albadeon's page

DemonicDem wrote:

GameDesignerDM wrote:

DemonicDem wrote:

I love the Remaster, but options are *already* gone from Archives of Nethys.

Which options?

Secrets of Magic Elementalist Spell List is missing. The current one is just the Rage of Elements spell list, which doesn't have all the options Secrets of Magic did. Blistering Invective, Flammable Fumes, etc.

Deities that appeared in Rage of Elements but also was written before have had their alignment removed. ie Sairazul

The SoM one is right here, for example, and those other spells are still up and findable.

Well, actually... the elemental spell list linked in that (SoM) archetype is the RoE one (not the SoM one), missing Blistering Invective and Flammable Fumes. Should be an easy fix, though, as there really is no good reason why those two spells are missing the obvious fire trait, which would automatically add them to the RoE list.

I get that they're trying to reach a different audience with this, but for me, this one's a hard pass. I would have loved to see an actual adaptation of 2e rules into a turn based crpg, but ... :(.

Let's hope the 2nd upcoming game is closer to that, but I'm not holding my breath.

Sorry for necro-ing this old thread, but my question is also related to the shadow spawn ability, and why start multiple treads:

Do you treat the shadow spawn (which the text says is "under the command of the shadow") as a minion for that shadow (i.e. requiring the shadow to spend an action to Command the spawn to give it two actions) and only after the death of the origin-creature does it stop being a minion and becomes a fully independent ("full-fledged, autonomous") creature?

Or do you use the (much more powerful) interpretation that the spawn starts out being able to act fully independently and is only "under the command" of the shadow rp-wise, similar to how a soldier would be under the command of their superior officer?

Unfortunately, the text doesn't give any clear rules on how to handle this "spawn", but for the latter interpretation, the difference between it being a shadow spawn under the command of the shadow and then later becoming a "full-fledged, autonomous shadow" seems rather minimal, especially for those spawned by a greater shadows.

My apologies, I should have used the correct game term "unnoticed" to describe the sniper's condition, i.e. none of the enemies (or, depending on circumstances, noone in the room at all) have any idea that he's there.

While this is not quite the same as a surprise round, it still does make sense that whatever happens happens in the correct order. The attack that turns the encounter hostile actually has to have happened before people react to it. After all, the sniper only has to actually spend an action to strike when it's his turn in the initiative order. There is no reason why he should be the only person to commit to an action way before his turn. If on his turn he decides to just keep doing the same thing he had been doing the past 20 minutes while observing the negotiations and not to attack, why would any of the other people present and before him in intitative order have reason to act any different on that round? Nothing has changed when it's their turn and whether or not things are going to change is decided only on the sniper's turn.

The second the combat starts, initiative has to be rolled, even if you were already in encounter mode before (in that case it is rerolled as it's another encounter). Allowing the party to be in combat (using Delay and Ready) while the enemies are not is just not the way the game plays.

Why would it be a new encounter? It's just the same encounter turning from tense negotiation to open hostility. If you already are in intiative order, because you are in a situation where every individual action counts and the order in which people act is relevant, I see no reason why you would need to reroll initiative just because the next action taken is "Strike". There is no sub-form of encounter mode that is "combat mode", it's one and the same encounter.

Also, I don't quite understand what you mean by allowing only the party to be in combat? When the game is in encounter mode, everyone involved is in encounter mode and thus in initiative order. PCs and NPCs are not treated differently in that regard.

Whether or not the PCs are using Deception or something else depends on how much they know. If they know the sniper is going to take a shot during the negotiation, they're are quite possibly using Deception. If they just know that something surprising might happen today, I'd lean more towards Perception. It depends on the exact circumstances.

If the other PCs were not there, then the situation would be a bit more tricky, as an NPC rolling higher in initiative than the sniper would be in this very strange case where they know that someone is intending on attacking them without having any idea who.

The last situation you describe is the principal reason why it's not a good idea for the sniper player to say "I want to take a shot", but to say, "I might want to take a shot during the negotiation, it depends on the exact timing, let's take this to encounter mode". The NPC rolling higher than the (undetected) sniper has no way of knowing if and when someone is going to attack them, they can only act as if they knew, because the GM knows (and fails to keep that GM knowledge seperate from NPC knowledge).

In my experience (ymmv), the encounter balance does not seem to expect everyone to have every consumable resource always available. Both as a player and as a gm it is the norm here to continue playing until the party is actually severely reduced in capacity. Usually, the cleric will announce when they're out of heals to let the party know that they may have to proceed more carefully, and other spell casters may mention when they're almost out of non-cantrip spells (not just top level spells).

