Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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After browsing the forums for a while, it's apparent that there are a few recurring themes. One of the most frequent is the "roll playing vs. role playing" (false) dichotomy. This shouldn't be a surprise - the same argument has been going for well over thirty years now, and looks to be good for at least another thirty.
When it turns up in discussions of PFS scenarios a common observation is that it's practically impossible to craft a scenario that will present a meaningful challenge to a party including one or more highly optimised characters while still being survivable by a group of characters built more to a concept. The end result is usually to err on the side of caution - a scenario designed to not kill the lower-powered party.
While I believe that the new scenario guidelines for season 4 (with more customisation options within a tier based on party size) will go some way to addressing the problem merely by providing finer-grain control of the challenge level, it won't make the issue go away entirely. And if you do run into a character that wrings every last advantage out of the rules, and a player who wants to run that character to do what it was built for, there's not a whole lot you can do other than invoke the "Don't be a jerk" clause, and ask that the character be run at less than 100%.
This means that some players are being asked to sacrifice their choice of play style for the common good - "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few". While this may well be true, it doesn't necessarily mean that the needs of the few can simply be ignored.
So what can Paizo do to address those needs? Well, let's take a look at what a certain other RPG company has done. They have a second organised play system aimed fair and square at optimisation/system mastery/whatever you like to call it, with a challenge level that makes it unlikely that the average party will succeed on the first attempt. But that's not the end of the road - it's just the beginning. Tweak the character design, then simply come back next session and try again. I think it would be great if Paizo could come up with something in that vein.
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So you think the right answer is to follow WOTC's system of having both D&D Encounters (for "Role Playing") and D&D Lair Assault (for "Power Gaming")?
I would strongly disagree, if only because I have seen a few shops move solely to Lair Assault. While I do not play 4th Edition, I have to feel very sorry for the people who want Organized Play 4th Edition that does not focus on Power Gaming, but end up losing that opportunity due to a switch by local game shops to only Lair Assault.
Fragmentation is counter-intuitive to the purpose of Organized Play. The whole point of Organized Play is to unite several RP Gamers into one group, and allow them a chance to all play with each other and experience a broad base of GMing Styles and Player Styles. Splitting an already very small community would not be a good idea.
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I also agree that trying to split is based on styles would be a bad idea. Organized play is a place where all takers of all levels work together and help each other grow. To split just cause of a few is not right. If you feel that its not for you its ok, but then consider GMing or perhaps starting a campaign. There are already so many options in place for those who are looking for something more specific.
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There's nothing stopping us from having writers craft roleplay-only scenarios with a miniscule level of combat.
The onus is on Paizo to fairly brand the scenarios written so that players and GMs know if they're about to embark on a 'pure combat delve' or a 'social intrigue and investigation' mission. Just as long as these scenarios are clearly labelled, I'd love to see a fair few 'social' scenarios get written up.
I guess the major problem is ensuring that there are penalties for failure for these social missions. If failure = death in normal scenarios, what would failure entail in social scenarios?
Director of Brand Strategy
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For us to have the resources to offer two different organized play programs, we'd have to have marked growth in our existing offerings. But the larger Pathfinder Society gets, the more we'll need to support it with staff and other resources, and thus the less extra resources we'd have for a second program. If there's something you'd like to see in the existing program, however, please share your opinion on the boards or email Mike or I. We can't change things on a dime and we aren't likely to make major changes on a single request, but we are listening. And who knows, maybe Pathfinder RPG continues to grow and we eventually need a second organized play program. When that day comes, we'll take all the feedback we weren't able to incorporate into Pathfinder Society for whatever reason into consideration for a second program.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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Aaargh! The browser demons just ate the post I spent the last half an hour composing :-(
Do I take it that Society means GMs can't already optimise the module to match?
Pretty much, yes. Apart from some leeway in picking tactics (where not specifically laid out in the scenario) there's not a lot a GM can do - the usual home-game remedies of adjusting hit points, spells memorised, and number of minions are not permitted. The new rules being introduced with season 4 provide a limited way to scale encounters based on party size, but that is not an option for older scenarios (although Paizo are at least considering the possibility of providing some kind of guidelines to cover that).
