Because after reading CheshireElf's off-hand comment, I think that those would be awesome. 8)
The Bottom Line
I had a vision of how it could maybe work, going through the Paizo website up to twice. First, the DM fills out a web form that creates a PDF chronicle sheet that is watermarked in a specific way, and then added to both his and the player's downloads. Then, the player maybe fills out a different web form that completes the rest of it and watermarks it in a different way. But just a sec.
The Forum Placement Defense
This thread totally belongs in this forum, because I'll be talking about things that only the website peeps could do. Not the PFS ones. Thanks!!
(Sorry about that, but I've experienced that threads tend to be moved according to philosophical considerations of tidiness of logical organization, rather than practical considerations of who reads what forum and would like to read what thread.) So. Back to the topic at hand!
From the Top
PFS chronicles are PDFs that are watermarked with the purchaser's paizo.com #, name, email address, and date of purchase. However, the chronicle sheets at the end are not watermarked with those identifiers; they're something to be given away, not kept. They're also not form-fillable, which is reasonable on two counts: they're designed to be printed out for tabletop play, where you can just fill them in with a pen; and I've been given to understand that forms compromise the security of a PDF.
There are many different kinds of remote play, from internet chat and messageboard posts to webcams and virtual tabletops. (Sometime around 1990, I actually played a one-on-one Champions/Terminator mash-up one-shot over the phone; it went fine until the end, when I had an incredible string of great rolls, and the GM didn't believe it. Modern tech FTW!) The question is, how to distribute chronicle sheets afterward?
When I finished a PbP of First Steps Part I, my DM printed out the chronicle sheet, filled it in by hand, scanned it, turned it into a pdf, and emailed it to me. In order to finish that sheet, I'll have to print it out and fill it out by hand; then, for another PbP DM to see it, I'd have to scan it and email it. I think that you can make a better way. The key is that every PFS character has to be registered on the paizo.com website anyway.
I can already look at my PFS character's Sessions tab and see where my DM entered the date, event, session, GM, scenario, player, character, faction, prestige points, and notes. There's very little more that you'd need to ask for. (Entering GP gained? Crossing off items that were not found during the scenario? What else do GMs do to a sheet?) Suppose that you then generate a PDF for that scenario's chronicle sheet, merely modifying the original based on the form. (I've never tried to work programmatically with PDFs, so please forgive me if that isn't anywhere near as easy as I make it sound. But there's always a work-around for everything.) Then, you watermark it at the top with the GM's name, PFS #, and date of creation, and add it to the downloads of both the GM and player.
One possibility is that the player prints it out and fills it out by hand like an old-fashioned chronicle sheet. Alternatively, when the player completes an online form for the rest, then that updates the download and watermarks it at the bottom of the page with the player's name, character's name, PFS #, and date of update. But it would really be a PITA to have all those on the Downloads page, when the only place where you need them is in a column on the Sessions tab.
What I'm picturing is a record of a remote session that you could print out and take to a tabletop game, and the DM there could trust. If the player also filled it out digitally, then it would be equally accessible to online DMs; the only sticking point there would be somehow uploading chronicle sheets that were filled out by hand at a tabletop game. Also, for those characters with purely digitally-maintained records, I have a hazy vision of far-distant future upgrades to how those could be accessed and viewed. Finally -- and there might not even be any demand for it -- but I can also picture a future possibility of exposing hooks for other sites (like third-party VTTs) to submit all that info after collecting it in their own UI, and then there's a Paypal-like re-direct and you take the user's password directly.
I look forward to thoughtful replies! For the TL;DR crowd, I put the bottom line at the top. Hope that helps.
ETA: On second thought, I think that it would be better to require that a digitally-prepared chronicle sheet be completed digitally by the player too. Otherwise, you could re-print it and fill out your part differently later, which is something that you can't do with hand-written ones. Probably best to keep things on an even playing field.
Keep in mind, I in no way speak for Paizo- I'm just a peon like yourself.
The only issue I see, if I understand your proposal correctly, is that you are asking Paizo to add bytes and bytes and bytes of data to its system for no purpose other than to support online PFS.
And, bytes and bytes and bytes of data stored costs a good chunk of cash, especially if it starts to get used alot. (and who wouldn't want their CS's stored online by paizo? its the perfect safe spot).
