Play Style Question


Pathfinder Adventure Card Game General Discussion


Hello Guys,

I wanna do a quick survey: what is your play style against the time played?

Example: "I play twice a month with with 4 friends and we spend 2 hours per session".

I just wanna ask that because this may not be my game. After RoRL and this begging of S&S, I'm wondering about how I play. I moved places recently to another city, and I did that in the begging of my adult life. So I don't get to know many folks who plays RPG. My friend circle is around my work friends.

Where I live, there is no PAIZO Venture or Shops specialized in RPG content. I tried to form a new group to play PFCG but after 2 encounters the group vanished, because a lot of things: distance, ppl get the game wrong and didn't liked, lack of interest, etc..

My final though was "I can play this alone" and so I have been done. I've work, and I'm doing my second graduation in the night time. So the only time that I can play is in the weekends. No problem so far.

But the amount of time needed to setup the game alone only left me one choice: to play with a small party (1,2 or 3 characters). Although, I can only play 1 or 2 scenarios per week.

It left me with a hard feeling: "I'm not enjoying the game" Because after I choose my part, I cant change that and try new characters..If I do that, the next adventure box will come and I'll late. I tried that in RoRL and even now I'm starting the adventure box 5.

And then it came S&S and If the delayed deliver of addon characters deck I was force to abdicate the war priest or any other new character that I could possible play with. Because if I change the characters I'll be late again for the next adventure box.

Final toughs: this game is not for everyone, even if you like it, you must have a huge amount of time to play it.


Quick survey answer: I play weekly with three friends. We complete one scenario and joke about how far behind we're getting.

Longer, probably more pedantic answer: Gaming takes time--it doesn't matter what the game is. Even if you love the game, the constant updates may be too much for you. That is OK. Perhaps you might want to not get the next couple master sets while you explore your options with the sets you have. That is also OK. I don't think anyone here will think less of you for playing at a rate you're comfortable with (at least I hope not--it continually astounds me how quickly some of the regulars here start posting info about updates--I've seen them appear within hours of receiving my own copy).

One thought, though. If you're still in adventure box 5 of Rise of the Runelords, there's no reason to "abdicate" use of the warpriest in Skull and Shackles. Finish Rise of the Runelords first and the add-on deck for Skull and Shackles will be there in plenty of time for you. You may be stressing overmuch about strictures set only by you, yourself.

But if PACG isn't for you, it isn't for you. There's no such thing as a perfect game that appeals to everybody, no matter what the advertising says. I doubt you'll be judged negatively by forum-goers for playing what and how you want to play, and even if you are, what business of theirs is it?


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I play monthly with a group of 5 others. We are in adventure 5 of RotR. We usually get in 2 scenarios in a 3 hours time span, maybe 3 if they run quick.

I also play "regularly" with my wife. We would play 1 scenario per night, and maybe 1 or 2 nights a week. That would be about 60-90 minutes. We finished RotR once and got more than half way through a second time.

And I sometimes play solo, 3 characters. I'm only in adventure 4 of RotR with that party.

Keeping the box organized is the most important thing for speedy setup and play. Make sure you put your characters, ready for the next scenario in the character holders. Alphabetize your locations and henchmen. Arrange Adventure, Scenario, and Villain by Adventure Path order. (Villains can be alphabetical if you want.) And keep the rest of the cards shuffled up. If you aren't switching characters, setup shouldn't take you more than 5 to 10 minutes. Play should be about an hour per scenario.

As for trying new characters, I'd suggest trying them all out during the base adventure. Don't repeat scenarios, but swap them around, find what you like. Decide which ones you want to keep, give those ones the reward for the base adventure (a skill feat) and then start the adventure path. No one is going to report you for it.

And with the the class decks and the number of characters now available, it will be impossible to every play each character. You'll just have to look over their powers and decide what interests you. Maybe it will be that they are very different from what you played before. Maybe it will be that they are similar to what you played before. But if you find you don't like one, you don't have to stick with them. Treat them as dead and build a new character to replace them. There are rules for building a new character late in the game.

