Introducing Paizo One-Shots!

Good to have some free pregens and wallpaper for this PF2e one-shot. ;)

Love this idea and good adventure to kick it off. Keep up the good work!

Ah ok so it seems to be this module is made to be played with the pregens and with the pregens only, no self made characters? Because the Pre gen sheet even mentions that you should ad a pregen as an NPC if you play with 3 players

Woudln't say that pregens are required, but they already got hooks and backstories that make sense for the one-shot. Still, if i wanted to start a new swashbuckling pirate campaign at level 5, potentially I would make this the first adventure the new group would have. And I don't really see any reason why they would not be able to make their own characters.

Sliska Zafir wrote:

Is it repeatable for society credit?

I do not see a repeatable tag on the sanctioning document, so my guess is no. Tonya and Alex can feel free to correct me if I am mistaken here.

Hilary is correct, this adventure is not repeatable.

I just noticed the missing domain and focus spell as well. Is there an official ruling on this?

So, a couple of notes. Folks have already caught the typo. The Acrobatics should be a +12.

As for the missing domain, looks like that is on me. Sorry about that. It was supposed to be the Water domain, with the Tidal Surge focus spell. I will see about getting that changed here in the near future.

Hope folks are enjoying the adventure. I had a good time putting this one together.

Candlejake wrote:

Ah ok so it seems to be this module is made to be played with the pregens and with the pregens only, no self made characters? Because the Pre gen sheet even mentions that you should ad a pregen as an NPC if you play with 3 players

Woudln't say that pregens are required, but they already got hooks and backstories that make sense for the one-shot. Still, if i wanted to start a new swashbuckling pirate campaign at level 5, potentially I would make this the first adventure the new group would have. And I don't really see any reason why they would not be able to make their own characters.

You can play these adventures with your own characters, and they make for a great little side-mission you can drop in to an ongoing campaign, but that said...

...for these, we're looking at building specific little encounters that are tailored to a specific party of adventurers. So if you use your own characters, the GM will likely need to make some adjustments to the plots, or it might be a bit trickier to set things up on the fly. Of course, you can always just abandon the story and use the encounter itself as you see fit in your game!

But they're written very much to be used with the pregenerated characters in mind.

I'm guessing they missed the folder with all the art assets in it. The map in the PDF is pretty blurry, but that's probably to keep the PDF size down. There's a high quality map in a separate folder which is quite nice.

Yes indeed, the JPG included is a high resolution image, somehow I missed that. Now to decide whether I want to add a grid to the JPG without secret doors or edit the secret doors out of the JPG with the grid.

...for these, we're looking at building specific little encounters that are tailored to a specific party of adventurers. So if you use your own characters, the GM will likely need to make some adjustments to the plots, or it might be a bit trickier to set things up on the fly. Of course, you can always just abandon the story and use the encounter itself as you see fit in your game!

But they're written very much to be used with the pregenerated characters in mind.

At first I was not too enthused by this design philosophy, but if they will mostly be special event releases like for Cons and Free RPG day, then I can see the value in it.

Especially since this might let you show off less used ancestries, archetypes, and locales without needing to justify characters trekking out from Avistan.

James Jacobs wrote:

...for these, we're looking at building specific little encounters that are tailored to a specific party of adventurers. So if you use your own characters, the GM will likely need to make some adjustments to the plots, or it might be a bit trickier to set things up on the fly. Of course, you can always just abandon the story and use the encounter itself as you see fit in your game!

But they're written very much to be used with the pregenerated characters in mind.

At first I was not too enthused by this design philosophy, but if they will mostly be special event releases like for Cons and Free RPG day, then I can see the value in it.

Especially since this might let you show off less used ancestries, archetypes, and locales without needing to justify characters trekking out from Avistan.

It's a new line, so we'll be watching and incorporating feedback as we go, but since all our other adventures generally don't assume specific PCs, this philosophy lets us tackle different, much more specific stories than we could for standalone adventures or Adventure Paths, or for Org Play scenarios (which assume the PCs are members of the Pathfinder Society).

If we hear that folks aren't super keen on the "built for specific regenerated characters" element of these, we'll adjust. But at least for the first few, that's the plan.

