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I misspoke (or miswrote). The rule was actually no politics on game night. We often have dinner together beforehand, so this was necessary. But now that you mention it, that should also cover any parting shots after the game is over. Thanks for the well wishes!
This is really the issue. I'm glad someone understands where I'm coming from. I talked to one of the other original players. I'll call him Big J. He claimed to be unaware of the issue. Not sure how that is possible, but he is one of those super open minded accepting people so maybe it really doesn't bother him. He said he couldn't bring himself to kick Bob out of the group. He also said that Bob needs people that will confront him and challenge him. Without us, he doesn't really have anyone that will do that. I think if I pushed the issue, Big J wouldn't stop me from kicking Bob out but it may cause even more strife. Big J offered a compromise. We are laying down a strict "No Politics" rule at the table. This should remove most of Bob's outlets for annoying people. I am dubious, but I feel like it is a reasonable compromise. It works as both a warning and a partial muzzle. If it turns out not being sufficient, then we may go on to removal. Once again, thanks to all of you for your input. Some of it was hard to hear, but all of it gave me additional insight and direction. It was appreciated.
Wow. That escalated quickly. It's a frought situation. People are rarely a single thing. Bad people can do good things. Caring and helpful friends can also become obnoxious. 80% to 90% of the time he is a good guy to have around. But that remaining percentage of the time he is obnoxious. This usually works out to about 15 to 20 minutes a game session dealing with him being annoying. People have busy lives and lots of options for fun things to do. Going into an evening being pretty certain your are going to be annoyed for 15 or 20 minutes makes the other options look better. When he annoys me with the stupid things he says I chew his ass out and he either shuts up or tones it down. Not everyone is comfortable doing that and there is no reason they should have to. But in the gaming community I've met a lot of people with poor interpersonal skills. People with odd personalities. People with poor insight into their behaviors. I know Bob is the problem and I know something needs to be done. I am fairly certain it will lead to an old friend feeling rejected by people he trusts, becoming angry and defensive and probably storming off. I'll probably lose an old friend over this. I've known from the beginning that this would probably be the way it would go. I just wanted to explore all the possible options before I made the move.
I want to thank everyone for their feedback and advice. I appreciate it very much.
I want to clarify that Bob isn't a huge jerk. He can be annoying and tiresome. He is very political, very outspoken, and very poorly informed. At least once a week he goes off about something he heard a fringe political pundit opine about. He will take an already skewed story that he only partially listened to and take it to a whole new level. In today's charged political environment it gets tiresome. I really don't want to kick him out because of his politics. In fact, myself and the other two "old timers" often consider it an asset to have a diverse set of views in our social group. I'm not sure if the others would even be on board with removing Bob. They are both very fun reasonable guys. Bob can be a great guy to have around sometimes. But his confrontational and ill informed conspiracy theories have worn thin.
Bob is Bob and that's never going to change. Another issue is that we went through almost the exact same thing about 4 years ago. The original founder of the group had grown increasingly belligerent. After many casual comments to him about his behavior were ignored, we essentially had a group intervention. It got ugly. After that experience we are all a little gun shy.
That's a good way to frame it.
Bob has killed your group. Give it up. Ouch. Accurate, but ouch.
I've got a group that has played together for about 10 years. There are 4 of us that have been around since that first year and we have always had 2 or 3 other players to fill out the table. It seams like we lose about 1 player every year or so, but we have always been able to recruit someone to keep a full table. One of our original players has always been a bit off putting. Let's just say he likes stirring the pot and this tendency has grown over the years. Let's call him Bob. A couple months back one of our players that has been with us a few years dropped out. He didn't say it directly, but indicated that he just isn't having fun anymore because of Bob always stirring the pot. We got a replacement player, but the new guy has very directly indicated that he is not sure he can deal with Bob and may have to quit. Recently another player that has been with us for a couple years has informed me that he doesn't enjoy playing with Bob. He hasn't officially quit but has started finding other things to do on game nights and is missing sessions regularly. I'm worried that this group is falling apart. I don't think it's feasible to kick Bob out but I'm worried about being able to recruit more players with Bob around. Not sure what to do. Has anyone had a similar experience? What did you do? Any advice?
