Online Guide Team Lead - JTT's page

It is on the top of my list to get an answer to.

I think the idea is to prevent Dragonkin from just having a "floating" bond that they can lock onto a different character every game. But I will see if I can get a more concrete answer for you.

FLite wrote:

Doug Hahn wrote:

Blog wrote:

• The Core Rulebook now allows all characters to take two free ability boosts instead of the printed options for their ancestry. Newly created characters in Pathfinder Society may use this rule; previously built characters may not unless they rebuild the character from scratch with a boon.

• However, to retain the legality of numerous existing characters, the Pathfinder Society campaign will continue to offer the Voluntary Flaws optional ruleset and retain the text within the Guide to Organized Play.

OK. So we have THREE options for new PCs:

1. Vanilla ability boosts as printed
2. 2 free boosts and no flaws, any ancestry
3. Old optional flaw system

Is this correct?

Four Options (at least as I understand it.)

1. Vanilla ability boosts as printed
2. 2 free boosts and no flaws, any ancestry
3. Vanilla ability boosts + Old Optional Flaw System
4. 2 free boosts + Old Optional Flaw System, any ancestry

Hrrrrmmm. Seems like that's not quite right.

This is conjecture, but I doubt the OPF devs intend for us to combine deprecated Optional Flaws with new Alternate Ancestry Boosts. I say this because the updated Optional Flaws section as published in the CRB does not give boosts, only flaws.

It's an interesting corner case arising from how Org Play is moving away from the core rules; maybe Alex can confirm.

Following up on this now.

Added the old Voluntary Flaws text to the guide so that people don't lose it if they update their PDF. (not a full guide update as I am preparing for a Con, but didn't want the info to get lost.)

Wait, can they not?

The fame version had:

Special You can purchase this boon multiple times. Each time you bequeath a different character option.

Is that missing from the AcP verison?

A recent history of the Starfinder Society is available. (May have spoilers)

I do think though that the spell cards should count as a rules reference, but maybe they don't count because they are only for spells?

They count as a Rules Reference for "Accessory Perks" Boons.

The Guides for PFS2 and SFS are online:

Starfinder Society Guide to Organized Play (single page layout)

Pathfinder Society (Second Edition) Guide to Organized Play (single page layout)

Greetings.

Reading through the guide I have found out that nowhere in the guide it says you can't pass/trade wealth in form of items or gold permanently between players. SFS have this line:

Group Purchases

In Starfinder Society play, you can never buy, sell, or trade items with another player, but you may allow another player to borrow an item for the duration of an adventure.

But for Pathfinder Society there is nothing in the guide says you can't do that.

This is already causes a divide between new and old players in our local community.

Can this issue be addressed, please?

We are currently looking at how and where to add this language. In the mean time, the same rule does apply. You can never buy, sell, or trade items with another player, but you may allow another player to borrow an item for the duration of an adventure.

Thanks.

That's interesting. So that's still more 'in-world' calculation than real-world PFS decision?

Correct

I did look at Spellcasting services, but there's only spell-casting costs which gives 80g for 5th level spell and doesn't explain the amount. I can't find any reference how to calculate full-day casting for a n-th level NPC. :) Maybe in Gamemastery? Don't know this book very well.

"Spells that take a long time to cast (over 1 minute) usually cost 25% more."

Probably all day should be *even* more, but someone decided to be generous.

For secondary casters the decision was made to assume that they cost half as much as the primary caster. (It doesn't really spell out how much they cost.)

Actually, the spells are being cast at a quite substantial discount as: "uncommon spells typically cost at least 100% more, if you can find someone who knows them at all."

So really "in world" the base costs should be closer to 400 gp or more.

But isn't all gear with stats adventuring gear?

As Pirate Rob said, Adventuring Gear is a specific category of mundane items.

Why is it so high? (Not the in-world reasons, these are imaginable.) Base ritual costs are 75xlvl, but PFS costs are 75xlvl+125 for the first levels range. It's about 4x character wealth at the 3rd level! What's the point?

I am guessing you are asking (specifically) about how the prices in the Spellcasting Services Cost sheet were calculated?

