I noticed a lot of people have replied with the negs of my 7s. I haven't read every reply, still on the first page, but I'd like to address some of this.
First Str, being it's a 7, I know my melee is very weak but I am playing a ranged character. I know it's not the greatest but keep in mind I'm playing a teenaged human female. 90% of the teenage females I know can't carry that much. In game I am still in my light weight, with 1lb spare. That might not be ideal for most, but I am buying a bag of holding, and don't really ever carry anything. I already have a cart, and since I don't purchase a lot, I pay party members to carry anything else I need carried.
My Con is 10, which keeps me from any negs in HP. My fort save isn't the greatest, but so far I haven't had any problems with it.
My Int, which is 7. Now again, I remind the I'm a young girl with no schooling. As far as it's link to my I.Q., I wouldn't say a 7 is retard or anything, but I agree she isn't smart. I play that in my role playing though, I often confuse races for others (Example, she often thinks halflings are human children), and I'm never the one that comes up with great plans, I role play as a ditsy blonde stereo type girl. As far as where INT comes into play on my sheet, it really has only affected my Skill points. I get 3 per lvl (2 class + 1 human). But the Skill's I put them in are skills that use my high Dex and Wis, so all my skills I'm trained in are 7 and 9's. I am also gonna be taking 3 levels in Rogue by the time I hit max level at 12, so my lack of skill points will be fixed from that as I will be getting 21 points from those 3 levels.
My Cha is 8, but really that hasn't affected anything at all. My bluff isn't the greatest, but I hardly use it.
I'd also like to point out that I'm a fairly experienced played with about 10 years experience. I know how to use my strong points to over come my weaknesses. I keep my range decent and know how to get out of situations that would present problems for me. My dex is high, so I'm a very good shot, I've only missed on 1 attack so far, and it was from rolling a 2 against a AC of 21. Also with my high dex, Dex related skills are great, at a starting base skill of 9, my Acrobatics, Disable Device, Escape artist, Sleight of hand and Stealth are all easy checks for me. which is how I play my character, she is great at avoiding danger with this. I'm also running with a Init of 7, soon to be a 11 with Improved Init, so going first generally lets me find a good place to be in battles. With my high Wis I have access to a lot more Grit, and with each Class Bonus Feat I'm taking Extra grit, at lvl 2 I already have 5, by lvl 12 I'll have 10. also having a high Perception has helped me avoid a lot of danger.
I know it's a bit harder in some aspects to play a character like this, but using the right actions at the right times have kept me out of any kinda of trouble I would be in with my weaknesses. In a party with a Orc Paladin, Fighter Dwarf, and Monk Catgirl, I'm actually the the highest output in damage and have had the highest accuracy with making hits.
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Just a couple of rules items:
You refer to paying party members to carry items for you; payment or gifts of gold or items is not permitted between PCs. Other PCs can carry kit for you, you just can't pay them.
You mention your character is a 'young girl'; be aware that the minimum age of a human PC is 16. See the FAQ and table 7-1.
You mention your character is a 'young girl'; be aware that the minimum age of a human PC is 16.[/url].
I wasn't aware of that rule, but I rechecked my sheet and I actually already had it written as 16.
And as far as the paying other to carry my stuff, I understand that I can't really give them gold, but I usually just pay for things. I pay for the Carts we use and I usually buy all the meals we eat.
Catgirl? Did you mean a Kitsune, or are they a Synthesist Summoner?
EDIT: Ok, so really that's irrelevant to the total topic of the thread, I'm just curious since Catfolk aren't legal for PFS play at this time.
It's the catfolk, the none allowed one. We were play testing them one night, and after a party wipe with out other characters, we allowed her to just use that sheet. If she becomes serious about using this characters and wants to make it a more permanent one, we talked about just switching the race.
My 5th level rogeuy human druid (original stats)
STR: 7 DEX: 14 CON: 14 INT: 14 WIS: 17+2 CHA: 7
Thats funny, I just made a Kensai with
19
14
14
14
7
7
But normally I don't do the dump thing, sadly some character classes are really MAD and you almost have to (Note, I said ALMOST, no you do not HAVE to, but it helps IMHO)
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RPG Superstar 2015 Top 16, RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16
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With those dump stats and sucky skills, how do you do faction missions?
I find that characters like that either a) have very lenient GMs who never dock you PA even if you actually fail faction missions, or b) have a buddy who helps them on all their faction missions.
RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8
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With those dump stats and sucky skills, how do you do faction missions?
I find that characters like that either a) have very lenient GMs who never dock you PA even if you actually fail faction missions, or b) have a buddy who helps them on all their faction missions.