Thanks so much, everybody. I knew there was a rule like that out there, but I couldn't find it and I didn't remember exactly how it worked or if it applied to this situation. Your willingness to take the time to clear this up for me is greatly appreciated. Thanks again, and happy gaming everybody!
I have a medium sized dex based character. I'm planning on using reduce person for the various benefits. Can I also use the long arm spell to get 10 foot reach? Is there some rule about stacking transformative spells?
Thanks. I'm giving this a bump in the hopes of a little more verification. I have a big PFS event coming up in a couple weeks and I want to make sure about the legality of it. Being able to buy spellcasting services at above minimum casting level is just so good it almost feels like cheating. But if it's an available legal option I will definitely be taking advantage of the opportunity for the set of adventures coming up. Thanks again for the feedback.
I know that for spells that require a caster level check you can pay to get spellcasting services at a higher than minimal level, such as with the remove curse spell. I have always assumed that all other spell casting services were done at the minimum caster level, but after hours of searching I can't find anything definitive either way. Is there an officially ruling? Can I pay a 12th level wizard 360 gold to get Greater Magic Weapon cast on my sword and get a +3 sword for the next 12 hours?
Thanks for all the feedback. I think I will pass a bunch of this on to the other players. I may try to boil this down into a handful of key points to keep in mind during play.
I'm doing an all day marathon speed run. We have lined up a set of modules and are seeing how much we can get through as fast as we can. I'm not looking for build advice. What I want is tactics and strategies to increase the real time speed in which we can clear rooms and floors of a dungeon. I want tips to increase my personal play speed, and strategies for making the team as a whole act as quickly as possible. We are sticking strictly to PFS 1st Edition rules. We will be starting at 1st level. I expect to progress to 10th level or beyond over the course of the day. Any tips or tricks to increase play speed would be appreciated.
I guess what I really want to know is: Are subsistence rolls something you are supposed to do every day, even in exploration mode, when you do not have food and shelter readily available? Does anyone know the answer to this?
Are characters supposed to make subsistence checks in exploration mode? Subsist activity says that it can be done after 8 hours of exploration, but you take a -5 penalty on the check.
That was how I was viewing it.
Ok. Looks like it's not just me. Patron Deity isn't actually defined anywhere. At this point it looks like any distinction is just a judgement call.
I was looking at the Godless Healing feat. It requires that you do not have a Patron Diety. I have a rogue character that worships a god. He doesn't get spells or any other game benefits, but he does definitely worship. Does that count as a patron Diety?
In my experience is has been generally accepted that they stack. But I've never seen an official ruling. Actually, I've never met anybody who didn't think they stacked. This is the first time the idea was ever presented to me.
Sigh.......... So long old friend........
Has there been at least a semiofficial answer on how this works? Dotting for interest. I've been wondering about them for a few years now.
The Cayden Calian Tankard style lets you take a drink do a dirty trick with your mug hand 2hen TWF. What happens during a Brawlers flurry when you are technically TWF but can take all those attacks with a single hand? At 10th level, a Brawler gets 4 attacks. Would using the tankard's ability eat up one attack or two?
Multiclassing may help too. MC Fighter for Intimidating Strike, Monk for Dragon Roar, or Bard for Dirge of Doom, all give ways to keep enemies scared. You know, I had looked at intimidating strike and completely missed how it worked. On a re-read, I think that is exactly what I need. Thanks!
Is there a way to extend the Fear condition from an Intimidation attempt? I have a fourth level rogue and have just started using intimate in combat. It's pretty powerful, but it would be really nice if I could get it to last more than a round or was able to intimidate someone more than once.
