Thordelion Copperpots's page

Sorry to be the slow one in the room, but there's something I'm not understanding about this.

I was considering taking Farmhand for a goblin bard, and being able to use a 3rd action trip with a whip on occasion.

Here's how I thought that worked:
Assurance +10, proficiency (lvl + training) + 1 lvl +2 trained = +13 trip role

The mobs reflex DC just needs to be 12 or lower and I auto trip.

Now, in the spreadsheet posted earlier, the avg Reflex save is less than 12 up to lvl 5, at which point I'm assured of a 17.

I feel like I'm not understanding something fundamental here.

I have an alternate take on wolfsbane and paladins for y'all.

In a home game my friend is GMing, he had one of us get bit, and cursed. Surprise, it was the paladin! He has a whole system laid out on turning, resisting the turn at multiple levels, and what happens to the paladin if they can't control it, or only partially control it.

As a party we were able to obtain some wolfsbane. Sure, we did it through pretty shady methods, but me (wizard), and the Swashbuckler actually went to town to take care of that business. We do take the paladin code seriously, and as a party we decided to keep her out of harms way if we needed to bribe, cheat, steal, or whatever to obtain it. She sensed motive when we told her it was a quick and easy purchase, and that's just what she believed.

Through the use of the wolfsbane, the paladin was able to maintain a semblance of control, and kept a hold of her mind so she would not change into a chaotic evil beast.

The bottom line is, this made for a fun adventure, and by working together we were able to accomplish the short-term goals, and keep on track to beating the long-term threats to the very world!

Sure, the GM could have at some point cornered the player and tricked her into falling, but then she would have stopped playing, as her character is fairly wrecked, and the whole game would stop. Where's the fun for anyone in that? Please remember, we're all just doing this for fun, and that really should be rule #1 before any ruling. If you're a GM and want to pursue this particular case, consider a fun way to make it a part of the story, don't try to trick your players.

How about for a caster-focused Bard, how would you build that?

Party: Reach Cleric, Swashbuckler, Bowadin, me!

In a given scenario, one may earn up to two prestige.

A module or story arc tends to earn less from my limited experience with them.

So three PFS scenarios x2=potentially 6 prestige/fame, 3 exp(on normal track)
The modules I've played both were 4 prestige/fame, 3 exp (on normal track)

That's been my experience, mileage may vary for others?

Is it a big enough loss for a core campaign to not do it?

Am I going to be hurting my players when they get into middle levels?

I'm a new GM who is running a home-based core campaign.

I just ran our third adventure, and it's been going well so far. The group is: mage, melee-focused druid, barbarian, archer ranger. They're all pretty good at optimizing, and play well together.

I was thinking of running The Dragon's Demand for them, partially because it seems easier for me to run a single adventure path like that instead of piecing together level-appropriate scenarios. It also seems a little less expensive for me, at $14 to get them to lvl 7 instead of $4 a scenario.

My real question is, Am I shortchanging my players for prestige or fame by running this type of path? Will they earn as much?

I put this specifically in the core forums because it's a core campaign.

Any different advice on scenarios or paths that would be fun for my players, and relatively easy for me to prepare for?

I keep thinking that most of the supposed benefits of Core are a lot more hypothetical than real. The fact that I keep seeing the point of view of "novice" GMs recounted by 5-stars and VOs is particularly telling. I started GMing mid-Season 4 with the APG, UM and UC in full effect, and never had any of these problems.

I am that novice GM.

My group agreed to a Core campaign at my urging because I want to provide the best game experience for all of us. Part of the enjoyment for me as a GM is to have a good understanding of the game system. That is easier for me if the system is simpler. And that's not necessarily simpler in pure mechanical terms, it's simpler in that there are fewer rules, feats, etc to grasp.

Granted, my first session in the campaign is not until next Saturday, but my preparation has been much more focused on building a story, and less on trying to absorb material from multiple rule books.

Also, I'm kinda cheap and don't want to buy a lot of rule books.

I like that there's a hard line between core and standard PFS.

I understand that means people can come up with times where they may not get to do everything they want. However, it makes record keeping a lot easier if we keep that hard line.

As a new GM, I don't want to spend a lot of time auditing character sheets. I'd rather have a quick look, and get to what's fun for everyone, playing the scenario at hand.

