How A God’s Death Impacts Pathfinder Society

Beginning on November 15, 2023, if a class has been reprinted in the Player Core, no new characters may be created using its class chassis as printed in the Core Rulebook...

As the Cleric was reprinted in the Player Core and the 'Gorum is dead' rebuild is after that. It would very much stand to reason that the answer to

1) Can the Core Rulebook chassis be used instead of the Player Core chassis?

is very likely no, as the whole point is to transition to the remaster everything.

The answer to 1) is no, as no clerics may be built using the CRB chassis as of the release of Player Core 1.

x x 342 wrote:

Master of None wrote:

x x 342 wrote:

Going back to PFS1, I have always and only played clerics of Gorum. So POOP.

Three questions on the 'free rebuild':
1) Can the Core Rulebook chassis be used instead of the Player Core chassis?
2) How much gp does the character get on the rebuild? The 15% tax/penalty on the remaster rebuild is a problem.
3) Will the answers to my first two questions be documented somewhere other than as a post on this forum to establish a Source of Authority?

I think the answers for all of your questions can be found in the remaster section of The Guide to Organized Play.

I think the remaster section of The Guide to Organized Play is specific to the remaster. The 'free rebuild' for clerics of Gorum is not a remaster and the rules may or may not be the same as the remaster rules. I posted my comment hoping to get my questions definitively answered by someone either at paizo or at PFS3.

Gorum's death is still a future event. I'd imagine that when the book that formailizes it is published, Alex and our PFS leadership will tell us how it works.

Well yeah, but .... as I read this thread, my PFS GMs are being 'directed' to not allow my Gorum cleric starting August 1. I may be wrong but I'm not expecting a book in the next five weeks. IMHO an update to The Guide to Organized Play that is specific to the death of Gorum would be 'very helpful'.

The answer to 1) is no, as no clerics may be built using the CRB chassis as of the release of Player Core 1.

That's...really bad.

By all means mandate that new characters must use the new rules, but we are not talking about new characters, we are talking about extant characters. And my understanding was that all existing characters were grand fathered in (as they absolutely should be). That should apply just as much to (former) clerics of Gorum as to anyone else.

It doesn't affect me directly, but it leaves a bad taste in the mouth. And I would imagine those who are directly affected will be (rightly) livid.

So, what's the difference in class chassis for Clerics?

Some very slight wording tweaks. Changes to descriptions to keep up with changes to the rules (mentions of alignment removed, paragraph on Sanctioning added, mentions of spellcasting components removed, trained in "spells" instead of just "divine spells," "negative" and "positive" replaced with "void" and "vitality," ability boosts to attribute boosts... I think that's all of them). Wording that matches the current rules is a little easier to use, but there's no changes to the actual class here.

Trained in Cleric Class DC. Oh man, people have been complaining about how spellcasters without this training can't really use certain options from Archetype feats for a long time. This will have no impact at all on most characters, but for those who use it it's an improvement with no downside.

Divine Font no longer linked to Charisma. However, the number you get is now equal to the maximum possible you could get before. Unless you maximized Charisma and took a Charisma apex item... but aside from that being a very odd choice, it's also out of the level range of PFS anyway. An improvement with no downside.

Cloistered Cleric's Fourth Doctrine now grants Expert in simple weapons and unarmed attacks as well as your deity's favored weapon, though favored weapon still gets the extra boost of Crit Specialization. An improvement with no downside.

Warpriest's Third Doctrine now grants Expert in simple weapons, martial weapons, and unarmed attacks as well as your deity's favored weapon, though favored weapon still gets the extra boost of Crit Specialization (it was always weird that Warpriests gained Training in martial weapons as their main feature at 3rd level, then effectively lost it at 7th level). An improvement with no downside.

Warpriest's Final Doctrine now grants Master proficiency in your deity's favored weapon as well as spells. Okay, I guess what I said about gaining proficiency just to lose it still applies, but at least it takes 12 more levels. And regardless, it's an improvement with no downside.

I went through it line-by-line, and I didn't see anything else.

Five changes. Three are to doctrines so any given character isn't affected by all five, and two of those are basically the same tweak to both doctrines (plus one of them is at 19th level, so...).
The only change likely to make any significant difference for most characters is the buff to Divine Font, but all five changes are buffs. Who's livid over three or four marginal buffs?

Some classes had more changes, but Cleric isn't one of them.

[...]

The only change likely to make any significant difference for most characters is the buff to Divine Font, but all five changes are buffs. Who's livid over three or four marginal buffs?

Some classes had more changes, but Cleric isn't one of them.

So, while that's all good, I think they might have wanted to rebuild OUT of the cleric class into another, non-remastered one, maybe something like battle oracle?

So, what's the difference in class chassis for Clerics?

It doesn't matter what the changes are. We were told that they would be optional, and now a subset of us is being told "except for you - for you they're compulsory". That's not cool.

There's also the factor that to keep playing the former cleric of Gorum as a cleric now potentially comes with a 40ish quid price tag (I know it's core assumption or whatever it's called now, so you can look it up on AoN but not everyone has Internet during their PFS sessions or suitable devices). Obviously, Paizo wants us to buy the new books, but being heavy handed is the wrong way to go about it IMNSHO.

Compulsory expert proficiency in simple weapons. Okay. If you don't use them, there won't be a difference there.

Your complaint is something that did happen, but this isn't the case where it happened.

It doesn't matter what the changes are. We were told that they would be optional, and now a subset of us is being told "except for you - for you they're compulsory". That's not cool.

*Shrug*

Yep. It is how it goes.

Obviously, Paizo wants us to buy the new books, but being heavy handed is the wrong way to go about it IMNSHO.

I think you are mistaken. The goal is for all characters to operate under the same rules. This is for ease of GMing.

You can just write down the changes on your sheet. The differences between Legacy and remaster cleric are so minimal nobody will care if you're referencing the old book and just have two stars on your character sheet to remind you a feature changed a tiny bit. The internet is only needed for a brief moment while leveling up once or twice.

glass wrote:

It doesn't matter what the changes are. We were told that they would be optional, and now a subset of us is being told "except for you - for you they're compulsory". That's not cool.

Yep. It is how it goes.

It's not an immutable law of nature that that is "how it goes". Someone's decided that that is how it is going to go in this case, and they could (and IMO should) have decided differently, and could still change that decision.

glass wrote:

Obviously, Paizo wants us to buy the new books, but being heavy handed is the wrong way to go about it IMNSHO.

I think you are mistaken. The goal is for all characters to operate under the same rules. This is for ease of GMing.

Mistaken about what? That Paizo wants us to buy their stuff? I am pretty sure I am not!

As for ease of GMing, what difference does it make to the GM which version of a class a player is using? That's the player's responsibility to track, and 90% of the time the the GM doesn't need to worry about it (that's one of PF2's strengths relative to PF1).