Greg Hurst's page

Just ran the first session today, we had to call it after the 2nd round of the skreesire. The party flushed out the skreelings and it showed up to ensorcel a few of them into protecting its offspring.

While not unique to this AP, the sarcesian sniper didn't make a ton of sense mechanically. It's an operative, but didn't have any equipment that would it allow it to use any of its abilities. I'd probably suggest changing its hand weapon out to something with the operative property and maybe giving it debilitating sniper. Otherwise it just seemed like it was built correctly.

It took me a bit to ferret out the skreeling pile on bleed ability. Ultimately, with the requirement to flank, 3 skreeling is an odd encounter. That seems like something that could've been built a bit more simply for something as tame as a bleed 1 or 2 effect at level 5.

The whole valley feels like it's going to be a bit of a slog fighting their way from one side to another, but we should get it knocked out and onto part 2 in fairly short order if the "suggested" fighter types don't wipe the party.

If they ever repackage it I suggest they call it Stuck in the Cathedral. Seriously, Race wasn't well received (it's sitting at 2.5 stars right now) and the sequel while being very exclusive and run only by 4 and 5 star GMs still wasn't particularly well-liked by anyone I know that played. I just checked and I've run part one 3 times which includes a party rage quit at CincyCon.

So, I played this awhile back and I'm GMing it in a few weeks. I just did my initial read through and I feel like the storage box should've been the key to this adventure. You're told several times that the items were dormant in this strange box that only effects technology (like an EMP I suppose). Then when you discover the box you find it's non-working with a DC30 Engineering check. The high DC alone seems to dissuade the players from using the box, but I can't see why they wouldn't at least try to bring it along. I'm also not sure that a mending or make whole still wouldn't work on it. It's not magical so I don't see why it couldn't work. Without a wizard/sorcerer the end battle is such a tedious resource suck I don't see why a creative party can't trap Blakros in the box, which shuts down the goo then use the wand to extract it. That seems like a much more tidy ending then the haphazard one we had which involved me handing out all my alchemist fires just to have everyone miss with them.

So is there a compelling reason to not let the party use the box if they have either the magical means or maybe someone who surprisingly has the technologist feat?

Something evberyone that plans to GM PFS should read.

I have seen a presitigeous PFS GM, not allow a father and son to share an ultimate combat sitting at the same table.

Prestigious PFS GM is like saying celebrity bowler or sexy grandpa. It's not really applicable. My wife buys all our PDFs since our AP subscription is on her account and we get a discount. If I sat at a table and she and I (and/or my son) couldn't share resources I'd just get up and walk away. Though I'd probably drop some choice words for our GM. The real law thinks of ownership very differently than his interpretation of PFS guidelines.

So just for clarification this character is doing about 1d8+1 damage if they can even hit. Why is this even a concern? I have a level 3 tower shield specialist who is going a little less aggressively with the defense feats so he can at least power attack. Why would a villain even bother to single out a non-damaging opponent that they can't hit?

Just play the game and let the GM know you've already prepped it. I GM more than play and I've almost always run games that I play. You will want to let the players know too so when they're stumped trying to figure out something they understand why you're not helping. It's often a great help because a lot of times players zone out during the opening text and you can get them back on track. One other suggestion is to have a couple characters that have a good reason for not being super helpful for puzzles, etc... Maybe break out the low intelligence fighter, a monk with a vow of silence or a deaf oracle.

Welcome to Indiana! You just missed 12 inches of snow. Hope you get to collaborate with the numerous Paizo contributors we have here in central Indiana.

Basically WF2013 was a bit of a cluster for various reasons. We told the management all the concerns we had (both before and after the con) and were summarily dismissed as being wrong. So basically nobody was interested in going again this year. I'm speaking for many of the folks in Indiana, not Paizo.

Are we counting a person's present location or their place of residence for the majority of their games GMed (at least for the first 100–150 required to reach 5 stars)?

To illustrate my question, I performed somewhere around 90% of my games GMed as a representative of the southeastern US. Am I a Far West Region 5 star GM or a Southeast Region 5 star GM?

Do you prefer bitter coffee or sweet tea?

I don't feel the OP's posts are clear enough to explain the situation. Your GM may've marked off items because you played a different tier, maybe you didn't find the items or there are some cases where you have to accomplish certain goals to receive the items. In most cases you can buy the item anyways since PA tends to outpace chronicle sheet rewards.

