The Flaxseed Pathfinder Lodge: Explore, Report, Cooperate!

Game Master Redelia

Our Mysterious Benefactor wrote:

Has anyone heard anything from Steven_Evil? He's in my game and he's been MIA for a while. I'd like to find out if he's okay. He runs under GM Evil.

He's probably OK, he's gone MIA a few times now - pops up later alive and well though :)

He is missing from a (non-PFS) game I run as well. I will say that one time when he before, he disappeared was dealing with a medical condition that crops up sometimes unexpectedly. Not going to say more since that's his business, but my hope is that he'll be back soon and well!

Thanks for sharing what you could, Norv. Hope he's well and back with us soon.

Thanks for sharing what you could, Norv. Hope he's well and back with us soon.

Likewise. He's a good player, and I enjoyed being at a table with him. The last messages were a real bummer and I keep hoping he will pop up sooner rather than later.. if nothing else, to let us know he's still kicking!

★ - PARTIAL SITE OUTAGE ANNOUNCEMENT - ★

Hey all, GM Hmm here. There’s been a crazy site outage going on for most Paizo users. For some reason I can get in while connected to mobile, so I’m just letting you know what is going on. If you can get in, and you're wondering why things have suddenly gone quiet in your games, that's why!

Thanks for your patience!

Hmm

★ - PARTIAL SITE OUTAGE ANNOUNCEMENT - ★

Hey all, GM Hmm here. There’s been a crazy site outage going on for most Paizo users. For some reason I can get in while connected to mobile, so I’m just letting you know what is going on. If you can get in, and you're wondering why things have suddenly gone quiet in your games, that's why!

Thanks for your patience!

Hmm

Yeah, it's weird... I can hit it from my phone (but only when my phone is not hooked to wireless)...can't hit it from my iPad or my PC...

We're back up! Huzzah!

Hmm

I also only had luck last night using a new computer with a VPN to pretend I was somewhere else in the world. Phone has worked sometimes when my computer does not, but not last night.

Do we know if anyone from Paizo has info? Usually when the boards go down, the rest of the site is available, but not this time. It seems to me to be a bad DNS record or something, and not necessarily servers. I am wondering if it is worth moving my games somewhere else for a while, but I hate to do so because I prefer this site to anything else I have tried.

I would imagine this is hurting business, too. I tried a few product links yesterday and they all simply spin as well.

But I seem connected now :)

They have said in a thread on the website feedback forum that they're working on a website overhaul that "shouldn't effect regular website usage" but I have to believe that's not true after all this.

Some sort of official statement would go a long way to setting people at ease at least. At this point I'm staring at a paizo loading screen more often than not.

I just keep getting TCP RST errors on my PC (using Brave, Edge AND Chrome). LTE on my smartphone usually works, but not wifi.

Latest update from Paizo's Director of Technology.

Let's all cross our fingers that the fixes they pushed through today hold. Why? Because we need to look towards the Future!

Announcing Play-by-Post Gameday VI!
(August 25th - November 11th!)

Follow the link to find out how to signup and participate!

Hmm
(Cross-posted in Recruitment too!)

I'm thinking of GMing my first PbP game as part of the second session of Gameday VI. I'm a little nervous about my roleplay abilities for a large number of NPCs, so I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions for a fun little scenario that is little more combat based? Something along the lines of 'Hall of the Flesheaters' maybe.

I'll wait and see if Paizo manages to get the forums stabilized before signing up for anything (to GM or play).

I'm thinking of GMing my first PbP game as part of the second session of Gameday VI. I'm a little nervous about my roleplay abilities for a large number of NPCs, so I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions for a fun little scenario that is little more combat based? Something along the lines of 'Hall of the Flesheaters' maybe.

My first recommendation to prospective GMs comfortable with combat is always master of the fallen fortress.

Any evergreen is always a good place to start - especially after you've played them.

Shieldbug: Mists of Mwangi, Voice in the Void, Penumbral Accords are all relatively light on the RP end of things-- just kinda dungeon museum crawls. Best of luck with your GMing foray. :)

General toss-out to the community for PBP Gameday: I'd like to pick up #8-02: Ward Asunder with a 7th level wizard of mine, and a fellow PC friend who's also level 7, but GM Fuzzfoot's table is a) full except for waitlists, and b) looks like it's shaping up to be low-tier. Anyone interested in running a second table of Ward Asunder at high tier, with two spots reserved on it? I'd be willing to run a (regular) scenario of your choosing if so! (i.e., not the special, I'm hoping to play that one first)

Seconded especially on Mists of Mwangi! I LOVE that scenario. It's a great fun romp and a good way to kick off your GMing career!