The "Cost" in the spell/ritual entry is the cost of the Material Component for the spell. You *also* have to pay the person who casts the spell (See spellcasting services in core rule book, page 294.)

That extremely high cost is why there exist ways other than gold to bring characters back (essentially "calling in favors" from the pathfinder society to offset the gold cost.)

In terms of Treasure Bundles, Resurrection starts being feasible at about 9th level (which makes sense as it is a 5th level ritual.) Starting at level 9, Resurrect costs between 15 and 20 Treasure Bundles. (Or spread across a table of 5, about 3-4 TB per PC.)

If you have a member of the Envoy's Alliance at the table, with the "Bring them Back Alive" boon, that drops to closer to 10-15 TB (starting at 10th level) Or 2-3 TB.

So I would spend that 8+4 or 8+8+8 back to back, but then would need a session to be able to gain and use more?

Yes. Or more accurately, you would need to use it all before you entered your next session.

Note that for a field commission, in an AP, you would actually apply *6* downtime units: 8+4 | 8+4 | 8+4 (at each of the | you would apply 4 XP as well, and check to see it you had leveled up.)

Nothing carries over past said session, whether or not it's used?

In general, that is correct, the only things that carry over are gold, XP, reputation, and things you have bought / used.

Does that unit grouping apply anywhere else on a chronicle, such as with gold?

Are you asking if you lose unspent gold from treasure bundles? No, you keep all the gold you earn (at least until you spend it.) But you could not (for example) bank treasure bundles and wait to convert them to gold at a higher level.

I think it has already been made clear, but just in case it has not:

Spending downtime is part of the process applying a chronicle. You must complete spending the downtime before applying the next chronicle.

You cannot bank them to spend on later chronicles.

For PF2e adventures the governing text is:

Additional Adventures

Adventure Mode is used for adventures not published for society play, and allows the GM more freedom to adapt those adventures, including running the adventure in Pathfinder using GM house rules, and the ability to alter encounters and statistics found in the adventure.

Per clarification from leadership that means it must pass 3 tests:

It must be
Recognizably Pathfinder.
Recognizably the same story.
Recognizably the same setting.

As long as those are all met, you can earn ACP each time and 1 chronicle for GMing, and 1 chronicle for playing.

(Starfinder is governed by essentially identical rules, however replace "Pathfinder" with "Starfinder"

Just received confirmation:

The Pine Leshy boon from Pathfinder #176: Lost Mammoth Valley is required to unlock Defensive Needles (as it is a limited option)

It not only unlocks the "limited" restriction, it *also* grants access.
"access to this additional heritage, the other uncommon leshy feats on page 77, and any common-rarity options with the leshy trait available in the campaign, "

As such, the boon can be applied to a cactus leshy to grant them access to Defensive Needles.

(This has been confirmed as permitted by Alex Speidel)

Online Guide Team Lead - JTT wrote:

No. That language was very intentionally written. It applies only to the contents of adventures. Not rulebooks.

Though I do have to say that Additional Resources: Character Options are not written very clearly and aren't very easy to understand. I think there should be a sentence which explicitly says that to use an option you need both 'access' and 'Resource Ownership'. That 'access' is a term inside rules system which only deals with rarity, Availability and level restrictions sometimes. And resource ownership is another deal.

Because I have trouble explaining all this. And not to a novice at all. I have almost nothing to quote and sentences like this: "Access: Players can access uncommon or rare options via access points built into the campaign. If you satisfy the access condition specified in that option, then that option is freely available to you, and you can purchase it or take it at character level up/creation" don't help (that's from the organized play guide). The sentence reads as if you need only access and if you have it, you need nothing else.

Also, boons from specials, which are only useful when you have that one book, are a little sad. But that's another matter.

The section in the guide is just a quick summary of the rules. And ends with a link to the full rules on using options from other books. Since you need to go to that link to see if an option from another book is even legal, we don't duplicate the full rules in the guide.

Character Options: All of the ancestries, backgrounds, and classes from the Core Rulebook are available to you when creating a character. You might need to spend Achievement Points to access some ancestries and options from other books before you can use them in organized play. More information on approved resources can be found in the Character Options Document

Rarity: Some options within the game have a rarity trait of uncommon, rare, or unique. Options without a rarity trait are considered common. Rarity is described on page 13 of the Core Rulebook.

