Mike, you have been very clear on the fact that new coding to limit the number of non-core races that each player can have is not happening. I'm actually bewildered as to why people continue to suggest it.
I don't understand why this has to be policed so mechanically. Simply make a rule that each player may on have one non-core race in addition to whatever racial boons that they have acquired. This way the boons still have value as they allow you to create characters beyond your 1 non-core race limit. Sure, I suppose that people may lie and attempt to cheat the rule, but that is the nature of having such an extensive gaming community. I honestly believe that the vast majority will respect the rules, just like the majority of them respect all of the other rules found in the society guide.
That is what I'd like to see, give the community some new fun options and also give us some credit that we're not a bunch of cheating scoundrels that will purposely violate a rule the campaign coordinators put in place.
Also, a determined cheater can only do so much with what he as to work with. Right now, I know no one can play a Drow or the like period. What you guys are asking for is completely opening the book up for use and I'm not adding 20 new races to PFS.
One final point. The majority of players are not clamoring for additional races to be open. A vocal minority of 15-20 are. I talk to gamers everywhere I go, and get feedback from VCs and VLs and the majority of players, from the feedback I have received don't want this.
I want to clarify my particular stance on this subject as I've posted in here a couple of times and the above statement by Mike does not represent my stance, even though I believe I am in that referred to vocal minority.
I do not want, nor think it is appropriate, to unleash every race published in the ARG to be legal in PFS. I just think that a handful of the non-core races would make perfectly acceptable pathfinders. Based on the race boons, someone in the higher ups thought that they did as well, regardless of the rarity, they thought it was appropriate to allow them to be part of their organized campaign. I am in no way advocating that 15-20 more races be adding to the list of race choices, that is simply absurd. To go from 6 available races to 26 overnight is in no way what I have been attempting to advocate.
What I am advocating is that the campaign organizers take a look at the races being published in the ARG. Select a handful of new non-core races that best fit the setting and make them legal for play. This would probably need to include (and possibly only include) all of the ones currently available as boons. Not every race fits the setting and I understand that, but a precedent has already been set by these racial boons and I think that shouldn't be ignored.
For example, I had no real issue with the limitation of not allowing any of the gun-wielding archetypes for classes other than the Gunslinger class. It was clear that the campaign staff wanted to minimize gun use by making players invest a level in Gunslinger for the benefit of that ability. However, had there been boons available that allowed a fellow player to wield a gun with his Paladin prior to the publication of the UC (persumably with playtest rules for guns), but upon release of that book, I find out I can't utilize the Holy Gun archetype. I would have been frustrated to say the least.
So in short, I'm not advocating that we blow the doors off the barn holding all the crazy race options in ARG, just that the campaign should utilize the book to carefully expand on the current available race options.
As it appears attempting to force a limit on players is currently unavailable due to technology, just be cautious what is made legal, but for the love of Pete, make some of it legal! (and more than just the racial traits and feats for the core races)
The limiting of an exotic race to one or two per player will certainly help.
+1 to this.
I've been harping on this for a while now. In fact this seems to be the middle ground of both sides of the argument. Limiting players to one exotic race is the way to go (exclusive of any convention boons).
There is a control mechanism in place that would both limit the number of exotic races and open the ARG book the way the fanbase is asking for.
Chronicle #04-RB Race Boon
Quote:
Exotic Ancestry: You may choose to play one of the approved exotic races. This race must be legal for play (see the Additional Resources list), beginning at level 1 as normal. Other than access to this additional race, all character creation rules are the same as those outlined in the Guide to Pathfinder Organized Play 4.2. This Chronicle must be the first Chronicle for the given character, and you must bring a copy of the books where the race is detailed in (see the Additional Resources List) to all sessions in which this character appears.
Write the selected race on the line below. Include this Chronicle sheet along with your records for the character.
You are allowed only one exotic race character at any one time (exclusive of convention boons).
Something similiar to what I wrote above would do the trick.
+1,000,000 *makes Dr. Evil pose by pointing pinkie finger at corner of mouth*
Mark, I understand your point that you're trying to separate the issue of racial boons and the advanced race guide that is coming out in the near future. I can understand why you would want to be very clear in separating the issues because the book has uses for everyone regardless of whether or not they have access to all of the races presented in the book. I do not however agree that their needs to be two separate threads to discuss the issues. The publication of the Advanced Race Guide has simply raised the issue that many of us have with the current system by which the PFS staff distributes access to the non-core races. That is what this thread is ultimately about, and the connection to the ARG is simply that if we can never make a (insert non-core race here) than we're not all that interested in purchasing the ARG. And you can argue that is silly, because there is lots of core race material in there, but some of us still won't be that interested in purchasing it.
To me the "only a Fighter has access to weapon specialization" point holds very little water. It is absolutely a true statement, but there is a distinct difference between that and say some cool new tengu racial trait. If I just absolutely love the weapon specialization feat, and the idea of a mighty warrior that focuses on being the greatest long-swordsman in history, I can roll up a fighter and beginning building a PC that can utilize that feat. Unfortunately, if I absolutely love some feat specific to Tengu or Aasimar because I love the character concept that I can build around that, I cannot do that because I wasn't able to procure the appropriate boon. We love to have options, and we understand that it is an organized play environment and you have every right to say that we cannot play non-core races. That does not mean we have to like it, and have to agree that the some players should be allowed use of options from a book that we do not, despite having bought the book just like that other player.
I honestly hope that we can come up with some method to expand access to the non-core races because I love diversity in my gaming world, and it's not like these would be crazy made up races, they are just more rare than the core races.
