Madhippy3's page

gesalt wrote:

Do tell me about drowning though. Not something I've given much thought to outside of the monk suffocation combo.

Spells like Aqueous Orb, Wall of Water, and Pillar of Water can instantly put foes underwater, and rely on them getting out of the water to avoid drowning.

If you combo a water spell with some form of holding the foe in place, they can drown pretty quick.

Pillar of Water has an up to 15ft radius, meaning that there's rooms in APs like Abomination Vaults that if door-blocked, can become drowning traps filled with water.

I'm pretty sure devils need to breathe by default, so uh... yeah.

To add to this. I have a player theory crafting a game where they will use Aqueous Orb plus the Investigator's Pointed Question to force drowning.

True, but for the narrative my stupid idea still requires Starfinder Agent. You can start Xenoarcheologist at level 4.

Here is my one dumb idea of the day

SFS and PFS adds free archetype but it can only take the Star/Pathfinder Archetype in it. Add then a special rule that the FA doesn't have the SPECIAL.

Maybe then players would all have some minimal skill level which devs can plan for and players can feel connected to the org and each other as members and not feel so much adventures who just walked in off the street.

Also, DMs of home games should be able to know what the rules are. What good is buying a rulebook that gives you unclear rules and says "I dunno, figure it out for yourself?"

Which is not an insignificant reason some players swapped to PF2e from dnd5e. That game is so full of holes and minimal options my swap to PF2e is pretty which and complete. Haven't played a game of 5e in 3 years and don't miss it.

So the release of the newer wizard subclass and schools isn't addressing what people feel the class was lacking?

I also consider this to be a Paizo level mistake. Instead of fixing the core problem they try to "patch" the problem with a fix only in subclass. We saw this with Sorcerer options in the dnd5e book Tasha's Cauldron. The new options are objectively better mechanically than the older options. Its a great fix to what Sorcerer was missing, but it wasn't retroactive and thus is just power creep.

There doesn't seem to be any guidance for GMs if a PC wants to accept the bad guy's offer. I get its not a common thing to worry about but the bad guy legitimately asks for people to come peacefully on their terms. Its not as outrageous of other false choices we have seen in TTRPGs, and eventually someone is going to do it if for no other reason than to go against the grain. Leaving the GM to make something up.

Going to be a common problem? Not in the slightest. But I would have liked to see a short response for what stops a PC from accepting the offer.

I don't think it is myopic in the slightest to see the energy this and past threads get and see that the community at large does not think this class is A tier.

Reverse even, to tell someone to just move on when this is clearly a problem and say "its A tier to me so whatever" (paraphrasing of course) is just covering your ears to problems. We have legit criticism and even better ideas just here. Though they haven't so far "the squeaky wheel gets the grease". As long as we are vocal, insistent, and polite there is a non-zero chance someone will take this into consideration. Maybe it just keeps the ideas alive for new people to find and make into homebrew. I vehemently disagree with moving on. There is nothing wrong with talking.

I tried to be insistent but my idea seems not to have impressed anyone so I'll certainly move on from that, but not from my stance that Wizard isn't appealing to play. As anecdotal as it might be I insist that I hardly see wizards played in more than 300 online games through Warhorn. Its not a popular class. Other classes are more engaging to play, are more enjoyable to play, and live their specific fantasy better. That might be anecdotal, but its backed up with what is said here.

And yes it has been 53 days since the first complaint on the changes on this thread and the most we have heard from them is Mr. Jacob's reassurance that they are discussing our feedback. While I appreciate Mr. Jacob's speaking to us, the longer the silence the less contented I am about it.

Have they been in talks for 50 days? Have they made a decision? Are they going to tell us if they did? Or can we expect 7-09 to land without any more acknowledgement.

It was probably always to late, 7-09 and later scenarios were probably to far along to do a major rewrite for normal level bands from the day the announcement was made. Paizo made their decision, and there wasn't anything more to say, because they waited to late for feedback to matter.

Madhippy3 wrote:

Unicore wrote:

It just seems like it will be harder to get the numbers to run those except at large conventions.

Maybe in person, but these will fill up fast on Warhorn.

... great? I sure hope "this is fine for online play so it doesn't matter what happens in person" isn't a decision point.

