So, I think this is more referring to the Organization in the World of Golarion that you don't need to play PFS to have a character be a member of. As well as mechanics around some new things (as they have done in these world books so far) to use.
But it probably some nice tie-ins to the Org Play items for lore and reasons they are going to send us off to die horribly.
Also, yeah, really loving the art on these books so far.
Hey folks! Thank you for posting your feedback about the selection for this year's Free RPG Day. I think it might be a better venue, though, to post any ideas about alternate adventures to our Pathfinder Modules subforum. Our product discussion threads really need to be centered on the specific product being discussed, and there are definitely nuggets of good discussion to be had here that I'm not sure quite fit.
Is it going to be available as a PDF a little ahead of time so we can run it on Free Module Day, like it was last year?
The trip to Hunclay's manor is pretty much a walk through an "I want this" store.
My group is likely to leave everything alone (as the Paladin would insist), but what about the Spellbooks? Did you allow your players to copy spells out of them before the auction? I mean there's a month of down time (I'll have a lot of that filled because they decided they wanted to own the tower and I've got side quest), and letting the wizard sit down and copy 224 levels (8 hours/day, 7 days/week, 4 weeks) I feel would massively upset the wealth by level (11 5th level spells is 12k gold in scrolls alone, let alone the other levels of spells).
Also anybody deal with a group of 5 in this module? It's really built for 4, the XP is pretty tight and you've got to keep up.
I was mean and had the local Cleric of Abadar come in with the Mayor and execute a binding contract with the party that they wouldn't take anything from the house. At the end of it I told them they would be subject to Truthtelling and anyone caught lieing would be arrested.
As far as the 4 to 5 player adjustment - just give the critters more HP or add 1-2 if they are really weak (like Grioths tend to be later on).
People, can we stop about the intelligent eidolon that was supposedly send to the stables?
Even if it was written in the scenario, it is clear this applied to low intelligence, non-bipedal eidolons (as there were many of those pounce beasts around at the time).
There are always exceptions to the rules and I hope the next time a GM faces this question (s)he will make the right call.
At the same time, players should understand that their GM is trying his/her best to run the game to the best of their abilities (and that it isn't an easy job!), so give them a break as well!
Heck, I diplomacized them and took my wolf into the wedding anyway. I put a dress tie on him and said he was my link to Gozreh.
I mean, do you really want to anger the deity of storms on a wedding day?
I recently played Barker, tiefling Ranger 8/Investigator 1 in Doom comes to Dustpawn in the shadow of the Shrine to Compton's Head.
On a side note, I game with Jessica and Sterling fairly regularly and I can always count on fun characters and the unexpected from them no matter which side of the table I am on.
Hey Mark, I was wondering what your take would be on allowing an intimidate check (all opponents within the 20 foot fadius of swirling energy or elemental matter) as part of gather power. Personally I see the thematic effect as being quite like the dazzling display feat discribes.
Anyway, would you say that dazzling display would work with a kineticist's blast (even though it's technically not a weapon) since weapon focus can apply to it?
And would you personally allow a version of dazzling display with a shorter range to be used in conjunction with gather power?
I'd say kinetic blast definitely works for Dazzling Display, but it should be its own action, not a freebie to go along with another action, in the same way that a fighter can't do some crazy full attack or Whilrwind Attack and also get a free Dazzling Display.
Combine blast, kinetic blade, and elemental overflow for
a bit of a light show.
Also useful for your Intimidate situational bonus needs.
(do what the glowing man says and don't make me any angrier!)
So - a kineticist question - aether element - so what exactly does draining infusion (which is listed as a universal substance infusion) actually drain from with this ability?
Skipping ahead since I happened to see this one and it'll be fun to answer. Basically, [aether] creatures. To ask a similar question, what can the telekineticist create with the spark of life utility talent? The answer: aether elementals!
So, I'm a little obtuse here - is this something you are developing or something I just can't find? :)
Mark Seifter wrote:
Barker wrote:
Oh, and welcome back from Gen Con - you guys should all come down to Dragon Con someday
Thanks! I know Jason has been invited as a Guest of Honor at Dragoncon over the last few years. I'd be happy to come down to a con that invited me as a Guest of Honor (which means paying for airfare and hotels); I could even run some of my special scenarios that have so far been Paizocon exclusives :D I know that Stephen goes GoH to a few cons each year, so it's definitely possible to grab other members of the design team than Jason. Talk to your local cons and get them on board (if it helps, my girlfriend is PFS Asst. Developer Linda Zayas-Palmer, so they can split that room pretty easily and get two fun Guests of Honor!)
