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I'm pretty sure that if Pathfinders are ever victorious in a battle in the streets of any city in Golarion, as soon as one of them pulls out a straw and starts to drink the blood of his fallen enemy, the population will turn against a Pathfinders and all of our PCs will be hunted down and killed across the globe.
But that's just my interpretation of how things would go. What about you MrSin? You think, if you sit next to a fallen wizard and start slurping away, you'd be safe? You think any other Pathfinders with you, would be safe?
That's... a pretty intense statement. I mean a whole mob after you for drinking up some blood with a straw? They might think your weird, but I wouldn't say your entire organization would get lynched over it. I think the society has done worse to corpses too, if I remember correctly. Or even to the still living.
Among the things we can do in public are devil worshipping, soul eating, murder, kleptomania, and a variety of other nasty things. But the thing that gets us is a bendy straw? I think its a bit of an overstatement to be honest.
So no, I don't think siphoning a bit of blood for arcane knowledge is that bad. I could name a number of things I've seen in society I think is grossly worse.
Edit: I should add, I don't think comparing on banned thing to another legal thing is the best way to decide if they're okay or not.
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Most of the bad things that Pathfinders do, are done discreetly. Devil pacts included, you don't see people doing human sacrifice in public, not even in Cheliax. Pangolais, yeah, there's a bit of that and it freaks the hell out of people there.
What you want to legalize is a very public thing. I don't think any person in Absalom, Quadira, Osirion or even Cheliax, has ever witnessed a blatant drinking of blood by a Pathfinder.
We would get lynched. Heck, if I'm one of the people living in this fantasy world of Golarion, I'm leading the lynch mob and there would be torches and pitchforks involved. And the Grand Lodge would burn, that same day. That level of insanity, I wouldn't stomach, fantasy world or not, and neither would most people playing PFS.
Wait, why is the blood drinking public but nothing else is?
Why are you leading a lynch mob over some blood drinking? Isn't that a little extreme? Is it really that awful to you?
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Why do we think that some shades of evil (specifically Cheliax) are perfectly acceptable in PFS even with their potential to cause inner party tension, while some other shades of evil (necromantic tendencies) are frowned upon or banned?
Speaking only of personal preference, I'd like to see it resolved as follows:
• Treat the casting of spells with the [evil] descriptor as minor evil acts (even if the spell only sometimes has the descriptor, such as summon monster). Alternatively, make PCs incapable of casting spells with alignment descriptors opposite their own (much like clerics).
• Ban spells that inherently involve evil beyond just the descriptor (such as blood transcription or animate dead).
• Whenever you gain a familiar/companion that is inherently evil (like an imp familiar), as well as whenever you gain a level while you have such a companion, your alignment shifts one step toward evil unless you subject yourself to an atonement spell.
But that's just me and my pipe dreams. :)
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Speaking only of personal preference, I'd like to see it resolved as follows:
I think many of your thoughts are fair and valid, though somewhat likely to cause a bit more hassle in book keeping.
Speaking only of my personal preference, I do not have a problem with evil elements in PFS play past the fact that they can cause huge table tension while partied with good PCs. Removing the no pvp policy would be disastrous, so I personally am not really sure how to find a good balance between the extremes.
I think during most scenarios and most tables, it is a non issue. For those occasional scenarios where Cheliaxian's and Sczarni's faction missions call for obvious malevolence though, it's pretty wretched for the good PCs since most anything they might do to prevent that malevolence taking place is likely to be considered pvp or being a jerk.
Careful what you wish for Jiggy, when you ban everything that could be deemed as evil you might get more than you bargained for.
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Why do we think that some shades of evil (specifically Cheliax) are perfectly acceptable in PFS even with their potential to cause inner party tension, while some other shades of evil (necromantic tendencies) are frowned upon or banned?Speaking only of personal preference, I'd like to see it resolved as follows:
• Treat the casting of spells with the [evil] descriptor as minor evil acts (even if the spell only sometimes has the descriptor, such as summon monster). Alternatively, make PCs incapable of casting spells with alignment descriptors opposite their own (much like clerics).