I am willing to say, not great. I brought up in my first post on this thread that the decisions seem made with online play in mind. I am almost exclusively online PFS2 and things seem to fill up with at least 5 players very quickly no matter what scenario it is. As long as it is at a reasonable time and on Foundry, I've never seen problems with tables firing. This is why I think Paizo are committing to the narrow level bands so hard. Without even waiting to see how well it works in SFS2 Year 1 they are bringing it to PFS2 because I can only imagine that their internal data shows these changes won't be significantly harming the online space.

I have from testimony like yours that this will hurt the local con scene and so I am afraid that this very well might be a decision point for them. That they are discounting the local scene knowing Gen Con will survive and Paizo Con is almost all exclusively online anyways.

Madhippy3 wrote:

I disagree. This is a long thread and it isn't filled with wizard defenders. Everyone has one reason or another to explain why the wizard is only playable compared to where other classes are excelling.

Yeah because these arguments have been going on for years now and most people are exhausted. You're late to the party

That doesn't rebuttal what I said in the slightest...

I disagree. This is a long thread and it isn't filled with wizard defenders. Everyone has one reason or another to explain why the wizard is only playable compared to where other classes are excelling.

We want spell substitution as part of base despite it being something you can already have at level one. The class needs a lot more added to it than getting what you already have as a default.

It is well detailed by Firelion that PF2e Wizard is PF1e Wizard with all the bells and whistles pulled off. Now we wouldn't want them back on because we don't want the PF1e wizard back, but importantly it really has very little to show how it has adapted to 2e, making it the worst of all solutions.

I agree fully that the perfect solution is one of the grander ideas above that can really address the wizards flaws at its core, making a whole new class, but these ideas are limited also in how system wide they would be too necessitating a wait till 3e.

My idea is only a band aid, but at least we could say that the class identity of wizard could be as simple as "the fighter of casters" and its simple enough it could be in an errata.

While I respect that there is a lot of fun theory crafting happening, a few of these ideas we would be lucky to get in a 3e as it is to major a change. I am not convinced that making the Wizard more potent is bad merely because it doesn't fit the idea of the versatile wizard, which we acknowledge wasn't everyone's idea of a wizard anyways.

It doesn't really matter about making it wrong as long as we don't make it worse, because the current wizard is the worse it has ever been. It is so bad it created a misconception about the Arcane list that started this thread. This is all a hope dream, but if there is ever going to be a Reremaster of the Wizard that we will see and be able to enjoy in this edition we should theory craft towards simpler changes to the class. So far we have a lot of that.

Unless it would absolutely break the game I am not convinced that letting flexibility be from a huge spell list, swappable spellshapes and spells between combat, and emphasis of spell power through earlier Expert, Master, and Legendary is something to simply dismiss because its not perfect for everyone. It is practical on a printing level and thats what might, with luck, get Paizo to change. Things that already have page space get moved from the feat and thesis side to the class chassis side, and you change Trained to Expert, Expert to Master, Master to Legendary, and delete the redundant Legendary, where you find them related to Spell Modifier. Secondarily Paizo can emphasize more exclusively Arcane spells with new book releases.

While there might be more fixes to add, this is simple and practical. It doesn't matter if it isn't the wizard everyone wants because the wizard we have is the wizard no one wants. We need a buff for the wizard practical enough that someone is going to want to play it and Paizo is willing to print it. Hell my suggestion is so simple it could be done in an errata.

How would the game be effected if Wizards were the "fighters of casters"?

Meaning, Expert in Spell Mod from level 1, gets to Legendary at 13, and build flexibility (spell substitution as part of chassis and Combat Flexibility for Wizard Feats).

It just seems like it will be harder to get the numbers to run those except at large conventions.

Maybe in person, but these will fill up fast on Warhorn.

Madhippy3 wrote:

I am so sick of 1-4s. There is enough level 1-4s which aren't even repeatable to take someone to level 5. The foundation of the level band pyramid is to damn wide! And now they want to waste our time with 1-2s! We don't need these levels. We need more 5-8, 7-10, and 9-12. We need to build the pyramid to be better proportioned.

