Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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Frankly, I am disappointed at all of the talk about pregens. One of the big selling points for PFS has always been "You can go to a convention and play *your own* character!" If we're telling people to use pregens so much, then it really guts that argument. It undermines character attachment and investment. It's simply not a realistic option.This.
Pregens have their place, and most people will end up playing one at some point, but any solution that encourages more playing of pregens and less playing of a character legal for the scenario is creating a bigger problem than it's solving, in my opinion.
I consider myself a very reasonable person. I really hope no one thinks I haven't done anything for my local PFS community, either.
I won't play a pre-gen. Nor do I encourage anyone to. I work very hard to be sure that the only pre-gens played in my store are by new 1st level characters. In all the years I've been coordinating, I can only think of twice that a player has been forced to play a pre-gen when he has a stable of characters available to him from regular play.
Pre-gens aren't my character. I have no interest in playing them. I don't think that makes me selfish.
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Mergy,
I agree with you that they are great for new players. However, when we start talking about telling somebody with a level 10 character that they should play a pregen for the 7-11 scenario that they signed up for, we are far, far beyond the point of new player. It's frankly insulting, in my opinion, that we'd be telling them to do this when they have a character that they have a long history with, that they've been looking forward to playing, and that they know how to play well. We're talking about characters that these players have spent hours on, playing, honing and building.
A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.
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A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.Mergy,
I agree with you that they are great for new players. However, when we start talking about telling somebody with a level 10 character that they should play a pregen for the 7-11 scenario that they signed up for, we are far, far beyond the point of new player. It's frankly insulting, in my opinion, that we'd be telling them to do this when they have a character that they have a long history with, that they've been looking forward to playing, and that they know how to play well. We're talking about characters that these players have spent hours on, playing, honing and building.
Sure, they can play down - if they do, they'll lose out on 10k+ gold that would have been the difference between the tiers. They will have no opportunity to make that 10k back. They will have no real way to convince the party to play up, because there is no reason for the 7-8 leveled players to agree to play up. The solution that has been repeatedly stated in this thread is to use the level 7 pregen - that is NOT an option that we should be encouraging or advocating.
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Owner - Enchanted Grounds, President/Owner - Enchanted Grounds
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I have yet to see a solution to the wealth by level thing that wouldn't be worse than a problem you'd need half an hour and an excel sheet to really pin down.
People not getting to play is bad. People not getting to play their characters is bad. Even with twice WBL is a character really going to ruin the game worse than a slumber hex happy witch?
I very much agree with this, as well.
I have to say, I'd rather see no change to this rule. I don't think the problems the new proposal creates being worth the one problem that is (not really) solved.
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As far as pregens are concerned:
So i have a group of 4 or 5 people here and we get a newbie.
I tell her to play a pregen first time and she does.
What about the next times? She would actually be stuck with a pregen untill there is a new level 1 oportunity, because as it is, she would always be behind the other characters even if applying all credits.
With the 2xp solution, she would be able to have a character that can catch up after some time and play her own character then. At least this would give a better option. You could still stick with the pregen if you would like.
I´m also not really for APG pregens, just as i asked a player here not to start the game with a alchemist/gunslinger with three arms. Why did i do that? Because it´s a rather complicated class mixed with something other not so standard and he is a real newbie. Of course if he insists he can play whatever is legal (even if i don´t like alchemists and gunslingers personaly, but that doesn´t matter) by Pathfinder and PFS rules.
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Sure, they can play down - if they do, they'll lose out on 10k+ gold that would have been the difference between the tiers. They will have no opportunity to make that 10k back. They will have no real way to convince the party to play up, because there is no reason for the 7-8 leveled players to agree to play up. The solution that has been repeatedly stated in this thread is to use the level 7 pregen - that is NOT an option that we should be encouraging or advocating.A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.Mergy,
I agree with you that they are great for new players. However, when we start talking about telling somebody with a level 10 character that they should play a pregen for the 7-11 scenario that they signed up for, we are far, far beyond the point of new player. It's frankly insulting, in my opinion, that we'd be telling them to do this when they have a character that they have a long history with, that they've been looking forward to playing, and that they know how to play well. We're talking about characters that these players have spent hours on, playing, honing and building.
What do you currently do when confronted with an issue like that? Force the level 7 to play 10-11?
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Frankly, I am disappointed at all of the talk about pregens. One of the big selling points for PFS has always been "You can go to a convention and play *your own* character!" If we're telling people to use pregens so much, then it really guts that argument. It undermines character attachment and investment. It's simply not a realistic option.
This. A thousand times this. The whole point of PFS is the portability of your character. How many times have we told people, "You deal with extra rules so you can play your character anyway. If portability isn't an issue, go play a home game." We cannot sacrifice that in favor of forcing pregens on people, especially--dare I say it--when we can't get updated pregens to save our damn lives.
Also, I want to restate the following:
Actually a really good point has come up a few times during the last 50-odd posts:
If Season 5 is going to encourage people to want to play characters of specific factions in specific scenarios, then Season 5 is a bad time to start making it difficult for people at different subtiers to play together. "Shut up and play a pregen" is (edit: might be) a valid argument in the current system, but not when scenarios are targeted to specific characters.
Finally, I'm going to take a stab at this:
If you have one or two, you explain to them that your current tables are full or not really new player friendly due to level discrepancy. As someone advised above, our playerbase is intelligent and a reasonable person will realize and understand that reasoning for what it is. You invite them back for the next game day and make sure you set aside a table specifically for them, as well as any new walk ups you get.
Trust me. i have experience scheduling local game days that barely managed to scrape one table together, and that was with walk-ins. ... Only 3-4 times did the new player not come back. D you really think the new player is going to have a positive first experience playing a level 1 character at a table full of level 4-5s?
