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Because: what's the alternative? You're not getting paid to GM, and there aren't shackles keeping you chained to the table. A GM always has the option to decline to run, if the venue organizer would decide to press the issue. Of course, then you would a reputation of flaking out under bad circumstances at the last minute, and you would probably get fewer requests to GM.
Not that we have a problem with GMs in our GM pool, but I would say that even a bad GM would be called because folks almost always prefer to play vs GM.
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As far as "personal" examples go, I am an old paper and pencil gamer too. I have a general disdain for computers. I can usually do combat modifiers quicker and more accurately in my head than others using computers. And yet, with all that being said, I think Hero Lab is one of the best tools for PFS out there. First, it makes character creation and leveling far quicker, easier and efficient. I can use the search window to winnow down the list of feats, traits, etc. with keywords specific to my build. It will remind me of obscure options that I might not have thought of. There are just so many things it helps. Most importantly it can help a less experienced player with many of the mechanics that come naturally to more experienced players, as a GM that is incredibly helpful and promotes game flow.
Add to all of this, I am pretty sure Lone Wolf and Paizo have a very good working relationship. I know that Lone Wolf offers many specials that help PFS, especially support for the VCs and VLs.
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I'm happy to keep using HL as a "crutch." ;)
I use an airplane as a crutch sometimes when I don't want to hitch up a covered wagon and travel several years to my destination.
(As an aside, the use of the word crutch is baiting - trying to imply that one is a better person/player than you are if you use HeroLab - which every time I hear/read it I envision a cantankerous old man with a cane stomping in his doorway telling kids to get off'n his lawn and yelling things like "back in MY day...")
I'm bringing a minimum of 3 devices to every table at which I play (laptop, ipad, phone). I can have several sources open at the same time that way in a very small space compared to a stack of books or even printed pdf pages. That way I also have three copies of everything I own. I rarely use all 3 but when things get busy or if I am GMing they are useful to have.
There is simply too much material to remember. No one here knows all of it. Everyone here uses a "crutch" to help them organize the game unless you are using physical copies of every single source, every single time (in which case I pity you - how archaic!)
I also have no problem with people saying "HeroLab said so" because 99.9% of the time, HL is correct. Many of the examples given above have nothing to do with the tool being used. They are also easily corrected by looking at the screen modifiers when they occur.
People showing up without purchased sources has nothing to do with HeroLab, either. The rule is the rule. I've seen people show up without sources of any kind -- same issue but no HL involved.
And as long as we are using personal experiences as a basis for argument (as if it matters to the reader), here's mine. I have been challenged at tables exactly five times on rules / whatnot that appeared in HeroLab while I was using it. All five times the GM was incorrect and HeroLab was right. These included 5-star GMs and GMs who are (very) outspoken that HeroLab is badwrongfun.
I find the experience...satisfying when that...
Do you generally know the rules? Do you read the books? Do you look up the rules pertinent to your character?
If the answer to these questions is "yes" then my comment regarding Hero Lab being a 'crutch' was not addressed to you.To liken it to a person in physical rehab, using a crutch to avoid physical rehab is the problem here. *Some* people use it to avoid learning the rules.
My experience regarding "Hero Lab said so" is that the people who claim that are wrong much of the time, far more than 0.1% of the time.
Now, I do not claim that this is due to Hero Lab being wrong but probable user error on the part of the person making the claim.
The problem is that the perception of Hero Lab being infallible is giving these people a false sense that anything they build with Hero Lab cannot possibly be incorrect. That sense is what I have a problem with. Of course, that is not necessarily a problem with Hero Lab.
It sounds like none of my comments cover you as a user, perhaps you should not take them as if they did.
Venture-Lieutenant, Florida—Melbourne
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** spoiler omitted **I guess my "personal anecdote" was too subtle. Oh well, I tried.Well, it seemed to parallel the current discussion a bit to closely for me to accept it as 100% genuine.
Regardless, the only real point I got out of it is that rules lazy people are a pain in the butt. But I do not think that was a point that was ever in contention on this thread. The main point in contention I see in this thread is whether or not removing a crutch from rules lazy people will make them less rules lazy. My experience says, 'No.'
Never-the-less, the parallel to his story and Hero Lab was obvious. I am just not quite sure of the point he was trying to make in drawing that parallel.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Florida—Melbourne
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The problem is that the perception of Hero Lab being infallible is giving these people a false sense that anything they build with Hero Lab cannot possibly be incorrect. That sense is what I have a problem with. Of course, that is not necessarily a problem with Hero Lab.
That is the part of the this discussion I am having a problem relating to. Not that such a sense wouldn't be a problem, but that this sense is so prevalent that it is a problem that warrants drastic action like banning a tool from a table.
