Matthew Hinton's page

Hey, not sure where exactly to put this. Mostly wanted to know what the other GMs out there do about DR to let their players know that the attacks are doing less damage than they are rolling.

I can explain fairly well when they are using the correct thing "You hear a hissing as your cold iron weapon slices easily through the skin of the devil" or adamantine weapons getting through constructs hardness is fine, etc... Even this is difficult and sometimes monotonous and difficult with DR/Alignment, since there is nothing to describe.

So what do the GMs out there say? Do you let players know? Give me a few examples of what you guys do, cause I really struggle not sort of repeating myself.

Thanks GMs. :)

Hey, just a quick rules question.
Is there any limit on the "no cost" weapon that is received at level 1 for the Wizard as the arcane bond. Obviously you shouldn't be able to get a enchantment bonus on this weapon, but with all the new high cost firearms, is there any reason one of these cannot be got at level 1 for a Wizard?
I had a player at GenCon who wanted a +4 composite longbow as his bonded item (not sure why) but I wasn't sure about whether he could do it. I told him to ask a venture-captain after the game (and not get any STR bonus during the game) but I never found out what the ruling was.

Hopefully I've missed something and this isn't actually possible.
Thanks for the clarification.

Hey guys,
I'm new to the forums really, but after running 10 slots of PFS at GenCon. (Most awesome thing ever!) I thought I would try and invest some time in yet another brower-based distraction.
So, gripe #1:
I ran 3 slots of Shades III during GenCon, after having run I and II at Scotty's just before (yup it was a 13 slot PFS week!)
I and II were awesome, even in the crazyness that was Scotty's and I think all of my party really enjoyed them.

However, this is when I then got to part III.

Spoiler Alert!!!
I ran the first encounter with a table of 5/6s in the tier 4-5, so I knew they were gonna do well. But there was one guy with a power gaming summoner, who would have taken down the wolverine in a single hit. Following on this trend, none of the encounters would have challenged the party and not just because of this stupidly overpowered summoner.

They would have just blown up the dinos, (what party doesn't fireball a cave just in case) and the final fight they would have done in a round! I just don't know how that is tier 4-5!
This was then confirmed for me when I ran my 3rd slot of it for 1-2 level characters at tier 4-5 (I warned them that they very very well could die)
In no way did they breeze through it at tier 4-5, in fact the final fight only had 2 guys standing and all the others guys bleeding out (one was just saved by one round after combat as a party member charged to him, wand in hand and made the UMD check)
But still, level 1-2 characters at tier 4-5?

So, in my second slot and half of my first slot I made a few changes.
Ran the first two as normal, but made the ambushers rougue/ barbarians for sneak attack damage, they also hid a decoy weapon just showing out of one snowpile!

Dinos are just past the cave in, so when each party started clearing it the small ones jump over the hauling people's heads and attack the squishy mages (that'll teach them for never doing manual labour), then after 1 round an anklyosaurus busts through the rock fall, doing bludgeoning damage (mainly so I wouldn't kill them!)

In the final fight I really wanted to add in a white dragon of some kind, who flies in and takes revenge by going for whoever has the axe at that time, believing him to be a descendant of the king. This would have meant much more hitpoint to the woman, because she would be taking damage from the dragon, but it would have been far more cool. Then if the party want to take off with the axe, then they have to slay the white dragon.
Unfortunately I did not have time to run this as the final encounter, due to the roleplayiong and set-up section taking a while.
I would love to see how this works, to provide a fitting end to what really could have been an awesome series.

Obviously, it's a bit mean to kill party members due to making things tougher, but the secenario is just not a challenge at all, and that's what PFS is about, the risks (and possible rewards) of life as a pathfinder!

Hope people eventually got through all of that and have some comments, if you didn't, hey! don't worry, I'm not exactly going to read it now for horrible spelling mistakes!

Matt