RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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See, this is something I think both players and GMs forget sometimes. Good to see it brought up.
The PFS Field Guide is Core Assumption, and has (for instance) a whole section that basically amounts to "You're going to fight undead at some point; here's the basics." I'm sorry, but not a single Pathfinder is going to look at a standard undead creature and think it's just some guy with hygiene issues or whatever. Unless measures are taken to disguise an undead creature, or there's a specific reason it looks alive, I'm going to run my tables with the assumption that everyone can immediately identify it as an undead creature without a check, and know the basic undead traits. They'll need a Knowledge check to know what kind it is, whether or not it's mindless, what its attack forms or special defenses are, etc. But they'll know it counts as undead and can be harmed by positive energy and holy water.
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See, this is something I think both players and GMs forget sometimes. Good to see it brought up.
The PFS Field Guide is Core Assumption, and has (for instance) a whole section that basically amounts to "You're going to fight undead at some point; here's the basics." I'm sorry, but not a single Pathfinder is going to look at a standard undead creature and think it's just some guy with hygiene issues or whatever. Unless measures are taken to disguise an undead creature, or there's a specific reason it looks alive, I'm going to run my tables with the assumption that everyone can immediately identify it as an undead creature without a check, and know the basic undead traits. They'll need a Knowledge check to know what kind it is, whether or not it's mindless, what its attack forms or special defenses are, etc. But they'll know it counts as undead and can be harmed by positive energy and holy water.
I would assume that this kind of information was a DC 5 Knowledge check for trained Pathfinders (like identifying a goblin). This means it can be rolled untrained and almost everyone will remember it in battle except those with 7 Int (and even most of those).
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I was just wondering whether it would make sense for me to note the creatures my characters encountered on their chronicle sheets. Seems silly for me to roll a Knowledge check to identify something I fought one level ago.
Perhaps more to your point, when time isn't a factor, there's no reason a group of Pathfinders can't spend a couple hours in the archive to prepare for any anticipated threats. In a recent adventure, we were warned that we would likely encounter harpies. We got a decent knowledge check and realized that stocking up on earplugs might be wise. Now I've got a bunch and I'm prepared for my next nest of harpies.
Most of what you're preparing for are things that would seem to be common sense in the world of Golarion. I should know how to deal with things that fly, or things that can confuse or dominate me, or things with reach. Why wouldn't a reasonably intelligent adventurer have plans for such contingencies?
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I would wager if you are fighting a skeleton or zombie, it would be easy to tell they are a skeleton or zombie. But a roll might need to be made to determine the skeleton was a skeletal champion or the zombie was a fast zombie (or one that exploded).
If you take copious notes of your character's exploits then I'll let your character make pre-emptive choices on how he approaches a combat or location. (i.e. if he assumes harpies are in a place, and he's been through a scenario with harpies, then he likely knows they sing, and that's bad, so purchasing ear plugs or whatever and using them would be fine.)
But if Bob is playing with his character Muffin, and it was his character Lopsy that ran into a rhemoraz, then Muffin would have no reason to purchase that potion of resist energy electricity unless something else informed muffin to do so.
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I am on the overall with Jiggy on this for somethings, some times undead don't look like undead. Context is king here that we might be able to know what type of creature that is but on the overall we don't know jack unless we make the knowledge roll.
I was just wondering whether it would make sense for me to note the creatures my characters encountered on their chronicle sheets. Seems silly for me to roll a Knowledge check to identify something I fought one level ago.
I believe this assumes that our characters have a perfect memory and are not finite. That is the beauty of the knowledge system; that there is a chance that you know what the monster is or that you remember fighting that monster. If we're studying for exam, we're not going to recall everything we study for and so knowledge checks work in the same way.
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I have often wondered if there is a grade below identifying the creature that would tell you just the type. I have an Inquisitor who only really needs to know what she should set her Bane to. The name of the creature and its abilities are just icing. Luckily, I usually succeed on my knowledge checks, but it's rough when I don't and there is no doubt the thing is an aberration, but I can't metagame it.
