I think it would be worthwhile connecting to the local Organized Play volunteers (known as “Venture Officers”). Pathfinders and Starfinder Society run a lot like DND Adventurers league: monthly releases of serial adventures that each take 4-5 hours to play. We love to play in venues that have play space and let us buy stuff! As for younger players, most society adventures are PG-13 ish. Generally there is some violence (kill the monsters, sometimes dealing with bad people as well), but a good game master knows when to tone it down. In my area, we have had several young players who participate regularly, though we typically ask a responsible adult to also play or hang around while the kids play. What players buy is going to vary from group to group, but our local GMs like to buy the map product and adventure path books. Players and GMs alike tend to purchase snacks/drinks from the store on game day, and buy minis, dice, and rules books. Though I’ve always suspected that the biggest profit items for the game stores are the snacks. Depending on where in the world you are located, you can get in contact with the regional coordinator through the emails listed here: https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/communities/paizo/findpop/ These folks can get you connected with any existing local groups there might be. Questions specific to Society are usually answered pretty quick in the Organized Play section of the forums. Welcome!
Ooooo I might just have to spend a couple months GMing for all these Lodges I've been crashing lately ^_^ I've had the chance to play at a table with you once or twice as well, so have an "official" invite from the Buckeye Lodge to "crash" our GM pool too. :) We run SFS several times a month, Monday nights and Saturdays. New GMs are always welcome. (FYI, our VL is planning to continue to schedule games exclusively online until at least late summer.)
Introducing Con-Current 2021 We welcome gamers of all types to join us (virtually, of course) for three days of “Bee”ing yourself while we play Pathfinder and Starfinder together. We may not be able to gather in person this summer, that only means there will be no lines for food, the bathroom is always clean and well-stocked, and the “hotel” room is close by. We still have plenty of gaming and socializing opportunities. There will be no cost to attend but we encourage you to donate to our sponsor charities for 2021, Jasper's Game Day and Planned Parenthood. We have three fun-filled days planned for you of games, author tables, charity events, and daily/nightly activities. Several events will request donations to participate — we appreciate your support of our partner charities. For current information, visit our website: https://con-current.org/ or email us at ConCurrent2021@con-current.org Important Dates
Considering putting in a order for these with my FLGS. Do we know if the set will be similar to the Pathfinder battles? Eg: 3 minis per booster, 8 boosters per brick, 4 bricks per case giving a total of 96 minis per case, with a very high probability of getting at least one of each of the 32 different figure?
Other GMs can also loan tables they have made for society scenarios. If you are in a location with an active “in person” (though probably operating online at the moment) society group, they might be able to hook you up with some ideas/help. There is also the online lodge at http://pfschat.com. My understanding is that Roll20 has no immediate plans to create and sell the individual scenarios for Pathfinder or Starfinder.
Overall my biggest question for this adventure is why do they speak common? Real answer: Because it’s extremely boring to play a role play heavy scenario when you can’t talk to the locals. In-world answer: Whatever reason you can think of. Examples to spark your own ideas: 1. They speak common, but very poorly. 2. An Ulfen wizard brought his spell book a century ago and it was written in Common so that no one else could steal his spells. So everyone learned Common as a secret ritual language. 3. Hundreds of years ago, a Linorm King sailed to Valhalla, and her primary language was Common because she was raised in Oppara. She taught everyone. 4. They arent speaking common at all, they just all have babelfish in their ears. 5. They have all had a curse of tongues put on them so everyone learns the cursed language (Common) as a child. 6. It’s not actually Taldane. It just sounds exactly like it. 7. The Ulfen weren’t the only ones to venture to Acadia. Someone from Taldor established a colony nearby and thought all the locals to speak Common. 8. The gnome Lirall put a long-lasting *tongues* spell on you before you left the ship without you noticing. Etc. Ooh: my best one yet: 9. Sveinn Blood-Eagle has been teaching them Common for the last year since he knew the Pathfinder Society was coming.
Your GM should be making you aware that your cold iron weapon (or whatever) did a surprising amount of damage to the creature, if it has a weakness. A good GM communicates how various weapons/energy types affect the target. It’s part of narrating the story. A lot of how heroic a combat feels is dependent on how the GM narrates it. Honestly, I never felt “heroic” when the fighter/paladin/whatever slaughtered everyone on the opposing side in the first round of combat, frequently before my PC would even get a turn. Heroic is when the PCs overcome a challenge that they have a possibility of failing.
