GM Bearington's page

I aim to post 6x a week.

I expect players to 6x a week, but feel free to post more often! I understand that the GM is the primary pace setter, but feel free to respond to other character's posts as appropriate! Please keep as much ooc conversation in the discussion tab as possible. I don't mind comments or questions in gameplay, but if your post is majority ooc text or warrants some back and forth, take it to the discussion tab.

If you are inactive for more than seven days, you will be booted. I understand life comes up, but in a seven day period you should have time for a quick one liner. If you know you will be absent during our game, please let me know! I will bot you as appropriate and your seat at the table remains yours.

Really, my only rule here is to not submit a post that consists purely of dice rolls. In a F2F game, I'd allow it (RPing with strangers is hard, especially when your character has more int, wis, and cha than you do), but part of the beauty of the PBP medium is that you can put serious effort into your posts. Even if it is just one line of descriptive text or telling us how your character goes about what they are doing, that is significantly better than dice rolls. Not only does it make your posts uninteresting, it brings the overall quality of the game down for everyone. Why should other players bother to try if you aren't even pretending to try?

Arguments between characters stay between characters. Whatever beef PC's create between each other will not bleed over into player vs player in the discussion thread. If a conflict arises between players, you must assume best intentions, come from a position of seeking to address the issue, and be civil. Players will be booted for personal attacks. If a player or their PC's actions makes you uncomfortable for any reason, feel free to let me know via PM and I can speak to them as well, leaving your name out of it.

Here are three excellent guides/primers on using the Play by Post format to experience Pathfinder:
DH's Guide to PbP
Painlord's Guide to PbP GMing
Painlord's Advanced PbP Play

I will roll initiative, perception, and saves for you (typically this keeps it moving and minimizes back and forth posts). If you have unusual/situational modifiers to any of theses things, you are free to apply them both pro and reactively, but you must let me know you have such options before the game starts (Example: Halfling with the Adaptable Luck racial trait. Nonexample: Rogue with a bonus to perception vs traps). While not 100% by the rules, the PbP medium is not very good for some of these abilities and I am sacrificing being by the book for practicality.

I will post chronicle sheets on a google drive that I will provide the link for. Your chronicles will last for a month or until everyone has confirmed they have acquired it. If you need access to it again, you will need to provide me with an email address and I will send it to you. I save all chronicle sheets to my hard drive, so don't fret if you miss the one month window.

If you know that there are debates occurring about some aspect of your character, please inform me ASAP. I do not enjoy making decisions when they are immediately relevant to the game. I will provide my thoughts on the matter and you are most certainly welcome to provide yours, but understand that as the GM my word is final in the games I run.

Please post any information I would need to know about your character. This includes perception, initiative, and all your defensive stats (AC, CMD, Saves, etc.). I may ask you to make additions to your tagline. Please don't take offense. All this does is make my life easier by not having to click around for your information.

I do not put all the foes in the same initiative unless the dice fall that way. I think it is immensely unfair to the players when enemies are automatically bunched into the same block and will not bend on this.

I'm flexible in how I resolve posts in the same block and err on the side of what is in favor of the players. At a FtF table, if the Wizard likes to buff the party with haste, but is seated after the Fighter in initiative, the player would just ask the Fighter to delay. In PbP, that is a cumbersome option. Instead, if the Fighter is above the Wizard, but in the same block of initiatives (no enemies between them), I'll modify the rolls the Fighter made if the Wizard's spell would have changed it. If you aren't in the same initiative block, you'll have to declare your delay as normal.

I wait 24 hours from my previous post before putting characters into the next initiative block, effectively putting you in delay. This is not a punishment, I just like to keep combat moving so we don't spend a week on three rounds of combat due to slow posting.
An example:

Initiative
Biggy McSmasher <--- It would currently be this character's turn
Bad Guy
Bad Dude
Spellsy Mc Spells
I'm not a rogue
A DRAGON!

A whole 24 hours pass and there is not a word from the player. Time for delay!
Initiative
Bad Guy
Bad Dude
Biggy McSmasher <--- It would currently be all of their turns and the enemies turns were resolved
Spellsy Mc Spells <---/
I'm not a rogue <---/
A DRAGON!

Please include botting instructions in your character sheet. I don't mind botting characters with instructions, but if there are no instructions present you are waiving your right to veto your botted actions. This will most likely only occur during combat. During noncombat, your PC will languish in silence.