FurtiveZoog's page

Victory in the Ruby Phoenix Tournament earned the Pathfinder Society a pick of the legendary treasures of the Tian sorceress Hao Jin, and the Decemvirate knew just what item to select: a frayed and dirty tapestry hidden deep in Hao Jin’s vault. This unassuming tapestry acts as a doorway to another dimension in which Hao Jin stored her most massive items, including entire buildings, battlefields, and the ruins of ancient civilizations. The Pathfinder Society is now methodically exploring and cataloging the diverse locales tucked within this extradimensional space.

Deep beneath Absalom’s Grand Lodge, the Pathfinder Society’s Master of Spells, Aram Zey, gestures at the tapestry hung on the wall, surrounded by ladders and scaffolds. Scholars and diviners scurry around the tapestry, analyzing its abstract patterns and comparing insights.

Zey snaps his finger to quiet the room and speaks rapidly. "The aasimar nation of Tianjing contains a handful of temples to Korada, Empyreal Lord of forgiveness and foresight. The Pathfinder Society is interested in exploring these holy sites, but the aasimar disciples in Tianjing are reluctant to grant the Pathfinder Society full access to their faith’s secrets. Fortunately, the custodian council of Tianjing gifted one such temple to Hao Jin centuries ago. This temple—the Temple of Empyreal Enlightenment—now sits vacant within the museum demiplane of the Hao Jin Tapestry. We need well-trained explorers to survey the isolated and abandoned site.

"We will transport you to the Temple of Empyreal Enlightenment within the Hao Jin Tapestry and provide you with a small cache of supplies. We need a complete report on the temple with a focus on four key locations. First, locate the temple’s meditation room, find evidence of any meditative techniques described there, and record any effects of performing those techniques. Second, prepare a comprehensive catalog of all works in the temple library. Third, find the temple gardens and draft a detailed plan of the garden’s layout. Finally, enter the temple’s crypt and take rubbings of the carvings on each sarcophagus.

“You will enter the tapestry within the hour. Any questions?”

Discuss!

An autumn chill filled the Pathfinder Society’s chapter house in Almas as Venture-Captain Brackett briefed you. Normally brash and outgoing, the hatchet-faced veteran’s face instead wore an expression of guarded concern. “I need you to venture into the Aspodell Mountains between Cheliax and Andoran; a dwarven prospector there seeks a lost dwarven site and we want in on his expedition. The prospector’s name is Torvic and he’s obsessively searched for years, hoping to find the hidden galleries of his ancestor, the dwarven craftsman Barek Triongger.”

At this point, the chapter’s librarian Wystorn Telfyr stepped forward and from a small wooden case, he produced several tattered scrolls and a gleaming, strangely phosphorescent pearl. “We recently acquired these from a man called Beggar. They describe the Gallery of Wonders built by Barek Triongger during the death throes of the dwarven Empire of Tar Khadurrm.”

Picking up the strangely-glowing pearl, the librarian continued, “These pearls are only found in the deepest of the Darklands’ seas. While not especially valuable, a cache of these would be a rare find. Divinations revealed that Barek apparently used this one as a key. We could claim substantial favors from the dwarves of Emperor’s Peak should we discover what it’s a key for.”

Venture-Captain Brackett took over. “I’m wagering that Beggar stole these items, as the likelihood of a wandering vagabond possessing legally acquired dwarven heirlooms seems small. Looking through these documents and comparing them to Pathfinder Chronicles on the matter, it’s clear that this Torvic is onto something.” Brackett cocked a thumb toward Telfyr. “Our librarian was able to glean some information from Beggar about where he acquired these items and was also able to divine a likely location where the dwarf might be holed up. Find him and make an alliance with him; hopefully, he’ll want his pearl back and will show you the way to the Gallery of Wonders.”

Discussion is open!

You have spent some long, mostly uneventful months on a ship, sailing south from the frosty Lands of the Linnorm Kings, although it is always a bit nerve-wracking until one has passed safely from the relatively-dangerous Arcadian Ocean, through the Hespereth Strait and beneath the remnants of the Arch of Aroden - both of which are currently under Chelaxian control - and into the relative safety of the Inner Sea.

