Relixander's page

Relixander wrote:

Truly it comes down to one thing, is the GM offended. If he is you may not get your day job roll, if not you will. That simple.

I am highly offended at bartenders for serving alcohol and courtesans for not being appropriate for a younger age audience. Obviously these people are trouble makers and don't deserve a day job roll.

Not a big fan of that ideal.

The problem being of course that courtesans is already listed as an allowable profession. A bartender is not specifically listed, so sure a GM has the ability to disallow it (I would not), just like the ability to disallow Serial Killer, Murder-Hob, Computer (or Abacus) Programmer none of which are listed. A GM could easily reject any of those unlisted professions, based on them being offensive, not fitting the campaign, not fitting the setting, take your choice. If the setting did not allow alcohol (the Pathfinder setting does not make murder legal), then I would deny the roll as a bartender as well. Again the rules are *not* there to defend jerkiness, regardless of interpretation, so hard line of what offends and what does not could never be drawn it is subjective.

Murder is by definition *illegal* killing (in most cases the killing done in adventures are "monsters" which typically have no laws against being killed, evil doers that have been targeted by authorities, or other sanctioning by higher powers), so although the moniker is funny, and in an obtuse and misleading way descriptive of an adventurers life, it misrepresents nearly any campaign, setting, or adventure that does not play from an evil point of view (and actually misrepresents many of them as well). I would say that profession would be offensive to every Pathfinder (and most adventurers) in Golarion, and any player that actually role plays within the setting in the "real" world. However, since it is subjective a GM can completely disagree and allow it.

In addition a GM could make a valid argument that since murder is illegal, the character would then go to jail and face murder charges after rolling the day job check. I would additionally point out that the Society, would most likely, not only side with the authorities, but use their resources to make sure the character faced charges and punishment for the murders committed.

For specifics
Profession: Bounty Hunter - *legally* pursues and possibly kill fugitives, and return the subject or poof of death fugitives of the law... (there are illegal forms of this profession and if a player were to choose Murderous Bounty Hunter or Illegal Bounty Hunter, I would deny the roll as well).

Profession: Jerk - only if referring to a style of cooking ;) (maybe, how does the money making work for being a Jerk? movie/play royalties? insulting people for tips? or did you really mean Profession: Comedian ;p

Let's distinguish between a couple of similar situations:

* Three or four jerks at a table, with two or three players who want to play.
vs
* All six players are being doofuses.

I have few problem with the "0 XP, 0 prestige, 0 gold" solution for the second category, but it seems unfair to hand a "you lose" Chronicle to people just because they sat down at the wrong table.

PFS Coordinator: "What are you going to do for the next four hours?"
Innocent Player: "Find another game system."

--

* Players who want to pay attention, but who are playing "screww the authority" characters.
vs.
* Players who are trying to be disruptive.

The ideal situation is to get the players fired up about playing PFS and focused on success. The first type might already be there. Having the in-game Venture Captain put them on potato-peeling duty for the next month might just be the right response. They get to register their iconoclasm, and then the party gets down to bugbear-bashing and treasure-swiping.

The second type might wake up if we punish them for childish behavior, but maybe not.

GM: "Drengle Drang sighs, puts away his papers, and excuses you. The adventure is over. Give me a minute and I'll pass out your Chronicles."
Disruptive Player 1: "I paid $2 for ten minutes of nothing?! This GM sucks!"
Disruptive Player 2: "Hurry! Let's talk to the the coordinator to get in on another group!"

It might be better to STOP THE GAME and level with them.

Just a note from the other side of this. I have had basically the opposite experience. Forcing players to "play" with one or more people being intentionally disruptive/jerkish. The Jerk, even if he tones its down bit, rarely makes the game an enjoyable experience and the other players at the table come away with a horrible PFS experience. While the Jerk is enabled (after all he got the attention he wanted, didn't get kicked, and was still able to be a jerk, just a bot less of one), and will surely return because he knows he can get away with it. I have not ended a scenario at the briefing and the one time I probably should have resulted in a couple of new players I have not seen again, even after apologizing for the game session and the rude player. (I was flat out told, "That was the worst gaming experience I've ever had.") I don't know if ending the session with goose eggs for rewards would have done the trick to "save" the players, but it would have given them a better impression of a society game, and the typical society players.

If they pay to play, refund the players that were the cause (or credit them for the next game day, if the $ is a big issue). An open game policy (i.e. anyone can join) or players paying to play, give them no special "rights" to play, as far as I am concerned I, as the coordinator, or GM, can refuse to seat anyone I choose at my event or table. I do not have to give second or third chances to ban a player, even though I do, I have the ultimate say, it is my event. They can report me all they like, if I do something jerkish as the GM/Coordinator I may not be a GM/VO any longer, just as they won't be a player (at my events) any longer.
I do agree that the best thing to would be to stop the game and let the players know your intention before simply passing out 0'ed chronicles. I hope GM's would not do this type of drastic action with out multiple warnings and good communication of intent. Regardless of what happens after that, all the players will know what caused it, who caused it, and that PFS does not tolerate it.

