1) There are many different styles for loot. Aside from actually taking stuff from the bad guys (equipped gear, handful of coins, the odd gem or jewelry), I like to make sure it fits with the story. I don't seed metallic loot if a rust monster is anywhere nearby, for example. If a bunch of orcs in a dungeon have a chest, I seed things there they wouldn't actually use, but would hang onto for its value.
Good example, I put a longsword of greater undead bane at the bottom of a pit over a tricky, trapped, narrow walkway. Next to the (aged and unpreserved) remains of what was likely a knight of some kind, if not a Paladin. It tells a story, they get a cool item, and the world as a whole seems richer for it.
That said, there's always the random method. Each monster entry will list the treasure to allocate (by CR), then you just roll down the loot table. Takes a little time, but you're more likely to come up with some off the wall neat item nobody would have thought of.
2) If you look under Craft in the Skills section, it lists the core alchemical items and DC's. Here's a link:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/craft
I think to distribute loot is I like to think of one nice thing to give to multiple characters when placing the treasure like maybe a masterwork weapon at first level some armor like breastplate and spend the rest on a few coins and some npc gear and maybe give some healing items at first. I think if someone inherits a magic item or problem you can get a magic item as a story reward works well.
I must follow this thread. I have so many similar questions. No answers though... sorry.
I'm still curious and confused about the whole treasure thing actually. I think I need to read over the rules more carefully.
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Hit Dice is usually equal, for player charcaters and many NPCs, to level. Not sure what needs to be explained about it. First level gives maximum hit points for the hit die, additional levels, whether in the same class or a different one, only allows a roll for how many are gained. NPCs typically get "average" rolls for their hit dice, and so do non-classed creatures.
Alchemy allows the creation of non-magical items, like alchemical fire, acid, weapon blanches, and the like. It is cheaper in money, but more exp-ensive in time, to create the items yourself.
Wands: Any spell of appropriate level (wands have a level limit of 4th level spells, no higher level spells can be put in a wand) can be put in a wand, but a wand only casts a single spell.
Scrolls: Any spell can be put on a scroll, but. like the wand, the caster making the scroll needs to already have the spell in their spellbook or known spells.
Crafting, for alchemy, has a list of the various mundane items in the CRB.
Crafting for magical items, has a general, basic list in the Magic Item section.
Ehh, mundane crafting is kinda broken in PF. Someone on the forums counted it up. It takes a level 20 character with max ranks in craft and int something like half a year to craft a suit of adamantine fullplate; which is silly.
Conversely, a level 1 commoner with no ranks in craft can literally touch a tree and have it transform into an infinite number of clubs.
The way I run it, if a character invests enough ranks into a craft skill to pass the craft check while taking 10, I let him have the item for 1/3rd price. I set the craft time to something that seems reasonable and get on with adventuring. I figure that investing some skill points is expensive enough at low levels, and at high levels the gold they save by crafting is a pittance compared to their wealth.
I think you should tackle these questions one at a time. When you are 100% clear on the 1st one, move on to the next.
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For the 1st question I would read the section "Building a Treasure Hoard" in the the Gamemastering chapter of the Core Rule Book.
Then use the Table: Treasure Values Per Encounter to build a sample hoard.
Try a minotaur. He's CR 4 so you have 1150 GP to spend on treasure. Mix it up with some coins, gems, maybe a couple potions. Once you do it once you will feel confident that you can do it any time.
Sorry if this advice is too basic or already covered by other posters above me, this is just what worked for me.
I going to respond to the first one, because I have spent a lot of time looking into loot distribution systems, and also, I don't really understand the craft rules either.
There are a variety of ways to control loot, and while there are definitely some that make more sense than others, it really depends on the group as for which one you want. I would sit down and discuss with your group which one piques their interest. I'll spoiler them below, and they're not in any real order. The names are made up as I'm writing this.
The assumptions on these is:
1) Everyone in the party is, for the most part, wanting to split loot as evenly as possible (which is not always true, if you have a greedy character [or even player] or if the party wants to gear out the tank first)
2) Loot as a whole is split into two groups: items and gold, with gold being a universal term for currency. All items will be valued at half their market price, as that is what they are sold at (thus are worth to the party), though you could easily value them at full price.