With your home base of Absalom 'just around the corner', the ship makes dock in Almas, the large and bustling capital city of Andoran - a special thrill for many of you.

As it happens, new orders from the Pathfinder Society are waiting for you at the dock. You are to go straight to the immense Cathedral of Aroden, which has been converted into a Pathfinder Lodge by its current master, Venture-Captain Brackett. The apparently singularly-named Brackett, distinctively hawk-nosed, is a former swordsman of note, now middle-aged and the man responsible for converting the cathedral into a lodge.

This is where the new adventure begins!

Morning light streams in through the stained glass windows of the Cathedral of Aroden in Almas, where Venture-Captain Brackett sits behind a large, antique desk replete with hairthin lines that mar its surface like nearly healed scars. He scans a handful of papers before speaking to you and the other assembled guests, among them the no-nonsense wizard Wystorn Telfyr and Major Colson Maldris.

“I recently received news of a kidnapping in Sauerton, up in the northern wine country. Thalia Andares, heir to the Sauerton Red wine fortune and daughter of Consul Tercio Andares, vanished during the Silverglazer Sunday celebration and has not been seen since.”

With a meaningful look, Maldris catches Brackett’s attention, and the two nod in understanding as the major contributes. “Tercio Andares is powerful and widely respected; not only has he been the mayor of the large town for many years, but he is also a strong voice in the Andoren military—even for a consul. The Sauerton Red winery has made him extremely wealthy, and his financial support could be a considerable asset to the Pathfinders’ important work in and around the Worldwound. He seems uninterested in foreign affairs, though, perhaps because it’s politically safer to focus on domestic matters. Even so, he is known to help those who help him.”

“I appreciate the summary, major,” says Brackett. “I am convinced that the Andares’s gratitude would do much to refill our war chest for a struggle that is unlikely to end quickly. When you track down Thalia, as I trust you will do quickly, it is important not only to the Pathfinder Society but perhaps to the whole world that you request funding for the military campaign against the Worldwound. Of course, convincing Tercio to contribute troops and military aid would be even better, but aim for finances first.”

With a sigh, Major Maldris picks up his tricorne hat and prepares to depart. “I would stay longer, but I must make final preparations to travel,” he states in a quiet voice. “While I hope that the Andares family agrees to help the society, I am also wary of this political practice of mutual backscratching. As all of you are in Sauerton—especially those who care for this fine country—remain vigilant for signs of short-sighted corruption and abandonment of Andoran’s founding principles: freedom and democracy. Follow what you believe to be the best course of action, as I will not be available to advise you. Nonetheless, I would appreciate any reports of corruption after the situation is resolved.” After sharing a quick handshake with Brackett and a nod of farewell to the rest of you, he departs, closing the door behind him.

Telfyr breaks the moment of silence that follows by reporting, “My scrying indicates that the young Andares is being held in a building with high ceilings and once-elegant adornments in a style popular in this nation before the People’s Revolt. The structure seems to have sustained extensive fire damage which has not been repaired. Thalia is alive and unhurt, at least for now. She was reading a fresh copy of the essays of Alysande Benedict when I saw her.”

Brackett begins to bring the briefing to a close by concluding, “We have transportation ready to take you to Sauerton as quickly as possible. When you arrive, present this letter to Consul Andares before you begin your investigation. It introduces you and offers the condolences and assistance of the Pathfinder Society. Not only is this proper etiquette to announce your intentions to the mayor, but Thalia vanished from the Andares manor. Someone there should be able to make sense of Telfyr’s visions.”

Telfyr frowns at Brackett’s diction. “Scrying, Brackett, is diff–“

“Alright, yes, scrying,” the venture-captain concedes as he pushes a sealed letter across the table. “Introductions, rescue operation, then negotiation for funding and possible military support. Make any questions quick; you’ve got a boat to catch.”

Hi all,

I am going to run PFS First Steps, Part I: In Service to Lore as a Play-by-Post, Pathfinder Society game here on the Paizo boards.

Having four spaces already filled, I am looking for two more new Pathfinders!

I am especially interested in inviting people who are new to PFS, PbP, or both as I’m trying to give some new people a chance to get started playing. This will probably be a one-shot campaign because of my other commitments, but I hope that getting a scenario under your belt (and your character's) will make it easier to find the next game on the boards.

