I am writing this post as venting more than anything else. I've yet to run Part I of the AP since my group can only gather once a week - in the meanwhile, I gathered two of my players and we decided to roll up some characters and fiddle around with the combat mechanics a bit. And here I realized that as a GM, my work just tripled. My opinion may sway yet on running the AP, but bear with me.
There is a lot more to keep track of than there was in P1. Every piece of maths went out the window in favor of pools and points. The monster stat blocks are simpler to use, yes - they look very much like the crib notes I made for myself on simple or recurrent enemies in a given adventure. On the other hand, since I don't have the breakdown of all the numbers, they sometimes make no sense to me.
I have no standard of XP to give - instead, I should give XP, from what I've gathered, based on how difficult I think the combat was... but that leaves a lot to my ruling. I can be benevolent and give a Medium encounter Major XP because the rolls weren't that good. I can decide four goblins with crossbows is not that big a challenge and the players simply chose their tactics wrong, and this is a Minor event. Despite the fact one of the characters died.
Treasure is also a problem. Instead of having monsters drop stuff, I feel like I have a budget of items and currency to give out - which of course I will have to tailor to the adventure or the player. I feel like I'm handing out stuff mechanically, instead of allowing players to pick up, keep or sell whatever they want.
I feel like I have to make more decisions on the fly, instead of planning for them.
And then there's the mechanics itself. In P1 a player would tell me something like, "I'll run here and tumble past the ogre to get at its back." and from the simulations I got mostly "First action I'll Stride here, second action I Strike this guy and third action I'll Stride away from him again". Which feels somewhat less organic, like programming a machine, rather than incorporating a character.
Like I said, I'm yet to run the AP - I've read some of it, I'm loving the story, but I fear it might pale or get pushed back when worked through with the mechanics. Maybe because it's a new kind of game... but I feel somewhat like the roleplay will drown in page after page of Feats of all sorts.
Hero Points in particular confuse me: when do I give them out? Am I giving out too many or too little?
I don't feel like a "game master" at all - instead I feel a prisoner of the uncertainty and the complexity. Both players who simulated those combats with me (one of which is my husband) are veterans of fantasy RPG and they feel equally perplexed.
Is anyone else a little lost?
For the AP you don’t need to worry about XP, but if you were then each encounter in the book already lists the challenge rating (Trival 1 or Severe 1 for example for first level characters). But no one is leveling traditionally in the playtest so you can skip over XP. There’s other posts in this forum that explain how you can design encounters around XP budgets which is worth looking at to get a sense of how it might work if you wanted to play a homebrew after the AP.
Hero Caps are for when players impress you. They always get one free at the start of each session and hey never carryover. They can get one buy being helpful outside of the game, maybe they brought the snacks or organised everyone to attend. The 3rd is if they do something cool in-game, if you listen to the GCP then it’s a “bottle-cap” situation. Did they just save the party by doing something clever? Bottlecap!
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
All of that was largely true of PF1, and I imagine the first few games you GMd that you felt equally lost. I know I do anytime I start GMing a new system. It won't take long until it all becomes easier, not many will have an instant understanding of it all. For what it's worth for the most part it does seem to me simpler than PF1 so far.
Pools and points are for the players to track, not the GM. And I know I didn't try reverse engineering the creatures in PF1 until I had a grasp on the system - and it'll make a lot more sense when we get the full rules including the "how to create your own critter" section that will inevitably be included.
The XP rewards in the rulebook are for overcoming non-combat challenges and exploration - the former story awards. Look to page 21 in the bestiary for combat encounter XP awards.
You had a budget for treasure in PF1 of sorts, it's just now level X items instead of the random tables.
The actions I've yet to play, but I imagine we'll soon shorthand it, and part of the playtest is to see how intrusive the mechanics are so it's all good on that front.
Hero Points I have issues with, mostly due to the fact that I dislike the idea of ingame rewards for out of game actions. I'm considering simply starting everyone with 2 and aim to give another 1 out at sometime before the final encounter and ideally prior to the penultimate encounter as they don't carry forward. If no opportunity arises then I'm not going to lose sleep over it.
In short, keep up the good work, don't worry about it you will 'get it' in time and most of all have fun
Hero Points I have issues with, mostly due to the fact that I dislike the idea of ingame rewards for out of game actions. I'm considering simply starting everyone with 2 and aim to give another 1 out at sometime before the final encounter and ideally prior to the penultimate encounter as they don't carry forward. If no opportunity arises then I'm not going to lose sleep over it.
My group did not give Hero Points for out of character activities; unfortunately, this has now been formalized on page 300, "A character needs to do something selfless or daring beyond normal expectations. Players add Hero Points by taking on at least one additional responsibility, such as bringing food for the group, keeping a map of a dungeon, or taking notes."
When I was GMing for Iron Gods, my wife declared that I was not giving out enough Hero Points. This was true, because during the heroic moments I was distracted by roleplaying the enemy's reactions to the daring heroism. Therefore, she developed a system of voting among the players at the end of the game session for the Most Valuable Player Character whose actions had helped the party the most. The winner received a Hero Point. If the winner had maximum Hero Points already, second place received the Hero Point.
