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Hey All You Magnificent PFS Piddlespotters--
As most of you know, I believe PFS's core is a social community and so whether you can make it to Paizocon or not, I hope that you will participate.
In the past, we've detailed our games, our meets, our greets, and our beerings. There are some good memories stored up in the threads of yesterPFS:
2011 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery
2012 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery (w/Grand Convocation and massive Banquet spoilers)
2013 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery (w/GenCon Special Run)
2014 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery
2015 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery
2016 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery (w/Starfinder Announcement)
2017 PFS PaizoCon Bloggery
I believe I am in at least one Pathfinder Playtest and will try to offer notes from what I see...and encourage others to add their notes.
I'm mostly excited to see/meet the Glass Cannon Podcast cast. They are the Special Guests at PaizoCon. I've listened to most of the Giantslayer run and strongly recommend a listen to everyone. Start listening at Episode 1. I laugh my ass off even while I'm screaming at the cast for various reasons.
For you attendees:
- Post about whom you've met and where they are from.
- Post about the games you're playing in, with whom, and fun details. (Avoid spoilers...and use spoiler tags if you're going to spoil!)
- Post about extraPFSular activities.
- Get others to share their feedback from PaizoCon.
- Post links to pictures and media.
- Post about neat characters you've played with.
- Post any cool 'tricks' you've learned.
- Post about the sessions and talks you've attended.
- Post about how awesome your judges have been and what things they did well. Heck, even thank them.
For you non-attendees:
- Tell us what sessions you want reports from;
- Questions you want us to ask and to whom;
- Things you want to know about;
- Give lip/guff/sass/snark to PFS board personalities you know (or don't...either way, sass is encouraged).
I, like usual, promise nothing...except that I'll be twisting some arms of people here to join me in describing their experience playing PFS and Starfinder, and the ACG this weekend and the people that make it happen.
-Pain
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Kicking this off real quick, as I run down to see if anyone needs a hand with set-up or whatnot...
Last night (Wednesday) had the chance to chat the ears off of David Montgomery, a VC from Massachusetts who had shown up to play a 'test run' of PFS #9-16: Fallen Family, Broken Name.
Unfortunately, it's hard to run a table with one player, so after an *hour* of chat we determined rest was probably the best option, as he's from the East Coast and I'm from the Chicago area, and time schedules mesh weird with the time in Seattle.
Fortunately, it DID remind me that I have a tendency to talk more than Luis from Ant Man and steamroller conversations, so will be trying to watch out for that as the weekend progresses.
However, while pleasantly surprised that the Jack In The Box makes tacos (to avoid the horrific experience from Taco Bell two years ago), I was not prepared for their onslaught. Lesson Learned.
Venture-Captain, Minnesota
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So, I have not not even arrived in Seattle yet — but Bret’s and my PaizoCon 2018 experience started on the train here. I have been frantically train-prepping the special, 8-99C, and wound up drawing the custom map for Night March of Kalkamedes while in the observation car of the train.
It was not until midway through our first day of travel that Bret and I realized that we’re not the only PaizoCon Goers on this train! Venture Captain Amanda Plageman of Savannah Georgia, is on the first floor of the car we’re in — we’re on floor two — and we had a great time chatting in her room about Organized Play and our excitement for the upcoming convention. If you have not met her yet, Amanda is good people — hard working and funny. She’s been taking pictures of her awesome Renkroda mini at many of the stops along her journey.
She was a pleasure to talk to, and I will poke her to see if she can post here too! We’ll be ubering in to the hotel together once we arrive in Seattle — probably around 11:00am.
Hmm, over and out!
Chugga-chugga-choo-choo!
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You know it's the first day of the convention when you run into people you totally know from past year's cons and totally forget their names.
Ayep. Totally knew Keith but called him "Matthew". *sigh*. He's only a 5 star and VC...and I screwed up his name. Sorry Keith!! I'll make it up to you by calling you Matt all weekend.
But it's been a good morning and i see more and old friends and recognizable faces. Saw long time friend Majuba. Saw ToZ and Tonya (and got hug), and Silbeg and my old friend Balodek.
Balodek is running me through a play-by-post of Ironfang Invasion. It will be good to pick his brain about the campaign so far, some back story and character arcs and the like this week. If you are new to PbP and want to see how the format works...reading that isn't a bad idea. (GM Euan's Mummy's Mask is good too.)
There are some self-organized PFS games starting at noon.