My bard is more than happy to help people with their faction missions! As a Pathfinder Chronicler in training, what better way to get his name into the margins of some Chronicles than help his heroic compatriots out of whatever skill-based quagmire they find themselves in?
With those dump stats and sucky skills, how do you do faction missions?
I find that characters like that either a) have very lenient GMs who never dock you PA even if you actually fail faction missions, or b) have a buddy who helps them on all their faction missions.
Mostly this.
Yes some times faction missions are missed.
I find I get around 1.5 out of every 2 PP available.
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With those dump stats and sucky skills, how do you do faction missions? {/quote]
I get by with a little help from my friends
About the only skill I don't have is climb and the social skills. I figure if I'm finding obscure plant matter for the Qu'diran, disarming death traps for the osirion, stabilizing the guy we're beating up that the andoran needs to give messages to, performing a toungectamy for the scarzini and getting lowered into every offal,snake, poison, and diseased filled nook and cranny from varrissia to Mawangi to find the PERFECT gift for a taldan princess the LEAST i can expect from a party member is "Hey.. talk to this guy for me will you?"
I find that characters like that either a) have very lenient GMs who never dock you PA even if you actually fail faction missions, or b) have a buddy who helps them on all their faction missions.Note the high int. Even with a low cha putting ranks into diplomacy is better than the -2 in the long run (and evens out very quickly in the short run) Perception is the one skill you can usually count on someone having in spades.
Actually thats become my stance as well.
I stoped droping skill points in Perception.
Yeah it is the most called for skill in the game, also yeah every other character will have it maxed out.
Does this mean that once in a while I don't get to act in the suprise round? sure.
But at 6th level thats 6 knowledge skills with 1 point in them.
or thats 6 ranks in Diplo to maore then make up for the -2.
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But there are plenty of faction missions around that don't rely on skill checks. Not to mention the PP for completing the scenario primary mission successfully.
Heck, I did one faction mission in
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I'm all about helping your buddy on faction missions. My -1, Professor Forthlake, is a ranger/rogue/Pathfinder Delver skillmonkey for that very reason. However, you don't always have a Professor Forthlake along to help you.
The thing is that if you're running a fighter you're not going to succeed on your own anyway. Faction missions are already nastily hard to accomplish if you go by a strict reading of some of the success conditions anyway, so if you're a fighter with a 10 charisma you aren't making that dc 25 diplomacy check anyway : fail by 5 or fail by 7 and you still fail. There's little mechanical reason to go for a 10 vs a 7.
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It's the catfolk, the none allowed one. We were play testing them one night, and after a party wipe with out other characters, we allowed her to just use that sheet. If she becomes serious about using this characters and wants to make it a more permanent one, we talked about just switching the race.
Sorry to derail, but this struck me as confusing. Are you allowing a player to use a catfolk character in sanctioned (reported) PFS events?
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First I want to say that I absolutely *love* the way you guys and gals have handled this - this thread has definitely seen a few "blow ups" but no one flew off the handle so much that it couldn't get back to being a calm, rational (except for groaning at Jiggy's awesome jokes :) discussion. Sometimes I have to wonder if I'm actually among fellow gamers when I read PFS and Pathfinder boards... this level of civility was unheard of in my youth!
As for the discussion itself, as a longtime GM (but new to PFS GMing) I actually encourage players in my games to have something akin to a "dump" stat. Regardless of what kind of point-buy or roll-stats we're doing, I have it that for every 17-18 a character has, they must have a 9 or less. The theory is that an Olympic sprinter (Dex 18) would have had to have made some sacrifices in order to focus the years/energy to train his/her body to that caliber. Maybe she didn't go past high school (low int), maybe he stumbles over his words all the time or has no personality (low cha), maybe he's just the brawn and his father/brother/friend "runs" him as a "manager" and all he does is train, perform, and wonder if he's being swindled (low wis).
The only dump-stat / faux-roleplaying issues I ever take a firm "hell no" stand on as a DM are with Int/Wis. If a character has a 10 Int, they're considered to be of "average" intelligence. If that "average" joe has a 7 Cha, he can still think of the right way to approach an angry/scared/proud/scoundrel NPC. He just won't be able to communicate those words in an effective way. Likewise for a character with 14+ Wis but a 5 Cha - she could know exactly how the Baron is trying to swindle them, but if she were to step forward and try to get around it by herself she'd end up opening by blurting out that the Baron is a swindler (and possibly ruining the whole negotiation and/or getting the PCs thrown in jail). I have no problems with players roleplaying smart even when their characters have low Charisma... but I *do* dislike players who dump Intelligence or Wisdom and then have their characters come up with, say, Command-Staff level battle plans to outflank the Hellknight forces on the back of a napkin when their Int is only an 8, or have a Wis 7 fighter wonder if when the merchant's eyes flicked to the left in the middle of the conversation if that suggested someone hiding in the store-room listening in, without making a roll to have that kind of an idea.