I'll talk to my VC and see if we have any pull that way for next year.
So - a kineticist question - aether element - so what exactly does draining infusion (which is listed as a universal substance infusion) actually drain from with this ability?
I ran this on Friday...part one ran like a truck with
no wheels. I prepped for it even. The rest went a lot
more smoothly.
My thoughts on the scenario.
Spoiler:
Too many factions, and the functions at each location
were too obtuse.
I had fun with the Iron Golem - "NO FIGHTING!"
Also, a sperm whale flesh golem submarine?!
I had problems with the staging of the fight in the whale.
I would have rather just used more Incutilis than had the humans there.
Because in one part of it, Poppo is sealing the blowhole (oh god the jokes...) and next we have sailors and a caster just appearing through
it like it never happened.
Once you make it through the hell of part one, it's a pretty nice
train ride.
My advice is to make a cheat sheet for part one. Really, it is all
about getting a faction in the lead, doing your faction missions, and then finding out about the performance on Wealday. I would suggest making a list of what each location does for the party.
Also, remember that allying with the Galtans qualifies as fulfillment for the Liberty's Edge mission. You're also going to have to be heavy handed with the Dark Archive people on theirs if they don't go buy info at Gold Street.
There seems to be some information that has been cut out or missed off the VC briefing. One of the sample questions that the PCs can ask the VC is 'What’s Poppo’s message?', but there's no clear reference to Poppo sending a message to the Society (or how Olandil came to the attention of the VCs at all).
Yeah, that is in the GM summary at the start but not the briefing. Honestly, the more I prep this thing the more annoyed it makes me.
My wife is prepping this, and she brought this issue up immediately. Any feedback on how to handle this, as it seems quite important, would be helpful.
It is in the questions section from the briefing look for the answer with noodles. Apparently it is some kind of personal code he and Drendle share.
any word when the chronicle sheets will come out? I'm running multiple sessions at my FLGS and one will be an intro to society for new players.
I typically write/develop the Chronicle sheets for a Free RPG Day product in early June and release the sanctioning document about a week before the event.
Any possibility of posting the pregen goblins/nord in PDF format to make it easier to run this for game days?
So how are you guys GMing this handling the economy in the area as far as
stuff for PCs - overall the AP seems a little light on loot, and Trunau seems to have a low economy.
How are you working around this for party equipment?
Inner sea world guide has you covered with the Belkzen chapter. It's south of the Kestrel River, looking at the map, approximately 25 miles west of its eastern border and 50 miles north of south border (I think player guide gave more specific coordinates)
Thanks! That's what I was looking for. The old 'Inner Sea Reigon' map didn't even have the Kestrel River marked for reference.
There is also a map in the next adventure, "The Hill Giant's Pledge," that shows the area, including Trunau, Freedom Town, Vigil, and the borders (as well as the locations for that adventure). It'll be here in only a month!
This is what happens when things are added later for plots and stories :)
This does seem, on first reading, like a particularly tough initial adventure. I agree about the danger of the high trap damage in the plague house, and the assassins' nocturnal attack, but I was most concerned, however, by the fact that Parts 2 and 3 run with no possibility to rest overnight and regain per day abilities or learn new spells.
When the orc attack comes in Part 2, the PCs are still in 'investigation mode' since they haven't uncovered the murderer, and spellcasters are likely to have prepared spells that aid their investigations. Sure, those spells might still be useful when interrogating captives, but the massive amount of battles they are expected to survive will assuredly be their priority, and I foresee some very frustrated players who haven't been given the opportunity to prepare a full complement of combat spells.
As soon as the battle against the invaders is over, the PCs are expected to go straight into the tomb to start Part 3. Although it doesn't explicitly state that the PCs must go in immeditaely and cannot rest overnight and enter the tomb in the morning, that seems to be the implication. After all, if left in there overnight, Skreed is likely to have found what he is looking for.
What a dastardly tough pickle the PCs are going to find themselves in.
I was considering having a Trunau patrol spot the orc invaders and arrive in time to warn the town that an attack is imminent, probably by the following day. This should give PCs the chance to prepare new spells and stock up, but still allows for the surprise of when the orcs will actually attack. Obviously, in this scenario there would need to be some reason why the prepared town was caught with their pants down enough to let orcs inside at all. Thoughts?