I'm perfectly fine with the idea of racial boons being purchasable. This is my hobby and I am more than happy to spend a bit of money on my hobby. It is no different than making the choice to purchase the APG so that you can play that Witch character that you really wanted to play. If I really want to play a Tengu, here's ten dollars to the PFS fund so that I can play my Tengu character. I don't go to the conventions, so I'm not contributing my money to the campaign in that sense, so I have no real issue with shelling out the ten bucks for the racial boon.
Also, I want to point out that I hate the idea of having scenarios or scenario chains that unlock a racial boon. This is going to cause local groups to break the canon of the races being rare just as much as giving them unrestricted access. The reason is that if my local group goes out of their way to play said series of scenarios, it means that at least a couple of us really want that racial boon. Guess what character race each and every one of those players is bringing to play at the next game session, yep, that Tengu they all just unlocked.
My apologies on the links, my forum-fu is weak. I flavor the raging as almost a curse from the fey spirits. Tralamin (Gulliver was apparently already taken by another Pathfinder somewhere) thinks of himself as a strong tactical fighter. However, he has difficulty controlling his emotions (particularly after he's been struck in combat) and these spirits feed on this emotion causes a spiral that leads to his rage. While raging, it is essentially feral and completely instinctive behavior.
Stat wise 16 str 14 con sounds better and 14dex 13 cha. For combat reflexes
Not sure if you read the stat restricitons, but given the fact that no stats can be dunmped, what your suggesting is impossible. Having a 16 strength post-racial would be nigh impossible requiring 17 of the 20 points for character creation. I'm going to chalk this post up to not reading through the OP, which is long so I sort of understand.
Also as mentioned a couple of posts up, the character played in his first session tonight, so stats are set in stone at this point.
That way you could later go the barb/oracle PrC the name of which I forgot.
In addition you could get things like +10ft base movement or unrestricted movement in medium armor.
but it would delay stalwart.
As I mentioned in the OP, "I'd like to avoid multiclassing: As part of the difficulty restriction is playing a "gnome martial class" no dipping into Oracle to get Charisma mod to AC (I find this cheesy anyways). Dips into Fighter or Ranger would be appropriate, though I don't think they would make the character better than straight Barbarian. If you can convince me otherwise, great!"
I mentioned no Oracle mostly to head off the advice to dip Life or Lore Oracle for Charisma to AC, but I'm trying to avoid spellcasting classes in general. Not that I don't think it would make for a cool character and if I get bored with him may do it anyways. But in an effort to follow the intent of the martial class self-imposed restriction, I'm avoiding dipping Oracle.
And the name of that prestige class is Rage Prophet. It's pretty cool, I actually played a Human Barbarian/Oracle of Battle/Rage Prophet in a Rise of the Runelords adventure path.
Nice! Barbarians are my favorite class, and the idea of a small one is awesome to me. You laugh at a halfling/gnome that tells you he's a barbarian once, ONCE! And then you're dead lol
Get the Taunt feat (apg), get terrifying howl, ride around on a wolf with ferocious mount, both of you howl at things, eat popcorn.
As I don't actually have a good bluff score, taunt wouldn't be of much use. Also, I didn't mention it in the initial post, but one of the restrictions for increased difficulty is playing a small martial character without a mount.
Though I must say the idea of a bad-mouthed gnome hurling insults from the back of his terrifying wolf is a downright awesome mental image. And who doesn't love popcorn, I might make some now even.
Absolutely agree with the analysis that a two-hander is much better than a one-hander and shield for Barbarians in general. However, one of the restrictions is trying to match the mini as best as possible. This is the main reason for sword and board at the moment. However, in situations where damage-potential and raging are key, I am willing to switch to the two-hander.
Benefit: When you use Combat Expertise, reduce the number you subtract from your melee attack rolls by 1.
I unfortunately didn't see this before the first session so the traits are set now, though it would've been a very handy trait to have. But it would have replaced the Diplomacy trait and I like having that as a means to effectively role-play in social encounters without having to always resort to yelling at everyone (i.e. intimidate).
I picture around level 4 or 5, once I have the Stalwart feat, I'll be power attacking/raging about 50% of the time and using combat expertise being the traditional sword and board fighter the other 50%. Makes for a very versitile character. May even pick up the quick-draw feat and a quick-draw light shield to make switch between sword and board and raging two-hander more viable still.
Well, the first level and stats are now set in stone as I played the little crazy barbarian in the first part of the Godsmouth Heresy module for PFS.
Final starting build turned out as below:
Stats after Racials (cost of the point-buy in parentheses)
STR 14 (10)
DEX 10
CON 16 (5)
INT 13 (3)
WIS 10
CHA 14 (2)
Feat: Power Attack
Weaponry: Longsword (Lucerne Hammer as a back-up weapon)
Armor: Scale and Heavy Wooden Shield
Archetype: Invulnerable Rager
Traits: Insider Knowledge (Grand Lodge) - +1 Diplomacy and Diplomacy as class skill
Reactionary - +2 to initiative
The 13 in intelligence is to qualify for combat expertise at level 3 and pick up stalwart asap.
Beebs wrote:
I know it doesn't fit the mini, but if you're going to play a gnome melee fighter, it seems a real shame to miss out on the chance to use the array off stupid weapons available to the gnome such as the Gnome Hooked Hammer, The Piston Maul, or the Ripsaw Glaive. The latter two don't have "Gnome" in the title so I believe you still have to spend a feat on Exotic Weapon Proficiency, but it might be worth it for the bonus damage + the awesomeness factor.