FWIW, the announced scenarios that follow the 2-levels band are

Lvl 3-4 on January 7th
Lvl 13-14 on January 7th
Lvl 7-8 on February 4th
Lvl 5-6 on February 4th
Lvl 9-10 on March 4th
Lvl 3-4 on March 4th

If thats how it is then I missed that and will chill out about level bands. I don't care for 3-4s but its a lot better than 1-2s. 13-14 is exciting, would prefer 11-14, but I am still excited about that regardless.

I don’t know if there is an answer to this but I am going to try anyways.

Is Season of Ghost book two supposed to have such a dull combat gauntlet? We are on a linear path and it is just one encounter after another and the encounters just aren’t interesting. Especially two which are so obvious it was miserable to be forced into an ambush. Two so far because we still aren’t done with this linear gauntlet.

The current part has broken me. Its too linear with forced fights. I run abomination vaults and in comparison, this is to many fights in too forced a setting. I really want to give my GM a suggestion to spice it up because I am not the kind of person to make a request and leave the GM to do all the work.

My whole point of buying APs and not making something up from scratch is I don't want to do that kind of work and trust professional writers to write better than I do. Thus I go out of my way to not go "off script".

That said sometimes it is inevitable, usually a strong desire by the group. When my group got tired by so many fights in Age Of Ashes, I removed fights and swapped to milestone leveling. That was an easy one. It was negative work really.

I've changed a dungeon layout once. I am sorry, the writing was good, but the architectural design was atrocious. Thats the furthest I've gone "off script".

Most changes are adding and changing items. Like, oh this fight was hard but there is no reward. Lets add some gold for the PCs' trouble; or oh there is a staff in the next chest, but it isn't for anyone's tradition, lets swap that real fast.

PFS lore becoming default in PFS has been among the changes I have been most pleased with to my own surprise. It just makes sense and it comes up a lot. IDK how it works in Starfinder Society, but all but the Legacy Field Promotions spent 3 years in Pathfinder College before their initiation. It just made sense.

It is a little silly. Too late now, but having it be 0 credit cost would have been fun.

I am adding my +1 for Slow Track.

I've used in in PF2e for a character I wanted more time with. It is hard sometimes to let go of a character because they outlevel the scenarios currently available or what a local lodge is running.

Please consider this soon.

The Realy has an interesting rule I have not seen used before.

"Non-participants may loan the participating PCs equipment but may not otherwise assist in any way."

I'm courious how/if players have been taking advantage of this.

Is this a new rule? I always believed a PC could give another PC their equipment, but that it is automatically returned (if not consumed/destroyed) at end of session.

So far I haven't seen this much used. A player shared a Celebrity Serum once and I as a player used spells to buff, but this is only a 1-2 and players likely have what they need / can afford. The basic kit is cheap enough I assume everyone has.

My question is should PCs be explicitly warned if they use Exposed armor that they will likely die? Does seem like maybe this should be made more explicit what the environmental effects are?

So is the 2nd Cheliax AP getting previewed soon?

Before Hellbreakers gets a preview? Not likely.

Did they say if the part 2 was going to be immediately after Hellbreakers release?

I am so sick of 1-4s. There is enough level 1-4s which aren't even repeatable to take someone to level 5. The foundation of the level band pyramid is to damn wide! And now they want to waste our time with 1-2s! We don't need these levels. We need more 5-8, 7-10, and 9-12. We need to build the pyramid to be better proportioned.

On top of the great posts from Tridus and Talgeron about what smaller level bands are actually going to do to tables in practice. My own petty contribution is that a few people I know and myself are very tired of the low level focus and want more opportunities to flex the cool builds we earned with actual play and to show off our game mastery. In short we want variety and opportunity. Not a reset to more 1-2.

Referring back to the announcement of changes coming to SFS for 2e. It is clear whatever picture Paizo is getting from reporting, it is distorted or their analysts need another go at it because their stated conclusions are empirically wrong. To refresh anyone who cares, we were told that high level content was unpopular so they weren't even going to try (thus the lower level cap for SFS2e).
It was pointed out to blind eyes and deaf ears that the obvious reason PFS2e high level play don't get scheduled as often is there are less scenarios in the range, no repeatables of that range, and fewer players with characters in that range. Not that people were avoiding high level play. (In personal experience even high level scenarios which are badly reviewed get filled because people want to play their high level PCs that got retired for lack of scenarios). People point out that the level cap is unnecessary because Paizo already fixed the above problems with their other changes, more repeatables, and makings new PCs at level 7 will make more characters available for those scenarios. Paizo only needs to sell us scenarios which can get us there (or allow us to make up characters higher than 7, but this is probably a bad idea as Talgeron has already stressed).