I am not too worried about the time frame. The party's only chance to find out what is going on is to capture the half orc in the Plague House and he is only there at night. If the PC's do a night adventure and finish up by morning...
I planted a rumor of strange goings on and a blue fire at the Plague House at night. I used Rodrick's funeral as a distraction to launch the attack - all the leaders of the town were there.
If I'm reading the pacing right, casters are almost certainly out of spells by the time they face Crusher, much less the final battle.
Am I reading it right; if so are other GMs just planning to let this run its course; if so and if not how do you plan to deal with it?
personally, it feels like the scenario becomes unfun for casters when they spend the last half trying to contribute without casting spells or getting into close melee. I could be wrong, though, and so the question.
Hey Kirk, I was really glad to find this thread because we are playing it right now. In fact, we are just at the point where the PCs level up to 3 and are about to engage with Omarst Frum at the assault of the west gate of Inner Trunau.
Basically in getting there, one barbarian and one battlemage fell but were brought back with healing. Where they stand now (Group of 5: barbarian, battlemage, slayer, cleric, rogue) is to be almost out of spells, although I did give them that wand of cure light wounds and with the potions they found I don't suspect healing will be an immediate issue.
I was going to run that final assault with Frum with a few mods:
1. In reading the adventure it never made sense to me that the PCs would secure the inner quarter, then run outside to the barter stones, then somehow come back to fight a giant. So they are going to go straight from the closing of the Inner Quarter to Crusher. Depending on how the waves of orcs go with Frum, I ***might***introduce a light catapult that flings the flaming bodies of Trunauan guards at them. Thought this was a particularly grisly touch.
2. After closing the inner quarter gates, I was thinking you could do something like have Kurst ride up and tell them that the inner quarter and Trunau common (the area they entered from, can't remember the name at the moment) are all secure and that the battle appears to be shifting in their favour the lower quarter, giving the PCs once they get through and light the fire at the...
I'm not giving mine any rest - I prefaced the encounter by telling them it would be a series of battles, not a single encounter.
I also have plans to have one of the town clerics do a drive by channel if it gets too dire before they make it down to the tomb.
Right now they have cleared the gates and are making their way to the Hopespring to light that candle...err fire.
After having done a bit of math, I've realized that if we assume the defenders are about 100 feet up (seems reasonable given the lay of the land and the towers), they can see about 12 miles away, which is a 4 hour march. That won't, even at the best of times, be a lot of time for a city to prepare for a siege, so I'm gonna stick with the fog, and have them caught nearly totally unawares.
I just had a sentry roll in at the end of the funeral and the burning rocks came flying in and set the trees on fire.
I focused more on the attack happening when most of the guard would have been at Rodrick's funeral, then ran the party through the gauntlet to light the fires. It was an underhanded attack, through sheer trickery.
The way I figure it, the fires are visible to the surrounding area, where most of the Trunaun folks live (it does say that most don't live in town, and some rent space in town for during attacks) - and it gives them time to scramble some militia and counter-attack.
In event 3 should the assassins not coup de grace if they can? That could be a real TPK if they do. That would be 3d6 on the first attack and a fort save.
Make sure you apply all of the bonuses for the perception rolls. It's in your best interest to wake up at least one party member to sound the alarm. You _ARE_ allowed some fiat now and then in the AP so you can get over small bumps like this.
One of the characters in my game took the Trunau Native trait, so I gave him a house. The Assassins have to navigate the house, in the dark, so I had them make perception checks as they moved. One hit his leg on a chair, which woke up the rogue, which woke up the group - I still nearly killed 2 of the party members in the combat.
This does seem, on first reading, like a particularly tough initial adventure. I agree about the danger of the high trap damage in the plague house, and the assassins' nocturnal attack, but I was most concerned, however, by the fact that Parts 2 and 3 run with no possibility to rest overnight and regain per day abilities or learn new spells.
When the orc attack comes in Part 2, the PCs are still in 'investigation mode' since they haven't uncovered the murderer, and spellcasters are likely to have prepared spells that aid their investigations. Sure, those spells might still be useful when interrogating captives, but the massive amount of battles they are expected to survive will assuredly be their priority, and I foresee some very frustrated players who haven't been given the opportunity to prepare a full complement of combat spells.
As soon as the battle against the invaders is over, the PCs are expected to go straight into the tomb to start Part 3. Although it doesn't explicitly state that the PCs must go in immeditaely and cannot rest overnight and enter the tomb in the morning, that seems to be the implication. After all, if left in there overnight, Skreed is likely to have found what he is looking for.