Going back to rest after just one encounter would be considered extremely unusual (though it can happen, e.g. if the party got really roughed up by a boss fight), and suggesting doing it routinely would be frowned upen by players and gms alike. Essentially, the mind set is "if you're not willing to take risks, you have no place in a dungeon". That includes ongoing conditions from say diseases or curses - noone expects to routinely be able to keep resting until they've made enough saves, you just make your daily save at the start of the adventuring day and if you fail you suck it up.

I think that that is more of a system agnostic mindset, however, we do the same for D&D 3.x and 5e (and would for PF1, if there were a campaign). And it seems to work just fine for PF2 as well, neither tpks nor character deaths happen particularly often. In fact, both 5e's short rest system and PF2's plethora of out of combat heals and focus spells are imho obviously designed to push players away from "maximum safety" play and into exactly the play style I've described. It does require the party to occasionally decide that they may be in over their heads and withdraw from a fight, however.

Rolling initiative doesn't automatically mean combat, merely "moving to encounter mode". As such, the encounter can proceed as before, just in the more structured encounter mode until someone makes an overtly hostile action (such as shooting at someone), at which point the enemies will likely attack back.

As long as the sniper is undetected, there is no good reason why anyone should act differently before the sniper takes the shot. However, it is perfectly reasonable to assume that everyone not actively involved in negotiations (i.e. guards, non-face-PCs, etc.) are constantly delaying their actions, or (in case of a body guard, e.g.) actually have actions readied to trigger in case of an attack. But nothing unusual should happen before the actual shot is fired. And those who are focused on whatever else is going on (negotiations, etc.) are busy with that and cannot also delay/ready an action.

Keep player/gm knowldege about what one player has announced his character is going to do strictly seperate from character knowledge, where most characters have no clue about what's going to happen.

The cleric feat "Holy Castigation" could use some clarification:

The current wording is

You combine holy energy with positive energy to damage demons, devils, and their evil ilk. Heal spells you cast damage fiends as though they were undead.

The problems I see are as follows:

My recommendation would be to change the wording to the following:

You combine holy energy with positive energy to damage demons, devils, and their evil ilk. When casting a Heal spell you (may chose to have it) treat fiends as though they were undead and had negative healing.

NB: the part in parentheses is optional, see below

What does this do:
- it now allows fiends to be targeted by treating them as undead for the entire spell (including targeting), not just the damage part
- by referencing the negative healing ability, it clarifies how the fiend can actually be damaged by positive energy even though it is not undead
- (optional) the part in parentheses gives the caster the choice of whether to actually heal or damage a fiend, e.g. if one of your party members was a (half) fiend, or if the party (temporarily) had a fiend as an ally. I'd personally include it but I'm not sure whether or not that is intended.

Alternatively, the words "were undead and had negative healing" could be replaced with "had the undead trait", but I feel that my wording is easier to understand (and is more in line with the wording of the Heal spell, which also just references undead, not "creatures with the undead trait").

The way I read the section, the success only lets them recognize the city as Sothis, not give them the information in the rest of the text. Akmajet is not a notable person in Golarion history as best as I can tell, just a named npc invented for this scenario. The scenario does not seem to even give the pcs a way to know his name, unless you rule they can find it written somewhere.

I don't think I'm making a judgment call. Here's the second paragraph of the CRB rules entry for "Conditions" on p453; it's the first "mechanical" paragraph after a brief, general definition of a condition.

Quote:

Conditions are persistent; when you’re affected by a condition, its effects last until the stated duration ends, the condition is removed, or terms dictated in the condition cause it to end.

It is explicitly stated that "conditions are persistent" until they are ended in one of those three ways. There are other monster abilities that inflict conditions on a PC with no duration or terminal condition, and they're assumed to be permanent until removed by some other means. This is why I said in both prior posts that there isn't any ambiguity. In this case, the rules are clear on what happens.

To be fair, it could quite reasonably be argued that a "condition" in terms of the rules is not just any effect, but only those specific conditions listed in the "list of conditions" in the conditions appendix on p618ff of the CRB, e.g. blinded, broken, clumsy, concealed, etc.

Therefore, rules specifically concerning (e.g. the duration of) conditions do not necessarily apply to other non-"condition" effects, such as the cairn wight's "status penalty to saving throws against drain life".

And if there are no clear, unambiguous rules then it requires a gm call...

The cairn wraith ability was merely copied from the Bestiary 2 (where it has the same missing duration), and I'm not aware of any correction that has been provided. My expectation would be that the -2 status penalty to saves against drain life is meant to last for a minute, which would adress both of the problems. Alternatively, I'd let the effect end when the creature causing it dies.