(It's not so much that we're eager to show off less-used options, although that's nice, but more because we want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

I think it's a really neat idea. I don't use adventure paths because of how much work it is to plan out, read ahead, and adjust for my group.

A oneshot written for the characters in it might just be easier to use.

I've often thought about bringing some characters along to a board game night and seeing if I can introduce new people to ttrpgs. This sort of thing would be ideal for that.

For Elsir, he should have 5/4/4/3 spells for a 5th level Sorc. Also, what are his signature spells and what spell should he have prepped from his spellbook. (I am assuming he would have Crashing Waves prepped as an additional 3rd level spell and I can kinda figure what his signature spells might be based on the spells he has. I am guessing magic missile, hydrolic push and lightning bolt? but again, looking for an official ruling).
Also, thank you Jason for clearing up the domain and focus spell for Lavanna! *Sorry to be so finicky about the pregens, for the record, I am looking forward to running this. It looks like it will be a really fun adventure!

Quick comment on Jaden, his +1 dagger should be +10 to hit when thrown (an it is not listed but +14 when used in melee). At my first pass over, everything else looks correct. (I am guessing it is just missing the +1 to hit from the +1 magic of the dagger)

It's a new line, so we'll be watching and incorporating feedback as we go, but since all our other adventures generally don't assume specific PCs, this philosophy lets us tackle different, much more specific stories than we could for standalone adventures or Adventure Paths, or for Org Play scenarios (which assume the PCs are members of the Pathfinder Society).
If we hear that folks aren't super keen on the "built for specific regenerated characters" element of these, we'll adjust. But at least for the first few, that's the plan.

(It's not so much that we're eager to show off less-used options, although that's nice, but more because we want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

I can see the value in that, and in what Waterslethe says regarding using prebuilt NPCs to tailored exactly to a scenario being easier to use.

Well, it was just my initial reaction. I'll reserve full judgement until later; I already softened my initial hesitance once I realized the Free RPG day adventures have similar "this adventure is designed for these specific PCs" designs to a lesser extent, and they certainly work there.

So this format may grow on me when I have more samples to play with.

AnimatedPaper wrote:

James Jacobs wrote:

...for these, we're looking at building specific little encounters that are tailored to a specific party of adventurers. So if you use your own characters, the GM will likely need to make some adjustments to the plots, or it might be a bit trickier to set things up on the fly. Of course, you can always just abandon the story and use the encounter itself as you see fit in your game!

But they're written very much to be used with the pregenerated characters in mind.

At first I was not too enthused by this design philosophy, but if they will mostly be special event releases like for Cons and Free RPG day, then I can see the value in it.

Especially since this might let you show off less used ancestries, archetypes, and locales without needing to justify characters trekking out from Avistan.

It's a new line, so we'll be watching and incorporating feedback as we go, but since all our other adventures generally don't assume specific PCs, this philosophy lets us tackle different, much more specific stories than we could for standalone adventures or Adventure Paths, or for Org Play scenarios (which assume the PCs are members of the Pathfinder Society).

If we hear that folks aren't super keen on the "built for specific regenerated characters" element of these, we'll adjust. But at least for the first few, that's the plan.

(It's not so much that we're eager to show off less-used options, although that's nice, but more because we want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

There is definitely market for it so I hope paizo doesn't change this because this fills niche paizo hasn't filled before that is really important as well :'D

Like one reason why I run slithering with pregens was that players didn't want to bother to create their own characters for oneshot game and they had assumed pregens had been custom built for the module.(<_< I think its safe to say they were built to showcase APG rather than to deal with oozes)

Like yeah, you can always hand out iconic pregens at con games but... Having pregens custom built for adventure you are running for "test the system game" or "oh crap we need emergency game because next session is final boss but fifth player isn't able to come" is really super important :'D

Wow! I am excited about this news. With the beer virus going I haven’t been able to run my two tables for over a year (not everyone has reliable internet services so running the groups online at the moment isn’t a viable option). This will give me a chance to finally run something in 2nd ed.

For Elsir, he should have 5/4/4/3 spells for a 5th level Sorc. Also, what are his signature spells and what spell should he have prepped from his spellbook...

Logged in to comment exactly that. However, I selected the following for his signature spells:

As for his Arcane Evolution spell, given his scroll and wands, crashing waves is the only one that would add anything to his selection. Once he's used his scroll of blur (and assuming the adventure spans more than a day), I would probably choose blur instead.