I hate having dump-stats on my characters unless I'm focusing on a weakness that I want to role-play, but in the PFS system it seems that sometimes one has to sacrifice some stats in order to play a concept that isn't "optimal". Say I want to play a Dwarf Musket Master who's surprisingly nimble and witty, middling in strength and health, but doesn't like to over-think things too much and has no scruples about being an arrogant bastard to pretty much anyone who isn't currently hiring him to do work for them. Once you've got a stat down to a 6 or 7 but most of your others are just "eh", the temptation to drop that one down to 5 for the extra two points *is* tempting...
Sorry for being long-winded. I did want to contribute to the discussion at-large, as well as trying to decide one way or the other on the musket master I'm toying with building :)
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I *do* dislike players who dump Intelligence or Wisdom and then have their characters come up with, say, Command-Staff level battle plans to outflank the Hellknight forces on the back of a napkin when their Int is only an 8
Well here's the thing, there's very little of that in the game. Usually the height of workable strategy is to walk around to the back of someone and flank. While that's more thought than a lot of players will put into combat, even a wolf with an intelligence of 2 knows how to do that much.
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Well here's the thing, there's very little of that in the game. Usually the height of workable strategy is to walk around to the back of someone and flank. While that's more thought than a lot of players will put into combat, even a wolf with an intelligence of 2 knows how to do that much.
That's something I'm going to have to get used to in PFS I think... I'm used to my players out-thinking the scene in front of them rather than just figuring out the tactical level of things and then leaping into action.
Heck, I've had PCs figure out a way to befriend a Mimic before (natural 20 on a paladin's diplomacy check plus a wizard present who fed the paladin information/lines during the encounter) and ended up turning it into the party mascot of sorts - *very* different than the combat I had planned for them.
I'm almost starting to wonder if that level of complexity of character-development and thought isn't really present much in PFS... I'm not saying anything bad about the caliber of people playing PFS, mind you, just that the setting as written doesn't allow for that too much (I've yet to see a post about role-play elements of a class or archetype not called "fluff", such as a Magus' Blackblade for example).
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As far as the scenarios go the players ARE allowed to talk their way out of the encounter if they're that creative/have the requisite skills. You even get the loot (somehow) if you solve an encounter through guilde or diplomacy.
might surprise you with a creative solution to an encounter
(or the entire scenario) that you didn’t see coming and that
isn’t expressly covered in the scenario. If, for example, your
players manage to roleplay their way through a combat and
successfully accomplish the goal of that encounter without
killing the antagonist, give the PCs the same reward they
would have gained had they defeated their opponent in
combat
There's fewer posts about fluff and Role playing because.. well there's very little to argue and far less to be gained from asking people with more knowledge/experience. I can't tell another person what kind of PERSON they would enjoy role playing or what the 'best' background for a character is.
I've played with a number of very different groups: one will usually consider all the options and then look at how to gain tactical advantage, set each other up to go nova, or find alternative solutions to problems. Another will just charge in and hit stuff, generally getting bored and irritated with extensive research, knowledge rolls, planning and so forth. I think this is more to do with the players than the characters, as stupid characters played by the first group will suggest storming in, but then sit quietly whilst the rest of us do the research. The latter group will get frustrated whilst I do knowledge rolls even if their characters are super smart. It's just one of those things. :-)
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And if it is a diplomacy check they are trying to make that isn’t dictated in the scenario?
Just because a Scenario doesn’t indicate you can negotiate with an NPC, doesn’t mean as GM I can’t allow it. “Sorry, you can’t negotiate with this guy, he’s a computer mob with no soul or personality, he just regurgitates the information the scenario needs him to.”
So as a GM, I would prefer to actually roleplay the encounter. You know, interact with each other based on our characters personalities, traits, and stats?
I’m fair though. If I notice as a player you aren’t very eloquent, but you are playing a Bard, I’ll let you roll and take that result, describing it as you wooing him wonderously. But if as a player you are very eloquent, but your character rarely washes and picks his nose in public, then I will likely just let the diplomacy fail without a roll, because as a player you are being disingenuous with me.
I have been sorting through this thread as I only came across it today. And I had been thinking about a friend who I consider to have low Cha, and one of the reasons is that he picks his nose. That doesn't mean that he is incapable of stopping when he is in a situation that dictates he be on his best behaviour.
Another question that I have not seen asked. If I play my 7 Cha "correctly" are you going to mitigate the penalty? That would be the only fair thing if you are going to punish for playing my Cha 7 "wrong."