I went to purchase the new PF2 Gamemastery Guide PDF yesterday and noticed that at some point I lost the ability to put items in my shopping cart. Please help, I want to give you $$$. :) Behavior: When I tap the “Add to Cart” or “ Add PDF” button/text for an item, it returns a message of “Your request produced an error” in the location where the link/button was. This happens with any product I have attempted to put in my cart.
Guys, this is clearly a PF2 question, since the text quoted iis from that book (though Doug didn’t specify). So while your answers are correct, they are not useful to OPs situation. According to the text quoted on p.294 of the PF2 CRB, NO, Riding dogs are NOT combat trained and will take the Frightened penalty. Only Warhorses and Warponies are exempt. I don't know of any rules that allow animals to be trained by the PC. Justification: the text clearly calls out warhorses and warponies, not riding horses or riding ponies or riding dogs. I see nothing in the CRb that gives a riding dog this ability. The flavor text from the Bestiary doesn't matter in this case. We are only using it for stats, if needed. As an aside, for purchased animals, the Command an Animal action only gives the animal one action, not two like a minion (familiar or companion) would get.
One other note – The Origins staff event organizer noted that a $10 processing fee applies to any badge returns. If you are volunteering at a level that receives a badge as part of the perk package, please keep this in mind before purchasing badges, as any fee incursions are the responsibility of the GM.Does this mean we shouldn’t buy a badge if we are volunteering for 4 or more blocks as OPF will provide one? Correct, For Origins you should not buy your own badge. In the past, GM badges have been available (just) before Event Registration.
No, you and your player are wrong. Why would you ask a random person why people are upset instead of reading what people here are saying they are upset about?? The people this is hurting are those that want something “special” to put on the schedule at conventions or occasional game days to draw in players for our events. This thread is filled with Venture Critters saying “This hurts my scheduling.” If the problem is people speed running repeatable adventures — and don’t fool yourself to think it doesn’t happen with scenarios too — the answer is to not to stop giving correct* XP for modules, it’s to stop making them repeatable. Other than a few modules that were written inappropriately short for the amount of XP given, modules generally give about 1 XP per hour. Emerald Spire is a perfect example of a module that gives too much XP for the time it takes to play each level. The very fact that these power-levelers you speak of used ES to do it only reinforces the fact that most modules did NOT over-award XP for the time spent. You are seeing the exception and making a rule. When I scheduled modules for our local game days they were always done in 10-12 hour “slots.” At conventions, modules typically get 3 slots or 12-15 hours. And at the end you get one level. Exactly on target for 1XP per hour. In fact, the 12XP currently being given for Plaguestone is significantly less than your 1XP per hour standard. It’s perfect length for each chapter to run in about 12 hours, with a bit of roleplay. All that is needed here is to do like the other 64 page modules have done: One sheet with 12 XP per chapter. If creating individual sheets is the problem, then make the sheets like quest sheets where you tick a box for every part played, and only get the keepsakes and boon(s) once you complete all parts. That is literally a few minutes additional work (to put checkboxes on the chronicle) than the current plan. * I use the term “correct XP” to mean XP rewards as written in the adventure.
I don’t think I have ever seen an AP run at our conventions. Thornkeep was the only module I recall. Most of our module play has been limited to game games dedicated to it. Ok. That’s your experience. Yet many people in this thread are saying that their experience and needs are different.
I really like this idea. This is a good compromise that will work for those of us who want to run this under PFS rules. It seems to me that the most cumbersome part of the old process was figuring out how to trim down the module to fit into a certain number of play hours and still make sense. This idea leaves the plot trimming up to the GM, and still allows us to work within the PFS play restrictions. (With a loose interpretation of Run As Written.)
Because when I play the module with the new rules, my character is expected to end as a 4th level character. And I only get one level of PFS credit for my “real” PFS character. Playing the module with my PFS legal character under the new rules would be perfectly possible if we just got 3 levels of PFS credit.
I noticed. Gonna run it for Black Friday/ Fifth Saturday in November. Super glad to have some extra content for PF2. :)
The pudding fights were tough, since most of the pregens were built to use Pointy-Slashy Things. But... in 2E, *everyone* is trained in unarmed attacks. Once the party splits the first one and realizes the Attack did no damage at all, the GM might need to give the party a hint on how to stop the things. The two best plans I have seen so far are to create as many puddings as possible and let Ezren roast em all like giant marshmallows, or for the melee characters to throw down their weapons and start punching it in the squishy bits. As we all learn a new rule set, I think a few hints from the GM on better tactics is a good thing. I’m not advocating telling people how to play their characters, but I suspect that very few players will realize that everyone is now trained to punch things — this is a change from how we are all used to thinking.
