In case you're interested, here's the general idea of how the Cauldron legal system works:
-The subject is arrested, either by the town guard or by a posse of concerned citizens.
-After the subject has been apprehended, he is generally kept in a cell in the barracks of the town guard. A rich suspect may be allowed to return home pending trial if he posts bail/ransom with a city magistrate. A monstrous suspect ( e.g. any non-PC, non-humanoid race) enjoys few rights; the more monstrous the lawbreaker, the more likely that they may just get summarily executed before trial.
-The suspect is interrogated. This generally involves a beating (for poor suspects) or a respectful chat (for the rich and powerful).
-If the suspect confesses (either by signing a confession or confessing in front of a magistrate), a magistrate sentences the guilty party to the appropriate punishment (showing leniency as he sees fit). Appropriate punishments include serving time in the stocks, amercing a fine, and flogging for minor crimes and ear/nose-cropping, branding, maiming, exile or death by hanging for more major crimes.
-If the suspect doesn't confess, a trial is held. For minor crimes, a single magistrate presides; the magistrate questions all witnesses and the defendant and has fairly broad jurisdiction over what evidence he is willing to entertain. For major trials, a full panel of four magistrates plus the Lord Mayor presides; questioning is done by an Inquisitor from one of the major churches (almost always a cleric of Wee Jas or St. Cuthbert, and almost never a cleric of Kord) who uses Zone of Truth and/or Discern Lies to question the defendant and other important witnesses. Rich defendants often hire a barrister to act as an advocate on their behalf before the court.
-If the defendant is found guilty, punishment is carried out, generally in the town square for the edification of the good citizens of Cauldron. On occasion, the hanged bodies of notorious malefactors are suspended in cages outside the town gates, but this isn't especially common.
So, for example, the thugs who accosted Ruphus yesterday will probably be tortured for a bit (nothing fancy) and then sent before a single magistrate to face trial for assault. The first one to confess might get flogged or maimed in some way, and the others might be sentenced to hang (unless they can come up with a good excuse, or maybe a big, fat, juicy bribe).
I could have sworn that I wrote a bit more on Cauldron's laws as well, particularly with respect to D&D (e.g. why it's okay to kill monsters and take their stuff). Basically:
-Non-PC races don't really have any rights under Cauldron's law. You can kill them all you want, although naturally you risk making trouble with other people who do have rights.
-Cauldron has strict anti-bandit laws, so vigilantism is not frowned upon in Cauldron and the surrounding area. In fact, people will admire you for making it a safer place to live.
-If you kill a bandit or monster and it has some treasure, the rightful owner has the right to buy it back from you for 1/2 of retail price (i.e. the same price that you could sell it for). Looting bandits and monsters is not considered evil in the slightest.
-Rich people can usually get away with all kinds of crimes by paying some kind of blood money or fine.
is exactly the number of XP needed to attain that level on the Medium chart. Note: this is an OpenOffice Calc formula, but it's easy enough to convert it to an Excel formula.
Fast = Medium/1.5 (rounded)
Slow = Medium*1.5 (rounded)
Erik is fine and continues his ever-expanding role as publisher.
As for my title, we haven't had an editor-in-chief for some time and for the last three years my role has been considerably more than just "guy in charge of the editors." As the company continues to grow Erik's attentions rightly move toward exploring exciting new projects and possibilities, while I've been increasingly helming the day-to-day adventure of making sure Paizo Publishing keeps... well... publishing.
What this promotion means for me is that now all of our editing and development officially falls under my umbrella, as well as much of the organization and outlining of new products - along with the champions of our individual product lines (and others, because coming up with new books and adventures is usually fun). Pretty much, if it has to do with our print projects, assigning them, developing them, editing them, approving them, getting feedback to authors, or any of the other bits that go into making a book happen (that isn't layout or on the design team's shoulders for the three hardcovers in our Pathfinder RPG line), it's on me and my crew's shoulders. Other than that, most of the other ramifications of our internal changes are mundane (or DOUBLE SUPER TOP SECRET... if that's a thing).
What this means for folks playing the home game... is pretty much nothing. The crew that brought you everything you already love is the same crew bringing you everything you're going to love. Nothing to see here, move along.
In other news, this has meant that Fiction Editor James Sutter has stepped up to Senior Editor to take on direct oversight of the wilder-than-you'd-expect world of editing everything for the Pathfinder brand, as well as captaining the most bombproof team of editing geniuses in gaming.
Beyond this, James Jacobs continues to be our creative director, assuring elf eyes from Pathfinder Society to Pathfinder comics to Pathfinder Miniatures to Pathfinder Everything Else are appropriately shaped, continuity is maintained across our brands, ideas cleave to the highest calibers of coolness, and that his writer's callous never grows soft. Lead Designer Jason Bulmahn still heads up the design team and spends his days coming up with innovative new ways to kill characters (or is it monsters this week?). "Señor" Art Director Sarah Robinson continues her jet setting as head of the art team (She's at Spectrum Live this week, less than a week since her return from a con in Germany) and wrangler of a thousand incredibly artistic cats. And beyond that, everyone else - Andrew, Chris, Crystal, Judy, Mark, Mike, Patrick, Rob, Sean, and Stephen - got other rewards for their fantastically hard and continually awesome-under-fire work (except for Adam who just got a pat on the head and half a shiny red apple [and not even those] because he's still new; but we love him anyway).