Mike, I'm not disputing your experience, and it certainly trumps my few months of running an event, but I never once turned new players away, and I'm not aware of anyone in our area doing that. I'm incredibly uncomfortable with this being the accepted practice of game days, and I don't think I'm going to be alone with that.
I get that WBL is a problem, and I'm all for a solution, but making it harder to get a table together is not the way to do it--especially when that means turning away new players, who are, rather by definition, absolutely essential for the continued growth of PFS.
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What do you currently do when confronted with an issue like that? Force the level 7 to play 10-11?Sure, they can play down - if they do, they'll lose out on 10k+ gold that would have been the difference between the tiers. They will have no opportunity to make that 10k back. They will have no real way to convince the party to play up, because there is no reason for the 7-8 leveled players to agree to play up. The solution that has been repeatedly stated in this thread is to use the level 7 pregen - that is NOT an option that we should be encouraging or advocating.A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.Mergy,
I agree with you that they are great for new players. However, when we start talking about telling somebody with a level 10 character that they should play a pregen for the 7-11 scenario that they signed up for, we are far, far beyond the point of new player. It's frankly insulting, in my opinion, that we'd be telling them to do this when they have a character that they have a long history with, that they've been looking forward to playing, and that they know how to play well. We're talking about characters that these players have spent hours on, playing, honing and building.
It depends on the scenario and the table composition. If the table feels as if they want to play up, the level 7 is confident that he can make enough extra to cover a Raise Dead if necessary. If the table feels it best to play down, then the level 10 eats the loss....but there's a choice and a reason for the level 7 to go the other way.
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Frankly, I am disappointed at all of the talk about pregens. One of the big selling points for PFS has always been "You can go to a convention and play *your own* character!" If we're telling people to use pregens so much, then it really guts that argument. It undermines character attachment and investment. It's simply not a realistic option.This. A thousand times this. The whole point of PFS is the portability of your character. How many times have we told people, "You deal with extra rules so you can play your character anyway. If portability isn't an issue, go play a home game." We cannot sacrifice that in favor of forcing pregens on people, especially--dare I say it--when we can't get updated pregens to save our damn lives.
Also, I want to restate the following:
Actually a really good point has come up a few times during the last 50-odd posts:
If Season 5 is going to encourage people to want to play characters of specific factions in specific scenarios, then Season 5 is a bad time to start making it difficult for people at different subtiers to play together. "Shut up and play a pregen" is (edit: might be) a valid argument in the current system, but not when scenarios are targeted to specific characters.
Finally, I'm going to take a stab at this:
...If you have one or two, you explain to them that your current tables are full or not really new player friendly due to level discrepancy. As someone advised above, our playerbase is intelligent and a reasonable person will realize and understand that reasoning for what it is. You invite them back for the next game day and make sure you set aside a table specifically for them, as well as any new walk ups you get.
Trust me. i have experience scheduling local game days that barely managed to scrape one table together, and that was with walk-ins. ... Only 3-4 times did the new player not come back. D you really
A thousand times this as well. I flatly refuse to turn a newbie away from my table if it is at all possible to accommodate them. My first experience with Pathfinder, I wasn't really looking for a long-term gaming commitment. If I had been turned away, I don't know that I would have given the game a second thought; not because I was angry or childish, but just because I don't know that I would have remembered it. You have a person who is present, who has taken time out of their day to show up and learn about your product and service, and you're going to turn them away? Absolutely not. Pathfinder Society thrives on the addition of new players, and I will not take a risk of losing someone who could become a committed player.
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That is similar to the double exp route. It still suffers from fame issues however. If you end up getting double the exp and not the fame, you will quickly end up being unable to purchase anything even remotely level appropriate. The whole reason you want people to play up or down (if your not gaming the system) is to help with mustering a table. Many PFS locals do not have enough player base to run a table for each sub tier after all. Although...since you don't have the dead level issue with this, it could be not a bad way to normalize wealth...just have to deal with the fame issue (which I honestly would not mind going away if we are gonna normalize the wealth).here's an easy fix. Get rid of the current XP system associated with PFS, and put it on the medium track. If you play up, you're also getting more XP, and so your WBL in theory should balance out.
Suggested XP/Gold breakdowns:Intro (1) 670 XP 340 Gold
Tier 1-2 835 XP 500 Gold
Tier 3-4 1670 XP 1250 Gold
Tier 4-5 2350 XP 1670 Gold
Tier 5-6 3340 XP 2170 Gold
Tier 6-7 4670 XP 2840 Gold
Tier 7-8 6670 XP 3750 Gold
Tier 8-9 9000 XP 4840 Gold
Tier 10-11 19170 XP 7670 Gold
Tier 12 31670 XP 10670 Goldusing tier 3-4 as an example, I arrived at the numbers by taking the xp to reach 5 and subtracting the XP for 3 (15000-5000=10000) and dividing by 6 (3 games per level) and round up to the nearest 10 XP. Gold done in a similar way. Intros and Tier 12 I divide by 3 instead since they represent only 1 possible level of characters.
Fame/Prestige then becomes the disincentive to play up. So, its still allowed, you may do it once in a while, but it becomes something you don't want to do all the time. I think you should still be able to play "slow" (for 1/2 gold and XP) however. I've never been a big fan of the "3 games per level" system in pathfinder society. Its simple, sure, but we've dealt with "real" XP in living campaigns before, so it shouldn't be such a burden.