Access: Players can access uncommon or rare options via access points built into the campaign. If you satisfy the access condition specified in that option, then that option is freely available to you, and you can purchase it or take it at character level up/creation, but it does not become common. Pathfinder Society characters are enrolled members of the Pathfinder Society organization in the world of Golarion, so they gain access to all options requiring membership in the Pathfinder Society.

The Pathfinder Society Character Options Page contains further details on how to access uncommon and rare character options.

If you follow that link, you get the full rules on access and ownership, including the following.

Using Options: Resource Ownership

Using Options From Other Sources
To use an option from any source other than those discussed above in Pathfinder Society play, you must bring any one of the following to your game table:

A physical copy of the book you wish to use
A name-watermarked PDF copy of the book
Name-watermarked printouts of all relevant pages you wish to use from the PDF
Access to the rules you wish to use in the form of either electronic access to the Pathfinder Reference Document (paizo.com/prd) or a photocopy of the relevant pages, along with proof of purchase, such as a receipt from a game store or a screenshot of your My Downloads page on paizo.com.
The following do not satisfy this requirement:

A photocopy of a physical book with no proof of purchase
Printouts from electronic character builders such as Hero Lab
Content reproduced in other sources under the Open Gaming License (such as an online reference document or a homemade omnibus)
In addition to the copy of the rules themselves, you must be able to provide a digital or physical copy of the below Additional Resources page for that source to show that the options you have selected for your character are legal for play.

So, we know that:

"Ownership of Adventures or Adventure Path volumes is not required to use Character Options printed on Chronicle Sheets in the Pathfinder Society campaign, as long as option rules are referenced from the official Pathfinder Resource Document (prd)."
Does this or something else allow not having rulebooks, when options from them are printed on Chronicle Sheets?
For example, Deathtouched Explorer and Book of the Dead:
** spoiler omitted **

No. That language was very intentionally written. It applies only to the contents of adventures. Not rulebooks.

There are a small number of options published in adventures that are themselves inside a rulebook. (I believe there is one in Book of the Dead.) Options from those adventures, granted by the chronicles from those adventures, do not require the rulebook.

Quote:

That same section on Downtime Activities tells us "Only one crafting project may be started during a Downtime Unit". A "Downtime Unit" is 8 Days.

So if you spent your usual 4 Days preparing to Craft something (or 2 Days if you have that Boon that I can't recall right now), but you failed at your Crafting check, you'd have to find something else to do with your remaining 4 (or 6) Days.

I've noticed that GMs tend to allow a second attempt at the crafting if the first one fails. Sometimes it's because this is the SAME project so it still counts as 'only one crafting project during this downtime unit'. Or sometimes because the failure result of the crafting activity seems to explicitly allow you to start over. Sometimes that phrase is even thought to mean something entirely different, about starting a second crafting project before the first one is complete. You or I might not agree with either of those interpretations, but they're common.

The relevant rule is actually higher up the page:

Downtime

Downtime is spent in Downtime Units of up to 8 days at a time. If a character earns 8 days or fewer of downtime, it is spent in a single unit. If they earn more than 8 days, the character spends units of 8 days, one at a time, until 8 or fewer days remain, then spends the remaining days as a single unit. Multiple different activities can occur in a single downtime unit, but you can only ever roll once for a given activity in any given unit.

the "Only one crafting project may be started during a Downtime Unit." is just an amplification of that rule.

Micro Update to the PFS2 Org Play Guide.

Broadened the ability to receive harm in place of heal and oils of unlife in place of healing potions as starting consumables to apply to *any* time you would receive one of those from the society and it's allies. (For example, if your character relies on Negative Healing and you receive healing potions during a briefing, or on reporting back part way through a mission, you can request and receive an oil of unlife of the same level instead.)

Negative Healing

Hi Sharkbite.

I am going to start at the beginning.

Starfinder Society is a series of 4 hour adventures called Scenarios. Each scenario gives 1 XP, 2 Reputation. After ever 3 adventures. the character goes up a level.