• Ban spells that inherently involve evil beyond just the descriptor (such as blood transcription or animate dead).
• Whenever you gain a familiar/companion that is inherently evil (like an imp familiar), as well as whenever you gain a level while you have such a companion, your alignment shifts one step toward evil unless you subject yourself to an atonement spell.But that's just me and my pipe dreams. :)
In my own personal world, I'm with you Jiggy. I would even furthermore want to remove worship of at least the daemon horseman (SKR does an amazing job with the deity articles, and it's easy to make a N worshiper of either Norgorber or Urgathoa who believably follows the religion as presented without being evil. The same is not true for a cleric of one of the horsemen. Holy crap the Szuriel article!). This somewhat stems from my characters tending more in personality towards Thomas the Tiefling Hero than they do towards the imp-on-the-shoulder soul-sucking "totally not evil guys" characters.
But on the other hand, I know a lot of great players who love these concepts and would be sad to see them go. It can also be ridiculous fun to play with nefarious or blatantly evil characters in a campaign with greater players where everyone knows how to handle it (see if you can get anyone in John Compton's super-evil Kingmaker campaign to tell stories if you already know Kingmaker--it's hilarious).
But the problem is that in PFS, you never know what you're going to get. Hmmm....I wonder if they could close down the dancing on the line "totally not evil guys" options while allowing a hard-to-get boon that allows an evil Pathfinder with all those options opened, with the caveat that any player or GM at the table was allowed to veto a character with that boon with no explanation required. Of course, given that the assassin boon was an auction boon, it might have to be equally rare, so it probably wouldn't solve anything.
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Lets be clear here. The Society knows that many of it's agents have divided loyalties. The Society however doesn't send it's agents on those faction missions, it sends people on it's own missions and the factions tend to insert themselves COVERTLY into the agent's agenda. While they could dismiss agents with divided loyalties, this would have two effects.
1. It would cause a massive manpower shrinkage in an organisation where every active hand is needed.
2. As opposed to ending those questionable activities, it would drive them further underground. The Society puts a damper on the excesses of the factions by forcing the faction members to work together for common goals.
The Society is basically clamping down on practises that would be visible and cause harm to the society's image overall.
Fair points, and one's that work particularly well for the ooc story aspects and logic.
What are your views for the occasional times that these things lead to conflict at the table during game play?
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Wait, why is the blood drinking public but nothing else is?
Why are you leading a lynch mob over some blood drinking? Isn't that a little extreme? Is it really that awful to you?
I will answer each question, with an answer.
1. Because in my experience there is always one a-hole who will ruin it for everyone.
2. I'd lead the lynch mob because I'd be a common person faced with a monstrous evil, it might come for me or my family, another day. So, the reason I'd lead the mob is simple self-preservation.
3. Not extreme in this world. This is a world where the gods are real, not just going to church faith, you see their miracles on a daily basis real. Faith is not required for these folks, they know their gods exist and that they are being judged on a semi-regular basis.
4. Yes, it is that awful. Not for the reasons you might think I do, though.
I am not personally offended by this scenario, I described. But I administrate games in a store and welcome everyone to our tables. I went from 5 players in March to 31 names today, that get my game schedule every week, 14 of them are regulars, who play twice a week. So, I've put in some work into building up PFS in my area and I wouldn't appreciate someone wasting all my work to grow my community of players, with their anti-social shenanigans.
And I get all sort of players sitting down, including Church people, kids and all sorts of other players at lvl. 1. This could potentially offend, would be players, who have been warned since the 80s mania, that D&D players are devil worshipers.
This sort of play would not endear our gaming community to the general public, just to satisfy the macabre needs of the few. You want to drink blood in your game, cool go for it but not in public. Do it at home with mature players, not in a public PFS setting.