If it got to be too big (as determined by Paizo) they'd have to charge for it and then you have them charging for online PFS but not for table top PFS.. and so far as I can tell at least they've been fairly studious about never charging to play. In fact, aside from 1 sheet of paper and a pencil you never *have* to buy a dang thing to play PFS. (not that they don't want you to buy the books, or encourage it.. but its not strictly a requirement as long as your critter only uses the CRB you never have to buy a thing.)
Now it could be that the amounts you are talking about data wise are so small as to be inconsequential.. but 4-7 documents for every game online seems like quite abit especially added up over time.
(3 per level up to 12 levels and then all the modules and whatever goes along with it, assuming they don't quit or die.)
Alternate solution?
I'm not entirely sure I have one, to be honest.
Since most online games are done typing, or at least with typing capability, you could have the DM fill out the entire sheet- even the stuff the player might normally fill in. this gives you *one* sheet as a PDF that the player can just store on his computer ready to toss out to another DM as necessary.
And if someone was going to be doing alot of online play they could certainly look into any of the myriad of free web hostings out there to toss their PDF's up onto for any given DM to browse through at their leisure. For that matter- the entire rest of the character could be tossed up on there as well.
(and for *that* matter scanning in your character sheets and chronicles and storing them in that fashion isn't a terribly bad back-up whether you play online or not. logging in to a site and clicking "print" is easier than tracking down a DM you may have gamed under 2 years ago- thats for sure)
-S
The only issue I see, if I understand your proposal correctly, is that you are asking Paizo to add bytes and bytes and bytes of data to its system for no purpose other than to support online PFS.
And, bytes and bytes and bytes of data stored costs a good chunk of cash, especially if it starts to get used alot. (and who wouldn't want their CS's stored online by paizo? its the perfect safe spot).
Nope. Disk space, aka data storage, is the cheapest part of the issue. See THIS as an example.
-- david
Papa.DRB
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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The real constraint isn't storage space, or bandwidth, it's time.
Paizo has a fairly small crew of bit tamers and a monstrous pile of projects, many of which are as awesome as this, some are even more awesome.
A project has to be more than just cool or awesome, it has to be more cool and awesome* than enough other potential projects in the hopper.
Oh trust me, I'm very much aware of the time constraints. This is just me getting a vision out of my head. And maybe someday, after having been refined by criticism, other people's visions, more criticism, and then some bright spark figuring out how to deal with *those* problems -- or perhaps a few years after that -- then it might actually be the coolest idea on the table.
...
Dangit! I didn't want to describe my "hazy vision of far-distant future upgrades to how those [purely digitally-maintained records] could be accessed and viewed", because it isn't anywhere near ready for prime time. But it's going to be stuck in my head until I get it out. :(
It would be nice if the Status tab were pretty, but mostly it has to be easy to find things on it, since it's really there as pre-audited record that GMs can trust. When my remote sessions are digitally submitted by a PFS GM, I have some more things to do, like spending prestige or buying items; fortunately, there's a Download menu option right next to the Upload one, so I can easily update my character in Hero Lab. Then I make my changes, and upload him again to update the Status tab with my sales and purchases. On paizo.com, I check the box for that character's Status to be available to other programs. Then, when I'm getting ready to play the next scenario on some VTT -- maybe a 3rd-party one, that tracks lots of stats -- it only takes a few clicks and typing in the alias, and whammo there he is.
Whew! I am so glad to have that out of my head. Now I can forget about it, and get on with my day.
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I play lots of online PFS and I think that this is a non-problem and not worthy of paizo's time when they have so many other things that need doing.
When I DM online, I print the chronicle sheet virtually out of the senario to another PDF file and open it in Photoshop to write in all the information. This eliminates the scanning on my end and is the exact same amount of work as filling out a physical chronicle for a real table.
From a previous online gaming group, I got a completely blank, form fill-able chronicle sheet, which is useful. Paizo no longer endorses completely blank chronicles though.
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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I would prefer the chronicles were 100% digital myself. Players show up at a game and the GM would scan a character QR code, the GM could review the character's past chronicles if he desires and when the session finishes up, he just scans the QR again and enters the relevant session info and rewards. Players could print out chronicles when they get home or reference on the digital device of his choice.
Carrying around a binder with 100+ pages of chronicles is a PITA and keeping track of all that junk is one of my frustrations with PFS.
If we're going to go digital with chronicles, no half steps for online players only. There should also be a paper back up for ludites and places where internet access isn't available.
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That ties in with another idea I've been chewing on for a few months.