And don't feel like you have to keep up with the release schedule. So what if you are a month or two behind? I've only played the first base adventure of skull and shackles and I'll have deck 2 soon. I've just been too busy with other things. That happens. It shouldn't bother you. Enjoy it at your pace, or else you won't enjoy it.


I play PACG with two groups.

First group is just me and my wife. We play about 1-2 times a week, both of us just playing single characters. Initially it would take us 2 hours including setup and cleanup... Now it takes about an hour to go through a scenario now that we are more comfortable with the rules

Second group is with three other friends and we try to get a bi-weekly gaming night. Since Juy, we have only played PACG twice and they took about 2 hours. They are not concerned with keeping up with the game's release schedule.

To be efficient with game time, I pre shuffle the decks during spare times between sessions. For me it's a stress reliever to shuffle the decks after a day at work and will do it while watching tv or reading forums. When we are ready to play, I just need to deal the cards for each location, shuffle it up... and takes about 10 mins to do.

For my other group, if I know they want to play PACG I will also prepare each deck type (eg take out the adventure deck cards, put back in banished cards) the night before

For both groups, we play with a house rule that when we defeat a bane or fail to acquire a boon, we put it in a single stack to the side, rather then shuffle it back into the appropriate deck in the box so when we are called to pull a random card from the box, we can just quickly grab the top from the appropriate deck.

Sovereign Court

I do two groups right now. One weekly with 3 friends, for 4 or so hours depending on how people are feeling. Usually 3-4 scenarios (the monthly releases are great!). The other is with my brother, once a month when I visit family. I spend about a day there, and we try to get most, if not all of the newest adventure done.

Sovereign Court

Pathfinder Maps, Rulebook, Starfinder Maps, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I play with 2 friends once a week for 3-4 hours a night and we are getting 2-3 scenarios done each time.

I have recently started showing another friend the game and we've gotten together twice. We have no set schedule.


My play varies widely.

When I play solo, I usually play 2 characters at a time, but play 6 characters total. Doing a single scenario per team tends to take about 45 minutes on average, and sometimes I play the same scenario 3 times in a row with the three teams. Other times, only once or twice.

When I play in a group, it depends on the group ;)

I have a group of 4-6 players; we usually play once or twice a month. A single scenario with that group tends to take 2 and a half hours.

I have another group of 4 people, we play once or twice a month as well. A scenario with this group tends to take around 2 hours, and we typically do 2-3 scenarios per play session.

My experience with S&S suggests that the scenarios take longer than they did for RotR, so I suppose that might be a factor as well.


I play solo w/ 2 chrs, and then a dif game of 3 toons with my 2 teen daughters. We stalled round adventure 4 of rune lords and just finished up this weekend after 3 weekend marathon secessions.

Looking forward to organized play.

Scarab Sages

At this point, I only play in the group with Hawkmoon, once a month. Too many other life commitments at this point mean that I don't have the time to play any solo run-throughs of an adventure path. Hopefully winter and summer breaks will allow more time to do so.

Scarab Sages

I play 2 scenarios a week at my FLGS. This will switch to OP once it launches.

On Mondays we have an on and off game night for PACG in which we do 2 scenarios.

Occasionally I solo (not alot of time to do so anymore).

I like doing 2 sessions back to back as it fits in a 3 hour time slot.

Contributor

I play very regularly with my wife and our housemate. We play two to three evenings a week for three hours or so, and we get through one or two scenarios each time (rarely, three scenarios).

About a third of the time, we incorporate a fourth person--usually a houseguest and not someone that's specifically come up to play the game with us. This tends to increase our play time to three and a half hours or so.


My husband and I try to fit in two 1 - 3 hour sessions a week and play a couple of scenarios. We play double-handed, each of us controlling two characters.