In a society scenario, I'd generally decide in favor of the players if I think (as is the case here) that the catastrophic outcome is not intended but the consequence of an oversight by author or editor. Keep in mind that PFS scenarios have an abysmal track record when it comes to catching issues like that before publication. I'd probably check with my VA or VC afterwards, but if I were to encounter a situation like this, I'd opt for what I think is reasonable.

As an aside, I've been unable to find the rule in the guide that says PCs shall be marked dead when they have an unresolved negative condition, curse, etc. at the end of the scenario. Did that get removed since I last checked (season 1, probably?!), or am I just too blind to find it with the current format?

Another small issue just came up in our game: The poltergeist in high-tier task 3 has its alignment listed as N, while it normally would be LE according to the Bestiary. This is true even for the version that actually does evil damage, has weakness 5 to good damage and allows good damage to bypass its resistances. Which makes no sense at all if by virtue of being neutral it would be immune to good damage anyway.

Since nothing but the alignment is changed for the basic version, it's probably just a typo and all versions should just be LE. But most certainly, at the very least the last "holy hand" variant is clearly meant to be evil.

Congratulations to Jim for the promotion!

On the other topic, if a company was sad to see someone leave after years in a leading position, they would get their own article with thanks for their service, not a mention as an aside in someone else's promotion notice. Health issues aside (and noone deserves those, so best wishes for a speedy recovery!), this is either a major communications mishap on the side of Paizo, or a very deliberate choice. Your guess is as good as mine...

Did the Customer Service Forum get removed?

The "how do I reach customer service?" section on the FAQ/Help page refers to it, but the link now just leads to the main forum page. Has that been moved and I'm just to blind to find it, or is the forum no longer an option to reach CS? (way back, it used to be the only somewhat reliable way...)

Just a quick FYI for the team, not sure if this is the right place to post this:

The pdf seems to have an issue with the font for some paragraph titles, where the dash is replaced by the letter K. For example on p. 15ff.

NB the same issue affects the pdf for Monsters of Myth that has been simultaneously released.

I haven't gotten a hold of a printed issue yet, so I cannot say if this is also the case for those.

I'd strongly discourage the use of these Beginner Box scenarios as "normal" repeatables for getting your PFS characters out of the low levels. Keep in mind that these are very simple adventures. They do a good job at taking new players (and GMs) by the hand and slowly exposing them to various rule mechanics. But that's about it, there is nothing particularly interesting for experienced players! And of course, despite being sanctioned as repeatable for PFS, they have no variable elements to them. In short, playing these repeatedly as an experienced player just to level up character -200x will be a mind-numbingly boring grind, way worse than any other repeatables.

Use them to expose new players to the game, that's what they're good for.

I love it, always good to have more things to do during downtime!

Maybe when one of the next scenarios taking place in or around Otari is PFS sanctioned, we'll get a boon "Friend of Vandy Banderdash", allowing access to the above downtime options in OP. I do feel that my cleric has very limited options to spend his downtime at the moment...

While I don't really share TwilightKnight's concern about Medicine being the "most powerful" of the skills, building in slightly higher DC for tasks using some or all of these options would certainly be possible.

The chronicle for this scenario awards the item "shifting runestone". I assume that that is intended to be a runestone with a shifting rune engraved on it; however if that is the case both item level and price would be increadibly low - a shifting rune is normally a 6th level item costing 225 gp (not 4th level / 20 gp)

As that is obviosuly not intended (a resale value of 112 gp and no limit would be an easy way to infinite gold), GMs should probably correct this before handing out the chronicle, lest players start purchasing them for 20 gp a piece...

albadeon wrote:

Due to the 500 error, the FAQ and the errata download link is still inaccessible to me. Since the errata document is likely a free non-account-linked download anyway, could someone post a direct download link to the pdf here, please? Kind of as a temporary work-around until the 500 error issue is solved.

I don't think there is an errata document to download. The errata is only available in the FAQ.

However, you can see the new changes on reddit.

Whoops, I totally assumed it was published as a pdf, just like the first one. Even tried to make the obvious manual change to the 1.0 download link with no success...

Due to the 500 error, the FAQ and the errata download link is still inaccessible to me. Since the errata document is likely a free non-account-linked download anyway, could someone post a direct download link to the pdf here, please? Kind of as a temporary work-around until the 500 error issue is solved.

Also, if the intent was to provide these maps to make importing them into VTTs such as Roll20 easier, could you (Paizo) please include any added features, i.e. furniture, bone heaps, etc., like the pawns from the Traps & Treasures Collection directly in the map file, not as seperate icons (maybe excluding the rare case where these would be intended to be moved)?!