The prerqs for some feats, like Extra Hex, are having the Hex Class Feature. When do I quallify for that Class Feature? For example the Gravwalker Archetype replaces the first level Witch hex, could the Gravewalker take Extra Hex feat at first level? Are they considered to have the Hex Class feature, even though they don't get a hex yet?
If they are allowed, could a monk take Extra Ki at first level and start using Ki then?
A lo-o-o-ong time. Here's a Sage Advice question from Dragon #37 (May 1980), for example.
Sage Advice wrote:
Question: How long does the paralysis caused by a carrion
crawler, ghast or ghoul last?
Answer: I have always assumed it to be 24 hours. However, since
the duration of the paralysis is not clearly defined in any of the
books, I suggest that each DM decide the duration in his particular
campaign.
And that particular column ended with a note:
Sage Advice wrote:
Note: Because of the great volume of mail which is being received
for Sage Advice, individual questions can no longer be answered
through the mail. Because of this, it is no longer necessary or
advisable for questioners to include a self-addressed, stamped envelope
in their letters. The only way Sage Advice questions can be
answered is in the pages of The Dragon, and for that purpose only
the most appropriate or most frequently asked questions will be
answered. Readers are once again reminded that Sage Advice is
designed to settle specific questions concerning rule definitions or
interpretations. General questions about procedure in an adventure
or a campaign should be handled by the DM of that campaign
whenever possible.
So people have been asking "great volume[s]" of questions about the rules for over 30 years. It's not like it just started with 3E.
So with 4th edition edition announced, we can finally begin speculation on 5th edition (hey, you clicked the link to get here, not me).
So after another 4 years, 2012 will see the release of 5th edition. Here's what I predict:
After another crop of game designers take over after doing all the sweat work for 4th edition, they begin to cross-check their own "House Rules" and realize that if house rule A and House rule B replaced canon, and if 4th ed. mechanic was tweaked, just so, they would have a vastly superior game. Like any good Game Designer, they begin hosting D&D sessions (online of course via the DI) with fellow WoTC employees. Sure enough, their players are hooked and soon the buzz of 5th edition leaks and within a few months it is announced at the 2012 Gen Con.
What does this new edition entail?
It recognizes that the D&D game is best when customizeable. In older editions, when there wasn't a rule, the DM "winged", and if the DM was good at their role, all were happy. So 5th edition will invilve "Game Pieces" that you mix-and-match to create the game that you and your players wish to play. Pieces like (martial combat system) or (Low magic system) or even (character advancement system). In fact, D&D has multiple versions of the same piece so you can truly customize in a plethora of ways. For example you can use the (vancean magic system) or the (spell point magic system) which brings us to where the complexity of 5th edition comes in: Some pieces are exclusive of each other. That is you cannot have both pieces in the same game. Some pieces are inclusive (if A then B), etc.
You see, these game designers realized that the player base is not only capable of designing their own game, it is pretty much a given that no two games are alike. The only constant is the language we use (to hit rolls, Armor Class, and Magic Missile).
2012 becomes known as The Year D&D was Liberated from the New Edition Cure-All caused by Sagging Sales Syndrome (a common malady for book publishers - What edition is your copy of "Lord of the Rings"?)
This Parady was brought to you by the makers of Slurm! Slurm, get your fix today!
It's not a nerf. They didn't change it. They clarified it for the apparently dozens of people on this board who were using it incorrectly.
Yah, god i feel dumb for reading the rules as if Zen archers can actually fire 6 arrows at level 20 with their bows and not have to fire 4 arrows, and attack twice with their feet or whatever. Especially if we also throw in that they cant use manyshot or rapidshot, then it seems really obvious that such a limitation is not to prevent them from having upwards of 9 attacks per round, but instead because anything more than 4 attacks at level 16 is cheese. Oh wait that doesn't make sense...
The only thing this "faq" did, was to explain how monks are not supposed to be using any type of weapons, though i must say that i dont understand why they did it. Even letting the monk flurry with one +4 weapon (worth 32 k) compared with the fighter/ranger/barbarian using two +3 weapons (36k) he is still inferior.
I never said the clarification made sense. I was simply stating that taking offense to a clarification does not somehow change it from being a clarification into a nerf.
It's like people who complain that throws are cheap in fighting games, instead of just adapting.
People would rather throw in passive aggression with a nerf statement every time then admit there was a misunderstanding, and then move towards getting it clarified where it now doesn't seem to make sense based on the intended wording.
Except that for the preponderance of evidence to the contrary that even Paizo's own writing staff were not clear on the developer's intentions. And that the issue was never even raised until discussion started on the Ultimate Equipment thread about monk's getting a fair shake for their unarmed strikes. I do not doubt Mr. Buhlman's sincerity when he states that it was his intention from the start to have flurry=TWF. The problem arose in that his intention was never clearly conveyed to his own writing staff and to his customer base. It may not be a nerf; I strongly doubt that it was intended to be a nerf. But coming out of the blue, three years after the release of Pathfinder, it certainly feels like a nerf.
I am glad to see that Mr. Buhlman is taking a look at the issue, and having discussions with other members of the Paizo team. At the same time, I--and others--would like them to tell us where they are going. And that is for three reasons:
1. Pathfinder Society players with monk characters (especially Zen Archer or Sohei archetypes) are now in an official limbo. PFS is allowing a free 'rebuild' of their characters in accordance with the clarification, but have already stated that if the 'clarification' is changed, no more rebuilds will be allowed. Many of them are forced, if they want to keep their character builds, to switch to a different class. Every week that we do have a ruling is a week in which they miss out playing their characters.