Rolling a bad number on a random die, is not related to system mastery. Having a string of bad rolls by multiple players is not related to system mastery.
What is your expected will save for a level 7 rogue? he starts with a base of 2...

So with a roll of 2, he only would have needed a bonus of 15.. Which he only would have needed to spend around 75,000 gold, if he could get stacking bonuses.

A bonus of 6-7 to a will save is pretty good for a level 7 rogue (and several other classes), which means he would need a 10 or better to make a DC17, roughly a 50% failure.

It sure is upsetting when things like that happen in a game, but as your other player pointed out, dice are random. I'll point out a DC17 save at level 7 is not quite the auto success being implied.

Has your GM bumped up the difficulty of your oppenents to adjust for your amazing stats, bonus feat, and cash? If so, then "crushing" the dungeon would be relative also.

If you find yourself not having fun, then your should certainly find another group or have a discussion with the group about gaming style. However, getting mad at other players because they didn't make a 17 will save when rolling under 5, seems a little over-reactive, but we all play for different reasons

Oh and the relevant section:

Determining Subtiers
In order to determine which subtier a mixed-level group of PCs must play in, calculate the group’s average party level (APL). Divide the total number of character levels by the number of characters in the party. You should always round to the nearest whole number. Starting with Season 4, scenarios are designed for six characters and contain instructions on how to adjust the scenario for four-character parties. When the APL of a table is between two subtiers (like APL 3 for a Tier 1–5 scenario), a party of four characters must play the lower tier without any adjustments for party size. A party of five to seven characters whose APL is between two subtiers must play the higher tier with the four-character adjustment.
For scenarios written in Seasons 0 to 3, when the APL is in between subtiers, a party of six or seven characters must play the higher subtier. Parties with four or five characters must play the lower subtier. In the fringe case where there are no players that are high enough to have reached the subtier level (such as a party of six 3rd level characters), the group may decide to play down to the lower subtier.

The entire concept of choosing to "play up" has been removed entirely so references to "playing up" are no longer meaningful or relevant. Nothing has been done to discourage "playing up" because the concept is no longer a relevant one. You playing according to average level and number of players.

Yep, the entire idea of playing up was removed, so why would you think they would keep it around for a no risk GM chronicle. The concept is still there, it is simply not a choice, except for a few corner cases. A level one playing in Tier 4-5 is still "playing up" the gold reward isn't quite as nice as it used to be though.

Nothing in the current version actively discourages or encourages or addresses one option or the other at all.

Again the entire idea of of interpreting rules based on... " It doesn't say I can't" *is* the bastion of unscrupulousness. I believe the intent is obvious based on previous guides, numerous messageboard posts, and the changes made from season 4 to season 5 is that GM's take the lower tier, by removing the option to play up, in most situations, perhaps they also assumed they could take out the statement due to redundancy or it was simply an oversight. Until clarified I see no reason to make a new interpretation of the rules due to a lack of a previous statement.

The whole "playing up" thing just isn't relevant any more because there is no such thing as playing up. In the one edge case described, the default is playing the higher tier and players can chose to play the lower one instead. Even if were still a relevant reference, the tier an adventure was played at has nothing to do with what the GM receives. That's quite clear.

There is playing up (see first above). IF you are not happy using the phrase, simply substitute "taking rewards from a higher tier". There are four previous seasons and numerous message board posts, and probably some leadership clarification on this topic already. You are right, the tier played has never had anything to do with the GM rewards, the GM *always* took the lower tier (when they got rewards at all). No argument.

This isn't just a matter of unscrupulous players trying to "cheat". There is room for legitimate, actual disagreement here. No one in pH unbalanced's example is trying to cheat. They are simply trying to answer a simple question asked by a new GM by reading what the document says. Reducing other views to simply unscrupulous people trying to cheat is disingenuous.

It isn't *just* a matter of scruples, but acting like that isn't a huge part of it is also disingenuous. If ignorance of previous guides and rules was the reasoning behind pH's group determination of why the GM should get to "play up" with chronicle items, then that is legitimate and why I agree'd that a clarification may be warranted. However, if there were experienced GM's or even players familiar with the rules for previous seasons, or have been to the messageboards regularly, or have been participating in PFS to any significant degree, I think it *is* unscrupulous, regardless of the definition of *is*.