What we really need is essentially the map as displayed in the adventure, just without annotations, as a single picture file. Otherwise it's still a major cut, copy, paste nuisance.

Adding to Eric's list:

One thing I've noticed (and I have no idea if it's relevant, but maybe others want to compare their data) is that a number of scenarios show up on the sessions list with the scenario name not linked to the web store page. For me that's a block of scenarios in November and December of 2019. Every scenario name on the list before and after shows up as a link to the store page, but these are just plain text, no link. These are also the one's found when filtering the search for "Scenario: unknown". I've talked to my VC, but even he cannot "fix" this, scenarios with no link remain with no link, even if he changes the actual scenario to another one. And they include repeatables that at other times have shown up linked correctly.

It might just be random correlation, but for me the number of AcP I should be receiving from these scenarios is very close to the number of AcP that are missing from the total the website is calculating. Maybe it's not registering these as "real scenarios"?

Has anyone else noticed this, and does that correlate with your missing AcP? And is it also just during a certain time towards the end of 2019? I'm thinking that maybe there was a temporary issue with the reporting site that got patched but left some traces?!

Isn't that kind of the same thing, though? It's not like you got to 12 in PF1 without doing a lot of society missions. Seems like a distinction without a difference. Not a complaint, per se, just an observation that it doesn't seem much different.

Effectively, it's probably similar. But you get the XP/levels by not dying, even if you fail miserably otherwise. But the Reputation you get for completing goals. I'm totally on board with that.

I think they mean being able to buy boons for other players. Like a con organizer being able to buy a leshy boon to give out as a door prize.

I think that's a good idea for the team to keep in mind for the future. Adding it in right now seems like it might cause more chaos...

Outside of some edge cases (we know Quest 7, for instance, is misbehaving), AcP is working fine from a calculation perspective. If you've got sessions that don't look right, email us and we'll take a look!

How is Quest 7 misbehaving? That's one of those that seemed alright so far...

However, when it comes to the calculation perspective, I'd just like to point out that when I add the AcP that the sessions list on the "my organized play" page claims I'm receiving together manually, I get 206.5, while somehow the website gets 190.5 from the same numbers. That's very much not fine from a calculations perspective in my book!

And yes, my calculations are correct, the page is just somehow off by 16 points... Oh, and off course I did click the "Refresh points" button.

For spells, the counteract check modifier is your spellcasting ability modifier plus your spellcasting proficiency bonus, plus any bonuses and penalties that specifically apply to counteract checks.

Since there are no specific bonuses/penalties qualifying for the last part, +9 is right.

Hi nathanielwise, it's my first time as well and Numbat was so kind as to point me to her newbie slides:

@albadeon - if this is your first time to PbP you may find some useful information in these slides. I put them together for a largish group introduction. They are not complete but do cover a lot of the basics.

I've found them to be very helpful, enjoy! (They also explain the concept of dot :) )

An alias, like their Warhorn or Discord name, would be perfectly sufficient, if they wish to keep their real name private.

A contact email would alse be nice (though this doesn't make reading some people's writing any more fun). As with the name above, it doesn't have to be your firstname.lastname@google-address, but most people, especially those with privacy concerns about online activities, have set up an email used just for these activities. And a way to easily contact people would really be helpful.

Looking at the low sub-tier combat primarily:
To be fair, it's a moderate difficulty encounter, so being chewed up is the expected outcome for the baddies here (especially considering that despite previously routing from the eagle knights, they're now supposed to fight to the death instead of using their invisibility to sneak past the PCs). In addition, they have a horrible position, waaay to close to the starting point of the PCs considering they are both ranged combatants (I have no idea why a "sharpshooter" with a 120 ft. range increment crossbow and darkvision would choose to pick a position this close to the enemy instead of waiting somewhere in the darkness >200 ft. away and actually sniping at those PCs who do not have darkvision - imagine being in a cave seeing no further than your torch can shine and every now and then a bolt comes flying at you out of the dark! Yes, it's slightly elevated, but not high enough to actually stop a dedicated assault force, i.e. the PCs, from just rushing the mound.

