Some Thoughts After 3,000+ Pathfinder ACG Threads


Pathfinder Adventure Card Game General Discussion

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I still think "at the start of the encounter" would work just fine as a replacement for "before the encounter", and similarly "at the end of the encounter" would work fine as a replacement for "after the encounter." Why introduce extra terminology into the game when it isn't necessary?

"At the start/end of your turn" effects already don't happen at the literal start/end of your turn, so it's fine if "at the start/end of the encounter" effects don't literally take place at the start/end of the encounter. For example, if "end of your turn effects" happening before you reset your hand isn't an issue, then "start of the encounter" effects happening after the opportunity to evade shouldn't be an issue either.

Pathfinder Adventure Card Game Designer

QuantumNinja wrote:
I still think "at the start of the encounter" would work just fine as a replacement for "before the encounter", and similarly "at the end of the encounter" would work fine as a replacement for "after the encounter."

That is quite probably where we'll end up, but we have a lot of card analysis to do first.

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

Mike Selinker wrote:
QuantumNinja wrote:
I still think "at the start of the encounter" would work just fine as a replacement for "before the encounter", and similarly "at the end of the encounter" would work fine as a replacement for "after the encounter."
That is quite probably where we'll end up, but we have a lot of card analysis to do first.

The thing that prevents that from being a perfect solution is that things that happen "when you encounter a card" would happen before things that happen "at the start of the encounter," with evading in between the two. It's probably less confusing than what we have now, but it's still not as obvious as I'd like it to be. (Perfection may be unattainable...)


What about before/after attempting to defeat/acquire?


Some barriers you don't attempt to defeat or acquire directly. They summon other cards and are defeated or undefeated based on the outcome of the encounter with that other card. But they may want such a barrier to still have what is for now called a "Before the Encounter" effect. That's my guess anyway.

Like this:

Fake Nest barrier wrote:

Before the encounter each character at this location attempts a Perception 8 check. Any character character that fails the check has the difficulty of all checks increased by 3 for the rest of the turn.

Each character at this location summons and encounters a Fake henchman. If all the Fake henchman are defeated, the Fake Nest is defeated. If any character does not defeat the Fake henchman, the Fake Nest is undefeated.


Good point. It seems like there is no single phrase that will work perfectly on every card.


Since those specific "before the encounter/check/engagement" effects are only on specific cards you could just tailor the phrase to the card. If the card doesn't have a check then you wouldn't say "before the check"

But if it does have a check you could say before the check, if it has two checks and you want the "before the encounter" phrase to be before both checks just say "before the checks" or "before the combat(s)" or something like that.

As mentioned above, it sounds like you're looking for one phrase you can just errata every "before the encounter" phrase into and because of differences in different cards that seems unlikely.


I've mentioned before that the words "before the encounter" can easily be removed from all of the currently released cards without affecting game play, since when you decide not to evade a card, you read the "powers" section of the card and proceed accordingly.

The Enchanter's powers section could easily read:
The Enchanter deals 1 Force Damage to you.
After the encounter, the Enchanter Deals 1 Fire damage to you.

Or, for S&S, it could read:
The Enchanter deals 1 Force Damage to you; attempt the check; the Enchanter Deals 1 Fire damage to you.

Just my two cents.


Brainwave wrote:

Since those specific "before the encounter/check/engagement" effects are only on specific cards you could just tailor the phrase to the card. If the card doesn't have a check then you wouldn't say "before the check"

But if it does have a check you could say before the check, if it has two checks and you want the "before the encounter" phrase to be before both checks just say "before the checks" or "before the combat(s)" or something like that.

As mentioned above, it sounds like you're looking for one phrase you can just errata every "before the encounter" phrase into and because of differences in different cards that seems unlikely.

I would avoid "before the checks", because the first time I read that, I asked: "before each check, or before the first check?" If the intent is for it to only apply once, I would use "before the first check."

Isn't English fun?


huskyskins wrote:
I've mentioned before that the words "before the encounter" can easily be removed from all of the currently released cards without affecting game play, since when you decide not to evade a card, you read the "powers" section of the card and proceed accordingly.

You need to read the powers section of the card before evading. For example, it is supposed to be impossible to evade Blessings of the Gods before you acquire it and there is a card where you need to roll a die and one of the effects prevents you from evading it.


Just a quick idea that popped up in my head.
If i understand it correct, the only problem is that order of events is:
Encounter, evasion, before encounter.
So, wouldn´t it be possible to refrase Before the encounter... to If you didn´t evade....
And change After the encounter... to At the end of the encounter....
This could save the timing issue because you don´t do thing before/after the encounter while you really do it at the encounter.
But it couldn´t solve the problem if a evaded card was still encountered or not. Because thats something that should be in the rules, and not an every card.

So the order would be:

Encounter card
Evade the card (optional).
Apply any effects that happen if you didn´t evade the card, if needed.
Attempt the check.
Attempt the next check, if needed.
Apply any effects that happen at the end of the encounter, if needed.
Resolve the encounter.

Edit: If it´s unclear if the If you didn´t evade... part is before or after the checks, if any, one could add If you didn´t evade, immedately... to clarify


I think the "If you didn't evade" suggestion works rather well. I was going to make the similar suggestion of "If not evaded" to mimic the "If not defeated/undefeated" phrasing, but I was struggling to come up with concise wording to capture the timing (either before or after the check(s)).

I was thinking of "If not evaded, before the first check", but that sounds way too wordy. Your suggestion of adding "immediately" gets the point across rather succinctly.