I know that usually someone at the table can help out, but this feeds into the first example. You may be able to recognize a tank but not know its armaments or weaknesses in its armor. For some, just knowing it's a tank is enough.
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If the very shape and description of it screams "aberration", I don't see how it's metagaming to declare your bane against aberrations. Similarly, the difference between a standard zombie and a standard skeleton is obvious, and should not require any check to choose the appropriate weapon.
Harpies are a little farther away from goblins, skeletons or zombies. However, I certainly don't think it would be far off for a character to have earplugs "just in case of harpies", even if he couldn't tell the difference between a harpie and a manticore. Maybe he puts in his earplugs whenever he encounters flying beasts?
RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8
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I was just wondering whether it would make sense for me to note the creatures my characters encountered on their chronicle sheets. Seems silly for me to roll a Knowledge check to identify something I fought one level ago.
My chronicler bard does this, and whenever we get into combat and he rolls to identify, even if he doesn't get more than a name from the kind of creature, he's then still able to cry out useful bits of information.
"By the Gods... another Glabrezu? Don't listen to any of his lies, friends! He's a demon of treachery and chaos! Last I battled one of these, he stunned the fighter with a single word and sent the cleric into the stratosphere by cancelling gravity!"
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I am on the overall with Jiggy on this for somethings, some times undead don't look like undead. Context is king here that we might be able to know what type of creature that is but on the overall we don't know jack unless we make the knowledge roll.
I was just wondering whether it would make sense for me to note the creatures my characters encountered on their chronicle sheets. Seems silly for me to roll a Knowledge check to identify something I fought one level ago.I believe this assumes that our characters have a perfect memory and are not finite. That is the beauty of the knowledge system; that there is a chance that you know what the monster is or that you remember fighting that monster. If we're studying for exam, we're not going to recall everything we study for and so knowledge checks work in the same way.
Granted, but I also think it's fair to assume that my Barbarian will not soon forget her encounter with a Remorhaz. Practical experience with a giant heat worm tends to sink in a lot better than reading about it in a dusty pathfinder chronicle.
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My point for this thread was that we all hear the same tales - all our PCs talk to each other.
"Thing to remember about meeting Harpies Lad - they sing and you just stop doing stuff. Stuff wax in your ears, or anything to keep from listenin' to 'em." My PC may not be able to recognize them... Heck, I might just be stuffing my ears with wax if I encounter a Gargoyle, but I'm not going to go, "Harpies you say? aren't those the flying ladies with lovely voices? Yeah. Special Attacks? Have no idea lad, didn't make my roll."
The thing is, our PCs should be TRAINED for this. Heck, they ARE. I resently saw a list of DCs for knowing things about Ghouls. The fact that they Paralyze people was 3rd or so on the list - you had to beat the knowledge DC by 10 before the judge would tell you this. What? Heck, any adventurer as an instuctor in the Lodge is going to mention Ghouls and the fact they paralyze by touch. It's the most common undead after Skeletons and Zombies, and the first intelegent one.
V.O. Ardenson looks over the cadets. "Kawolski, what's this?" he points at the illusion of a creature before them.
"IT'S A GHOUL, DRILL INSTRUCTOR!"
"And what do you know about ghouls?"
"PARALYZEING TOUCH, DRILL INSTRUCTOR!"
"What else?"
"AHHH... Undead? yeah! UNDEAD, DRILL INSTRUCTOR!"
"Maybe there's hope you'll last a week in the field... maybe."
You walk a fine line in doing this, however, as one could extend the claim to perhaps encompass all creatures in existence. Knowledge checks are a simple way to determine how well your character paid attention during those drills and training exercises. I mean, I've run and played so many scenarios that at this point, if we see a monster, I could have my character rattle off a legitimate scenario where such a monster appeared before, "Oh I remember hearing about this one from reading the chronicles about that mission in X. It's abilities are Y". But if I don't have any knowledge skills to back it up, how is that at all fair to the player who invested the resources into taking those skills?