Also, in your example, Flat Footed is no longer a bonus to attack, it’s a penalty to AC. We’ve always had a lot of complicated math. Take Power Attack for example: to correctly calculate the penalty/bonus I need to know the critters BAB, then determine how many multiples of 4 that is, determine if its weapons are one or two handed or Primary or Secondary. And that’s just *one* feat that a critter might have going on. There are also probably buffing spells that I need to calculate as well when I roll that d20. IMO, the math for PF1 only seems easy because we are used to it. I do not believe that the math for PF2 is objectively more difficult — it’s just different.
This has been discussed in he GM slack channel when prepping for GenCon. The devs confirmed that the text listed under OP’s second quote are an accidental holdover from playtest text. The rule “increase/decrease one degree of success/failure” is the correct rule to apply in all situations. I expect there will be a bunch of Core Rulebook errata for our Christmas present. :)
Good question! The retail incentive has been pretty popular among the stores where we play. They mostly sell snacks and drinks to us, but people also tend to do their boardgame buys on game days because of it. It looks good to the store owners. So much this. I’d like to continue to incentivize players to buy merchandise at the stores we play in — none of which sell the T-shirts, pins, and book bags that are being discussed in this section. I’m not sure how to best do so under the new rules, but maybe something like 1 extra hero point if you (personally) buy $10 of merch and 2 Hero Points if you buy $20+. But that might put us at risk of giving out too many hero points.
I disagree. I believe his story about faking his betrayal in Rivalry’s End. That little speech he gave never meshed well with how he acted in other scenarios. It felt fake at the time. I see Torch as a man driven by the need for justice. Certainly bitter and resentful, but also a champion for those being abused. And, to him, the “abused” are the Pathfinder agents. He has demonstrated that he is willing to do what needs to be done in order to protect others, even if those same people will vilify him for his actions. But also a man who is not going to complain if serving justice means he can serve a side of revenge on those that wronged him in the past. Chaotic Good, leaning Chaotic Neutral. The kind of man who belies that the end justifies the means. I am glad to see that the Emerald Sage Jewel healed some of his scars. Perhaps it’s healed his soul a bit too.
Sounds nice. Lots of nice rewards. But I’d be a lot more impressed if my Playtest points were actually getting calculated correctly, so I could redeem some of these in a couple weeks. I’m supposed to have over 100, but my Org Play page still shows “0”.
I just noticed that the Max Gold section has disappeared. *sad face* Any chance we can get that back? As a player, I have gotten a lot of chronicle sheets where the GM has not written the Gold amount legibly. Since players generally end up getting max gold, it is useful in trying to decipher such scribbles. And as a GM it’s very handy to have it printed right on the sheet when I am filling it out. Hopefully, this info will be put at the end of the scenario at least, so no one needs to manually add up gold for each encounter.
Oh. And last I heard, the only events known to be missing from the Origins online registration are some of the older scenarios. But they should be getting added “soon.” (Not on the committee, so I don’t know any more details on which events specifically, or when they will get added.)
We would love to have you at Origins, BNW! As far as walking, Columbus is quite flat. The convention center is on two/three levels, but there are escalators everywhere to get between floors. Random other things a first-timer might want to know: The closest grocery store is probably The Hills Market, and that’s a mile, maybe. It’s also more of a botique grocery. There is also a small grocery in The North Market, one block from the convention center, but go there for the myriad foodstalls, not the grocery store. (They mostly seem to have overpriced produce when I have been there in the past.) Fair warning, the food stalls will be packed tighter than the dealer hall with people. But it’s worth the trip at least once. There are a lot of restaurant options nearby and a food court right downstairs on the RPG end of the convention. FYI, we are always on the ”south” end under/in the Hyatt hotel, in their ballrooms. The Hyatt also has some food options and the “Big Bar On 2” is a popular late night spot. There is a Starbucks just outside our room. Water stations (cold only) are provided by the hotel. Origins is considerably smaller in attendancethan GenCon, so most people end up at one of the ”attached” hotels. But even if you are staying elsewhere, the downtown area is very pedestrian friendly. We also have a bunch of different scooter companies and a bike share for getting around. I think the Segway Tour place is even still in operation. For Pathfinder, some events will sell out, like the specials, but if players are flexible in the Scenarios they can play, nearly all generic tickets get seated *somewhere* in every other slot. Events: I GM the whole time, so I haven’t looked st the online registration yet, but assuming they use the same system as recent years, DO NOT try to filter events by day when purchasing tickets for the evening game slot. Since they end at 12:00, the site considers them to span two days, and will not show any of those events if you enter a day in the search tool. Easiest is to download the Excel Event Grid and search for events you want by the event number or name. If there is anything else you want to know, just ask! PS: Origins is the same weekend as Pride. The downtown area including the convention center is going to be very crowded, and parking will be... potentially difficult. The Satruday parade usually goes past the convention center, so some roads will also be closed at times that morning/noonish. Plan accordingly if anyone is going to stay at an outlying hotel and drive in each day.