If you feel that it (PFS) is not for you its ok, but then consider GMing or perhaps starting a campaign.
I never claimed I was unhappy with PFS play - were there an alternative style of play I'd still be spending my time on the PFS side of the line.
But I've encountered players (both here on the message boards and over the tabletop) who do want to be able to play their ultra-optimised characters all out, not throttled back to less than 100% of their abilities. Such behaviour is disruptive in a mixed environment, but pretty much the only recourse is to ask them to leave the table. That's already splitting the community, and enforcing a much harder split than having two different sets of scenarios under a common Pathfinder umbrella.
And while anecdotal evidence isn't proof, it's been my experience that providing multiple styles of play doesn't necessarily lead to fragmentation. The FLGS where I play in a weekly Pathfinder Adventure Path campaign has recently added a regular D&D4e campaign (positioned as a follow-on to last season's Encounters storyline) to their weekly Encounters and Lair Assault settings. There's considerable overlap of players between those campaigns, although there are some players who only participate in one or the other. Not only that - the ability to push things to the limit in a Lair Assault setting satisfies the itch to go all out, so the characters that those players bring to an Encounters game tend to explore different facets of the gaming scene.
Now if we could only persuade a few more of them to dip their toes into the Pathfinder waters to keep our game alive ...
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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Perhaps rather than two different societies you could deliberately produce some modules that are harder than others, and either come with a warning or just have a common keyword that means "Warning: you're gonna die"
Perhaps anything with affair in the title...
I know just what you mean :-)
The big problem is that death is such an expensive proposition in PFS. If I lose a 7th-level character, say, it's going to take me a long time to build another character up to that level (or it's going to eat a lot of PP, or a boon, or an even larger pile of GP). But some players want a challenge that will push them really hard - perhaps with a chance of death well over 50% - so they get a real sense of achievement should they come out the far side on their own feet, not on their shield.
I personally build my characters for concept first, and abilities second. But I like to let them grow into their part; I consider it a good thing if a character ends up developing in a way that I had not envisioned when I first drew up the character sheet. By the time we've been together for 20 or more scenarios I've got quite a lot invested in that character; if they die I want it to be a good death, not just the result of randomness. But I can see the other side of the argument, too - it would be nice to have a situation where simply surviving should be a good (and noteworthy) result, not just the result of randomness.
Obviously you can't do that within PFS play, because the cost of failure is so high (especially since I'd expect the really challenging scenarios would be aimed at something higher than 7th level characters). Perhaps that's one way to go - high-level scenarios (maybe beyond PFS retirement level) which can be beaten, but only by a well-built and well-played team. The characters would be specially built for the scenario. You could, perhaps, run one or two tables of this scenario at a large convention, and players could replay the scenario as often as they wanted (or maybe just until they survived). I'm not sure what the reward for winning would be, other than bragging rights - possibly a boon that the player could assign to any regular PFS character.
I'd consider trying to craft such a scenario myself, but it would need somebody with a much better grasp of the rules than I have at present (and, I suspect, somebody with better flair for design).
For us to have the resources to offer two different organized play programs, we'd have to have marked growth in our existing offerings. But the larger Pathfinder Society gets, the more we'll need to support it with staff and other resources, and thus the less extra resources we'd have for a second program. If there's something you'd like to see in the existing program, however, please share your opinion on the boards or email Mike or I. We can't change things on a dime and we aren't likely to make major changes on a single request, but we are listening. And who knows, maybe Pathfinder RPG continues to grow and we eventually need a second organized play program. When that day comes, we'll take all the feedback we weren't able to incorporate into Pathfinder Society for whatever reason into consideration for a second program.
Maybe you could occasionally produce scenarios that are particularly challenging and are labeled as such with a boon at the end granting true resurrection for free to any player characters that died.
True resurrection isn't the only way to do it. The PCs could adventure in a dream world and simply wake up if they die.
We Be Goblins was like this. Players can kill the goblins with no repercussions for their PCs.
EDIT: Like Big Norse Wolf said.