They do not fit the mini, but they are interesting ideas for back-up weapons, I used my Lucerne hammer just as much as my sword and board in the first session tonight. I had considered them, the ripsaw glaive I find very cool and flavorful. The hooked hammer is a neat idea, but with wanting to go with a Barbarian, the feat costs and dex reqs for those feats to be a proficient two-weapon fighter were going to be to too much given the stat restrictions.
Current gameplan during the leveling process:
Level 2 - Barbarian, Rage Power = Spirit Totem, Lesser
Level 3 - Fighter (Unbreakable Archetype), Bonus Feats due to archetype are Endurance and Diehard, Combat Expertise as normal level 3 feat
At that point I'm torn a bit, I want to get as many levels in Barbarian as possible to max out the DR benefit from Invulnerable Rager, but a second level in Fighter lets me pick up Stalwart at level 4 instead of level 5. This would free up my level 5 feat for other things as well. If I do take a second level in Fighter, than do I take a third for Armor Training? Moving 30' instead of 20' in medium armor would be nice, though that could be done with an investment in mithral breastplate. Ideas, suggestions on that front?
Beebs wrote:
Various Paly goodness
I decided against the paladin idea initially because it didn't really fit the mini at all, and for some reason it seemed to easy to make work lol. Here's a link to the mini so you folks can see it btw: http://www.reapermini.com/FigureFinder#detail/02942
Ranoral, that's a very nice combo there for the DR focus. Almost makes me want to forget AC even further and actually wear an armored kilt to better match the mini :-)
Here's some highlights from the first game session:
Godsmouth Heresy Stuff:
The very first fight, gnome superpowers for the win! Arcane caster of the group attack by a strange critter that cast darkness on the party and attacked her. Hmm I seem to be able to cast Dancing Lights once per day, bingo cancelled the darkness spell and we killed the thing before it could slowly strangle us to death in the darkness.
No Rogue in the group so with my +6 in perception I ended up playing not only frontline heavy, but also the skill monkey a good bit. Even smashed through several locked doors, though I had to remind the party that I only made a Gnome-sized hole so they'd have to crouch on their way through.
He proved to be quite capable in combat doing very solid damage for a first level character, managed to one-shot the CR 2 monster with a crit on the lucerne hammer with rage up that did 32 points of damage!
Then came the dreadful brown mold incident...Party thought "oh mold, let's throw fire at it!" The brown mold quadrupled in size over the next to rounds and ended up doing 3d6 points of non-lethal cold damage to the whole party. DM roled two 4's and a 6 on the dice, guess who's the only PC that could take that much damage and not fall unconscious, the gnome barbarian! In fact there were two second level characters at the table and I had more hp than either of them. I drug the unconscious cleric away from the mold, administered a cure light wounds potion to bring him to consciousness, so he could heal the rest of the party and run from the killer mold. If my gnome would have only had 14 hp instead of 16, that would have been a TPK lol.
So long story short, the gnome barbarian was a great bit of fun and will probably become my secondary PFS character, behind my half-orc sorcerer that's now level 8.
Keep the comments and advice coming guys, it's been very helpful.
Oh and if I take the Unbreakable Fighter archetype, just one level in Fighter gets me both Endurance and Diehard as bonus feats. And Diehard is a great feat for a Barbarian anyways.
I like that a lot. Though it means I may switch the 13 in Dex to Int for combat expertise. I even like the roleplay aspects of being an intelligent tactical fighter, but when the Fey spirits start to swarm his mind he flies into a bloodthirsty rage.
Don't forget Dazzling Display which can also demoralize a bunch of people at once.
Also, can the Invulnerable Rager wear armor?
Yep the invulnerable rager can wear armor. It just changes the DR mechanic to be equal to half the character's Barbarian level.
The Savage barbarian archetype is the one that doesn't wear armor. Also it doesn't prevent it, just gives dodge and natural armor bonuses if you don't wear armor.
I will mention that I am starting the Godsmouth Heresy Module with this character tonight. So all of the initial character creation will be set in stone after tonight.
So if anyone has some suggestions for archetypes, or maybe a different stat distribution or whatnot, input is greatly appreciated.
Yea, I have considered the idea of going around intimidating, but I see a couple of issues.
The -4 penalty for being smaller than the opponent is rough (which will apply most of the time). Although, I don't think the DCs scale up too quickly, since it is always 10 + Wis Mod + CR. Seems like it'll scale pretty smoothly. But without spending some feat support, it'll be a tough number to hit (i.e. Intimidating prowess, persuasive, etc). Also there is the issue with the society often crawling through dungeons filled with undead and/or supernatural nasties that would be immune to intimidation.
Is it effective for your friend, or is it more comical (not that that's always a bad thing) having the gnome trying to scare the pants off the Devil.
I think that I'm in the middle of the pack on this one. I like the idea of additional races, but I think that they should be limited. Both because the campaign setting isn't loaded with them already (its loaded with the core races), but because part of the allure of these is that they are exotic. Why would I want to play an aquatic elf werewolf if I'll bump into three others at my weekly game?
So, I like the idea of restricting the new races to boons. Maybe a bit more often than just for attending conventions, especially as I've never been to one. Maybe VCs, VLs, 5-stars and the ilk randomly hand out one or two of these boon sheets each month at various local games. While that still doesn't help everyone, it spreads the net a bit wider.