So far, I have:
1. Zander Drax (Human Cleric 1)
2. Kawrock (Tengu Druid 1)
3. Vyk Tyr (Tiefling Magus 1)
4. Eurydes (Taldan Cavalier 1)

I'm hoping to start sometime mid-next week, giving time for new people to get their characters going. I've put an introduction to PFS and PbP on the campaign page.

Let me know if you have any questions!

Greetings and Salutations!

One of my GM duties:

Your Duties as Game Master:

As a Pathfinder Society Organized Play Game Master running a session at a convention or an in-store event, you have the following duties.
• Introduce yourself.
• Encourage your players to introduce themselves (and their characters).

But, since this is online, just share what you want, if you want. You can introduce your character best, I think, on the gameplay thread, or add some OOC info about them here.

I'm Matt, a 43-year-old father of a two-year-old boy, staying at home while my wife goes through an accelerated nursing school program. As I said on the Campaign Info page, I am relatively new to PbP, PFS, Pathfinder, and GMing, though I have now finished as an online player in six games and as a GM in five (I think - I am starting to lose track). I am hoping online gaming will help keep me relatively sane, especially now that I have had to give up my in-person game for time and scheduling reasons.

Secondary Success Conditions
Or, How do I get my second prestige point?

There is a "Secondary Success Conditions" document we were sent a link to and I've copied the introduction here so that you will know how things have changed with faction missions and getting that second prestige point.

At the beginning of Season 5 of the Pathfinder Society Organized Play campaign, the means by which a PC earns Prestige Points and Fame changed. Before, a PC earned Prestige Points by completing faction missions (short missions assigned by the respective head of the faction) and by completing the scenario’s main mission. With few exceptions, these faction missions are no longer tied to earning Prestige Points, but the players may opt to receive and perform these missions for Season 0–4 scenarios for no special benefit. In those few cases where the scenario still uses the faction missions, treat members of the Grand Lodge faction as though they were members of the Osirion faction, treat members of the Sczarni faction as though they were members of the Taldor faction, and treat members of the Silver Crusade faction as though they were members of the Andoran faction.

In Season 5, a scenario’s individual faction missions have been replaced by a secondary success condition, which typically ties into exceeding the goal established in the mission briefing, finding an additional boon, securing a longterm ally, not damaging the reputation of the Pathfinder Society, or generally excelling at the tasks set before them.

I think it is best to still provide the faction missions for role playing purposes and for PFS historical flavor, but I was never completely happy with the faction missions being tied to the prestige point since they often seemed to require a single pass-fail d20 roll with a skill the character may not have, rather than good and creative gaming.

Also, it seems that the new Secondary Success Conditions are at least sometimes related to the old faction missions, so you might be more sure of getting the second PP if you do the faction missions.

Fresh off your induction into the Society, the completion of your basic training within the organization, and then finally passing your test of Confirmation, you find yourselves in the office of Ambrus Valsin, the venture-captain in charge of daily operations in and around the Grand Lodge. The efficient and straightforward chamberlain greets your group curtly and motions for you to sit before jumping straight into your assignment.

”All right, Pathfinders! Listen up. I know you are new recruits eager to make names for yourselves in the organization, but first we need to make sure you are up to snuff and won’t get yourself killed out there. I have a number of small assignments for you and your team, and it would be best if you could finish them before the day’s end.

“Every day we get some doe-eyed hopeful or some sniveling bootlicker willing to do anything to join up with the Pathfinders. Most of them are good kids, but not all of them have the salt to make it in a world like this. It’s rough out there and I’m not just talking about the ruins, tombs, and wilderness Pathfinders find themselves in on missions. We’ve got people who look down their noses at us, folks who think we squander our resources, and agents who want to take everything we have collected. This wealth of knowledge and these items of lore make us the most powerful organization on the planet. That said, since we are fractured and widespread, it’s difficult for that power to light on anything for too long. For every friend of the Society, there are two enemies.