Perhaps the rule that dead characters can no longer be played in Pathfinder Society (is there actually a rule for this) should be discarded. Maybe instead just give them the experience point for playing the scenario but with everything else crossed out on the chronicle sheet. A player may find that dying too many times would seriously set them back in the wealth curve.
I like challenging encounters, but I don't like encounters which start with:
GM: "who's that at the front?"
Player: "Me"
GM rolls dice "You're dead. The rest of you see..."
To paraphrase a certain scenario. :-)
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I personally would prefer more of role-playing options in modules then "tweak the CR" options.
I have SO many ideas that don't fit into the mold of "Pathfinder". Golarion is a big world - granted the PFS can be played as some sort of umbrella organization taking all walks, but I prefer not having to squeeze into the mold.
Nor do I like repeating treasure-grab, dungeon crawl adventures. Where is the political angle? Where is the nuanced, player influenced outcomes? I have noted that Mr. Brock has promised more interesting options in the coming campaign years, but we're all waiting on this.
I do know Painlord was trying to start some sort of non-official, shadow campaign where one could expand the RP options for their characters, but I am unfortunately far away from his stomping grounds and virtuality has its limitations.
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There are people who optimise to enhance a roleplay decision. And then there are those who put in roleplaying elements to justify an absolute a build that's clearly built on putting numbers above all.It's generally not that hard to tell the difference between the two.
Sure, however a weak build is a weak build, and a strong build is a strong one.
Thats got nothing to do with 'roleplaying' though.
At the end of the day if you design a double amputee Dwarven savant with an interest in basketweaving then more power to you, however when you rocked up you knew that at some point adventure implies that swords are going to be swung in anger and if your guy doesn't have the chops to deal with that then I would ask why you were surprised that things go the way they do.
I would also point out that I find it odd our handicapped basketweaving dwarf woke up one morning and decided to become an adventurer, and indeed given how far fetched and contrived the response would HAVE to be I'd actually point the bad roleplay finger at that player because despite trying to be all unique and conceptually interesting, they aren't really keeping their character 'in character'.
Roleplay and Rollplay are two sides to the same coin.
Learn to Rollplay, and be a good Roleplayer too.
If you just want to Roleplay then go the whole hog and get along to a LARP or a Freeform where you aren't as hindered by so much hard data on a character sheet - the irony is that 1st Ed and even Basic D&D were a lot more liberating because there WASN'T so many constraints imposed by your stats.
Society play only offers a limited opportunity to roleplay anyhow, as they are often disjointed missions, and subject to strict real world time windows - so you just wont have time to really get into the groove.
Perhaps you could start having Pathfinder based Freeforms at Cons or something, where nary a die gets thrown and the whole thing is acted/roleplayed. Pathfinder the LARP.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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Sure, however a weak build is a weak build, and a strong build is a strong one.
There are people who optimise to enhance a roleplay decision. And then there are those who put in roleplaying elements to justify an absolute a build that's clearly built on putting numbers above all.It's generally not that hard to tell the difference between the two.
Strawman - nobody is advocating weak builds.
But if someone decides to build a character based on Inigo Montoya (or the Dread Pirate Roberts) they're not going to be all that receptive to suggestions that they should really have chosen a two-handed sword because they'd be able to do more damage per round.
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Then if we accept no one is advocating weak builds I shouldn't see 'optimised for roleplay' as the de-facto term for it anymore either.
If you want to play an Inigo Montoya then go right ahead, Inigo could just as easily be 'roleplayed' using a two handed sword or a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire. If on the other hand you said 'I want to roleplay a rapier build' then I'd point out a 'rapier build' has nothing to do with actual roleplaying, thats rollplaying a build.
Lets not try and have our argument both ways here guys.
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I thought this was going to be a thread calling for an evil-compatible sister campaign to PFS.. ala Aspis Consortium Organized Play.
Put me down for that one.
All nine layers of Hell yeah. To work though, there'd have to be a strict code of conduct (think Lawful Evil, heavier focus on Law) so that players wouldn't deliberately be jerks to each other, just to keep players from killing one another over petty disagreements. Like a parallel to PFS; you'd work together with other agents to get things done that further the Consortium's agendas, and occasionally would come in direct conflict with the Society itself. Just write scenarios that involve stealing, assassination, or other types of political debauchery, and there you'd have it: an Aspis Consortium Organized Play. As far as factions go, you'd see some from PFS working the other end: Cheliax, Sczarni, and the rogue Shadow Lodge would be good examples of this. There's plenty of other evil factions in existence to make sure it at least starts at five to begin with.