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For the first time, Painlord wasn't the first person I saw. It was Majiba. Managed to see some of the Minnesota crew, and Al Riggs. Had a nice talk with Tim "Founder" Nightengale as well. Now off to Denny's for lunch with Ross Tait, VC Edmonton and an old
Friend from way back. Food!
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Got in Wednesday and spent some time pre-Con at the Museum of Flight, then down to the market for dinner and drinks and drinks and drinks.
Did you guys know that Seattle has a lot of nerds? Our Uber driver and multiple random bar patrons were happy to talk tons of nerdy stuff with us! (Or maybe they were just being friendly?)
There's also a bar in a former morgue, so that's cool.
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Looked to for this thread in the Paizo Con section... found it here. Oh will the obfuscations of Painlord never cease?
Got in yesterday, and “Matt”and I went to the Museum of Flight (was awesome). Then it was up to Seattle where we learned about coffee at the “slow bar”, then dinner and drinks with Al Rigg at Matt’s at the Market. From there we went to Cloudburst brewing
Already got yelled at for not inviting Pain to dinner last night. He did sound happy his liver survived the night, though.
Just hanging out now waiting for Bret and Hmm to arrive
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Chilling in the bar with Thursty. Send help.
On my way.
Two little known facts but totally facts:
1) When I first say Thursty today, he had a beer. I didn't recognize the person holding the beer as Thursty at first, because I did not see the alcohol and thus, could not confirm Thursty as an entity in front of me. Then I saw the beer and then knew the being to be Thursty. I got a good man hug.
2) It's good to hang with Thursty at PaizoCon if you're trying to save money. I often hang around him when I want to pre-game or pre-party as the contact high from his breath is pretty potent (downside warning: you have smell his breath). There is a rumor that a single Thursty tear is akin to a phoenix tear in that instead of healing you, you get roaring drunk.
Anyhoot, pray for my liver.
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Hanging out side Thunderbird cafe with GM Lamplighter and Thunderlips discussing yoga & meditation. JonD, the book I’ve recently read is this one. I don’t get it yet, but I’m trying.
While hanging out, saw Gary Pepper who I met last year or something. He’s prepping for the 6 sessions he’s running this week. What a boss.
Had visits from John Compton and Thursty, which is ‘nice’.
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Having a good chat with GM Lamplighter and Wei Ji the Learner. This old post is discussed.
Just also met Thorin. And saw Dragnmoon. I’ve known DMoon for a long time.
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Spent a pleasing few hours with Painlord, Jon, Wei ji the Learner. Met Michael Sayre, my developer at Paizo - so good to meet face to face when you've worked together! Crowds are building. Met Jared Thaler. Blame all misspellings on autocorrect and not my poor hearing. Apparently the all-Harsk party took on Bonekeep today - waiting to hear how it went.
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Just want to say thanks for doing this again Painlord. I appreciate it. Any card game info you can gleam would be great. I think there might be some announcements about the release plans at the banquet.
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Excellent! I’m looking forward to anything and everything you can tell me about the GCP folks. It’s your fault I’ve lost at least 125 hours of my life laughing uproariously at their antics over the last several months, I figure giving me a report is the very least you can do.
I’m also in need of reports on the play test, plus any seminars you may get into. Reports on almost anything will be great. Card game updates, lottery games, the banquet, and the trivia game are all on my wistfully missed list for this year.
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Sitting outside the Thunderbird cafe and Daigle just brought down all the extra pizza from the set up party. About 10 of them. Nice. I’m full of BBQ as I went to dinner with Balodek and Motteditor, but free pizza is a free pizza.
Spoke a bit with James Anderson who is a VL from my part of the world. I haven’t seen him in a few years.
Hung for a bit with freelancers/RPGSSers Jesse Benner, Jeffrey Swank, & Motteditor listening to them talk about freelancing and gigs they’ve had and what they have contributed. I don’t understand all of it, but I’m trying to draw it all in. It’s good to hear from the perspective of those who are trying to break into the business and what motivates them.
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Posting so Painlord doesn’t yell at me. Thought I was going to miss my flight in, which would’ve been two years out of Two but made it by the skin of my teeth. Caught up with Kate baker and played my first live Starfinder game, which was a blast. Though I think I scared everyone with my Keskodai wishing them all good deaths. I can now be a walrus person (or eventually I can at least).
Had dinner with Pain and Balodek, which was excellent, and then came back and tried to stay awake even as I had lots of excellent conversation outside the bar. Now hanging out with Pain again and Jeff Swank!