After thinking about some of the suggestions made here, I came up with this "streamlined" version of the encounter sequence:

1. Encounter the card. Apply effects here that happen when the card is encountered.

2. Evade the card (optional) - Shuffle the card back into the location deck and skip the remaining steps. The card is neither defeated nor undefeated. If you don't evade, apply any effects that happen when you don't evade. If you do evade, apply any effects that happen when you do evade (these don't exist yet as far as I know, but it opens up the design space for them).

3. Attempt the check

4. Attempt the next check, if needed

5. Resolve the encounter. First apply any effects that happen when the encounter is resolved. If you succeed at all of the checks required to defeat a bane, banish it and apply any effects that happen when it is defeated; if you don’t succeed, it is undefeated— shuffle the card back into its location deck and apply any effects that happen when it is undefeated. If you succeed at a check to acquire a boon, put it in your hand, and apply any effects that happen when it is acquired; otherwise, banish it, and apply any effects that happen when it is not acquired.

Perhaps a bit wordy at the end, but I was trying to be explicit as possible. Could definitely be improved upon.

But the idea here is that "If not evaded" effects in step 2 replace "Before the encounter" effects. "When resolved" effects in step 5 replace "After the encounter" effects. I basically took out the "Apply any before the encounter effects" and "Apply any after the encounter effects" steps and combined them into previously existing steps. I think the basically functionality of the mechanics is still preserved. Any thoughts on this approach?


So with regards the new dying rule.

Am I correct in thinking that now a Character can draw his/her last card and still remain upright? (ie because drawing a card is not removing?)

OR Is use of the word removing to tighten up the language and means that ANY time a card needs to be drawn or taken from a character's deck and you cannot, that character is KIA ?


Any time you take a card from your deck, whether you are told to draw it, bury it, banish it, anything at all, you are removing a card. If you've got no card in your character deck to do that, than you just bit the big one if you were instructed to do a "remove a card" action. So resetting your hand tells you to draw cards if needed to get to your hand size. If there aren't enough cards to get to your hand size, then you have expired.

You can be alive with no cards in your deck (i.e. if you reset your hand and get back to your hand size with the last card from your deck) but the next time you are told to remove a card from your deck, you just went to the great beyond.

What is the Pathfinder term for the afterlife?


Troymk1 wrote:

So with regards the new dying rule.

Am I correct in thinking that now a Character can draw his/her last card and still remain upright?

You could always draw your last card and still be alive. It's when you CAN'T draw when you are required to that you take a dirt nap.


Sorry My first option was not well worded, but I get the gist of the rule now


mlvanbie wrote:
huskyskins wrote:
I've mentioned before that the words "before the encounter" can easily be removed from all of the currently released cards without affecting game play, since when you decide not to evade a card, you read the "powers" section of the card and proceed accordingly.
You need to read the powers section of the card before evading. For example, it is supposed to be impossible to evade Blessings of the Gods before you acquire it and there is a card where you need to roll a die and one of the effects prevents you from evading it.

I don't understand your premise, and how it fits into the discussion. None of those cards are affected by changing the "before the encounter" wording, which is what this thread had been focused on. There are a lot of great ideas about changing the words to "before the check", or "before the engagement", etc. My thought was that instead of adding something new to the rules, just remove the wording that is causing the illogical sequencing that "before the encounter" is responsible for. We already read the card once we turn it over (encounter the card). If the card or something else says you can't evade, do what the card says. If not, choose whether to evade. If not, do what the card says. This has to be the least restrictive path to future development, which seems to be Vic's overarching driver. Somebody please punch some holes in this, and tell me what I'm missing here.


huskyskins wrote:
mlvanbie wrote:
huskyskins wrote:
I've mentioned before that the words "before the encounter" can easily be removed from all of the currently released cards without affecting game play, since when you decide not to evade a card, you read the "powers" section of the card and proceed accordingly.
You need to read the powers section of the card before evading. For example, it is supposed to be impossible to evade Blessings of the Gods before you acquire it and there is a card where you need to roll a die and one of the effects prevents you from evading it.
I don't understand your premise, and how it fits into the discussion. None of those cards are affected by changing the "before the encounter" wording, which is what this thread had been focused on. There are a lot of great ideas about changing the words to "before the check", or "before the engagement", etc. My thought was that instead of adding something new to the rules, just remove the wording that is causing the illogical sequencing that "before the encounter" is responsible for. We already read the card once we turn it over (encounter the card). If the card or something else says you can't evade, do what the card says. If not, choose whether to evade. If not, do what the card says. This has to be the least restrictive path to future development, which seems to be Vic's overarching driver. Somebody please punch some holes in this, and tell me what I'm missing here.

What you are missing is that if you remove 'before you encounter', then the text will happen before you have a chance to evade; it will be always in effect, just like being immune to particular traits. 'Before you encounter' is a specific step that comes after evading in the current rules (and evading comes after 'when you encounter' and text that doesn't tell you when to execute it).


This thread has deviated from its original topic. Before it gets too much further off topic, I'm going to create a new one for the specific discussion of "Before" and "After" the encounter.

It is here.


On the original point of this thread, I'd like to thank Mike, Vic, Chad, and all the other editors, designers, playtestors (and anyone I've missed) who have helped to make this game what it is. It may not be perfect, but it offers a great deal of fun... and to me that's well worth the price of admission. Seeing that Paizo and company are still working hard to make the great game better even after they already have my money puts them a step above quite a few other publishers and only makes it that much more likely they'll get more of my money in the future.

Also, as a playtester for S&S, some of the more vocal critics to these revisions should probably take note of the fact that several of the changes only really came up because of a need to clarify settings which don't yet exist but will probably come up in future releases. You can't really blame them for getting out ahead of issues, and if you find that objectionable you're clearly off your rocker.

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