That is not to say that I haven't heard people say that "that's what Hero Lab says" when questioned on a rule. I have said it myself. But in every case I can think of, this was stated as an explanation rather than as a statement of definitive rules. In short, people treat Hero Lab as a knowledgeable rules source, not as an infallible one. I have just never had an issue where a player insisted that they are right solely because Hero Lab says so. Maybe it is our local environment. About 20% of our players use Hero Lab, but most of those are actually people with a high level of rules mastery. So for them, Hero Lab is more of a tool than a crutch. When we talk to people about Hero Lab we explain you have to buy the additional materials and they don't count as PFS legal sources, so you have to buy the Paizo materials as well. So our local player base is well aware that Hero Lab is not a legal source, even if it is a largely accurate source. Everyone locally knows that if they want to "prove" they are right, they are going to have to pull out the rule book or at least pull up the PRD on their smart phone. So maybe just educating the player base is the solution to the problem.
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If the organizers have to keep doing more work to get everyone seated because a GM keeps kicking people from his table at the last moment, they might well stop asking. Sure more GMs better, but more GMs who make them shuffle players after assigning them to scenarios is bad.Not that we have a problem with GMs in our GM pool, but I would say that even a bad GM would be called because folks almost always prefer to play vs GM.
Because: what's the alternative? You're not getting paid to GM, and there aren't shackles keeping you chained to the table. A GM always has the option to decline to run, if the venue organizer would decide to press the issue. Of course, then you would a reputation of flaking out under bad circumstances at the last minute, and you would probably get fewer requests to GM.
Agreed, as an event organizer and a GM (50% of the time for my non-pfs campaigns, and 90% of the time for PFS) I would say that GMs get a fair bit of leeway and enshrined status based on their scarcity, they can get away with being dickish to a limited extent because we are GM starved more often then not. Certainly if it became problematic we would act, but it would have to become fairly egregious. Unfortunately, this scarcity of GMs leads to classic GM power tripping like "Feeding the blood god" or keeping a body count. (I've once and only once nearly had a TPK, and it isn't something I'm proud of, it was caused by bad choices, and a undersized table, and was prevented by throwing the poor pregen kyra to the wolves (or yeth hounds as it were.)
I'm going off topic, the point is that behaviours and attitudes like this anti-hero lab sentiment, will be tolerated because we have to few GMs, and is probably more symptomatic of some GM burnout and frustration levels being high due to lack of relief.
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Galahad0430, could you please cite the rule in question?
No, Nefreet, you do not have that right. In fact, it is against PFS rules.
I believe it falls under the "Don't be a jerk" rule.
If you have a legal character in terms of build, level for scenario, additional resources, chronicle sheets, and inventory tracking sheets, how are you as a player violating any rule? The words "character sheet" only appears in a few places: multiple mentions of pregenerated characters, duties of the GM to look over character sheets, importance of reporting sessions for rebuilding lost character sheets. That's it.
The only context would be forum posts from campaign leadership that home games can restrict players however they want because they are on private property and that public venues need to be as public as possible save for problem players. The broad category of people using Hero Lab does not equate to problem players. Period. The problem player categories that relate to Hero Lab exist no matter what form a character sheet takes.
There are zero interpretations of the Guide that would allow a GM to ban players from their tables as a category of player because every citation against HeroLab is not unique to HeroLab, nor do I believe they are necessarily more agregrious or more frequent.
I'm going off topic, the point is that behaviours and attitudes like this anti-hero lab sentiment, will be tolerated because we have to few GMs, and is probably more symptomatic of some GM burnout and frustration levels being high due to lack of relief.
And this is why I won't play PFS, except online in a PbP and even then very limited (3 sessions total across 2 characters). I blew a gasket when one of the 5 star GMs started boasting about how many PCs he had killed and even though I calmed down a bit, this kind of crud really annoys me no end and makes PFS just not worth the aggravation, just like the anti-Hero Lab sentiment. And I don't own Hero Lab.
-- david
By the way, how much does HeroLab, with all the books legal for PFS, cost these days?
A lot! The basic package is $30 and then all of the supplemental books have their own price. Fortunately, the campaign settings and player's companions are grouped into packages so you can snatch up several in a batch.
I'd say starting out you have to absolutely spend at least $60 on Hero Lab to get started. That would include the $30 start up basic Pathfinder package and their Roleplaying Classic Bundle which has several of the player's companions and campaign guides included.
It's best to add new data packages one at a time over a period of time until they build up. I made the mistake of jumping into it all at once and dropped a good bit of money over the holiday.
But - it was my present to myself so gosh darnit I am glad I bought it!
Now instead of spending an entire day building a new character by crossreferencing all of the books, I can build a new one in 30 minutes to an hour - or much less if I just want to punch my way through it.
I love having the rules cross-referenced because it helps me remember obscure changes that I might have otherwise missed.