2. It would be best if Paizo settled the issue instead of letting it fester. Debate (on both sides) has been intense. We, as players and posters, should have some expectation that issues with the rules will be quickly dealt with and not allowed to linger. That is one of the things about Paizo that I greatly admire--they, generally speaking, don't hide in the closet and ignore problems with the rules once the issues with those rules have been raised. It is better to have a final ruling--even if it is one that I myself disagree with, than to have silence and only encourages more . . . intense debate.
3. Future products, including adventure paths and modules, need to be brought compliant with the actual rules--not what the writer believes those rules to be. For the writing staff to be brought onboard on this issue, there needs to be a final, official ruling.
I recall someone saying that Paizo doesn't actually get 100% of what is bought at the paizo store, due to distributors. It's kinda weird, and I'm not sure if I trust that assessment. Maybe someone will shed light.
In the hobby industry, publishers generally sell to distribution at 40% of retail price, and distribution sells to retail at 60% of retail price (plus or minus a few percent). So the publisher makes 40%, the distributor makes 20%, and the retailer makes 40% (more or less).
The book trade (which includes Amazon) works a bit differently, and factors like returnability change the discount structure, but all those numbers are still usually within several percent of the hobby standard.
So if you buy a Paizo product from anybody other than Paizo, assume we get about 40% of the cover price. If you buy a Paizo product from paizo.com, we get 100% (minus credit card fees).
If you buy a non-Paizo non-digital product from paizo.com, we're acting as the retailer, so we get about 40% of the list price (unless it's consignment, in which case we make a bit more, but you have no way of knowing what's consigned and what's not). If you buy a non-Paizo digital product from paizo.com, we keep 25% and pass 75% to the publisher.
All that said, we need sales in all of the channels we sell to, so buy wherever it makes the most sense for you.
Keep in mind that we've inherited a system that's essentially compiled from decades of material by countless authors and editors, and when we created the Pathfinder RPG, there was definitely a big question in our minds about how much we could change without driving people away. (And I'm not just talking about rules, but about the presentation of those rules—decisions like italicizing spell names, and not capitalizing all game terms—these are decisions that were made before us, and we decided not to mess with them.*) Hindsight indicates to me that we chose wisely, but I also believe that we could go further in some future iteration.
However, that's what it's going to take to make the types of changes you're asking for—a future iteration.
*Personally, I happen to think that both of those were very good decisions, and I wouldn't change either of them given the chance. However, applying very consistent game terminology would definitely be high on my own wish list.
Whether you think it's "fluff" or not, it is what it is. Fireballs begin as glowing, pea-sized beads, and detonate with a low roar. Fused eidolons are translucent. Just because those things are descriptive doesn't mean you get to change them at your whim. (At least, not when you're supposed to be playing by the rules. Change 'em all you want outside of PFS, of course...)
Yes, that goblin adventure was fun! The reason was partially because there was no risk to the player's other characters. You could fully embrace the silliness of being a goblin and taking risks. We played it too and we really liked it. it is precisely this, "Just have fun" attitude that I wish was encourage in all PFS games. If PFS employed a system where there was no huge penalty to death, aside from sitting out for a while, it might lead to a lot more players having more fun and feeling more free to take risks and be heroic.
I see what you mean, I wish the penalty for death was much less as well. I generally find that players have more fun when there's a penalty for death, but it's not too severe.
With a relatively low penalty of death (We Be Goblins for example), I find players take more chances and risks and the game is overall more fun. Also, GMs aren't afraid to kill players, and players don't take it as badly. With a strong penalty for death, everything is reversed, on average the game is more serious, there's more min-maxing, GMs are afraid of killing PCs, and players take death harder.
Non-severe penalties for death appeal to casual players. Hardcore players (like the people on this forum) usually prefer strong penalties for death. For that reason Wolflord, you'll find very little agreement from people on the forums on this.
Regarding the penalty for death, I would have preferred if Raise Dead also included the Restoration spells, like it did in the past. In other words, if you died it cost 16 PP in the past, it now effectively costs 24 PP. That crosses the line into the severe territory imo, it takes a long time to accummulate 24 PP.
And btw, it depends on the GM, but some of us put a LOT of work into sessions. Maybe I'm above average, but I put at least 10 hours of preparation work into each session, and at least $20-30 out of my pocket. My players just show up. It's not even comparable. You should try GMing sometime to understand things better on the other side of the screen.
Ummm... hopefully this thread gets back on track, although penalties for death are definitely relevant.
This is a very tough question. Here are the facts:
1) Cooperation is expected in the Pathfinder Society organization.
2) Cooperation is expected by the players so we have a good time. Screwing each other over creates bad feelings at the table and will generate a PVP type sentiment.
Even non-cooperation will create bad feelings at the table. For example, if some guy refuses to help me with my faction mission and dies, there's no way I'm chipping in to pay for a Raise Dead for him.
3) The factions are "competing" against each other, which insinuates we want to be uncooperative with regards to faction missions. However, you can't hinder anyone else, so that makes the "competition" non-entertaining.
4) The power of our PCs is closely tied to PA/Fame, therefore if someone is unsuccessful with their faction , it directly impacts how effective that player will be in the future. This affects not only his PC, but the effectiveness of any group that PC joins in the future. It's in the group's best interest that each and every PC is successful.
5) Let's call them what they are, faction missions are side quests. They take up gaming time, so they had better add something to the experience and/or story, especially when most slots are only 4 hours long.
Eventually something has to give. Most groups help each other with their faction missions, because it's in the best interests of the players (#2), PFS (#1), and the group (#4) to do so. And there is no real faction war (#3).