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Granted, but I also think it's fair to assume that my Barbarian will not soon forget her encounter with a Remorhaz. Practical experience with a giant heat worm tends to sink in a lot better than reading about it in a dusty pathfinder chronicle.
To me, that's the difference between a DC 5 untrained knowledge check and a DC 10 + CR check that can only be made trained.
If your barbarian is really stupid or just having a brain fart at the moment, he really could forget the details when he faces the same type of beast a second time.
"Hey! I killed one a these once! What was it called again? Is this the one that breathes fire, or has heat comin' from its belly? But I know it looks familiar!"
depends on the creature.
I'm pretty sure EVERYONE knows what a dragon and goblin is.
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Slippery slope, assuming characters should have learned certain things in training. See the Lamplighter Creed for an example of the stuff that I think Pathfinders "should" know based on the fact that they went though this training.
But the campaign has chosen to not limit character choices by requiring this background be incorporated into a character's stats. Fine. But you can't have it both ways - either you learned stuff in training, or you didn't. You can't say you didn't, and spend you skill points on whatever you want and dump Int and Cha, and then claim you should get what amounts to free skill points in Knowledge skills because of all your training and experience.
The Knowledge system is abstract, but easily-definable RAW. Keeping track of monsters you fought assumes a) that your character has eidetic memory, and b) that the enemy used every one of its abilities and you were able to identify them and their effects. We can't ask GMs to track that, or to look back at Chronicle sheets to see what monsters you get to know for free.
tl;dr: if you want to be able to identify monsters, put skill points into Knowledge skills.
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Granted, but I also think it's fair to assume that my Barbarian will not soon forget her encounter with a Remorhaz. Practical experience with a giant heat worm tends to sink in a lot better than reading about it in a dusty pathfinder chronicle.To me, that's the difference between a DC 5 untrained knowledge check and a DC 10 + CR check that can only be made trained.
If your barbarian is really stupid or just having a brain fart at the moment, he really could forget the details when he faces the same type of beast a second time.
"Hey! I killed one a these once! What was it called again? Is this the one that breathes fire, or has heat comin' from its belly? But I know it looks familiar!"
Perhaps with a healthy circumstance bonus to remember it can swallow whole.
Actually, that could be a perfectly reasonable answer: having encountered the creature before would credibly add a circumstance bonus to a knowledge check.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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For those GMs thinking that granting any "auto-knowledge" at all is a questionable idea, I ask this:
Do your NPCs make knowledge checks to realize they shouldn't try scorching ray or hold person on tiefling PCs, or to know that all those human PCs will be blinded by a deeper darkness?
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For those GMs thinking that granting any "auto-knowledge" at all is a questionable idea, I ask this:
Do your NPCs make knowledge checks to realize they shouldn't try scorching ray or hold person on tiefling PCs, or to know that all those human PCs will be blinded by a deeper darkness?
Nope. They try it anyways, and if it doesn't work, such is life. If the tactics say they try deeper darkness, then they try deeper darkness. If they want to cast scorching ray, they will. Its not my job to make the NPCs win. Its to provide a credible fight in which they lose but make it look cool.
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Does identifying a CR 1/2 enemy count as a DC 11 Knowledge check? Is a spellcaster without Knowledge (Local) screwed when casting sleep against elves?
I would argue Elves are common, so 5+. Remember that for Knowledge checks a result of 10 can be achieved with no ranks, even though it's trained only.
Also monster knowledge checks are 10+CR for normal, 5+CR for common and 15+CR for rare.Where exactly to draw those lines is up to the GM, but remembering that commons creatures of CR 5 or less are potentially knowable by anybody is useful to remember.