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Then if we accept no one is advocating weak builds I shouldn't see 'optimised for roleplay' as the de-facto term for it anymore either.
If you want to play an Inigo Montoya then go right ahead, Inigo could just as easily be 'roleplayed' using a two handed sword or a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire. If on the other hand you said 'I want to roleplay a rapier build' then I'd point out a 'rapier build' has nothing to do with actual roleplaying, thats rollplaying a build.
Lets not try and have our argument both ways here guys.
So, under what circumstances to you should one use a rapier? Its not the optimal damage choice, and you said that wanting to use a rapier is "rollplaying" the build. So, I can't think rapiers are thematically cool, that's really me building a concept around a sub-optimal weapon?
Why don't we all agree that both view points are valid, and stop taking potshots at the other viewpoint, ok?
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You can use a Rapier any time you want, any time you feel like making a rapier build or even a broken chairleg build you can go right ahead. That isn't 'roleplaying' though, thats making an X- Build.
Rollplaying is about making 'optimal builds'.
Roleplaying is about playing a character.
Inigo Montoya isn't a 'rapier build', the actor didn't get handed a Rapier day one on set and go 'oh sweet, I'm acting out a rapier build'.
He was acting out, or 'roleplaying' if you will, a convoluted character on a mission of revenge who was notionally semi-'spaniard'.
Now you and I know that one can make a decent rapier build behid the scenes, fairly well 'optimised' so that the character is good in combat, so that when the game turns to swinging swords our Rapier guy is 'effective' and can hold his own. Will he be better at combat than someone who cheezed to the enth degree? maybe not. Will he still be better than Joe Newguy who doesn't yet understand optimisation and just rolled up what he thinks is good? Absolutely.
Regardless, he will be 'good enough'.
Now given that, we can go back to roleplaying any way we want, and if we want to be a troubled man set on revenge - whether it be with the rapier or bag of apples, we can do so.
We can roleplay in the talky bits, and stabbity quite well in the other bits. At no point have we had to make a 'weak' build unless we wanted to.
If thats the case, then why the need for change?
If the Cheezemonkeys are protesting that all your talking is ruining their game then fair enough, but if they are prepared to pnly play half the game whilst you get to enjoy the whole thing then I'm lost as to why you want two styles of play.
Unless, of course, you believe that Rollplay and Roleplay are incompatible and the only way to be a roleplay is with a crippled dwarven basketweaver.
Reckon I could make an optimised version of that too.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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If the Cheezemonkeys are protesting that all your talking is ruining their game then fair enough, but if they are prepared to pnly play half the game whilst you get to enjoy the whole thing then I'm lost as to why you want two styles of play.
That's rather the point, isn't it?
Some of the players you refer to as Cheezemonkeys aren't prepared to play half the game; they insist on grabbing the limelight and dominating the parts of the scenario they have built for (usually the combats) to the exclusion of any other players who would like to take part. (There's a thread about just this kind of thing currently running in another part of the forums). The justification for this action generally runs along the lines of "other players should build characters the way we do so they can fight as well as we do". And, as you surmise, they frequently do complain that the talky bits are a waste of time - just cut-scene straight to the next fight.
So do we just show those players the door? Or is there a way to give them scenarios where their character-design skills can be pushed hard? I think that at some time in the future there might be, and I further hope that doing so would take some of the conflict away from PFS tables.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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If you want to play an Inigo Montoya then go right ahead, Inigo could just as easily be 'roleplayed' using a two handed sword or a baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire.
Well, maybe. Although the "fighting at a penalty when using the off hand" schtick pretty much requires a one-handed weapon.
But you skipped the other point - it wasn't just the suggestion that the player should use a two-handed weapon, but that the over-riding metric for the build should be damage-per-round.
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And here we really get down to what this is all about - "grabbing the limelight".
How are they doing that exactly that then precludes anyone else also taking part?