All of my players in my home game have changed their faction to Shadow Lodge, so they are unified (they didn't like the faction conflict in a previous scenario, almost came to PVP which I didn't allow).
So where do we go from here?
Michael Brock wrote:
So, what can be done about it? What should be done about it?
Right now, most faction side quests are scenario time wasters. They don't really accomplish anything other than distracting from the main mission.
We can leave things as they are, or we can take a different approach:
1) Cooperative: Make faction missions officially cooperative. Faction missions will be for flavor only and these side quests will be because you're from a different country. The only time PCs are uncooperative are when they're from rival factions (Cheliax-Andoran, Taldor-Qadiran, Grand Lodge-Shadow Lodge, etc).
2) Competitive: Make missions competitive. Your PC gets more PA if your PC can make another (rival) PCs faction mission fail (without open warfare). The only way this makes any sense is if the faction results REALLY mean something, and Fame has no effect on what gear you can buy (because too much is at stake and it's no longer for 'fun').
Competition would have to be done sparingly, without open warfare (PVP). The problem is that it would have to be done very carefully, so it's risky because (poorly designed) faction missions could erode the goodwill between the PCs (and the players). On one hand, you'd want to keep your faction secret (if there was a rival faction at the table), on the other hand this option is risky and would require maturity on the part of the players as well as the GM. Perhaps best avoided.
3) Interesting/grey: Make the PCs do highly debatable actions during the course of the mission. I think this would be interesting and create some conflict without it degenerating into open warfare. Since the missions will be much more difficult and the other PCs don't necessarily have to help (or share your vision), I recommend that Fame NOT be associated with what equipment you can buy.
For example::
- Cheliax basically want to bring Hell-on-Earth. Typical missions might be releasing a devil from imprisonment. Or ensuring a portal to a plane in Hell remains open (from a certain season 1 scenario). They might convince a NPC to sign their soul away. They might draw a pentagram underneath someone's bed to make them susceptible to possession and/or control of their dreams.
- The Shadow Lodge wants the Decemvirate out of power. They're goals could involve finding out the true identity of members of the Decemvirate. They could uncover Decemvirate plots that are evil. They could track down "missing" artifacts. They could make the Decemvirate look bad. SL members could purposely allow (renegade/terrorist) shadow lodge members to escape (or go undetected), maybe even foiling the main mission.
- Silver Crusade should be regularly trying to make the party go out of its way to "do good" in the world, even if it means making our main quest that much harder. Sometimes, it will take a (small monetary) sacrifice on the PCs part to complete.
- Lantern Lodge could gain an artifact or steal something for Tian interests (even if it means running away from the party at the end of the scenario). Or even hide (Tian) knowledge from the other PCs. Anything that another country is interested in, Lantern Lodge should potentially be interested in. LL should potentially be in conflict with all factions of different countries imo.
- Andoran: Andorans are basically the "bad boys" of doing good and getting the job done. They would probably want to ensure people like drug lords, extortionists, and other bad people eliminated (not negotiated with).
- Qadiran: Qadirans on the other hand would probably want to negotiate with most opponents and then arrange a secret (trade) deal with them on the side (for letting them live).
- Osirian: Osirians are the ultimate mad scientists, how could a scientist without scruples cause problems in his hunt for knowledge? Using unknown arcane methods to test/poison/kill a certain population. Knowingly infect someone with a plague, so that it can be brought back and studied. Kill someone and preserve their body so they can be later dissected. Maybe they want some loot to stay in the tomb (meaning slightly less gold for the party).
- Taldor: The ultimate political schemers and spies, they should be causing conflict between NPCs. They should maybe even cause an argument between rival factions with the party. They should be trying to setup deals with powerful NPCs in Absalom or perhaps even bribe, seduce, or extort them. They should slip poison into unsuspecting political rivals food. Convince Andorans to assassinate someone for their own gain.
- Sczarni: Sczarni would perhaps be the most amicable to all of the factions, since they would help with anything "for a price". (It would help if you could transfer a (limited: 50g/lvl) amount of gold from PC to PC for faction missions, for bribes.) They could also be responsible for snatching loot while no one is looking, which could result in the party getting slightly less gold and the Sczarni getting slightly more gold if he wasn't caught.
With factions working this way, no one is going to reveal their faction!
But like I said, Fame should not affect equipment purchases in this case, because it's affect on a PCs power is just too strong. It would create bad (player) feelings when there's minor conflict at the table.
Also, the rules for "not directly interfering" would have to be strictly enforced, because factions would come into conflict with each other. For example, instead of directly interfering with each other, I think it would be ok if Cheliax talked to an NPC in private (to convince him to sign his soul away), and then the Andoran talk to the exact same NPC in private later (to convince him NOT to sign his soul away). They're conflicting, but not in open warfare.
Michael Brock wrote:
What should the results mean?
Well, the results from season 3 were going to be based on what % of PCs from X faction gain PA. So there would be a clear "winner" from that result. Maybe the faction "score" should be: 50% (number missions complete) + 50% (% success of missions), so that we don't take quantity over quality.
Obviously, if a certain faction has won the faction war for the year, the plot of the campaign should be adjusted to show that they're winning the war, and perhaps a scenario should be written with that in mind.
For example:
- Cheliax: There's a little hell on earth. Maybe a college dedicated to devil studies is allowed to exist in Absalom. Several key politicians and judges are actually possessed, dedicated, or extorted by devils/Cheliax (which could have unknown effects).
