom feats as written don't actually work. RAW, a status bonus granted by a feat won’t actually do ANYTHING! A kingdom already has a status bonus to everything and status bonuses don't stack. Beyond that there's a few feats that are very good while the rest are barely worth taking. This doesn't result in a lot of fun meaningful choice when choosing a Kingdom feat.

Problem Analysis #2:
Even though there are 22 different Leadership Activities the vast majority of them are either not useful enough or too situational to have meaningful choice in how to spend Leadership Actions. To understand this let’s break down the actions into categories:

Situational Actions: These actions are useful but require an opportunity to use them or some form of trigger. This includes all actions that reduce Unrest. Establish Trade Agreement, Hire Adventurers, Infiltration, Pledge of Fealty, Provide Care, Quell Unrest, Recruit Army, Relocate Capital (likely NEVER will be used), Repair Reputation, Rest and Relax, Send Diplomatic Envoy

That’s already a full ½ of our 22 Leadership Activities that are not useful every turn.

Rising Cost Actions: These actions would be useful every kingdom turn but have a significant cost or subsequent increased DCs that make them not useable every kingdom turn: Capital Investment (Costs gp from the party), Celebrate Holiday (Increased DC on subsequent turn), Clandestine Business (Increased DC on subsequent turns)

That leaves only 8 out of 22 Leadership Activities that are useful every turn.
Flat Cost Actions:
These actions are useful and useable every turn but the RP cost limits how many of them you can do in a kingdom turn at lower levels. Craft Luxuries, Creative Solution, Purchase Commodities, Supernatural Solution.
That leaves only 4 that are potentially useful and fully useable 4 times (1 per PC) within a Kingdom turn. These 4 warrant individual consideration.

Prognostication:
Just plain useful and will likely be done every kingdom turn. More than one success in a turn doesn't help though so it won't be done on each PC's turn

Request Foreign Aid:
Useful every round though it's weird it can be repeated freely. Really seems like it should be limited to 1/kingdom turn and have a higher DC on subsequent turns

Create a Masterpiece:
Limited to 1/Kingdom turn. While an extra point of Fame/Infamy is good and this is very useful for low level Kingdoms, it's nearly worthless for high level kingdoms unless you've highly invested in Arts and can get a critical success due to Focused Attention.

Focused Attention:
Conversely to Create a Masterpiece this isn't very useful for a low level kingdom but becomes amazing for a higher level one. This is because unlike every other Leadership Activity, Focused Attention's DC stays flat at 20. It's the Kingdom version of the Pathfinder 2e Aid action. In the Kingdom building rules a Critical Success on any Kingdom roll
gives a point of Fame/Infamy. To crit succeed on a Focused Attention roll you only need to get a 30. For a skill you've invested highly in, by Kingdom level 10 you're Crit Succeeding on Focused Attention rolls more often than not. Focused Attention is far and away the best way to generate Fame/Infamy at higher Kingdom levels.

From the above we can see that there aren’t a whole lot of Leadership Activities that will be useful on any given Kingdom Turn.

Major Problem #1: The Math for non-invested skills breaks down at higher levels:

Problem Analysis #1:

The Kingmaker 2e Kingdom Building Rules might be intended to be system agnostic but the math is just Pathfinder 2e Math. The Kingdom Control DC chart exactly matches the Pathfinder 2e DC by level chart from level 5 on. From 1-4 the Kingdom Control DC is just a tad easier to help out new Kingdoms. The math for a highly invested Kingdom Skill on a Kingdom’s highest ability score works fine at all levels and matches that of a similarly invested skill of a regular Pathfinder 2e character.

The problem here is that the math breaks down for non-invested skills compared to a regular Pathfinder 2e character. A regular Pathfinder 2e character has a significantly higher chance of success on something they’re only Trained or Expert in than a Kingdom does. In addition to that, a regular Pathfinder 2e character has the rest of the party to rely on. A Wizard doesn’t have to make Thievery roll at all if there’s a Rogue in the party. A Kingdom may be intended to feel like an extra PC in the party, but there’s only 1 Kingdom, it can’t rely on anyone else. Furthermore, while a regular Pathfinder 2e character has Attacks, AC, and Saves in addition to Skills, a Kingdom does EVERYTHING with skills. It will be rolling a lot more skill checks for skills it hasn’t invested in than a regular Pathfinder 2e character ever will. If your group is ok with failing and critically failing significantly more often on Kingdom Skill checks compared to regular PC checks, you can ignore this problem. The system is obviously designed to work like regular Pathfinder 2e though so we believe the math should match.

