How to update PFS characters to Year 2 format

You started this conversation saying that you were doing this as a form of protest. You shot your own credibility in the foot.

And yet here you are, not engaging with any actual substance I do present. I've been nothing but honest and forthright with my intentions (which is to follow the rules to the letter on this matter), whereas you seem to be arguing for the sake of it.

Protest doesn't have to disrupted play in this context you know, it can be to encourage players to engage with the community in discussions about the game.

I do like that I'm getting hassled more for saying I'll follow the rules than those who have implied or stated that they won't follow the ruling.

How do you plan to enforce the rule, Jared? At least Fireclaw Drake has a plan to enforce it even if I disagree with him over doing so. This is one of those rules that cause a lot of divide when there is no reason for that to happen.

We have a bad rule.
We have poor implementation.
We have lousy explanations of the rule.
We have a terrible defense of the rule.

So far, I see nothing good coming of this rule in any way.

Yet, here we are.

The same way I enforce any rule of that nature.

For the first day of the adventure:
"Oh, you prepped that spell? Isn't it from rulebook X? Did you hear about this ruling? You need to have succeeded at a learn spell check to do that. Since you had the chance to do that this morning when you prepped the spell, why don't you make that check now.

If they fail, or if it is later in the adventure, when they would not be in a lodge where they could find someone to learn it from. "I'm sorry, you will have to learn until you have an opportunity to learn it, you will have to take a different spell."

This doesn't affect spontaneous casters, and it is not clear yet if it affects wizards, but even there, as long as they have 2 core rulebook spells per level, they shouldn't need to change anything for this.

The point is I am *not* doing this as a "work to rule protest" to make people unhappy enough to forc the rule to change.

Which is the plan Fireclaw put forward.

Educate people, ease them into the change, just like you would any other of the hundreds of legitimate changes that people didn't realize had been made from 1e to 2e.

Don't disrupt play and make people intentionally unhappy to "punish" the design team to try to force them to change the rule. See the difference?

Jimmy Dick wrote:

How do you plan to enforce the rule, Jared? At least Fireclaw Drake has a plan to enforce it even if I disagree with him over doing so. This is one of those rules that cause a lot of divide when there is no reason for that to happen.

We have a bad rule.
We have poor implementation.
We have lousy explanations of the rule.
We have a terrible defense of the rule.

So far, I see nothing good coming of this rule in any way.

Yet, here we are.

The same way I enforce any rule of that nature.

For the first day of the adventure:
"Oh, you prepped that spell? Isn't it from rulebook X? Did you hear about this ruling? You need to have succeeded at a learn spell check to do that. Since you had the chance to do that this morning when you prepped the spell, why don't you make that check now.

If they fail, or if it is later in the adventure, when they would not be in a lodge where they could find someone to learn it from. "I'm sorry, you will have to learn until you have an opportunity to learn it, you will have to take a different spell."

This doesn't affect spontaneous casters, and it is not clear yet if it affects wizards, but even there, as long as they have 2 core rulebook spells per level, they shouldn't need to change anything for this.

The point is I am *not* doing this as a "work to rule protest" to make people unhappy enough to forc the rule to change.

Which is the plan Fireclaw put forward.

Educate people, ease them into the change, just like you would any other of the hundreds of legitimate changes that people didn't realize had been made from 1e to 2e.

Don't disrupt play and make people intentionally unhappy to "punish" the design team to try to force them to change the rule. See the difference?

[Url]Most people who hear about this ruling think it's ludicrous based on any plain reading of text.[/url] So something tells me a sunny disposition isn't going to make this land any better no matter how you sell it. Maybe you missed the people in this thread already expressing regret about their cleric or druid characters. It will be worse for people who don't frequent these forums.

Well, one quite senior PFS personality has publicly stated that they will NOT follow the new rule.

If you are playing PFS, you MUST follow this new rule... to do otherwise would be defined as cheating by the Guide...

Okay, so I will rephrase. Its not so much that I will not follow the rule as I will just choose not to audit the player's character sheet nor chronicles. I will have no idea which spells they have obtained "legally" and which ones aren't. So, I'M not "cheating" the player is. People keep saying that we should trust players. So I will.

I guarantee that if my cleric selects any spells from outside the CRB, there will be record in the chronicle history of the acquisition.

Besides, with the chronicles changing to remove the starting values audits will be increasingly more challenging. Most players didn't maintain their records before when it was more obvious by looking at recent chronicle sheets. Now, unless they are actively running spreadsheets and/or other 3rd party programs to track their progression, it will take quite a bit of time to audit. Something I have little interest in doing. If you are a VO and at my table and you think one of the player's characters might not be up to snuff, you are welcome to audit them—after the game—and make whatever adjustments are necessary.

At this point, knowing Tonya as I do, she is following this thread and working with the Org play team to determine the best course of action. Either they are going to hold true to the rule or they are going to consider some form of "house" (re: campaign) rule that modifies the text. While somewhat rare, it would not be the first time public opinion steered a rule change. Most players don't even follow the blog or messageboards so I would guess that most are still unaware of this particular issue and it will be quite some time before it will be considered universally (or close enough for government work) understood. Its not particularly obvious so unless you have all the spell lists memorized along with their source, its going to be missed more often than caught which will perpetuate the issue for a very long time.