Best strategy I can come up with (low-subtier): focus fire on one of the low-level, low-AC, low-hp back-rank squishies, ideally bringing one of them to dying. Then keep throwing bombs at that dying PC, hopefully hitting him several more times (bombs do splash damage even on regular fails, and even a little damage while dying increases your dying condition by one each time.) Get the PCs really worried about their friend's life, tying up some of their resources. PCs will usually outnumber NPCs in this fight, so you need to even the odds somewhat. If it looks like your position is getting rushed, cast invisibility on yourselves and reposition - ideally move any sharpshooters waaaay far off to make use of their really, really long range! Don't wait too long with the invisibility, it's your best bet to improve your currently untenable position! In fact, it might be a good idea to just do this as the very first thing, though I'd consider trying the focus fire at least for a round. The invisibility lasts 10 mins, so take your time to reposition, let them wait for a few rounds, give them the chance to do something dumb, let spell durations run out, rage wear off, etc. and then do the same again, focus fire on the next target. When the alchemist is out of bombs and infused reagents (assuming he is still alive by then) cast enlarge and use warhammer as a last-ditch attempt.
If you have multiple sharpshooters due to scaling, your odds are improving slightly - again, use your range and focus your fire.

In high subtier, you're at least getting a somewhat decent melee combatant (though one level 3 enemy is not going to be enough against a high sub-tier party, obviously...). He has a number of useful spels, but again, being way too close to the PCs at the start, he's going to be rushed and not have the time to cast them. If you could get even one extra round to have magic weapon already cast that would be a noticable improvement. But as it is, you'll likely spend your first round casting that and in the second or third round, you'll go down...

The more I think about it, the more the answer is to cast invisibility asap. All Duergar. Then spend a few rounds all move actions towards the north, spreading the ranged in a quarter circle. Or if you don't want to extend the map (the part of the cavern shown is not even 1 range increment for the crossbow across!), head for all the corners except for SE. Then sneak up on one of the PCs with the melee and focus fire/jump him from invisibility (you can cast magic weapon and enlarge while invisible).

Honestly, if the reward is just the boon, I'd just as soon take 0 xp and gold. The fractional xp drives me crazy. Can we make that an option?

Technically, since the boon can be transferred from the character who earned it to any one of your characters with the correct ancestry, you could just assign the chronicle to a throw-away character and not worry about the xp at all.

Or maybe don't throw it away, just keep it at lvl 1 in case you want to try the bounties for now...

Congratulations!

One thing I've been wondering (and this may just be my incomplete grasp of the english language): what exactly does a designer do compared to a developer? I'm assuming we're not talking art/graphics design, but game/system design here, but what differentiates game design from game development? There must be a difference at Paizo, as they are apparently two different departments, but I cannot figure it out.

Sorry for the off-topic post, but hopefully someone who's a native speaker or who knows about these issues can provide me with just a little enlightenment :).

Also, those damage numbers aren't even super impressive:

A regular PC 1st level giant aspect barbarian with 18 STR raging while wielding a (large) Greatpick with magic weapon cast on it (or even using a potency crystal) will deal 2d10+10 damage on a regular hit and a whopping 5d12+20 on a crit. That's a maximum of 80(!) damage, easily enough to kill every possible 1st level and even many 2nd level characters outright through massive damage. And even regular hits have the potential to outright destroy a number of low-hp builds at first level.

That constellation wouldn't even be a super unusual thing even for a party of purely 1st level characters, especially in the boss fight. Heck, even pregen Amiri with her greatsword instead of the fatal d12-pick would do a maximum of 68 damage on a crit and half that on a regular hit (again, assuming magic weapon). No 1st level elf wizard would survive a single max-damage regular hit!

And there's really no reason why enemy NPCs should not be able to do the same, raging barbarians and potency crystals/magic weapon spells are certainly nothing exotic.

In short, while I think that character death is a threat that should not be taken out of the game, it works much better as a threat, not an unavaoidable execution by massive damage where there's nothing the player could reasonably have done, other than not take the character out on the adventure. And that's not really an idea to instill in players...

Honestly, I think the massive damage rule should be restricted to actual "massive damage events", i.e. falling into a lava lake, falling from a very high cliff, having a mountain collapse on you, etc. NOT mere combat damage.

Copying myself over from the Cottonseed Lodge recuitment thread:

If you'll have me, I'd like to join up as well. However, be warned that this would be my first attempt at PbP, so bear with me, if I don't get everything right the first time :).

I'm going to whip up a brand-new level 1 character to play as all of my characters in level range have actually played 1-14 before.

If you'll have me, I'd like to join up as well. However, be warned that this would be my first attempt at PbP, so bear with me, if I don't get everything right the first time :).

I'm going to whip up a brand-new level 1 character to play as all of my characters in level range have actually played 1-14 before.

I agree that for a crafter it likely doesn't make that much of a difference either way. But I still don't see any significant harm in using the same mechanics as for wizards here, either.

However, I'm coming at this from a primarily alchemist's view. An alchemist's formula book and a wizard's spellbook serve such a similar function that using the same rules is easily the most obvious and best choice imho.