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It depends on the scenario and the table composition. If the table feels as if they want to play up, the level 7 is confident that he can make enough extra to cover a Raise Dead if necessary. If the table feels it best to play down, then the level 10 eats the loss....but there's a choice and a reason for the level 7 to go the other way.What do you currently do when confronted with an issue like that? Force the level 7 to play 10-11?Sure, they can play down - if they do, they'll lose out on 10k+ gold that would have been the difference between the tiers. They will have no opportunity to make that 10k back. They will have no real way to convince the party to play up, because there is no reason for the 7-8 leveled players to agree to play up. The solution that has been repeatedly stated in this thread is to use the level 7 pregen - that is NOT an option that we should be encouraging or advocating.
A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.
Really, though, how often do they actually have the choice.
The only time you can decide to "play up" is when the APL is (in the case of a tier 7-11) is 8.5 or higher (because 8.5 rounds up to 9). If the APL is less than that, you HAVE to play down. If the APL is 10+, you HAVE to play up, right? Or am I missing something here.
And, if we take Robert's suggestion of getting rid of the +1 APL bump at tables of 6-7 in seasons 0-3, then the actually choice becomes rather rare.
So, take these situations (of tables sized 6).
Table 1: 7, 7, 8, 8, 8, 11 (APL = 8.16 -- play 7-8)
Table 2: 7, 9, 10, 10, 11, 11 (APL = 9.67 -- play 10-11)
Table 3: 7, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11 (APL 8.667 -- choice)
Of these three examples, only one table can actually choose to play up or down. So, if you were the lone level 11 character on table 1, what would you do? You cannot coerce the table to play up, because it would not be legal. You'd have a choice... play down, play a pregen, or leave?
We can all agree that this is sub-optimal, but it happens. I would hope it would happen less (with decent planning, etc) on the higher tiers, because these are more experienced players, and more used to planning their scenario choices around sub-tiers. Can it still happen? Sure. But it should happen a lot less often then with the lower tiers, in my opinion.
A fourth option, of course, would be for the player with the level 11 character to pull out one of his other characters and play at a lower-tier table, right?
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1. Remove the rule that 6 players gives you +1 APL. This will severely reduce the number of tables that are even able to play up.
Let's say for example you have a 1-5 table that looks like this:
1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5
Your APL is 2.8. 6 Players you add +1 to make 3.8, round up, and you qualify for 4-5. Remove the +1 APL and you do not qualify.I hadn't seen anyone else correct this, so I wanted to mention that the assumptions here are a bit off.
Specifically, APL 2.8 can already play up. 2.8 rounds to 3, 3 has the option to play 1-2 or 4-5. As they should - half the group is 3+. The +1 for 6 players in seasons 0-3 actually requires them to play up. Again, probably as they should. The 3,4,5 are 3/4's of a balanced 4-player group for a Tier 4-5 in seasons 0-3.
This situation is quite common for the gameday I organize and others nearby. Just finding scenarios that can be played by old and new players can be difficult - matching sub-tiers all the time is far more difficult.
For the Out-of-Tier option:
No need to re-do prior season chronicle sheets - the value is simply the average of the two tiers. Actual mid-level tier gp value might be slightly different, but not enough to make a large difference.You are correct. I forgot that APL between subtiers gets a choice to play up or down. Perhaps there needs to be a rule that you must be within 1 level of a subtier in order to be eligible with that character. Like if you want to play in a 4-5 scenario you must use a level 3 or higher character. Instead of using APL to determine eligibility, use a minimum/maximum level for each individual character in order to qualify.
3-4 Requires you to be level 2
4-5 Requires you to be level 3
5-6 Requires you to be level 4
6-7 Requires you to be level 5
7-8 Requires you to be level 6
8-9 Requires you to be level 7
10-11 Requires you to be level 9These changes, in addition to others could help solve the...
Agree...the tier breakdown needs to be just the sub tiers...and you all have to be within 1 level of the tier played. I'd also introduce a new subtier.
1 (Intro)
1-2
3-4
4-5
5-6
6-7
7-8
8-9
[bold]9-10/[bold]
10-11
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Sure, it's rare, but we need rules to address both rare and common situations. As it stands, level splits are common enough to promulgate new rules to cover them. I find it strange that people are saying that level splits are too rare for this to be an issue when we are already looking at new rules regarding it.
Booting a player from a table is not a great option. It's tough, locally, to get 7-11 tables going. We've only had a handful of them. If you want to play a particular scenario with a particular character, it may be months or even a year before you get that option, and there's no guarantee that character will still be available at the time. If we're adding time-sensitive faction missions, this is even more true.
You also have to remember that playing down at 7-11 is mitigated by having played up in 1-5, 3-7 and 5-9. Doing that a couple of times will seriously reduce the hamstringing of characters who have to play down in 7-11 to create a legal table.
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...1. Remove the rule that 6 players gives you +1 APL. This will severely reduce the number of tables that are even able to play up.
Let's say for example you have a 1-5 table that looks like this:
1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5
Your APL is 2.8. 6 Players you add +1 to make 3.8, round up, and you qualify for 4-5. Remove the +1 APL and you do not qualify.I hadn't seen anyone else correct this, so I wanted to mention that the assumptions here are a bit off.
Specifically, APL 2.8 can already play up. 2.8 rounds to 3, 3 has the option to play 1-2 or 4-5. As they should - half the group is 3+. The +1 for 6 players in seasons 0-3 actually requires them to play up. Again, probably as they should. The 3,4,5 are 3/4's of a balanced 4-player group for a Tier 4-5 in seasons 0-3.
This situation is quite common for the gameday I organize and others nearby. Just finding scenarios that can be played by old and new players can be difficult - matching sub-tiers all the time is far more difficult.
For the Out-of-Tier option:
No need to re-do prior season chronicle sheets - the value is simply the average of the two tiers. Actual mid-level tier gp value might be slightly different, but not enough to make a large difference.You are correct. I forgot that APL between subtiers gets a choice to play up or down. Perhaps there needs to be a rule that you must be within 1 level of a subtier in order to be eligible with that character. Like if you want to play in a 4-5 scenario you must use a level 3 or higher character. Instead of using APL to determine eligibility, use a minimum/maximum level for each individual character in order to qualify.