My point is that Paizo's data and analysis suck and they are coming to faulty conclusions. We have to hope they are reading these posts because they are missing very real and lived experience which contradict their stated policy.

I am sorry for your lose. I hope you are doing okay.

The original question misses it is okay to make evil campaigns. PF2e has lich archetype too and no one thinks we are trying to reform liches. Its not an archetype for all games. It might work for a reformed Hellknight who still fights like one even if that is no longer their cause. Could be your token evil team member who is tolerated and tolerates because there is something worse than peace, love, and freedom to stomp on right now. Or as said in the top, its an evil campaign and everyone is a bastard.

No reason to remove Hellknights from PC options. Just an understanding of what kind of story the group is telling and setting some ground rules and boundaries at session 0.

I would say the barrier acts like a wall for the purpose of Line of Effect and only the Field is effected, and not the character within. Whether to assume failure or crit failure is harder to answer. Its probably GM dependent as I don't see rules on this. Crit Fail seems the most logical (it literally didn't move), but a simple failure is a nice gesture to the player. As long as it only counts as one attack the shield breaking should be the only outcome with the PC being unaffected. Though becoming Blinded is an interesting effect you might still allow. The damage was blocked but not the light.

I think the Book of the Dead did a pretty good job of why necromancy doesn't ever really get a good reputation.

It's easy to imagine what sort of things could create normalization of undead: the business incentives could make undead labor commonplace, or charitable necromancers could use undead labor to repair natural disaster damage or protect towns. Book of the Dead covers why that doesn't work: even controlled mindless undead work worse around the living and cause more accidents. Between that and undead slipping free of control and killing or injuring people, enough attempts at using undead in a pro-social way would be marred by deaths and injuries that it would never be able to turn its reputation around. The businesses would always be breaking reasonable safety laws for an advantage over their competition, not just following normal practices. The undead helping do repairs would cause accidents, or a natural undead would come along in the disaster aftermath and nobody would believe it hadn't just gotten loose from the work crew.

Except this isn't true. Kaer Maga has a large mindless undead menial workforce. There are dangers, but aren't there always. Is there a significant difference between a necromancer losing control of a zombie vs a living employee just "going postal"? I don't see evidence that losing control of the dead is any more common than a living person flying into a deadly rage. At least in the former case we know who is responsible and can exact vengeance. Kaer Maga is proof it can work. In a more ordered society than Kaer Maga it might even be safer.

Appeal to authority's only a fallacy when one's authority is merely a social position or one's scholarly work/authority lies outside the topic, i.e. quoting Einstein outside of physics. Until Nethys and similar deities develop an evidence-based consensus that disagrees with her (or you develop a way us players can investigate Golarion metaphysics), Pharasma IS the authority based on her actually knowing.

Yes, we as players might consider she's mistaken, but in world there's no reason to suspect that. She's as objective as one can get barring James Jacobs giving a definitive answer (unlikely until it serves a narrative purpose in some adventure).

I disagree here for the reason that you have already explained. Why would we use Einstein as an expert of non-physics and why should was ask Pharasma about about universal truths? In Three Fears she seems to be figuring this out for herself too. She doesn't have the answers you think she does. Interestingly it seems to be Yog-Sothoth in his role as the watcher who knows but will not tell. Pharasma doesn't know how this will end and we know Prophesies are borked now anyways.

I disagree that there "are a lot of (dangerous) things in Golarion that aren't treated with near this level of stigmatism". Undead (and the medical issues around corpses) are ubiquitous threats with emotional gravitas.