I just had to 'play up' at a table, and despite being the demonstrable 'gimpy kid' at the table I am pretty sure I puleld my weight in both the talky bits and during the fighty bits. GM may or may not agree :P
Sure they may do more damage and kill more creatures, because that is all they are designed to do, but how is that preventing you from also participating in the bloodbath? Why can't your InigomontoyaRobertsConceptdude also participate in the action?
On the other hand if there really is a problem that those Cheezemonkey guys (who really are a minority) have within their ranks a few people (so a minority within a minority) who want to complain that the talky bits are wasting their time then perhaps they just aren't suited to PFS play and are better off at a home game. I'd suspect that to hold something for their express benefit would be untenable in the long run and not financially viable. They are just too niche.
I remember Games cons used to run 'Arena' deathmatch sessions and also 'module' sessions. The deathmatches would be lucky to fill a table. truth is that most of the Cheezemonkeys don't like it a whole lot when they can't 'shine' against less optimised builds. When everyone is optimised to the point that they are simply 'normal' all their limelight has vanished.
What is plain rude and inexcusable though is if those players tell you how you 'should be building' or 'should be playing' if you haven't invited said comment. I'm all about sharing, so if they want to point out some moves I could have made to improve Lumpy my disabled Dwarven basketweaver then awesome - but if that advice is 'give him both legs, take this optial weapon, drop basketweaving and make him a half-orc' then they can keep that advice.
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All of you are missing the point. Rollplayers and Roleplayers have a symbiotic relationship: neither should be even considered for being disallowed for a PFS table, unless they're a jerk in their own right. Roleplayers get through the talky bits, while the Rollplayers get to text their buddies on their phone, while the exact opposite happens when combat rolls around. But that's the nature of this sort of game - different people will have different play styles, and learning to recognize and accept that is an important part of organized play. If you can only stand one sort of play style, then maybe you should find those people who agree with you and start a home game, because I wouldn't you want to be playing PFS at the same table as I am.
Now if you happen to be proficient at both play styles, stop being angry with those who aren't. That's like a veteran Wizard player being mad at someone who's playing an arcane caster for the first time and not knowing what all the spells do off the top of their heads. It's an unreasonable, and frankly, ignorant way of seeing things, and once again, I wouldn't want you at the same table with me.
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There is a second organized play option that uses the PFS rules set called Ledgend of the Shinning Jewel. It is played at Origins and some other Cons and the Campaign Guide is sold as a download here on the Paizo site
It wasn't to my taste but it might be to yours
Expecting Piazo to have multiple organized play systems is a bad idea for all stated reasons
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Back on the original topic.
No, I do not want "encounters" where we basically just try to beat the encounter with optimized PCs. There are two reasons.
I personally wouldn't find it enjoyable. I think the best part of RPGs is the roleplaying and story aspect. If you just want to beat some twink encounter with some twink PCs, and do it over and over again, play a video game. It's faster and more convenient.
I also don't like the idea because I feel that a twink/mastery program would cause a lot of bleed over into PFS. If you think there's a lot of optimization and twinking now, I suspect there would be a lot more with a new "twink" program. No thanks.
I wouldn't however mind if some scenarios were labelled "hardcore" or "difficult".
I find that some of the scenarios in season 3 are definitely difficult, and that only highly effective PCs can survive, especially in groups of 4. Groups of 6 are still fairly safe.
I also wish that Paizo would create some mini-scenarios, that could be done in 2 hours (or less). Two encounters basically. They would give 0.5 XP, 1/2 (or less) normal gold, 1 PA max. Or perhaps just a boon (if there was only 1 encounter). I wouldn't want to see a lot of these mini-scenarios, but a few (1-3) each season would be ok.
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In any game, when the difficulty is schizophrenic, it makes it hard on the players. However, 99% of the time (excluding the Dalsine Debacle), TPKs result from player folly, not scenario difficulty. Auto attacking at a swarm, not being able to bypass DR, going toe-to-toe with a giant, etc. If you look at the "core assumption" the Pathfinder Society Field Guide is in there. Inside there's a good 20 pages of "stuff you should know as a Pathifnder." Stuff like bring a splash weapon to fight swarms, be prepared to overcome DR, and don't go toe-to-toe with a giant.