- Shadow Lodge: A member of the Decemvirate is revealed and/or removed.
- Silver Crusade: The world is a better place, less crime, and more cooperation within the populace. Perhaps the good guys have enough manpower to launch a crusade against one of the "bad/monster nations".
- Lantern Lodge: Tian gets a strong political representative in Absalom and officially joins the faction war. A strong portal opens between Absalom and Tian. Tian terrorists start creating unrest in other countries. Many warriors "disappear" after attending the Tournament of the Ruby Phoenix (and it's not because they found Tian wives. Sorry, had to go there.).
- Andoran: The leader of a smaller nation/city is overthrown/assassinated. Unrest and riots are created in a country with democracy as a possible future. Cheliaxian deception is uncovered and destroyed. Large terrorist operations occur in some countries, possibly even liberating a city in a main faction.
- Qadiran: Each Qadiran gains an extra 100g per level. Qadiran customs start becoming the norm in Absalom. Commodity prices fluctuate widely (all consumable cost +10%). Sudden influx of Qadiran immigrants into Absalom could influence the culture of NPCs in future seasons.
- Osirian: A major artifact is found and will be tested. Osirian becomes more prosperous with better farming practices, water, engineering. An entire village in Qadira mysteriously dies and Qadiran officials become "easier to deal with".
- Taldor: Taldor gains back a part of one of their lost nations (through negotiation, bribes, extortion, warfare). Absalom sides with Taldor in various arguments over territory and rights. Qadira and Osiria openly declare war on each other.
- Sczarni: Each Sczarni gains an extra 100g per level. Sczarni gain political control over a city in one of the nations. Everyone in Absalom becomes easy to bribe (-10%). Encounters with thugs/criminals are 20% more difficult (or they carry certain gear).
That's just an example, I'm sure you can come up with your own ideas.
Also, if you wanted to award members of the faction, you could create a mini-scenario (1-2 hour scenario) each year for whatever faction that wins. This mini-scenario wouldn't give the faction any XP, but it would give gold and PA.
Michael Brock wrote:
How can we make factions, their missions, and the competition between them matter?
By having some conflict, without it being open warfare. See my interesting/grey spoiler above.
This actually means breaking the link between Fame and gear though, because too much is on-the-line with that in place.
Michael Brock wrote:
Should we even try?
The easiest thing to do is "stay the course". However, many people feel that faction missions are time killers in scenarios and are indifferent to them. Rarely do they add to the story because they're so vanilla. In their current format, they don't "hurt" anything, but they certainly don't make things more interesting and consume time during sessions.
The second easiest thing to do is to remove factions altogether. My home group wouldn't have a problem with that and I've felt many times that the scenario would have been better without any faction missions at all. Having said that, one of our most memorable PFS experiences was when a PC minorly screwed over the rest of the PCs while completing a faction mission, so I have mixed feelings about this. But that was 1 scenario out of 11, so it's rare.
The most difficult solution (with the most upside and risk) would be to keep the factions, but have them behave either cooperatively, competitively, or in interesting/grey ways (see my post above). Making the faction missions non-vanilla is slightly risky, however it's a lot easier to reverse this process if it's not working out. For example, you can have a few scenarios to test whether this concept works or not without making wide scale sweeping changes (like removing all faction missions).
So lately we've seen a lot of discussions and calls to offenders about min-maxing, optimizing, roleplaying, ruining the game, org play and beer. The beer doesn't really have anything to do with the rest directly, but still.
And so as someone who would probably be judged as an "offender" (as would the group I play with) simply by looking at our sheets...I am throwing my opinions in the ring.
The crux of my opinion...play the game as you will. It.Is.A.Game.
The corrollary to my opinion...have fun and aim to help other have fun too...no matter how you build your character.
Do you want to be a jack-of-all-trades/master of nothing who rolls out with 12s and 14s and is successful half the time and needs to be rescued from near-death by the hero the other half? Awesome, have a blast playing the would-be superstar who juuuust can't quite get there...honestly, it's a good, well-rounded schtick.
Do you want to be a One-Trick-Pony Nackle, due to the fact that you are playing a crazy-@$$ gnome who really thinks he's a pony who can only do one trick and who's best stats are Cha and Int, but took levels in Fighter? You have fun with that...seriously, as long as I'm not playing in the world's hardest death-rally, I would love to be at a table with you.
Do you want to be a min-max, flying, bomb-dropping, 25 rage-per-day barbarian who wields 4 keen falchions, has 18 attacks a round and has more HP than a geek has action figures?? Awesome, I will let you wade into battle before me and have fun RPing in the background if I'm not as strong as you. Again, have a blast with it.
Do you want to be a skill-monkey bardic rogue who picks locks while playing a drum with your third hand and inspiring the masses of virginal lasses while diplomacizing the king and giving us a lecture on all the knowledges of the world...while performing acrobatic feats? Awesome once more...be in my party...sounds like fun.
In all seriousness...I really think we need to knock off the "optimzation sucks" threads. Jason S (who just happens to share my first name and last initial, as well as at least some of this opinion it seems) put it well when he said this is really more about "the player" not "the character". My group tends to play cracked-out characters. We enjoy building characters that are "uber"...sometimes on their own...sometimes because the three of us specifically who play often meld together in a wicked synergy. People have complained that we are too powerful...and then I laugh like the Emperor and force-lightning them.
And yes, we have characters that could probably finish certain year zero mods solo...with only one leg and arm. But we also know how to play nice with others...we paid attention in Kindergarten you know.