General toss-out to the community for PBP Gameday: I'd like to pick up #8-02: Ward Asunder with a 7th level wizard of mine, and a fellow PC friend who's also level 7, but GM Fuzzfoot's table is a) full except for waitlists, and b) looks like it's shaping up to be low-tier. Anyone interested in running a second table of Ward Asunder at high tier, with two spots reserved on it? I'd be willing to run a (regular) scenario of your choosing if so! (i.e., not the special, I'm hoping to play that one first)

I'll take you up on that offer- I'm on the waitlist for that and was choosing between my level 3 and 6 characters. If I don't get a chance to play it, I may as well GM it!

dien wrote:

General toss-out to the community for PBP Gameday: I'd like to pick up #8-02: Ward Asunder with a 7th level wizard of mine, and a fellow PC friend who's also level 7, but GM Fuzzfoot's table is a) full except for waitlists, and b) looks like it's shaping up to be low-tier. Anyone interested in running a second table of Ward Asunder at high tier, with two spots reserved on it? I'd be willing to run a (regular) scenario of your choosing if so! (i.e., not the special, I'm hoping to play that one first)

I'll take you up on that offer- I'm on the waitlist for that and was choosing between my level 3 and 6 characters. If I don't get a chance to play it, I may as well GM it!

Sounds good! Is there a scenario you want in turn? I've previously GM'd Ward Asunder myself, but I suppose I COULD GM it again, haha (if you still wanted it). ...then there'd be three tables of it. But I'm wide open as to any other scenarios you may have a hankering for, for Gameday.

If I have a character I want to rebuild per the level 1 rebuild rules, but I've posted more than 10 times, am I SOL as far as changing the character name? Normally it wouldn't matter, but I intend on using the character for PbP games.

You could create an alias to use for the PFS character. Doesn't have to be the actual character alias posting to play in a PbP game.

However, you're going to have to tell the person reporting for you character that it will say the wrong name, because your PFS character alias's name will come up every time they report you (and it will be the same for any game, not just PbP). Just need to tell them to report it anyway.

Also, I don't know if Customer Service can help out with that or not.

Thanks for the suggestions! I'll look into the Fallen Fortress and Mists of Mwangi and see how things go.

@Gummy Bear: I've looked into that myself in the past and it seems that names are only changed in exceptional circumstances. However, the alias thing might work ;)

I've wondered about aliases versus PFS characters. It seems that once you've used a PFS character for 10 posts, the name is forever attached to that number. But I don't know if the same holds true if you use an alias instead.

Here's what I know:
> Create character > post 10x with character => name stuck
> Create character > play at a table first => name not stuck (though the original name will show up for that table game)
> Create character > create alias > post 10x with that alias => ???

-Posted with Wayfinder

With either if you post 10 times the name is stuck. The main difference is that with PFS it is designed to assign a number to the character strictly for PFS purposes.

Aliases are more for campaigns or characters playing in a module that doesn't necessarily need a PFS character.

I made the same mistake assigning my GM to a PFS #, not knowing about aliases. It doesn't really mess anything up except for your # sequence for PFS.

So, one of my groups has come across a discrepancy in what players are being taught: How do Animal Companion/Eidolon/Phantom Hit Dice work?

My understanding was always that (Constitution and other modifiers aside) they're calculated the same way as PCs' HD - the full die at 1st level, 'half+1' at every level thereafter - but now I'm with a couple of people who say it's 'half, rounded down,' even for the first HD. What's going on?

So, one of my groups has come across a discrepancy in what players are being taught: How do Animal Companion/Eidolon/Phantom Hit Dice work?

My understanding was always that (Constitution and other modifiers aside) they're calculated the same way as PCs' HD - the full die at 1st level, 'half+1' at every level thereafter - but now I'm with a couple of people who say it's 'half, rounded down,' even for the first HD. What's going on?

Here is your official answer.

According to the FAQ, you get average hit points. For d8 Animal Companions, that's 4.5 HP per die. Also note you round down AFTER adding the HP, not before (so a 2 HD animal has 9 HP, not 8 HP)

How do I determine hit points for my animal companion, eidolon or other companion creature with a listed number of Hit Dice?

Companion creatures receive the average result on each Hit Dice. For example, animal companions have d8 Hit Dice, which has an average of 4.5. Multiply 4.5 by the number of Hit Dice your animal companion has and round down to determine how many hit points it receives from its Hit Dice. Next, add in appropriate bonuses from its Constitution modifier, feats, and so on.