Hey, if these are pregens, will there be an option to use them in PFS as pregens in the future (once the bugs have been worked out?).

It'd be nice to have a tengu alternative to Korakai if a party needs a Rogue in the future... :>

If you need a rogue, we already have one named Merisiel. She's well-suited to fill the needs of org play.

Now I wish we could get a gothic horror one-shot.

We want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

Mark me down for a vote in favor of this approach. It makes the one-shots work better as pick up and paly products, and lets them fill a different niche from other types of adventure.

Now I wish we could get a gothic horror one-shot.

That's funny, as I returned to suggest this. :)

Yet I was thinking in terms of monster POVs (though preferably not against good folk). A group of trolls or giants similar to We Be Goblins, but it could be anything.
I most would enjoy a Halloween episode w/ a vampire, mummy, ghoul, etc., maybe even a werewolf and (awakened) golem.

Similarly there could be missions tied to specific regions we seldom see explored (and which are unlikely to have an AP based around them), so maybe the Elves of the Spire have to work with Kyonin on some overarching elvish issue for example. Or some Darklands races need to work together (then again, a completely underground AP would please me).

Oh, and there could be teasers, like a powerful group that succeeds (hopefully) at their main mission, but gets TPKed in the epilogue.
Next AP, face that same enemy that easily wiped out a much more powerful party. Gulp. (Naturally one wouldn't assume players have played it.)

It's a new line, so we'll be watching and incorporating feedback as we go, but since all our other adventures generally don't assume specific PCs, this philosophy lets us tackle different, much more specific stories than we could for standalone adventures or Adventure Paths, or for Org Play scenarios (which assume the PCs are members of the Pathfinder Society).

If we hear that folks aren't super keen on the "built for specific regenerated characters" element of these, we'll adjust. But at least for the first few, that's the plan.

(It's not so much that we're eager to show off less-used options, although that's nice, but more because we want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

I am very much interested in the PCs being custom-made for the One-Shots. Like others have mentioned, being able to run these with little to no prep ahead of time will be a great boon. I plan on using them to either introduce new players to the game or fill in for one of my group's regular sessions when someone cannot make it (I have five players, so it works out well for me).

One of my players purchased this, and I GMed it today.

We found it very combat heavy. There's almost no interaction with NPCs, and it's a mix of puzzles and fights. The adventure recommends the PCs are friendly rivals, probably in order to provide interaction.

One might think it would be similar to a society adventure but there is a lot more hand holding, and I suspect it was done specially to make it more accessible to newer groups.

If you remember the old D&D modules where NPCs would pop up to deliver advice whenever the players go off course, and where GMs were instructed how to modify the behaviour of a creature to avoid a TPK. I understand why it's done but can feel a bit cheesy.

Hopefully that's just for these modules and we don't start seeing training wheels on APs.

Most importantly, we did enjoy it. I would recommend it. There are also a lot of good PFS adventures.

James Jacobs wrote:

We want to be able to tailor the events in these one-shot adventures to play to the themes of the PCs. This lets us save a LOT of space in the writing since we know who the story's being written for, which is a huge boon for a format this short.)

Mark me down for a vote in favor of this approach. It makes the one-shots work better as pick up and paly products, and lets them fill a different niche from other types of adventure.

Indeed. I thought overnight that this would be perfect for a heist adventure. We have one in Agents of Edgewatch, but I was not really too happy with it (which surprised me, as I generally like that author), but this format would let them start with a more defined set up.

Also, my boyfriend and his friends are huge fans of board games. I've been slowly tempting them over to RPGs; this might help with that.

Speaking as a backer of the Pathfinder for Savage Worlds kickstarter, these One Shot adventures are akin to the One Sheet adventures that Pinnacle puts out for its various settings. I am super excited about converting these over to SWADE. :D

Now I wish we could get a gothic horror one-shot.

Sign me up for this! :D

One other thing i noticed about the Rogue (Kaako Ashfeather)- she has 3 "Primal" Cantrips listed, but she should have 3 Primal and 1 Occult.