For instance...we have three barbarians that can carve through enemies like 'butta', but when we're at a con with less-optimized characters, we'll hold back as long as we're not going to get killed doing so. We have spent entire mods before without swinging a weapon and instead grappling and cornering enemies so a weak ninja and a weaker neg-energy cleric could do their thing happily. And you know what? We all had fun.
Because all the players made it fun. Optimized characters fraternized with newbie heroes who had no idea how to build a character...and the Earth didn't implode and the table didn't run away sad or angry.
Why? Because of the players...not the characters.
So, here's is my plea to the smart masses out there...end the hate on character builds! Instead, support free-thinking creation of your own hero or heroine and support the idea that players make the game fun no matter what character they bring to the table!
And if you are still reading to this point...thanks, that was long. :)
So Crusader's Flurry and Feral Combat Training feats significantly devalue because they now require you to buy feats so you can either: 1) hinder your full-attack iteratives in order to get one additional low-damage unarmed strike; or 2) take a full attack with your underpowered unarmed strike in order to get one additional attack with your favored weapon/natural attack?
I can see the logic behind this flurry ruling but it's going to have ramifications on any of the APG/UM/UC hybrid character options that incorporate monk.
I guess on the upside it provides a reason for the increased cost on amulet of mighty fists.
I will just leave this here:
Quote:
Flurry of Blows (Ex): Starting at 1st level, a zen archer can make a flurry of blows as a full-attack action, but only when using a bow (even though it is a ranged weapon). He may not make a flurry of blows with his unarmed attacks or any other weapons.
So, is the Zen archer a special case on single weapon flurries?
(This was initially composed as a response to a question in this thread, but I didn't want to take that thread so far off topic.)
Doug Daulton wrote:
...allow the community to request an OoP product go back into production. Paizo could set a pre-order threshold (maybe public/maybe not) for each OoP item (ie. Map Pack: Village) and once enough people add it to their cart from the list, a print run is set.
We don't plan to ever bring back any out-of-print Map Packs or Flip-Mats—at least not in the exact same form.
Now, I know a bunch of you are thinking that reprinting is easy and cheap, because we've already done all the work, and paid for all of the art and such, so reprinting a sold-out product is a no-brainer for easy cash in the bank. Seems obvious—but it's not true.
First of all, the printing costs are usually the highest costs associated with most products. And since print costs are based strongly on volume, that means for a reprint, we pretty much need to print—and sell—almost as much as we did the first time around so that we can charge the same retail price. And while there's a number of people would buy a reprint of a sold-out product, there's also a *very* large number of people who already own the original printing and have no interest in buying a reprint.
Next, keep in mind that most sales for a new product happen in the first month or two, and then taper off over the next couple of months to—hopefully—a slow-but-steady trickle. (You might notice that it usually takes a few years to sell out most of our products. And we've planned things so that that works for us.) Past sales—and our current subscribers—give us the knowledge we need to set print runs and retail prices to ensure that that first burst of sales pretty much covers our costs, allowing the profits to come in slowly over the next year or two, or three. That's one of our primary strategies for staying in business: Cover your costs on the launch.
Now, reprints don't get that "new product" burst at the front end. For one thing, we wouldn't be sending it to subscribers, so that's a huge loss in immediate sales right there. Also, our distributors generally place much, much smaller orders for most reprints than they did the first time around. Without that initial sales bump, it would take much longer to sell out the run—and more importantly, we wouldn't be generating the instant cash that lets us pay the print bill out of the product's own cash flow.
Now, that said, we do realize that if, say, Map Pack: Village has sold out, that means there's probably some demand for a village-themed Map Pack. Given what we've learned, then, the smart thing to do is design an *all-new* village-themed pack that will satisfy the latent demand while also potentially appealing to a chunk of the audience that bought the first one—especially people who like maps enough to subscribe to the line, and to retailers who can promote it as the hot new thing instead of just something else to restock.
While I've put this in the GameMastery thread, the truth is, it applies to most of the products we produce. The same reasons apply to not reprinting our Adventure Paths, Modules, and most other products.
There *are* a few exceptions, though; certain products are considered "evergreens"—that is, products that will have a consistent shelf presence, year after year. The Pathfinder RPG Core Rulebook and Bestiary are the most obvious examples. The Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting would be one, except that it was written for 3.5, and the change in rule systems means that we'll be doing more than just a reprint when it comes time. Similarly, the Critical Hit Deck and Critical Fumble Deck, both evergreens, got some tweaks when they went in for reprints, as did Flip-Mat: Basic, and (you'll soon see) the GameMastery Combat Pad. Kill Doctor Lucky is also considered an evergreen; it's been selling well (in different forms) for over a decade now. (Eight evergreen products out of the hundreds we've produced—that's actually pretty good!)
Well, thanks to Hrakar there is now a map of the island with coordinates under Campaign info. Your camp is at F15. Yesterday you got as far as N8. Ishirou's map indicates a pirate's stash at M14 and the lighthouse is at S4, which is probably your best bet for an overview of the island. I hope that will facilitate your deliberations.
For 4 years now Jacobs has been saying that APs can't be anything but 6 volumes and for 4 years now I've felt that every "reason" he gives is silly. Harder work on the designers, no doubt. But not undoable (You guys are working your dream-careers, yes?) Not impossible to make sure a new AP begins every GenCon. You got 12 months: One 7 and one 5. Or a 6 and two 3s. Or a 4 a 6 and a 2. Harder work but doable . . . . And you don't have to start every one at 1st level. Starting a 3 volume AP at level 9 would not lose customers. Finishing an 8 volume AP at level 21 would not lose customers. (in theory)
You're treating AP volumes like interchangeable widgets, and that's not so.