We're not playing Vampire: The Masquerade here and a human being doing this stuff, could possibly make things hairy for people who then have to explain why their 10 year-old son was exposed to such vile content.
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But on the other hand, I know a lot of great players who love these concepts and would be sad to see them go.
If you go with the "Alternatively..." method on my first bullet point, then you can still have neutral PCs casting [evil] spells (minus the beyond-the-descriptor ones) to get those concepts. You couldn't create your own undead (I'm sorry, but neutral characters do not add walking evil to the world as SOP) but you could still be necromancy-themed and/or go with a "use it against them" thing by using Command Undead.
And folks could still play their imp-on-the-shoulder wizards, they'd just have to face the reality that reciting "nuh-uh, I'm still neutral" does not remove the consequences of bonding yourself to a creature of pure evil. If you want to play with that fire and not be corrupted, you're going to need regular doses of alignment-preserving magic.
These measures let evil be evil without actually removing very many concepts at all.
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Continuing on my previous post. I don't have an official Pathfinder Society venue, provided by Paizo. I administrate the game in a game store, like most people.
If your store is anything like mine, then you'll see kids coming in and playing Pokemon or something else. If those parents found out that the game store was offering a public game that explores such behavior to their kids, we might find ourselves not having a venue to play in. Our store owner is very open minded but he's a businessman first and a gamer second. And I doubt very much he wants to attract that sort of a reputation to his place of business, from the local community.
EDIT ADDED:
I didn't even think of this, until now, that our store owner also has a 4 and 6 year-old and when his babysitter bails on him, his kids come to the store to hang out, until he can get their mom to pick them up. So, sometimes when we game, we've got kids running around.
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I fear this discussion is rapidly getting wrapped up in squabbling and, if it continues further, we might end up changing the nature of PFS in a direction that would ultimately cripple it.
Is the best way to curtail the actions of a PC that's more evil than neutral to, officially on paper, restrict the options available to all players? I certainly hope not. It's the GM's job to communicate to that player that drinking blood, raising the dead, and kicking puppies is evil, and that they should refrain from such action. The alternative is a world where our options are more limited, where spells and actions are outright banned, and where such characters cease to exist.
That's not the campaign I want to be a part of. I want to see players struggle with finding the "right thing to do" in morally grey situations (like Eyes of the Ten). In fact, I want to experience that myself!
I think that this thread has made it's point but presently, all that is left to do is argue over minutia that will lead to no charitable resolution. And that, I feel, it is a task best kept absent from these boards.
I will answer each question, with an answer.
1. Because in my experience there is always one a-hole who will ruin it for everyone.
2. I'd lead the lynch mob because I'd be a common person faced with a monstrous evil, it might come for me or my family, another day. So, the reason I'd lead the mob is simple self-preservation.
3. Not extreme in this world. This is a world where the gods are real, not just going to church faith, you see their miracles on a daily basis real. Faith is not required for these folks, they know their gods exist and that they are being judged on a semi-regular basis.
4. Yes, it is that awful. Not for the reasons you might think I do, though.
I am not personally offended by this scenario, I described. But I administrate games in a store and welcome everyone to our tables. I went from 5 players in March to 31 names today, that get my game schedule every week, 14 of them are regulars, who play twice a week. So, I've put in some work into building up PFS in my area and I wouldn't appreciate someone wasting all my work to grow my community of players, with their anti-social shenanigans.
And I get all sort of players sitting down, including Church people, kids and all sorts of other players at lvl. 1. This could potentially offend, would be players, who have been warned since the 80s mania, that D&D players are devil worshipers.
This sort of play would not endear our gaming community to the general public, just to satisfy the macabre needs of the few. You want to drink blood in your game, cool go for it but not in public. Do it at home with mature players, not in a public PFS setting.
We're not playing Vampire: The Masquerade here and a human being doing this stuff, could possibly make things hairy for people who then have to explain why their 10 year-old son was...