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Venture-Lieutenant, California—North Coast
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All good stories must start at the beginning.
My flight came in about 45 minutes later than expected but I still made ot here alive. Hopped the Shuttle from the Airport to the Hotel and Ran into Calinda and Eric Conrtibutors to Wayfinder if I am not mistaken. Fun Magnetic Stores were shared.
After hopping off the shuttle as it arrived I met up with Adam Daw chatted with him for a few about what games we will be running during PaizoCon.
Any good GM should be prepared for the games they intend to run which includes maps right! Well this GM forgot the Maps he needed for the Special and the Custom Maps so I set to work with a little Arts and crafts time ensused where I met up with Jared Thaler VC from Sacramento where he also started some arts and craft time. Alistair Rigg dropped by for a second.
Painlord wandered over and I spoke with him for a few and then had to go meet up with Larry Smith to talk about the upcoming seminar on PbP I went back out and sat down with a bunch of great people. Some of those who stopped by include: Cheryl (silbeg's Sister), Her husband Paul, Jim & Bret from New Orleans, Greg Vaughn, Julian, Gavin, Kate Baker, James Anderson, Leg o'Lamb, Jacob, Andrew Mullen and Jeff Swanks.
Thats about all for now. I will most more later. Now is the time to finish Preping for my tabel of SFS 1-12 Ashes of Discovery Tomorrow at 8AM.
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Venture-Captain, Australia—WA—
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I had a wonderful game this afternoon with Kate and six other new friends. I liked the banter between our two priests and was happy with the outcome of our adventure.
There was a spotting or two of Hmm as she swept in and out to say hi to Kate.
The evening was spent with Lone Wolf Development folks, assisting where I could with the setup of the character creation station (CCS).
Now for some much-needed sleep to be fresh and ready at 07:00 to staff the CCS and provide what assistance I can to any who wish to use it.
Looking forward to meeting many more fun fellows and to my Playtes session tomorrow afternoon.
Venture-Captain, Netherlands
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Thank Desna the bloggery is here! I dont know if I would have survived without my 'fix'.
Tip from Painlord from last year: internet can be spotty and eat your forum posts. Write them in your email app first so they get saved as drafts, then copy/paste them to the forum once your internet connection improves!
Of course, i want to know everything about everything. Especially the trivia contest!
Did majuba bring his kitties? Can someone pet the kitties for me?
I miss not being there with you all :(
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Thank Desna the bloggery is here! I dont know if I would have survived without my 'fix'.
Tip from Painlord from last year: internet can be spotty and eat your forum posts. Write them in your email app first so they get saved as drafts, then copy/paste them to the forum once your internet connection improves!
Of course, i want to know everything about everything. Especially the trivia contest!
Did majuba bring his kitties? Can someone pet the kitties for me?
I miss not being there with you all :(
We miss you as well.
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Contributor
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Because I’m apparently squeezing in as many games as possible this PaizoCon, I arrived yesterday about noon and then ran two sessions of my Starfinder scenario, which I think makes 15 times running it. I’m starting to lose count. Luckily, it’s still fun to run every time.
I’ll try to post how my games go today! I have four of them. Back to back. On a terrible night’s sleep. I see nothing wrong with this plan.
First one to post spotting Steve Geddes wins...
Spotting Steve Geddes
Not good enough
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Things I’m learning from the ACG Playtest.
Nothing here is set in stone, but some initial things from the playtest.
1) Now 3 types of blessings, each with different types of effects. The Incitation card reads: “Discard to bless any check. If it invokes the Acid, Cold, Elec, Fire, or Force trait, you may freely discard instead. <cr> Discard to explore.”
Bless means to add a die.
Discard vs Discard freely means that you can override the number of cards that can be played on a check.
2) Locations can now be of variable size. S, M, L depending on things.
3) I’m playing Seoni, her card is very similar to her old card. She’s still a blaster. The core stats d4 for str etc, system is still in place.
More later.
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Last night (Wednesday) had the chance to chat the ears off of David Montgomery, a VC from Massachusetts who had shown up to play a 'test run' of PFS #9-16: Fallen Family, Broken Name.
Unfortunately, it's hard to run a table with one player, so after an *hour* of chat we determined rest was probably the best option, as he's from the East Coast and I'm from the Chicago area, and time schedules mesh weird with the time in Seattle.
As someone who reports underneath him, I will vouch to say David is an awesome VC and everybody should say hi to him and give him a high five.