BTW, thank you for your effort and consistent message Jared. I know how difficult it is to be in the position you are in. I still disagree with your insistence than org play cannot change core rules, but it might be a misunderstanding of the meaning of "cannot." In any case, your efforts are appreciated and I hope this gets resolved before your aggravation level reaches nuclear proportions.

Are we applying the CRB-only restriction to Wizards too? Meaning that they cannot select their free spells for leveling outside CRB, or at least not without using the Learn a Spell action?

I've got a better idea, Jared.

Let's get rid of the bad rule. Do not tell me OP cannot do that. Do not waste anybody's time with that nonsense.

If you want to keep advocating keeping a bad rule that is going to continue to cause problems and cannot be enforced, then that is on you.

That's certainly not Jared's call. I think the "tone" of the room is fairly obvious in that most dislike the rule. It is up to Tonya and the org play team to decide if they will deviate from the core intention and publish a house rule that applies only to PFS. I doubt they will, but there is a non-zero chance.

I don't think there is anything more to gain from the people who have already posted. Our positions are clear. What matters now is new posters sharing their feelings to further demonstrate how many additional people have an issue with the rule, vs how many don't.

I was going to make my -2002 character a cleric but he's a Rogue instead because of this. I'll just stick to martial. Less headaches. Nobody asking me what spells I've prepped- wait. Do GMs do this? Like for real? Cause I've never seen it- just when I was thinking of exploring casters. Oh well. I mean another barbarian will be cool. When I get enough ACP I'll make an orc barbarian that gets 12 hp for its heritage. So like 27 starting hp. Yep just killed my desire to play a cleric.

Certainly not going to tell you what to play, but the rule is relatively minor in the grand scheme. The vast majority of your spells are likely to come from the CRB anyway and those few that you might want from another source, you'll likely succeed on the check more than 50% just with minimum training and that goes up with fortune effects. Plus some GMs would allow you to benefit from things like guidance or an Aid action from another PC. I agree with those that say the rule is not player-friendly, but we might be making too big a deal about it.

That doesn't mean I am going to go out of my way to call a player on it. I am not going to be the PFS-police. I'll leave that to the VOs.

I am not going to be the PFS-police. I'll leave that to the VOs.[/ooc]

I wonder if a Badge comes with that...

Unfortunately not, citizen.

Yep, still not worth it. Real me has to pay something for the spell. Fictional me has to pay something for the spell. And do work for it with the check. And if I fail the check, even though real me and fictional me have shelled out monies, I can't attempt again for another level. Nope not for me. It's like going into Best Buy and them taking your money for the new XBox and just before they hand it back to you they make you attempt a handstand and if you fail even though you paid for the XBox they can't give it to you. And you can't attempt another handstand until you are noticeably better at all things.

We don't need no stinkin' batches :-P

That is the most atrocious tortured metaphor I have ever heard. And I've been around awhile.

Your point?

Torture isn't legal in PFS anymore
I'm not sure metaphors are legal either
:-D

Did they ban koans? And would we even notice?

I was going to make my -2002 character a cleric but he's a Rogue instead because of this. I'll just stick to martial. Less headaches. Nobody asking me what spells I've prepped- wait. Do GMs do this? Like for real? Cause I've never seen it- just when I was thinking of exploring casters. Oh well. I mean another barbarian will be cool. When I get enough ACP I'll make an orc barbarian that gets 12 hp for its heritage. So like 27 starting hp. Yep just killed my desire to play a cleric.

Martial have access requirements too so don't think your clear of the dreaded auditing.....

Which forum is the appropriate one? Since it seems like other than Jared's defense (as a down-level volunteer) we've essentially been met with radio silence from OPM and anyone else actually employed by Paizo who could provide even the smallest bit of clarity to this conversation.

That's the irritating part for me. Not that the ruling came in an otherwise unrelated blog post when it should've been in the Character Options blog (though that's still irritating).

That someone came in and dropped a bomb in everyone's lap, then when called out on it, said 'I guess I can look into it.' and then disappeared for a month while this thing festered and got out of hand.

What I see is a lack of trust from the small number of posters towards OP Leadership. This DEMAND for an answer NOW is not realistic. It was not in the past, it is not now, it will not be in the future.

My concern is the heat that is coming up. It has turned into a virtual shouting match with no one listening and giving consideration to the other's view point.

This is an appropriation forum to raise the question. It has been raised. It not an appropriate forum to disrespect others, especially a volunteer who is trying to help us all understand.

As for the other thread being locked, has anyone given consideration why it was locked? Maybe because leadership is looking into the concerns?

You all are acting like spoiled children. Grow up. Show the patience we all have to play a RPG and respect that we give each other when we sit down at a table.

Certainly not going to tell you what to play, but the rule is relatively minor in the grand scheme.

In general I agree. Whether or not a cleric of druid gets to use a shiny new spell isn't a big deal.

But there is at least one specific case where it IS an issue for me.

I have a cleric who is largely built around a non Core domain spell (draconic barrage). It's the reason why I chose to rebuild him using the rebuild boon.