I didn't say cheating, please don't change my wording with the intent to inflame with an opinion I did not express. It wouldn't be cheating, at this time, as you have pointed out, it *is* unscrupulous and the reason that word was chosen. In the real world I can got to jail for cheating (on taxes) but not for being unscrupulous (on taxes).

Gaming the system not illegal, it *is* unscrupulous behavior and should be discouraged. Part of the "playing up" problem was it allowed players to game the system, easily, as well as pressure other players at the table to play above their tier, leading to the the system wide changes to "playing up". Assuming this is an oversight in the guide, GM's and players with previous knowledge of how GM chronicles were awarded, in lieu of a clarification, would be acting unscrupulously by taking the higher tier items. Cheating is unscrupulous, but one can be unscrupulous and never cheat.

If it is not an oversight and the intent was to allow GMs to take higher tier rewards for dead level characters, then I will eat some crow when that comes to light.

I think we sometimes we try to put partitions in where they don't belong. It is not always the intent for each sentence to be a complete and wholly contained rule, there is a paragraph, a section, a chapter, and a document, that sentence is part of, and it may reference directly or indirectly.

I think the intent is obvious and clear. The GM gets awards appropriate for the character level the chronicle is being assigned to, regardless of Tier played. The lack of the word "items" in the sentence does not in any way disguise the intent, in my opinion.

Perhaps a better question might be...
Why would you think a character should or would get items from a higher Tier? is there any indication or precedent to make that assumption? Have you ever had a character earn tier 4-5 rewards when playing in tier 1-2? It would seem to me the idea of getting rewards outside of a played tier (or character level appropriate tier) is the one that would need a precedent, not the other way around.

Quit doing things that your players enjoy!!

"Friends don't let friends use Hero Lab."

Sorry, but its a dumb statement. I suppose you refuse a pencil because it lets you erase, so it encourages mistakes. Maybe refuse a pen because it allows me to write things down instead of using my memory (you and your new fangled writing machines!). What a hammer! use your freaking hand to drive that nail...

Hero Lab is a tool, no more, no less. Idiots that use it as replacement for the rules would gain nothing even if if it was banned, they would simply use a step-by-step guide...

My anecdotal evidence would point to the worst offenders of illegal items, bad math, and general mistakes, are sheets done without Hero Lab.

Although its nice to have a something to blame, blaming the hammer because it doesn't turn the bolt, is as dumb as blaming Hero Lab for idiot players.

The fact of the matter is, GM rewards are incentives. I know of several players who had no inclination to GM until they found out how GM chronicles work. GM's are the life blood of the game, even without event organizers, if there are GM's there will be games. Any way to reward GM's is beneficial in my mind.

Truly a symptom of many of our game's players. There are a decent percentage of players out there that have no interest in any part of the story, or role play aspects. The goal is to power through as much content as possible gaining the maximum benefit at each session. Getting item X a level late is a devastating loss that makes the character unplayable (in their minds). ANY gain that is not a maximum is also seen as a loss, that could cripple the character. It's not about having fun, its the concept of winning. If I can not "win" the game I will at least beat everyone else.
The interesting part to me in this post is the fact that the OP asked for help, was told the help he was asking for was frowned upon (to the point that it is considered cheating) and then gets angry because he "has" to cheat anyway. I doubt that any argument given would be mind changing to such an individual. I just wish he would have given more information as I would prefer not to play at the same table.

There are a few confusing a re-rolled attack and additional attacks.
If I hit and get an attack deflected, an ability that grants me a re-roll does not grant an additional attack, so if I attack a monk with crane style and he defects the shot, a re-roll would still be deflected as it is not granting an additional attack but a second chance to get a better result on the original attack. Unless the ability specifically states its grants an additional attack many of the re-roll questions I've seen here are moot.

Wow, it has always amazed me when people spew insults over the way other people have fun. I don't care for watching basketball, but I certainly do not believe that anyone who does, is an idiot. How about the reverse? Anyone that uses the bland Critical hit multiplier system and no mechanic for Fumbles, must be a complete bore, min-maxing jerk, and is an imbecile for doing so... yea not really very nice or accurate is it?

There IS a disparity between martials and casters, its called a class system. Criticals and Fumbles are not the only place where the disparity is shown. Not that the martials complaints are invalid (1 crit chance per round is more than sufficient, and is presented as optional implementation). Hmm, wonder if the same should apply to Criticals, after all its kind of "unfair" that martials get multiple chances to Crit each round and casters only get one, and only if their spell has an attack roll... Just an opposing thought on being "fair".

It also sounds like many of the opinions really have little to do with actual game mechanics, but rather about vindictive GM's refusing to be reasonably about optional rules (which is a valid complaint...). News flash: a GM that wants to be cruel and vindictive does not need Fumbles to do so. Typically cruel and vindictive GMs find a way to kill you (often regardless to RAW or RAI). Unless you have no other options, I would try not to play with cruel and vindictive GMs.