Last Friday I ran a party through level 1 of Thornkeep completely comprised of ACG classes. We used Pathfinder Society rules so we could both get credit as well as have a good baseline to compare against.

Our party consisted of a hunter, shaman, swashbuckler, slayer and warpriest. All players were pretty seasoned with Pathfinder.

Here's a quick breakdown of my perceptions:

hunter - Felt like a ranger. The player chose a wolf animal companion and a melee build. Primarily he used his wolf for flanks and used magic sparingly. He did start using magic more as we went shilelagh and some heals. Having a 0 BAB is a little tough for someone playing as a frontliner. At the same time he had a dex build and was the party scout. I'm not 100% sure what role the hunter was envisioned to play, but the name makes me think of an offensive one.

shaman - Felt like a cleric. I don't really get what's particularly witch -like about this class. Calling their oracle mysteries "hexes" just seems confusing. The shaman took the life mystery and focused on channels and healing. She had a longspear to try and help out in combat, but with a 0 BAB and 10STR wasn't very effective. This class uses WIS/CHA and CON (for life link) so feels a little spread out. They don't get a "hex" until level 2 so really it was a weak cleric with only 1+CHA channels a day.

swashbuckler - Felt like a swashbucker... :) My friend has been trying to make a swashbucker from day one so this was a welcome addition. At level 1 the swashbuckler could make some pretty impressive acrobatic checks using panache and was all over the field. I'd imagine once they get mobility this will be a pretty crazy class for a support fighter. I'm not sure if their damage will scale effectively to be the primary fighter, but they're wherever they need to be at a given time. Climbing up ropes and jumping all around the battlefield.

slayer - Felt like a rogue? Hard to say on this one. They get a mark that gives them some bonuses to attack. I kept getting a 4th edition feel on this character. The player built her as a ranged fighter. Her dice went cold towards the end of the night so I didn't get a lot of insight on what the class could do. I didn't realize she had a 1 BAB because of the rogue vibe the character gave off. Just an assumption on my part.

warpriest - Felt like a warpriest (battle cleric). The player used a great sword and ran around bashing stuff. He used the flexible buff system a few times and while it didn't seem earth shattering I liked it. I'm a fan of the inquisitor and this just seems to be a variation on that. He didn't take any sort of healing ability so focused on some self buffs and smashing things.

My general conclusion is at level 1 most of the hybrids seem to represent one of their 2 parts more strongly. That could be my perception or the way players approach them. With the above list we didn't have anyone who was particularly perceptive or able to do anything about traps. We also didn't have anyone with any knowledge or magical skills. Nobody was particularly awesome at anything except for acrobatics/climb on the part of the swashbuckler. On the other hand, had the feeling of being a pretty well-balanced party. Several people could heal, most people had some ability in combat and the party as a whole was pretty mobile.

Don't forget about this:

Any confused character who is attacked automatically attacks its attackers on its next turn, as long as it is still confused when its turn comes.

So against a solo opponent this doesn't do anything particularly useful unless you're not going to attack it.

Dennis Baker wrote:

The pixels per inch varies significantly based on the source image.

So it all boils down to trial and error? Is there a nice way of determining the DPI to print 1 inch squares?

I've printed quite a few maps so I'm pretty decent at this. In Photoshop (or whatever editor you're using) copy a one inch square from the map then check its size. I randomly pulled up a map and it was 27 pixels an inch at 72dpi, when you convert that to inches it's 0.375" (27/72). So now take 1/0.375 which gives you 2.7 this is the scaling factor for the map. Lastly, scale the map up 2.7x (so if it's current 1000px wide resize it to 2700px wide).

If the image bothers you so, let's cover it up completely. A burka it is for Seoni. And let's advance the burka a bit.

Let's hate on muslims!

Do we all have to drink the kool-aid, and step into line repeating the party manifesto? Absolutely not.

A pointless rant about sheeple!

There was nothing degrading about the pose that Seoni was painted in. There was nothing obscene about it. There is absolutely nothing about that cover artwork that would prevent me from allowing my five year old daughter to see it.

Poor girl. Though you should point it out and mention how she's going to be sexualized by people like you.

Yay, the world is perfect now with my blinders on!

