Alurad Sorizan

David Bowles's page

** Pathfinder Society GM. 3,006 posts. 3 reviews. 1 list. No wishlists. 16 Organized Play characters.


1 to 50 of 188 << first < prev | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | next > last >>
Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

All of them.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm not in support of something like this until druids get looked at. Druids are like the original sin of OP classes that break scenarios.

Silver Crusade 2/5

3 people marked this as a favorite.
GM Lamplighter wrote:

First: if a player or GM has a bunch of additional restrictions on themselves like "won't play core classes" or "won't start a PC with GM credit", blaming core for their inability to play is silly. Self-limitation is, well, limiting.

Second: if your GMs only GM to get player Chronicles, try expanding your player base. We have a bunch of people who prefer to GM, and even run a scenario more than once - with NO CHRONICLE (GASP!) - because it's fun and they get good at it and every experience is different and...

Seriously. If credit is all that drives your local Lodge, it is doomed. Even with Core Campaign, you will eventually run out of scenarios unless you play less than twice a month.

"

I don't GM just to get chronicle sheets. So I don't have a problem with that. However, I think it's fair for players like myself to claim burnout on core classes. Some of us have been playing them since 2000.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Walter Sheppard wrote:
Clearly you just need to run some tables of Core and show them how fun it can be Silhren! Once you've given your GMs a taste of it, then they'll be itching to play more.

I think it sounds like the opposite of fun, but I'll still run it because others might love it.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Silhren Rilbahn wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
The GM's refuse to run CORE? That's kind of a strange situation, I think.
Not really. If they don't want to play core, they aren't going to bother running a scenario to get credit for a character who could only be used in core. *shrug*

I plan on doing exactly that. I'll run it, and just not keep any sheets for myself because I'll never play it. I think they are being rather selfish. It's no different than GMing a game more than once.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

We have evil, it's called CN. The choice alignment of murder hobos everywhere.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Undone wrote:
DM Beckett wrote:

I was pretty excited for this. It would solve a lot of issues between what some players can still play and also each time we get someone new, someone either just cant play their character or someone just cant play. Sadly, everyone has declined based on how limited options are. Maybe the next solution, though. It kind of dawned on me that I think this option will be a lot more popular among the DMs than the players, but we will see.

:)

Remember you can only apply GM credit to core only characters. One of the selling points of GMing in PFS for many players is that they can rotate but still level up their guys. If the first adventure is core only you're limited to core only race/class/feats/traits.

z

All my chronicle sheets from GMing core are going in the recycle bin after the table credit posts on Paizo.com.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
outshyn wrote:
doc the grey wrote:
Mike Lindner wrote:
I think this will really help those who want to or at least may be willing to try GMing.
Not really.

Speaking for yourself, I hope. For me: yes really. I've run 9 PFS games in Normal mode, and I'm dying to run in Core mode. I have the Core classes mostly memorized and understood. I know nothing from Advanced Class Guide, and I'm dreading the Occult book classes. I simply feel out of control when I have 5 out of 6 players using classes I've never heard of, and abilities that I don't understand and cannot double-check easily without slowing down the game. That is just my personal brain at work. We can all be derogatory of people like me and suggest that slow people shouldn't GM or something, but until they actually bar me from GMing, I will GM, and I will extremely value a Core game that sets my mind at ease.

Even if you think my mind being set at ease in a Core game is irrational, it doesn't change the fact that that's how my brain works and I'm fine with it, and I want to embrace the Core game. It's delightful to me. So I'm thankful to management for creating it, and I hope my Core games pull in a new player or two (or three).

(I think the concept of a Core game has merits and is easily defensible, but my point here is that there is no need to defend it with merits -- entirely subjective comments such as "I like it for no legitimate reason and irrationally feel good when I do it" is a 100% good enough reason for a person, since each person is fully entitled to decide for themselves. They don't even have to defend it or assert the good qualities of a Core game. They can simply say, "But I want it" and that's legitimate. If the detractors are right and the idea is terrible and yet people still respond to it anyway, then we have still met the target of pulling people in. So that's how I'm going to handle people telling me that I'm wrong to like this or that it will ruin PFS: I'll say, "OK, but I'm having...