What a dastardly tough pickle the PCs are going to find themselves in.
I was considering having a Trunau patrol spot the orc invaders and arrive in time to warn the town that an attack is imminent, probably by the following day. This should give PCs the chance to prepare new spells and stock up, but still allows for the surprise of when the orcs will actually attack. Obviously, in this scenario there would need to be some reason why the prepared town was caught with their pants down enough to let orcs inside at all. Thoughts?
I am not too worried about the time frame. The party's only chance to find out what is going on is to capture the half orc in the Plague House and he is only there at night. If the PC's do a night adventure
...
I handled this by staging the funeral the day after the Plague House was finished. This gave them rest and new spells for the attack gauntlet.
It's not that important for local games, I do keep an eye on my own GM points vs what paizo has listed. But if I want to run games outside of my area and I say I have 3 stars, but Paizo says I have 2...it causes undue drama especially when my sessions don't line up with what I claim I have.
I mean, that's 8 gm points that is listed as 1 - and showing as broken on my character I applied them to as well.
I've also noticed that some of the scenarios and modules are messed up for reporting.
Specifically Thornkeep - it seems to only have one entry for five modules and they don't give the right amount of gm credit and with one entry, they don't stack right on the characters.
I have a question about spell sunder. Something that may be FAQ worthy.
Was it meant to be more powerful than Dispel Magic?
From how it is written, the Barbarian can just wail at targets and if they happen to have an effect on them, they can dispel it. They can't even make the required checks to ID the spell while they are raging.
I find it hard to believe that an angry person with a weapon has a better chance of targeting and dispelling an effect than a wizard or arcanist who has studied magic all of their lives and can actually see it with detect magic.
By powerful, do you mean more precise? Both the barbarian and the dispel caster can name an effect as a guess. If you mean that it has a higher chance to dispel, that's for sure true. If not for rage-cycling, though, which likely wasn't considered when the power was created, it's a rarer resource than dispel magic would be.
Yeah, it's the unintended side effects of the interplay of items and feats that takes something like a free action and stretches it as far as you can.
Are the Quests required for PFS or just there to add to the flavor?
The quests just add to the flavor, and they are a nice way to keep people interested from week to week running it through for PFS the entire way.
It makes it a little more than just a level grind - you get out of the dungeon a little and get to enjoy some of the other scenery provided by the nice people who write these modules.
I have a question about spell sunder. Something that may be FAQ worthy.
Was it meant to be more powerful than Dispel Magic?
From how it is written, the Barbarian can just wail at targets and if they happen to have an effect on them, they can dispel it. They can't even make the required checks to ID the spell while they are raging.
I find it hard to believe that an angry person with a weapon has a better chance of targeting and dispelling an effect than a wizard or arcanist who has studied magic all of their lives and can actually see it with detect magic.
Nature’s Whispers (Ex): You have become so attuned to the whispers of the natural world, from the croaking of frogs to the groaning of great boulders, that your surroundings constantly keep you preternaturally aware of danger. You may add your Charisma modifier, instead of your Dexterity modifier, to your Armor Class and CMD. Any condition that would cause you to lose your Dexterity modifier to your Armor Class instead causes you to lose your Charisma modifier to your Armor Class.
So was this meant to be exempt from armor restrictions?
I'm not chasing extra sheets or anything, just the ability to play the whole environment and not just level-by-level chunks.
There's no campaign mode, but there's nothing stopping you from incorporating the Fort Inevitable (or even Thornkeep) experience into the adventure. The group I'm playing through it with (for Pathfinder Society credit) has explored some of the fort, uses the campaign cards, and has received missions from local townspeople.
The two things that come to mind that the format does not allow are changing encounters (adding creatures to reflect more than four characters, for example) and limiting gear access.
So just straight up PFS character builds and run it per the book and give out sheets as they finish the levels?
Still new to Society Play, will my character still be legal, or will I have to change it?
If you have played it and gotten at least 1 exp, you will be grandfathered in.
In case you don't know what that means, if you played at least one scenario with your character as an aasimar or tiefling, then you will be able to continue to play your character just fine. Any new characters you make, however, cannot be aasimars or tieflings, nor any future planned characters that you currently have that have not played in a scenario.
There was a mass influx of Tiefling and Aasimar anchor babies since the announcement - I think there will be no shortage of them for some time to come.
