Kjersten Gibson's page

Con of the North this year - The half-orc bard rousing the crowd with an inspiring speech and screaming "CHAOSSSSSSSS!" and doing *jazz hands*.

Can't forget the *jazz hands*

The entire table was doing it the rest of the scenario.

Previous year Con of the North - The party needs to sneak a rod into the city without being caught. The same half-orc looks at her dead goblin puppets and says "Da comrades, I have an idea".

Natuska, making every Con of the North memorable.

I will say that in our area, we've been working on trying to work on this topic. I've started to organize a "Women's Only" table a couple of times a month at one of the game days. It's an extra table, in addition to other tables being offered. It's to encourage women players to come out and play, but we also wouldn't turn someone away if the other tables were full.
The first session was a lot of fun. AND it was the first time the person GM'd (who was a woman), so it made it pretty cool.

Hmm....Women in PFS. It's actually something I've been a bit passionate about advocating since I joined Society a year ago. I joined PFS with my husband, with maybe 10 RPG sessions ever in my life (never did D&D or MMOs, nothing), so I had a LOT to catch up on for rules and understanding stuff and things like that. I started to run a Women's Only Pathfinder home group, and I worked hard to try to teach them how to play, which in turn made me learn the rules a lot better.

I ended up becoming much much more involved in PFS and that home group fell by the wayside. My husband stopped playing in PFS within a few months, but I continued on my own, showing up to game days a few times a week. Honestly, I was overwhelmed and often felt out-of-place at the table, and felt like I could never hold my own in combat or even out of combat. There were a number of times I went home in tears after games, because there was someone treating me like a real jerk or feeling like I would never be good enough to be treated as a equal with all the other super experienced [male] players.

I kept telling my husband I was going to quit and never go back, but I'm super persistent and stubborn, and I did keep going back. And I'm glad I did. I finally feel like I'm treated as an equal at the table, and newer [male and female] players will even ask ME for advice or rules questions. But it was a long and, frankly, emotional journey to get there.

When I took over organizing one of game days, I made it my goal to work on involving more women in PFS and helping them to feel more welcomed and comfortable at the table. I had planned on working on planning a few gaming seminars for women players, to help them build characters and confidence at the table and hearing and addressing concerns they have had while gaming. I would also like to try to start hosting one table for women players only, maybe once a week or once every couple of weeks at one of our game days. I'm hoping to work on actually trying this stuff out when I've got a little time to plan (there's been a lot going on personally for me lately).

What advice can I give the male players of the gaming world? Treat the lady players as you would that little sister (or even your mother) you respect and admire. Be protective, without being degrading. Let them shine once in a while, they will surprise you. Even if it's just one awesome D20 roll or ending combat with the last blow. Cheer them on, just like you would anyone else. High fives all around after combat is cool with everyone. Have fun and don't be afraid of a little light-hearted humor. Everyone likes a good laugh, but don't do at someone else's expense. Just remember - would you look at your sister like that? And would you let someone else talk to your sister that way? And is that joke one you'd tell in front of your mother?

I enjoy playing with most people in our local PFS group and I like to think of some of guys I game with regularly as like an older protective brother (even if they're younger). I think they'd have my back if someone starts to act like a jerk, which makes more comfortable at the table. I'm often times the only woman player at the table, so I've had to learn to hold my own ground and try a little harder to earn the respect of newer [male] players at the table, especially GMing. But like I say, it's still something I'm working on and I am still trying to be an advocate of increasing women players in PFS. Ladies - we've got this! :-)

I love playing druids, so this sounds like a lot of fun! :-)

One idea might be to create a group of druids that after years of adventuring together with their animal companions, they decide to Awaken (per the spell) their companions and give them their own decision to continue to join them or go off and do their own thing. So the animal companions, after years of being told what to do and to run into battle to save their masters, have decided they want the power to rule over people. They run off and find a large city to take over and run a criminal empire like "the mob", and enjoy the sweet life of having people serve them. The druids find out what they've done and step up to raise an army to overtake their former companions, realizing the mistake they've made. That's where the PCs come in. The animals might have found some sort of old magical relic that turns people into lycanthropes and serve the animals in their army against the druids (perhaps something the druids had uncovered years ago adventuring and thought they destroyed). But it would all make an awesome investigation for the PCs to find out all this backstory and what's happening to all the farmers and villagers that have gone missing (if they were turned into werewolves, etc). And figuring out how to infiltrate this animal "mob" and destroy it from the inside out or just join the army against them. It could be very interesting as a moral dilemma for the druids and the PCs, to destroy their former animal companions with NEW animal companions and having them look at how they are treating nature. Plus you'd get to create NPCs that are sentient animals and giving them class ranks and stuff. Especially creating a story for the fey caught in the middle - to side with the animals or the druids?

Just a thought. :-)

Have fun with your story, however you decide to do it. :-)

I would like to say a HUGE THANK YOU to all the VCs and VOs and VLs out there working hard everyday to provide awesome game days to all the players every week!!!! :-)

I've seen how hard you work and I admire and appreciate all you do. I only organize game days for one store, I could not imagine how much work it would be to oversee everything in the region.

Most of us players are able to take a week off of PFS if we want, but that's not an option for the VOs. The VOs are still people, with families and friends and a life outside of PFS, and I feel grateful that they've chosen to dedicate as much time to PFS as they do.