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Common monsters are DC5. And note the use of the word "monster" here - I take this to mean that the races listed in a nation's population (which is general the core rulebook races) are so common as to be ubiquiteous and not need a roll. If 90% of the population of Varisia is human, I'm pretty sure you don't need a roll to identify a human unless they're disguised (and then it's not a Knowledge roll anyway, it's opposed Perception versus their Disguise skill). Similarly, recognizing a riding dog as a dog should be a given. If for some reason, knowing what *kind* of dog it was was important, I'd ask for a roll (DC5). But usually, a riding dog is identifiable by the halfling riding it. ;)
The resistances of teiflings and similar things is a valid point, Jiggy... probably a DC5 roll is needed, since they aren't common enough to be in the population listings.
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Again, I'd put that in the DC 5 common knowledge category. Elves are pretty common.
In that case, it would still be a DC 10 (or perhaps higher) check to realize that elves are immune to magical sleep effects. More importantly, what if the GM decides that is not the first thing that one would know about elves? What if it goes:
DC 5: "That's an elf. You can tell from the ears and stuff."
DC 10: "Elves have sharp senses, including the ability to see in conditions that aren't brightly lit."
DC 15: "While they still sleep, elves are completely immune to magical spell effects. They also have a built-in resistance to enchantment spells."
DC 20: "Elven spellcasters are innately good at breaking through a monster's spell resistance."
The knowledge skills, unfortunately, make it incredibly easy to have table variance. Simply by going down the elf racial chart, I have excluded anyone without a rank in Knowledge (local) from EVER knowing that elves are immune to magical sleep effects. Other GMs may decide that their spellcasters have cast sleep unsuccessfully on elves previously and noticed. Pathfinders may claim that they have an elf friend who told them at one time.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Okay, some people need to re-read the rules for untrained Knowledge checks, and how exceeding the DC by increments of 5 works.
An untrained check does not cap your result at 10. Rather, you can't attempt the check unless the DC is 10 or less.
The difference? Monster ID checks have a single DC, and every 5 by which you exceed it gets you more information.
So to use Mergy's elf example, the DC is 5, period. An untrained PC with 20 INT (maybe the wizard put his ranks elsewhere?) could roll a natural 20 and get a result of 25, getting four pieces of useful info beyond simply identifying it as an elf.
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The knowledge checks have always been weird. They don't capture the way people learn and recall stuff, but they do provide a mechanism for the fact that people go through a process of over generalizing what they do know and have to fit new pin formation into the knowledge that they already have.
The in game mechanism for training are ranks in knowledge skills. Without them, characters can hit a DC 10 only. While not part of PF, the monster identification system that was introduced in MM IV basically worked on the idea that the type (undead, magic beast, etc. ) could be determined with a DC of the lowest creature of the type. I don't think it is a breach of the PFS GM standards to use this as a reference point, but will not be surprised if others disagree.
Keeping player notes on monsters encountered with the expectation that this information substitutes for a Knowledge check is akin to using ranks in a knowledge skill that the character doesn't have. In other words, using a character resource that the character doesn't have. It's the same thing as using a spell, class ability, feat, or piece of equipment the character doesn't have. It breaches the wall between player knowledge and character knowledge. The character keeping notes is another story and is a great in-game expression of the knowledge ranks that the character takes.
Being prepared with items to get through DR or the like is one thing. As others have said, the character knows there is stuff out there that is best harmed with certain types of items. He just may not know that THIS critter is the one that calls for such an item.
Between these factors and and the common critter DC 5 there is a lot of flexibility in this stuff that lies in the purview of the table GM. Personally, I generally expect characters to reasonably have equipment appropriate to their role as Pathfinders, I'm pretty generous with type knowledge and the characteristics common to all such creatures, I'm proactive about calling for knowledge checks as a reaction, and I'm pretty strict with knowledge that demands rank based knowledge checks. I think this is a reasonable balance of how to handle things in a shared world organized play environment. YMMV
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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The resistances of teiflings and similar things is a valid point, Jiggy... probably a DC5 roll is needed, since they aren't common enough to be in the population listings.
Yeah, I don't require checks (in either direction) for Core races. I don't think the tiefling issue has come up yet in games I've GM'd, but continuing with that train of thought...