Before we get into our solutions let’s look at exactly where the math breaks down. In Pathfinder 2e the bonus to a roll is made of the following bonuses/penalties: Proficiency, Ability Modifier, Item Bonus, Circumstance Bonus, and Status Bonus. The Kingdom Building Rules also add a Size Penalty based on the number of hexes the Kingdom controls. To understand why a Kingdom lags behind a regular PF2e character we need to look at each section individually.

Proficiency:
A kingdom gains proficiency in its skills at the same levels as a regular Pathfinder 2e character. A Kingdom's proficiency bonus on a skill the Kingdom has invested in will be the same as a regular Pathfinder 2e character. The problem here is with skills that haven't been raised beyond Trained. Both a Kingdom and a regular Pathfinder 2e character will usually pick a few skills and raise those skills and leave the rest trained or even untrained. As mentioned above, for a regular Pathfinder 2e character this isn't much of a problem because they don't have to cover every skill, they're part of a party. The vast majority of skills checks only need one PC in the party to be able to handle it. A Kingdom doesn't have a party, it has to do everything itself. A Kingdom will be making far more trained only skills checks than a regular character would and thus fail checks a lot more often.

Ability Modifiers:
A regular character has 6 ability scores, gets 9 boosts (net) at creation, and 4 boosts every 5 levels. A kingdom by RAW has 4 ability scores, gets 7 boosts (net) at creation, and 2 boosts every 5 levels. While these look similar overall, a Kingdom has to care about all 4 of its ability scores while regular characters only really care about 4-5 of theirs. In practice, a regular character has far more boosts for the abilities they care about than a kingdom does. In addition, kingdoms can't get Apex items. All told this averages out to a Kingdom being roughly at a -2 to ability modifiers compared to a regular character

Item Bonus:
Item Bonuses can be gotten at roughly the same levels for a Kingdom and regular characters. Item bonuses for regular characters are controlled by their equipment so availability is up to the GM. Item Bonuses for Kingdoms are strange though. If you can build a structure that gives an Item Bonus to a particular roll then it's very easy to get a maxed Item Bonus. If you can't, then you can't get an Item Bonus at all. The majority of Kingdom skill activities do have Structures that give item bonuses so we'll call this one even. I’v added a section below regarding the Kingdom Skill Activities that don’t have existing Structures to grant them an grant Item Bonus.

Circumstance Bonus:
Circumstance bonuses are, well, circumstantial. Kingdoms actually have a lot of ways to get circumstance bonuses on various rolls but so do regular characters in a well built party. This one is a wash.

Status Bonus:
Status Bonuses are hard to come by for most rolls for regular PCs. Kingdoms get an automatic Status Bonus with Invested Leadership but in practice this just serves to help mitigate the Kingdom Size penalty to DC.

Kingdom Size Penalty:
In practice this is mostly mitigated by Status Bonuses from Invested Leadership. It averages out to a +1 higher needed on rolls for the Kingdom overall.

Let’s do an example with numbers:
(Math Comparison for Skills left at trained only, assuming a 12 ability to start)

Level 5:
Regular Skills: DC20
Skill Bonus +9 (+7 Proficiency (+5 Level, +2 Trained), +1 Ability, +1 Item)
Roll needed: 11

Kingdom Skills: DC 21 (assuming 1 Size penalty at this point)
Skill Bonus +10 (+7 Proficiency (+5 Level, +2 Trained), +1 Ability, +1 Item, +1 Status)
Roll needed: 11

Level 10:
Regular Skills: DC 27
Skill Bonus +16 (+12 Proficiency (+10 Level, +2 Trained), +3 Ability, +1 Item)
Roll needed: 11