Also, why not put 2 or 3 of these boon sheets in the book itself? They get signed, and thus consumed, when a character using one first gets played. No tearing out or photocopies allowed. If someone is desperate to play more than that, they need to go shell out for another book. Yes, that is economic tyranny, but that's OK as long as there are other ways of getting those boon sheets.
Another idea is to reduce the long term options of the new races. Cap them at 8th or 10th level or whatever. Or they have to take the slow progression. Anything that keeps them viable for play but off of the path to ultimate power.
I like everything you mentioned, right up until the last bit about capping them or forcing them to use slow track. If they can be played, they should be able to play all the way to retirement just like everyone else.
Hello all, I'm building a Gnome Barbarian for my local PFS gaming group. Now I'm restricting myself in a lot of ways to sort of self-nerf. I'm a pretty good character builder, and commonly referred to (I think mostly as a compliment) as the group's rules lawyer.
I'm following a blog post by Dennis Baker (https://plus.google.com/115022859420675980618/posts/8ZGscC9Suog) for increase difficulty in PFS. I'm going with the "Ultra Violence" difficult setting by playing a Gnome martial character with the added restrictions of no dump stats and no starting stat can be over a 16 after racials. I'm going to try and focus on the strengths of the gnome's racial stat gains as best I can. Also I already bought a sweet mini off of reaper minis that has a longsword and a wooden shield, so that is set in stone as well.
I know that's a whole mess of restrictions, but mostly I want to get thoughts on options for Rage powers and feats, things to focus on as the character levels, things people might do differently with stats given the above restrictions.
Gulliver the Gnome Barbarian
Stats after Racials (cost of the point-buy in parentheses)
STR 14 (10)
DEX 13 (3)
CON 16 (5)
INT 10
WIS 10
CHA 14 (2)
Feat: Power Attack
Weaponry: Longsword (Lucerne Hammer as a back-up weapon)
Armor: Scale and Heavy Wooden Shield
Archetype considerations: I'm planning on using the Invulnerable Rager archetype as I plan to maximize the benefit of only putting levels in Barbarian and off-set the low dex score and therefore low AC with DR from the archetype. Also could go with the armored hulk archetype to get into heavy armor (this doesn't fit the miniature, but I do probably have to make some allowances to make the character playable). Any other ideas that people think would work well?
Rage powers: I like the idea of the Spirit Totem powers to utilize the Gnomish bonus to Charisma, and I think a Gnome Barbarian haunted by evil fey spirits has so much delicious roleplaying flavor. Increased DR rage powers may be important as well. Also figure I'll be bumping intimidate pretty high, so the intimidating rage powers are options (though I find them underwhelming from a mechanical standpoint).
I'd like to avoid multiclassing: As part of the difficulty restriction is playing a "gnome martial class" no dipping into Oracle to get Charisma mod to AC (I find this cheesy anyways). Dips into Fighter or Ranger would be appropriate, though I don't think they would make the character better than straight Barbarian. If you can convince me otherwise, great!
Faction will be Grand Lodge, as he's joined the society so that they can help him determine the origin of these fey spirits that seem to drive him mad (i.e. into a rage).
I know a lot of players prefer to have the actual book to hold in their hands, but this book, like all the other hardcover books in the Core Rules line, will be available as a pdf for $9.99 and that is a lot more reasonable when you are not sure what will be allowed versus the $40-50 cover price. So right now you could have pdf's of all 7 currently available hardcover books that have pfs-legal material for only $70, which is less than what any two of those seven books would cost for physical copies. Add in the pdf's of the ARG and Ultimate Equipment once they are released and you are still looking at only $90 for nine very useful books.
This is true, however it does nothing to help out our local gaming stores that put up with our shenanigans on a weekly (in my group's case) basis. If I were really hurting for cash I might go with the pdfs but I do try and purchase the hard copies and support my local store. They've been very good to us players.
Shout out for Underhill's Games near Akron, Ohio. :-)
I think the idea that purchasing the ARG, provides an opportunity to make one PC of a non-core race would drive the sales of that book through the roof. I'd pre-order the hardcopy right now (like before I even finish this comment) if that were the case.
Unfortunately, I don't know how they could reinforce this rule. Ideally, they would be a code on the inside of the book cover or something that could be entered on the website to unlock one PC of a non-core race for the account that entered the code. But that would take a great deal of coordination between PFS staff and the paizo staff directly responsible for the publishing of the ARG. I don't know what if any overlap there is between the two entities.
Edit: I guess the inside book cover thing wouldn't really work either, as someone could just look at the number in the book off the shelf without purchasing it. Defeating the whole point, hmmm...ideas?
Here's a suggestion: Paizo could simply sell the boon certificates, the same way they sell reroll shirts.
I'd be fine with that. ;)
Id probably also be fine with buying a copy of the ARG means you can create 1 character using a race from that book, though that may be hard to enforce.
I missed Chris making this comment the first time around. Excellent idea! If the convention boons are meant to help the campaign prosper financially and grow as a whole, selling them separately to those of us not interested in conventions would seem like a good idea.
I don't have anything against conventions, just prefer to stick to my local gaming group, and I prefer not to travel. But if the boons were purchasable, that is certainly more money that you'd get out of me that you otherwise wouldn't (I won't be attending cons either way).
And I've seen several times that the campaign coordinator has strongly hinted that the non-core races will not be made available to the general public.
