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Just wanted to give a quick shout-out to David Montgomery VL Boston, ran our level 15 Siege of the Diamond Gate table. This guy knows his Sh** and is a great roleplaying judge, took our crazy table and just ran with it.
Thanks man and many props!
"So what is it that Farene the Far Traveled does?" "I flip up these 3 cards."
Agreed. He ran our Bonekeep table and did a great job :-)
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Linda and I arrived early Thursday evening, earlier than we had been able to arrive in previous years, and so we managed to make it to the Meet and Eat for the first time ever. Big Kyle put on a truly awesome event. Talked to Tetsujin Oni and Enlightened Bystand on the shuttle over, Justin Sluder and Nani Pratt briefly on our way in, and then once we got there, I met up with Cheapy, who showed me around to everyone he had found so far. Swapped Shattered Star and Ifrit Wishcrafter stories with Benchak the Night Stalker, said hi again to Jason Nelson and shared the best cat and minis story I'd heard when that became a topic at his table, which included Lisa Stevens, Vic Wertz, Jessica Price, and Neil Spicer. Cheapy brought me over to find Thursty, who promised to kill Iakhovas in the Special if I played 7-8 (which was, unfortunately, never tested since Linda and I overlapped best in 5-6). I dropped by the chat table where I saw innumerable awesome chat people and then headed over to the table where lots of PFSers were about, including first PFCBG (who was surprised that I knew who she was right away--the ears were a dead giveaway!). Erik Mona was there, and I wound up helping to explain the sadness/OPness that is the Clear Splindle ioun stone's resonant power (fortunately, it seems from the banquet that he managed to pull off some good mind control, so not everyone at this Throne of Azlant had it!). Afterwards, I chatted with Verdigris, a few awesome people on whose handles I am blanking, and then eventually Josh Foster, who had so many great stories that I wound up talking with him until Nani returned from the VC dinner, which is when we found out that Kyle and Nani had randomed into Bastardhall, just like Linda and me. There's only four seats in Bastardhall, so what are the chances? Even more excited for Bastardhall than before, we were heading out, but we didn't realize that the shuttle had moved locations due to a nearby shooting! After meeting several new people waiting for the shuttle, including some of Mergy's PFSers up from Ontario, we managed to make it out on what was, for us East Coasters, a super-late shuttle and then collapse.
On Friday, we got our tickets quickly and easily from registration (seeing Ray Diaz and David Montgomery on the way there from our very own region) and then headed over to discover that Wes Schneider had, to his own surprise, managed to wrangle an amazing room for Bastardhall. Quiet, private, with an easy ability to control lighting and ambient music, free water and candies--it even had a bathroom! Wes had a beautiful map of Bastardhall's grounds, and the best part was that his style of extremely evocative descriptions without miniatures matches my playstyle perfectly. The characters had plenty of banter, and a good time was had by all. I will probably be posting an in-character summary of what occurred elsewhere, as Wes tipped us off that the Bastardhall fandom would appreciate hearing what we discovered about the secretive haunted castle.
Afterwards, Nani and Kyle invited us to join their table for Bonekeep, although we had a different slot scheduled for Bonekeep, so we went to see Todd Morgan at PFS HQ. After catching up with Todd, he assured us that Bonekeep had plenty of open slots, and then we ran into Mike Brock. I've previously said that Mike Brock is an action hero (I think it was when he managed to get rid of Quickrunner's Shirt extremely quickly while simultaneously setting up for Gencon), but for anyone who's read my post about what Gencon did to Linda and me last year, Mike told us that if we're willing to come back one of these years or even if we had told him what they did last year, we can always count on his higher Intimidate score backing us up, with the promise that he would make it right, even if that Intimidate failed too. So perhaps we shall return to Gencon in future years! After a quick delve with James Sutter--"Quick Valeros! Focus his wrath by saying Mengkare isn't Lawful Good!"--we wound up wandering around for food and eventually found something. By the time we were done, we just headed back and chatted up a variety of people, whose handles elude me, until the special. Linda and I wandered around looking for a 5-6 group, and we found a group including Gavgoyle, one of our partners in crime from the near victors of the 2011 Grand Melee as well as wakedown (whose dwarven inquisitor of Angradd is quite the character) and one of our new friends from the Meet and Eat the night before whose handle I already mentioned eludes (but his gnome wizard was awesome, with a funny voice and a quirky personality). Our GM was John Dehning, who did a great job of letting us experience all the different facets of the amazing second act. John was meticulous in writing down his notes and ideas as the game went along, and I think the 5-6 subtier is going to benefit from his and our feedback, particularly the finale. We stumbled off to sleep, only to wake up early again to go to PFS Q&A.