Kingdom Skills: DC 30 (Yes, you'll likely have 50 hexes by now for a +3 Size Penalty)
Skill Bonus +17 (+12 Proficiency (+10 Level, +2 Trained), +2 Ability, +1 Item, +2 Status)
Roll needed: 13

Level 15:
Regular Skills: DC 34
Skill Bonus +23 (+17 Proficiency (+15 Level, +2 Trained), +4 Ability, +2 Item)
Roll needed: 11

Kingdom Skills: DC 38 (34 +4 Size Penalty)
Skill Bonus +24 (+17 Proficiency (+15 Level, +2 Trained), +3 Ability, +2 Item, +2 Status)
Roll needed: 14

At this point a kingdom skill that's only trained is 3 behind a similar trained only skill on a regular Pathfinder 2e character.

In Pathfinder 2e math, a -15% Success rate on rolls is quite significant. Also remember that a Kingdom will need to roll Trained only checks far more than a regular character.

Hello everyone!

Kingmaker 2e is a massive tome and it took herculean effort to produce, most of it the work of one man, James Jacobs. So before anything else I want to give my heartfelt thanks to Paizo and James Jacobs for giving us this wonderful campaign!

The Kingmaker 2e Kingdom Building Rules, however, need some work. Paizo has admitted that there simply wasn’t the time or resources to playtest. The basic chassis of the system is sound but there are some issues that aren’t obvious without testing. Kerenshara and I have been testing these rules for months, doing simulations of kingdom building, including one sim to double digit levels.

We've created a Google DOC with all of the problems we've found, along with our solutions and reasoning.

You can find that doc here: Problem Analyis

We've also created a shorter doc with just our Rules Changes, you can find that here:Rules Changes

This post will server as a general thread to keep track of things, I'll also post threads for each major problem individually.

Major Problems:

Major Problem #1: The Math for non-invested skills breaks down at higher levels.

Major Problem #2: Insufficient Number of Useful Leadership Activities.

Major Problem #3: Most Kingdom Feats don’t work as written.

Major Problem #4: Kingdom XP is insufficient for proper progression.

Major Problem #5: Low Level Urban Grid Restrictions on the Capital.

In addition to the Major Problems we've found a few other areas where the rules needed clarification.

Please let me know your thoughts!

The rules in Kingmaker are a bit ambiguous about rewarding XP for kingdom events.

Under Apply Kingdom EXP text it says: "If the kingdom experienced a random event, it receives 30 XP."

Under Resolving Kingdom events it says: "The kingdom’s event modifier is the value you apply to the kingdom’s level to determine the event’s level, for the purposes of determining XP rewards (so if a 1st-level kingdom is experiencing a +1 event, that event’s level is 2).

Under Gaining Kingdom Experience it says: "A kingdom earns 30 XP for experiencing a random event or more for a Story event, regardless of the event’s outcome"

It's not clear whether "Experiencing" means completing the event (regardless of the outcome) or simply having it trigger.

So the main question is:
Are there two points at which you get XP for a Kingdom Event (when it triggers, and when it completes), or is there just one (when you "experience" it)?

Other Questions follow from the answer to that one.

If there is only one point (when you "experience" an event) then how much XP is awarded for Random events? Is it 30XP or based on the level of the event?

If you get Kingdom XP for both "experiencing" and "completing (regardless of outcome)" an event then:

For Non-Continuous Random Events it seems like you'd get 30 XP for experiencing it and XP based on the event level for completion.

For Continuous Random events do you get the XP for "experiencing" it every turn the event goes on?

For Story events the Completion Bonus is always specified. How much XP do you get for "experiencing" it if the event itself doesn't specify? Seems like it could be either None or 30. I think using the rules for Random events if a Story Event doesn't specify makes the most sense.

I'd love to hear others' thoughts though!

Hello everyone,

I've been running a Kingdom Sim in advance of running Kingmaker and I have a few questions .

I'll probably have more eventually but just to start:

1. Invested Leadership Status Bonus:
The Kingdom Building rules say both: "Investing a role provides a status bonus to Kingdom
skill checks based on that role’s key ability"
and
"On the kingdom sheet, record the leader you assigned to each role and indicate the four
roles you invested. Record a +1 status bonus to the skill associated with each invested role’s key ability,"

Is this a status bonus to the individual skills selected or a status bonus to every skill associated with an Ability affected by Invested Leadership?

