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ABSOLUTELY. Because it is a fact universally acknowledged that swimming in duck ponds is a thing every Regency aristocrat must do. (I am so amused at how many movies since the first Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice have featured a wet-shirt scene for the comely gentlemen. Bridgerton has done it once a season so far.)
It is a fact universally acknowledged that a socialite of indifferent fortune must be suspected as the villain of any metaplot... So is anyone else hoping that we will get one Regency-style house party with shenanigans in the coming season? It does not have to be Bridgerton (though I adore Bridgerton) but could be Pride and Predjudice and Zombies! Or a mystery with people of very proper facades hiding most improper (and dangerous) secrets! Our Venture Gossip could be our very own Lady Whistledown. Then again, maybe this is just me...
I've never had an issue iwth investigators on either side of the table. I just tell the GM, "I'm now pursuing a lead of X" or ask when we get into a fight, "is Y related to my investigation of X so I can Devise a Strratagem as a free action?" and get a yes or no answer, and we move on.
I'll admit that while I love PFS, I hate tracking and paperwork. That is why I use a spreadsheet to keep track of my stuff. It saves me so much aggravation, and does all the math for me. Here is Pip's ITS, to show you what a filled out spreadsheet looks like. Here is a blank ITS (Item Tracking Sheet) that you can use to track your character's wealth, XP and levels. Best of luck, and hope you can get past the character upkeep and get to the good stuff like playing in adventures again. Hmm
I would try for a set of bounties that teach different ideas. I'm going to warn you though that although I can go through four bounties in four hours with time to spare, new GMs are going to be a lot slower. We usually only do 2 GMs at a time when we do new GM training so that we have space to talk about the adventure afterwards. As for the bounties themselves, I am fond of the following: B4 Cat's Cradle - though I might be biased on this one. Still, this one is best with people who have not played it before, for *ahem* reasons.
If you are sticking with a group of four players throughout, the first two bounties (B1 Whitefang Wyrm and B2 Blood of the Beautiful) work well as well. I would not do them with larger player groups as the Challenge points scale poorly on those two. Hmm
You can endlessly create trees. You can have an entire orchard if you put in the time. But yes, I agree that it would need to obey the laws of seasonal blooming, and it still has to be planted in suitable soil. And yes, a diet of just fruit would not be balanced as a long term nutrition option. So I'm not arguing with you about the in-game bonus, just clarifying the kineticist mechanic. I've never found planting a bunch of trees to be game-breaking and kind of love the fantasy of a wood kineticist reforesting the world wherever they go. Hugs,
I made a Gear Handout for all the strange equipment in this scenario and I included a bonus handout of the partial letter which the party is supposed to find (but for which we had no handout.) All in all, I liked this one. Mike Bramnik captured the personalities of the Pathfinder Leadership as more fully themselves than we have seen in ages. The lab was appropriately creepy, and the story is great. As a bonus, it runs fast. My party of five got through in four hours. Not bad at all! Plus, I loved all the PF1 callbacks. This one was a pleasure to run. Hmm
I made a Gear Handout for all the strange equipment in this scenario and I included a bonus handout of the partial letter which the party is supposed to find (but for which we had no handout.) All in all, I liked this one. Mike Bramnik captured the personalities of the Pathfinder Leadership as more fully themselves than we have seen in ages. The lab was appropriately creepy, and the story is great. As a bonus, it runs fast. My party of five got through in four hours. Not bad at all! Plus, I loved all the PF1 callbacks. This one was a pleasure to run. Hmm
★ --- ★ --- ★ --- ★ Given that the sizes of creatures from outside the dollhouse are the same relative to their surroundings inside the dollhouse, and that most poppets (with the exception of the Warden) are size Small, the various poppets are size Small.
Doug Hahn did a nice listing of Scenario Arcs in PF2 on his Unofficial Guides Website. It's worth a look.
You joke about the KORonation, but I swear that I plan for all kinds of cool giveaways for review tables. For my 150th game for my stars, I ran Heroes for High Delve and and gave everyone gold origami dragons that I folded myself. For a Nova table, I gave everyone fancy paper airplanes (starships!) For a recent Pathfinder 2nd Edition review when I was running Fanciful March of Urwal, I gave everyone mini jars of blackberry jam. I feel like these events should be something that we go all out for and celebrate! Crowns are always acceptable sartorial attire.
Thank you folks for your suggestions. I have so much potential material available that I need recommendations to break it all down! I am actually considering stealing material from Starfinder as well. I wrote some really great animal encounters for volume 2 of Horizons in the Vast, but obviously they will require adapting!
I am taking over as interim GM for the party of a family member of mine, and they were tracking strange happenings with animals. This will not be for Organized Play, but as an Organized Play VC, I own all the Paizo Adventures and I am happy to steal from all of them. So... tell me what I should be looking at! I am planning a few Society Scenarios for fodder, including: * Lions of Katapesh
Are there any adventure paths that I should be looking at? If so, which ones? Should I be looking at Kingmaker or Quest for the Frozen Flame? Give me fodder that I can build with. Hmm
If it is in a scenario, we treat it as an eligible lore to roll on. Let's face it though, the only people rolling on it will be either high intelligence characters rolling it untrained, or folks who have the ability to recall knowledge on all lores via bardic / diverse / gossip / loremaster lore.