Attack of the Swarm is an Adventure Path. It is not explicitly designed for Society Play, you can play the adventure without filling out anything. But if you like, you *can* fill out the chronicles and give some credit to your society PCs.

Each player can get an ID by visiting paizo.com/organizedplay and click on the “New Players Create an Account” button.

That will give the player an ID. They will also need to chose a character to assign the credit to. This will probably be their first character -701. (Starfinder character numbers start at 701 and go up from there.

AP chronicles give 3 XP (The same as 3 scenarios, and enough to take you up one level.) They give 5 reputation. (Slightly less than 3 scenarios that were all fully successful.)

Achievement Points will be awarded automatically by the system when you report the adventure online.

To report the game, you log into your account, go to the link above, and go to the "GM/Event coordinator" tag and create a new event.

(More on this later, but I have to go pick up a kid from school.)

Having trouble with access to: https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/Lorespire/pfs2guide-en/pfs2guide

Must I have a password and register with PFS first?

The link on the first post is wrong.

It should be https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/Lorespire/pfs2guide

I will look into that and try to get an answer.

SAME NAME: "cannot select multiples of the same boon"

This is ultimately the clause I came here to ask about. Originally, there was only one Basic Hireling. So, clearly, you could not "select multiple" Basic Hirelings to slot.

But that has since changed, with the Boons going online. There are now 4 different Basic Hireling Boons. They are each their own download. Different files. Different names.

The change seems intentional to me, but I've been burned so many times in the past making basic assumptions that I feel the need to get my ducks in a row before doing anything these days.

Circling back to this: Official word from Leadership is that those are all the same boon (Basic Hireling.) Separating the 4 flavors of Basic Hireling is purely for tracking and convenience.

Clarification: What was retired was just the Fame versions of boons.

Anyway, bringing back the revered boons is officially on the todo list, and I will continue to update as I learn more.

I am still waiting on an answer to this. Will bump it up again.

I want a divorce. Where can I get a remove curse cast on me?

At any lodge between game sessions.

Here are the price breakdowns.

Tomppa and Nefreet are correct, you pick one *line* of the table, not one cell. And you can pick lines from lower levels if you wish.

If anyone has any suggestions that would make that language clearer, and prevent that confusion in future, I would welcome them.

Just in time for Gen Con, we have the latest edition of the PFS2 guide available.

Most of the changes are minor clarifications (No, you can't start a harmful emanation and then walk over to your fellow PCs unless you get their consent first. No, you can't leave the table "early" after playing a scenario for 12 hours and get 12 XP from a 4 XP scenario.)

The new Season of Shattered Sanctuary backgrounds have been added under Legacy Backgrounds

The Promotional Boons have been updated on the Player Rewards page. While Vestments and Campaign Service Coin are largely unchanged, (Vestments now covers a much wider array of apparel, but the effect is unchanged) Accessories has now been expanded into 3 different categories (Worn Accessory, Rules Reference, Other Item) and has (correspondingly) 3 new effects.

I hope everyone has a happy Gen Con!

Full Changelog

The Sticky first post is by Alex Spiedel. That was intended to allow him to update it as needed. But I probably need to remind him to update those links. (ETAS: It looks like one of those is being proxied, but the proxy itself is not *quite* right. I should be able to put a fix in on the OPF site to make those links take you to the correct pages, at least as a temp patch until I can get Alex's post fixed.)

In the mean time the correct links are:

English
Brazilian Protuguese

Season 4 Guide is now up on the site.

I will add that to my list of things to ask Alex about at the annual Guide review. But that may not be until January / February.

Will the PFS Guide be updated on the morning of July 29th?

Depends on how busy things are for the volunteers who maintain it, but that is our intent.

I will see if I can get an official clarification on this.

I am 95% confident this is not an international change and that these all count as "basic hireling" boons.

A PL can get a chronicle twice, one for play and the other for runing (GM). Can these two chronicles go to the same character?

No character can ever have more than one of any given chronicle.

NielsenE wrote:

Leveling Up in in Player Basic's for PFS2.