So you want to not have so many more made, so you create an event to inspire people to make even more?
The goal is not 'to not have so many more made'.
The goal is to shift focus to the new races.
If you stop production of Coke Zero, it doesn't matter how many people buy before production stops. Eventually, the number of Coke Zero's available will decrease.
John and Mike are considering the lifecycle, while everyone else is focused on the present day.
That's because your customers are spending their money elsewhere on other products...that might be a bad example for Paizo.
Glad to see my money was well spent on the Blood books.
Well, good news is I will save money in the future by not buying side books. I bought the blood books to be pfs legal. Now that content is being removed from pfs, I dont see the point in wasting money on non core books.
Can we expect these new races to be banned in the future? Should we warn new players to only use content from the core books, just to be safe?
Just play an aasimar and or tiefling in the next month and you're good to go.
You mean the deluge of EVEN MORE tiefling and assimar characters as The Confirmation and We Be Goblins gets run more times than it ever has been run in the past?
I've even heard players who don't normally play them getting ready to make "grandfather reservations just in case I want to make one in the future."
This is what aggravates me more then the perceived OPness of the 2 races. Paizo itself made the ruling on SLA's and put out the books they you to required to own to use the varients of those races, and then they get banned? This kinda seems off to me.
Mike and John did not make the SLA ruling, that was the rules team. The goal for PFS is to change as few things about RAW as possible. Since the rules team made the SLA ruling, PFS has abided by it.
And no official reason has been given (publicly) for why the Aasimar and Tiefling are getting banned, but they were a problem long before the SLA rule change.
Would you want to get blamed for something at work that someone in another department did? Cause thats what you are doing here.
They are representatives of Paizo as a whole, run by volunteers - and yes, while this is a free thing Paizo puts on - it can very very quickly affect their sales.
So to people outside of the box, they can only see the box making the decisions on their behalf. They blame the box because that is all they can see. The inner workings are invisible to the angry people throwing rocks.
So, I have to admit I have done a bit of TLDR on some of the rants here.
I really like the quests - those will come in handy.
I've read over the faction changes - very cool, it's their campaign and a static world is boring. It's good to see those boxes we check on the reporting sheets actually do something.
If we are going back to Tien, folks may want to see if they can get a Xenophobia boon or two and put those no longer useful Kitsune, Nagaji, and Wayang boons back to work. Chances are there may be some bad guys there from those races.
On the Aasimar and Tiefling "ban" - I have mixed feelings. I've only been playing/running PFS for a little over a year. So to me and all of the players that have come in since those two races were allowed, those are part of the "standard package" for PFS. From what I understand there has never been a race that has been disallowed in the game before.
There have been classes that have been banned or modified, pieces of source material that have been banned and modified, and so forth. But I think this is the first time I have seen races removed from play, which, I understand the reasoning on - with the Blood of XXXXXX books, well, you can build whatever stat combinations you want, and really out-tweak everyone else.
One of the serious complaints I have heard is that Paizo is just trashing its own material. Folks have a LOT of money invested in this game based off the past year or two of play, some people well into the hundreds. And now, off hand, they are told "hey, those books we got you to buy because you could use them in our game? Yeah, those are useless to you now." It doesn't do good to instill that kind of doubt into your customer base. I've been hearing a lot of "Well, I was going to buy that book about the Djinn blooded, but Paizo is just going to ban it in a few years anyway." Not the best way to inspire confidence in your customer base.
Maybe just a ban on the variant bloodlines in future use - that would probably cut down on the number of those characters played.
My other problem with this scenario is that we are being told that boons will be available play them in the future - but that date is "someday." "Someday" is never to a lot of people and in a lot of gaming systems. Having some real, tangible, timeline would help folks out a lot.
This is also the first time players are hearing of this "cycle" where races come in and out of play. To may players, this feels very arbitrary "oh, by the way, we have this cycle we haven't told you about before...and now you can't play two of the key races that bring people to PFS." So are these three new races only available for play for a limited time? Is this a documented cycle your players can depend on, like the seasons of the game?
I also think with the new classes coming out, the changes to FOUR factions, and now the changes to the races, I think you have put a bit "change shock" into the game. Maybe a little less change all at once in the future and a little more visibility. Maybe a longer lead in on this change may have helped it go down better?
Anyway, I've been a gamer for a few decades now. I've seen companies come and go over the years. I think you have made a mistake with this change that will cost you in sales and established players.