Tonya, Any chance we will get an Origins Slack channel as well? I assume the existing channels for PF2 and the specials could be used for discussion by both groups.
I have been pondering this, since it’s an interesting question. As far as the rules go, I would like to suggest that jewelry should be considered as ”clothing.” The only specific entry for “Jewelry” available to purchase is in Ultimate Equipment on page 90 and listed in Table 2-9, both of which have the heading of “Clothing.” All the other items listed in this section are clearly worn items that most would consider as clothes. Therefore, the jewelry should take damage, albeit applying some hardness when calculating the overall damage seems appropriate. You could argue that jewelry is also mentioned in the Core Rulebook since it is listed in the entry for Courtier’s Outfit and Noble’s Outfit, and obliquely referenced in the Royal Outfit. But these are all still in the “clothes” category. Holy Symbols, for example are “Adventuring Gear,” not “Clothing.” Clearly, the Gods protect them. ;) Philosophically, it does not seem unreasonable to me that the character should have to either suffer the -2 penalty or spend most of their chronicle gold to replace the items. This is significantly less costly than, for example, Raise Dead. Will it hurt to lose most of the gold for the scenario? Yup. But benefits have costs.
YingYanck: The “deadly” die is *in addition* to double the normal damage. So Mersiel’s “rapier +5 (1d6+4 piercing); deadly 1d8, disarm, finesse” would deal 2d6+8+1d8 on a successful crit. Master or Legendary weapons would be 2d6+8+2d8 or 2d6+8+3d8, respectively. (All else being equal.) The quoted text seems to have a typo.
I just ran and reported The Rose Street Revenge. I did not get the expected number of playtest points. Based on the info in the blog, I was expecting 5 (4 plus 1 for being the GM), since this was a scenario/4 part quest. But my GM tab shows that I now have only 3 Playtest points. Did I calculate this wrong, or is the reporting system wrong?
PFS scenarios have a wide variety of themes. Some scenarios are dungeon crawls. But there are also wilderness adventures, investigations, infiltration missions, social events, rescue operations, diplomatic missions, and many more. Almost all of them have the opportunity for role play. The plots are generally more well developed after season 2. But roleplaying isn’t really about the scenario. It’s about the GM and players at the table. I disagree with blathers that role playing only happens with a regular group. Some of the most fun roleplaying tables I have run/played were at cons where everyone had just met. Ive also had tables where the GM have done 95% of the talking since I was the only one interested in roleplay and everyone else just wants to roll dice. People play PFS, and Pathfinder in general, for a variety of reasons. Some of them just want to throw dice and slaughter things. Others want to explore their characters and the world around them. Some people come to RPGs after playing video games and expect it to be the same kind Grind and Level experience. It sounds like the group you played with is more of the “just throw dice” kind. But maybe they just don’t know any other way? If there are multiple PFS game days/location in your area, I encourage you to try one of the others. Maybe you will find people who have a more similar style to what you are looking for. But if you are in an area where this group is your only play option, maybe you could try to show them that roleplaying is fun? Be the roleplay you want to see! Teach them that there is another way to play. Side note for born_of_fire: Three hours is VERY short as a scheduled play time. Scenarios are written to be 4-5 hours. Games locally usually run 5 hours, sometimes six. I don’t even think it’s possible to complete a high tier (7-11) scenario in 3 hours! Are there no venues you can find where you can have longer sessions? Gaming doesn’t necessarily have to be at a LGS. One of our local groups had a standing reservation for the “community room” at the local Panera bread, for example.
HMM, In case Tonya gets too busy to answer quickly (since she’s out here at Origins this week), I might be able to ease your mind a bit. I’m running the short Playtest demos at Origins, and I got a PDF packet with the adventure, pregens, and abbreviated rules a couple weeks ago. I was able to learn what I needed to know, no problem. Then she showed up to Origins with a giant suitcase of laminated pregens, maps, minis and dice for us to use. Easy-Peasy. It would be surprising if you folks didn’t get something similar once GenCon gets closer.