Hero Lab is not infallible however, as I recently leveled and added a totem transformation giving me +2 bonus to Natural Armor and Hero Lab added the bonus outright rather than leaving it as an ability that would have to be activated.
I've always played Pathfinder with the first rule being to have fun and a lot of people in this thread seem to be against that and more for turning it into a job, no thanks I already have one of those.
Yes. Nerd Rage is the longtime bane of many a RPG table!
As a Gm i reserve the right to deny a person at my table for whatever reason i deem reasonable....
if you dont want herolab at your table let people know ahead of time...they can print out a sheet and bring their resources if needed... or they can play a pre gen
Actually no you can't. You need a legit reason. What you deem reasonable is not good enough. You might want to read that PFS guide again.
No. I am new to the program. I'll see what I can do.
I Gm pfs games from my home...
I can refuse whoever i want.. for whatever reason i want...
new rule - no pink dice.. unless you are a little girl( then its just cute)...
Not letting someone is your house is an entirely different argument fro m what you were saying before. You never mentioned the venue.
I see moving goalpost.
So are we discussing your house or an actual table without including your house?
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Those numbers seem off somehow... :P
Agreed, as an event organizer and a GM (50% of the time for my non-pfs campaigns, and 90% of the time for PFS)
They are two separate data sets. For non-PFS campaigns I GM 50% of the time and play (run a player character) 50% of the time. For PFS related gaming I am a GM 90% of the time and run a character about 10% of the time.
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Do you generally know the rules? Do you read the books? If the answer to these is "yes" then my comment regarding a 'crutch' was not addressed to you. To liken it to a person in physical rehab, using the crutch to avoid physical rehab is the problem here. *Some* people use it to avoid learning the rules.
My experience regarding "Hero Lab said so" is that the people who claim that are wrong much of the time, far more than 0.1% of the time.
Now, I do not claim that this is due to Hero Lab being wrong but probable user error on the part of the person making the claim.
The problem is that the perception of Hero Lab being infallible is giving these people a false sense that anything they build with Hero Lab cannot possibly be incorrect. That sense is what I have a problem with. Of course, that is not necessarily a problem with Hero Lab.It sounds like none of my comments cover you as a user, perhaps you should not take them as if they did.
1) Actually no, I don't read rulebooks much at all. I have in the past but there are too many sources now, as I said before. I read only the relevant bits that I need from the PRD and then only when HL doesn't make them clear, which is rare. HL is much easier and accurate enough that it has never yet caused a real problem in any of my builds.
Does that make my style of play inferior to yours because it is different? That I am more casual in my approach to this game? By the above, I'm guessing the answer is yes, but correct me if I am wrong.
The fallacy in that position is the assumption "Hero Lab MUST be wrong" somehow. Well, so can the published source. So can the interpretation of said source. So can the human doing math in his or her noodle. HL ain't the issue when it comes to rules accuracy.
You choose to memorize rules. I choose to spend my time doing other things because I have multiple sources that I can check in a few seconds, should the need arise. 15-20 years ago I might have agreed with you. Now I have other...
I never made any qualitative argument regarding inferiority, please do not read into my statements more than is actually present.
Good thing I do not make that assumption. If you think I am show me where I said "Hero Lab MUST be wrong". I did not make that statement.
You are making the same mistake that several other posters made. You are reading more into my statements than I actually stated. Please do not do that, it is it's own falacy.
To clarify, I am not discussing Hero Lab, I am not discussing people who know the rules. I am discussing two things:
1) People who claim Hero Lab is right 'because it is Hero Lab'. These people are wrong in surprising ways and are usually as a result of user error. I don't give a damn if people are wrong, the problem I have is what happens when people swear, for 30 minutes, that Hero Lab cannot be wrong even when they are shown that they are wrong.
2) That people do not know the rules of their character because they build something using Hero Lab without ever learning how their character works.
If you use Hero Lab to learn the rules, then at least you made an effort to learn them. However, there are people who do not and those are the people my comments are addressing.
Summary: I have not once stated Hero Lab is a problem, please do not pretend I did.
Regarding "crutch" I was the first person to use "crutch" in this thread and your point appeared to address that. However, you are correct that you could have been addressing someone else's post but if that is the case then you should indicate that.
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By the way, how much does HeroLab, with all the books legal for PFS, cost these days?
I try not to think about how much money I have spent on Herolab and I don't even have all the expansions for PFRPG.
I do know for people looking to get in later they add bundles that cut down that cost for older expansions.
The problem is that the perception of Hero Lab being infallible is giving these people a false sense that anything they build with Hero Lab cannot possibly be incorrect. That sense is what I have a problem with. Of course, that is not necessarily a problem with Hero Lab.That is the part of the this discussion I am having a problem relating to. Not that such a sense wouldn't be a problem, but that this sense is so prevalent that it is a problem that warrants drastic action like banning a tool from a table.