Sometimes it's worth slowing down the game. There is no PFS police that are going to haul you away for slowing the game down. More to the point, you'll never learn any non-core material just running CORE. If you think a PC build is dubious, make them explain to you for 5 min. 5 min that can save 30 min is time well spent.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Undone wrote:
There are a large number of season 4, 5, and 6 adventures at higher levels which are flat out impossible with the four core only iconic characters.

A lot of people will disagree with you, but I am in agreement.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

We'll see. The local VOs seem super happy, but I'm not sure about the players. I can image problems where there supply of Core and the demand for normal might be in conflict. Forgive the conjecture, but a big part of gaming is conjecture. Plans might not last contact with the enemy, but planning itself is essential.

" And I know, should this option not work as intended, that they will do whatever they need to to fix it."

You have way more confidence in this than I do. I hope you're right, because I dislike 5th ed DnD quite a bit.

Silver Crusade 2/5

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Andrew Christian wrote:
Oh, and if you have no interest in playing Core Mode... why are you posting so much in the Core Mode threads?

Partly expressing my concerns, partly letting people who think that it's a fix to "power creep" and "power builds" know that that's likely not the case.

I thought that Paizo might found have found this part interesting:

" Either I'll run them myself, or failing that, stop playing this game and in the process quit giving Paizo money. Paizo needs to be careful with this.

A month ago, I thought nothing could ever make me try 5th ed DnD. But I'd play that over Core Campaign in a heartbeat."

But clearly, I was wrong.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I find myself oddly unconcerned about not being able to get a normal mode game. Either I'll run them myself, or failing that, stop playing this game and in the process quit giving Paizo money. Paizo needs to be careful with this.

A month ago, I thought nothing could ever make me try 5th ed DnD. But I'd play that over Core Campaign in a heartbeat.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'll run all the normal mode you want.

"Some (but not all) GMs grow resentful when they spend hours prepping a scenario only to find each combat end before the surprise round is over"

I've never understood why anyone is ever upset by this. The GM didn't write the scenario. The GM can't control the match up of PCs vs pre-generated NPCs.

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Sebastian Hirsch wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
I taking bets on how it is before CORE campaign GMs start complaining about how CORE didn't fix pounce kitties.

David, we know about your opinion regarding the animal companion issue, but I would argue that with CORE animal companions will thrive, since almost everything they use is in the CRB (additional traits is an awesome cherry on top).

Yeah. That was the point of my post. They are going to dominate games and all the GMs that expected "balance" are going to be crying in their beer.

Silver Crusade

6 people marked this as a favorite.

I taking bets on how it is before CORE campaign GMs start complaining about how CORE didn't fix pounce kitties.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

This issue is why I try to get a feel for a gm before the table gets going. Gms with obvious attitude problems get walked away from before the game starts. Gms that hand down bogus rulings during the game are tolerated to get the sheet and not sat with again. There's no reason for a power struggle just vote with your feet.

I will say that when I GM I dont consider myself outranking players, as judgement calls should be minimized and acceptable to the table.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Any griefing of players on knowledge checks just makes the power combat builds more desirable. Two hander power attack barbarians and clustered shots Zen archers don't care about DR in anyway. Their "knowledge" is pure, raw damage which very few Bestiary monsters can stand against regardless of defenses.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

It's not the only metric, but getting dangerous NPCs off the table quickly is the best way to stop their shenanigans. And prevent loss of PC resources. Pregens typically fail spectacularly at this task.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I think in this case the NPCs actions were justified. Because they were a killing machine by background.

And I think the lethality of archers can be remember as well, even in the heat of battle, if we want to get into that point.

I'd also like to point out that many players play their PCs the way you describe, always counting precisely for their fireballs, etc, so I think some NPCs should be able to do the same.

The game is not called PCs rule, NPCs drool and always lose like chumps.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Amanda Plageman wrote:
Jason Wu wrote:
Honestly, the only time I can ever see an NPC actively going out of his way to attack downed PCs while being threatened by the other PCs, is if the NPC is arrogant and supremely confident in his abilities, dismissive of the PCs, or both.