GM: Alright, he casts scorching ray on— wait, no, you're a tiefling, so he casts it on the other guy instead.
Player: How does he know it won't work? Shouldn't that require a Knowledge (planes) check?
GM: Fair enough. We'll call it a DC 5 for a common creature. There, he rolled a 7, so he targets—
Player: Not so fast, that only gets him one piece of information. So the first thing he gets is special defenses?
GM: Yes, so he—
Player: So earlier when we were fighting that demon, and I made the check, and all I got was that it was a powerful outsider...? You didn't give me his special defenses.
GM: .....
;)
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RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8
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This is starting to sound like that conversation about identifying a summoner and his eidolon.
GM: The enemy will target the guy controlling that summoned monstrosity
Player: Wait, how does he know it's me?
GM: Cause you both have the same glowing rune tattoo on your forehead?
Player: So that fighter knows enough about magic to know I'm a summoner?
Ugh.......... >.<
That whole thread about attacking a summoner instead of his pet made my head hurt. People should just use common sense.
If the player isn't going to play in character and not target the tiefling with charm person, then why should the GM? If the GM is going to force the player to roll to identify a race that is now legal for play, then shouldn't the GM's NPCs have to do the same? It all boils down, at the end of the day, to just using common sense.
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The resistances of teiflings and similar things is a valid point, Jiggy... probably a DC5 roll is needed, since they aren't common enough to be in the population listings.Yeah, I don't require checks (in either direction) for Core races. I don't think the tiefling issue has come up yet in games I've GM'd, but continuing with that train of thought...
GM: Alright, he casts scorching ray on— wait, no, you're a tiefling, so he casts it on the other guy instead.
Player: How does he know it won't work? Shouldn't that require a Knowledge (planes) check?
GM: Fair enough. We'll call it a DC 5 for a common creature. There, he rolled a 7, so he targets—
Player: Not so fast, that only gets him one piece of information. So the first thing he gets is special defenses?
GM: Yes, so he—
Player: So earlier when we were fighting that demon, and I made the check, and all I got was that it was a powerful outsider...? You didn't give me his special defenses.
GM: .....
;)
I do this. I make sure none of the NPC know who or what you are. Other then your pathfinders. Unless they make knowledge checks. I think it is the only way to keep it fair. It is the same thing with spell craft, if we don't identify the spell, we don't know jack about it. It is not common sense to assume a wight in a crypt knows nothing about a gunslinger or a summoner. But this is my opinion, everyone runs there table differently.
I have had too many tables where people have been like
"Oh that a Spirit Naga, they cast spells and have a charming gaze."
or
"Oh it is a vampire and that weapon won't work it is not sliver and magical."
Meta-gaming is rampant in PFS. Knowledge checks are one of the only way to reign it in.
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I think it's a double-edged sword. It's the fear between meta-gaming players and new players (don't forget them).
GMs revealing too much?
--GMs shouldn't feel like "oh if I say that, I'll reveal too much if I say what it is". I feel like a Pathfinder will probably be able to identify that's some kind of zombie or skeleton or dragon or goblin, just as we (regular people of Earth :P) can identify a dragon etc in a movie.
--Players probably don't have the memory for all the str and weaknesses of every PF creature ever!? (heehee I even find DMs that miss info on monsters)
GMs revealing too little?
--Worse than GMs revealing too much! Some players play casually and have bad memory. I think characters should have some basic knowledge of undead (skeletons, zombies), humanoid characters, etc.
--GMs should tell players basic things their character would know (maybe skeleton weaknesses). If they learn of their mission ahead of time, maybe encourage players to bring certain weapons, items along. There's nothing wrong with helping a player out if his character would know basic knowledges. Especially if a NPC warns them of undead, fey, etc. (maybe even gathering info before hand instead of a knowledge check :P)
Too Much Rolling
--I can see that if you roll for every little knowledge check, how it can really slow down game play (especially with PFS). So maybe only relevant checks should be rolled.