First off, you should realize that doing 12 installments in the AP line per year currently uses our full capacity. (Actually, you might note that historically, it takes about 13 months of development time to do 12 AP volumes, so we're technically *over* capacity, and end up nearly killing ourselves to get caught up each Gen Con.) And this is not a problem that can be solved by throwing more people at it—it doesn't work that way. So any change we would consider needs to be something that won't increase the workload *at all*.
If we went to, say, three 4-volume APs in a year, it would take more person-hours, because creating and outlining an AP is a big job, and the amount of effort to do that is only partly related to the number of pages of content needed. So "more (but shorter) APs per year" is not feasable.
Also, higher-level adventures are harder to develop, and take longer than low- and mid-level advantures, so stretching APs further into high-level territory would increases the amount of time it takes to do one. So longer APs are not feasible; even doing an 8-volume and a 4-volume would probably take more time than two 6-volume ones. (Maybe we could fit in a 5 and a 7, but A) the 7 would be pushing it, and B) that's just weird, and I don't think it would particularly improve anything.)
And yes, we *do* have to start every one at 1st level. Low level adventures sell better. Always have, always will. There are some really good posts on the boards on that topic already, so I won't repeat them.
Bottom line here is that we have a formula that works really well, and I fail to see any real reason to screw with it.
After reading the thread, I had a thought; why must all adevnture paths adhere to a 6 book format?
Because the process of building an AP is complex, and that process doesn't really change as the individual parts of the AP change. It's more or less just as time intensive to juggle authors and create outlines for a 4 part AP, a 6 part one, or a 12 part one. By only doing 2 a year, we save a lot of work that we wouldn't have time for anyway, were we to do more than 2 a year.
We also really like being able to start an AP at Gen Con. That happens in the same month every year, so if we vary the length of the APs... that starts getting weird since one of the 2 we're doing every year HAS to be in the August volume.
Doing more than 2 a year also provides more "jumping off" points for continuing subscribers.
An AP that's shorter than 6 parts would be similarly short in its level span, and we've had enough complaints about APs only going to 14th level that I'd rather not shorten them much more.
An AP that's longer than 6 months starts to overstay its welcome. We saw this happen for all of our 12 part APs we did for Dungeon.
The APs are tied to our other lines, which have similarly complex cycles that would be disrupted if we varied the length of our APs.
All of these are very compelling reasons to not vary the length of an AP. Someday we might experiment with AP length, but it's not as simple as just saying "This one only goes for 5 parts."
“If all you’re looking for is fulfillment of your wish to be an idealized projection of yourself who gains in wealth and power by overcoming monsters, there are lots of ways to do that nowadays,” said Tavis Allison, a game designer in New York who has made his own role-playing game, Adventurer Conqueror King. “In the ’70s Dungeons & Dragons was the only game in town.”
Um you mean you when D&D was at it's most popular?
Never got the whole 'split' your customer base thing. Who cares as long as they are buying from you. The only thing that makes this questionable is do they have enough people to continue to develope and write things for both APF and BPF. Otherwise I think they should put some thought into it.
It may have been at it's most popular, but the splitting of the customer base is the #1 reason why TSR went out of business. It would take me a couple of hours to explain why this was the case, but as the person responsible at WotC for taking the old TSR data and analyzing it to see why they went belly up, the biggest cause that I found was splitting the customer base into segments. Whether it was D&D vs. AD&D. Or Forgotten Realms vs. Ravenloft vs. Greyhawk vs. Dragonlance vs. Birthright vs. Dark Sun vs. Planescape vs. Mystara vs. Al-Qadim vs. Spelljammer vs. Lanhkmar vs. any other setting book that they produced. Splitting the customer base means lower sales on any particular product which means lower profit margins which eventually means going belly up.
Look at it this way, by avoiding 'ambiguous' parts of the rules you make rules arguments at the PFS tables less common. This makes the game a more pleasant experience for you, your GM, and your fellow players. Clearly you know this is something a lot of GMs disagree with you on so either you are going to be frustrated, or you are going to argue rules with a lot of GMs.
Rules arguments kill fun at the table, steering around them you are doing everyone a favor.
Beyond that, maybe Mark or Michael will bless you with a PFS campaign ruling, but I find it unlikely because they (rightfully IMO) tend to stay out of game rules related issues.
This isn't a PF issue. It's a legacy 3.X issue. Extreme rapid advancement was introduced with 3.0, and was one of the biggest system shocks for grognards.
There are currently no official methods for adjusting encounters, whether it's by adding extra foes or bumping up people's stats out of thin air. Until such time as rules are put in place to do so*, GMs are expected to continue running adventures as written. If that means that coordinators need to run more tables of fewer players in order to maintain a particular level of difficulty in a scenario, then that falls to those coordinators and the GMs who feel the need to make things harder.
*This is not to be construed as a promise that such rules are forthcoming, nor even that they have been considered.
In 3.PF, it's not brutes that you can't grapple, but instead it's things with huge natural stats like outsiders and stuff. Try doing a same-level test with demons or devils or something.
For interest's sake, here are three specialized grapplers. All of them have Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple and Greater Grapple, and the fighter has Weapon Focus (grapple).
Some of the monster numbers in the analysis I did changed when the Bestiary came out. I'm putting an updated version below.
