GM Ladile's TL;DR: A Pathfinder Society Campaign

Game Master Lady Ladile

I agree with the others, I don't mind waiting things out to keep things in the forum.

Oh, and I'll have Tupp's purchases up later today. Although I just found out I can't get a potion of expeditious retreat, which is a bummer for a slow poke like Tupp.

Don't worry, Ylva can carry you. ;)

Reading between the lines in their tweets, it was a hardware problem. Although the site upgrade they did earlier in the month came with a good share of bugs.

If you buy a wand, one of us could use it on you, Tupp.

Is the site back up yet...?

YES!!

I'm just getting back home after dropping my kid off to start her freshman year of college, and have been out-of-the-loop. I would have let you know, but the site was down yet again.

I'm hapoy to keep playing here for now, but if we do hit another extended outage, we might want to look seriously at moving to another site.

Might have to take you up on that offer Ylva. I wonder how far you could toss the little guy if we need to quickly cross another river. :)

I thought about a wand because I love that spell so much, Zithembe, but I was more thinking of emergency situations like with getting to the minotaur before he killed Janira. A wand might be too slow, but I have wrist sheaths that let me retrieve a potion as a swift action and was thinking of what to put in them. Feather step will be one so that difficult terrain would be less of a problem, but I was hoping for a speed boost too. Is there a potion that negate armour encumbrance, maybe?

No worries Theo! As you can see, you've not missed a great deal. Since it looks like most of us have checked in I might start some initial posting for School of Spirits later today; since it takes place within Absalom anyone who hasn't had a good chance to consider purchases will still have time and the means to buy stuff :)

Hey y'all, I posted a playtest for a setting I'm working on. If you're interested in seeing how GURPS works, give it a read.

Sounds good to me Ladile! And here are my purchases. :)

Purchases:
Potion of Feather Step (50gp)
Potion of Cure Light Wounds (50gp)
Wayfinder (1 PP)

Money Left: 627 - 100 = 527gp
Prestige Left: 2 - 1 = 1 PP

Gonna spend 2PP on a Wand of Cure Light Wounds. Not gonna tell anyone what to do with their Prestige, but having a couple of these bad boys floating around could be really useful in a clutch situation! I'm also happy to use someone else's consumables, so feel free to grab those wands/scrolls for me to cast on you!

No gp spent at this point in time. Will likely buy scrolls with it at some point.

Ha! I totally forgot that I have a wand of CLW and that I'm actually able to use it myself, so I'll be putting the wand in the wrist sheath and will change my shopping list to...

Purchases:
Potion of Feather Step (50gp)
Wayfinder (1 PP)

Money Left: 627 - 50= 577gp
Prestige Left: 2 - 1 = 1 PP

Thanks for the reminder Kiango! :)

Hey guys, just checking in to say that your purchases have been noted and I've not forgotten you! Work has kept me busy the last couple of days but I will get us rolling within the next day or two. I'll also give Sylvak's player a nudge to make sure he knows the site is up again (and that we're about to start on the next scenario).

Sorry for my slow return! and thanks for the nudge

As the outages dragged on I was checking the boards less and less, and I think maybe I was just unlucky while they were working intermittently because I was always checking while they were down (or, worse, writing a post and then having it go down before I got to actually post it). Now that everything seems stable again I should be back to regular posting as soon as I read through all my backlog and get caught up.

I plan to get Theo's purchases together later tonight, and will post when I get to it.

just realized that I never did roll for Ylva's day job.

Perform (Sing): 1d20 + 7 ⇒ (5) + 7 = 12

Edit: Well I just found something else that's far more embarrassing. I apparently never added in that free +2 to one ability that humans get. As tempting as it was to just put it in CON, I added it to STR. She should be able to hit stuff a little harder now. Stats have been updated and purchases have been noted.

Moving this here so as to not clutter up the game thread.

Honestly, I like that there's some fiction between members of our team. It gives us something to work out through the scenarios. As far as Ylva is concerned, anyone doing anything with spirits is dabbling in things better left alone. :)

Fiction or friction?

I don't mind it narratively.

I will say, though, as a player, having half the team or more not taking advantage of the core feature of my class is a little discouraging.

I meant friction.

And I hadn't thought of it from a player's perspective. I've mainly been focusing on things as a writer would.