There were actually very few of us at the PFS Q&A, notably including Lady Ophelia. I asked about the new wealth rules, and as Lady Ophelia teased above, basically there will be out-of-subtier gold and then 4 player tables in the middle area must play the 6 player version of the low subtier while 6 player tables in the middle area must play the 4 player version of the high subtier. No choice to play up or down. Also interesting was the idea that new quests might include "We Be Kobolds" or other "We Be X" for unusual characters. As to the "character retired from 1 ability drain" thing, Mike Brock graciously stated that if your character is currently dead from this ruling, it isn't a permanent retirement just yet--you can wait until the new guide comes out and probably start playing them again under the new rules, if applicable. Mike and John strongly hinted at major stirrings in the factions, and I can't remember how they phrased it, but I got the sense that Colson Maldris isn't as secure in his seat as the Andoran faction leader as his Aura of Arrogance (Su) makes him think.
After a demo game of the PFACG (I had played the alpha the year before, and Linda wanted to try it out) wherein Ezren kicked major ass, we had some lunch and then stumbled into GM 201. It was awesome how dedicated each and every one of the presenters was to PFS in their own different ways. Presenters included Eric Brittain and Verdigris, while other attendees included VC Jonathan Cary (that might not be right, but I know for sure he was a Texas VC). It amused me how many times someone said "How the heck do you have the time to do that?" just showing that some things come easier to each person, and when you hear about the insane commitment of all the PFS volunteers in an area that is harder for you, you can't help but marvel. For instance, Linda's multiple scheduling files to ensure that we'll always have new games for local players unless they've played them at cons flabbergasted a few people who didn't seem to think that building complex 3D terrain was that much work, and vice versa. Learning tips from each of the GMs and coordinators present was awesome, but by far the best part of GM 201 was the deck of many situations. Full of hilarity but also a lot of lessons for each and every person who went up to the GM slot, the deck also included my favorite line of the con. We were pretending to be a table of whiny entitled players who demanded to bring along an obscure side NPC into the main quest. So when the GM starts to balk about bringing "Bobby" along, my whiny player rolls the dice and calls out "45 diplomacy", and when the GM still refuses, goes into a rant about the "Rules as Written" and "beating the DC by 5 or more" and "Helpful", eventually culminating in, "No no no! You can't just ignore THE RULES! The Core Rulebook is a sacred covenant passed down to us from on high by Jason Bulmahn!"
In the banquet line, Ogre and Sean K Reynolds's wife swap plan was foiled completely when they realized that Jodi would just wield Sean as an improvised two-handed weapon and put the beatdown on everyone else involved. At the banquet, we sat with Kyle and Nani Pratt, Josh Foster, John Compton, Painlord, Enlightened Bystand, and one more person whose forum tag eludes me. They're all great company, and the banquet seemed to fly by at breakneck pace (then again, I think it was actually shorter too). I learned that John Compton's character in Wrath of the Righteous very well might be wielding a legendary (new type of magic item from Mythic) chair as an improvised weapon--how cool is that? Good food, great company. At the end, Pain stepped back to blog and Matt Goodall and Justin Sluder joined us to form Not PFS Legal (since we had 8 active players). We managed 24/25 this time, missing the super-tough ARG question that no table answered correctly (awesome question! We need more that tough). It probably isn't surprising since we had many of the people from the neck-and-neck teams that alternately won the contest last year and the year before by tiebreak and 1 point respectively. After the banquet, we first passed through the pool area, where I said hello to Mattastrophic, then went and talked with Cheapy, Justin Sluder, Tim Hitchcock, Wolfgang Baur, and Louis Porter Jr for a while and then headed back to sleep.
On Sunday, we got to play a table of Bonekeep with entirely familiar faces, as we joined up with Kyle, Nani, Josh, and John, as planned but also managed to have our awesome Boston VL David as our GM somehow. Linda brought her Sylph Preservationist and I played Iakhovas "the invincible". Kyle's Thunder and Fang ranger, Nani's controller gnome with the decidedly evil rat, Josh's sword saint, and particularly John's buff-heavy cleric of Yae Zhing were quite the characters and great companions for such a dangerous mission, and we managed to get in some good RP and still only run out of time amid the final encounter. Some near death situations for two characters, but no casualties, and we weren't close to losing any of the fights (it was only a matter of those characters surviving some particularly evil tactics that targeted them). Afterwards, I wandered around talking to as many people as possible, including Gavgoyle and Lady Ophelia.