==========
For interest's sake, here are three specialized grapplers. All of them have Improved Unarmed Strike, Improved Grapple and Greater Grapple, and the fighter has Weapon Focus (grapple).
Barbarian (base Str 18 at level 1)
Spoiler:
Level 9: CMB +22 (+9 BAB, +9 Str when raging with belt of Str +4, +4 feats), +31 w/ Strength Surge
Level 10: CMB +23, +33 w/ Strength Surge
Level 11: CMB +25 (+10 Str when raging), +36 w/ Strength Surge
Level 12: CMB +27 (+11 Str when raging with belt of Str +6), +39 w/ Strength Surge
Level 13: CMB +28, +41 w/ Strength Surge
Level 14: CMB +29, +43 w/ Strength Surge
Fighter (or monk, if you prefer, with base 18 Str at level 1)
Spoiler:
Level 9: CMB +21 (+9 BAB, +7 Str with belt of Str +4, +5 feats)
Level 10: CMB +22
Level 11: CMB +23
Level 12: CMB +25 (+8 Str with belt of Str +6)
Level 13: CMB +26
Level 14: CMB +27
Druid (with base 14 Str at level 1)
Spoiler:
Level 9: CMB +21 (+6 BAB, +6 Str in tiger form with belt of Str +4, +4 feats, +1 size, +4 grab)
Level 10: CMB +22
Level 11: CMB +23
Level 12: CMB +27 (+8 Str in giant flytrap form, +2 size)
Level 13: CMB +27
Level 14: CMB +28
Results: The hardest to grapple is the Nalfeshnee -- the fighter's CMB of +27 vs. the CMD of 42 means he has only a 30% chance of succeeding, the druid has a 35% chance, and the raging barbarian has a 40% chance (rising to 95% if he uses Strength Surge, however). The easiest to grapple is the Vrock -- the fighter and the druid have a 75% chance of succeeding and the raging barbarian has an 80% chance of succeeding.
Note that any short-term or conditional bonuses like flanking, Haste, Enlarge Person, bardsong, etc. are not included in these numbers.
I don't recall saying with Shackled City that we'd never compile another Adventure Path...
Quite the contrary. While we still had a license to publish Dungeon magazine, I remember telling plenty of people who asked if we were planning an Age of Worms complication that we'd most likely do one if Wizards would approve the project. Only when the license went away did we tell people that we'd probably never be able to compile those Dungeon APs.
Note that there's a pretty big business difference between compiling a Dungeon AP and compiling a Pathfinder AP. The Shackled City AP was originally released in 11 issues of Dungeon, which, as a magazine, was printed in quantities generally intended to sell out within a month; once a retailer had sold out of an issue, there was no way for him to buy more. Compiling it was really the only way to give an AP any kind of permanence at the time. Pathfinder AP books, on the other hand, are intended to have permanence from the start; any game store can order a copy of any volume of Curse of the Crimson Throne (that's PF 7–12) *today*.
Also, in Dungeon, each AP installment was merely one out of three adventures in each $6.99 issue, so when compiling it into a $59.95 volume, we were charging only a little less than the original purchasers had paid, but delivering only a third of the content those original purchasers had. Essentially, buyers paid a premium for the compilation, so that didn't have much potential for undercutting sales of new issues. That's not the case with the APs.
Based upon tallying up average gold per sub-tier on a number of scenarios, here is your following wealth progression as you hit the next level. This assumes you always play within a sub-tier that your character level falls in (for instance, level 3 playing in 3-4, level 4 playing in 4-5, etc), which will maximize your gold. This does not account for playing up or down within a tier. I also put into parenthesis on the side what character wealth is by level (according to the table in the Core) as a reference. You will see that PFS tends to be generous to you and gives you a couple thousand gold above where the Core would place you at, depending on the particular level.
Level 01: 150 gp
Level 02: 1659 gp (1000 gp) Level 03: 3168 gp (3000 gp) Level 04: 7008 gp (6000 gp) Level 05: 11646 gp (10500 gp) Level 06: 18423 gp (16000 gp) Level 07: 27309 gp (23500 gp) Level 08: 39447 gp (33000 gp) Level 09: 53991 gp (46000 gp) Level 10: 68535 gp (62000 gp) Level 11: 91065 gp (82000 gp) Level 12: 113595 gp (108000 gp) Level 12+: Holy cow / incomplete information.
SM 1: celestial eagle (3x melee attacks)
SNA 1: eagle
SM 2: small earth/mud elemental (melee)
SNA 2: small earth/mud elemental
SM 3: celestial aurochs (trample) or celestial leopard (pounce) or lantern archon (ranged attacks)
SNA 3: aurochs
SM 4: celestial lion (pounce) or hound archon (melee)
SNA 4: tiger (pounce) or satyr (spells)
SM 5: celestial dire lion (pounce) or celestial woolly rhino (melee) or bralani azata (ranged + spells)
SNA 5: ankylosaurus (melee + daze) or cyclops (melee + natural 20 & greataxe)
SM 6: celestial dire tiger (pounce) or shadow demon (incorporeal + spells) or succubus (charm monster) or lillend (bardic music + spells)
SNA 6: dire tiger (pounce)
SM 7: celestial tyrannosaurus (melee) or bone devil (melee + SLAs) or vrock (melee + SLAs)
SNA 7: fire giant (melee)
SM 8: hezrou (melee + SLAs)
SNA 8: purple worm (melee)
SM 9: trumpet archon (spells) or nalfeshnee (melee + SLAs)
SNA 9: storm giant (melee + SLAs)
(Not counting multiple creatures of a lower level.)
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