Speaking of which, I need to nerf my eidolon slightly...

They do not get full. nor half+1.

How do I determine hit points for my animal companion, eidolon or other companion creature with a listed number of Hit Dice?

Companion creatures receive the average result on each Hit Dice. For example, animal companions have d8 Hit Dice, which has an average of 4.5. Multiply 4.5 by the number of Hit Dice your animal companion has and round down to determine how many hit points it receives from its Hit Dice. Next, add in appropriate bonuses from its Constitution modifier, feats, and so on.

Ninja'd!

This is very new. Is it retroactive?

It is not that new.

As for retroactive: it is the way it should be calculated. If your friends have used another method (and it is PFS) they should recalculate the hit points immediately.

I can see why people think it's new, but if you look at the dates on the Organized Play FAQ they all got updated to March 13, 2017 because they redid the section.

Thread from 2011 about the FAQ

I never heard a thing about this. I can put up with the not getting the full die at first, but why can't they do a simpler progression otherwise rather than having to fiddle with decimals every level?

I think, after creation, it'd be easy to handle, wouldn't it? Couldn't you just alternate between taking a 4 or a 5 for your companion's health?

If simplicity was what they were after, they would use the same rules as pc's except that you don't get full hp at first level. As an example, an animal companion with a D8 hit die would just get 5 every level. That way the two systems are the same except for first level.

I think, after creation, it'd be easy to handle, wouldn't it? Couldn't you just alternate between taking a 4 or a 5 for your companion's health?

At a practical level, that is what you do--and how I do it, personally.

If simplicity was what they were after, they would use the same rules as pc's except that you don't get full hp at first level. As an example, an animal companion with a D8 hit die would just get 5 every level. That way the two systems are the same except for first level.

That's what I'm talking about.

Hello Flaxseed GMs --

If you are playing or GMing in a PFS PbP campaign right now, please spread news of the Free RPG Day Replay boon and the follow up post by John Compton.

In a moment of awesomeness, Compton opened this up to everyone in online play who in a game tomorrow. Anyone who is playing in a PFS game on PbP Post Gameday will earn a boon for one free replay of a free RPG day scenario. GMs, Players, everyone. Only one per participant!

Remember that we do not earn the Tome of First Contact boon (that's reserved for those playing in participating stores) and that we only earn these boons when we complete our scenarios!

Thank you so much!

Hmm

PS If you play PBP in other venues, please boost the signal of this announcement and post about it there! Thank you!

Thanks, Hmm.
Just noticed the blog post myself, and I was about to ask if PbP is included.
You are so, so on top of things!
Thanks for all you do to keep the PbP community informed.
Larry Smith

Hello Flaxseed GMs --

If you are playing or GMing in a PFS PbP campaign right now, please spread news of the Free RPG Day Replay boon and the follow up post by John Compton.

I'm a little confused; where do we download this Boon from, and is there any trick to doing so? How many are there? Do we really just need to be presently playing a PbP game on here right now? I'm in a whole bunch.

Try this

And correct, just need to be in a session to get the boon, but you get the Free Replay Day boon, but not the First Contact one.

Try this

Seemed to work; thanks.

I expect you will need to get the GM for the session to sign off for it and you are only allowed one boon, not one boon per game.

I'm going to be running pfs at a local game shop tomorrow... I've heard there is a boon for first time pfs players to apply to their first character... where do I find this boon to give to the newbies? or is it all a myth? thanks for your time...

There is, and it is available through your area venture team.

Contact your VA/VL/VC, who may be able to provide you one.

Is the venue covered under your RSP (regional support package)?

I will reach out to my vc, but I have no idea what an rsp is or if the venue is covered... I suppose the vc will, and I will ask him about that.. thanks Shifty.

Rsp is amazing - if you run an open game in a public venue :)

Has there been any talk of getting RSP for Flaxseed?

Has there been any talk of getting RSP for Flaxseed?

There was some time back, around march or so - don't think it got progressed.

Does anyone know anything about the new book that just came out? Is it any good? Does it have any new classes? pfs legal? Thanks

Does anyone know anything about the new book that just came out? Is it any good? Does it have any new classes? pfs legal? Thanks

Lots of new books come out. If you are referring to First Contact it just mentions a few Starfinder rules, a couple of class abilities that will be in the Core book, and has some sample monsters including a couple of PC races that are not in the Core Starfinder race so won't be SFS legal. Not right away anyway. Since one of them is large I doubt they will be legal at all without a boon.