This won't work in Pathfinder 2nd Edition, because Hero Points don't carry over. In PF2 they disappear at the end of the game session. Everyone starts with one. Without the out-of-character methods of earning a Hero Point, gaining a 2nd Hero Point in a timely fashion will be difficult and won't help beyond the game session, regardless. Maybe winning MVPC should give two Hero Points instead of one at the beginning of the next game session.
Hm, if someone earns a Hero Point for taking notes or mapping the dungeon, is that for merely promising to take notes at the beginning of the session, or is that Hero Point given out uselessly at the end of the game session?
And then there's the mechanics itself. In P1 a player would tell me something like, "I'll run here and tumble past the ogre to get at its back." and from the simulations I got mostly "First action I'll Stride here, second action I Strike this guy and third action I'll Stride away from him again". Which feels somewhat less organic, like programming a machine, rather than incorporating a character.
It's interesting you say that. As I'm reading through the book, I'm finding myself with a "this reads like a python or PowerShell script" reaction. Not saying that's bad. It's just that I absolutely got the same impression.
Heavy keywording and tight procedural language is something I've always thought the game could benefit from. Still, you're right that the organic feel is diminished. That said, I've got one guy new to one of my groups who is a heavy describer. Like your example, he'll document his PC's actions, describe hip-twists, ankle-angles, finger-twitches, pulling back bowstrings, and the wind in an arrow's fletching as it's let loose. I find myself thinking... dude. Kill me now... I'll be elderly by the time my turn comes around. Could you please just say "I move and take a shot at the bad guy?" Please?
So anyway... I dunno. Time will tell if this is a good direction or not.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
And then there's the mechanics itself. In P1 a player would tell me something like, "I'll run here and tumble past the ogre to get at its back." and from the simulations I got mostly "First action I'll Stride here, second action I Strike this guy and third action I'll Stride away from him again". Which feels somewhat less organic, like programming a machine, rather than...
Sincere question: is this an issue of having internalized the old mechanics vs explicitly working through new/unfamiliar ones?
It seems you could phrase the first example, from PF1, as "I use my Move Action to make an Acrobatics Check to move through the orge's threatened squares, then make a Standard Action Attack"
And the second, using the new mechanics, as, "I spring at the orc, slashing at him with my longsword before ducking back behind the cover of the column."
Do you think practice and familiarity with the new mechanics will allow them to fade into the background, or is there something about them that you expect will keep them in the forefront?
Personally, I think (or at least hope!) the new action system will make it *easier* to background the mechanics, since I won't have to remind my players that they can't 5-foot-step because they already moved, or that both those things they want to do are standard actions.
Hm, if someone earns a Hero Point for taking notes or mapping the dungeon, is that for merely promising to take notes at the beginning of the session, or is that Hero Point given out uselessly at the end of the game session?
In Warhammer 40K we had the Fate Points, and I'm told in Shadowrun (which I never played, but my husband did) you had Karma Points, and both carried over. The Hero Points are more closely related to the Fate Points I believe, only Fate Points were handed for outstanding achievements in-game. The big difference being they carried over. In both cases, to my understanding, they existed to counter the system's lethality - so they're basically butt-savers for buying rerolls or stave off death. Considering what little I've experienced of the lethality of P2 at lower level simulated encounters, I don't think they're really expendable.
As for map-keeping, snacks-handling and so, we usually see it as part of playing the game. Invariably we have someone in charge of notes, someone with book in hand to consult rules, someone on drinks duty - sometimes one of us writes session logs or their character's journal. I did for Kingmaker in fact - it's more like part of playing the game. I'd much rather Hero Points were handed out for thinking outside the box in-game, for instance, and carried over for the next session like Fate Points did. They might even serve as a good incentive for the shyest players to act more often.
Sincere question: is this an issue of having internalized the old mechanics vs explicitly working through new/unfamiliar ones?
Sincere answer: I've considered more than once that might be the issue. My group played fantasy RPG in 3.5 before Pathfinder came about and it was brought to the table as "like 3.5 but..." I suppose we may have expected P2 be "like Pathfinder but..." and we're somewhat resisting P2 because we keep comparing it to the first edition instead of seeing it as a new system.
What I'm hoping will happen is that as the system becomes familiar so will the players (and the GM) feel more at ease and focus on the narrative, as happened in systems before this. That's why I wanted to run the encounter simulations to begin with, before we tackle the AP: I wanted to get everyone familiar with the way the game is played, so when we got to the AP we could simply play it.
I noted a somewhat similar effect in my first session -- I somehow had assembled a mix of players with experience in D&D 2e, 3.5, 5e, and PF1, as well as one player who'd never done a tabletop RPG before.
And...the total newb seemed to have the easiest time picking up the action system and running with it; the experienced players were the ones explicitly commenting on the mechanics they were invoking.
Partly this was analytical -- digging into comparisons between systems -- but partly also having to catch/correct habits that don't apply here. I'm hoping both of those are learning curve or "new toy!" issues, rather than things inherent to the system?