“Your first mission, to test your mettle and loyalties, sends you to meet a few people important to the Society living here in Absalom. These are other venture-captains or close allies of our organization, so follow their orders as you would mine. I’ve prepared a list of things I want you to do. They’re not arranged in any particular order of importance, but I want them all completed as quickly as possible. Only report to me once you complete them all. Included in the envelope you hold in your hands is the list, complete with the name of your contact, and directions to the meeting location.”

tl;dr: Dying sucks, and even small risks add up over time, so how many players (4, 5, or 6) should I allow on a PFS scenario? How dangerous should PFS scenarios be?

I had a question - or two related questions - about how dangerous a PFS scenario should be since, although you can't mess with the "mechanics" of a scenario, you can decide how many players/characters to allow on the scenario (at least in online play).

Having one expectation, I was running six characters through a scenario that another PFS GM had limited to four characters. As I was discussing with this GM, one really odd part about PFS play is that while there is a hard and fast rule against changing "mechanics" in the PFS scenarios, the same Tier 1-2 scenario would be presented in most cases to 4 brand-new level 1 characters with character-driven builds who's players just sat down with each other for the first time and to 6 (or even 7) almost-third level characters with optimized builds who know all of each other’s tactics and were even designed from step 1 to be a team. (I guess at some point in the development of the scenarios they decided to modify things a bit for bigger or smaller parties, at least. I'm not sure at what point that was since I haven't run that many scenarios.)

On one hand, the most memorable encounters for me as a player were ones where it seemed that everyone was going to die (but no one actually did). On the other hand, death in PFS is especially harsh given that it (or a similar remove-from-play fate) means starting over at 1st, while in most home games I would guess you would come in with a new character at or just below the group level. (That would seem a good change for PFS: When a character dies, you get to make a new character 1 or 2 levels below, starting with some slightly below average amount of gold.)

Doing a little math (feel free to correct me on it), having even a 5% chance that a character dies permanently per encounter means about 16% of characters will make it to level 4. (I think the math - given 4 combats per scenario, three scenarios per level, and 3 levels - would be .95^36). Reducing the chance of death to 2% per encounter brings the survival to 4th level up to about 48%. (Making it to 6th level would be about 5% and 30%, respectively.)

(I was picking 4th level since that is about the first time would seem to have enough Prestige Points to get a Raise Dead, if essentially all of their scenarios earned them two points. Additionally, though, Raise Dead may not work because of the cause of death or time since death, may cost more in PFS if the death wasn’t in or near a substantial city, and will cause lot of lingering damage and expenses with its ‘permanent’ negative levels.)

So, from a character risk-of-death standpoint, are scenarios best run with 4, 5, or 6 characters?

Hi all,

One space is available for a PbP, PFS run of The Frostfur Captives played at Tier 1-2 here on the Paizo boards. (Here is the campaign description page, detailing how I do things.) The campaign is up and going, but only in the initial mission briefing stage. We have five, but I always like to have a full house to give more players the chance to go.

I'd prefer someone who is relatively new to PbP, who doesn't have 10 campaigns going, and who hasn't played the scenario before, all so that the fun is spread around a little better.

I also would expect 1 or 2 posts a day. (I'll try to restrain myself and not make it go too fast. Since this is my only GMing at the moment, we'll see how well that goes!)

We have in the group:

a human paladin/1;
a halfling bard (detective)/2;
a tiefling witch/2;
a human cleric of Gorum/2; and
a half-orc alchemist (grenadier)/2.

Thanks, Matt/GM FurtiveZoog

So, if you have a character ready, let me know!

The discussion thread is open!

I'm going to make a slight change in a few lines of introductory 'fluff' for The Frostfur Captives (I think minor changes to fluff would be allowed in PFS.)

There is just a small section that bothered me when reading it and, since I found that the developer agrees it doesn't make much sense, it seems OK to make a small change.

Hey, a probably quick and simple Ear-Piercing Scream damage question: Does it do 1d6 damage at 1st and 2nd (caster) levels, and 2d6 at 3rd and 4th levels, etc.?

It is worded, though, that the target "... takes 1d6 points of sonic damage per two caster levels...". Arguably, then, 1st level wouldn't get the 1d6 caster bonus because, well, it isn't two levels... So, you would only get the 1d6 at 2nd level, 2d6 at 4th, etc.

I am probably reading too much into it, but I was wondering because such spells often are written like, "1d6 plus 1d6 for every additional two levels...", IIRC.

Thanks!