Here too. You cannot call something ubiquitous when you have good PCs and NPC around that are Undead. The undead aren't even required to prey on the living as we see tombs of forgotten undead survive for centuries or even millennia. I think when we think critically about the topic we see that there is nothing inherently evil or predatory about the mindful undead. So why do we perceive them as such? Probably because those are the stories we are told, and it isn't like there isn't a power structure in place which has a vested interested in maintaining that status. You are ready to draw earth parallel and so am I. There are lots of underprivileged groups that are demonized like this IRL for the purpose of power. With the exception of the mindless undead I think there is a possibility of undead as lifeforms which are predators by nature like many other animals, beasts, and humanoids, but can make their own decisions to not act like predators and still exist without starving.

The Three Fears is beautiful writing. I note though it doesn't mention the undead or damage to the cycle. It gets the mind racing of "if there is undead then who is ultimately the survivor at then end" and referring back to the last fear, maybe she fears it will be forced to be her if no one is born, and no one dies, but existence continues at the end of it all.

All that is to say that it is thought provoking on the implications, but light on facts. Or even guarantees of its truth. Being official doesn't automatically make it true. For writing like this that doesn't really have an answer, not taking everything to be unquestionable is safest. It is certainly canon, but does that mean it is true?

Circling back to my first post, the prophecies of Pharasma are compelling, but not proven fact. It seems reasonable for scholars to question this truth, and once faith is shaken new traditions can grow. Such as necroethics and the application of undeath as a tool shunned by one goddess in a sea of gods and goddesses.

Thank you for the update, Mr. Jacobs.

If the item DCs scale automatically how will the magic vender upsell us the next expensive version :D

We need a trait for weapons which isn't necessarily grapple, but more like "latch". Here is what I mean. I have had several campaigns where a new player takes the whip and thinks they will Indiana Jones an obstacle. I am honestly surprised it has happened four separate times. Got me thinking that for the sake of good pulpy fantasy we need whips and other weapons a chance to act like grappling hooks, or probably more reasonably, add this as an option given in a feat to the Archeologist Archetype.

And the reason we don't run into a lot of level 10s going up against level 5 challenges is that its kinda boring. Maybe a few checks over a few minutes to flex on challenges that aren't threats anymore, but there isn't challenge in this, nothing is really at stake when you are +5 level.

Typical play takes you to harder and harder challenges. The bad guys are richer with harder locks and straighter walls, and deadlier weapons on top of that. We get this impression nothing is easier because we rarely turn around and engage with something that is no longer on our radar. If you do turn around and your GM artificially increases difficulty you should talk to the GM about it, but this isn't what I think happens at most tables.

Bugbears I guess. Overall I am fine, but I want to run PF2e in Eberron some day and if Paizo saves me the work on making an ancestry that would be pretty great.

I am not dying for anything though. I don't think we have any horrendous missing pieces from ancestries. A little off topic but an oozemorph heritage might be nice. The way we have Beastkin and Werecreature Archetypes both accessible I would like to see for oozes, but off topic.

I think the idea gives to much away, does it really take someone to read the whole AP on their own to decide chronicle boons, or couldn't we just ask a writer to pick something special from the adventure they wrote and put it on? It doesn't have to be good. There are several chronicles with nothing good on them, but it is the thought that counts imo. Same for the description. Writer can't write an abstract?

BUT I see a compromise will have to be made and people with more AP experience than I do are behind this so I will accept this is the compromise that people are behind and will support it as well. This is a small offering to players and GMs that their time was valued.

Congratulations and thank you, Fivers!

Sorry Mr. Jacobs but seeing is believing and this was just posted.
https://paizo.com/community/blog/v5748dyo71fj6?September-2025-Organized-Pla y-Monthly-Update

The opinion is practically one sided on the PFS2 changes, but we are being ignored. Its worse they read, no one could be bothered to respond, and ignore feedback to continue unaltered. Not even acknowledging there has been feedback.

This is getting absurd.

Christopher#2411504 wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Better to leave this "Why?" for GMs to decide. Just like for Undead PCs.

What would the GM have to do with a purely player facing question?

Setting lore belongs to the GM first and foremost IMO.

The setting by default is Golarion. The devs can write for that setting that like they do when they write for the Society and Religion entries.

I personally don't think finding lore justifications for game balance imposed by the devs is a GMs jobs. As always a GM is more than welcome to change/add/remove anything, but not everything needs to be made with the "GM fills the holes" in mind. That's why a lot of people left dnd5e for fuller pastures.