Which is, in fact, the BBEG's attitude an a lot of PFS scenarios. Also, a lot of tactics call for "This NPC fights to the death for <reason>". Sure, this can imply desperation, zealotry, fear, any number of motivations. But it can also mean "I'm willing to die for my cause, and if I can take even 1 other person (PC) with me, I'll die satisfied." In scenarios where the NPCs have been arrogant, zealous, or whatever, I tend to consider killing PCs to be the NPC's final 'screw you' before dying.

That's the NPC's attitude, not mine as a GM. When I kill PCs, I always feel horrible about it, even when the death is either 100% the player's fault or just bad dice rolls. It's never personal. I'm sure that somewhere, sometimes, a GM will target PCs for some vindictive, meta-gamey reason. But 'the GM is a jerk' should never be the first conclusion a player should jump to.

Jason Wu wrote:
ven moreso if the NPC can't seem to hit the active PCs - at that point most folks would start getting desperate and considering fleeing or surrendering, not "making sure this one's dead".

Again, often the tatctics say 'this NPC fights to the death'. While yes, we have the option to change the tactics when they become non-viable, but this one almost never gets changed, since dying is part of the point. If an NPC is committed to dying, why not take a downed PC with him if he can?

It's not something I consider until the PCs show healing resources.

Silver Crusade 2/5

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Undone wrote:
David Bowles wrote:


B) A superior attack had missed the only other target within reach on an "18".
Just as a note this GM metagaming. No one knows what they roll.

Players do. And they use that knowledge constantly to make decisions about toggling power attack. And I think players and NPCs should have some idea of how solid of a hit they landed and whether it affected the target or not.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
icehawk333 wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
icehawk333 wrote:

Course, I never play PFS, so that part doesn't really matter, neh?

Even so, DM's should only really CDG if it's a valid tactical decision, not just to be a jerk and kill a player.

That's almost as bad as sundering a magic weapon, witch can cost more to fix then the PC themselves.

Oh I am totally all about sundering. Too bad PFS writers never give me any good NPCs with adamantine two handers. Basically whatever dirty trick the PCs come up with will be used against them in my games.

Most pc's won't use sunder, to my knowledge. They want the weath.

Considering one sunder check can cost twice as much, or more, then a PC's life, I think something is a little off.
But that's a different thread.

In PFS, you can sunder and still get the loot. At a minimum, hyper-lethal bows made of wood are premium sunder targets.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
icehawk333 wrote:

Course, I never play PFS, so that part doesn't really matter, neh?

Even so, DM's should only really CDG if it's a valid tactical decision, not just to be a jerk and kill a player.

That's almost as bad as sundering a magic weapon, witch can cost more to fix then the PC themselves.

Oh I am totally all about sundering. Too bad PFS writers never give me any good NPCs with adamantine two handers. Basically whatever dirty trick the PCs come up with will be used against them in my games.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Pounding unconscious PCs came up with an NPC with many, many attacks (flurry) and were down to the swings where the to hit was too poor to hit active PCs. The PCs had displayed healing, so the NPC made sure the down one wasn't getting back up.

I find that there are so many easy encounters in PFS that a few deaths are really necessary to keep PCs feeling threatened.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I think disallowing evil is weak sauce. I'd rather adventure with lawful evil over chaotic neutral (because CN PCs just do whatever they want anyway) any day of the week.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

People proficient with 3.X don't have to bend over to make it work. Speed and ease of play only get you so far.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I don't think I ever said 5th is "wrong", just gutted, simplistic, and more arbitrary vs formulaic. People have made it very clear that they like the simplicity, whereas I like formulas.

I personally think they could have done a much better job of dropping some clunky things, but not stripping it down as much as they did. For example, I love buffs, and what they did with them, to me, is horrible. They could have thrown players like me a bone, but they didn't. Full-on gutting mode.

Silver Crusade

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Diffan wrote:

Creature abilities in 4E and D&D:Next sort of replace the need for feats IMO. An Orc doesn't need Power Attack, he could simply have a line that says "-5 to Attack, add an additional +10 to the damage roll" or to illustrate Lightning Reflexes "The Orc has advantage when making Dexterity saving throws."