Never is a very strong word that we try to avoid, as things do change. But it is true that we currently have no plans to open them up except through boons. This has so far been a powerful incentive to drive up Pathfinder Society numbers at conventions, and the stronger showing we make in places where our numbers are most visible, the better that is for the campaign. There may come a time when players are no longer incentivized by special convention boons, at which time we'll have to look into other options, but for now, the current method of distribution has only been going for eight months so we're not quite to that point yet.
Mark, thanks for the response and being very clear that the boons appear to be a marketing tool to drive up numbers at conventions. I fully understand that from a business prospective and accept that is possibly the best decision for PFS as a whole.
That doesn't change my personal stance that as a doctoral student that has neither the time nor inclination to travel far and wide for the chance at a convention boon, I'm disappointed by this strategy. I want to see the society prosper as a whole, but this limits my personal enjoyment of the campaign, as there will be parts of it that others get to enjoy that I likely never will.
I will add that while I don't travel to conventions, I do support the game as much as possible through the purchasing of books, scenarios, etc. and in am many ways the unofficial voice of authority for my local gaming group.
As I said before, what is and isn't made an Additional Resource from the ARG and what races a particular player has access to are two different things that are being conflated because the races' base stats will be reprinted in the ARG as well. if folks have an issue with how the campaign currently grants access to non-core races, that's a legitimate opinion that we want to hear. But it has little to do with what we do and don't make available when the ARG comes out.
Yes, I think my main point is that I have an issue with how the campaign currently grants access to the non-core races. I believe that some of them make for very interesting and fully-functional character concepts in the setting. I'm frustrated that what should be pure excitement for the upcoming release of the ARG, is instead mixed with sadness as I do not currently have a racial boon to enjoy some of the book. And I've seen several times that the campaign coordinator has strongly hinted that the non-core races will not be made available to the general public.
Those who say they won't be happy with the ARG Core Race Crunch, unless it opens "special" races, how do you know you won't like it since you haven't seen any of it?
I see that like saying, I won't like any of the Doritos brand of chips unless they have turtle flavored chips... I find it a very closed minded comment.
I recommend everyone wait till the book is out, and you actually see what's in it before you pass judgement. You know, "Not guilty of sucking till proven so, not just assumed so."
I can only speak for myself here, but I'm not suggesting that the crunch for the core races in ARG will suck. I'm just stating that I'm completely disinterested in purchasing another book for more, let's say, Dwarf-related crunch. I already own the Dwarves of Golarion, and there is plenty of Dwarfiness available elsewhere. The only true reason that I'm interested in purchasing the ARG is for the non-core race stuff.
And your Doritos analogy is just silly. A more appropriate analogy would be if they said to you, for an extra 50 cents a bag you can eat a slight variation on Cool Ranch flavored doritos. No thanks, I like the original cool ranch doritos just fine, no need to pay extra for more of the same. But turtle-flavored doritos, hmmm, now I'm intrigued, maybe even enough to purchase that pricey bag of flavor.
There's already a 'tax' for playing an advanced race, if you have to have the ARG to play them. Just like to play the Alchemist and Witch you need the APG, UC to play a Gunslinger, etc.
Also, would it be as enjoyable if the APG classes, UM, UC classes, templates, etc were only 'unlocked' by the boons? Speaking as someone who enjoys his Sage bloodline sorcerer, Magus, and soon to be played Acrobat, I don't think so.
The Boons existing *prior* to the full book coming out don't bother me (as much). Being told that "You can play X-race, but only if you have a boon even if you bought the rulebook it still sucks to be you." is Unfun.
This was one thing that bothered me about Living Eberron. Being told you couldn't start with a Kalishtar or psionics unless you had a special cert (possibly a cert for each, I don't remember) REALLY angered this psionics fan who was basically told I wasn't one of the 'cool kids' who could play a core race concept for the setting.
I really like your points here, if these were class options instead of races, would everyone still be comfortable saying that you couldn't play them even if you purchased the book supporting them.
I can pretty safely say that if the non-core races are not allowed in PFS, I likely won't purchase the ARG when it comes out.
I also want to emphasize the point that I don't necessarily want to play a non-core race to be special. I've always thought Tengu made cool Rogues characters, and I don't currently have a Rogue active in PFS. I'm certain that if Tengus were a racial option for me, I'd have made and started playing a PFS Rogue by now. If I then sat at a table with two other players with Tengus, I wouldn't be upset that I'm not special. If anything, it'd be cool, "the flocks back together again!"
I think I may have worded that last bit poorly as I'm at work and attempting to type on here between boss appearances tehe.
I don't know that anyone ever officially stated that the races would be opened up to everyone, but I think a good number of people (myself included) assumed that when the boons were given out at GenCon last year, they were meant to be a reward to the attendees by giving them early-access to races not being published for almost another year.
If it turns out that non-core races will be forever restricted to convention boons I will be disappointed (though I saw somewhere that the beginners box bash had boons for running which I wish I had known about).
And I wasn't suggesting that you didn't have a point in saying that Human characters could be special, just that if your argument is that a Human is special, why not allow other special creatures to play as well.
They need to be rare and special. It needs to be enforcable.
This is sort of the idea that I think I buck up against the most. Why do we need to limit them so much! Isn't a Human with a super-human intelligence of 18 equally as rare as a Tengu or Tiefling?
Every character played in PFS is of exceptionally rare ability compared to the average commoner (unless someone specifically designed a character to not be for RP reasons I suppose). That is the nature of the game. Why is it ok to play a Gnome, Human, or Elf that is in the top 0.0001% of their race in regards to ability, but playing an unusual race has to be restricted.