Also: two comments about the RedCap example stat block: First, I cannot figure out if the one melee action gives both the scythe and boot attacks, or if each is a separate melee option costing one action. It’s also not clear why the stomp action is listed separately from the other actions. Second, the special irreligious weakness would be easier to adjudicate if we break out the most important bits that the GM needs to reference: Irreligious (emotion, fear, mental) If a redcap sees a creature brandish a holy symbol of a good deity or use one for the Material Casting of a divine spell, the redcap must attempt a Save. To brandish a holy symbol, a creature must Interact to brandish it for 1 round (similar to Raising a Shield). Once a redcap has to attempt a save against a brandished holy symbol, it is bolstered against brandished holy symbols for the next 10 minutes.
It’s the same number of lines of text, but now the GM can get the relevant information at a glance. As a GM preparing to run a scenario with a red cap, I will remember that it has “a fear of holy symbols”, but in game what I need to know is “what’s the save and how many rounds is he frightened”? I would actually like to have it broken out this way for most abilities that depend on saves to inflict a variety of conditions.
Pretty please can we get an updated set of condition cards to coincide with the launch of the new rules? The condition cards (including the funny illustrations!) are some of the most useful reference tools I ever bought. With the changes to conditions, everyone is going to ask: “What is a Frightened 4 again?” Best answer: Here’s a reference card. And ooh, look at the funny Goblin/Kobold/Whatever cowering in fear.
Loaning print copies is fine. Gifting them PDFs through the Paizo store is fine. Sharing your own pdf is not.Good to know. In the future, I'll start printing them out. Thanks. I know I’m off on a tangent, but you also need to *get your printed copies back* from GMs you loan them to.
4. Notes: I wish the chronicle sheets had a space on the bottom to encourage note-taking. For practical purposes, players can use it to track what items they found in the scenario, what items they are purchasing, what enemies they fought or just what city the scenario took place in. It also always warms my heart when GMs write notes on my chronicle sheets, and makes them special records beyond telling me when I played a game.There is nothing stopping people from noting this kind of information on the current chronicle sheet format. All sheets have space: The back of the prior chronicle. :)
While I like the idea of not wasting paper, I am against a digital-only solution. The reality is that many games already never get reported online, or are reported incorrectly. Increasing the number of things that need to be reported will only make for more opportunities to get things wrong. As a GM, I don’t need the extra burden of reporting detailed data, and dealing with players who dispute the online record. As a player, I don’t want my characters’ rewards to rely on the reporting accuracy of someone that I may never see again.
Very much this. One of the things I really do not like about the current guide is that character creation rules are buried in an appendix. Basic info needs to be in the first chapter. The most important thing a new player needs to see is how to make a legal character, not minutiae about how much gold your PC has to contribute if a pregen dies during an adventure.
Stars won't carry over direct, there will be some other symbology, but the team is looking at ways a GM's stars may impact pieces of version 2. If you have an idea, we'd love to hear it. Assuming PC races will be restricted in some way, I maybe you could unlock alternate races based on the number of existing stars a player has?
Thanks for continuing the RSP. And an especially big thanks for letting people keep working toward the Skinwalker boon. We are going to have a lot of happy GMs in my area. Paperwork question, however: will existing locations need to “re-apply” to participate in the program for the new year?
For those who need a hand drawing circular rooms. You might one to grab a tool to help you out. I bought one of these (https://www.dickblick.com/products/helix-circle-ruler/?clickTracking=true& amp;wmcp=pla&wmcid=items&wmckw=55740-1012&gclid=Cj0KCQiAwKvTBRC 2ARIsAL0Dgk3lvkInrDjxx8CdyuNSpw5oe282_N1outS517-UbXnItN3GObMGWFAaAnLiEALw_w cB) a few years ago. The holes are even big enough to use my wet erase marker with. The intended use is to draw up to a 6 inch radius circle by putting your finger on the small “button” in the middle and your pencil in one of the tiny holes marked for the radius you want. Spin it around and you get a perfect circle with the exact radius you need. But, with a bit of care, I found that I can get up to 12 inch radius circles if I put my “pivot” finger inside one of the 1/2 in cutout circles on the one end, and put my pencil/marker in the tiny holes as usual, then spin. |
Venture-Captain, Ohio—Columbus 161 posts (163 including aliases). No reviews. No lists. 1 wishlist. 48 Organized Play characters. 