Knowledge DC too High?
--Knowledge skills are also pretty brutal! You can't know everything about a creature from a knowledge check, huh?
What happened to the power of describing?
--If the dragon has red scales, well you could probably say "you see a giant, red-colored dragon fly overhead". Now just because your PC can say "oh! A red dragon!" doesn't mean he/she knows its weaknesses and strengths. I mean, it is red, I would assume a fire dragon too haha. I always forget about the metallic dragons tho!
--If the players are fighting it, describe when things work, don't work? They can slowly piece together a creatures powers!
(sorry for the rant, but many ppl were targeting meta-gamers when I have the new gamer problem haha)
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This thread seems to boil down to
"We have rules, Knowledge checks, to find stuff out. That should be the way characters learn about their adversaries" (Translation: My character took ranks in Knowledge skills and you should not get benefits that I 'paid' for and/or I am rules lawyer when it benefits me)
VS
"Its realistic to assume that any given Pathfinder has some information on basic threats by virtue of being a Pathfinder" (Translation: My character build does not allow me to easily take Knowledge skills but I personally have been playing for a long time and I should be able to apply my out of game knowledge due my my vast gaming experience and/or I want to be a munchkin)
Pick you poison because you don't get to have it both ways. Both sides have valid points for and against.
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Nosig,
Having been in the army, I know of the training you speak.
But what I think you are forgetting, is that just because you had that training, doesn't mean you will actually remember it in the heat of the moment.
The skill checks (albeit not entirely realistically, but this is a game full of metaphors and abstracts) handle your ability to recall the information in the heat of the moment.
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To riff off what I just said:
the reason this type of training works in the real world, more times than naught, is because in the real world there aren't a lot of people who have dump stats (at least not more than one--I know we all know that guy or gal who probably has that 7 Int or 7 Wis or 7 Cha) and there aren't a lot of people who don't have at least one rank in various knowledge skills.
Yes, there are always exceptions.
But buy and large, if you scored well enough on your ASVAB test to get into a branch of the military, then you have a general set of knowledges.
In the game, you can create a character, that by all standards is fairly unrealistic in our modern world, with absolutely zero knowledges, and no skills other than a narrow focus.
The medieval world (or even renaissance) was more closely relating to Golarion, and we all know that the narrow focus was more prevalent in the average person back in those days. A farmer knew what a farmer knew, while a blacksmith knew what a blacksmith knew.
I think it highly unrealistic to try to equate modern examples to the way it should work in PFS.
Here's how I see your DI example going:
DI: Ok, buttcheese, yes you, you mangy half-orc, I'm talking to you, when you see a harpy...
Half-Orc: <If he calls me buttcheese one more time I'm going to show him what my greatsword does. And who cares about a stupid singing bird woman. I'll show her what my greatsword does too.>
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I can see something like this in PF training. "You WLLL carry a potion of CLW in the left vest pocket, so your team can find it!" that's why I liked this line "...he/she should have a Potion of Cure Light Wounds and have the foresight to mention to their traveling companions wherein it might be found on their body...".
Just tonight both Walter Sheppard and I saw a level 8 Dwarven Barbarian, that was RP'd as 250 years of age, who did not have a potion of fly, ranged weapons, or potions of Cure light wounds... Point being people don't always pay attention... This exact situation probably occurred!
DI: Ok, buttcheese, yes you, you mangy half-orc, I'm talking to you, when you see a harpy...
Half-Orc: <If he calls me buttcheese one more time I'm going to show him what my greatsword does. And who cares about a stupid singing bird woman. I'll show her what my greatsword does too.>
Yup.
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Player: Not so fast, that only gets him one piece of information. So the first thing he gets is special defenses?
GM: Yes, so he—
Player: So earlier when we were fighting that demon, and I made the check, and all I got was that it was a powerful outsider...? You didn't give me his special defenses.
GM: When you run a game, you can make those decisions. There's an open table over there if you want to start right now.
