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Game Master Redelia

Hi all. I posted this in Advice but haven't gotten any responses, so thought I'd try posting it here since it's (distantly) PFS-related...

In a couple of weeks I'm going to be running a one-off game for a group of complete beginners: creative arts therapists who are interested in incorporating RPGs in their work, in fact. Because they have almost no experience with RPGs but a fair amount of experience with roleplaying in other contexts, I'd like to run something that leans more heavily on roleplaying than combat mechanics. So I'm looking for recommendations! I assume a PFS scenario will be best since those are meant to be played in one sitting, but I'm open to other formats.

I am tempted to run The Confirmation, but I feel that it's a little mechanics/combat-heavy; since they're totally new I'm not sure that they'd "get" We Be Goblins (I could be wrong!). To give you a sense of what I'm looking for, if we had more time I'd probably run "Murder's Mark" for them.

Currently considering:
Scars of the Third Crusade
Night March of Kalkamedes (fun concept, but a bit mechanics heavy?)
The Confirmation

...bonus points if you have recs from PFS seasons 4-6, since I own all of those thanks to Humble Bundles!

Any of the "cocktail party" scenarios will have lots of Roleplay and less mechanics generally.

Season 5 has the Hellknight's Feast (05-03). Season 4 has 04-09 The Blakros Matrimony and there are others. see if those don't get the RP flavor you are looking for.

Library of the Lion seems to be combat light from memory. I read it prepping to run it, but never did.

What about one of the quests? Silverhex or Phantom Phenomena or Honor's Echo or House of Harmonious Wisdom?

Library of the Lion would be good, or my personal favorite, The Overflow Archives.

Stolen Heir is practically combat free, if the players are willing to talk, and pretty rules simple.

Library of the Lion is pretty combat light, but also not a lot of roleplay due to the research mechanic. I'd second the suggestions of the Dinner Party scenarios (Blakros Matrimony and Hellknight's Feast).

The Disappeared (#4-11) is a Mission Impossible type scenario, with a bit of combat but several places where creative thinking and roleplay come into play.

Bid-for-Alabastrine is a season 7 scenario. There is basically 1 fight in the beginning and then it's all skill checks and roleplaying.

Library of the Lion is pretty combat light, but also not a lot of roleplay due to the research mechanic. I'd second the suggestions of the Dinner Party scenarios (Blakros Matrimony and Hellknight's Feast).

The Disappeared (#4-11) is a Mission Impossible type scenario, with a bit of combat but several places where creative thinking and roleplay come into play.

The Disappeared was my first thought as well! Probably my favorite scenario ever.

Are you running this as an “official” PFS event?

If not, I would second (third?) Hellknight's Feast, and turn down the opposition and influence DCs significantly.

If yes, and you need something for first level PCs, I would run Overflow Archives or #6-22 Out of Anarchy

I loooved running Out of Anarchy (not necessarily prepping it) and I note you are an experienced GM, Norv.

I can't remember the title, but there is an old one where your group has to infiltrate a party at (I think) the Chelish embassy. That would could easily be piles of role play and iirc the fighting could be avoided if clever. (We were not clever).

I can't remember the title, but there is an old one where your group has to infiltrate a party at (I think) the Chelish embassy. That would could easily be piles of role play and iirc the fighting could be avoided if clever. (We were not clever).

That was 'The Disappeared' :-)

All PFS Mods will be "mechanics heavy." Just things like the social ones can be handled by the GM and combat ones need the players knowing what they can do.

If you want to do "PFS lite" run something like Gallows of Madness in "Campaign Mode" You can still get PFS credit, but you don't have to do everything by the book.

Thanks for the recommendations, all! And yeah, it's not officially PFS, so no need for it only to be scenarios--I just know that scenarios are designed to be done in one sitting, so I thought they might be easy to mine for good options. I'm reading through the suggestions now!

I was gonna throw a suggestion for Murder on the Throaty Mermaid, but you'd need to have them have "Factions" on that one. But consider it! Its my favorite rules-lite scenario.

Bid-for-Alabastrine is a season 7 scenario. There is basically 1 fight in the beginning and then it's all skill checks and roleplaying.

+1 to that. I've played it at a con last year, it was interesting.

I have a level 1 CORE fighter that I'm thinking of converting to a "regular" fighter so that I can take advantage of some of the rules in the recent Weapon/Armor-Master's Handbooks.

I don't think I need to do anything special, right? Since she's level 1, I can just rebuild her for free, and I don't need to do anything else special to play her in Classic versions of scenarios, right?

Is there any particular record-keeping that needs to be done to note the change?

I don't know what you mean by rebuild, though. I don't think you can change up the character without retraining. You just have access to non-core things going forward. Can someone verify?

Before a character plays at level 2, rebuilds are free.

I don't know what you mean by rebuild, though. I don't think you can change up the character without retrainin

"Rebuilding" and "retraining" are not synonyms in Pathfinder. Rebuilding is what 1st level (and playtest) characters do. Retraining is what higher level PCs do. Check page 36 of the Guide for more info.

miteke wrote:

I don't know what you mean by rebuild, though. I don't think you can change up the character without retrainin

"Rebuilding" and "retraining" are not synonyms in Pathfinder. Rebuilding is what 1st level (and playtest) characters do. Retraining is what higher level PCs do. Check page 36 of the Guide for more info.