This is something we receive a good deal of feedback on. I'm curious what the best number of scenarios released each month is. I know there are some people who would advise they could play 10 scenarios a month. However, 10 simply isn't feasible. So, what do you think is the target number for players, where PFS is the primary source of their Pathfinder games.

We keep a spreadsheet and while it doesn't cover everyone it covers a good chunk of our "active" players. It's a snapshot of about 60 players. About 23 or so have played 50 or more games. About half of those are in the 80+ range. And then we have a couple 100+ games. The biggest issue for veteran players, is that it's very hard to find scenarios that nobody at the table have played (let alone are in the right tier). With brand new players there are piles and piles of scenarios, but early season production values and the metaplot are so disjointed that personally I've started my store a season 3 and am working my way forward. I worked it out ahead of time and I believe there are just enough scenarios to keep them leveling up. However, the reality is that they're going to go to other stores and keep playing. Not to mention, new players have a habit of playing *tons* (4-6x a week). All players also have a habit of starting new characters once they hit level 3 or so. So the focus is always going to be on Tier 1-5.

My pref would be for two Tier 1-5/month, one 3-7, and alternate between 5-9 and 7-11.

However, at a small venue running one table as soon as you get a level disparity people start creating yet more low level characters so they can all play together which creates a bit of a vicious cycle.

Seoni needs to summon up a pair of pants. That cover is pretty stupid.

Way to go, Chris! Wish I'd been in town for the Thornkeep game. I'm torn about asking for the blow-by-blow details because I still want to play it. For those who haven't played with Chris, he's the right level of laid back GM with a solid understanding of the rules. He can make quick rulings that are fair and don't require digging out rules. Also, he has some of the craziest gaming props I've ever seen.

You're paying $5 to support the kickstarter and the boon is a "thank you". It's not like they added a section on the Paizo site where players can buy boons. I have Shattered Star minis to buy in January, but I'm tempted to drop $105 so I can get that adventure (and a boon I guess?).

Here's the one I did last month:

Dreading the long trip from Ravenmoor back to Absalom, the party instead heeded a summons along the way in Korvosa. There they met with Venture-Captain Varian Jeggare. The half-elven noble warmly greeted the party at his apartment near the Acadamae campus. His bodyguard, Radovan, stood quietly in the corner, arms crossed.

"It is fortuitous that I was able to reach you so quickly, Pathfinders. A dear friend of mine, Lady Tiboros of Nisroch, has some troubling news of her lovely daughter Anya. A sprightly girl, but I found her a competent enough horse rider on my last visit to their manor. Anyways, Anya was wed to Baron Boroi of Karpad going on a year now and she has already birthed a beautiful boy going on two months old now I believe. You see as a dutiful daughter, she maintains frequent contact with her mother, keeping her abreast of her day-to-day going-ons.

However, the tone of her letters has grown increasingly strained and her mother, Lady Tiboros, has not received any communication in going on three weeks. So as you can imagine the Lady is quite concerned about the well-being of her daughter. I do hate to impose, but it would bring relief to both myself and the Tiboros family if you would please travel to Karpad and check on dear Anya? She is the youngest of her family and her mother loves her so. I will take care of all your travel arrangements and you should arrive in a week's time."

The trip to Karpad was mercifully unremarkable, involving little more than a short ship ride through Conqueror's Bay allowing them to bypass the Mindspin Mountains. Then a short overland trek brought them directly to the village of Karpad. The nearest bit of civilization is the city of Pangolais that lies some 100 miles to the south.

In my territory, I usually cook and the VC does laundry. However, we both are bad about doing the dishes.

Well my gf tagged along a year and half ago and she's a VC now so you never know. Just bring your 'A' game and make the game seem accessible even if she decides to be a spectator. If she's in-town long enough maybe she'll come back to the next game with some dice.

My fiancee (who is also a PFS VC) runs an all-girl game of Buffy the Vampire Slayer every so often. Compared to our normal mostly-boy game there's a lot more wine and giggling. However we do our best to drink lots of beer and vodka and heartily chortle whenever possible.

I know she'd like to get a regular girl gamers table going in PFS. It's intimidating to some women to sit at a table with a bunch of guys playing stripper Cheliax priestesses of whoever (with 10 ranks in dance and profession: prostition). I'll give her a heads up when she gets home to see if she has anything to add. :)

68. You marry a Venture Captain.