Alcohol Addiction DC 12?

I’m on my first read through of the addiction rules in the GMG. If I’m understanding this correctly every time a character takes a dose of alcohol they make a DC 12 Fort Save to avoid addiction. Assuming no Con penalty every first level PC has at least a +3 Fort Save, which means they have a 60% chance to avoid addiction on each check, but that also means that every time that PC downs a drink there’s a 40% chance of addiction, which seems absolutely insane.

Fortunately the Commoner and the Noble in the NPC gallery both have a +6 Fort, so they only have a 25% chance of becoming addicted every time they take a drink.

The system seems sound in general, but the addiction DC for alcohol looks way too high to me.

That's just because you're accustomed to that watered down swill that blasphemers against Cayden claim is "good alcohol."

Now, if you want the real stuff, then ya' gotta contend with the consequences.

First you have to fail a Save to even be affected by the Alcohol. Then you have to fail a second Save to become addicted. It also doesn't specify dosing, so a GM would be perfectly reasonable saying that a single mug of ale can't get you drunk or addicted.

That's just because you're accustomed to that watered down swill that blasphemers against Cayden claim is "good alcohol."

Good answer.

First you have to fail a Save to even be affected by the Alcohol. Then you have to fail a second Save to become addicted.

You are explicitly allowed to voluntarily fail the initial save, though.

It also doesn't specify dosing,

You’re right that it doesn’t specify dose, but it does state that the price is “1 cp or more” per dose, and state that the only way to move from one stage to the next is to “consume more alcohol,” so I think it’s pretty clear that the intended dose is one drink.

so a GM would be perfectly reasonable saying that a single mug of ale can't get you drunk or addicted.

I think the idea is pretty clearly that a single mug of ale can get you to Stage 1, which is that sweet +1 item bonus to saves against fear effects. A 40% chance to become addicted from that single mug seems a little silly.

Aratorin wrote:

First you have to fail a Save to even be affected by the Alcohol. Then you have to fail a second Save to become addicted.

You are explicitly allowed to voluntarily fail the initial save, though.

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It also doesn't specify dosing,

You’re right that it doesn’t specify dose, but it does state that the price is “1 cp or more” per dose, and state that the only way to move from one stage to the next is to “consume more alcohol,” so I think it’s pretty clear that the intended dose is one drink.

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so a GM would be perfectly reasonable saying that a single mug of ale can't get you drunk or addicted.

I think the idea is pretty clearly that a single mug of ale can get you to Stage 1, which is that sweet +1 item bonus to saves against fear effects. A 40% chance to become addicted from that single mug seems a little silly.

But that's only a 40% chance if you intentionally fail the save to get drunk. This seems like a perfectly acceptable balance to prevent players from constantly abusing alcohol to get the bonuses.

On the topic of alcohol, I recently ran a quick one shot for some friends while on vacation and, of course, the heathens wanted to immediately get tanked before venturing off to murderhobo a dungeon. The issue was, I started them at level 5 leaving the lowest fort save of the bunch at +11.

I know 1e had a rule about poison dcs going up with multiple exposures, but as far as I can tell that didn't continue into 2e. The only info I have found so far is on p458 of crb and the section on addiction on gmg.

Is it raw that pcs of a high enough level (which doest seem to be all the high) could drink enough booze to effectively replace all liquid in there body and be just fine?

I just house ruled that they got what they wanted and stumbled through the dungeon thoroughly intoxicated. The rules seem super lax on binge drinking to the point that I question why there are rule on it at all? Was there something I missed?

You could add stronger brews, likely Dwarfish or Orcish.

There are some characters who've lamented being unable to get drunk, like those with high metabolisms. Flash and Captain America come to mind, with the latter being within Pathfinder bounds I'd presume.
Or there are those in the fantasy genre like Conan who gets drunk, but remains highly functional (and cunning) except if drugged.

I believe addictions have a line somewhere about characters being able to willingly fail one's save, if getting drunk's their intent. More doses only matter if they've failed their save; then they get bumped to the next Stage of effect.

The cheap stuff is probably lower than 5% alcohol by volume, hence the low DC when compared to PC saves. Give them the harder stuff and increase the DC, the item is just a baseline and you can easily adjust it to match the pcs.

On the subject of alcohol, while on vacation, I ran a quick one shot for some friends, and the heathens, of course, wanted to get tanked right away before venturing off to murderhobo a dungeon.

On the subject of alcohol, while on vacation, I ran a quick one shot for some friends, and the heathens, of course, wanted to get tanked right away before venturing off to murderhobo a dungeon. The issue was that I had started them at level 3, giving them the lowest fort save of the group at +7. Is it true that people at a high enough level (which does not appear to be all that high) can drink enough alcohol to effectively replace all liquid in their bodies and still be fine? Being the person who sent everyone to rehab for alcoholics doesn't feel like it, but how else could it be done?

The DC should probably start lower and increase with every drink, or increase with each day of abuse. A flat DC does mean that high level characters are immune while low level characters are filling the seats of every 12-step program out there.