3-4 Requires you to be level 2
4-5 Requires you to be level 3
5-6 Requires you to be level 4
6-7 Requires you to be level 5
7-8 Requires you to be level 6
8-9 Requires you to be level 7
10-11 Requires you to be level 9These changes, in
This would be a planning nightmare. Egad. It's hard enough with 4 level ranges - you want 10 of them? This would also severely change the scenario availability - how many of each do you publish?
The mind boggles at the implications of this system.
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(Since NO ONE responded to me the last time I posted this three pages back, I am gonna repost it once more just to try and stick my finger in the d!@~ (dam in holland, lol) as best I can. This will be my last attempt.)
I may be over simplifying things, but what about this: No change to PP, XP, or APL. Just a flat sliding scale for GP irregardless of whether you play up or down.
Start with a fixed point: The top money someone can earn as the top level of the top tier. Anyone below that level earns -5% per level (to reflect the level 1-20 range) below the top level NO MATTER whether you play up or down.
Example: I am playing 3rd level character in a 4-5 tier game. I multiply the top take by -10%.
Conversely, you could normalize the percentage modifier to reflect the average wealth per level table, but it is nearly the same and 5% increments seem easier to manage.
Yes, high level characters playing down will earn big bank, but as has been readily pointed out they will be the work horses that session.
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The "Play up or lose gold" mentality is a major contributing factor to the wealth problem. The +2XP idea helps bring this in check, as does the gold based on level idea. Removing the +1APL rule for seasons 0-3 would help as well. The solution could be any of these, something i forgot to mention, or something that hasn't been presented yet. The solution might also be a combination of multiple ideas. No one idea is going to be the best solution. Bringing real XP into the mix could be a valid option as previously suggested. Let's try and figure out which ideas can be combined to best address the issue.
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Just throwing this out there, because I don't remember seeing it suggested before. What if we allowed players who were playing up to apply chronicles similar to when playing a pregen? So if the level one played in a 3-4 they could either take tier 1-2 rewards immediately, or they could apply the tier 3-4 chronicle when they reach level 3. Conditions cleared and expendable reimbursement could be recorded on the chronicle and applied when it is.
I think likely players between tiers would have to be allowed to apply the chronicle immediately, and if someone plays up to tier 4-5, for example, as a level 1 or 2, they would apply it when they hit level 3 as well.
This at least keeps the extra rewards as a possibility, but it shouldn't put anyone ahead of anyone else. If someone needs the xp to catch up to their group, they just take the lower tier rewards. If they die during the scenario and need the extra gold for a res, they just apply the higher tier.
I don't know that this does anything for bullying anymore than the podcast solution, and I'm not saying this is the best solution. I'm just putting it out there for discussion. My apologies if someone already did and I'm not remembering it.
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I want to say something. Mike/Mark/John, I know you guys probably have more experience organizing gamedays than I do, but let me tell you my personal experience on this matter.
1) Turning away players, especially new players, because of logistical issues is not something you want to do. These players end up feeling alienated or unwelcome, and will often not come back to the gameday for months at a time. I think that the new rule will cause more logistical issues for organizers trying to get things running "on the fly" than people suspect, based on my limited experience with mustering (I have had many tables with split levels because only one GM was running a scenario many times). I absolutely do not want to turn anyone away, and making someone feel unwelcome because they have a new character and showed up after hearing about PFS somewhere is not a good call.
2) At least here, I have not noticed a large disparity in power created by Wealth by Level. This seems to be different than your experience; do you have data summarizing how many players are gaining a large advantage? Since the reporting system does not report Tier, I would be interested to know how this data was gathered. There is certainly a large disparity in power between certain characters and certain players; however, this seems to have more to do with build choices and player skill than with the ability to be properly geared. Playing up is something that the organizers here try to discourage as much as possible; players are always grouped by level first whenever possible. However, it is sometimes impossible to avoid.
3) This section goes out to everyone. Please do not make accusatory statements towards players who "always played up" and accuse them of gaming the system or doing something wrong. By the rules of the game, under certain circumstances, playing up was LEGAL. You cannot and should not punish anyone who stayed within the rules of the game. I made similar statement during the Animal Companions with Weapons thread and the Synthesist thread; just because some people thought those features were overpowered does not give you the right to accuse players who chose those builds of any wrongdoing. Those people were playing LEGAL builds, and thus cannot be faulted. System Mastery is part of the game. While it might be cheesy to try and always play up, do not show any animosity towards those who did so in the past; they were doing something legal.
That said, I have a much simpler proposed solution to fix the WBL curve.
Why not have it so that if you play a character up, it is treated as if you played a pregen of the appropriate level?
In other words, if you play a level 2 character up in a 1-5 scenario, you "hold" the credit as if you had played a pregen until you hit level 3.
If you play a level 5 character up in a 5-9 scenario, you hold the credit until you hit level 7.
If you play a level 7 character up in a 7-11 scenario, you hold the credit until you hit level 9.
Any conditions gained or deaths incurred in the scenario would be dealt with once the character reaches the appropriate level (as the chronicle sheet, and everything on it, would be held).
This way, people get to play their own characters, mustering stays the same as it is now, and wealth by level is held to amounts that the Campaign want.
Any thoughts?
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I find it interesting that one of the reasons people object to a fix is the fact that it means characters playing down would be behind in wealth.
I think it's currently a worse problem than it would be with a fix. At the moment this happens to the lvl 2 every time they play a 1-2 instead of a 4-5, they get behind in wealth from somebody who plays up.
