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

Game Master Lady Ladile

Going to head towards TWF I'm guessing then? If so going Double Sawtooth's?

Anyone have major character changes or plans down the road since we'll be running through at least lvl 12?

Maria will be dumping the rest of her levels after 1-2 into Empiricist Investigator (the Int based Investigator). Pretty much she'll be a massive skill monkey, especially with int based skills.

At some point after 6th level, I'll be taking some levels in Kineticist.

I haven't really planned much out. I am planning on going with double sabres starting at 2nd level (when I get 2WF with my combat style), and I'll probably stick with ranger most or all of the way? I want to let the character develop naturally though and if something happens in game that makes me feel like a class change, or some kind of dip into another class, would be appropriate then I'm open to that.

Being a Str based melee, a dip into barbarian would be really beneficial but I don't want to do it if it's going to feel forced or artificial.

Actually... studying alchemy could make a lot of sense for the son of an assassin (and it wouldn't hurt to have a craft skill, I suppose)... if I can come up with another skill point, maybe I'll start investing in craft[alchemy] in preparation for a possible dip into brawler with the mutagenic mauler archetype?

I'm going straight warpriest. No frills here!

@Hepsubia - Okay, your chronicle is now complete and you can find it here! Let me know if anything looks amiss!

@Sylvak - Everything looks good to me. Thank you for linking to your relevant traits and such, that's a big help!

@Pete H. - It's not a requirement but if you happen to have a profile over at PFS Session Tracker please be sure to keep it updated! Doing so is a big help in keeping track of what scenarios everyone can play :)

Nothing seems wrong at first glance, I'll update my sheet ASAP

Thankies!

I'm very intrigued to see how our group meshes, both in combat and out. Two elves with Breadth of Experience is quite interesting! Who needs a bard when you have ELVES yar! (or other races that could get that feat)

I'll take a look at that tracker. I use an Excel file to do my tracking at the moment. It's nice because it's searchable, but is a bit of a pain to manage... plus obviously no one else can reasonably see it.

I'm intrigued too! We've basically had half the original cast swap out for new faces so we'll see how things go :)

And thanks re: the tracker. I'm hesitant to ever require anyone to do anything that requires making a profile and/or signing up on a website since I know plenty of people who try to keep their online presence low-key and their online distractions at a dull roar...but I have to admit that the tracker is handy and I do heartily endorse it if people are curious about trying it out.

Okay, joined and updated the tracker with what I've done.

I just found a major issue. :(

*Party hits 3rd*
The Shores of Heaven (Heaven)
The Segang Expedition (Jalmeray)
The Twisted Circle (Mana Wastes)

I've played all 3 on Standard. By that point, I'll likely have 1 GM replay available (hopefully, I have 7 done and am moving along solidly at a game every couple months).

But I'll only be able to replay one of those. :(

But the awesome news? I HAVE NOT PLAYED ANY OF THE OTHER SCENARIOS AT ALL!!!

Hmm...would you be willing to spend a replay on Shores of Heaven, then? I ask because Zithembe's player specifically requested that particular scenario for a replay and was nice enough to run it for me in return :)

The other two scenarios I can swap out; I have a list of backup options that didn't originally make the cut.

*edit* If you'd prefer to save your replay for something else, I completely understand. Though I'd hate to exclude anyone we could let you/Maria sit that one out and I could run it for the other 5 and then let you rejoin when we finish. Entirely up to you!

Naw, Shores is Cool for my replay. I hated it on the PC I played it on but that's... mainly because we 4-manned it and NONE of us were even close to being a decent fit for the mission.

Should be better with a full group and a... cough cough... WARPRIEST OF TORAG RAWR!!!!

Also, I didn't really hate it but it was a really rough run and we got jobbed on our rolls at the end.

"TOOOOORAAAAAAAAAAAG!"

I fully endorse any scenario that endorses MAXIMUM TORAG.

Awesome, thanks! I was going to wait until at least one of my former companions was in the tavern scene so I could re-introduce myself but I’ll plan to post something tomorrow either way. Also, since we haven’t started the next scenario yet can I still add something to my faction card for School of Spirits? If so, how do I do that?

Hmm...normally I would say yes *but* you've changed from Dark Archive (which you were during the actual scenario) to Grand Lodge so I can't check anything retroactively that would apply to your new faction. On the bright side, we've only done two scenarios so there should be plenty of future opportunities to check things off.