I would suggest allowing GMs to have more than the 1 GM chronicle sheet currently allowed for non-Tier 1 scenarios and non-Tier 1-2 sanctioned modules. Especially with Play-by-Post runs, preparing scenarios is a lot of work, but once it is all done it makes sense to re-use the material a bit more and run a second (or third) group.

I would like to potentially help GM two+ groups through each scenario I prepare, but I also don't want to neglect advancing my own characters. There would be more incentive to run two or more groups if I could get more GM chronicle sheets to apply to my characters.

The Blakros Museum rises into the night sky, its single black spire severing the full moon in twain. The black iron gates surrounding the exhibition hall grind in protest against the wind. Beyond, the museum’s large oaken doors stand wide open, a silver-gray mist belching forth from the cavernous darkness within. You wonder how you ended up here, standing at the precipice of unknown terrors, and instantly Venture Captain Adril Hestram’s wide looming face is conjured into your minds’ eye. His booming words ring out from memory as clearly as he spoke them only one hour ago:

“The Blakros Museum is cursed. Some darkness has descended upon the place and those who enter are blasted with evil and left raving through its halls, more beast than men. The curator, Nigel Aldain, is an old associate of the Society, though he chose to leave our organization some years back after a disagreement.” Adril looked sheepish then, as if remembering some distasteful incident from his youth.

“Nigel has long denied the Society access to the Blakros Museum’s considerable collection of relics and scrolls, using his extensive contacts to nab several excellent finds right out from under us... he always had a nose for the hunt. Whatever is past between Nigel and the Society, he needs our help now. Perhaps if we can come to his aid, he may think on rejoining the Pathfinder Society, or at least offering to share his discoveries with us.”

“Apparently the trouble at Blakros Museum began this morning, shortly after a wayward Pathfinder named Lugizar Trantos returned to Absalom after months spent in the Mwangi Expanse. Supposedly, instead of coming straight to the Lodge to report in, he went to Blakros, sold his finds to Nigel, and then disappeared with a hefty sum of gold. The few who glimpsed Lugizar claimed he was much changed by his time in the Mwangi... gaunt, his eyes yellowed and unfocused, a strange rasping cough that seemed to wrack his now wasted frame. Whatever he brought back with him, we believe it is the cause of the Blakros Museum’s ills. Root it out.”

Before you left, Adril handed you a folded map of the museum, a flashy piece of card that looks like it's meant to be given to patrons. He also suggested you head to the offices first to find Nigel as he may have some insight into whatever foul curse vexes the place.

Root it out. Your final order from Adril. All that's left is for you to proceed...

You've had an hour to prepare before coming to the Blakros Museum, meaning you've had time to go shopping or do some research.

The discussion thread is open!

Hi all,

First up, please make sure that your Pathfinder number-character number is easy to find on your character sheet!

Second, especially if you are new, please take a look at the "Campaign Info" tab where I am trying to develop a good guide to starting PbP PFS play and to how I run games. It's a work in progress, and I'm still learning.

Then, one of my GM duties:

Your Duties as Game Master:

As a Pathfinder Society Organized Play Game Master running a session at a convention or an in-store event, you have the following duties.
• Introduce yourself.
• Encourage your players to introduce themselves (and
their characters).

But, since this is online, just share what you want, if you want. You can introduce your character best, I think, on the gameplay thread, or add some OOC info about them here.

I'm Matt, a 43-year-old father of a two-year-old boy, staying at home while my wife goes through an accelerated nursing school program. As I said on the Campaign Info page, I am relatively new to PbP, PFS, Pathfinder, and GMing, though I have now finished as an online player in five games and as a GM in four. I am hoping online gaming will help keep me sane, especially now that I had to give up my in-person game for time reasons.

This is a recruitment thread for the First Online Gameday, which is closed - this is just to make sure I find all of the people who signed up.

I was wondering about what would be good prestige point purchases early in a Pathfinder Society universalist wizard's career. Any suggestions, or has this been covered in another guide?

For clerics and others with CLW on the spell list (and possibly those with Use Magic Device), it seems a Wand of Cure Light Wounds is a pretty standard purchase. But what about other classes, and for clerics after the first two points? (Obviously, it would make sense to save some for later needs, but the purchases seem really useful at early levels.)