Some of the proposed fixes are way too complicated such as attempting to track player's wealth or even requiring 1 play down for every play up. I'm not even a fan of the must be within 1 level of subtier because of the added difficulty in mustering.
The key things I think a solution should do is: Remove the huge wealth incentive to play up. Don't make mustering too difficult and don't require too much record keeping.
Clearly there are lots of PFS locations that manage to muster one table at a time and can't afford to turn away players and who's players don't want to play pregens. At the moment any time they play up the lower level people get ahead in wealth and every time they play down the higher level people get behind in wealth. (Even if they alternated the lower level people would still come out ahead and the higher level people would still come out behind, so I imagine up happens a lot more often, although less so in season 4, due to difficulty increases)
If we just gave people wealth for their level there is a worry about higher level people trying to play down in order to minimize their risks. I think this is a reasonable worry and I think I have an idea that will help.
Thus playing up gives you cooler boons, more desirable item access etc. This allows us to make playing the higher tier give more rewards without throwing the WBL system too far out of balance. You can even do things like at low level the BBEG's Scepter of Awesomeness is broken and doesn't work. You recover it but if you want to buy it you also have to pay 5PA, at high tier they get to be Awesome but you also get to buy the item without the PA expenditure. There are lots of ways to make the things on chronicle sheets cooler and I think they can be cool enough to make the rewards from up/down different enough without the WBL problems the current system has.
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I want to say something. Mike/Mark/John, I know you guys probably have more experience organizing gamedays than I do, but let me tell you my personal experience on this matter.
1) Turning away players, especially new players, because of logistical issues is not something you want to do. These players end up feeling alienated or unwelcome, and will often not come back to the gameday for months at a time. I think that the new rule will cause more logistical issues for organizers trying to get things running "on the fly" than people suspect, based on my limited experience with mustering (I have had many tables with split levels because only one GM was running a scenario many times). I absolutely do not want to turn anyone away, and making someone feel unwelcome because they have a new character and showed up after hearing about PFS somewhere is not a good call.
2) At least here, I have not noticed a large disparity in power created by Wealth by Level. This seems to be different than your experience; do you have data summarizing how many players are gaining a large advantage? Since the reporting system does not report Tier, I would be interested to know how this data was gathered. There is certainly a large disparity in power between certain characters and certain players; however, this seems to have more to do with build choices and player skill than with the ability to be properly geared. Playing up is something that the organizers here try to discourage as much as possible; players are always grouped by level first whenever possible. However, it is sometimes impossible to avoid.
3) This section goes out to everyone. Please do not make accusatory statements towards players who "always played up" and accuse them of gaming the system or doing something wrong. By the rules of the game, under certain circumstances, playing up was LEGAL. You cannot and should not punish anyone who stayed within the rules of the game. I made similar statement during the Animal Companions with Weapons thread and...
The only problem I see with that is you can die and then continue playing your character. You could die playing up and then die again. You would also be able to plan around that future death because you know for a fact that it's coming.
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People keep saying "it isn't optimized characters it is wealthy characters causing problems".
I'm not convinced this is true, I believe optimization has more to do with making encounters trivial and the wealth has very little.
I actually fully agree with you that the character build is the primary force in trivializing encounters. But that said, adding a ton of wealth on top of that adds considerably more impact than I believe you realize.
Let's use level 7 for test purposes. Run the numbers of all scenario at-tier play up to that level vs. all scenario next tier up to that level. Depending on the scenarios in question, you will find that the WBL is anywhere from +50% to fully double that of playing at-tier. Now this may end up reduced if raise dead is needed - but it also may not.
The difference is that it is both fair and reasonable to regulate the wealth towards a universal standard. With the exception of race boons, character creation is regulated to a universal standard.
Actually playing up every game from level 1 can net you 3-4 times WBL. Playing up at dead levels gives you about 150% of WBL and playing down at dead levels will net you about 75% of WBL. If we assume play at tier is some up and down at dead levels, you end up pretty close to WBL.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Just throwing this out there, because I don't remember seeing it suggested before. What if we allowed players who were playing up to apply chronicles similar to when playing a pregen? So if the level one played in a 3-4 they could either take tier 1-2 rewards immediately, or they could apply the tier 3-4 chronicle when they reach level 3. Conditions cleared and expendable reimbursement could be recorded on the chronicle and applied when it is.
I think likely players between tiers would have to be allowed to apply the chronicle immediately, and if someone plays up to tier 4-5, for example, as a level 1 or 2, they would apply it when they hit level 3 as well.
This at least keeps the extra rewards as a possibility, but it shouldn't put anyone ahead of anyone else. If someone needs the xp to catch up to their group, they just take the lower tier rewards. If they die during the scenario and need the extra gold for a res, they just apply the higher tier.
I don't know that this does anything for bullying anymore than the podcast solution, and I'm not saying this is the best solution. I'm just putting it out there for discussion. My apologies if someone already did and I'm not remembering it.
I think there could be something to this. Might need to be refined, but there's some real potential here. Someone else (who I think accidentally clicked "Reply" on a different post but meant to reply to this one) mentioned an issue of dying and still playing, but I think that can be worked out.
I think we should investigate this idea further.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Thoughts on Ferious Thune's "delay the chronicle if you play up" idea:
There could be an issue if you die. However, I think this is manageable. Resolve any conditions (including death, as well as diseases and such) before the event is over, as normal. If you're still kickin' after that, then whatever's left of that chronicle gets held for you until you reach a certain level (probably either the first level of the subtier played, or the level right before that). If you can't get everything resolved, then the PC stays dead right then. There would be no "keep playing for a couple of levels and then drop dead" situation.