The basis for this one is pretty simple. Basically, you keep a "loot order list," and every time you sit down to divvy up loot, the person currently at the top of the list gets to pick an item or can take gold equal to most expensive item in the pile. If there's nothing they want, they can pass, in order to remain higher on the list.
Using this method allows players to barter with their picks. Say, you have a monk who's eying those bracers of armor +1, but he's last on the list, he might offer the cleric who is at the top of the list some sort of favor, gold, an item to trade,or even multiple future picks, whatever they can agree to. This can be interesting, to see what people value items at.
One possible serious downside to this method is the players' mentality towards each other and loot in general. I played with a group with this once, and we had a bit of a selfish player who fell on the bottom of the list. He started just picking items when his turn came around, which always kept him on the bottom, but he was then just turning around and selling them for his own profit, instead of letting the item get liquidated and then the gold split evenly.
One alternative to this is instead of keeping a list always, instead essentially use an "initiative order," where everyone rolls a d20 and the highest goes first.
This is the most universally used system, I think. It's simple: choose who would benefit most from an item. That +1 flaming bastard sword is definitely going to be better for the party's fighter than it is for the wizard. You probably will run into some problems where some gear overlap comes into play, and while some of those are solved easier than others (such as that bastard sword going to either the fighter or the barbarian will probably end after a party vote or a compelling argument from one side), you can have role overlap (such as having two finesse rogues fighting over a rapier) or items that are universally useful (i.e. cloak of resistance). It's always an option to put this to a d20 roll when you have a conflict, but make sure the party accepts that the conflict is worthwhile - the greedy characters don't deserve a shot at everything that drops because they can make up some random reason why they need X item.
This system is not perfect, though. Wands almost always go to the casters (with maybe the occasional odd one going to a UMD'r), for example. Also, if you use random treasure, you run modules or APs, or whatever else might cause it, you might end up accidentally overgearing just one or two players. In my experience, this method works best when the GM gives out gear he intends and keeps track of what everyone has, so you know who needs to get the next few drops.
This is actually the 100% most fair way of handling loot but also takes away from what loot is to a party.
Everything that drops is instantly turned into gold. Then divide the gold evenly. You might occasionally keep in items, such as plot-central ones, ones that have some sort of meaning (like the dagger that the rogue's brother had when the party was forced to kill him), or maybe just fun ones that the party might not buy or have access to otherwise (Deck of Many Things, anyone?).
I LOVE finding heaps of loot as a player, digging through it and finding the stuff that your enemies tried to use to kill you, and you lose this feeling when you say, "Well, there is yet another pile of gold where those armor sets were. Have at it."
Also, you pretty much are forced to run a Magic Mart in this method - the party goes to a town, flips through the books for items they want, then custom orders everything they want. A lot of people don't like this, and while I am not particularly opposed to this, there are times you might want the party to have to work with what they got, and if all they find is gold, they will be forced to retreat at times in order to maintain their strength.
This is one, like the Gold, Gold, And More Gold method, breaks verisimilitude in exchange for the fairness of the system. This one also requires you to keep lists of what each character has on them. You, as the GM, decides what each character should get and gives it directly to them. You can control just how much each character gets, and you don't have to worry about squabbles.
However, you sort of lose that same feeling of finding stuff, it feels sort of contrived, and really, without doing wishlists (see below), you might give them stuff they aren't interested in.
A lot of groups like to have wish lists for the players. Just items that the player wants their character to happen upon. Usually, this stuff is eventually bought, but they'd like to see it drop soon, so they don't have to take the time to save up for it. This can be applied to most of the above systems without changing how they work fundamentally.
This is fun, sure, since you get to gear out your character as you want them to be, but this does two things I don't like:
1) Takes away from the immersion. Finding exactly what you asked for does not have a very organic feel. Some groups don't care about this, and if yours is like this, then go for it, but the more I play this game, the more I care less about perfection in the system and more about the roleplay, so that's just me.