Just about all the gaming sessions and conventions I've been to use Warhorn for signup for PFS games. But all that nice digital data doesn't play nicely with the PFS reporting system. I'd love to see everything working together so when a judge/GM sat down at a table there already was a pre-generated signup sheet. Obviously there would have to be some way to make corrections, etc., but if the five players you were expecting showed up (with the characters they'd indicated) there wouldn't be anything else to fill in.
Similarly, at the end of the session, a lot of the (virtual) paperwork could be done automatically. The subtier would, of course, be the same for each character, so a default character sheet (full GP & XP for the advancement track of the character, every item found) would be easy. Fame/Prestige is only a little more complicated; while season 3 or later scenarios just need a single checkbox, some of the older scenarios need to be able to award 0, 1 or 2PP independent of the XP earned.
Obviously there's a lot more to be done to round out the details (sanctioned modules, assignment of players/judges to an appropriate table when there are multiple tables running simultaneously, etc.). But there is an opportunity to streamline the process considerably.
Really, there needs to be a digital solution for PFS chronicles, especially with the Game Space coming up. Whether the OP's vision is the one or not, a more elegant solution than the "kludgy scanning/email" is a must as we move forward. Naturally this solution would work with hard copies.
...Keep in mind, I in no way speak for Paizo- I'm just a peon like yourself.
The only issue I see, if I understand your proposal correctly, is that you are asking Paizo to add bytes and bytes and bytes of data to its system for no purpose other than to support online PFS.
And, bytes and bytes and bytes of data stored costs a good chunk of cash, especially if it starts to get used alot. (and who wouldn't want their CS's stored online by paizo? its the perfect safe spot).
If it got to be too big (as determined by Paizo) they'd have to charge for it and then you have them charging for online PFS but not for table top PFS.. and so far as I can tell at least they've been fairly studious about never charging to play. In fact, aside from 1 sheet of paper and a pencil you never *have* to buy a dang thing to play PFS. (not that they don't want you to buy the books, or encourage it.. but its not strictly a requirement as long as your critter only uses the CRB you never have to buy a thing.)
Now it could be that the amounts you are talking about data wise are so small as to be inconsequential.. but 4-7 documents for every game online seems like quite abit especially added up over time.
(3 per level up to 12 levels and then all the modules and whatever goes along with it, assuming they don't quit or die.)Alternate solution?
I'm not entirely sure I have one, to be honest.Since most online games are done typing, or at least with typing capability, you could have the DM fill out the entire sheet- even the stuff the player might normally fill in. this gives you *one* sheet as a PDF that the player can just store on his computer ready to toss out to another DM as necessary.
And if someone was going to be doing alot of online play they could certainly look into any of the myriad of free web hostings out there to toss their PDF's up onto for any given DM to browse through at their leisure. For that matter- the entire rest of the character could be tossed up on there as well.
(and for
Poke fun.. But you are also talking about the opportunity cost of creating it, maintaining it, and actually paying for the space- however cheap it may be. And you are talking about doing so, so that a DM doesn't have to hit a scanner and press an e-mail button. Not saying its a terrible idea- but that all things have a cost even if its just the cost of not having the salaried guy be doing something else.
Which is just another way of saying what Dennis Baker already said, above.
-S
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I think a lot of people don't understand that the way they play PFS isn't the majority. IME, across a couple of states, Warhorn is used by maybe 25% of the organizers. And it's not at all inclusive for new players. Likewise, gaming sites with internet access aren't that common and printing facilities are less so.
And no, digital record-keeping will not replace printed Chronicles anytime soon. I had an event which was submitted, showed up in my history and then disappeared. (My guess is that the DM deleted his Paizo account because he was so disgusted by the hack and slash PFS players and the table disappeared). WotC has tried for years to force digital records and they can't make it stick either.
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WotC has tried for years to force digital records and they can't make it stick either.
I'm not suggesting digital record keeping is a one-size-fits-all solution for everybody. But if digital information already exists (Warhorn signups at one end, paizo.com Pathfinder Society records at the other, and sometimes even an event organizer database in between) it just strikes me as a bit ridiculous that the only way to get data from one part to another is to have a person copy information from one printout to different boxes on another piece of paper (not to mention scanning and emailing the resulting document). Not only is this inefficient - it introduces an opportunity for human error, which pretty much guarantees mistakes will be made.
We depend on event coordinators and all the other volunteers for our PFS sessions; I'd like to at least think about what tools they could be given to make the best use of their time.