She gets Electric Arc as an innate Primal spell from the Storm's Lash Ancestry Feat.
She gets Guidance as an innate Occult spell from her Pendant of the Occult
So it seems that Know Direction comes form the Minor Magic Rogue feat, but she should get a second cantrip with that as well. And since Know Direction is on every spell list - the 2nd cantrip could theoretically come from any spell list too...

That said - I love the flavor of Kaako. And I really look forward to playing her in my upcoming game.

Sean Montgomery 7819 wrote:

For Elsir, he should have 5/4/4/3 spells for a 5th level Sorc. Also, what are his signature spells and what spell should he have prepped from his spellbook...

Logged in to comment exactly that. However, I selected the following for his signature spells:

1) hydraulic push
2) illusory disguise
3) magic missile
This allows all his signature spells to have a meaningful effect at his current level.

I didn't think that was how signature spells worked. Doesn't each signature spell have to come from each spell level? That's how it reads in the CRB to me.

coriolis wrote:

Sean Montgomery 7819 wrote:

For Elsir, he should have 5/4/4/3 spells for a 5th level Sorc. Also, what are his signature spells and what spell should he have prepped from his spellbook...

Logged in to comment exactly that. However, I selected the following for his signature spells:

1) hydraulic push
2) illusory disguise
3) magic missile
This allows all his signature spells to have a meaningful effect at his current level.

I didn't think that was how signature spells worked. Doesn't each signature spell have to come from each spell level? That's how it reads in the CRB to me.

You can select Magic Missile (level 1) for your first level signature spell, Illusory Disguise (heightened to level 2) for your second level signature spell and Hydraulic Push (heightened to level 3) for your third level signature spell.

I didn't think that was how signature spells worked. Doesn't each signature spell have to come from each spell level? That's how it reads in the CRB to me.

That is correct, but as Raven Black explained, it doesn't have to be each spell's base level.

Thanks to you both, that's exactly how I understood it.

But while you could select Magic Missile (level 1) for first level, Illusory Disguise (heightened to level 2) for your second level signature spell and Hydraulic Push (heightened to level 3) for your third level signature spell, those spells all are shown on the pregen as occupying at their base level.

I agree that you can do what Coriolis suggested, but you'd also have to change the sorcerer's known spells at each level to accommodate the heightened first level spells.

For pregens, Signature Spells should likely be listed at every level they can be cast with the signature denotation for which level they use that spot for. Somebody running a new PC, or maybe even new to spontaneous casters or PF2 at all, would benefit when they see "Oh, yeah, I can use that slot for that spell too."

James Jacobs wrote:

...for these, we're looking at building specific little encounters that are tailored to a specific party of adventurers. So if you use your own characters, the GM will likely need to make some adjustments to the plots, or it might be a bit trickier to set things up on the fly. Of course, you can always just abandon the story and use the encounter itself as you see fit in your game!

But they're written very much to be used with the pregenerated characters in mind.

At first I was not too enthused by this design philosophy, but if they will mostly be special event releases like for Cons and Free RPG day, then I can see the value in it.

Especially since this might let you show off less used ancestries, archetypes, and locales without needing to justify characters trekking out from Avistan.

It's also a way for players to try out classes, archetypes, or ancestries without investing lots of time on character creation or months-long campaigns.

This looks great. I'm thrilled there is a new one shot that doesn't involve playing a goblin or a skittermander.

A lot of errors in the prebuild chars. Do Paizo not use apps?

I can understand if it needs unreleased content, but I don't think these do.

A lot of errors in the prebuild chars. Do Paizo not use apps?

Internal ones yes. Using other company's apps for Paizo products runs into legal questions.

I hate to ask this now, but: Should Kaako have 1 more Cantrip? He gets Electric Arc from Storm's Lash; Guidance from his Pendant of the Occult; Presumably Know Direction from Minor Magic, but Minor Magic grants 2 Cantrips. So He's Short 1 unless there's something I'm missing.

That was noticed before, but doesn’t seem to have been corrected.

Also, these aren’t exactly errors, just weird choices. The Fighter has Battle Medicine, but no Healer’s Tools. The Cleric also does not have a Healer’s Tools (no one does from what I see). The Fighter is trained in Thievery, but does not have Thieves’ Tools (that one makes sense due to backstory). No one has a repair kit.

Basically, maybe let them spend what little gold they have filling out their mundane gear. Unless there’s some reason in adventure why they wouldn’t have that stuff with them. But since they brought their adventurer’s packs, that doesn’t seem to be the case.