2) Sometimes, a character happens upon an item that entirely changes the vision for their character. Maybe it's a flaming weapon that makes that martial dude become fire-themed, maybe it's a wand of minor image that makes the mage realize just how much he likes illusion magic, it can be whatever. Sometimes, and maybe even most of the time, the party will just toss aside stuff that they're not interested in, but it's great to find new strategies or developing character concepts, etc. etc.
Those are the ones that I can remember off the top of my head. You can do Google searches and turn up dozens of ways people have come up with to handle loot stuff.
Another question, if I want someone to roll perception or something like that, do I have the entire party roll or just a particular person. If just one person, how do I determine which person this is?
Personally, I usually have the party roll 5-10 perception checks at the beginning of the session and check them off as we go, telling people when they notice things based on the rolls made earlier. That way people aren't "on edge" whenever they enter a forest/etc because I had them make a perception check.
As for having one person roll or all people roll ... it depends on the situation. If only one character is in position to perceive then only one person should roll. I've also considered the idea of having a 'party perception' roll based on relative perception ranks of group members, their level of awareness (are they just strolling through town not thinking ... or actively hunting for someone and looking everywhere?) ... but often I let everyone roll their own perception if they are all involved and able to perceive.
Yet another question, is about the time lapse. If someone want so take, say a week in game to do something, is there likewise sort of way to track that, or is it just like "ok a week passes"? What are ways to combat this or is this acceptable?
You're on your own for declaring the passage of time. If there's nothing going on (such as goblin invasion, princess was kidnapped and about to be sacrificed, etc) ... you can feel free to just say "a week passes". Sometimes you may want to mix things up ... make things happen during the passage of time ... that's fine too. Really, that part is all up to you.
1. What's a good way to determine what loot to distribute?
1 - Look at the average wealth by level chart.
2 - multiply that wealth by the number of people in your party.
3 - Divide that wealth by the number of adventures you want to run between levels.
4 - Disperse the per-adventure wealth result throughout each of your adventures as it most makes sense. Should goblins carry a few silver? Does a wizard have Dust of Disappearance in his lab? etc.
Example: 4 players, 1st level, 3 adventures to 2nd level.
Average wealth at 2nd level: 1,000 gp
x 4 players = 4,000 gp
/ 3 adventures = 1,333 gp per adventure.
... now, split that into gold, silver, copper, gems, random jewelry or ornaments (silver cups? ornate paintings?) and magic items (potions are great for early levels) based on the adventure at hand.
I don't remember seeing that in the GMG, where was it?
I have my monsters use some of their loot, maybe even burn through some of the consumables like potions. So my PC's can get whatever they have on them as soon as its possible to loot the bodies. Of course some treasure will be horded away in a layer sometimes.
I've been wondering the same thing...so being a somewhat new GM myself, this is what I have been doing.
I look at the creatures relative intelligence. If the intelligence is "high" (and high is totally a judgment call on my part) than I will use the monster more strategically against my PCs. If it's low, than I will try to be as mindless as possible and attack my PCs with abandon. On a similar note (and this happened in our very first battle), if the PC's set themselves up hoping for AoO, then similarly, if the monster is as dumb as a brick, I will have no problem walking right into the PC's "trap." But if its higher, than I skirt around the problem somehow.
That's what I do anyway. I'd love to hear others' thoughts on this.
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Play an AP until you get the hang of things...APs are all premade and generated so you will have minimal work to do. Then when you see how other people put things together move on to more of doing your own thing. Most APs only run to like level 12, so maybe you can continue the story after that.
The benefit to APs is they may need a few fine tuning tweaks but even your monsters come with stat blocks and explanations on how they should act and strategize in battle.
Just thought of another of my biggest, involving combat. Is there a specific way to determine agro? In other words, how do I know which players the monster or creature should attack? Is there a threat range or table?
AGRO is probably not the appropriate word to use. It reeks too much of MMORPGs and Video games.
You should think MOTIVATION. Are the orcs more motivated to attack the barbarian that is charging at them or the tiny gnome in the back that is waving his hands about. Probably the barbarian, even though the caster will wind up being more deadly.
Are the Skeletons motivated to attack the rogue that is picking the lcok of the chest they are tasked with guarding or are they goign to attack the Druids animal companion.