I think another merit of this idea is that it mirrors existing rules rather than being something completely new.
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I'm against builds as the ruin the scenario as much as anyone, but I find that is *builds* that are the killer, not the gold being thrown around. Feat combinations and class feature combinations are the killer, not $$. I personally don't see what the big deal about wealth is at all. At higher levels, a deviation of 5-10K is not the difference between effective and ineffective characters.
But the issue isn't that the deviation is 5-10k gold. By level 6, the difference can already be 12k gold IF played at tier for none dead levels. If you play up every single session, the difference will more likely be around 26 grand difference. That isn't a small amount issue. The big thing is, the proposed change really won't stop the 12k gold difference anyways as you have the option of play up or down at dead levels anyways. It does stop the 26k difference...but really how many people play up EVERY single session to cause this? Are we gonna make it harder to run PFS, make people have to use pre-gens more just because of a tiny fraction of the player base?
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RPG Superstar 2014 Top 32
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Regarding the playing up and applying the chronicle later, I would support this so long as the playing up PC ALSO had the opportunity to accept the playing down gold if they so chose - that would help get them out of the lower tiers and get them to apply the chronicles faster.
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Thoughts on Ferious Thune's "delay the chronicle if you play up" idea:
There could be an issue if you die. However, I think this is manageable. Resolve any conditions (including death, as well as diseases and such) before the event is over, as normal. If you're still kickin' after that, then whatever's left of that chronicle gets held for you until you reach a certain level (probably either the first level of the subtier played, or the level right before that). If you can't get everything resolved, then the PC stays dead right then. There would be no "keep playing for a couple of levels and then drop dead" situation.
I think another merit of this idea is that it mirrors existing rules rather than being something completely new.
One big issue is the collateral damage to the people who aren't playing up to game the system--it means someone who is behind and has to play up falls even farther behind. Additionally, if you don't delay the negative stuff and expendable loss to happen at the same time as the money comes, you can wind up with perma-dead characters who wouldn't otherwise be perma-dead, for instance.
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I have to say I second the notion that optimized builds contribute to curb stomping encounters. There are many archetypes that give a base class/core class better features than the abilities they replace. Certain feat combinations and multiclass combinations exemplify this. There are some archetypes that give prestige class features to a base class without ever taking that prestige class. We should make a separate thread for this issue though.
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Why not have it so that if you play a character up, it is treated as if you played a pregen of the appropriate level?
In other words, if you play a level 2 character up in a 1-5 scenario, you "hold" the credit as if you had played a pregen until you hit level 3.
This is a really good idea. I like the way you phrased it so I'm quoting you, but I'm also going to tip my hat to Ferious Thune, who had the same idea at about the same time.
(Note: I'm not saying one copied the other; the length and timing of posts makes it an obvious coincidence.)
This idea allows us to play our own characters, in whatever tiers we need to play them, and get full rewards, without breaking the WBL that people seem to find so very important.
In fact, we could roll this into a revision of the pregen rules: Instead of holding Pregen credit for the level of the Pregen, hold it for the subtier that was played. That way I can't use a level 7 pregen to get Tier 10-11 wealth several levels early while taking on no real risk.
The only problem I see with that is you can die and then continue playing your character. You could die playing up and then die again. You would also be able to plan around that future death because you know for a fact that it's coming.
Not at all. It doesn't work that way for pregens--if you assign a dead pregen credit to an existing character that character dies immediately, not once that credit takes effect. In fact, since you wouldn't be playing a pregen, you wouldn't even have the option of assigning to an empty character slot--the death is the death is the death.
We just make it so you can use the items on that chronicle to resolve conditions, then whole the whole thing (plus gold earned, minus gold spend) for the appropriate level, and boom.
In fact, the only drawback to this plan is that someone could play a level 2 character in enough Tier 4-5 slots that they would eventually jump up several levels once they finally hit 3 ... but so what? They're just hurting themselves by crippling their cash on hand. I think it's brilliant.
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RPG Superstar 2014 Top 32
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Why not have it so that if you play a character up, it is treated as if you played a pregen of the appropriate level?
In other words, if you play a level 2 character up in a 1-5 scenario, you "hold" the credit as if you had played a pregen until you hit level 3.
This is a really good idea. I like the way you phrased it so I'm quoting you, but I'm also going to tip my hat to Ferious Thune, who had the same idea at about the same time.
(Note: I'm not saying one copied the other; the length and timing of posts makes it an obvious coincidence.)
This idea allows us to play our own characters, in whatever tiers we need to play them, and get full rewards, without breaking the WBL that people seem to find so very important.
In fact, we could roll this into a revision of the pregen rules: Instead of holding Pregen credit for the level of the Pregen, hold it for the subtier that was played. That way I can't use a level 7 pregen to get Tier 10-11 wealth several levels early while taking on no real risk.
The only problem I see with that is you can die and then continue playing your character. You could die playing up and then die again. You would also be able to plan around that future death because you know for a fact that it's coming.Not at all. It doesn't work that way for pregens--if you assign a dead pregen credit to an existing character that character dies immediately, not once that credit takes effect. In fact, since you wouldn't be playing a pregen, you wouldn't even have the option of assigning to an empty character slot--the death is the death is the death.
We just make it so you can use the items on that chronicle to resolve conditions, then whole the whole thing (plus gold earned, minus gold spend) for the appropriate level, and boom.
In fact, the only drawback to this plan is that someone could play a level 2 character in enough Tier 4-5 slots that they would eventually jump up several levels once they...
Excellent points. This also has the benefit of protecting the (often new) player playing up, because if it is a new slot that dies, then the player hasn't lost their character permanently. I fully endorse this solution.