My point is this: at what point does difficulty and player ineptitude become so meshed that we can't separate them? I had a table of level 9s complaining that a single flesh golem was an impossible encounter, because they never bothered to prepare themselves, or read that book.
Some of the early early games had low difficulties, likely due to the 3.5 to PF conversion. Since season 1, however, most scenarios have been enough of a challenge for my players. Occasionally people (on both sides) get lucky crits and change the outcome of things, but for the most part my difficulty curve is a steady increase as levels go up, as it should be.
Making "hardcore" or "easy-mode" options for players would just make the gap between PC level and PC preparedness even greater. Eg: what's the point of being level 9 if you can't handle a flesh golem? No, I'd just keep it as one OP, for all the reasons mentioned above and mine -- the small potential gain of splitting the player base is far outweighed by the consequences.
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If I may weigh in on difficulty levels,
I believe that the lower tier modules should be less difficult from a combat perspective. This allows new players to become accustomed to the rules, and doesn't punish the odd builds that don't really hold up mechanically until level three or four.
High tier modules should be difficult. As your character levels up, so do the threats you face. You're not level 1 fighting some diseased kobolds anymore; you're a battle-hardened veteran who should know a thing or two, and the threats you overcome are hard. New players should have learned the ropes, and offbeat 'flavor' builds have had time to get their ducks in a row.
Adventuring is dangerous, and unprepared pathfinder agents derping through a high level dungeon should get killed. Without the risk of danger, the rewards of victory are lackluster. However, the scenarios should not be "omg you instalose" deathtraps.
For example, at my FLGS we recently ran our first 7-11 scenario. The party that attempted it was four casters, none super optimized but all pretty well built. The first encounter happened to be immune to magic, and it beat their butts pretty good - one death and the rest retreated. This is good game design. A balanced or versatile party should be required in high level scenarios.
That same scenario, the party had retreated, healed, rezzed the dead guy, and then returned to beat the first encounter through non conventional means. The party continued through the module, when the second encounter ambushed them. With no chance to notice, avoid the attack, or react, all four party members were paralyzed for 1d4 hours and killed. That's terrible game design. Nobody likes losing their characters (level 8 = 21 scenarios at 4 hours per for 84 hours of real life play time) to a save-or-die that they had no chance of avoiding.
The optimal difficulty level should be where a hyper-optimized munchkin character does very well in combat, but a plain-jane vanilla fighter or wizard has a decent chance at success.
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Venture-Captain, California—San Francisco Bay Area South & West
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For example, at my FLGS we recently ran our first 7-11 scenario. The party that attempted it was four casters, none super optimized but all pretty well built. The first encounter happened to be immune to magic, and it beat their butts pretty good - one death and the rest retreated. This is good game design. A balanced or versatile party should be required in high level scenarios.
That doesn't work. A large amount (probably most) of PFS play is at game stores, conventions, etc. where you have no control over the makeup of the party. What are you supposed to do if the players that show up don't have the right level-appropriate character mix?
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For example, at my FLGS we recently ran our first 7-11 scenario. The party that attempted it was four casters, none super optimized but all pretty well built. The first encounter happened to be immune to magic, and it beat their butts pretty good - one death and the rest retreated. This is good game design. A balanced or versatile party should be required in high level scenarios.That doesn't work. A large amount (probably most) of PFS play is at game stores, conventions, etc. where you have no control over the makeup of the party. What are you supposed to do if the players that show up don't have the right level-appropriate character mix?
Please forgive this strawman: I'm not saying you should need a sword and board two weapon fighting fighter, heal-focused cleric, rogue, and battlefield control wizard or you die die die.
I'm saying a 4-sorcerer party may fail and fail hard at high level, and that's fine. When you start heading through difficult dungeons, an experienced Pathfinder agent would want a versatile group. One plain fighter (or barbarian, or paladin, or ranger, or melee bard, or monk) in that group would have made the first encounter a success. A venture-captain who sends a hopelessly unprepared group into a deathtrap has no place being a venture-captain. Such is the stuff that shadow lodge rebellions are made of.