Thanks for that. The strange thing is, I can find it with your link, but I can't "reverse engineer" where you found that. Looking under Player Basics, etc., this information just isn't on there.

It should be shortly after "After the game"

If you still can't find it

Please contact me at:

So we can figure out why it isn't showing up on your device.

We are working on figuring out a way to let players/gms look up the text of those boons using the chronicle id code. (As especially for Adventures, GMs and players might want to decide what character to assign the chronicle to based on the boon text.)

But there are non trivial manpower and technical hurdles.

One of the technical constraints is that whatever methodology we use should not show the text of the boons unless the person has entered the correct id code, and boons should appear in searches (either by the site itself or by search engines.)

The man power constraints rely on having one or more people who can regularly add boons as they are issued *and* update them as they are changed.

I'm kind of afraid to ask, but how does this affect things like the granted access to weapons in the FAQ? Someone from Tian-Xia still has access to Katana, but it's no longer Common for them? Am I interpreting that correctly? I think there are a few corner cases where that might matter (like Tengu from Brevoy getting proficiency with the Aldori Dueling Sword from Tengu Weapon Familiarity).

Not specifically relevant to this thread, so you might want to bring it over to the May update thread where it will be more visible.

Tengu from the Broken Lands and Aldori Dueling Sword / Tengu Weapon Familiarity was *specifically* one of the examples I asked about when ironing out the language.

The answer was that no, having *access* to the sword (or any other option) does not make it common, unless a rule in a book says otherwise.

For an example of when access *would* make something common, see the "Hook Sword"

"Access If the player character come from a region in Tian Xia, this weapon is common"

So, now that everything is nailed down and worked out, I wanted to come back and follow up on this.

Due to the strange interactions making things common had with various components of the system, PFS is going back to rarities never changing.

This means that if you have access to a scroll of an uncommon spell, the spell is still uncommon. If you have access to the scroll *and* possess the scroll, you can learn the spell from the scroll. After you have done so, you can prepare and cast the spell. (Though the spell itself remains uncommon.)

The updated guides are now live:

PFS2 Guide Changelog

SFS Guide Changelog

Quote:

Finally, PVP combat is not permitted in Paizo Organized Play. Previously, engaging in PVP combat would earn Infamy, but Infamy is not meant to be a consequence for out-of-game behavior. You may not fight other players’ characters unless the scenario calls for it for some extremely specific reason.

Can't find it super well on the guide at the moment Obviously this is a good rule to have in place, but my mind goes to very fringe circumstances (like dominate or knocking out a dominated PC to prevent bad stuff). I'm sure what's here is a super brief overview, but that's just what came to my mind.

No Character-versus-Character Combat

In keeping with the “Cooperate” theme of the Starfinder Society, engaging in non-consensual character-versus-character conflict is prohibited. While accidental friendly fire happens due to missed attack rolls or other factors, players must obtain the consent of other players before deliberately including fellow PCs in damaging effects. This rule does not apply in situations where a character is not acting of their own free will, such as if they’re being mind-controlled by an NPC and forced to attack a fellow Starfinder.

The PFS language is more or less identical. (just replace starfinder with pathfinder)

Did the table of consumables change sometime? I remember the Generalist getting access to a little more healing than the default option, but that doesn't seem to be the case anymore.

So... Funny thing. With the exception of one level, the generalist's healing option was *always* better than the "Default" option, such that there was no reason a generalist would ever take the default option over the generalists healing. (There is one level where they get to pick between 2 minor potions or one lesser, IIRC so which is better is kind of situational.)

So we just made the generalists healing option their default.

If you compare the generalists "default" column, to everyone else's "Default" column, you will see that it is *slightly* better.

HammerJack wrote:

It isn't incorrect. Just incomplete, I think, for what you are asking. When you gain Access to something Uncommon, you treat that thing as Common. So in an example like JTT talked about, where a boon grants Access to a spell, you can go right ahead and prepare it, add it to your repertoire (via level up or retraining), etc.

When the Uncommon thing on a chronicle is a scroll, that means you treat that scroll as Common. There isn't any "once the scroll is Common, automatically treat the spell on it as Common and don't bother Learning the Spell" rule.