The consensus seems to be it affects all skills but the wording was at least a little ambiguous.

2. Other +1 Status Bonuses.
Assuming investing a role provides a Status Bonus to All Kingdom Skills checks based on that Role's Key ability, A savvy party will likely invest 4 roles that affect different abilities, giving a Status Bonus to all Kingdom checks.
Some other Kingdom options (such as The feats Fortified Feifs and Insider Trading) grant a +1 Status bonus to specific Actions.
Since Status Bonuses from multiple sources don't stack what's the point of these feats giving Status Bonuses? Just in case the Kingdom doesn't have an invested Leadership role in the corresponding stat>

3. Focused Attention.
Can the Focused Attention Leadership Activity grant the circumstance Bonus to a check made outside the Leadership Activity Phase?
It says you grant the +2 to a specific Leader and t has to be used by end of turn.
As long as it's that leader rolling the check during the Region or Civic can the bonus be used?

4. Work Sites outside your kingdom.
Can creating a Work Site be done in a hex that you have not claimed as part of your Kingdom?
Common sense says probably not but I'm not sure there's any RAW preventing it.

Per Lost Omens Gods and Magic, 3 of the Good aligned Elemental lords are imprisoned and cannot grant powers to their followers.

The book nonetheless includes their domains and info.

From what I can see these 3 lords are still legal to worship in PFS.

Does this mean that it's legal in PFS to make a Cleric of one of them and get power, even though canonically they can't grant powers?

I like how the new Core and Curse sets come with pawns for the characters in it. I went back to see what other Adventure Card Game characters have pawns available and it looks like most but not all do.

This is a list of characters I couldn't find any pawns for, does anyone know if any of these have pawns in a source I may have overlooked?

Iconic Occult Characters:
Erasmus (Medium)
Estra (spiritualist)
Mavaro (Occultist)
Meligaster (Mesmerist)
Rivani (Psychic)
Yoon (Kineticist)

Mummy's Mask:
Amhotep
Channa Ti
Drelm
Simoun

Class Decks:
Alase (Summoner)
Amli (Warpriest)
Korundo (Hunter)
Talith (Magus)
Ukuja (Hunter)
Uliah (Warpriest)
Zetha (Summoner)
Zvarbel (Magus)

Goblins:
Ak
Crimsi
Grenek
Nok-Nok
Pizazz
Reepazo
Siathorn
Zibini

Misc:
Aric/Red raven
Celeste
Radovan
Zova

Specific Question:

If you are a Wizard with the Spell Blending Arcane Thesis and gain spell slots from a multiclass archetypes can you use Spell Blending with the spell slots from your multiclass arcehetype?

More General Question:

If a class ability affects something about your spells and you have multiclassed into another class that grants spells which is the correct assumption?

A) The ability only applies to spell slots from your basic class unless something says otherwise.

B) The ability can be used on all spell slots you possess unless the ability specifically limits it to class.

I'm not really a fan of the mostly unconnected deities of Golarion but I am a big fan of the Spheres of Power alternate magic system from Drop Dead Studios.

That system has 20 spheres and Standard Paizo Pantheons have 20 deities. This pantheon came about as the result of a thought experiment a friend and I worked on to create a pantheon where each god was associated with one of the spheres, using standard Paizo Plane cosmology.

It is intended to still be a rather generic pantheon, fit for use in any world that utilizes Spheres of Power.

The World:

Long ago an overdeity whose name is unknown by mortals had 5 sons and 5 daughters. They created this cosmos as a playground and test for their children, promising that whichever of them recruited the most souls and built the best realm would inherit their power.

The siblings all created realms for themselves and while it is unknown when their parent will return, for now the 10 of them compete for souls.

As time passed more gods emerged, each allying with one or more of the sibling gods to varying degrees.

Each of deities also created one of the Spheres of Magic and granted mortals the ability to utilize it. While initially granted only to their followers, the Spheres exist independently of the gods and mortals can access their powers without being beholden to a divine source.