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What do you currently do when confronted with an issue like that? Force the level 7 to play 10-11?Sure, they can play down - if they do, they'll lose out on 10k+ gold that would have been the difference between the tiers. They will have no opportunity to make that 10k back. They will have no real way to convince the party to play up, because there is no reason for the 7-8 leveled players to agree to play up. The solution that has been repeatedly stated in this thread is to use the level 7 pregen - that is NOT an option that we should be encouraging or advocating.A level 10 character could play down. If they instead choose to play a pregen, that is their choice.Mergy,
I agree with you that they are great for new players. However, when we start talking about telling somebody with a level 10 character that they should play a pregen for the 7-11 scenario that they signed up for, we are far, far beyond the point of new player. It's frankly insulting, in my opinion, that we'd be telling them to do this when they have a character that they have a long history with, that they've been looking forward to playing, and that they know how to play well. We're talking about characters that these players have spent hours on, playing, honing and building.
Currently...it's almost a none issue. The draw of extra gold means that many player will be okay with running up. If they die, the extra gold of a 10-11 tier will cover their raise dead. If they live...ohhhh shinies. It is actually harder on the lower tiers where the extra gold does not cover the raise.
Now take away the extra gold and...yeah if you thought the bullying to play up or down is bad now...you ain't seen nothing yet. The proposed change is a perma punishment for anyone chooses to play out of tier so they can play with their character (seriously, some play up session at level 4 I spent 2k of consumables. If I got 1.5k for tier as oppose to the 3+k, I would have actually LOST money for my character for playing that I can NEVER make up).
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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One big issue is the collateral damage to the people who aren't playing up to game the system--it means someone who is behind and has to play up falls even farther behind. Additionally, if you don't delay the negative stuff and expendable loss to happen at the same time as the money comes, you can wind up with perma-dead characters who wouldn't otherwise be perma-dead, for instance.Thoughts on Ferious Thune's "delay the chronicle if you play up" idea:
There could be an issue if you die. However, I think this is manageable. Resolve any conditions (including death, as well as diseases and such) before the event is over, as normal. If you're still kickin' after that, then whatever's left of that chronicle gets held for you until you reach a certain level (probably either the first level of the subtier played, or the level right before that). If you can't get everything resolved, then the PC stays dead right then. There would be no "keep playing for a couple of levels and then drop dead" situation.
I think another merit of this idea is that it mirrors existing rules rather than being something completely new.
I may have been unclear on the death thing. What I meant to say was that clearing conditions could use the gold from the chronicle you just earned, then whatever's left after resolving conditions (prestige, remaining gold, and XP) would be held until later. That should solve the death issue, unless I'm missing something.
As for the issue of falling further behind, that is indeed the biggest issue, and worth discussing.
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I've read the replies, but I still think builds trump money pretty significantly in PFS. Or even in general. I see PFS at giving people a 50% money cut by not allowing item creation to begin with, so I really don't care how much money people have.
Maybe if playing up was appropriately challenging: more templated NPCs, more enemy spellcasters that don't suck, more power attacking and cleaving NPCs, the lowbies couldn't risk it to begin with.
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"I have to say I second the notion that optimized builds contribute to curb stomping encounters. There are many archetypes that give a base class/core class better features than the abilities they replace. Certain feat combinations and multiclass combinations exemplify this. There are some archetypes that give prestige class features to a base class without ever taking that prestige class. We should make a separate thread for this issue though."
No, the issues can not be deconvoluted so trivially since it is all a matter of PC power level. And I'm firmly in the camp that build trumps money. So I see no point in trying to regulate money without regulating builds.
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The hold credit idea in that light sounds better. I was referring to the suggestion that you wait until later to clear conditions. You already save credit for a pregen or if you GM. Saving credit when you play up could work. You would have to make sure that nothing purchased that scenario is used before reaching that tier.
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Regarding the playing up and applying the chronicle later, I would support this so long as the playing up PC ALSO had the opportunity to accept the playing down gold if they so chose - that would help get them out of the lower tiers and get them to apply the chronicles faster.
That was my intention, yes. The player should always have the option to take the rewards at their tier. I'm driving cross country today so I'll leave it to everyone else to discuss, and I'll check in later with some thoughts.
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Fame/Prestige then becomes the disincentive to play up. So, its still allowed, you may do it once in a while, but it becomes something you don't want to do all the time. I think you should still be able to play "slow" (for 1/2 gold and XP) however. I've never been a big fan of the "3 games per level" system in pathfinder society. Its simple, sure, but we've dealt with "real" XP in living...That is similar to the double exp route. It still suffers from fame issues however. If you end up getting double the exp and not the fame, you will quickly end up being unable to purchase anything even remotely level appropriate. The whole reason you want people to play up or down (if your not gaming the system) is to help with mustering a table. Many PFS locals do not have enough player base to run a table for each sub tier after all. Although...since you don't have the dead level issue with this, it could be not a bad way to normalize wealth...just have to deal with the fame issue (which I honestly would not mind going away if we are gonna normalize the wealth).here's an easy fix. Get rid of the current XP system associated with PFS, and put it on the medium track. If you play up, you're also getting more XP, and so your WBL in theory should balance out.
Suggested XP/Gold breakdowns:Intro (1) 670 XP 340 Gold
Tier 1-2 835 XP 500 Gold
Tier 3-4 1670 XP 1250 Gold
Tier 4-5 2350 XP 1670 Gold
Tier 5-6 3340 XP 2170 Gold
Tier 6-7 4670 XP 2840 Gold
Tier 7-8 6670 XP 3750 Gold
Tier 8-9 9000 XP 4840 Gold
Tier 10-11 19170 XP 7670 Gold
Tier 12 31670 XP 10670 Goldusing tier 3-4 as an example, I arrived at the numbers by taking the xp to reach 5 and subtracting the XP for 3 (15000-5000=10000) and dividing by 6 (3 games per level) and round up to the nearest 10 XP. Gold done in a similar way. Intros and Tier 12 I divide by 3 instead since they represent only 1 possible level of characters.