This is a fantasy game, and these other races exist and they do not all seek to destroy the world. Some likely do wish to contribute to something such as the PFS. I agree the new races aren't necessary, but I think the logic that they are too rare to just allow people to make without jumping through serious hoops is silly.
I'll abide by the rules of PFS regardless, but it was mentioned when they started given out the racial boons at conventions that they intended to expand that to everyone at some point in the future. If that turns out not to be the case, I will be severely disappointed.
This entire thread makes me sad, as I appear to be in the minority of loving the idea of non-core races being available to everyone in open play.
The pathfinder society is such an eccletic bunch of adventurers that to suggest they would turn down committed help just because the adventurer happens to be a Tiefling, does more to damage my since of the setting than allowing a Tiefling PC ever would.
Yes there should be limits (I suppose) on what races are available (perhaps no Goblinoid pathfinders running around), but the idea of a Tiefling working for the shadow lodge makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
I certainly understand the campaign coordinators' right to dictate what is available as race options in PFS play. But limiting non-core races to convention boons is not going to get me to go to conventions (I haven't got the time), it just means I will sadly not get to try out my Tengu Rogue concept or Aasimar cleric. :-(
Well, I’ll attack this question from both my stance as a GM and as a player.
I’ve become known in our local group as the “rules lawyer” (for better or worse) because I love tracking all of these little things. I always make sure I have the essential adventuring gear on all my characters and make decisions about my characters starting strength and whatnot just to accommodate load limitations. As someone that actually enjoys overly in-depth rules systems like Rolemaster, I like the added bit of realism because it feels like more of a living breathing character than just a tool with which to allow me to roll dice.
That being said, I’m acutely aware that for many players this is much more of an annoyance and really takes away from the fun more than adds to it. Because of this I’m not real strict on these sorts of issues in games that I’m running. I often double check character sheets to make sure that mechanical issues such as attack bonuses, saving throws, AC, and whatnot are all appropriately calculated. But if the player doesn’t happen to have a tent and rations when we take a weeklong trip into the wildness, I don’t start penalizing his character for it. I suppose I should, it would be within the rules of the system, but it is clearly not something that would add to the enjoyment of the player. I like to let my players enjoy the game for what they’d like it to be, I personally love diving into all the micromanagement because that’s part of what I love about it. If they do not enjoy that part, I don’t feel the need to really push the issue.
Bump, as I'm hoping to play this character at a PFS game in the near future and I was hoping for some feedback on whether or not this sounds legit.
To me I don't see any reason why one of the forms of variant channeling introduced in Ultimate Magic wouldn't work with Channel Smite, but I wanted to get some other input first.
Lol, I believe the x3 is referring to the critical multiplier on the short bow. When that goblin shots its short bow one time at +4 it does 1d4 damage which has a x3 critical multipier.
If the writer had intended the goblin to shot the bow three times the line would have read, Shortbow x3 +4 (1d4/x3)
He's going to be a battle cleric, and while his Charisma bonus will be decent it probably won't be over a 14. Based on the fact that I'll always have at least 3 companions, selective channeling is not my preferred option. I'm going to be sticking with channel smite, just need to know if the variant channeling would work with it. Combining the harm effect on Rulership variant channeling to daze the person I hit with channel smite would be nice.
I'm building a negative channeling cleric for PFS and as I don't want to hurt my fellow pathfinders, I'll be taking advantage of the channel smite feat (see below). Does anyone know if the variant channeling effects can be applied to a channeled smite? I can't seem to find an answer on here anywhere.
Channel Smite (Combat)
You can channel your divine energy through a melee weapon you wield.
Prerequisite: Channel energy class feature.
Benefit: Before you make a melee attack roll, you can choose to spend one use of your channel energy ability as a swift action. If you channel positive energy and you hit an undead creature, that creature takes an amount of additional damage equal to the damage dealt by your channel positive energy ability. If you channel negative energy and you hit a living creature, that creature takes an amount of additional damage equal to the damage dealt by your channel negative energy ability. Your target can make a Will save, as normal, to halve this additional damage. If your attack misses, the channel energy ability is still expended with no effect.
Hi all, I spent yesterday evening making a new alchemist gnome character for my weekly Monday night PFS game. With my first character hitting 4th level and some n00bs still occasionally joining the group, I wanted a new 1st level character in case we run the 1-2 tier for a scenario. I'm very excited to see that alchemist can use craft(alchemy) now in PFS. The character will be sort of a jack of all trades, but his primary offensive option will involve splash weapons and bombs. So I was hoping to get some clarifications on the rules.
Since time is not a measurable commodity in PFS, it would seem to me that the alchemist could make as many alchemist's fires, acids, etc. as his little gnomish heart desires. Is this correct?
Also can I "take ten" on these rolls? I would assume so by the core rules which gives me a result of 20 so I should be able to make anything up to that difficulty without a roll.
If I try something more difficult and fail, what are the consequences? Normally a failure of 4 or less just results in no progress on the crafting for that week, however in PFS that has no bearing. Can I simply try again, or do I need to move on without that product until I complete another scenario. A failure of 5 or more costs some resources, but I would think I could just mark that off and try again.
Not sure there's been any sort of official ruling on this, unless my search-fu has failed me. I know this isn't clarified directly in the FAQs.
Any insight that people can provide would be much appreciated.
Sure you can. You can reasonably build a wild rager that fails that save only on a natural 1, gets a reroll once per day (say starting at 5th level), makes sure to have already taken his 5' step away from allies before full attacking, brings in an animal that stays near him to further decrease the chance of attacking a fellow PC, hands a scroll of calm emotions to each party member that can cast it, etc.