I believe the idea behind holy and unholy is the cosmic war of "good" and "evil" which is why it replaced alignments and why Pharasma is still cosmically above it all. While some Evil spells were related to undead and negative energy, the trend was more about hurting the good physically or spiritually. So with exceptions I believe the opposite of undeath isn't holiness, only 4 Undead have a weakness to Holy/Good according to AoN. So the question of an inherent immorality to Undeath on a cosmic level seems irrelevant to me.

Her judgement is also irrelevant, she has been an impartial judge of souls for a long time and while she might give your soul a sneer for being disgusting in her eyes, your soul goes to where it is supposed to go. If you did it knowing and not caring about the destruction to the universe you probably belong in Abaddon where your existence will continue to act on harming creation. Maybe you only Talking Corpse'd to solve murder mysteries. Then Pharasma sends your soul to Heaven with a sneer.

The destruction of the universe is often brought up but never elaborated on. It seems reasonable to me that there might be some debate on how true this is and if it matters when threats like the Spawn of Rovagug exist and threaten the security of the Dead Vault and the threat to the universe that is. The fundamentals of Necroethics probably is to question this very notion. Attempting to disprove it in the theoretical or minimalizing its impact. Essentially called Pharasma (or just her church if you can really trust them when they say Pharasma is talking to them) a liar, or at best exaggerating the problem. A moral Necromancer could be quite conspiracy minded seeing Pharasma as a manipulative deity everyone just kind of took her word for that this was a problem (and wouldn't it be just like a church of grave diggers to discourage people not needing graves???)

Consider also while generally dangerous Undead are not inherently "evil". They are allowed in the Pathfinder Society which in 2e is pretty strict about not being "evil". Undead PCs have no character features which compel them to be "evil" either.
Yes, the mindless undead without control are definitely destructive, which is a weakness of this argument, and lots of Intelligent Undead aren't "good" either, but there is an argument to be made we just aren't telling the stories of good undead enough. Geb is certainly a place where it has gone wrong, but is that inevitable for an undead nation or can we point to the influence of Geb who was like Nex, evil all their own.
Its a weaker argument but I believe it is worth asking. After all even the evil dead cannot completely predatory to living. in Blood Lords at least one Blood Lord is a Quick, and a Quick PC is trying to become one.. I just don't think it is as cut and dry.

It might also be prejudicial (in game) to say just because something has to kill the living to survive it is "evil". Hyenas are obligate carnivores and we might assume the Kholo are too. Both might have a necessity to eat meat (or bone or blood etc), but the Kholo isn't a monster like a Ghoul. Why? The only difference I see is the undead have the potential to exist longer. Which could be an ecological problem if there isn't something to prey on the Undead (release the Giant Vultures and let the gods decide!), but I think undead can prey on each other so its probably self correcting.

In conclusion I think the immorality of necromancy comes from the "its icky to see grandma puppetted like that" and the destructiveness of the mindless and uncontrolled undead. The first rule of Necroethics as mentioned above is to question the power structures that enforce proscriptions on using dead bodies and souls. Asking if they don't have reasons to lie and enforce a status quo.
The second rule is to be discrete, respectful, and responsible. Don't do it where you'll make innocent people upset, don't treat a body like a toy, and for the love of the gods don't let it off the leash!

Madhippy3 wrote:

I serious think your group is an outlier. You are telling me the group cannot complete Swordlord's Challenge, Elsewhere Feast, Footsteps of Horror, or Winter Queen's Dollhouse in less than 2 hours. It staggers rationality. Surely you jest.

Not sure we did those, but I recall quite vividly that, when playing my first Quests, I was a bit upset at having devoted my evening to PFS for half the usual XPs.

I didn't list them all, but those are a few, including the first of series 2 which got a lot of attention. I am assuming you played series 2 because you have been consistent about 2xp. I haven't played all those, and two I have played I only played once, so I can't speak for all of them, but you are saying you could count on one hand how many end at time, and from my experience thats just hard to fathom. For at least Swordlord's Challenge, Elsewhere Feast, Footsteps of Horror, or Winter Queen's Dollhouse, and Escort a Mirage I know these are fast. I have limited experience with Tanuki Troubles, but we kept it under. To the best of my knowledge, only Lacking Respect has time problems, and thats three hours, not four, which is still overtime, but not a whole scenario bad. Just regular bad.