An endless list of feats based on HD isn't required (and good riddance).

Except for those of us who find "advantage" and "disadvantage" limiting and boring as watching paint dry. The Ork needs power attack so the effect of it scales with the BAB of the Ork.

Monsters built like PCs level the playing field for both the players and GM. It also gives the GM opportunity to build some really cool mosnters!

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.

With that many goblins, you would have troops of goblins, which don't even roll to hit.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
thejeff wrote:
goldomark wrote:
Pathfinder 2.0 or 1.5? If there is anything that was learn in the last 14 years is that compatibility and continuity help when there is an edition change.
Which is why the change from 2E to 3.0 was such a disaster.

There was nothing disastrous about throwing off the shackles of 2nd ed. I gratefully trash canned all my 2nd ed stuff. I hadn't used it since 1994 anyway when 3rd ed came out.

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Logan1138 wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
I guess I have been unlucky in my history of GMs. I find that more jaded players have a tendency to prefer crunchier systems. I am one of those players I suppose.

You have my sympathy (no snark or sarcasm here, btw). I played with my good friends and our DM was never "out to get us" so I only have positive experiences, thus I do not have the same concerns over DM control.

In the old days of gaming (70's-90's) I think people mostly just gamed with their friends (except for the occasional convention game) and this issue with overbearing DM's wasn't as much of a problem. The advent of organized play which sets a bunch of strangers at a table together probably necessitated the massive codification of rules and giving greater authority to the players.

I knew some fine people that became controlling jerks as soon as they put on their "DM" hat. Controlling and playing favorites. The two horsemen of the roleplaying apocalypse.

The whole DM thing is one of the reasons why I prefer wargaming to roleplaying.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Sorry that the iPad can't store simple pdfs, then. What good are they then?

Silver Crusade 2/5

2 people marked this as a favorite.

The way is deal with that is be friendly and not adversarial as the GM. I frequently laugh along with my players at the some of the absurdly easy fights from early seasons and I don't care if my NPCs get crushed. Interestingly, players have been less interested in crushing NPCs since I have displayed no concern for it.

I also try to rule in the player's favor whenever it's possible. If the players know that I'm not going to try to "get them", then they are less likely to bring their 150 DPR PCs.

Lastly, I encourage solid builds, but try to steer players away from overpowering builds. If everyone is solid, then almost every scenario runs just fine.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
houstonderek wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
houstonderek wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
Golarion
Biggest reason I bailed on PF.
I have my own setting in my homebrew. So Golarion doesn't matter to me.
Too bad the entire rules set exists to support Golarion, not vice versa.

I don't find this to be true, not anymore than AD+D existed to support Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Or you could just be an evil priest and cast undetectable alignment. Or just use the fact that you are the head of a state to foil the paladin. Remember that Golarion has plenty of evil aligned nations.

Frequently, lawful evil NPCs will have lawful neutral NPCs in their employ that aren't smitable by Mr. Paladin, which makes the paladin a sad panda. Especially if they are cavaliers or fighters.

Detect evil is not nearly as useful as it sounds on its face. It could reveal embezzles money from the orphan's fund evil, or head of a doomsday cult evil. The telepathy spell if far more likely to cause the effect you are looking for.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Kthulhu wrote:
5th and 2nd are really mechanically nothing alike. The similarities are really only in some of the philosophies behind the games.

A philosophy which apparently I despise. I don't want GMs enpowered; they already have infinite supply of any NPC they like with as much gear as they like with as many HD as they like. How can you "marginalize" an omnipotent entity? You can't.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I've kind of moved on from that specific topic. I played it 5th once, and I have explained my grievances. Let's move on.

Silver Crusade

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Diffan wrote:
David Bowles wrote:

Letting combatants take a full move and take all their attacks has a lot of unforeseen consequences. Something like a dragon just got nearly impossible to deal with. Fly 80 feet, take seven attacks with power attack, good night.