It's a pen and paper RPG not a video game.
Treat all your NPCs as if they didn't get the message that they are not the main characters of the story.
I am not sure what AGRO is but I tend to play monsters and NPC's based on their Intellagence, Motivates, Goals, and what they know from their own senses.
Animals even Magical animals tend to have more simple mindsets and thus simpler motivations and goals. For example: Where is my next meal coming from, is it a threat, can I escape or do i need to defend my young to my death?
Low Intellagentance Creatures Like Orcs, Goblins Etc. Will have some level of preplaning added to the mix. The also tend to have leaders with more skill or experance that can add to the chalange. In my mind there is a big differance between a fight with 10 orcs using a cave as a short trem camp and the same ten orcs as the first guards of the orc lords cave lair.
Normal Intellagentance Creatures such as any player char race etc. Will be even better at planing and looking for the advantage in a fight.
Now we get to the High Intellagenagence Creatures. these are the ones that may have minds that are so smart that they are beyond our own level in real thinking and will know more and plan better then we really can for them. This will add to the chalage of them in an encounter, but even more as a long running villian.
Has anyone ever thought about changing the length of the week in their homebrew settings to make craft better? like make it maybe 4 days maybe one for the four elemental planes.
Treasure Generation: There are several online treasure generators that you can use. Maybe roll a couple hoards and pick the one you like best. Then you can use what is in the hoard to get ideas about how the items got there, who would use them, what sort of challenges to build into the dungeon, or even the next one.
Thanks! Yeah I think my videogame mind is at the forefront. I never really though about motivation before.
Also, I was wondering if there are special combat tactics like particular body shots? Meaning that if a player targets an opponents leg or arm, is there any sort of effect on the defeating creature? Can they drop their weapons, or be hindered with movement? Or do these qualify as combat maneuvers?
I do not think there are called or placed shots in the Pathfinder system. I may be wrong. Much of what you described can fall under combat maneuvers. Striking at a leg to knock them prove, that's a trip same as being tripped with a whip or knocked over by a tiger. Knocking out weapons is a disarm. Also Grappling, pinning and bull rushing can all affect a characters movement or even placement on the map.
I might suggest you head down to your local gaming store and see if they run Pathfinder Society games on a regular basis. A lot of these questions and a good deal of experience with the game can be gotten by joining as a player and maybe even GM. They are always looking for GMs. All the players I've met through the game are very knowledgable and helpful.
From your posts it sounds like you have little experiecne with the game and it's mechanics so PFS games can really help you see the rules "in action" and easier to understand by doing rather then reading.
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Thanks! Yeah I think my videogame mind is at the forefront. I never really though about motivation before.
Also, I was wondering if there are special combat tactics like particular body shots? Meaning that if a player targets an opponents leg or arm, is there any sort of effect on the defeating creature? Can they drop their weapons, or be hindered with movement? Or do these qualify as combat maneuvers?
I do not think there are called or placed shots in the Pathfinder system. I may be wrong. Much of what you described can fall under combat maneuvers. Striking at a leg to knock them prove, that's a trip same as being tripped with a whip or knocked over by a tiger. Knocking out weapons is a disarm. Also Grappling, pinning and bull rushing can all affect a characters movement or even placement on the map.
I might suggest you head down to your local gaming store and see if they run Pathfinder Society games on a regular basis. A lot of these questions and a good deal of experience with the game can be gotten by joining as a player and maybe even GM. They are always looking for GMs. All the players I've met through the game are very knowledgable and helpful.
From your posts it sounds like you have little experiecne with the game and it's mechanics so PFS games can really help you see the rules "in action" and easier to understand by doing rather then reading.
Called shots are in Ultimate Combat.
Its a really bland system IMO but it is in there along with Piece Armor, Wounds as Fatigue and Armor as Damage Reduction.
Also, to edit in here...seriously man play an Adventure Path. Pick an early one with little variant like Council of Thieves and run that. It all takes place in one city, has all the stuff planned including loot, and will take around 1-1.5 years to run through if you play 4 hours weekly. APs make first time GMing MUCH MUCH MUCH easier, and if you like adding a little of your own flair to things you can still change things for fun.