But I’d prefer a magus. The magus has even better defense spells, like mirror image, and can easily cast them mid-combat. It’s not going to be nearly as good at skills as the investigator, but it’s a more flexible, powerful and durable combatant. ^This^ A lot. A magus is a great multipurpose martial character. A good mix of practical spells. Both offense and defense. At tenth level you have a lot of tools at your disposal. First, get yourself a familiar with the Protector archetype. It effectively doubles your hit points. Get the Wand Wielder Arcana that allows you to cast spells from a wand instead of using spell combat. Use the Weapon Wand spell to merge a wand with the reach weapon of your choice. Grow large and devastate anything withing 20 feet of you. I think your goal should be to sit back and defend the squishy casters. Get the Dueling weapon property from the Pathfinder Society Field Guide, not the one from ultimate equipment. The Dueling Property gives you a Luck bonus to combat maneuvers equal to TWICE the enhancement bonus of the weapons. At 10th level a magus can turn a +1 weapon into a +4 weapon as a swift action. Suddenly you are getting a +8 Luck bonus on top of a +4 enhancement bonus on all your combat maneuvers. Anything that comes at you on the ground should be tripped. If it comes at you through the air, disarm it. Focus on defense and controlling the field of battle. Let the mages blow up the bad guys.
WOW Bjorn! That was some good stuff. Everyone has given some good ideas. There are a few things that I don't think will work with this character, but I am going to totally steal to flesh out other characters. The current story ark actually has the character in a good spot. After his adventure with the party, they went their separate ways. The party was asked to intervene in a dangerous mission before leaving town. After what they had just been through the party declined and went home to recover. (This is actually not that big a deal. I throw so many plot hooks at them, that they could not possibly complete them all. I do make a point of from time to time mentioning to the party the consequences that have come to pass when they don't take a mission.) Anyway, I had the NPC and a bunch of other outcasts complete the mission. I played it up as a suicide mission for a group of broken heroes looking to die trying to do something good. I haven't really fleshed out the story, but the suicidal NPC group survives and come out of it as great heroes. It turns out that they were dealing with a gateway to Hell. Each is greatly altered by the mission. To survive, they were required to make deals with devils and everybody lost something dear to them. One lost his sight permanently. One lost an arm. One will be forever mute. The fallen paladin lost most of his memories of people that he loved. While the main party in the campaign were taking a month off to rest, recuperate, retrain, and gear up, a group of NPCs has filled the void. The group of NPCs is now the most revered party in that region. I'm wondering how the group will respond to being outshone by a bunch of NPCs. I'm sure there will be further interactions, but I want to figure out what the fallen paladin will have reinvented himself into. Currently I am thinking oracle, because you can still worship ideals and aspects of deities with out being closely bound to them. Once again, thanks for the inspiring ideas.
I'm probably going to be running a few scenarios for PFS in the near future. This particular group tends to like a good story with heavy doses of hack and slash. Could anybody recomend a few scenarios that had lots of combat, but wasn't just a slog? Something with multiple intense combats, but enough of a plot that the players feel motivated and that they are distributing mayhem with a purpose.
I found some. That's not bad. I tried a lot of word combos in my search, but never thought of that one. Those results look better than anything I found. Nice. Thanks!
I really like the concept and the backstory! Thanks! I try to make many of the NPCs in my campaign flavorful and three dimensional. I even have a wall of "Mug Shots" in my game room. They are small 3 x 5 pictures of NPCs with a note card attached with a few bits of info about the character. The players are welcome to add info to the note cards. It really seems to help the players connect with the NPCs instead of treating them like disposable characters.
I have a halfling bard/gunslinger that I have been playing for a while. I went with a mysterious stranger to get charisma to damage. Unfortunately Spell Cartridges don't combine with a mysterious stranger's ability to add charisma to damage, as both require a swift action. I only took one level of mysterious stranger and the only gun related feat I gave her was deadly aim. Eventually she had a pair of +1 double barrel pistols. She didn't use the guns often, but they were a good/flavorful secondary option. Around 6th level, she could do 2d6+20 damage by firing both barrels as a standard action. She almost never reloaded during battle. If she ever needed to fire twice during battle, (which was rare) she would drop her first gun and draw the second one. The remainder of the time she did standard bardy-things.