It's entirely likely I just missed something somewhere but how do starship roles work for a ship with only 1 crew?

I'd think the crew could be either pilot or gunner and have computers run the other but couldn't find anything about this and if it is this way makes 1 manned fighters not really that good.

I placed Order 4258642 on 3/21 and it still says pending.

Anyway I can get an update on it?
If it's not in stock please cancel the order and I'll order right from legendary games.

Hello all,

I'm a former heavy duty PFS player who stopped due to life.

I'm now working full time from home and realized I've been missing gaming opportunities by not playing online.

Due to the nature of my job I can use chat room during the work day but can't do anything with audio (so no skype).

I know PBP is available but I'm interested in getting a game together with other people who might be in a similar situation.

Basically I want to see if there are others who would be able to be in a chat room and game from 9-5 Central US time during the week.

I don't expect a fast paced game as people will likely to be working as well but I figure even slow chat based play is faster than PbP.

As for the game itself I'm willing to GM and quite open about what we do.

Also looking for recommendations good sites that have chat and a built in die roller.

Hello all,

I'm a former heavy duty PFS player who stopped due to life.

I'm now working full time from home and realized I've been missing gaming opportunities by not playing online.

Due to the nature of my job I can use chat room during the work day but can't do anything with audio (so no skype).

I know PBP is available and will look into that more but am also interested in interacting wit people more in real time.

What are the best sites out there for gaming via chat?

Hello, I placed Order 3780395 for Spheres of Power Softcover & PDF bundle.

I already have the PDF so in the shipping I put the PDF as a gift for a friend (Username: DarkLightHitomi) but the friend reports that it has not been added to their downloads.

Can this please be looked into?

Most of you who actually know me are already aware of this but I am stepping down as VL of Northwest Indiana.

After many years of trying (from long before PFS existed) my wife and I have a new little gamer on the way and there won't be time for Society for a while.

Game on everyone!

I'll be thinking of PFS with the lack of sleep, it'll remind me of Drandle Dreng

Come on out and join us for Arcticon at the VU student union in Valparaiso Indiana this weekend!

Doors open at 9:30 and full detaisl can be found here:
http://www.arcticon.webs.com/

The adventures we have scheduled are:

Table 1: The Silverhex Chronicles
Running all day as needed!

Table 2:
10am - 2pm 6-10 The Wounded Wisp
2:30pm - 6:30pm 6-13 The Overflow Archives
7:00pm to 11pm 6-06 Hall of the Flesh Eaters

Table 3:
10am - 2pm 5-19 The Horn of Aroden
2:30pm - 6:30 pm 5-21 The Merchant's Wake
7pm to 11pm 5-22 Scars of the Third Crusade

Table 4:
10:30am - 3:30 pm 5-07 Port Godless
5:00pm - 10pm 5-13 Weapon in the Rift

Come on out!

Hello everybody!

Recently in Northern Indiana we've seen a lot of crossover and growth between the active groups in Portage and South Bend.

I thought it would be best to have a joint thread for both and for any other play in Northern Indiana.

To start with here is the schedule for tomorrow 8/27 at Lightspeed Hobbies in Portage IN. Mustering starts around 5pm Central. Hope to see you there!

0-01 Silent Tide (1-5)
GM: Adam

1-48 The Devil We Know, Part 4 - Rules of the Swift (1-7)
GM: Paul

1-50 Fortune's Blight (5-9)
GM: Brian

Backup:

3-01 The Frostfur Captives (1-5)
GM: Sam

3-18 The God's Market Gamble (1-5)
GM: Sean

My friends and I had a full group of 6 lined up to play Legacy of the Stonelords but unfortunately one of them can't make it due to medical issues. We're looking for someone in the level 7-9 range who'd be interested in joining us. We have a wizard magus summoner fighter and fighter/rogue so some form of healing would be nice. If you'd be interested please PM me. We can provide the event ticket.

Just looking for a little clarification.

Under the Kingdom Turn Sequence it says to skip Phase 1, Upkeep if your Kingdom has 0 Hexes.

In order to found your first Settlement though don't you have to clear and claim its Hex?

Meaning that your kingdom starts with 1 hex claimed and then would have to do Upkeep on the first turn?