Clearly people should play what they enjoy, but if my only option for tabletop gaming were 5th ed, I'd just go play more Starcraft. That game holds zero interest for me. They tried to be everything to everyone and came up with something I feel inferior to even 4th ed. But as I said, I've been there, done that with 2nd ed, and by extension, 2nd ed redux. I have no interest in playing 2nd ed again.

I think you just made Dragons more interesting, especially when their whole turn consists of Fly, 1 attack, done and then 4 or 5 turns of concentrated attacks and then one attack from the dragon and rinse-repeat.

Interesting or not, a lot of classes/monsters would have to be rebalanced. The CR system isn't perfect, but playing with that house rule destroys it.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I would argue that the good part of the paladin's code necessarily trumps the lawful part.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I'm not try to force anything on anyone. I'm just showing why I give paladins a lot of leeway. If a paladin steals a horse in order to advance the greater good (pursue a very evil NPC), and then pays the owner back (maybe with interest) when she/he is able, no atonement is necessary in my book. That's just one example. Not all laws are created equal and not all dubious actions are created equal.

If paladins have to break mortal laws to protect people, then so be it. I'm not going to penalize them for looking at things on a bigger scale than the local sheriff.

Silver Crusade 2/5

3 people marked this as a favorite.

If I don't let the animal companion participate, how am I going to kill it? :)

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

To expand on that further, none of my lawful good PCs would consider that law by Taldor legitimate; why would a paladin?

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

I roll in front of the players, so what happens happens. In something like King of Storval Stairs, that means five kills happen.

Silver Crusade 2/5

3 people marked this as a favorite.

It's not even a lesser of two evils. If I am a paladin of Sarenrae and Taldor outlaws my religion, guess whose laws I'm not following? I'm still following legitimate authority, but to my paladin, there is no legitimate authority in Taldor. In this case, Sarenrae is the law, not Taldor.

Silver Crusade 2/5

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Rambone wrote:
Seems like the 5 drop outs are violating the "don't be a jerk rule".

The "don't be a jerk" rule can't force people to play. That's absurd.

Silver Crusade 2/5

5 people marked this as a favorite.

Usually you hear the harpies before you see them anyway. Bastards.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Warpriest is $$, imo.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Jane "The Knife" wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
Jane "The Knife" wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
It's not that rogues can't do well. It's just that other classes do more well. I imagine you can have all your PCs with rogue levels and not deaths, it's just harder.
I ... don't understand your comments David. Sorry, could you re-word this and try again?
Rogues can be quite good compared to PFS scenarios. Therefore, they can function just fine. However, rogues are not so good compared to what other PCs classes can do. That's what I meant.
I will have to respectfully disagree. Though this is just opinion...

I am only mildly anti-rogue, so I'm not going to carry their water in this thread. I am more reporting the news here than anything else. The single biggest problem I see is a bad fort and bad will save combo. In fact, I call phantasmal killer "power word: kill rogue".

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Curiously, this practice is flat out illegal in modules/APs. I wish they would extend this to scenarios.

Silver Crusade 2/5

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Jason Wu wrote:
David Bowles wrote:
redward wrote:
Game Master wrote:
redward wrote:
Game Master wrote:
Part of the fun is contributing meaningfully. Like it or not, it's impossible to enjoy combat if on my turn, I move and deal eleven damage, eating an AoO from the monster's 20 ft. reach, and the archer hits three targets for eighty-nine damage each.
Sure but at some point the player of that archer has to take some responsibility for the enjoyment of his fellow players and dial it back if necessary.
It is not, and never should be, the responsibility of the player to intentioanlly handicap himself in order to make the game fun for his friends.

In the context of PFS I will have to disagree.

Creating a character that can trivialize a PFS scenario is not particularly difficult. If everyone at the table wants to play "who can one-shot the bad guy first" then that's fine. Otherwise, some consideration needs to be given to the other players.

Declaring yourself the hero of the story and relegating everyone else to sidekick if they're not willing to compete is an incredibly selfish approach to what is supposed to be a cooperative experience.

But a perfectly legal one.

Not in PFS.

That whole "don't be a jerk" thing.

-j

Massive powergamer who nearly always dials it back in play to make sure everyone gets to participate.

I still debate the enforcability of that "rule".