I like that you mention devil worship above, yet ignore Cheliax entirely. In fact, I've seen the opponents to my point conveniently ignoring several points (posted above) that refute their claims. All said, the posters who disagree with me the most, and want to see more things banned WILL LIKELY NEVER SIT ACROSS A TABLE FROM ME. No one at my table has a single problem with my style of play, nor does my GM, other than these catch-all rules that he must abide by.
If players like Jiggy and Eric Saxon have such strong opinions on certain spells/characters/etc., petition you GMs, not PFS as a whole, because what works for you (within the printed context of Pathfinder) is NOT what works for everyone. Your heirophant/paladin/cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer, in party nor in combat, so why strive to affect MY game?
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I kind of figured Mike Brock's post way back on page 1 heralded the death of this thread. I guess not.
I guess I really just don't see what the big deal is. I mean, realistically speaking, spells are not that expensive to learn. And really, as far as physically eating other human-ish creatures goes, this ruling is consistent with every other ruling on similar content (such as dhampir racial feats and some other feats that involve devouring of body parts and/or blood).
Also, we should also put down for the record that just because it's an evil action does not preclude you from actually committing the act. There are plenty of set ups in PFS (especially in season 4). There are just consequences often in the form of an alignment shift, and sometimes an atonement. If you really want to use blood transcription, why not save it for a particularly "special" occasion?
I'm sure a bastard runelord like Krune deserves it!
We can talk all day about how cannibalism is no more evil than devil worship, but the campaign management has spoken by not speaking as far as I can tell. This is going nowhere fast.
If you really want to use blood transcription, why not save it for a particularly "special" occasion?
Blood transcription doesn't do anything to an individual, so there's no point in saving it for someone you don't like. You might save things like Boneshatter or Summon Cacodaemon for people you don't like.
The talk about evil acts reminds me of Severing Ties more than any actually. Don't think I've seen a group go through there without doing at least one thing my grandmother wouldn't appreciate.
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The talk about evil acts reminds me of Severing Ties more than any actually. Don't think I've seen a group go through there without doing at least one thing my grandmother wouldn't appreciate.
Challenge Accepted! Will try to get my groups to run through this a week from Saturday and see what comes of it.
The talk about evil acts reminds me of Severing Ties more than any actually. Don't think I've seen a group go through there without doing at least one thing my grandmother wouldn't appreciate.Challenge Accepted! Will try to get my groups to run through this a week from Saturday and see what comes of it.
Oh tell me how it works out! That's a good one for the funny PFS moments thread I think.
Also hope it goes well without any bad feelings or deaths. Them basilisks and the sentinel are not nice peoples!
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Eric your appeals to public relations sound convincing until your realize that 1. What is seen by the public can't be handled across the board as well as it can in person. 2. Decisions are not made in a vacuum, and rules can have unintended consequences.
It will be absolutely impossible to legislate what is crowd friendly in every environment, hence general rules like "Don't be a jerk." Who cares if someone says "I cast blood transcription on the sorcerer" when right next door you have a GM shouting "As you whip your sword around it lands firmly in the cleric's neck, spraying blood out all over you and the nearby crowd! As his heart thumps the last few beats, a couple strong streams of blood pulse against your blade." Some people would call this good GMing, and some would call it inappropriate for public. We trust our groups, with the help of organizers and VOs, to help make this decision. If you are organizing a store, I wouldn't fault you if I was playing in your store and you told me "Cut out all the blood talk, I want a family friendly environment here." I would fault you for telling me that the standards you set for your store is in the best interest across the globe for all players, GMs, store owners, and patrons.