I think the easiest, best and probably least controversial way of handling it is just applying the same rules to both spells and formulas. Use different base values if you consider formulas to be less valuable, but otherwise both should just be handled the same. There's really no good reason I can see why formulas got their own and different rules in this regard.

Great news! One additional thing that would be really useful for running PFS scenarios online would be for those scenarios that have maps that are put together from multiple map tiles to include one page where they are reprinted with no annotations. That way, it's easy to screen-grab the entire map instead of having to do the rather unenjoyable task of piecing it together from numerous tiles.

Maybe add a "copy-editing" task force?! Have them gather the most blatant typos/mistakes with any new scenarios and plan to published a revised version 14 days or a month after the initial release. Just, you know, text corrections, etc., not major content changes... Stuff that just makes quality control appear poor if it happens.

Sorry, I know this might seem silly or even sarcastic at first glance, but so many scenarios published have had their issues that were missed in-house and quite probably Paizo is not making enough money off of these to have them professionally copy-edited. Or maybe there is copy-editing, but whoever does it just cannot spend enough time on each module? Maybe the interested community can help provide that service, since we go through the scenarios with an eye for detail anyway?! Just have interested fans gather a list of typos and glaring errors and after some time have someone in house spend maybe an hour max to fix them in the pdf and re-release?

My PFS-scenarios for August just dropped and I've only had the time to look through some parts of Citadel of Corruption. But I've already stumbled across a chronicle that congratulates me on having finished a different scenario and an encounter that claims to award 10gp, but really awards 2 treasure bundles. Especially the chronicle part makes me cringe thinking I'm supposed to hand those out to players... It just doesn't look professional.

A "wand of (uncommon spell)" is a separate item from the spell with the same rarity as the spell, i.e. uncommon.

In order to buy an uncommon item you need to have access to it.

There is no rule I can see either in the guide or in the CRB that automatically grants access to these "related items" when you gain access to a spell.

So no, the rules as they currently stand do not support that.

It's just one of the example hazards from the CRB that was copy/pasted over. It seems like a 7th level hazard was needed, and they just picked the only one in the CRB with little regard for if it made any sense, worked at all or was contextually appropriate. Might have happened in editing, as it's completly at odds with the otherwise very flavorfully written adventure.

Vlorax wrote:

Bleeding doesn't stack so you'd never have to worry about tracking multiple different bleeds on a target.

I'm in favor if just having the bleed have the traits of the weapon that inflicted it but I could see ruling it's pure physical dmg

If one goes through the enemy Resistance and not the other one, how do you handle that?

I'm not sure about the specific example of persistent bleed damage retaining the traits of the original weapon, but for the examples in this post, let's assume it does. Generally, if you have two persistent damage sources of the same type, you'd apply the larger one. E.g. a weapon with a wounding rune deals 1d6 persistent bleed on a regular hit and 1d12 on a critical hit. If you did both, only the higher die would apply.

When comparing a fixed number and a die, I'd use the average damage for the die, so when comparing 2 persistent bleed damage to 1d6 persistent bleed damage, I'd count the 1d6 as averaging 3.5 points and use that.

If the target has resistance to some of the damage, I'd subtract that number from the (average in case of a die) damage before the comparison. I.e. a critical hit from a non-silver wounding weapon against a creature with physical resistance (except silver) 5 would thus only count as 1d12-5, or 1.5 on average and would thus be worse than the 1d6 (average 3.5) persistent bleed from a regular hit from a wounding silver weapon.

Since there are no specific rules on this that I'm aware of, I'd be willing to allow a player to pick a lesser average persistent damage instead if they wished, in case that gave an advantage (e.g. a constant 2 damage might be preferable to a 1d12-4, even if the damage is less on average if you take into account other factors such as weaknesses that only trigger if you do at least 1 point of damage of said type).

That is my interpretation only, though. I've heard at least one other player argue that if a target is hit with both 1d6 peristent bleed and 2 fixed points of persistent bleed, it should suffer 1d6 but minimum 2 persistent damage. I don't think that should be the case.

Ascendant's Tactics:

It says that he casts silence on a PC who uses magic, but insofar as I can tell you cannot cast 2nd level silence on an unwilling target. I understand the rule of thumb is "run as written" by this implementation of silence is difficult to adjudicate without making up rules for silence.

That is another of a number of instances where an author apparently was unaware that the spell had been significantly changed from 1st Edition and assumed it would still work offensively. If a suggested tactic doesn't work as written make up your own.

Also, for the NPC stat blocks. The dagger attacks don't have the agile, finesse, or versatile S traits. Hand crossbow doesn't have range increment or reload 1. Shortbow doesn't have range increment, reload 0, or deadly d8. Am I to run these stat blocks without these printed traits (again, abiding by "run as written") or assume this information was omitted by accident?