As far as how to actually do that, just tell me at the end of a scenario which task(s) you're curious about and I'll let you know if any of them can be checked off based on how the scenario went. You can only do one per scenario but if you meet the requirements for more than one of them you can pick which one to receive credit for. Some people keep a tally of this on their own profiles and others ask for a notation of it on their chronicles - either option is fine with me.

Speaking of scenarios, is everyone still on track to get started with House of Harmonious Wisdom this Sunday/Monday? :)

Yup!

Ready…

I'll keep my money so far. Just pondering whether to switch Bluff for Craft-Alchemy now or waiting till my 1 level of Alchemist

Yes :)

Yup! Ready to ROCK!!!

Oh, that's weird. The whole bar scene wasn't showing up as new posts.

You've been missing out! :P

Okay, looks like they fixed the 'can't edit campaigns' bug so I've marked some folks/aliases inactive and updated the maps link at the top of the campaign page~

Happy Thanksgiving, guys! Or Happy Thursday, if you prefer. Or both, that's cool too :)

I'll get an update shortly but given that it's a holiday for most of us please don't feel pressured to post today!

Hey guys, just popping in to say that you've not been abandoned! I just noticed that posting was/has been still pretty slow over the holiday weekend and decided to take the opportunity to largely chill a bit from PbP myself for a few days. We'll get back into the swing of things probably tomorrow or Tuesday :)

Forgot to add this part...

In other news, I finally managed to wrap up all of my Gameday games except one - which is on the last fight right now - so I should start having more time for this group and the League gang. No current plans to run any other games until my Legacy of the Stonelords table for RetroCon in January. That said, I'd definitely like to do more leshy adventures sometime next year....and then there's OutPost right after RetroCon and I'll probably run a table of something for that. Games for days months!

Something else that I'll share since it'll affect my general posting habits is that I requested to move to night shift full time and that 'officially' takes effect starting next week. Things will be a little different though in that night shift is going back to 3 12 hour shifts a week instead of 4 10s, which I'm really excited about because it means one less day of driving to-and-from work (which is about an hour & 1/2 of driving round trip) and an extra day off each week which means more time to get stuff done! My posting on my work 'days' might be a little more sparse unless things happen to be quiet but I'm hoping I can largely make up for it on my off 'days'. Guess we'll see how it goes!

3 12's at night? Idk if I could do that. Four days off is pretty sweet, don't get me wrong, but maaaaaaan! Good luck GM, hope it works out for you better than it would for me! Which I'd imagine it would since thats what you requested in the first place :P

How big of a difference does having a day job skill make? The more I think about it the more I feel like craft[alchemy] does kind of make more sense for my character than knowledge[nature], although the knowledge skill feels like it might be more useful?

I'm still not sure if I might want to dip mutagenic mauler at some point, so I guess that's a little bit of a factor too, but mostly I'm wondering (as a PFS noob) is it better to be able to make knowledge check sometimes (with a poor bonus) or day job checks (with an equally poor bonus)?

The main purpose of Day Jobs is to earn some extra cash on top of what you earn for a scenario. This can be handy if you play a character that'll need to spend lots of cash on gear and such, but of course a lot of people also work their Day Jobs into their character backgrounds too. It's a representative of what you do in your spare time when you're not out on assignment somewhere.

You can also Take 10 on Day Job checks if I remember correctly, so if you have a decent bonus and aren't the gambling type, you can at least guarantee a certain amount of extra gold each chronicle.

As far as knowledge checks, hmm...they come up with varying frequencies but most often there's the usual knowledges for monster IDs - I mostly see Arcana, Planes, Nature, and Religion. Dungeoneering can be *really* handy to have when it comes up but I haven't seen that one show up as often, at least in lower-level scenarios. History is always a good one for at least one person to have and Local comes up sometimes too. Nobility and Geography don't come up as often that I've seen and Engineering is fairly rare in my experience.

It looks like Maria has a pretty decent mod in all knowledges if you'd rather focus on a Day Job, but of course it's up to you guys if you want to put all your knowledge eggs mostly in one basket (a few of you have some duplicate knowledges) :)

My only knowledge is nature, which is a handy one for monster IDing, but my bonus is only +4 and I think Maria and Zithembe both already have it (with a higher bonus)...

Edit: that’s a lie... I also have religion but I’m definitely keeping that one (mostly for flavor)

Hepsuba can also roll all the knowledge checks, though doesn't have as high a modifier (I built Maria around knowledge skills first, then other things after).

