Asperax's page

Last week's PFS

Our elf ranger (awesome archer) was fighting with a club wearing only a loincloth on hot coals during a wedding (friendly exhibition match). Problems started (of course, it's a PFS wedding!) and an elephant started acting out after his master was killed. Our ranger approached the elephant and, with a series of natural 20s on successive handle animal checks was able to calm down the animal and befriend him, stopping him from killing lots of innocent men, women and children attending the wedding. He dropped the club, climbed on it's back and was controlling it (again, lots of natural 20s, resulting in DC 25+ every single time!). The image of an elf wearing only a loincloth, riding an elephant in combat with his long hair flowing in the wind was hilarious! Definitively his moment of glory and one of the funniest moments I've had playing RPGs!

A few examples...

I have played Murder on the Silken Caravan with *cough GM Lamplighter *cough. NOT grouping monsters together would make for an insanely long fight.

I have GMed Ruby Phoenix Tournament and I always rolled individually for each fight (1 to 4/5 monsters per fight). Not a problem.

I have GMed Wounded Wisp. For the last fight, I rolled individually since most monsters have different initiative. It was a longer fight but I wanted to give the party the feeling they were fighting a well balanced group of adventurers.

So for me, I guess I tend to adjust my style depending on the situation, the time left, how many people are in the party and how many monsters there are, so basically, common sense. For Murder on the Silken Caravan, it makes NO SENSE to roll individually... while for Ruby Phoenix, it is almost a necessity!

Sometimes, the complexity of a story can't be reflected by the simplicity of the alignment conundrum. How about there's no wrong or right answer? I know Pathfinder, like its predecessors, tend to lean towards black or white but I like my shade of grey (only one tough, no fifty of them!) BTW, congratulations on your story! I'm totally going to shamelessly steal it and see what some players will do in that situation. I can see how certain nationalities would be appalled by it while others would be ok with it (Andoran vs Cheliax for example). Unless a character is a paladin, I wouldn't worry about it. I would just enjoy the philosophical dilemma associated with the story. I would even pursue it more. What if a redeemer paladin was actually working with the orc tribe, trying to convert them to Sarenrae? Said paladin could totally be mad at the PCs and willing to hunt them down for their crimes. How twisted would that be? Should they fight a servant of good? Should they betray their employer? Should they atone for a crime that actually might not be a crime?

Sorry if I'm not actually answering your question, I just wanted to express my thoughts about the story...

Good one Scott! You know I support you 100% on this initiative. And just to put a bit of background into the discussion for everybody else not part of our Lodge here in Winnipeg, it had been an ongoing discussion for a while now in our Facebook forum. Some players, myself included, are a bit sick of min-maxers and one trick ponies. Here's a message I wrote a couple weeks ago on this topic:

"Seriously, it all comes back to the almighty rule #0. [...] unless players start putting more efforts into their background and character concepts, and less efforts into optimizing characters, we are doomed to see all of that happening over and over again. I am personally sick of level 4 fighters and barbarians doing 25-30 points of damage (str of 20, 2-hands, power atack, charging, furious focus, etc.) while I am trying to play a well-balanced fighter or rogue and can't even come close to that damage output even while doing a coup de grace on a flanked sleeping ennemy just because I chose to have normal stats, a few strong points and a versatility of feats and items. (/end rant) [...] I may sound pretentious or some might be offended but I think some players just don't care about the negative potential a min-maxer can have around the table, especially the minimal amount of fun the other players can have while the min-maxer is always under the spotlight and/or putting others in danger because of its actions or behaviour. Some combinations of classes/races/feats seem to be more prone to that kind of behaviour but at the end it is the player's attitude that makes all the difference. And some players just have a bad attitude."

The Lamplighters seem to offer a philosophy more than a faction or any tangible game effects. It offers an opportunity to think of other players, of your faction, and the general well-being of the Society (in and out of game) while creating a new character.

On the topic of dump stats, I hate seeing dump stats just to fuel a really high stat. But I think they could be acceptable in certain occasions, especially if the Pathfinder is making a reasonnable effort to compensate. However, one has to think, when crating of new character that, that said character is fresh out of training. How was training for a character with a str of 7? Would a barbarian without tact or common sense be able to pass some of the tests set by your "teachers" or recruiters during training? The Lamplighters offer an opportunity to think about it before jumping into the fray.

I also agree that having something as "meeting 6 of the 8 requirements" would open the group a little bit more, especially for some of the classes that aren't skillful like fighters or clerics. Altough, I wish PFS would have strict requirements representing the necessary skills to "pass" training... Thus said, it would be nice to see some of these characters choosing a trait that will offer them a new class skill instead of just choosing "reactionary"...