All that is to say I don't know what is happening at your tables, but it smells like an outlier.

I serious think your group is an outlier. You are telling me the group cannot complete Swordlord's Challenge, Elsewhere Feast, Footsteps of Horror, or Winter Queen's Dollhouse in less than 2 hours. It staggers rationality. Surely you jest.

Madhippy3 wrote:

Boosting? If we are lucky they won't lower the level cap.

Bad jokes aside there is no level cap is PFS. The limit is what is playable. Like there are no scenarios for level 15. We could call this a level cap but that wouldn't be entirely correct. You can, if the madness takes you, put AP credits on a character till they are level 20.

No there has been no word about lots of repeatables.

The highest-level current adventure is What Walks Again (6-19, level 11-14). That one takes a solid 5-6 hours and would be impossible to schedule on a weekday night (to be fair, even before the current age of "everything rolls up their sidewalks between nine and ten," nothing was open till midnight on a weekday but diners and pizza delivery).

If I can schedule high-level adventures on weekdays, that's a win for me. And I am nowhere NEAR the only weekday VA.

I admit my group was critting like crazy in this scenario, but it wasn't even 4 hours for us.

Madhippy3 wrote:

Boosting? If we are lucky they won't lower the level cap.

Bad jokes aside there is no level cap is PFS. The limit is what is playable. Like there are no scenarios for level 15. We could call this a level cap but that wouldn't be entirely correct. You can, if the madness takes you, put AP credits on a character till they are level 20.

I mean, we're in what...year 7, and if I'm not mistaken I think there is one scenario for above level 12?

I'm fairly certain level 20 just isn't in the cards (but I'd love to be wrong; maybe a 2E seeker arc?).

Which is why I called it "if the madness takes you"

Boosting? If we are lucky they won't lower the level cap.

Bad jokes aside there is no level cap is PFS. The limit is what is playable. Like there are no scenarios for level 15. We could call this a level cap but that wouldn't be entirely correct. You can, if the madness takes you, put AP credits on a character till they are level 20.

No there has been no word about lots of repeatables.

bugleyman wrote:

But seriously, with respect to PFS course-correcting, let's look at the $9 PFS scenario.

I recently bought Claws of the Tyrant for $20. 128 pages of AAA RPG adventures. Tons of great art, great custom trade dress, great editing. Custom maps. Very often a cool backstory, custom plot hooks, adventure tool box full of supporting material.

Meanwhile, look at your typical PFS scenario. $9 for ~20 pages. Consistently bad editing. Recycled mediocre trade dress. Probably a flip mat, lots of recycled art. Often a threadbare story. No supporting material.

So you do know Paizo severely undercharges for certain PDFs and quite honestly all you have done is point out that they really should charge more for the $20.00 one.

Or that's what we should expect for 20 dollars, so everything missing for about half stands out as a bad deal.

And I'll agree with Sanwah and Bugleyman that is the price was 6 dollars for 3 hours and questionable editing it would be an easier pill to swallow. But at Bugleyman noted, if that was going to happen here it is a very important thing to have forgotten to tell us.

Shorter, tighter scenarios ? Yes, please. I have been playing PFS almost exclusively since PF2 started. I think I can count on a single hand the times when we did not exceed the famed 4 hours, sometimes by a wide margin.

One hand? This might be a group problem. I can count on one hand the number of times we went over. My FLGS closes at our 4 hour mark. If the game is running over we have to end it early. This is not an issue we have had consistently. We don't speed through things, we do light RP, and we aren't better than anyone else in combat.

And if this change ends up being a wrong move, as so many predict, I am sure PFS will quickly see the light and adapt.

I too want to believe this, but there is some grave examples to the contrary. The irregular and too infrequent erratas, Korakai still being broken, and STILL not hearing from corporate about any of our concerns. Paizo is not engaging with its community more than some surveys (Excluding Jacobs).