Yes, take 10 is allowed on day jobs. But as was pointed out to me a couple months ago, the reward is built around benefiting those who take a chance and roll for it. For example, look at getting a 20 with take 10. If you do that you 20g every time, but if you roll a 15 (for 25) you get 50g which is an increase of 30g. However, if you roll a 5 (for 15) you get 10g, which is only a loss of 10. Plus... I believe you can use your re-roll on dayjobs at the end of the scenario (if you have a re-roll and it hasn't been used yet).

That said, the amount gained is usually such a small bit of gold that I only grab a day job skill if I have the skill points to spare OR if it fits the character really well. On rare occasions some day jobs will pop up in games too. And there are faction card things that can be done in lieu of a day job and sometimes chronicles options as well.

I only have a dayjob because none of my class skills synergize with my stats and I didn't have any trait space to spice it up. Fortunately, Torag is super into blacksmiths, so profession blacksmith was a great choice! :D

It's a low level potion or scroll per scenario (if you roll decently with a decent modifier).

Given this group's skill spread, the day job will probably help you more (plus Craft (alchemy) occasionally appears as a skill used to gain clues).

Zithembe has a day job because the skill he uses is a prerequisite for a feat I'll be taking. EDIT (hit submit too soon): Many people have that situation, and it makes those 'taxed' skill points a little more useful.

Thanks everyone, that's helpful stuff.

@GM- I think I am going to trade out know[nature] for craft[alchemy]. Is it too late to do that for this module? Also, is there anywhere I need to note that besides my character sheet?

Go ahead and do it after this scenario and no, just switch it out. You've got until you officially play at 2nd level for the first time to make changes, anything after that has to be retrained.

The seance link in my header leads to a spread sheet where you can make choices about what benefits you'll receive when Zithembe channels the associated spirit.

For Pete, as a Rivethun spirit channeler, Zithembe only provides the seance bonus when he's invoking the spirit (much like the spirit dancer archetype) for rounds per day and only if you're within 30 ft of Zithembe.

I'm not going to be writing up a seance every scenario, so assume that it was done each morning and if you want your character to have participated, apply the appropriate bonus when appropriate.

Zithembe, I think I've filled in the sheet correctly, but let me know if I have to change something!

This version of Sylvak has no qualms about participating in a seance (that was just part of my cover). I looked at the spreadsheet but I don’t understand what we’re supposed to be picking... you pick the spirit right? Like, if you channel the trickster we all get the trickster bonus? It looks like you’re picking specific spells/weapons/etc, is that what we’re supposed to do?

You guys pick the skill bonus for Trickster and the other spirit seance bonus for Marshall. The Marshall's seance bonus is whichever spirit you want.

Zithembe has more things to choose, which is what those other notes are about.

Got it, thanks. I believe I’m all set up now.

I know a little bit of everything-every knowledge at +4 total

I will specialize in alchemy too soon (next level)

Sooo... I think I found an issue with some of my skill calculations. I think about 5-6 of my knowledge skills will be dropping back to +7 instead of +10. I don't get K: All as class skills until I get into investigator. Not a huge difference, but it will certainly mean that I'll take better advantage of that seance boost.

Speaking of that, so we essentially chose one skill that gets a +1 and becomes a class skill as well as picking one of the other spirits to gain their bonus as well, but all that only applies while you are in your spirit dance (which is tracked in 7/7 rounds per day)?

Sort of, mostly. To get the skill boost, I have to channel the Trickster (or also select Trickster for the Marshall benefit and it will apply when I channel Marshall).

Usually, I'm channeling Champion which grants +2 to non-spell damage.

But you're right on 7 rounds per day (plus I can get 4 back by sacrificing Influence for a maximum of 12 back per day).

For all y'all phone posters, I almost exclusively post from my computer. If you include a note with clear expectations about where you want your token to be, I have no problem with moving it!

Ditto.

Thanks!

Yeah, I'm sorry if my earlier post seemed overly harsh - as I said, I've had this come up a few times recently in other GM games too and it gets frustrating to have to retcon combat rounds and such because people aren't where I thought they were. For those who largely mobile post, just try to be fairly descriptive/detailed about where you'd like to go - or not, if you just want to go in a general direction - and one of us will do our best to move you where you want to go.

Either way, it's all good and we'll keep it sorted :)

Semi-phonetically, probably.

Ah gah ih.
Wha dya wan?
Jus shoo da bir!

Those examples are really helpful, thanks Z!

Hey, folks.

It is with a heavy heart that I think it's time to take leave of this group.

I just don't have the bandwidth for Pathfinder PbP at this stage of my life.

I wish you all the best!!

I completely understand, best wishes!!!