Our local rager does exactly that. He needs to roll a 3 to save and gets a reroll if he fails, is careful to surround himself with foes when raging, and makes sure that calm emotions is available. The minute risk that he will attack another PC is more than outweighed by his overall effectiveness in combat.
You can share the relevant point of his builds? In particular how "costly" in term of efficiency it was to get that result? How many feats, how many GP spent in items to mitigate the risk and so on?
To me it seem that a Wild rager doing that has to pay a heavy cost in feat and money, to the point that he will be well behind a comparable character of the same level, especially in in Society play where your resources are limited.
That is the side effect of playing such a class responsibly. He spends resources so that he does not go nova on the party. Is that not his choice? Does it matter how much of his resources he has to devote to maintaining control, as long as he does? You can argue that it is not optimal to choose an archetype that requires so much maintainance to be played resonsibly, but don't act like he's somehow failed to build a proper barbarian because he's had to build it that way.
But we still haven't determined what is evil, and I think that's the fundamental argument here (massively paraphrasing obviously). You only need to hide your evil actions or compromise if they're evil. If they're not evil then why hide them?
The problem comes from a disagreement over whether something is so evil it borders on getting your character kicked out of the campaign, as opposed to it being perfectly acceptable and normal. Killing a helpless prisoner appears to fall into both those camps depending entirely on opinion. Certain faction missions likewise.
Right, and I don't think we can ever realistically define all possible Evil actions. It has to be a GM decision at some point. The GM is (1) beholden to let a player know when an action is Evil and (2) give the character time to react accordingly. If the Evil action would have been in view, the player has a chance to either obfuscate the action or change the action. If the action is already secret, the player can just go forward with the action.
Note again, I'm not getting into the "kick you out" argument. That's a campaign staff issue and I'll abide by whatever they say. If a faction mission requires what I deem to be an Evil act (the Sczarni example of torturing someone seems to fall into that arena; I can't verify as I have not seen that scenario) I'm not punishing a player for completing that action. I am requiring it to be done in a reasonable way, i.e. secret from anyone that would likely oppose the action. I do not deem this hindering the faction missions as I do not see "it's a faction mission" as acceptable justification for allowing all Evil actions related to completing said mission to go unopposed.
Several hundred posts ago, I was strongly disagreeing with you as we were still talking about what constitutes good and evil actions. I appreciate that you have your own opinions on what are evil, but refrain from permanently punishing a player who may disagree with you on what constitutes an evil point (i.e. marking it down on their chronicle sheet that they are closer to evil). As you said that's up to the coordinators.
I agree that if a character is attempting to do something shady, such as poison an NPC or whatnot, they should be intelligent enough to do so away from the prying eyes of the "do-gooders" in the party. I think having this expectation as a GM is not unreasonably. I don't know how many times I've discretely slid a note to the DM, because I was performing an action that I did not want the rest of the party to know about, but I bet it's been at least 2/3 of the scenarios I've played. If you've never DM'd for this particular group before, make sure that they know that they can pass you messages when they wish to do something without the rest of the party being aware of it. Part of the fun of playing the more morally-flexible factions is attempting to get away with it, that's the biggest part of being in a criminal organization. I think if we're downplaying the need to be discrete to the point where the other characters always know what mine is doing and have no recourse, that takes a lot of the fun out of the game.
GMs should never penalize players for completing faction missions.
Those are my two beliefs about PFS.
I see absolutely no benefit to enforcing alignments. None. Forcing alignment change is the equivalent to a GM telling players what they think or telling them what they do. It is a violation and the player has no recourse. If I know the GM I might have some inkling as to their belief system, perhaps alignments have some place in home games, but if I join a PFS game with a GM I've never met before I shouldn't have to worry that something I perceive as a neutral act would be perceived by him as an evil act and thus force an alignment change.
Supposing we captured a CE bad guy and we made him give us information, should I worry that the DM is going to view this as torture? Supposing we executed him for his crimes (as well as for his unprovoked attack on us) should I worry that this is an evil act as well? Suddenly the two acts which I think are very grey but the DM calls evil force an alignment change? This is not something I want to debate at the table or on the message-boards later. I know there are people who will agree or disagree with me. I don't want to waste time on the debate.
As for penalizing players for completing faction mission: I can't even believe that someone would do such a thing. It blows the mind. Invite someone into your home, tell them the rules to monopoly, and then fine them for passing Go because you feel that there needs to be taxes. Later wonder why they don't want to play monopoly any more. With any luck the player just won't want to play monopoly with you, but in all likelihood the bad experience could turn them off the game completely.
I do agree that the writers need to be careful when designing faction missions, assassination missions should be given sparingly (and then only when the target is truly evil) but it's not up to the GM to punish players for poor game design. You want to be a proactive GM? ...
I do not think I could possibly agree more with this post!
I think we can all agree that if someone were running around burning down villages that they also are liking being a very disruptive player and could be asked to leave the table so that the other players may enjoy the adventure. That is certainly within the rules of the PFS guide. I'm not sure that we need to make it so that GMs can rule a player's character illegal for play since we already have the option of removing disruptive players.
I think at this point we've made it clear that we'd like some ruling on this sort of thing from the powers that be. While I don't agree with the idea that evil acts should allow the GM to change a characters alignment (particularly if the character is neutral) if that is the ruling that is made, I will accept it and continue to play PFS regardless. I just don't believe that will be the case as a reasonable number of faction missions require questionable acts that I don't believe would have made it past editing if they did not intend to allow you the opportunity to complete them without losing your character.