Gary - I'll do my best to familiarize myself with the challenge adjustments and paperwork. I'm hoping to talk to a PFS GM in real life to get some hands-on guidance. I see that you are signed up for Kyle's game on March 15th. There will be two PFS GMs there, since the other Fox Den host, Matt S, will be playing as well that night. They're looking forward to meeting you! Hmm
Holy Flamingo - Some things that you should know about the specific convention that you will be GMing at, since I can answer those! 1) It will have Scenario Support. This means that once you send us your acceptance of the schedule that you received, we can put you on the scenario support list, and Paizo will drop you the scenarios that you need so that you don't need to buy them. However, if you want to buy them anyway so you have more time to prep, you can. 2) Noise. Yep, there will be some noise since two of the adventures that you will be running will be in the main room of Fox Den. The other adventure will be in a private gaming room, which will have better sound quality. 3) Dice and / or Minis. HQ will have some loaner dice, but we're also encouraging players to purchase dice at Fox Den since we're being hosted in a gaming store! As for minis, yes, Fox Den does not have much in the way of Minis, but Bret and I will be providing some cardboard minis available at HQ, along with laminated copies of pregenerated characters. But, if you have some minis you like to loan / show off, feel free to bring them! 4) Chronicles. This Convention will be using the RPG Chronicles program, so you will not need to print paper chronicles. Once you report the game to HQ, we will email PDFs of the chronicles to players and report the results to Paizo. Hmm
Hey HolyFlamingo! Nice to see you on the forums. I think that the biggest single piece of advice that I can give you is to get out to one of our many local games and just play so that you can get a feel for how Organized Play works. It will be the single fastest way to get up to speed! (By the way, I'm the same Hmm you've been conversing with about PaizoCon @ Fox Den!)
Thankfully, a lot of the basics are the same between the two. You'll still have the same basic character creation, the same basic hero points, and combat will be the same too. So a lot of your GM experience will transfer over. If you have used official Paizo modules, the world's setting will be familiar too.
Most of the differences between Organized Play and Home Games is cultural. 1) The society's motto is "Explore, Cooperate, Report!" This generally means that Organized Play parties cooperate with one another. PCs get missions, and they are usually pretty focused on completing them and working together. 2) Players in general need to own the resources that their PCs draw options from. There is a core assumption that makes everything in the Core Rulebook and Player Core available to PCs, but beyond that, if a PC wants to use something outside that, they need to own the sources they are using and/or have boons for stuff of uncommon or limited availability. 3) Parties are much more random than in home games. Home game groups try to have some party balance, but in Organized Play you get who shows up. Although there may be some last minute shuffling as players with multiple characters try to get some variety in the party makeup, it is not unusual to have a party of all casters, or all martials, or where half your players are the same class, like kineticist. An in-joke of the Society is "Why did the Venture Captains pick an all-barbarian group to attend the Duchess's Charity Brunch?" 4) The Society's treasure distribution is different than home games. PCs don't get to keep all the loot they find during an adventure, because that would be unbalancing and lead to arguments over who got what. They do get to use anything they find during an adventure, and then after the adventure, all loot is given back to the Society who sells it and gives you your adventure pay. But if there was something special in that loot (an uncommon item, perhaps?) you can gain access to it later if it appears on the chronicle sheets. In general, Society characters have more cash wealth than their home game peers, which lets them purchase the equipment they want (provided they have access to it.) 5) Challenge Points. Society Games tailor the challenge rating to the party based on the combined levels of the various PCs. There is a calculation, but I generally allow the RPG Chronicles program to calculate the value for me. What this means as a GM is that there is an appendix of all the creatures that the PCs must fight in the back of a scenario, and each of those encounters has a sidebar that talks about adjusting the combat for stronger parties. Often this means adding a minion or increasing the Hit Points of the NPCs. 6) Run-as-written. In general, Society GMs run scenarios as they were written. They don't change the monsters, they don't change important plot points, because those can have story implications later for the Society's storylines. 7) Metaplot and Reporting Conditions. Society scenarios are generally stand-alone adventures in the shared world of the Pathfinder Society. But some adventures have choices that the party makes, and those choices and actions can affect future scenarios in the storyline. So when you report a scenario, there may be reporting conditions (A, B, C, D) that you will need to mark to reflect that. I will let others talk about Chronicles and Reporting. We'll be using a program (RPG Chronicles) to make that easier at PaizoCon @ Fox Den. And all of this will make a lot more sense after you have played a couple games with us! Hmm
Man, Kublacon is tempting....and we'd love to see you at PaizoCon@KublaCon. I will post more details once I've got rid of this stupid cold!!!! Post more details! I won't be able to come out to you because I will be hosting PaizoCon@Fox Den, but I hope that Kublacon is a wonderful time for all involved.
I made a revised version of the lackluster handout that originally came with this scenario. Hmm
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