This seems odd to me.

I see two main ways around it.

1) Simply skip Upkeep on Turn 1.

2) The first settlements is actually created before you claim the hex. IE you've made a settlement and then decide to become a kingdom and thus claim the full hex the settlement is in.

Can anyone shed some light?

Under the Terrain Improvements section of the Kingdom Building Rules from Ultimate Campaign is says

"An improvement marked with an asterisk (*) can share the same hex as other improvements."

Does this mean that improvements not marked with a * can only share with improvements marked with a * or that improvements not marked with a * cannot share the hex with any other improvements.

For example can a hex with a Mine build a Farm or Road?

I'm inclined to say yes but there seems to be some ambiguity in the wording.

Every now and again on the boards I see people ask about what scenarios to use to make PFS feel more like a real campaign. A few years ago I posted a few lists that formed a more coherent story and people seemed interested.

I was recently inspired to go through and do this again so I hope you all enjoy.

Currently,there are enough scenarios for a player to have 4 characters reach level 11 with some to spare. I've gone through and created different lists, please let me know what you think.

In the lists below for each character is a list designed to take that character from Level 1 to Level 12. There is no overlap of scenarios between characters within the same path section. I do my best to make sure the character never has to play out of sub-tier and I always assume normal progression. If you wanted to use slow progression then I guess one character could complete two full lists.

I thought it might be fun to see what type of classes people like to play in PFS. Please post the total number of levels you have in classes amongst all your characters. Please only use levels you've actually gained, not ones for a planned build.

Here's mine to start:

Barbarian: 4
Bard: 18
Cleric: 11
Fighter: 9
Inquisitor: 1
Oracle: 3
Ranger: 6
Rogue: 4
Wizard: 5

Prestige Classes:
Pathfinder Savant 3

Hello,

I regularly buy PFS scenarios and gift them to some of my local GMs.

I attempted to do so today but did not see any options to select it as a gift before placing the final place order button.

I already have them so do not want to buy them for myself.

They're for a gameday this weekend so I need to make sure they get the scenarios by tomorrow at the latest, thank you!

Arcticon is a go for the 4th year!

Join us from 9:30 am to 10:30 pm Sunday March 9th at the Student Union at Valparaiso University in Valparaiso Indiana.

The web site is here http://arcticon.webs.com/

We will be offering PFS again and hope to have people come on down.

I'll also need GMs so if you're willing to run let me know.

The best part of all though is YOU can help decide the schedule.

Let me know what scenario's YOU'd like to play!

I'm all ears!

For a possible Wrath of the Righteous campaign I'm contemplating a Summoner but due to party makeup and the general view of Summoner's being overpowered I'm thinking of asking for a custom archetype.

The archetype would replace the Summoner's Summon Monster ability with the Cleric's channel energy ability?

Thoughts?

I'd also love it if my Summoner could get Cure Spells as spells known but I'm afraid that may be overpowered and not sure what to give up for access to them.

If you are not familiar with E6 please see here:

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?206323-E6-The-Game-Inside-D-amp -D

I am creating this thread to focus on what level limit works best for the E6 idea and Pathfinder.

Specifically, I'd like it to be a guide people considering running an E* game can go to to help them figure out what level to limit advancement at.

Some initial areas of consideration:

What spell levels to allow.

What class abilities / capstones you want to see.

# of attacks.

Ease of play.

I will post my own views on these matters in subsequent posts.

For one of my PFS characters I want to get his Profession: Merchant bonus as high as possible. The character is a Dwarf.

I'm looking to see if I've missed any possible areas:

Skill Ranks
Wisdom Bonus
Class Bonus
Prodigy Feat
Skill Focus Feat
Breadth of Experience Feat
Trait Bonus.
Cracked Ioun Stone.

Can anyone come up with anything I don't have?

Ultimate Campaign introduces rules that allow characters to retrain out some of their build choices.

Can these rules be used to make a character that could not have been built normally from level 1 up without retraining?

Example 1:

A Half Orc Rogue takes Skill Focus as his first level feat. He advances to 3rd level and takes Power attack as his 3rd level feat. The character decides he wants to use the retraining rules to retrain his Skill focus feat into Weapon Focus. He meets all the prerequisites for Weapon Focus now.

