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Banana peels?

COMBAT MANAGER!!!! A great piece of free software (thanks to Kyle Olsen).

Combat Manager tracks everything you need for combat. You can easily keep track of initiative, what round it is, and hit points. Also, say a few bad guys are dazed or bleeding, you can turn on these conditions quickly and even add durations for them as needed.

The monster tab has all of the statblocks for all of the bestiaries, and most of the PFS scenarios. You can add them into the combat screen and then save the entire encounter. This way when you get to the game, all of encounters are ready, you just need to open them up.

You can also create custom creatures, great for PFS scenarios. It also gives you the option to print, which I prefer, so that I can have that in hand.

There is also a dice roller, which keys of the creatures stats, so if you don't want to roll for claw/claw/bite just hit the button. It also considers critical threats.

I could go on for awhile about this, but this software keeps combat time for the GM down to a minimum, and keeps fights from going overly long. This means more time for exploring and roleplay. Important in a 4 or 5 hour slot.

On a less serious note, if life in PFS wasn't cheap think of what it would do the Society. The Decimvirate and their Venture-Captains would actually have to form well-rounded teams of agents instead of the normal random group of murder-hobos that they usually find.

I sometimes think that the VC's think of us as disposable mooks to be sent off to our deaths. Oops, team 1 got slaughtered, time to send in another. When's the last time any of the VCs actually did anything to help out our groups? Maybe a "hey guys, this is going to be a tough one, take a bunch of this awesome magical gear with you".

Given the Societies vast resources, they do happen to own thier own demi-plane, not to mention all those artifacts and treasures that we have retrieved for them, we should be getting more support from our leaders.

I hate to say it, but ever since Grandmaster Torch and the Shadow Lodge left I felt more and more like and expendable resource. Especially when Shiela Hiedmarch sends me off to my death again and again.

Sincerly,
Corvis Rhennik
PFS Mook

If your players have issues with undead barbarians just tell them this: "Life isn't fair, buy a helmet."

My observations on this: If the table has five or more players, than yes, it's probably not going to be all that hard for them. One PC may take a beating, but overall the party is going to succeed.

However, if it's three or four player, it tends to get more balanced.

I GM a lot, once or twice a week on average. When I run my PFS games, I don't try to beat the PCs in the fight, because the GM's creatures are intended to go down. What I do like to do is spread as much chaos as I can in the fights, forcing to PCs to use resources.

If the high AC fighter is the only one being attacked and never takes damage then the cleric never has to heal, no party resources expended.
However, if I spreading damage and status effects around, that can keep the PC's on their toes.

Also, remember that casters are usually smart. Force Will saves on martial characters and Reflex saves on casters. The big bad fighter isn't much of a help when he runs away from the fight for four rounds.

Finally, unless it violates the tactics of the encounter, try to get some of the critters around the party, most parties assume that the critters are going to run straight ahead, NFL style. Bring them in from the side and threaten the casters and archers.

Considering the majority of people working minimum wage are trying to support a family off of it, why shouldn't they provide a living wage?

The following is not meant to insult anyone at all:

I understand what you are saying, but here's a thought. If I raise the minimum wage to $15.00 for burger flipping do all other jobs fields gain an equal increase?

If I get paid $15.00 currently to do some technical job, say repair phone lines, do I now get bumped up to $20.00?

I fix airplanes, that job requires more skill and responsibilty than burgers and it's harder work, why should he make as much as I do?

In my opinion, some jobs deserve higher pay than others, some jobs just deserve more pay. If you push the bottom up, that puts a large squeeze on the middle class. I'll ignore the upper class because regardless of what happens they have the means to protect their wealth.

Just interesting questions.

Here's my gallon of gasoline -

As far as I know there isn't a certified GM course that one thakes to become an "accredited or certified" GM. Like most hobbies it's learn as you go.

I GM a lot, some people like my style, some don't. As a PFS GM, I like some the vast majority of my player's, even the one's that get on my nerves. However, there are a few that I don't.

Every GM has his/her own personal style. If I run a game in a style that doesn't agree with your play-style feel free to move on, no hard feelings either way.

Or, have a reasonable discussion with the GM. I had a kid ask me why I tended to target his character more often than others even though he was hanging in the back of the group. My answer was, your a wizard and keep blasting everything, my critters have deemed you a high-value target.

So in short, don't take things personally and just relax a bit.

This may be one of the most interesting topics I've read in a while. So let me throw some thoughts/ideas in.

I've been running PFS only for a while, which I do enjoy doing. I plan on continuing to do so because I like meeting so many new players, something I would miss if I ran hame games exclusively. But there is the drawback that other people have mentioned, players have access to pretty much anything they want, vastly reducing the challenge level that the old-school games seemed to have.

So with that, I dug out some of my old Necromancer Games modules. I think that I am going to run a home-game with some, in my opinion, needed restriction. I'm going to list them out, let me know if they seem like deal breakers. Also, with a full-time job and family I wouldm't have time to home-brew everything, so published material it is. But it's good material.

1 - CRB classes/races only -- most modules don't assume that gunslingers and summoners are running around creating chaos

2 - The magic shop, for the most part, is closed. There will be access to some minor magical items, but very limited. There will be plenty of items to find however.

3 - No Crafting feats, I feel this leads to overpowered parties, reducing the challenge.

4 - WBL and encounter balancing are out. While the main adventure is more or less balanced, the areas surrounding the starting town/dungeon aren't. Low level PC's can explore freely, but will need to exercise caution.

These are just some of the ideas I have so far. The intent is to put some of the challenge and uncertainty back into the game. No more steam-rolling every encounter.

Everyones feedback would be appreciated.

In my opinion, it's not the spells that are overpowered, it's the way that some of us play our arcane casters and the way different GM's handle us.

I run PFS games every weekend. Unless my scenario tactics specifically tell me target melee PCs I tend to attempt to move intellegent creatures around the sides to get to the casters and ranged PCs. Intellegent creatures should know where the greatest threats are. Even if you can't get the proper positioning to attack you may end getting the casters to fall back to where they will start encountering problems with targeting.

As a PFS player, I play a very cagey wizard. Cast and move back, rinse and repeat. My casting may seem overpowered because my team keeps me screened. Kinda like a quarterback with a good defensive line. If my wizard ends in melee range of anything, even a kobold, we have issues.

On the other hand, I know a guy who plays a wizard who has a death wish and like to use cone-spells, those being close range. This tends to lead to hime being unconscious and bleeding a lot.

Arcane casters aren't overpowered, we just make a great group better.

I think everyone's to focused on making an animated Pathfinder series. If you really want to get lots of viewers and high ratings we need to think outside the box. Now hang on and get ready...

We market a new show called "Sandpoint Shore" and get it up on MTV, they have plenty of time to air since they don't play that much music. We could get to see what really makes the iconic characters so iconic. I would personally cast Snooki as Harsk the Dwarvern Ranger, she's just about the right height.