This. I am 99% sure I know the answer. I am waiting to get that last 1% nailed down before I post definitively in my guide persona.

I have the answer to this now, working on making sure the language is correct, then I will post it.

It appears that rule may be out of date. I will need to follow up with Alex. ("Actions that violate the community standards are *never* handled via Infamy, they are handled by the out of game disciplinary process." is directly from the OPC, so I will have to check back with them on that.)

Have followed up. The above statement is correct, the Guide will be amended to match.

Just a general question, I cannot find it on the Organized Play pages. How do we add spells to a spellbook? I know I can do it with scrolls, but I only get a few free scrolls. Is there a way to get spells other than paying massive amounts of gold to get anything above a 1st level spell on a scroll?

You do not need scrolls. Per the Guide section on spells

Spells

Any prepared spellcaster can use the Learn a Spell activity to learn any common spells they have access to from tutors at the Grand Lodge. This adds no additional material cost beyond the standard cost for the Learn a Spell activity.

For uncommon options in general:

If you don't have access, you cannot take it.
If you do have access, you treat it as common.

This is a bit of an oversimplification of the system in the book, where having access sometimes means treat as common, sometimes does not, on a case by case basis on the part of the GM. But since that would be impractical in PFS, we use the above.

I don't understand the rest of the question.

It appears that rule may be out of date. I will need to follow up with Alex. ("Actions that violate the community standards are *never* handled via Infamy, they are handled by the out of game disciplinary process." is directly from the OPC, so I will have to check back with them on that.)

This has come up in recent scenarios, but I'm still confused. The two relevant passages from the online guide are (bold for emphasis):

Character Creation: Membership in the Pathfinder Society said wrote:

During their training, Pathfinder initiates attain a certain level of proficiency and background knowledge. To represent this, by default all pathfinders start with Pathfinder Society Lore as a trained lore skill. If they would already start with Pathfinder Lore skill from their background, they gain either Academia Lore or Scouting Lore as trained skills.

and

Additional Character Options: Pathfinder Training said wrote:

Characters who have ties to a school or who are field commissioned receive a bonus lore at first level. (This replaces the Pathfinder society lore that all agents gain by default.) At 5th level they also gain a bonus skill feat.

Was the guide updated for Season 3?

1. Yes, the guide was updated for Season 3. :)

2. As others have noted. *By default* all PCs get pathfinder society lore. If you chose to take a school, that *replaces* that default lore. It is the responsibility of the player who has chosen to take that additional option (School) to have read and understood that.

That said, as part of the process of editing the guide, I did produce a similar spread sheet for PFS2.

A character with a fairly average day job (say using a trained lore skill with +2) who earns 8 TB per mission, will be on track for having the correct wealth by level, when you count in the extra consumables granted by society.

Which means most society characters will be at least 10% above wealth by level.

Hi everyone. I am just back from a 3 month sabbatical, and getting caught up on stuff. I will take this up with Alex and try to get back to people with an answer.

Thanks for your patience everyone.

The Raven Black wrote:

Oragnejedi42 wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

We received group Infamy in a scenario because we were attacked by enraged bystanders, who nevertheless dealt subdual damage. The first PC acting was a sorcerer who used a Reach Chill Touch. The target bystander crit failed their save and died. So, the whole group got 1 point of Infamy, including those who only used subdual attacks and those who did not even attack.

And there was absolutely zero advantage / rewards compensating the group infamy awarded by the scenario.

Should the GM have warned the player before he used the Chill Touch ?

According to the Guide to Organized Play, the GM must warn players that their action will cause them to earn Infamy. They only earn the infamy if they go through with it.

The GM thinks this applies only to evil/criminal acts decided by the PCs, and not for Infamy that is "awarded" by the scenario.

The guide doesn't list exemptions to requiring a warning. If something you do would cause infamy, they're supposed to give some kind of clear warning.

Sorry for the minor thread necro:

Oragnejedi42 and NielsenE are correct.

There is *NO* exemption to the GM obligation to warn the players before awarding Infamy.

The GM *must* warn the players, or Infamy cannot be awarded.