In a campaign I am running, there is an NPC that has become a fallen paladin. I mean, he didn't fall a little. He fell hard. He has had a complete crisis of faith, but wants to still do good in the world. He has become a bit of a favorite character for the party, so I am trying to think of a way he can continue in the world in a meaningful way. Any advice for a direction to go with a character like that? Any gods that make a habit of rehabilitating broken people? Any good classes I should transition him to, or should he stay as a fallen paladin, keeping only his BAB, feats, and armor/weapon proficiencies? ----------------------------------------------------------
I was running a home brew version of a high level pathfinder scenario. The scenario gave the option of drinking a demon lord's blood to gain power, or even eating the demon lord's heart and gaining a small level of divinity, including granting spells and powers to followers. Long story short. Desperate paladin sacrifices his soul to gain enough power to help the party defeat a great evil. He drinks the demon blood to gain power which is an evil act that causes him to become fallen. He then offers himself to worship and serve the party member that ate the demon's heart and becomes restored as a (semi-)dark paladin. He is just an NPC that was supposed to die heroically. I ran him most of the time, but several players in the group have taken turns running him and making decisions for him. He has now become a party favorite. They went to significant lengths to save him, support him, and get him through the adventure alive. In the end, the fallen paladin helped the party defeat a great evil, but in doing so he committed many acts that would be considered evil. The paladin won't do an atonement, partly because of a backstory self loathing thing, but also because he doesn't regret doing it. Atonement requires remorse and regret for the the deeds done. He doesn't regret it because it allowed him to defeat a great evil. He believes damning his soul was a worth while trade off for the good accomplished.
I'm looking for some good character pictures that show a hero that barely survived a battle. Most pictures show characters in their shining glory or like some sort of bad @$$. I want pictures of a hero that just barely made it out alive. I want the fantasy equivalent of John McClane at the end of every Die Hard movie. Anybody have any good idea where to find something like that?
Not sure yet how to make someone clumsy, drained or sickened, but I've worked out some of the "frightened" mechanics. That could be a viable option.
Grapple someone and they become flatfooted.
Flank someone, knock them down, and then grapple them, still just flatfooted. And flatfooted really isn't all that bad. Sure, a rogue can now sneak attack you and you take a hit to AC, but it doesn't make you any easier to trip or grapple. I'm having trouble coming to grips with the fact that a downed foe that is grappled and surrounded by enemies is only mildly inconvenienced. Why do none of these things stack?
So if you try to maintain the grapple would the enemy be considered flat footed as you make your Athletics check?They are grabbed when you attempt to maintain, so yes. Apparently this doesn't matter. I've been informed that flat footed is only a penalty to AC and thus would not impact a grapple check.
There must be something about the Ape Instinct ability that I don't understand. I thought it just gave you proficiency with "fist" and gave that attack more damage as well as the grapple quality. Isn't unarmed attacks a light weapon that can be used with weapon finness?
Thanks for the response Castilliano. Very thorough and concise. Makes sense. I have been considering multi classing into barbarian and had already spotted the ape instinct ability that gives unarmed attacks the grapple weapon quality. I have been unsure exactly what that would do, though. If it does allow my character to use dex while grappling, then it makes an intriguing choice. As for assurance, it's not so great to use for grappling. My character has the feat, but it will rarely work against anything that is the same level as the character. Most monsters appear to have Fort as a "good save" and will always be ahead of the curve vs assurance with athletics. That being said, I have gotten it to work once.
The other maneuvers are also athletics checks.
If you are proficient in unarmed combat, can you use dex to grapple?
A flanked target has a flat footed -2 penalty to melee attacks. Does a flat footed target take a penalty vs maneuvers?
A rogue thief gets Dex to attack and damage for melee attacks. What about things like grapple that use an athletics check instead of a melee attack?
How are people getting the books already? Reeeeeeeealy want to get my hands on one.
A number of years ago I played in a scenario that had what was essentially a nuclear reactor that melted down and just about killed everyone. For the life of me, I can't remember which scenario it was. Anybody know what I'm talking about?
That's it. Can the exemplar use this magic item. The Exemplar gets an ability like bardic performance, but it does not use music. It does say that feats and effects that effect bardic performance effect the exemplar's ability. Three Reasons to Live is a musical instrument that gives a significant bonus to bardic performance.
My gaming group ran the first few sections of Plunder and Peril in Campaign Mode. It was fun for a while, but we stopped part way through to start a different adventure path with different characters. We have decided that we will not be going back to finish Plunder and Peril. The rules for campaign mode say that you hand out all the chronicles after you have completed the adventure path. Do you really need to finish the entire thing first? Can we just get the chronicles for the sections we completed?
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