We have two parties of 4 characters going in RotRL. We came to the game fairly late in the release cycle and are having trouble sourcing US prints of decks 4 through 6 locally, so one party is stalled out waiting for deck 4, the other is halfway through deck 2. We now have another party of 4 going through S&S.

I try to reduce setup where I can. All the locations are alphabetized and I sort out the scenario card, locations, henchmen and villain(s) for the next scenario that party will play. I have a stack of henchmen set aside that tend to get regularly summoned so I don't have to look for them during the game. If I have time, I'll shuffle the various decks. The Broken Token insert helps a lot too, since there's so much more usable space to put sorted decks.

In the end, as long as we're having fun with the game, that's all that matters to us. If we're behind the curve on releases, we just have all that content waiting, rather than stalling out waiting for the next one to ship.


One of the reasons I love PACG is that it's easy to learn, so people who are completely new to RPG's (and there's a lot of them) but who are comfortable with more complicated boardgames can jump in.

I mostly play with a single friend, but we have a few premade characters that we keep around for anybody that wants to play to come in and take control.
If you aren't a kid and you have jobs and people to take care of, this is a great way to do it. Gone are the days when I could play GURPS, Palladium or AD&D until 5am with a bunch of my closest friends.

I get through an average of 2 scenarios per session. If you create a laid back, enjoyable atmosphere that's not too obsessive about doing everything completely right, it's a fun way to play the game for casual gamers.


I used to have a few groups. Now it's a group of 3 with my roommates (usually one can't make it though), and I also play with my boyfriend over Skype. It's kind of slow that way, but we still manage to have fun.


I play a 6-character group with my wife and son once a week. We're just starting adventure 5 in RotR. It takes us 60-90 minutes to play a scenario.

I also play a 4-character group solo about once a week. This group is also beginning adventure 5 in RotR. (Having both groups in the same adventure makes it easier to play out of the same box.)

With my daughter we are playing a 4 character group once a month, which is currently in adventure 1 of RotR. I have to completely rebuild the box for this group (putting back in removed cards, removing advanced cards) but it's fun to play as a family.

I set up the 6-character game by myself and it takes a lot longer than 5 minutes. At least 20 minutes if not more.


Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

I play with a friend of mine, roughly once per 1-2 weeks. We get in 1-3 sessions depending on how much time we have. We're currently playing 2 characters each in RotR, and are so interested in the characters in S&S that we're at least going to try running 3 each for that one.

Edit: Oh yes, our time to play started out at about 2h/session, we're down to about 90 min per, now (chatting and generally just hanging out and having fun slows us down a bit :) ).


I usually solo a couple of scenarios a week. It varies how large my groups are. My first run of Rise of the Runelords had two characters. My second has six. Haven't been doing that since August though, been waiting for Skulls that was sent back to Paizo from my post office because there was some failure of communication on the postal services part...

When I'm visiting my parents home on vacations, I bring Rise of the Runelords along to play with my two brothers.

Now, this weekend I had a 11 hour Rise of the Runelords marathon with someone that had just bought the game and I offered to teach it to them. We were four people and had only two scenarios left of the first AP from the box. I told them that they probably should buy the next AP or two, and that I would like to join them for more if they wanted. Nobody wanted to play Lem though, with the joke being it was because of his names meaning in Norwegian. And our Harsk player was also made some fun of because of the Norwegian meaning of his name. Fun time. I'll probably could see me playing a marathon like this monthly or bimonthly.

But I will probably gear up my solo playing with me getting skulls either this week or next week. Playing it again this weekend really made me remember why I love this game :)

Dark Archive

I usually play 2-3 times/week around about 3 hours, 2 players with 2 characters each. tend to get through 2-3 scenario's in a session.

Currently running S&S but switching out to RoTR when we run out of scenarios.

Waiting on AP2 for S&S, currently just finished AP3 in RoTR

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