It's best to let players play their characters as they want. If a player is roleplaying in a way that you, as the GM, think doesn't fit his alignment, let him know that he's acting out of alignment and tell him why—but do so in a friendly manner. If a character wants to change his alignment, let him—in most cases, this should amount to little more than a change of personality, or in some cases, no change at all if the alignment change was more of an adjustment to more accurately summarize how a player, in your opinion, is portraying his character.
There don't actually appear to be any core rules allowing a GM to change a character's alignment without the player's consent. Can anyone cite such a rule?
If this is true then we can finally end this ridiculous argument and get back to enjoying PFS.
First off, I apologize if that last post came off as some sort of personal attack on you or your opinion, I'm simply at work and don't have time to beat around the bush, so to speak, in order to get my opinion out there.
I went back and re-read the citation that you gave about good characters and wanted to point out the it says that they seek to protect innocent life. In all cases where I imagine one of my good characters having to kill someone, that someone is far from innocent. And suggesting that I believe good characters should kill "wily nily" is inaccurate, that makes it sound like he'd stab every ruffin that got liquored up and started a bar fight. For a good character killing should certainly not be the first option in most cases, but there are occasionally individuals that I believe a good character can justify killing.
The faction mission itself granted them those rights. An entire powerful country basically deputized them. If the faction mission doesn't ask them to kill, then they are not deputized as such and should take the consequences of out of scope or off the reservation actions.
I don't see this "deputization" referenced anywhere (if there's a citation somewhere, I'd love to see it...). It blatantly goes against the standing regulations of the Pathfinder Society and the sovereignty of other nations--which would get the Pathfinders targeted as seditious/unlawful and thus get Pathfinders kicked out of the nation. Ironically, this is exactly the thing the Andoran missions cites as justification for the killing. It's illogical on all fronts...
And again, this would simply make the action Lawful, not Good. It's a faction mission that forces Good characters to do things outside their alignment when other Good options are available. A Good organization shouldn't be asking Good characters to kill a target by any means necessary. That is not Good. "Bring him in alive, although lethal force is authorized if necessary" is a far cry from "Do everything you can to ensure this person dies, even if he's captured and brought to legal authorities/temple sanctuary/etc." I'm not asking for anything crazy here, at least from what I can tell based on the rules of the game--simply have Good organizations offer Good characters Good/Neutral missions and never ask them to do Evil (and of course, for the thread focus, also don't ask any character to do Evil acts while also forbidding Evil characters--either stop the first or allow the second).
And here's the huge irony--the Andoran mission is the only mission in the scenario that leans so far toward Evil! Their hated rivals in Evil Cheliax, those nefarious foes, look like saints compared to the "Good" Andorans that are encouraged to fake an accident if necessary in order to kill their target.
** spoiler omitted **...
What I find odd is that you keep trying to force your ideals of what good is on the Andoran faction. Andorans are not lawful, therefore they are not overly concerned with accomplishing their goals through the proper channels (i.e. turning over enemiess of the PFS or Andoran more specially to the proper authorities).
You feel that "good guys" should never kill anyone, but myself and several others disagree with you. In my opinion you keep describing good as being synonymous with lawful good, while at the same time continuing to claim it has nothing to do with lawful. Robin Hood was chaotic good (IMO), do you think he wouldn't have killed someone that was threatening townsfolk. Is he suddenly evil if kills someone for the betterment of the community. I don't think so but you clearly do, and it seems quite obvious to me that the Andoran higher-ups don't see this as evil. It's not that they are asking their members to perform evil acts, it's that they are assigning missions that you personally feel are evil. So you can skip those missions, but if you do it's because you're playing your character as extremely lawful good, not merely good.
I have to say, reading through this thread I'm slightly astounding that everyone (or at least a reasonably large portion) seems to think that a good character would never kill another person. Maybe my thinking of good and evil is somewhat muddied by frequent trips to the 40k universe, but if a evil person dies and can no longer cause harm to the world at large, how is that not good. Granted a lawful good character (i.e. a Paladin) should not be killing a non-combatant regardless of how evil he is as that is not following the moral code of Law (though I'd argue it is legitimately good to snuff out evil-doers). I feel like if it were really the goal and a requirement of Good characters to never kill people then it should be written in that a Good character must always attempt to inflict nonlethal damage to any living creature that they attack (which would be ludicrous but follows with the logic several of you seem to purpose).
Also the statement by a couple of people that an evil act (or two) should push your alignment immediately towards evil is rather frightening and makes me very concerned to venture outside of my local gaming group for fear that I play at one of these people's tables. Are you noting every time that character completes a good act, such as saves a slave boy or completes the PFS mission that saves an entire village, you likely are not, therefore not appropriately weighing his good acts versus his evil ones. Mainly this worries me with regards to playing Neutral characters. Neutral characters WILL commit evil acts, but they will also commit just as many if not more (hopefully more) good acts. Very few major gameplay decisions have a "neutral" option lying in the gray area between good and evil. A neutral character is free to decide what action is appropriate based on the situation, if doing the "good" option brings greater reward to the character or his companions that he cares for then he follows the path of good. However, if killing an enemy that seems to have surrendered is more appropriate, then he has that option, because he's neutral not lawful good (notice I even made sure to include the lawful part there). And again, if the throat he slashes is that of a pirate raping and pillaging the shores of andor, then I'd sure as hell consider that a good deed.