I'm sure I missed half the awesome people I met, and particularly I forgot a whole slew of names and forum handles. Sorry about that--please remind me!
So for Linda and me, this was the best Paizocon yet. It was great to meet all of you who I hadn't met before and especially great to get to know the amazing crew from Georgia PFS (Nani, Kyle, Josh, and John).
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So this was my first Paizocon (Started playing November 2012) and I must say that I had a blast! Here's the breakdown of my time in Seattle.
Thursday: Arrived at noon and just did some exploring of the general area. Took a nap in the hotel room while waiting for other New Orleans PFSers to arrive. Went to the fantabulous Meet and Eat. Thank you Kyle for hosting such an extravagant and galliant event. I met many people at the meet and eat up to and including Painlord and many others whose names elude me (I'm terrible with names). Back to the hotel at 1AM local time (3AM my time) so the sleep is more than welcome.
Friday: Played Rivalry's End and Night March of Kalkamedes in the first 2 slots then on to the Special. I had a general idea of how specials worked but was not prepared for this kind of awesomeness. Sat at a 10-11 table with great people and a great GM (again, terrible with names). We managed to take down a vital enemy in the final battle and it was announced shortly after we did...room erupted in cheers. The Pathfinders were triumphant with an Outstanding Victory against the onslaught. Another late night and the bed is calling for me as I enter the room.
Saturday: Went to the How to paint Reaper Miniatures workshop in the morning. Learned how to paint minis so now I can start working on some at home. Played Day of the Demon in the afternoon. Had a couple beers in the atrium while waiting for the banquet line to shorten. Our group of 3 ended up being one of the last ones to enter the room but somehow managed to find a table with 3 empty seats. Fantastic meal and some jaw-dropping announcements made for a wonderful evening.
Sunday: Played in King of the Storval Stairs GM'd by Myron Pauls with his finely crafted props. Probably one of the best games I've ever played in to date. I am a big fan of props and realism and his stair structure just blew my mind. After ending my time at Paizocon, our group from New Orleans went out on the town to do some sight-seeing. We got back to the hotel and proceeded to hang out with other con-goers in the bar with a few drinks. Met Majuba and Barry (who I had played in Rivalry's End with on Friday).
All-in-all I had a great time and plan on returning next year to do it again. Thanks to everyone who helped to make this a great event.
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Rogue Eidolon was absolutely the best summoner player I've encountered in PFS to date, resolving the actions for a dozen summons in about a minute each round. I'd expect no less from an efficiency expert.
Well, as they say, Efficiency is a Virtue...
And it was a gloriously efficient defense against the feeble assault of chaos. Your efficiently decisive shouting of which place to go, followed by running off in that direction, was a great improvement over the usual debate (and also displayed the Virtue of Confidence), and our spellcasters were prudently efficient in their use of magic, saving enough for the final demonic push that we could decisively show them our full strength.
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So at long last, my Pathfinder adventures have come to an end... Which after needed rest, I am ready to share my report...
Forewarning: This will be staggered, as I have quite a lot to share.. But since I was the last to start reporting, it makes sense..We will skip Thursday, as that was the majority of my earlier posts. As well as the same with Monday.
So let us begin... with a quote from Justin Sludder:
“We gamers are so full of life.. That we have to create and live through other ones.”
Friday: The Day of Neverending Games!
As all good things, it started with Breakfast!! But this is PaizoCon, so by default, it started with a lovely celebrity breakfast! It was at first me, Ryan and Robyn. (Who are the best roomies ever!) Then upon entering the hotel’s restaurant, we found Greg A. Vaughan relaxed by himself, so of course, I have to ambush him since I’ve not seen him since last PacifiCon this year. But as breakfast continued on, more and more people came to see us, which also included, Gavin Smith and one of my favorite Scenario writers Alex Greenshields. Out the gate, I already knew that it was going to be a very “starry-eyed” convention for me. Breakfast with Ryan and Robyn.