I can see several potential negative side effects to trying to make this type of widespread legislation based on a supposed moral high ground. For one, it gives more credence to the "good guys" thinking they can do whatever they want in the name of "good". This comes both in the form of dictating how other players are allowed to play their characters, and in their ruthlessness playing their own characters within the game. Remember my paladin player from earlier who can't get through two sentences without shouting f!%# or s!!#? What ground do we have to stand on in opposition to him when he sees a guy walking down the street that detects evil so he immediately goes to "SLICE HIM THE F~+$ UP!?" If we concede a world where everything is clearly defined as black and white, when we call something evil it has no rights; killing people in the middle of the street you have never even seen or spoken with can't truly be argued as a bad thing. Instead it is a natural conclusion to be drawn from such simplified distinctions of good and evil. Mind you, I am not making up a strawman. I am talking about a real person who follows this chain of logic, and according to forum posts, he is not alone in this line of thinking.
Also, added legislation removing the grey zones often has the unintended consequence of causing people to inadvertently take steps in the wrong direction. I first saw this explained quite well several years ago in Freakanomics, I am sure several people here have read it. In it they give an example of a day care who wants parents to quit showing up late to pick up their children. They start to charge more money to those who are late in an effort to provide incentive for being on time. Instead, it had the opposite effect. People were more regularly late and for longer periods of time. The reason being, when people thought that their misdeeds was a nuisance to others and they were taking advantage of their good will, they were honestly trying to be on time. Once the rules were clearly defined about what happened in that grey zone and there was consideration being offered for being late, the parents no longer felt any moral obligations to the previous time frame. I noticed a very similar effect in myself a while back for PFS when it was stated that GMs were to audit all character purchases. The first time I started to do a personal audit for one of my characters after I read that rule, I momentarily stopped myself when the thought came into my head "Why bother, a GM is going to be doing audits now for me." I recognized the problem with that line of thought, but many people will not.
You also will likely have people who will want to push back against the boundaries out of spite. "What do you mean there is now a rule that my Dhampire can't bite a dead body! You have to be kidding me, that is ridiculous! Well in that case I am going old testament on this mother xxxxxxxer. I am chopping him up in pieces and delivering his body to different different corners of the city. I am going to urinate on him first just for good measure."
These changes right now really don't affect me. But they do scare me. Because it looks like a direction that not only runs the risk of the above problems, it runs the risk eventually boring me. There is a very good reason that TV, movies, books, etc have moved away from the traditional hero in the white hat who fights against the evil man in the black hat, it is so incredibly boring and unrealistic. Real people have real motivations and real tribulations, they don't always see eye to eye and there isn't always an obvious villain. The reason the white hats of old were so boring was because they were paragons of pure goodness in an unrealistic good environment. Once they could eliminate the clearly defined bad thing from that environment, there was an order and stability in the world. Now mind you, I am not opposed to strongly moral, thoughtful characters who stand up for what is right; but I expect them to own that burden. There is a reason most people you meet are not these righteous, uncompromising saints, it is really hard to have that level of conviction in a world that is not built upon those standards. In A Game of Thrones, I absolutely loved Ned Stark and was somewhat crushed when he died. I would say he very much represented an extremely moral character and a champion of virtue. I loved him because he maintained this virtue while having to pay through the nose to do it. If your characters want to be this type of righteous beacon of goodness more power to you, just realize that the world (and the society you exist within) runs on the backs of people lacking your level of virtue. To instead insist that the world conform around your set of virtues, is to remove the personal burden of being moral.
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Eric... how many scenarios can you think of where the Pathfinders engage in open combat in the middle of the street with arcane spell casters, which is the only situation I can think of where someone would maybe pull out the bendy straw to drink an enemy's blood for blood transcription? Every wizard I've fought so far has been behind some sort of closed doors, or in a town like say, Riddleport, where that kind of thing might be overlooked.
I get where you are coming from. PFS is usually played publicly, and having the guy at the table who talks about flaying his enemies to drink their blood like he's drinking the juice from a peach, probably not good for business in a store. Those types of players though, in my experience, tend to get filtered out of a group because they make other people at the table uncomfortable as well, and eventually get the hint to either tone it down or start their own games elsewhere. However, calling for changes to the game because of what some people might do at a table or because you don't like how people have fun smacks of "don't do that, it's badwrongfun" which is something I struggle with doing myself, but realize, my idea of fun isn't the same as everyone else.