Thanks a ton for that!

One thing that's confusing for me about Silverhex. How is it that you still run two more scenarios after it, and just get to level 2?

How does the pregen requirement work with my group, who are rolling their own characters?

There are several great Evergreen scenarios. Both 6-10 (?) The Wounded Wisp and 5-08 The Confirmation are great for 1st level characters, and probably easier to follow the story rather than perhaps Silverhex.

Beyond that, there are so many great low-level adventures. Are you running with 4 or 6?

There have been several great story-arc paths that can be told.

If 4, I'd suggest The City of Strangers, The Devil You Know series and Before the Dawn series.

If 6, I'd stick with some newer scenarios, as season 4 on is balanced for 6 players, not 4. 6 players would ROLF-stomp some earlier season scenarios.

Thanks, Dave.

It's a party of 4. One player is relatively new, but overall a very smart group. Should I steer away from the current season, or just look towards lower subtiers if we play season 5-6 scenarios?

Those adventures only give 1 XP each. The characters will be 1 XP short of level 2, not level 3.

Any suggestions of what to run before Silverhex, then?

Half-Orc Bard

Hi all,

I'm jumping into the GMing for the first time. We decided to run a core campaign, in part to help me get my sea legs as a GM.

The plan to kick off the game is to play:
In Service to the Lore
The SilverHex chronicles

This should land the party at lvl 3, and ready to get down with some fun adventures.

So, my questions are:

1. Any advice for a new GM?
2. Any scenario advice, or recommendations?
3. Any pitfalls I should look out for running Core?
4. For my own character, I think I can just collect GM credit for scenarios and roll up my character whenever I feel like it. Is that true?

Thanks a ton everyone! This gives me a lot to think about. I really appreciate the insight.

I'm super excited to play, and this gives me something to focus on until the game actually starts.

I'm planning on weapon bond.

I'll put a couple skill points into ride just to be able to have the trained skill in case we need to use mounts at some point. Maybe even just a single point.

I'm going to go mostly Diplomacy and Sense Motive for skills.

How does this look for a set of feats:
Lv 1: Fey Foundling
Lv 3: Power Attack
Lv 5: Combat Reflexes
Lv 7: Lunge
Lv 9: Angelic Blood
Lv 11: Angel Wings

Lv 13+ tbd

How does the ability score spread look?

A good friend of mine if going to run a home game of PF, and I'm going to play a tabletop RPG for the first time since the '80s. Can I have some advice from people on how you think my first build looks.

I've read a bunch of guides on paladin, and this is what I've come up with to play.

Game details: Rise of the Runelords - full campaign
Group comp: Sorc, Ranger, Bard, Rogue, Cleric, Paladin (me). I'm planning on being the front line plate wearer, but want to go for primarily DPS and not sword and board.

Aasimar - Angelic Blood

Str: 16 (+2) = 18
Dex: 14
Con: 14
Int: 12
Wis: 10
Cha: 13 (+2) = 15

Stat progression:
Lv 4: +1 Cha
Lv 8+: +1 Str all

Feats:
Lv 1: Fey Foundling

I just was reading a thread that included Fey Foundling. I've also read that at lvl 1 I'm going to be splatting the things I hit, and can always pick up offensive feats later on. Any thoughts on that?

Lv 3: Combat Reflexes

One of the reasons I went with the 14 dex, to pick up the extra 2 AoOs. Will I generally get a lot of AoOs? Enough to justify the feat? My intention is to get right into the mix, and be the tip of the spear in encounters.

Lv 5: Weapon Focus - Falchion
Lv 7: Power Attack
Lv 9: Critical Focus

Not sure about progression after this, but thinking of some form of Step Up, Strike Back, Cleave.

I might go with the Aasimar feats just because wings sound rad. Are there enough encounters where I could use wings, and maybe Death from Above to good advantage?

Skills:
Diplomacy
Sense Motive
Knowledge, Religion
Ride

Is crafting my own armor worth it?

Traits:
Missionary - for RP mostly, I wanted a reason to be going to Sandpoint
Reactionary - +2 init seems good

Do you see anything big I'm missing, or any advice on what I've put together?

Thanks for checking it out.