The Price of Friendship: So the Glories of The Past Series (which is Halls of Dwarven Lore, Price of Friendship and The Secrets Stones Keep) has been turning out to be a very awesome set of adventures. If you are an story arc completer person, then you play all three and enjoy it. If you aren’t you can play each one individually and still have a good time! I got the pleasure and honor to game with two people that I had always wanted to play with: Brian Darnell and Ryan Costello. Being a fan of the Know Direction Podcast, getting the honor to play with Ryan’s infamous via-podcast Scarnzi character with a Kangaroo familiar was a real treat. And if you get a chance to play with him, be assured you will have a good time together. An additional bonus, was that the adventure was run, by one of our newest GM’s in the Sacramento valley Jennifer Green. As our area has begun to grow leaps and bounds it’s hard to keep up with all the new GM’s. But it was a real delight and I look forward to seeing Jennifer in future conventions and adventures in the near future.
Lunch proceeded, with meeting Jason Bulhman, Stephen Radley-Macfarland (who looks a lot like Howie23), and Erik Mona. Again with the starry eyes… To the point where I forgot to order and had to take lunch with me to the next slot.
The Waking Rune: So I committed a sin, and was scheduled at one table for the game.. And I instead, snuck over to the great Eric Brittan’s table run of the event. Now what I did not know before siting down, was that in the slot previous, he had already obliterated a table. And all I can say about the adventure, is that Lucia, became the second Amberdagger to meet Pharasma. According also to news she had heard after coming back from the dead, her friend Abby (Brian Darnell’s character) had also met with the same fate but was no where to be found. For me, it was one of the most epic season enders I have ever experienced. I look forward to sharing this adventure at home with my area. Cause it is THAT EPIC.
Thank you Master Brittan, many GM’s take extreme evil pleasure in killing players. He did so, but did so in a way that allowed players not to feel like they were walking to their deaths. He gave us many choices and chances to improve, our lot and even save ourselves if needed. But we made our choices and took our consequences accordingly. That’s what I was looking for in a Pathfinder Scenario.
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An additional bonus, was that the adventure was run, by one of our newest GM’s in the Sacramento valley Jennifer Green. As our area has begun to grow leaps and bounds it’s hard to keep up with all the new GM’s. But it was a real delight and I look forward to seeing Jennifer in future conventions and adventures in the near future.
I know she will appreciate this, she was real nervous. - Jennifer's hubby.
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Siege of The Diamond City: So… How do I explain the special without spoiling it? Is it even possible? I have no idea. So let me start with the lineup… (See pic above for details) I would also like to state that our Pathfinder Society Facebook Link Available here is to thank for creating this huge table of fun awesomeness.
Me: I played my "tenth" character Charlotte Amberdagger.She was the recent survivor of the Eyes of The Ten Mission. I wanted to go raid the demons in the high tier as I had all the fun items from Season 4 attached to her.
Brian Darnell: He brought forth Jaren, Sorc of absolute casting insanity. Brian was also my Co-Conspiriator, and initial creator of the table of awesome.It took some serious diplomacy checks with Brian as he had terrible experience in the past playing high tier adventures in specials, but I promised him that this year would be different. And boy was I glad!
Alastair Rigg: VC of Australia—Brian’s first choice of who he wanted on the table. He played his infamous Cavalier with a (no joke) Profession-Sex check. You can imagine what fun we had.
Will Johnson: VL of Fresno-My first choice of whom I wanted on the table. (And I didn’t even have to ask.. It just magically happen he was on FB that day and signed up!) He played Hoppy who is Battle Oracle of Cayden Cailean. His PC’s cup, was actually a Guinness Stein which I now want to purchase in real life.
Matt Goodall: The writer of all things epic. His Society credits include Wrath of the Accursed and Rise of The Goblin Guild. He played Miffany, who was a cleric of Shelyn. Her philosophy was to kick demon ass in the name of friendship. Which was totally awesome.
Thea Peters: The 5-star mistress and creator of our GM Shared Prep. It would be the first time I would meet her in the flesh. From our online chats, she sounded like a lady of awesome, and I was not disappointed when I met her for the first time. She played a Gnome Sorc, who had a knack for lightning. Armed with a Rod of Wonder, that always seemed to end up in the lighting bolt setting.. (Although many of us were hoping for diamonds to shoot out of them.)
So needless to say, this out the gate was a table destined to have fun, drink beers, and kick demon butt. And it did. Because the adventure is still in production, I am not really allowed to get into deep conversations about it. I also have already sent my post-production feedback to them. But I will say this: GenCon players if you can, pre-muster a table early and get to know each other! Don’t wait till the last minute! You are in for one hell of an adventure.
Friday night ended with tea, after hour discussions with Brian, Ryan, Thea, Cherry Pie, Will and Robyn.. And sleep. Until Ryan accidentally set the alarm clock to the wrong time, and I couldn't get back to sleep. I forgive him, but 4am is not 6am. Ever.