Since there is no indication that these NPCs use non-standard weapons, I'd assume these were just omitted by accident. In particular, a ranged weapon with no reload doesn't really make sense.

Lastly, for the Murderous Bathhouse, it doesn't have a listed Stealth skill, so it's unclear what to roll on initiative (Stealth DC - 10 as bonus?). Furthermore, the Disable action doesn't list how many actions are required to perform it. Should I assume 2?

As a complex hazard, it should have had its stealth modifier instead of its stealth DC listed and is using that for initiative. The math is easy enough, though.

At least for alchemical items, it's fairly easy to say what makes an item alchemical according to the rules:

All alchemical items have the alchemical trait.

So no, potions are not alchemical items in general.

For runes and such it's more complicated. Personally, I'd argue runes, potions and other items with the magical trait are magical items and those are not a choice to pick from Specialty Crafting. However, I can imagine others allowing you to apply the material-based crafting bonuses to certain of these items.

As always, with the exception of rare official verdicts, we can only supply personal opinions...

Regarding the bi-resonant wayfinder not being on the Chronicle -

"Ok, the reason it is not on the Chronicle sheet is because the players actually already have access to it by virtue of being members of the Pathfinder Society, so it was pulled from the Chronicle in D2. There's no harm in including it to signal to the PCs that they might want one, but it doesn't actually change the game state to have it on the Chronicle sheet either."

Absolutely true, it doesn't change anything formally. Then again, with no actual formal change to the "game state" the players could have been issued a chronicle that was not depressingly empty. It was an all-win no-loss option that would have felt much more satisfying for the player and would have only cost a few letters' worth of ink on the chronicle. And somehow they still chose against it. Sad...

Regarding clearing curses (for Pharoah's Ward hazard) -

The Pathfinder Society has resources to take care of its members, and many of the possible negative effects an adventurer can be subject to during an adventure are assumed to be taken care of during Downtime. The exceptions to this are death, permanent petrification or polymorph effects, curses, and permanent negative conditions (Core Rulebook 618–623) acquired during the course of the adventure. These negative effects must be cleared at the end of the adventure or the character must be reported as “dead,” unable to continue adventuring in Pathfinder Society organized play. Most of these negative effects can be cleared by spending Fame for the appropriate service on Table 2: All-Factions Boons. Other PCs may use their spells, feats, class abilities, or consumables to assist you in recovering from such negative effects, but they aren’t required to.

Curses have been an issue from all the way back in Quest 1, where the same thing could happen to a player from one of the monsters - they end up cursed, may even be unaware of it (in Quest 1, the curse had an onset time of 1 day so that would only start manifesting after the expected end of the scenario) and then after seemingly successfully finishing the scenario would have to be declared dead according to the Guide. I'm not sure if any GM ever actually did that but according to RAW they should have.

It's a ridiculous way of handling the issue with no currently available in-game solution and I'm sure neither author was aware that they were including a hidden very likely perma-death trap into their scenario. So while I agree that it would make logical sense to have the hazard trigger on attempting to open the door, it is a modification of the scenario as written that is hugely disadvantageous to the players since it can lead to permanent character death that would not be possible if the hazard was used as written (since as written the curse would never be triggered). Thus I'm opposed to modifying this hazard, even if as written it doesn't work at all.

Really, curses need to be written out of the Guide as a cause for declaring a character dead until such time that a workable solution, e.g. via fame or ACP, becomes available. But that didn't happen when it was pointed out for Quest 1, so I doubt it will happen now :(.

There is still an open question whether only those characters trained in Crafting should get access (which seems to be the implication, otherwise why mention 'PCs who are at least trained' at all in regards to the conversation), or if the party as a whole gets access regardless. That aspect probably isn't such a huge deal though - if a character was going to ever take Crafting it's quite likely they would have done so by this point in their careers, and if not, they probably don't care about the formulas.

However, there is the bequeathal boon, that specifically exists to let players transfer an item that one character cannot use or doesn't care to use to another.

The text makes it clear that the character that is to learn the recipe needs to be trained in crafting and pay a fee. However, both of these are requirements at the time of purchase, and do not neccessarily have to be fulfilled by the character running this adventure, nor at that time. Having the item on the chronicle sheet really just makes the option available for purchase or bequeathal in the future, when they fulfill those conditions.

I agree the item should have been on the chronicle, maybe at a discount. We've seen many items on chronciles before that were accessible anyway, just to showcase them. I'm reasonably sure that not putting it on the chronicle is just an oversight, there is just absolutely no point otherwise to specifically giving the PCs this item, instead of just gp as a treasure bundle. Compare Quest 3, where the exact same thing happens, the PCs receive an otherwise available (common in that case) item as a reward at the end of the adventure, but there it is listed on the chronicle.