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ACG Playtest con’t:
4) There is MUCH more incentive to stick together as a party in this version. It seems they recognized the inherent option that most parties would split up to cover a lot of locations to start, now we are more encouraged to stick together.
5) Kate Baker is lovely to playtest with. The GM is Keith Richmond from Lone Shark Games.
6) There are a LOT more and new keywords. Like locations have ones like ‘Wild’. Oh and there are trigger/event/Barrier cards too, which is what I found on my first turn. I kilt one werewolf but Amiri/Kate didn’t. It was shuffled randomly away into another location.
7) Wow, the Scourge ‘frightened’ really harsh: “Every time you encounter a monster, you take 1d4-1 mental damage.’ The scourge sticks around at a location. Oh, how did it come up? Yeth Hound. Every local player can be nailed by if vs. Wisdom 6. Yeth Hound is now a beefy combat 11.
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I got to meet and hang out with David Montgomery, as well as David from PA and Amanda from Georgia last night, which was awesome.
Spent some time talking to Michael Sayre and finally met Jared Thaler too.
I keep seeing everyone else's swag bags from check in and see that it's stepped up a bit this year...
I haven't been able to get mine yet, cause unfortunately, I'm working remote from my hotel room today. Just waiting for a break to get my badge and such.
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Out of my 8am to 10am Playtest and have an hour to kill before the Glass Cannon Podcast’s Cannon Fodder Live! Seminar at 11am.
I head to the on-site breakfast place (which I freakin’ love) to type up more thoughts on the ACG Playtest and to eat what will be both my breakfast and lunch, which I call ‘brunch’. All the bagels, yogurt, granola, & blueberries that I can eat...and coffee. +1 to this place.
Anyhoot, I came down at 7am to check in and there was a huge line to get badges. Went and sat around for about 30 minutes and came back...no line. Again, the Paizo staff rocked the sign in process and got players their schedules and swag really quickly. +1
And the swag bags? Pretty nice. Really nice. A full set of the Beastary Box 4 card minis, an ACG deck, 2 boxes of minis, some paint, and a goblin. It’s a lot of loot.
* * *
More on the ACG:
8) Speaking with Keith more, they *REALLY* packed this Playtest with a LOT of mechanics and effects. More than I thought was possible, but what do I know? The final version probably won’t have all the new and old mechanics, but it’s clear there was some overall them changes: a) encouraging parties to stay together, b) the timer deck is now an ‘hourglass’ that changes effects by the turn, c) seemed to be a lot more ‘healing/status removal’ spread out among the characters and items (for instance Amiri had something that would allow her to remove the frightened scrouge), and d) several cards seemed to be better (like Luckstone is now a recharge to add 1 after a check, making it finally playable).
9) I always enjoy the ACG game and this Playtest was no different. There was a LOT going on with each person’s turn and with each new mechanic being explained and explored, I’m not sure I caught all the potential interactions.
10) I send Hawkmoon a bunch of info that I couldn’t capture with my brain (camera instead) and hope he can synthesize it into something else to post here.
It’s been a good start.
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Quickly looking at what Painlord sent (and keeping in mind this is all playtest and not all of it will necessarily make it into the final version):
Proxies There are proxy cards for villains and henchman. They are named Proxy A, for example. Looks like that might keep the number of cards they need to print down. This idea has a long history, and was seemingly even in early playtests of Rise of the Runelords.
Scourges Looks like this idea from Mummy's Mask is a more basic part of the game now.
Blessings Deck/Discard Pile As mentioned, the deck is called the hourglass. The top card of the blessings discard pile is called the "hour" and it seems blessing can have a power related to when they are the hour.
Villains and Henchman There is an note that these are called Story Banes and not Villains or Henchmen anymore. This is so they can be used for other purposes. (I'm guessing things like putting a Sandstorm in the blessings deck and that kind of stuff.)
Spells Spells seem to have something called recovery.
Loot Has a check to acquire and if not taken goes into the box with other cards of its "secondary" type. (i.e. Sihedron Medallion if not taken would get put with the items and not with the loot so you can run into it later.)
One card of each type This seems to apply to the group now, not just each character, but there also seem to be lots of cards that let you break the rule. Seems like that is one of the uses of the "freely" term.
Rest Looks like maybe there is a new part of your turn where you rest. Any cards you've banished (which seems to include all spells) that can be recovered will have been set aside. And at the end of your turn you can try to recover them.