My first issue is that I honestly have no clue what the rules actually are around this. He might be completely unchanged, he might be completely illegal, or he might have to spend some money and make a roll. The new ruling is to me so obviously not what the text actually says (I now accept it is ambiguous but people had to work hard to convince me that the words could be read the new way) that I now have no choice but to decide that I have no clue what the intent of Paizo is.

So I'm hoping to not get audited :-). Partly because I know that it is possible that audits will be wrong (in the sense of disagreeing).

To me the biggest issue is that this new ruling essentially says that the rules now have to be read in a very precise fashion that, quite frankly, the writing just does not support. The rules actively rely on reasonable people reading them in a reasonable manner.

My concern is the heat that is coming up. It has turned into a virtual shouting match with no one listening and giving consideration to the other's view point.

.

I'd disagree. I think many posters are actually listening and considering other points of view. Not all, but most. And most are trying quite hard to argue with positions and NOT just attacking the person. And are being fairly polite about it.

Note that listening and considering doesn't always mean changing ones mind.

Learning Spells - Some members of the community raised questions about how their cleric and druid characters could use the new spells from the Advanced Player’s Guide. We’re happy to provide a solution! Any prepared spellcaster can use the Learn a Spell activity to learn any common spells they have access to from tutors at the Grand Lodge. This adds no additional material cost beyond the standard cost for the Learn a Spell activity.

Let us break this down...

"Some members of the community raised questions about how their cleric and druid characters could use the new spells from the Advanced Player’s Guide. We’re happy to provide a solution!"

This is known as preamble, explaining reasoning or context.

~

"Any prepared spellcaster can use the Learn a Spell activity to learn any common spells they have access to from tutors at the Grand Lodge. This adds no additional material cost beyond the standard cost for the Learn a Spell activity."

This is the actual ruling.

~

We have all gotten fixated on the implied ruling in the preamble text... namely that Clerics and Druids didn't have access non-CRB Common spells of Standard availability.

Disclaimer: I continue to not see the Learn a Spell for non-CRB divine/primal spells rule adding anything to the game.

One notable challenge some people might have with the Learn a Spell format is the "but can try again after you gain a level" clause in a failure/critical failure.

Especially in our remote/digital exile, 2 more scenarios can be a long time. Furthermore, we play under different GMs and bounce around a lot (and more given the current situation).

Would it be the worst thing in the world, assuming the rule is kept, to modify a failure/critical failure to "but can try again during the next scenario?"

Disclaimer: I continue to not see the Learn a Spell for non-CRB divine/primal spells rule adding anything to the game.

Since this is something that was given by the designers and not OP, are you also active on the rules forum? I am not trying to be snide or anything and I have not gone to look.

Blake's Tiger wrote:

Disclaimer: I continue to not see the Learn a Spell for non-CRB divine/primal spells rule adding anything to the game.

Since this is something that was given by the designers and not OP, are you also active on the rules forum? I am not trying to be snide or anything and I have not gone to look.

Citation needed.

So far we only have hear-say.

And I don't buy the "Well, Martial's have to buy a new weapon when it gets published too" argument because spells aren't weapons. A level 3 spell added is 16 gold. That's for 1. If I bought even three remotely situational spells, it'd wipe out the gold from a single scenario in some cases. Martials will have maybe 2-3 backup weapons; caster spell lists are inherently more diverse. That's how it works. This means prepared casters not only need to be proactive enough to know which spells to prep, but which spells to buy. Druids and clerics don't get freebies to add like Wizards.

Uhhh... Ive just done a quick inventory of my highest level martial character which is level six. I've spent more than 375 gp on weaponry and weaponry ancillary items and that number will continue to increase. And I don't think it's that unusual of a build so yeah hypothetical strawman meet real life character.

cavernshark wrote:

And I don't buy the "Well, Martial's have to buy a new weapon when it gets published too" argument because spells aren't weapons. A level 3 spell added is 16 gold. That's for 1. If I bought even three remotely situational spells, it'd wipe out the gold from a single scenario in some cases. Martials will have maybe 2-3 backup weapons; caster spell lists are inherently more diverse. That's how it works. This means prepared casters not only need to be proactive enough to know which spells to prep, but which spells to buy. Druids and clerics don't get freebies to add like Wizards.

Uhhh... Ive just done a quick inventory of my highest level martial character which is level six. I've spent more than 375 gp on weaponry and weaponry ancillary items and that number will continue to increase. And I don't think it's that unusual of a build so yeah hypothetical strawman meet real life character.

Yes, BUT that spend INCREASED your attack chance, INCREASED your damage, etc. Casters have nothing to buy to increase their spell DC, increase their damage. These spells are NOT an increase in damage since all spells (with the exception of Electric Arc of course) are made to be quite similar. Instead these spells offer some versatility (maybe the same as buying a B/P/S weapon for a couple of quid)or fit a theme

So, has anyone gotten with the people of Herolab about this and do they have a way for those classes without spellbooks to have a list of known spells?

I still am a bit confused as to why this would be a thing for the Druid and Cleric but not the Wizard and Sorcerer. What were they thinking?