But now that I know it's frustrating to you as a player, would it be possible for Zithembe to talk with Ylva? I think if he explained it to her and showed her that he wasn't doing what she thought he was, then she'd be more willing to take part in it.

Sylvak could be convinced too... he’s from Irrisen, so he has a lot of hangups about anything that seems like witchcraft (which I recognize is ironic), but he’ll come around eventually...

And J...well, J has her own reasons for the mixed response she gave ;)

Sorry for disappearing! The site wasn't showing any activity on this campaign, and I thought we were on hold: The GM had to PM me on Facebook to get my attention!

I'll do my best to read through the backlog on my lunch hour today.

One other thing...

My wife and I are leaving Friday for vacation. We are traveling internationally, so data usage will be at a premium. I'll most likely be out-of-touch from 9/21 through 9/29.

By the way, I pinged Theodric's player who apparently wasn't getting post notifications for this game! I'm going to go ahead and advance us a little bit more but they said they'd hopefully be able to get caught up and check in later today.

*edit* Ninja'd by Theodric himself! And no worries; catch up when you can and thanks for the heads up about your vacation :)

I am spending 180 GP to buy that CL3 wand of burning hands with 4 charges from the Chronicle sheet.

Also buying 1 potion of cure light wounds for 50 gp.

That should bring his treasure to: 201 gp.

This was Theo's first adventure, so he gets a wayfinder for free.

For clarification: it has to be the first time you the player have ever received that chronicle, which I have no idea if that's Haladir's case or not, just trying to avoid propagating word-of-mouth errors.

Thanks for the clarification! And, yes, it still applied.

(This was my fourth PFS scenario, ever.)

Non-Lethal damage is not healed double. Healing cures an equal amount of lethal and non-lethal damage, thus sometimes getting double the bang for the buck, but it is not healed double simply on its own.

Well, shoot... I guess I got a little messed up with the whe double bang for your buck part. Thanks for setting me straight! :)

Out of time for tonight; will try and get a post in before work tomorrow morning!

Hooboy, Ylva is gonna be feeling that one. :)

Sorry for being slow to post (again), super hectic week with grad school.

No worries Sylvak. I know Theodric's player is on vacation and Tupp's player has also been a bit busy as of late as well.

@Zithembe- sorry if that last post crossed a line, I'm still looking for the right balance between RPing my character with his superstitious distrusts and sense of kinship with Ylva and being a good teammate. I'll try to dial it back a notch or two.

Apology appreciated.

The two factors that made it feel personal/OOC are: all the negativity has been directed at Zithembe, at least from my perspective (and we're egocentric creatures, so I could have missed other comments), and the comments are inside thought bubbles and thus not able to be interacted/addressed in character.

Well, for whatever it’s worth, I certainly didn’t mean it as a personal/ooc comment! Sylvak’s superstitious misgivings are directed at your character because he employs (at least from Sylvak’s understanding) association with non-god otherworldly entities and having grown up in fear of evil-fey tyrants that doesn’t sit well with him. The more personal gripe he made about your character seemed like a logical consequence of distrusting Zithembe and having a growing bond with Ylva (like, he would feel protective of his fellow northerner, and predisposed to not giving the medium the benefit of the doubt about his motive for rebuking her). It was in a thought bubble because Sylvak’s fairly non-confrontational (again, related to growing up under constant threat).

Honestly, I still think his thought makes sense from a purely RP perspective, but I also recognize that this isn’t all about my RPing, it’s about all of us having fun together and I’m happy to tone down that tension/friction for the sake of everyone else’s enjoyment.

Same here, and Zith's rebuke of Ylva is going to have her questioning some things.

As far as her reasons, she grew up among family and clansmen that have stories of witches and their sordid practices that ensnare the spirits of the dead and tales of the fey that live in Grungir, which was practically her back yard.

As for why she blew her top after dealing with the Qadarians, well, you'll find that out the next time we rest up.

Kiango likes Zithembe! :D

EDIT: As part of the campaign part of our PFS campaign, what if we had an "around the campfire" moment between this session and next? Our characters probably all have a decent amount of emotions and thoughts to unpack and sort through with each other.

^We can absolutely have intermission moments between scenarios! In fact, it'd probably work out pretty well to have maybe a few days (or a week at most) downtime after each scenario to make sure everyone has plenty of time to level up (if need be), make purchases, and interact with each other if they like - or just to take a short breather. And that'd give me a little extra time for scenario prep as well.