Shorthand There is definitely some shorthand. Not sure how much of that is just because this is a playtest and how much is being considered for a final version. For example, check difficulties now say "8+#" for "8 plus the adventure deck number of the current scenario" (i.e. veteran). That frees up lots of space in the powers box. There are even some "8+##" which I'm guessing is "8 plus twice the adventure deck number of the current scenario" (i.e. double veteran). References to traits are shortened, such as "Book item" instead of "an item with the Book trait."
Wildcards These modify the scenario. (Perhaps an idea taken from the Pathfinder Adventures App?)
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Venture-Lieutenant, Minnesota—St. Paul
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Blessings Deck/Discard Pile As mentioned, the deck is called the hourglass. The top card of the blessings discard pile is called the "hour" and it seems blessing can have a power related to when they are the hour.
Is the card game now like the show 24? "We only got 30 hours to solve this problem - go go go go go!" "When do we sleep?" "WE DON'T" haha.
I love hearing about the card game stuff! Some of it doesn't seem particularly compatible with the current class decks and such. Would there be enough mix-and-match for the PFSACG in particular to get by? Keyword replacement? Supplemental decks? Or is this a 'start anew' kind of situation?
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Contributor
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The PACG playtest was really fun! I played with my old friend Amiri, but got appropriate comeuppance after laughing a lot at Painlord when he pulled a Trigger Card on the first examination of the whole game.
I’m currently playing Skitter Shot with Jason Keeley, and it is an absolute delight! I love his description of skittermanders as an entire race of Leslie Knopes.
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My 11am to 1pm slot:
I’m a fan of the Glass Cannon Podcast. It’s funny as heck. Their knowledge of the rules of PF (especially early in the series) had me yelling into my headphones...but that was more than balanced by the amount of good laughs that I had. Give it a listen. They are playing all of Giantslayer via podcast. They have well over 150+ episodes and yeah...go for it.
Now at the live taping of the Cannon Fodder (the behind the scenes aux podcast that supports the AP run) and the room is full. They have 2 hours to fill and have a lot of guests planned. This episode is set to drop on Thursday, according to Joe.
Matthew proves he is the funny one. He’s accepted to a fancy playwright school. Good on him.
Joe announces the GCP $25,000 patreon goal to support GCP productions. Troy talks about dreams and goals...but you can listen to that on Thursday.
I like the way Joe handles and discussing the story and about their experiences in Book 4 of the Giantslayer AP. (No spoilers).
KC Owens is interviewed about his role as Paizo’s Lead Designer for Starfinder.
Erik Mona and Jason Buhlman next to discuss Paizo and Pathfinder. JB talks a bit about the status of the Pathfinder Playtest and how things are changing/moving/growing.
Erik makes a *really* good point about the Playtest: having a Playtest and having a safe space to make mistakes and push the envelop and try to things will eventually allow for a better final product. If there wasn’t a long process to explore and make mistakes, then the final product might end up being too conservative and possibly less good.
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I love hearing about the card game stuff! Some of it doesn't seem particularly compatible with the current class decks and such. Would there be enough mix-and-match for the PFSACG in particular to get by? Keyword replacement? Supplemental decks? Or is this a 'start anew' kind of situation?
It will be fully compatible. Some of things on existing cards or characters might need tweaking, or there might be some kind of "X in the old set is Y in the new set" but it will be fully compatible.
The trait shorthand and the veteran reference seem straightforward enough that they should require any adjustment of old cards. For cards that currently say "top card of the blessings discard pile" a note in the rule (or perhaps in a compatibility document) that such a phrase now means "the hour" would seem easy enough.
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Blessings Deck/Discard Pile As mentioned, the deck is called the hourglass. The top card of the blessings discard pile is called the "hour" and it seems blessing can have a power related to when they are the hour.I love hearing about the card game stuff! Some of it doesn't seem particularly compatible with the current class decks and such. Would there be enough mix-and-match for the PFSACG in particular to get by? Keyword replacement? Supplemental decks? Or is this a 'start anew' kind of situation?
Yeah, the timer isn’t blessings anymore. Now its the Hourglass which each seem to have a specific attribute tied to them when they are flipped over at start of turn. Some that I (sort of) remember are:
1) “Add 1d4 to acquire or recharge a spell.”
2) “Re-roll any 1s during a check.”
3) “Add 1 to every dice?” (Gah, can’t remember, but these are close).
In theory, these would be in effect for an entire turn...unless there was an effect that ate cards from the hourglass...or (gulp) had a pugwampi effect, I dunno.
It was interesting and required that we read each hourglass card because it affected our actions.