There, I filled in the blank! ;)
Seriously, the game has a GM for these reasons. I usually give my players the info I think they need, and don't pay too much attention to how many 5's they beat the DC by. Is resist cold/10 and resist acid/10 one peice of info, or two? We could be at this all day.
Bottom line - there is table variation on this. If you want to make sure you can ID monsters, put skill points into Knowledge skills. Sometimes it won't matter because your GM is generous; other times it will give you a high enough result that it will matter.
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[Aside: if I was re-inventing PFS from scratch, I'd try and come up with a template of skills that every character gets as part of basic training. Diplomacy, a Knowledge or two, maybe Disable Device... or I'd come up with a system by which it was logical that the illiterate barbarian who can't interact with humans or find his way through a ruin by himself would actually make it through the training. And then a way to assign appropriate characters to appropriate missions - but that kills the current play model. ]
[Aside #2: Or, I'd have a second organized campaign using the PF rules, which didn't require being a member of the Society to participate. But, that's not possible within Paizo resources.]
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or I'd come up with a system by which it was logical that the illiterate barbarian who can't interact with humans or find his way through a ruin by himself would actually make it through the training. And then a way to assign appropriate characters to appropriate missions - but that kills the current play model. ]
Always you pick on us for not understanding you "civilized" folks and your magic symbols on paper that transmit knowledge to your heads. You should know that we are more likely than our more mainstream brethren to find the way through a ruin.
(OOC: The only archetype that grants illiteracy also grants Favored Terrain, giving bonuses to, among other things, Perception and Survival in ruins if you pick Underground like Memory did)
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RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 8
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I can see something like this in PF training. "You WLLL carry a potion of CLW in the left vest pocket, so your team can find it!" that's why I liked this line "...he/she should have a Potion of Cure Light Wounds and have the foresight to mention to their traveling companions wherein it might be found on their body...".Just tonight both Walter Sheppard and I saw a level 8 Dwarven Barbarian, that was RP'd as 250 years of age, who did not have a potion of fly, ranged weapons, or potions of Cure light wounds... Point being people don't always pay attention... This exact situation probably occurred!
In his defense he's very a stubborn old man, and quite forgetful.
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RPG Superstar 2014 Top 16
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Question: even if a particular PC hasn't encountered a creature, isn't it plausible that the more common ones would have been talked about in the Pathfinder Lodge? Take harpies, for example: what if my PC was hanging around the canteen and heard the group of higher-level adventurers discussing how every other mission seems to involve harpies. And brainstorming what to do about them.
If a PC has encountered a given creature, then it's pretty obvious. If not, then it's still plausible that they may know some basic stuff.
On the subject of things like an NPC casting charm person on a Tiefling, I usually go based on that player's description of his character. If he's described as having red skin and big horns, then my NPC will probably assume he's not human and avoid spells like that. However, if he's described as a normal-looking person with strangely colored hair and eyes, then my NPC will probably be oblivious and try the tactic even if I as a GM know it won't work.
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[Aside: if I was re-inventing PFS from scratch, I'd try and come up with a template of skills that every character gets as part of basic training. Diplomacy, a Knowledge or two, maybe Disable Device... or I'd come up with a system by which it was logical that the illiterate barbarian who can't interact with humans or find his way through a ruin by himself would actually make it through the training. And then a way to assign appropriate characters to appropriate missions - but that kills the current play model. ]
[Aside #2: Or, I'd have a second organized campaign using the PF rules, which didn't require being a member of the Society to participate. But, that's not possible within Paizo resources.]
Concerning Aside 1, I don't know if it would kill the current play model. You could introduce a type of universal archetype that would make certain skills, class skills and perhaps add a +1 or something. Call it the Pathfinder archetype and it would apply to all PFS characters, so it would keep a level playing field. It could also translate to Pathfinder in general as a archetype that could be taken by any class, assuming you became a Pathfinder. But, saying that, I don't see how you could introduce it now without some major upheaval within the PFS community.
