I'm going into my first PFS session next week. Any advice?


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

I don't really know what to expect. I'm playing a level 1 Druid. Anything I should know about, that you wish you had going in the first time?

4/5 ****

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I wish I had known a little more about the setting before my first game.

The fan made pathfinder Wiki is pretty cool, and here's a good starting link.

Grand Lodge 4/5 ** Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver

Sparksfanboy wrote:
I don't really know what to expect. I'm playing a level 1 Druid. Anything I should know about, that you wish you had going in the first time?

Once you know what scenario you'll be playing, go to the products page and read the little blurb about it. It will give you a little info on what area of Golarion and the enemies you may be facing. Something like; 'The Decemvirate needs Pathfinders to delve into the Mwangi Expanse to rescue an Osirion princess from the clutches of the Aspis Consortium.'

I would then look up in The Inner Sea World Guide, or PF wiki, info about Decemvirate, Mwangi Expanse, Osirion, & Aspis Consortium to get general information on each of those topics. Pretty soon, you'll know quite a bit about the Pathfinder world.

Grand Lodge 4/5 ** Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver

Pirate Rob wrote:

I wish I had known a little more about the setting before my first game.

The fan made pathfinder Wiki is pretty cool, and here's a good starting link.

Same here! Awesome link, Pirate Rob. My biggest help was the other players also. I like to think of my PFS community as Family. Sooo helpful, even now, into my fifth year of PFS.

Dark Archive 5/5 5/5

Don't be afraid to ask questions. That said, play your character they way you want, not how someone else thinks your druid should act.

Have the resources your PC utilizes handy, especially if you use anything from the Additional Resources.

As a spell caster, have the DCs of your spells ready before you play.

The last bit of advice I can give you is the most important.

Have fun.

5/5 5/55/55/5

What to expect, lets say the game starts at 7

Game starts at 7

6:55 people start to trickle in

Folks eat, gossip, get settled in.

7:15 Geek soduku! People finalize how many people they have for which table. The veterans will then decide who's playing what character, trying to balance out levels, tiers, and party composition. The DM desperately tries to sneak in one more reading of he scenario

7:30: people get going. There's a mission briefing that one person will be paying attention to while most players find dice and minis check character sheets, phones,and chronicle sheets to make last minute purchases. You will get a flurry of 5 or six mispronounced names without much clear idea whether drendle drang is a person you're talking to, a place you want to go, or a particularly nasty curse you want to avoid.

You'll have a chance to ask questions, gather information and make knowledge checks to get some idea of what you're in for.

There will be ~ 4 encounters, usually some mooks for one fight, a trap or three, some sort of a skill or social challange, some sort of strong monster thats usually more likely to kill you than the boss, and then a solo or near solo boss fight. These will inevitably involve some "i'm over here he's over there what are you doing how are you searching how does that rule work" while trying to keep the game moving.

The encounters will test adventuring basics. Can you attack at both melee and ranged. Can you deal with swarms and other unusual creature types. Can you deal with damage reduction and incoporeal critters.

10:30 the boss fight starts! Hurrry!

11:05 The dm hurridly signs chronicle sheets and hands them out with a "go ahead fill them out"

Grab stuff get out the door hang out in the parking lot for a bit to come back to reality then head home.

Grand Lodge 5/5

Important stuff you should do:

~ Make sure your character is ready (unless you have questions, those are fine to have)
~Make sure to bring a mini and dice and any necessary books
~Shower
~Wear clean clothes
~Show up early
~Introduce yourself to people you dont know. At the very least to the GM/Coordinator
~(Optional) Inform the GM of your table that you are new to Pathfinder. They'll likely be a bit more lenient on letting you figure out what you want to do or offer up suggestions to help.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

What to expect, lets say the game starts at 7

Game starts at 7

6:55 people start to trickle in

Folks eat, gossip, get settled in.

7:15 Geek soduku! People finalize how many people they have for which table. The veterans will then decide who's playing what character, trying to balance out levels, tiers, and party composition. The DM desperately tries to sneak in one more reading of he scenario

7:30: people get going. There's a mission briefing that one person will be paying attention to while most players find dice and minis check character sheets, phones,and chronicle sheets to make last minute purchases. You will get a flurry of 5 or six mispronounced names without much clear idea whether drendle drang is a person you're talking to, a place you want to go, or a particularly nasty curse you want to avoid.

You'll have a chance to ask questions, gather information and make knowledge checks to get some idea of what you're in for.

There will be ~ 4 encounters, usually some mooks for one fight, a trap or three, some sort of a skill or social challange, some sort of strong monster thats usually more likely to kill you than the boss, and then a solo or near solo boss fight. These will inevitably involve some "i'm over here he's over there what are you doing how are you searching how does that rule work" while trying to keep the game moving.

The encounters will test adventuring basics. Can you attack at both melee and ranged. Can you deal with swarms and other unusual creature types. Can you deal with damage reduction and incoporeal critters.

10:30 the boss fight starts! Hurrry!

11:05 The dm hurridly signs chronicle sheets and hands them out with a "go ahead fill them out"

Grab stuff get out the door hang out in the parking lot for a bit to come back to reality then head home.

That used to be about how it worked at my lgs a couple years back. Since then we have really knuckled down and start on time or close to it pretty regularly. I cant attest to how soon the briefing is actually read the the table is under way for most of my GMs, but Ive at least got people assigned to their respective tables by 11:05 (since we start at 11am most of the time).

If you are coming in the door at 11:20 you may not have a place to sit. Just depends on how nice the table GM is about it and if you brought a character in tier*.

*:
Cause some of my players show up with just one character sometimes, after not signing up on our Warhorn site (which is usually up at least a month before the game day) and still are shocked that they wont be able to play at the table they wanted, and are bummed about needing to play a pregen if they are going to get to play anything. It's an uncomfortable situation for everybody involved.

Shadow Lodge 4/5

To add a few important things that don't seem to have been covered yet:
- Relax, everyone there wants to have a good time with fun people
- Have fun, it is kind of the whole point of the game, right?
- If you don't understand then ask, people are generally really good at filling new people in on the differences about an organized play campaign


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Thank you for your advice. It takes place tonight.

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