Actually think about this more...the issue will be fame farming. What is to stop a player from playing down session after session to farm PP and gain fame? Unless PP is tied to the tier your playing at, I don't think this is gonna work.
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I'm against builds as the ruin the scenario as much as anyone, but I find that is *builds* that are the killer, not the gold being thrown around. Feat combinations and class feature combinations are the killer, not $$. I personally don't see what the big deal about wealth is at all. At higher levels, a deviation of 5-10K is not the difference between effective and ineffective characters.But the issue isn't that the deviation is 5-10k gold. By level 6, the difference can already be 12k gold IF played at tier for none dead levels. If you play up every single session, the difference will more likely be around 26 grand difference. That isn't a small amount issue. The big thing is, the proposed change really won't stop the 12k gold difference anyways as you have the option of play up or down at dead levels anyways. It does stop the 26k difference...but really how many people play up EVERY single session to cause this? Are we gonna make it harder to run PFS, make people have to use pre-gens more just because of a tiny fraction of the player base?
Even the theoretical 26K is not worth making it harder to play. 26K still doesn't trump build differentials.
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My suggestion is similar to one already provided. Make the adventures levels 2, 5, 8, 11 and people can play the adventure if they are one level off. This means one set of monsters/traps no varying dcs. Plus 12th level characters would have more to choose from.I like this. No one's penalized because there's no playing up or down.
It also eliminates the need for more retirement arcs.
This has the same problem as the original suggestion from the podcast: It makes game days harder to organize. Right now I can run a 1-7 and a 7-11 and everybody can go somewhere. For backup I just have each GM be familiar with the other scenario too.
Under this system, I'd have to run four tables to fit everyone, which means I'd need four GMs, and I probably couldn't make four tables go if I was originally only seating two. Or I could have two GMs prep two scenarios each, but then I'm still gambling on which one will need to run which, and in the end I'm only offering slots for 6 levels of play instead of 11.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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I've read the replies, but I still think builds trump money pretty significantly in PFS. Or even in general. I see PFS at giving people a 50% money cut by not allowing item creation to begin with, so I really don't care how much money people have.
Maybe if playing up was appropriately challenging: more templated NPCs, more enemy spellcasters that don't suck, more power attacking and cleaving NPCs, the lowbies couldn't risk it to begin with.
This is a different topic and needs its own thread. This thread is hard enough to keep up with as it is. Thanks.
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This is a different topic and needs its own thread. This thread is hard enough to keep up with as it is. Thanks.I've read the replies, but I still think builds trump money pretty significantly in PFS. Or even in general. I see PFS at giving people a 50% money cut by not allowing item creation to begin with, so I really don't care how much money people have.
Maybe if playing up was appropriately challenging: more templated NPCs, more enemy spellcasters that don't suck, more power attacking and cleaving NPCs, the lowbies couldn't risk it to begin with.
Then I'll go with leaving the system as it is. I really think the money "problem" is the least of the issues.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Regarding the playing up and applying the chronicle later, I would support this so long as the playing up PC ALSO had the opportunity to accept the playing down gold if they so chose - that would help get them out of the lower tiers and get them to apply the chronicles faster.That was my intention, yes. The player should always have the option to take the rewards at their tier. I'm driving cross country today so I'll leave it to everyone else to discuss, and I'll check in later with some thoughts.
That's a very nice addendum to that idea.
To sum up this solution so far:
If you play up, you can either immediately take a chronicle sheet for the lower tier (as though you hadn't played up), or take the higher-tier (the tier you played) rewards but have to hold it until you reached a certain level.
If the player chooses the delayed high-tier chronicle but needs to resolve conditions (including death), the resources of that chronicle can be applied to the resolution of those conditions. Any conditions (including death) which are not removed will be immediately applied to the PC (not delayed until the chronicle would be applied).
Overall, I really like this idea. Probably my favorite so far.
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My suggestion is similar to one already provided. Make the adventures levels 2, 5, 8, 11 and people can play the adventure if they are one level off. This means one set of monsters/traps no varying dcs. Plus 12th level characters would have more to choose from.
And the suggestion from the podcast is just like what we played in RPGA. And I don't miss it AT ALL. If there really is a need to prevent this problem then this one is pretty good.
Frankly, the only time I've seen someone playing up or down like this, is to make sure the game makes and to make sure everyone has fun. I think the very best option is to leave it as is.
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My suggestion is similar to one already provided. Make the adventures levels 2, 5, 8, 11 and people can play the adventure if they are one level off. This means one set of monsters/traps no varying dcs. Plus 12th level characters would have more to choose from.
Chris I like this idea!
Tiers would be:
1-3
4-6
7-9
10-12
basing the GP off of levels
2
5
8
11
Sounds good to me.
To be honest this is a monster thread and many people have put out some great things. Lets just say this happens - that fixes the issues being brought up during Season 5 and on.
What would be the option for Seasons 0-4?
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Cormac - That would make the time spent to fill out chronicles much, much longer. It already takes a good bit of time to fill them out at many tables - let's not make that worse.
I'm gonna go out on limb here and guess that most GMs are gonna have access to a calculator.
Time for science!!!!
I'm gonna take a random number: 2613
I'm gonna take six sheets of paper.
I'm gonna multiply that number by 1, .95, .90, .85, .80, and .75
I'm gonna write the results one each on the six sheets of paper.
I'm gonna time myself doing all this.
Result: elapsed time 1:35
One minute and thirty five seconds does not seem to me to be in the category of "much much longer."