Hi, folks.

I'm back from vacation, and am now about to read through 50+ posts to figure out what's happening.

Welcome back!

Haven't forgotten you guys! I'm working today and we're also getting a new student so I'm going to wait until I get home tonight before posting an update here.

Apologies for the extended delay; finally have a post for you guys!

So, I have my own thoughts on the matter but I'm curious - do folks prefer for me to just tell you what sorts of magical items you come across (sans anything truly powerful or unique; I'd still make you roll for those) or would you rather me make you roll Spellcraft and/or Perception (for potions) on everything? Truth be told, I have personally seen it handled both ways during my time playing PFS and a quick forum search doesn't really pull anything useful up besides this old thread.

While I'm personally somewhat inclined to agree with this post and the one immediately following it, I can also see the arguments for making Spellcraft mandatory for item identification - especially in the case of not penalizing players who actually invest points into the skill. I'm happy to go either way and I'm primarily soliciting feedback on this so I can make a firm decision one way or the other and thus increase consistency in my games going forward.

Thoughts?

I'm inclined to say that easily identifiable items can be automatic, giving credit to those PCs who would be able to identify them with a take 10 or something. Anything harder or unique would need rolls.

I think Tupp's suggestion is fair. From personal experience, it is reeeaallllyyy lame when my spellcraft master doesn't get to roll for items. That said, after a certain point I feel like basic items should be obvious to identify (assuming the party has been investing into spellcraft).

Assuming a take ten and giving credit to the character for the identification, but having them actually roll when a take ten wouldn't make it seems like a nice balance to me. It is a little meta, but I think our group isn't going to abuse what little bit of information that gives us :P

EDIT: Now THIS is some purely meta thinking. We just landed a wand of lesser restore. IMO, those are crazy valuable. Since we all plan on gaming together, I suggest we take advantage of how PFS works and each buy the wand.

I use a few techniques both in PbP and face to face:

1. If someone gave it to you, no identification required.
2. If it was labeled, no identification required.
3. If it can be identified by a competent wizard taking 10 (16+1/APL), no identification needed (unless the scenario makes it clear that a roll is required).

If none of the above, cast detect magic and roll Spellcraft.

Then, if they fail, it functions by use, and they use it (e.g. ring if protection), I tell them without a roll so that I don't need to remeber their AC is 1 higher.

In PbP I'm definitely a proponent of telling the PCs what they know by taking 10 without asking/waiting for them to roll (just for the sake of expediency). Sometimes I forgo that (like in our RotRL where the skill rolls are the only thing going on right now) but it seems like a good general practice, and you can just credit the player or players who know the info like Kiango said.

Thanks for the feedback, guys! I also asked this same question of my other long-term PFS group and their opinions and suggestions are largely the same as what I'm reading here. Not to mention one of them pointed out that sometimes successfully identifying items can be a goal found on Faction Journal cards and I definitely don't want to short anyone on something like that.

Taking the feedback and what Zithembe mentioned as their own method for handling things, I'm thinking of the following:

(1) No ID required if someone gives you the item.
(2) No ID required if you find something labeled.
(3) No ID required for really common/low-level items like CLW potions.
(4) Automatic ID if someone in the party can achieve success with Take 10.
(5) Detect Magic + Spellcraft required for all other cases.

Does that make sense and seem fair to everyone?

One vote for me!

It occurs to me that it'd probably be a good idea for us to set up a general SOP for 'dungeons' and the like, especially since we've got one rogue and at least one PC who has natural darkvision. So go ahead and give me some general marching orders for the following formations:

Single File
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
(6) Kiango
(7)

Two by Two
(1) - (2)
(3) - (4)
(5) - (6) Kiango
(7)

It'll also help if you guys work out how you want to scout, which can be independent of the above marching orders. I can also assume that, provided there's no danger and time permits, you'll all be Taking 10/Taking 20 on Perception checks as you move?

*edited to account for Kiango's post below*

I'd like to be in the middle back. 6 seems great to me in single file and 5/6 in two by two, but as long as I'm somewhere not up front I'll be ok.

I will not be scouting unless I'm secretly the bait ;)

Zithembe can be slot (1) unless Hepsubia is scouting ahead.