Venture-Lieutenant, Arizona—Phoenix
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Minor note for the special. Not too spoilery, but only for GMs.
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Just noticed there were 266 posts last year in the 2012 thread for Paizocon and only 166 this year. Thats 100 posts of much needed information that we are missing out on!
I am working on that! But I can only post so much when at work. Also.. Since a lot of the fun stuff involves lots of potential spoilers, (i.e: The GenCon Special and the end of Season 4) we have to be careful what we share..
I will quickly share this.. DO NOT HARD MODE THE WAKING RUNE. I didn't play the hard mode version of this adventure, and our party still had a hard time, and death still happened. If your table chooses Hard Mode, be sure to accept that death will be higher possibility.
Side note: After the adventure, I took a look at hard mode.. And with the right over-optimized party, hard mode will be loads of fun... But if you are not optimized... Don't do it!!!!
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Just noticed there were 266 posts last year in the 2012 thread for Paizocon and only 166 this year. Thats 100 posts of much needed information that we are missing out on!
Yeah...as I said above, the Hotel internet sucked. Sadly, we'll be at the same location next year (so they say) so we might have the same suckage unless Paizo opens up the hotel conference internet for all (I don't now how wired the hotel is for tech conferences).
In the past, I'd have a chat or learn a thing and do a quick post about it on my computer. This year, I was decked to do more (iPad+easy keyboard), but the wifi failed.
Perhaps there needs to be a thread in the gms area then for Paizocon bloggry.. so spoilers could be fired at will
What the heck do you have against Will? Sure he's from freakin' Fresno, but he's still a good guy.
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I would say the following, only play hard mode if you are convinced that you can take it. There is no shame in not being either up for or ready for the challenge.
:-)
But if you sit with Master Brittain.. All bets are off. But as a result of sitting at his table, he's now been added on my list of awesome GM's whom I am okay with killing my characters. It's a short list of Brian Darnell, Will Johnson, Mike Azzolino and even Master Painlord himself. So Eric has entered an elite list by just being awesome. :D
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I had the pleasure of playing at one of Crystal Frasier's tables for We Be Goblins: Smash and Burn. It's set after the original We Be Goblins and introduces two new murderous psychopaths in addition to the ones we already know and love. We got to revisit a well loved locale from the APs and we got to see some extremely familiar faces from the other side of the tracks.
Crystal did a wonderful job creating the perfect atmosphere for a mischievous good time, and I dare say that all of the players did an excellent job with embracing the voices, psychopathic tendencies, and all the <redacted>, <redacted> and <redacted> that Crystal placed there for us to have fun with.
We're missing out if we don't get to see future additions to the We Be Goblins 'verse.
Many of my other sessions have already been covered by others, but I will add this regarding the gen con special table I played at.
Rogue Eidolon was absolutely the best summoner player I've encountered in PFS to date, resolving the actions for a dozen summons in about a minute each round. I'd expect no less from an efficiency expert.
There was not one summoner of amazing skill at that table, but 2. Rogue Eidolon and Linda had so many minions out at that table that my poor wizard was quaking in fear of casting a haste spell. To their credit they each took their turns in less time it takes for most to resolve 2 actions. Stats for those pesky critters were available as if pulled from a handy haversack... this was how one plays with power.. I felt like a babe in the woods.
Jon Dehning did an amazing job of handling our motley crew and I remember more about the story, the epic interaction in the convention hall, and our group interaction than I did about the crunch of the mobs and grid maps.. Bravo!
Venture-Lieutenant, California—Sacramento
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Friday- First slot, Waking Rune. Majuba, Deidre, TetsujinOni, Desmond (Reno), DragnMoon and I. I didn't know who half of these peeps were until after the fact and was pretty shocked that I played with such a dream team for the scenario. Everyone was awesome and it was great that two paladins smiting finished off Krune. Eric Brittan was a fantastic GM and I loved how he asked us the question "Describe to me how you killed X"
I was very disappointed I had to deal with Checking out of my room during that scenario, tried really hard not to have to do that but it just happened at the worse time. :(
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Minor note for the special. Not too spoilery, but only for GMs.
** spoiler omitted **
I was thinking about this just the other day, in fact. I will totally be bringing Venture-Captain Grayson of Lastwall in to sit at the table when I run this at GenCon. He just loves dispensing advice on how to best navigate the higher levels of society.