Yes, the VOs are people and mistakes can be made. But a private conversation seems far more appropriate when you believe a mistake has been made. And as long as both of you are willing to listen, there's no reason you wouldn't be able to come up with an amicable solution. I know in this age of digital media it can be easy to post and hide behind the anonymity that a computer screen can give and pretend that you're allowed to say whatever you want. But the truth is it still affects people. I hope other people keep these things in mind once in a while.

I also appreciate Mr. Mike Brock's open door policy to address concerns and Mr. John Compton's willingness to step in to address concerns as well. The support from the campaign's leadership is nice to see as a player.

So again, I would like to extend a big thank you to VOs everywhere!

Big hugs all around! :-)

Although, I don't recommend hugging the tiger. I cannot guarantee how he will react...

Confession: I draw some of my maps with crayons. They're so colorful then!

Confession: My dog likes to eat crayons.

I believe my dog hates it when I draw maps.

I believe that only druids should have access to owning exotic animals like tigers.

Oh Animal Archive, you and I have a love-hate relationship...
I love all the additional tricks and spells, but I loathe that any player can buy a combat trained tiger. I had to wait 7 levels before my tiger got that big.
Ah, but will your tiger listen to you? Haha, probably not...

I still love tigers.

Especially my tigers.

Ha! At last, a question I know something about!

I have 5 separate druid characters with tigers. What can I say? I like tigers.

For initiative, you can either have them roll for the same initiative (especially if the druid is mounted) or you can have them roll separately, in which case the companion will have to delay if it goes before the druid so it can be given a command, or the druid would delay to the companion's initiative so they can act as a team for flanking or whatever other tricks it's been taught.

You may want to check out (or have the player check out) the Animal Archives book, which lays out additional tricks to teach an animal companion. One trick they should teach it asap is attack attack (or attack anything). If it only has attack, it will not attack creatures with an unnatural aura (such as undead or aberrations, etc). It will also need to be taught the flank trick to flank and the grapple trick to grapple. You can have them "push" the companion to perform one of these tricks, but it will be move action for the druid and they will have to make a handle animal check to hit the DC in order to have them do it.

Most players will play their animal companions as well as their druids. To have fun with it, you can certainly chime in as the GM and have the animal give certain responses (i.e. the PC gives the companion an order and fails the handle animal check and you tell the PC "the tiger looks at you questioningly..." etc). Especially if they cast speak with animals. That can be a very fun interaction as you respond to the PC with how a tiger would think ("hmm...food? food now? how about food?"). But for the most part, they will be directing where their companion goes and what it does.

Tigers have 3 primary attacks - 2 claws and bite. If the tiger moves more than the 5' step on its turn, then it only gets one attack (EITHER one claw attack or bite attack). Otherwise if they don't move or only 5' step, then they can lay into the bad guy with the bite and 2 claw attacks (none are secondary). There is nothing more fun than rolling 3 D20s for the attacks. If the tiger has the grapple trick, it can instead attempt a grapple (which provokes attacks of opportunity), and once it succeeds on a grapple (on the same turn) it can make 2 claw attacks as the rake - it will still have to roll the attack to see if each one hits. On the next turn, if it maintains the grapple, it can rake again. The rake ability is a lot easier to use once it hits 7th level. At 7th level, the tiger can pounce (in which it can charge the enemy and take a full attack [2 claws & bite]) and if any of the attacks hit, they can get a free grab in which they can attempt a free grapple without provoking attacks of opportunity and if they grapple then they immediately get the rake attempt (roll for each attack for the claws). Tigers are quite deadly once they hit 7th level. Especially with feats like power attack. And improved natural attack. And spells like strongjaw (makes natural attacks 2 sizes larger).

You will probably have more questions as the druid levels up, like wild shape. For wild shape, at 4th level, they can wild shape as any small or medium animal they would be familiar with, so you'll need to look up the stats in the beastiary. BUT, they only have the template added to their character's stats, per the beast shape spell, but they are proficient in all the animal's natural attacks. They also keep their current feats and do not get the animal's feats as listed in the beastiary. They also lose all their armor and shields, unless they have wild armor (which is +3 armor bonus, which is 9000 gp enchantment to armor). Anything on their person melds with their body when they wild shape. If they have a bag, it gets melded. If their wearing magical items that have a constant bonus, it's melded into their form, but it will still continue to function. If you have Ultimate Equipment, there is a magical item called a polymorphic bag, which transforms to a small bag tied around their neck when they wild shape, so they can still have access to stuff in their bags (like wands and potions and things).

I hope that helped.

But most importantly - have fun with it! Having an animal companion in the party can be fun and makes things much more of a challenge then people think. "Hey, we're going to rest up in this inn overnight, oh, but what are we going to do about this tiger?" Or, "why is everyone in town looking at us funny?" "Maybe because we have a giant tiger with us?". And don't forget the fun challenges with getting an animal into various places. "Hmm...how are we going to get the tiger down in the sewer with us? And back out for that matter. They don't climb ladders very well." Or "A cliff? Seriously???"

*note, to help with these situations, you can get the Knights of the Inner Sea guide to get the Carry Companion spell, which helps in the most sticky of situations

I only play druids with tiger companions.

Yup, I'm "that" person.

Epic moment in [my short] role play history: three large tiger fight. My large tiger companion, wild shape into dire tiger and summon large tiger.

Yes. That happened.

Confession: It was awesome. I love my tigers.