I was thinking of a Wand of Mage Armor and/or Shield (for its anti-magic missile effect) and a Wand of Magic Missile and/or Color Spray.

In a PFS PbP game, an alchemist has just thrown one of his bombs in a warehouse with wooden floors and boxes of goods. Since the bombs do fire damage, is there a rule for determining if something catches on fire? (The question could be applied more generally to any fire attack.)

I, at least, wasn't finding one in the PRD, and while it makes sense that items would have a chance of catching on fire, I hate to arbitrarily add difficulties to a main attack.

Fresh off your induction into the Society, the completion of your basic training within the organization, and then finally passing your test of Confirmation – successfully exploring and reporting as a cooperating group on the dungeon of Asad’s Keep – you find yourselves in the office of Ambrus Valsin, the venture-captain in charge of daily operations in and around the Grand Lodge. The efficient and straightforward chamberlain greets your group curtly and motions for them to sit before jumping straight into your assignment.

”All right, Pathfinders! Listen up. I know you are new recruits eager to make names for yourselves in the organization, but first we need to make sure you are up to snuff and won’t get yourself killed out there. I have a number of small assignments for you and your team, and it would be best if you could finish them before the day’s end.

“Every day we get some doe-eyed hopeful or some sniveling bootlicker willing to do anything to join up with the Pathfinders. Most of them are good kids, but not all of them have the salt to make it in a world like this. It’s rough out there and I’m not just talking about the ruins, tombs, and wilderness Pathfinders find themselves in on missions. We’ve got people who look down their noses at us, folks who think we squander our resources, and agents who want to take everything we have collected. This wealth of knowledge and these items of lore make us the most powerful organization on the planet. That said, since we are fractured and widespread, it’s difficult for that power to light on anything for too long. For every friend of the Society, there are two enemies.

“Your first mission, to test your mettle and loyalties, sends you to meet a few people important to the Society living here in Absalom. These are other venture-captains or close allies of our organization, so follow their orders as you would mine. I’ve prepared a list of things I want you to do. They’re not arranged in any particular order of importance, but I want them all completed as quickly as possible. Only report to me once you complete them all. Included in the envelope you hold in your hands is the list, complete with the name of your contact, and directions to the meeting location.”

Working of a PFS run of PFS First Steps, Part I: In Service to Lore with a second group.

A recruitment thread for 'GM FurtiveZoog's PFS First Steps, Part I: In Service to Lore'.

This is semi-private, continuing with a group from First Steps, Part II.

There will need to be at least one more character added since one player is absent, and the rest depends on who from the last scenario wants to continue with this scenario.

Fresh off your induction into the Society, the completion of your basic training within the organization, and then finally passing your test of Confirmation – successfully exploring and reporting as a cooperating group on the dungeon of Asad’s Keep – you find yourselves in the office of Ambrus Valsin, the venture-captain in charge of daily operations in and around the Grand Lodge. The efficient and straightforward chamberlain greets your group curtly and motions for them to sit before jumping straight into your assignment.

”All right, Pathfinders! Listen up. I know you are new recruits eager to make names for yourselves in the organization, but first we need to make sure you are up to snuff and won’t get yourself killed out there. I have a number of small assignments for you and your team, and it would be best if you could finish them before the day’s end.

“Every day we get some doe-eyed hopeful or some sniveling bootlicker willing to do anything to join up with the Pathfinders. Most of them are good kids, but not all of them have the salt to make it in a world like this. It’s rough out there and I’m not just talking about the ruins, tombs, and wilderness Pathfinders find themselves in on missions. We’ve got people who look down their noses at us, folks who think we squander our resources, and agents who want to take everything we have collected. This wealth of knowledge and these items of lore make us the most powerful organization on the planet. That said, since we are fractured and widespread, it’s difficult for that power to light on anything for too long. For every friend of the Society, there are two enemies.

“Your first mission, to test your mettle and loyalties, sends you to meet a few people important to the Society living here in Absalom. These are other venture-captains or close allies of our organization, so follow their orders as you would mine. I’ve prepared a list of things I want you to do. They’re not arranged in any particular order of importance, but I want them all completed as quickly as possible. Only report to me once you complete them all. Included in the envelope you hold in your hands is the list, complete with the name of your contact, and directions to the meeting location.”