A minor note as I prep the pcs for the adventure. Bravery should give Jadren his Will save at Expert, the sheet shows it at Trained (unless I'm missing something?). Thanks to those that pointed out the other minor errors as I have yet to prep those sheets so I can take note in advance :)

A minor note as I prep the pcs for the adventure. Bravery should give Jadren his Will save at Expert, the sheet shows it at Trained (unless I'm missing something?). Thanks to those that pointed out the other minor errors as I have yet to prep those sheets so I can take note in advance :)

I think that was one of the things that was fixed on the updated sheets. Make sure you’re looking at the revised ones (liked in this blog). That shows him at +11, which looks right.

Ah, thanks for pointing that out. Got the newer version now :)

So I picked up the fighter and I have no idea what half the stuff on the sheet means. Is there a 1 or pager explaining all the abilities anywhere?

So I picked up the fighter to play in about 20 minutes and I have no idea what most of the stuff under feats and abilities means section. I don't see a one pager anywhere. So I guess this isn't really a scenario for new players.

I just downloaded the scenario and it's 125 MB. I haven't run any PFS Season 2 scenarios (so apologies for the confusion if this has been a thing for the past 6 months), but all the Season 1 scenarios I have are 4-6 MB.

Is this expected, or did something go wrong?

So I picked up the fighter to play in about 20 minutes and I have no idea what most of the stuff under feats and abilities means section. I don't see a one pager anywhere. So I guess this isn't really a scenario for new players.

I'd suggest looking them up on Archives of Nethys if Pathfinder Easy Tool weren't much faster for the purpose.

So I picked up the fighter to play in about 20 minutes and I have no idea what most of the stuff under feats and abilities means section. I don't see a one pager anywhere. So I guess this isn't really a scenario for new players.

The Pathfinder Beginner Box or Core Rulebook is designed to teach new players. Some basic game knowledge is needed to play a One–Shot.

Is there a page for discussion of this with spoilers ok? Just curious as I have now played it once and ran it twice and just wanted to provide a little feedback and I don't want to post any spoilers here. It was amazing fun for me playing it and for both sessions that I ran!

Is there a page for discussion of this with spoilers ok? Just curious as I have now played it once and ran it twice and just wanted to provide a little feedback and I don't want to post any spoilers here. It was amazing fun for me playing it and for both sessions that I ran!

You can put all your spoilers inside spoiler tags like this:

Start with |spoiler="Sundered Wave Spoilers"| (replace "|" by "[" and "]")
and end with |/spoiler| (replace "|" by "[" and "]")

There's also a product page here

Kaako still doesn't have his second cantrip from Minor Magic yet. I picked Detect Magic.

Does Kaako have a +1 potency rune on his hand crossbow? if so, does the potency crystal raise that to +2?

Kaako appears to have spent more on gear than a 5th level character would ordinarily start with. I don't have a problem with that, just wonder if it was intended.

He's trained in Occultism, but not in Nature, yet his chosen magical tradition is Primal. I see three possible ways to resolve this: 1) it doesn't matter, because he doesn't need to be trained in Nature, 2) he should choose Occult for his magical tradition, 3) give up trained in something he's got trained in order to put that training in Nature. Of the three, I'd go with 1) unless for some reason he does need it, in which case 2).

Haven't looked at the others yet. Gimme a minute. ;-)

Kaako still doesn't have his second cantrip from Minor Magic yet. I picked Detect Magic.

Does Kaako have a +1 potency rune on his hand crossbow? if so, does the potency crystal raise that to +2?

Kaako appears to have spent more on gear than a 5th level character would ordinarily start with. I don't have a problem with that, just wonder if it was intended.

He's trained in Occultism, but not in Nature, yet his chosen magical tradition is Primal. I see three possible ways to resolve this: 1) it doesn't matter, because he doesn't need to be trained in Nature, 2) he should choose Occult for his magical tradition, 3) give up trained in something he's got trained in order to put that training in Nature. Of the three, I'd go with 1) unless for some reason he does need it, in which case 2).

Haven't looked at the others yet. Gimme a minute. ;-)

The potency crystal won't stack with the weapon potency rune because they're both item bonuses to the attack roll.