If this is allowed we now have a 3rd level character in a 3/4 BAB class that posseses two feats with a prerequisite of BAB +1. Without retraining this character could not have been built this way as he would not have qualified for either feat at 1st level.

Example 2:

A character is Sorcerer 5 / Dragon Disciple 1 with maxed Ranks in Knowledge (Arcana). The character wishes to retrain One of his sorcerer levels into another level of dragon disciple. Under the rules he would immediately lose his 5th level of Sorcerer and gain a new level. As a Sorc 4 / Dragon Disciple 1 he still has 5 ranks of Knowledge (Arcana) so technically qualifies for Dragon Disciple so he can then add a 2nd level of Dragon Disciple.

If this is legal the result is a character who is Sorc 4 / Dragon Disciple 2 which is NOT a build that could normally be made.

Hey all,

I'm hoping to play Eyes of the Ten sometime before Gencon.

Anyone know of any conventions offering it between now and GenCon?

Announcing PFS at Arcticon on February 16th right here in my hometown of Valparaiso Indiana!

Arcticon is a 1 day con.
Last year we only ran 6 tables but I'm hoping to greatly increase that this year.

Here is the Schedule:

Slot 1: 9:00am - 1:00pm
Slot 2: 2:00pm - 6:00pm
Slot 3: 7:00pm - 11:00pm

Slot A: 11:00am - 4:00pm
Slot B: 6:00pm - 11:00pm

Table 1:
Slot 1: First Steps Part 1 (Tier 1)
Slot 2: First Steps Part 2 (Tier 1)
Slot 3: First Steps Part 3 (Tier 1)

Table 2:
Slot 1: 4-01 Rise of the Goblin Guild (Tier 1-5)
Slot 2: 4-07 Severing Ties (Tier 1-5)
Slot 3: 4-11 The Disappeared (Tier 1-5)

Table 3:
Slot 1: 3-02 Sewer Dragons of Absalom (Tier 3-7)
Slot 2: 4-09 The Blakros Matrimony (Tier 3-7)
Slot 3: We Be Goblins! (Tier 1, uses pregens)

Table 4:
Slot A: 4-07 Severing Ties (Tier 1-5)
Slot B: 4-11 The Disappeared (Tier 1-5)

Table 5:
Slot A: 4-EX Day of the Demon (Tier 3-7)
Slot B: 4-EX Day of the Demon (Tier 3-7)

Table 6:
Slot A: 4-10 Feast of Sigils (Tier 7-11)
Slot B: 4-12 The Refuge of Time (Tier 7-11)

I'm in need of GMs so if you're at all interested in GMing shoot me an email at PFSNWI@gmail.com

I'll have a warhorn site up in a week or two and now need to work on getting the word out.

Is this feat society legal?

It's not an item creation feat so it's not out right banned.

My suspicion is it's legal but all it really does is give you a +2 to a single craft/profession skill.

Thoughts?

Does anyone know what if any Inquisitions are available for Inquisitors of gods from the Dragon Empires?

I just wanted to post a shout out to my friends here in northwest Indiana who rocked the special at gencon. They played tier 8-9 and called their team the brute squad. 5 players from northwest Indiana and 2 from Illinois came together and rocked both parts if the special. Whereas all the tier 10-11 tables had TPKs in part 2 the brute squad not only survived but they came out on top on points!

Congrats to Annabelle, Lorithen, Duggan, Hacock, and the others whose characters names I don't know.

I look forward to running a few all goblin PC tables up here!

Without getting in to spoilers does anyone have a full list of exactly which scenarios involve the Hao Jin Tapestry?

Hi everyone,

I have recently stepped up to be the coordinator for Society at Lightspeed Hobbies in Portage IN.

We play every other Thursday night, starting around 5pm CST.

If you're in the area come on out!

Next game day is next week, Thursday March 22nd.

We're hoping to have two tables.

I will be running Assault on the Kingdom of the Impossible (Tier 1-5) and William Ronald will be running King Xeros of Old Azlant (Tier 7-11) so please come out and play!