Working on starting a PFS, public run (but where most of the slots are filled) of First Steps, Part I: In Service to Lore

Is there an easy way to change characters that are "aliases" into official "Pathfinder Society characters"? Or is it something someone "official" could do?

I inherited a PFS PbP game where two of the characters were created as simple aliases instead of as PFS characters. It is my understanding that to get proper credit for the character they are going to need them to be formally PFS characters in the computer, etc., instead of just aliases.

I suppose that the players could make up PFS characters the correct way (through the MyAccount links) and then manually transfer information over, reselect avatars, etc., but the names they would want for their PFS characters are already being used by the aliases. So, I am hoping that there is a better way.

A character in a PbP PFS game that I am running has a quadruped eidolon and the question arose as to whether he could fire through its square without incurring the usual soft cover penalty (the eidolon was right in front of him and the monster was a bit farther away).

In the rules on Low Obstacles and Cover,

A low obstacle (such as a wall no higher than half your height) provides cover, but only to creatures within 30 feet (6 squares) of it. The attacker can ignore the cover if he's closer to the obstacle than his target.

I've never seen it come up that a quadruped would be considered a low enough cover to be ignored, but is does make some sense.

On the other hand, there is a special feat for small or smaller creatures, low profile, which has as part of it the specific benefit "... In addition, you do not provide soft cover to creatures when ranged attacks pass through your square."

I would think that if small or 'low' creatures regularly modified the usual soft cover rules then it would be mentioned more specifically. (Of course, it might and I could just be missing it...)

But, since it was a good argument and makes sense, I decided to interpret cover rules for now to think of the cover provided by low/small creatures more like the low wall example.

Does anyone else have a more definite idea of how it is supposed to work?

You receive at your lodgings in Absalom an envelope of fine paper, sealed with red wax embossed with the seal of the Lantern Lodge. Inside is an invitation, written in Common and Tien in delicate calligraphy, to a party being held that evening at the Lantern Lodge, the beautiful and exotic estate of the Tian venture-captain, Amara Li, in Absalom’s Petal District. Tonight, the invitation informs you, is the Snapdragon Festival, a traditional Gokan holiday featuring fireworks and rich plum wine. You are encouraged to dress to impress, and instructed to seek out the hostess and head of the Lantern Lodge, Amara Li, upon your arrival.

If this is your first adventure, consider yourself to have 25 gp to rent or borrow any outfits/costumes.

Now is a good opportunity, as you arrive at the party, to introduce your character to the other characters and players, and we’ll move along after everyone arrives.

Map of Absalom

Hi all,

I am going to run a PFS-legal, Play-by-Post game here of Pathfinder Society Scenario Intro 2: First Steps—Part II: To Delve the Dungeon Deep, chosen because I’ve played it as a player and really enjoyed it. It is being retired, but apparently we only need to start it by August 14th and complete it by September 30th, neither of which should be a problem. If my schedule permits, I might be able to also GM a run of First Steps—Part I: In Service to Lore (which isn’t being retired) after we complete Part II. (It doesn’t matter much that they would be played ‘out of order’.)

I would like to recruit five or six players who are preferably 1) new to PbP and/or 2) not in any other PbP games yet, since I know how hard it is sometimes to get into a PbP game, especially before you have some character-making and PbP experience to show. If it isn’t filled in a few days, then it will be open, taking on characters on a first come basis, including those who have already posted.

Full disclosure: I’m also relatively new to GMing, Pathfinder, PFS, and PbP gaming (did I forget anything?), so I would need players who are able to work with me in making this a great game.

For character types, I would say that you should just run a character that you would enjoy playing. It appears that we already have a cleric from my pre-post conversations, so that should help as there are a fair number of encounters. Really, though, these initial games are not that deadly. (Play a cleric or backup healer if you like, though.)

I’ve prepared a short introduction to my game and to various aspects of PFS and PbP gaming on my campaign description page.

Thanks,

Matt/FurtiveZoog

This thread is for a Play-by-Post run of PFS First Steps - Part II: To Delve the Dungeon Deep before it is retired.

I'm prepping a PFS PbP run of the scenario #3-01: The Frostfur Captive, primarily for the group that I am currently in.