Madhippy3 wrote:

And @MadScientistWorking, you say "assuming still four hours", but is that really realistic? You tell people its a 2-3 hour and plenty of people are going to expect it to wrap up by hour 3. Not everyone is there for an hour of RP. This is not a positive every table is going to care about. What tables will care about is if they fire and as has been said ad nauseum, to grow the community we want as many tables to fire, even if there is some problematic elements like the level 4 doing all the work for the level 1s.

Actually the funny and sad part is that despite all the complaining and whining this will actually accomplish its goal as it makes my life easier as an organizer.

And no. Having the level 4's doing the work for level 1s will not grow the community. That is a really stupid mentality and quite honestly I know that has pushed away people from organized play.

It isn’t worse than people showing up to a game to find there is no place for them! I cannot stress how wrong you are about how narrower level bands will hurt organizing and limit player inclusion into the space. And I don’t have to, nearly three pages of people have done it for me. Just read up.

I am joining the dogpile. AP side of this announcement is fine. I too benefitted from spacing out my purchases, but it if the story consistency is better it is a change I will live with. I bothers me slightly our 1-20s are being turned into 2 parters which means less other stories in the year. I do understand this should be better for the writers editors as well that if their is a 1-20 there isn't also 3 other 1-10s coming out, but its something that's just nagging at me anyways. I'll get over it.

PFS though. What a doozy... I play a lot of PFS, GM a little. This is not a good change. I don't have anything more to say that has already been said but to give my support to those ideas I will list them briefly. Shorter sessions is less bang for buck. Please just reduce the use of subsystems and spongey enemies instead. Your level bands are to narrow, this makes organizing a problem. Assuming tables will be 6 strong is very Warhorn minded. As is removing stat blocks from PDFs. You've got tunnel vision for the online-VTT user experience and are making a mess of the in person experience for GMs, players, and organizers in one post.
And @MadScientistWorking, you say "assuming still four hours", but is that really realistic? You tell people its a 2-3 hour and plenty of people are going to expect it to wrap up by hour 3. Not everyone is there for an hour of RP. This is not a positive every table is going to care about. What tables will care about is if they fire and as has been said ad nauseum, to grow the community we want as many tables to fire, even if there is some problematic elements like the level 4 doing all the work for the level 1s.

"I’ll be lurking around in the comments for this blog and will be eager to answer additional questions folks have" -James Jacobs
Let me get salty here for a moment. I praise Jacobs for keeping his word and being here to answer questions about the AP changes which is his area of focus. It makes me all the more irate we can't seem to expect the same from the rest. The CEO, Butler, jumped in the answer a question about the subscription service. No one, is here to answer questions or give reassurances about issues we are having with the PFS side of this. Compared to Jacob the rest of the company doesn't even seem to care. They have made their decree and now we have to live with it. If it wasn't a question about the business no one else could be bothered to be in here with us. We have long time players, organizers, and GMs in here being highly consistent in their feedback and there isn't a sign anyone at Paizo is listening. I can't speak for people outside of my community, (though there are almost 130 other comments who are speaking for their own) but this will push people away from the game and you will lose business. Don't ignore this Paizo. Please say something! Even if it is just "Get over it".

Not thrilled for what this means for the canon ending of Age of Ashes, but oh well I will take the wait and see approach with but this one note of alarm.

More I am sad that my Cheliaxian characters aren't going to be welcome parts of this year. I like being the affable "evil" member of the team, but my hellknight characters are explicitly going to be put in an impossible position here. That saddens me most.

Speaking as a GM, we've really had problems with high level play taking too much time and game stores with firm cut off times.

I also don't really like level 1-4 play, but I absolutely understand the move to cap games at level 10.

The "people can only do high level play in SFS mode" commenters... No, only if the scenario is not running over time. You hit the same time commitment problem as AP books if your GM lets you have fun with role play, or if players spend time arguing or planning.
Even if your GM is moving you around quickly, or you're replay "speedrunning", you can still run over time on some scenarios if combat blows out. And combat can blow out from bad rolls, so it may not actually be anything in your GM's control.

Also, AP books don't neccessarily take that long. 3 sessions (of 4-6 hours) is doable. Same as an SFS retirement arc, really.

Deciding before you actually experience it isn't an informed decision.

I vehemently disagree. Especially on that last point. I run APs almost exclusively. You would have to be speedrunning to get numbers like that.