For low level adventures, the difficulty should be lower so that a party of whatever can succeed.
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The party continued through the module, when the second encounter ambushed them. With no chance to notice, avoid the attack, or react, all four party members were paralyzed for 1d4 hours and killed. That's terrible game design. Nobody likes losing their characters (level 8 = 21 scenarios at 4 hours per for 84 hours of real life play time) to a save-or-die that they had no chance of avoiding.
Can you spoiler the name of the scenario? My curiosity eyebrow is raised.
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Can you spoiler the name of the scenario? My curiosity eyebrow is raised.The party continued through the module, when the second encounter ambushed them. With no chance to notice, avoid the attack, or react, all four party members were paralyzed for 1d4 hours and killed. That's terrible game design. Nobody likes losing their characters (level 8 = 21 scenarios at 4 hours per for 84 hours of real life play time) to a save-or-die that they had no chance of avoiding.
certainly!
the encounter in question is act three, actually. I wasn't at that table but the hubbub drew me when the party TPK'd in the surprise round. Again having four arcane casters was a bad move, their AC isn't good when unprepared and their fort saves are bad. However, we re-ran that fight with a variety of made up characters and if you miss a DC 16 fort save you're done. Even balanced parties that we put together got beat down pretty hard.
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Ahh, that makes sense. Yea, the first fight of that one is the one that devastated my group (Barb, Witch, Inquisitor, Gunslinger). The rest were more or less a kill-fest. The witch debuffing, making people invisible, hasting, with the barb and rest cleaned up. They actually invis'd everyone for the final fight, and stealthed up to the BBEG, then all jumped him/her at once -- ending the fight before it started.
I wouldn't however mind if some scenarios were labelled "hardcore" or "difficult".
Considering that hardcore/difficult scenarios already exist, it certainly wouldn't hurt to label them appropriately!
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I wouldn't however mind if some scenarios were labelled "hardcore" or "difficult".Considering that hardcore/difficult scenarios already exist, it certainly wouldn't hurt to label them appropriately!
One of the OP campaigns in which I've played, Living Arcanis, has done exactly this. Adventures labeled as "crawls" are expected to be combat-heavy, with very challenging opponents. Similarly, "specials" in Living Greyhawk and Living Forgotten Realms are generally assumed to have more challenging combats.
Assuming that one is paying attention as one signs up for a game, at least you would know what you were getting into.
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Yeah, I'd like to see warning labels on the more difficult scenarios, too.
Actually, my group just played one yesterday that very nearly resulted in a TPK. I'm shocked that we managed to escape without anyone dying. And I mean escape literally - we had to run away from the final bad guy, and I'm still surprised that we were even able to do so. We healed and rested for a night to recover spells and powers, and tried again in the morning.
Knowing what we were up against, we had a very specific plan the 2nd time, which didn't work quite as planned, but got us far enough along that we were able to win in the end. But that second fight still resulted in two PCs hitting negative HPs, both within 2 HPs of death.
Like I said, we were shocked that nobody actually died in the whole thing. Between the two fights, every member of our group except for my barbarian ended up in negative HPs at least once, including a familiar and animal companion. And my barbarian only stayed positive because of the bonus HPs from raging - I took more damage than my non-raging max HP before I even started getting healed.
And it wasn't a problem with our party - I really can't imagine any other group of PCs having an easier time of it. That particular scenario seems like it would probably have a higher death toll by percentage than Dalsine Affair, but just doesn't get as much press because tier 7-11 adventures don't get played as often.
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Actually, my group just played one yesterday that very nearly resulted in a TPK.Which scenario was it?
Below the Silver Tarn.
Like I said, I'm really surprised we haven't seen more posts on here about all the PCs that died in this scenario. Our group got spanked the first time we faced the final fight. And even knowing what we were up against and coming up with a VERY specific plan the second time, we still just barely managed to win and avoid any deaths.
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Knowing what we were up against, we had a very specific plan the 2nd time, which didn't work quite as planned, but got us far enough along that we were able to win in the end. But that second fight still resulted in two PCs hitting negative HPs, both within 2 HPs of death.
That sounds like an absolutely perfect level of difficulty.