With regard to the organ, I'm confident that the intent is exctly that: the doctor is difficult to attack by the PCs while he's sitting at and playing the organ, laughing manically and having the mobs perform their macabre dance to his tune. I agree, it's mechanically dodgy not to consider some of his playing "hostile actions", not even just the blast, but also the "all zombies attack" tune. Still, it makes for such a hilarious scene, I'd honestly have been happy to have him be completely invulnerable while the members of his "ballet" are still "alive".

Well, "he offers to give interested PCs a lesson in how to craft xxx", doesn't really say they have to have the lesson right then and there. It could just as well be interpreted as saying he's available to teach PCs the lesson if and when they're interested.

Just like the item he's selling doesn't have to be bought right there, but is available to be bought in the future (and is thus on the chronicle).

In addition, the formulas are listed on the chronicle with a price of 50gp each. Normally, items listed on the chronicle sheet are available to be purchased for the price listed (assuming you meet the level prerequisites). If a PC has to spend the 50gp just to have the item listed on the chronicle in the first place, they are now either expected to pay double, or the discounted price listed should be 0gp (since they already had to pay the 50gp to have it listed on there in the first place).

And how is this supposed to work with the bequeathal faction boon?! I have to purchase the item first to be able to bequeathe the right to purchase it to someone else?!

In my opinion, it all doesn't add up. I think whoever is interpreting the "he offers to give a lecture..." sentence as it has to be bought on the spot is reading too much into it. It should really just be another item on the chronicle that becomes accessible for purchase later.

It's probably an issue that could be cleared up fairly easily by an interpretation by Michael Sayre, Tony Woldridge or someone else official from Organized Play. Maybe someone could point them to this thread for a quick clarification? :)

Rebuilding Your Character

You may find that there are aspects of your character where you’re not entirely sure about your decisions, such as the ancestry or class feat you chose. Don’t worry! While your character is 1st level, you can rebuild as often as you need to, changing any of these choices. Until you play a game in which your character has 12 or more XP, you can freely rebuild your character completely except for Reputation earned and character number.

You can completely rebuilt a character at 12 xp, however he will still have earned his Rep up until that point with GA. You are free to switch to HH going forward, but not to reallocate the previously earned Rep to the new faction.

Edit: which makes sense, I guess, since that info has been entered by the GM on the reporting website and would need to be changed by them.

I went with cold iron for my weapon, as you have the option to bring a vial of silversheen which costs only 6gp (and is available as a 3rd level freebie from the swords school). A weapon coated in that will count as a silver weapon for an hour, instead of cold iron or whatever other material, so it's a convenient way to have material flexibility available should the need arise.

Are only those PCs who are currently trained in crafting supposed to get access to the formulas on the chronicle? Also, are they in that case required to spend the money for the formula right then and there? In other scenarios, even if you cannot make use of or cannot afford to purchase a boon or item (yet), you still get it on the chronicle, right?

If you trained crafting or earned enough money later, you should be able to go back there and buy the formula then, no?

The Fall of Plaguestone chronicle e.g. (yes, not specifically a Society scenario, I know) grants you access to a special animal companion. Even if at the point of obtaining the chronicle you cannot have a companion yet, you can still take that later from the chronicle.

And in the Chronicle sheet section on p.24, while it specifically states they get another item if they did X, it does NOT say they only get the formulas if they did or have Y.

But nowhere in reverse engineering does it say that the process gives you access (the rules-term, obviously, not physical access) to the formula. And since it's an uncommon formula, you'd still need access to use it (and even to write it into your formula book).

I've seen a chronicle that lists access to uncommon formulas, but not to the items themselves. When you craft using these formulas you get... nothing?! Because you cannot have an item that you don't have access to?! Seems odd.

Logically, it makes sense that access to the item and access to its formula should go together. Alternatively, some form of conditional access (you gain access to the formula when you have access to the item only if you reverse engineer it; you gain access to the item when you have access to the formula only if you craft it) would be conceivable. IMHO likely the best way to handle this, but I don't see that supported in the current rules anywhere. Certainly not RAW.

Edit: since this is highly unlikely to be an issue outside of PFS, maybe that kind of conditional access is something PFS should add to their guide as an option to obtain access? You obtain access to the item after you have successfully crafted it once from a formula you have access to; vice versa you obtain access to a formula once you have successfully reverse engineered it from an item you have access to. GM notes it on your chronicle where you successfully completed the process. Should be easy to do.