That is not to say that I haven't heard people say that "that's what Hero Lab says" when questioned on a rule. I have said it myself. But in every case I can think of, this was stated as an explanation rather than as a statement of definitive rules. In short, people treat Hero Lab as a knowledgeable rules source, not as an infallible one. I have just never had an issue where a player insisted that they are right solely because Hero Lab says so. Maybe it is our local environment. About 20% of our players use Hero Lab, but most of those are actually people with a high level of rules mastery. So for them, Hero Lab is more of a tool than a crutch. When we talk to people about Hero Lab we explain you have to buy the additional materials and they don't count as PFS legal sources, so you have to buy the Paizo materials as well. So our local player base is well aware that Hero Lab is not a legal source, even if it is a largely accurate source. Everyone locally knows that if they want to "prove" they are right, they are going to have to pull out the rule book or at least pull up the PRD on their smart phone. So maybe just educating the player base is the solution to the problem.
I do not ban Hero Lab and I do not even play in PFS any more. My comments are only about a certain section of people who use Hero Lab. Those comments have been blown all out of proportion and people have been incorrectly mixing my stance with several other people's stances.
As for how prevalent it is, my experience with people is that it is quite prevalent that people believe Hero Lab to be accurate. This is not a problem. The problem is when that belief leads people to the unreasonable assumption that just because Hero Lab is accurate their characters (or modifiers) are accurate. People I have heard make the claim that "Hero Lab says" are not using it as an explanation, they are using it as a defense. It then takes a lot of time to show why they are wrong (again, usually as a result of user error).
As for the prevalence of how many have the unreasonable assumption? I do not have enough data for a proper assessment but it is enough where I, and seemingly others, have noticed the problem.
Because people seem to keep misunderstanding my position let me ask a question:
Based on my posts in this thread how many of you think I am anti-Hero Lab?
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Because people seem to keep misunderstanding my position let me ask a question:
Based on my posts in this thread how many of you think I am anti-Hero Lab?
I would say you are anti-idiot, and diagnose Hero Lab as enabling idiocy, and so use Hero Lab usage as a idiot filter.
It feels very baby + bath water.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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People see a discussion about a thing.
They see at least one person criticize Thing, and at least one person praise Thing.
They determine "Ah, this is an argument about the merits of Thing."
They then conclude that there must be exactly two positions: Thing is bad, and Thing is good.
Every post thereafter is categorized into one of those two camps.
Absolutely everything said by anyone who is put in a given camp is considered to be canonical to that camp's one and only stance on the subject.
Every poster who is put in a given camp is therefore considered to espouse every belief assigned to that camp, whether they themselves said such a thing or not, and in fact even if they said the opposite.
Posts stop being read. Instead, a given reader simply skims enough of a new post to guess if the author belongs to the opposing camp, and makes a generic reply to the opposing camp's overall position instead of replying to the things the other poster actually said.
If this is pointed out to them by the misrepresented poster, it is taken as an attack (because how dare you insult my intelligence by implying that I'm capable of error?) and the post's content is dismissed, while simultaneously adding to a perception that people in camp X are antagonistic.
Then the thread reaches page 2.
People see a discussion about a thing.
They see at least one person criticize Thing, and at least one person praise Thing.
They determine "Ah, this is an argument about the merits of Thing."
They then conclude that there must be exactly two positions: Thing is bad, and Thing is good.
Every post thereafter is categorized into one of those two camps.
Absolutely everything said by anyone who is put in a given camp is considered to be canonical to that camp's one and only stance on the subject.
Every poster who is put in a given camp is therefore considered to espouse every belief assigned to that camp, whether they themselves said such a thing or not, and in fact even if they said the opposite.
Posts stop being read. Instead, a given reader simply skims enough of a new post to guess if the author belongs to the opposing camp, and makes a generic reply to the opposing camp's overall position instead of replying to the things the other poster actually said.
If this is pointed out to them by the misrepresented poster, it is taken as an attack (because how dare you insult my intelligence by implying that I'm capable of error?) and the post's content is dismissed, while simultaneously adding to a perception that people in camp X are antagonistic.
Then the thread reaches page 2.
You forgot the part where people start making metaposts about the nature of internet arguments.
That does tend to happen a couple pages further in though.
Can we fit the profit step in there somewhere?
But whats "The Thing"!?!
whatever it is i'm against it!
or was that for it?
Free The Thing!! we won't be silenced any longer!!
or you know, whatever
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Contributor
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By the way, how much does HeroLab, with all the books legal for PFS, cost these days?
As near as I can tell from looking at their website, if you take advantage of bundles of packages and their attendant discounts, you can get Hero Lab and all official Paizo product supporting packages for US$279.63.
Nay the Thing!
Has anyone been called a nazi yet? If not then we still have work to do.
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Only you can prevent forum fires!