I encourage you to have your GM read through the Fumble rules as presented by the Fumble deck, including the optional rules, there are a number of ways to implement fumbles without being vindictive and cruel, and optional ways to reduce and increase fumble chances. As another measure to reduce the chance of fumbles as iterative attacks increase, consider allowing martials to add their level as a bonus to their confirmation roll, this will dramatically reduce fumbles as players gain levels.

http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9g?GameMastery-Critical-Fumble-Deck

As stated before and within the deck, Fumbles can be extremely damaging to PCs (and NPCs) if not limited and carefully vetted. This is a group game, if the players and GM have different ideas of fun, it will end up being no fun for anyone.

There's nothing in RAW that requires any of that. There's also nothing that says a one round search of the room is only done by standing in one place without touching anything.

Yep, we'll have to agree to agree, heh, there is nothing in RAW to rule-in or out any of the ideas expressed, so its left to the GM to rule with discretion.

Personally, I try to make the situation one that "taking your time" searching a dungeon undesirable, random encounters, checks to be noticed, alarms, environmental conditions, and so on, its not always possible, but not always required either.
I have a character with a high charisma and tons of ranks in diplomacy, when a GM forces me to act out a diplomatic encounter I will often remind them that my mediocre (at best) real life charisma and horrid diplomatic skills should not affect my character who is well trained and experienced in such situations. Just because I (as a player) am unable to express what needs to be said or not said, does not mean my character would not. Nearly all in game skills, including perception, have similar pitfalls for the role-play environment. I'm guessing my real life perception is probably quite low, as I can lose items I literally just put down or forget what the GM said 2 minutes ago...
A point I keep coming back to is; it should not be an adversarial relationship between the GM and players, they need to work together to have fun. So the players and GM need to sit down and come to a meeting of the minds on how they want it to work regardless of interpretation of RAW or RAI.

Speaking from the GM perspective, I have always found it easy to make tactical adjustments or NPC choices to adjust an encounter from deadly to epic or memorable. However, I have never been able to take an under-powered encounter and make it epic or memorable unless the PCs happen to do something incredibly, well... dumb.

I can recall many scenarios where I wished I had the option to add a little something to the encounter or throw out the tactics, just to make the encounter a bit more than 1 round of half the PC acting.

Much depends on the table IMHO also, a table of new players are probably looking for a different experience than a table of experienced players with new characters. GMs have to make adjustments in their style to accommodate this in my opinion.

At a table of new players I might use my character folio to re-roll an ill timed critical as the GM, or provide it to a player to re-roll a save (advising them it can be a good investment) my bad guys rarely concentrate fire and would only cou-de-grace if the tactics specifically called for it. You have to become a hero before you can die like a hero right? At the table of experienced players with new characters, my bad guys will concentrate fire on the most obvious threat and may even go for that coup-de-grace when it makes sense, again assuming the tactics would not prevent it. Of course there are some situations/tactics that are simply overpowered and not "winnable", I don't believe I have seen a Kobayashi Maru in PFS, yet, maybe Bonekeep?

To expand on my previous post:

Gold by Tier with Boons

Award gold by character level from the appropriate tier regardless of tier played, with tweeners getting the higher tier, per podcast proposal.

When a character plays up, the Society helps mitigate their extra risk with a boon of challenge, providing the character access to a session long Bless or a lucky charm allowing a re-roll or the ability to negate one critical hit or a one time immediate action to add 2 to a roll, something that actually addresses the risk at hand, playing up in the scenario.

When a character plays down, the Society shows their appreciation of helping younger pathfinders and developing the Society, by providing a boon of protection, a session long boon that allows the character to increase Aid Another action bonus's to increase by 50% or a one time use of misfortune or the ability to negate/take a critical hit directed at a party member or a one time immediate action to subtract 2 from a roll, again something that can help the situation at hand, helping a lower level party.

The boons presented above are examples, because of the way this could be implemented the boons could set by season, scenario, event, and be very specific. By using boons the quality, quantity, and, value of up/down rewards can have more control and be easier to modify as the campaign progresses.

I will post no more about this if it gets no traction this time, but I felt it was an idea worth expanding on a little before letting it die.

So you've got a few extra pawn bases sitting around.

I don't know about to you, but one thing that has always been a slight annoyance to me with any quality GM screen, is the tendency to try to return to a folded state.

Problem solved; Grab a huge base, set it at the center fold of the GM screen, grab two medium or large bases and put them on the "wings".

You can even put a couple more near the "wing" folds for extra stability, if you have a tendency to get a little excited, and bump the table when going for that great axe crit roll.