Right. I'm saying I don't think you can rebuild a core character after 1st level even if if it becomes a standard/classic character. You could retrain though.

It was a level 1 character being discussed.

It was a level 1 character being discussed.

And the "legality" of the rebuild was never in question. The question was simply whether there was any record-keeping required to document the move from CORE to Classic.

As soon as you receive a classic chronicle, you are a classic character. That's pretty much all the documentation you need.

Ok.. I have not seen this anywhere else so I am going to put it here.

I have been having a lot of computer problems, but I can't tell if this is something wrong with my laptop or if the site has been screwy again. Lately, I have been getting random log outs both on here and on my cell phone internet. Not too big an issue just annoying.

The big issue is that I will be logged on and posting, and the site kinda "hiccups" and either doesn't post, kicks me back to a login or the main page, or will kick me out all together and give me the site maintenance page.

This last happened last night from around 0230-0500 (ish Central Standard time, US). Then I log in today, and there are posts that are time stamped during the time that I couldn't log in. Last night, the site was not reachable from either my laptop or my phone, but the Down for Everyone website was reporting normal operations for Paizo during this time.

Hypothesis: 1) something screwy with my computer that is hijacking pages and substituting others. I had a virus like this last year, and I am really hoping and praying this is not the case.. it was a real (&^$#&*( to get rid of the first time.

2) Rolling black outs again, akin to what was going on slightly before Gencon.

3) ????

Any advice??

Paizo was down for me this morning, maybe 10 hours ago it came back up. Some of my PCs said all of their threads were marked as read, so they didn't know when I started a new round of combat. I've been logged out a few times as well and had to refocus.

I think it's the site and not you.

This would seem to suggest you're not alone.

It's definitely the site. If you're in doubt about something and can get to the site, check the Website Feedback subforum for updates and information.

ETA: Which is the general case for where GM Cwethan is having you look; the link is to a thread on Website Feedback.

Quick question, but I'm not sure if this is the place to ask.

If you play through a scenario as one character, can you play through it a second time with another character?

Quick question, but I'm not sure if this is the place to ask.

If you play through a scenario as one character, can you play through it a second time with another character?

Only if it's an evergreen scenario, or you're using a GM star replay.

No. The only way to do that is to earn a replay via GMing or rare boons. Or via replayable scenarios, as John mentioned.

If you play through a scenario as one character, can you play through it a second time with another character?
So long as one character plays said scenario in CORE and the other in Standard, yes.
Then you can add on what was mentioned re. Evergreens etc..

Yes if its evergreen; or yes if its evergreen and one is core and one is standard?

Evergreen is tier 1?

Yes if it's evergreen, and yes for any scenario as long as one is core and one standard. Evergreen is its own category; not all Tier 1 scenarios are evergreen. (There's also From the Tome of Righteous Repose, which is a higher-level evergreen.)

Got it, thanks!

Oh wow. I did not realize that and was assuming it was one time per character. Luckily I haven't done much other than evergreens on my characters.

Is there somewhere that details the design philosophy behind it? I am not too worried at this point since there are 9 seasons of scenarios but I do love making new characters.

It's basically just that once you've done a scenario, you know the story and the "right" things to say and do. In previous organized play groups, allowing replay led to a number of undesirable side effects in the campaign (including farming loot, groups of people replaying taking slots from people who hadn't played yet, players who knew the story ruining the experience for first timers, and so on). Because of that, the leadership for PFS decided that replay would be kept very limited.

And some of the evergreens have variables so it is not exactly the same adventure every time.

Given that Paizo has been logging me out every five minutes, I accused the Paizo tech team of taking bribes from my spouse. I figure this is a health measure, designed to force us to get away from our computer screens and get up and exercise.

That’s my dubious theory, anyway.

Hugs from the tail end of my vacation,
Hmm

It's not working.

^
^
+1

:D

Well....at least it's not just me then. I suppose we should be grateful the sight is still up? Though having to log back in every couple minutes is a nuisance.

No it's not just you. At least my posts are showing, but I'm going to check all my threads to make sure there aren't updates I'm not seeing.

Anyone having issues with the Wayfinder app as well?

Absolutely. Sadly, Wayfinder is dead to me currently. I hope once all this mess is fixed, that starts working for me again.

Wayfinder isn't recognizing my log in information either. :(

I set up some text shortcuts to help me get through and they work pretty well.

Well, as has been said many times already.. at least its not just me.

Anyone having issues with the Wayfinder app as well?

Yep, same as the others. I figured it was tied to the logout error.

GM DevilDoc wrote:

Anyone having issues with the Wayfinder app as well?

Yep, same as the others. I figured it was tied to the logout error.

That was the assumption I was hoping for, but I also upgraded my phone last week. Before I went posting anything on Google Play, I wanted to be sure which end the problem was on.

Wayfinder has logged in, but will stop working whenever i press [Draft new post]

Not to toot my own horn too loudly here, but I am pretty proud of this one:
I just finished GMing Rise of the Runelords: Burnt Offerings with 2,236 posts over 45 forum pages across One year, Ten months, and Seventeen days.

Despite several fitful starts that included me taking over from the original GM, we completed this with the same 4 player characters throughout the entire adventure. Most importantly, all 4 of the players stuck through to see the book to its end; and we shall be starting book two shortly!

DevilDoc, that's awesome... keep up the good work!