This topic is fun to read, but it has gotten way off track. At this point, I think the only thing to do is consider what has been said here the next time you sit at a table with a necromancer, and ask yourself is his undead raising ways are any worse than the barbarian's decapitating ways, the wizard's imp familiar, or the inquisitor's black and white views on right and wrong. Above all else, ask yourself why your character would be a PATHFINDER if he wasn't ready to Explore, Report, and COOPERATE.
Each time I've seen it happen, it's never gone beyond being a great roleplaying opportunity.
Lucky! Every time I see a disagreement at the table it turns into an out of character argument.
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• Whenever you gain a familiar/companion that is inherently evil (like an imp familiar), as well as whenever you gain a level while you have such a companion, your alignment shifts one step toward evil unless you subject yourself to an atonement spell.
But that's just me and my pipe dreams. :)
If they get an atonement and keep said evil item, then they haven't really atoned.
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Common, let's be honest here. If you can do it in public, someone will. And as soon as they do, there will be consequences. That's why this will never be allowed.
To derail the thread even further, that's where peer pressure and encouraging adult behaviour come into play. If you're being a Richard, you stop when called out on it.
To use a non-evil version. Whne I play Mayim, she's a flirt, when I play Ksenia she's a witch (she's working on changing through, really!) when I play Dexios, he's preachy. When I play Kodiak, he's old fashioned, etc. I have to be really careful with Mayim (and to a lesser extent, Ksenia) because Mayim being a follower of Calistra, complete with a 100GP holy symbol tramp stamp, is sex on steroids. That can really creep people out coming from an ogre like me at the table. With hte right people it's great. We all laugh. With the wrong people, I put her in a (mental) chastity belt.
Likewise when the 10 yo plays at the table, we all try to curb our language. I described the paracountess' room in The Disappeared as "This room is full of things we won't talk about at this table, and a bed." We try not to swear, etc.
Ravenstone is a small store, so anyone who comes in sees us. Whne I'm GMing I often try to get people to come over, and answer questions. (hey, I'm all for keeping my FLGS afloat and growing the hobby.)
Basically, there's a difference between, "Cackling wildly, I pull out my sippy straw" and "I cast blood transcription, what can I get." When a player crosses that line, you call him out, plain and simple. Don't make Paizo police your table, Mayim may not be welcome at a table of 10 year olds, she is welcome at a table of adults.
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Each time I've seen it happen, it's never gone beyond being a great roleplaying opportunity.Lets be clear here. The Society knows that many of it's agents have divided loyalties. The Society however doesn't send it's agents on those faction missions, it sends people on it's own missions and the factions tend to insert themselves COVERTLY into the agent's agenda. While they could dismiss agents with divided loyalties, this would have two effects.
1. It would cause a massive manpower shrinkage in an organisation where every active hand is needed.
2. As opposed to ending those questionable activities, it would drive them further underground. The Society puts a damper on the excesses of the factions by forcing the faction members to work together for common goals.
The Society is basically clamping down on practises that would be visible and cause harm to the society's image overall.
Fair points, and one's that work particularly well for the ooc story aspects and logic.
What are your views for the occasional times that these things lead to conflict at the table during game play?
That is fortunate. In the spirit of fairness, the question I pose is mostly for academic discussion. In the 52 character levels worth of play I have thus far been part of with PFS, I have only had to deal with one situation that caused inner party disharmony. We had a player hell bent on executing prisoners after surrender was accepted by the rest of the good aligned party. As we could not directly oppose him in any way, he killed both of them while we stood there begging him to stop. It was incredibly frustrating, and while our GM probably should have been the one to put a stop to it so we didn't have too, he was also relatively new to GMing in PFS. So I can sympathize with the reasons he might have thought it was too hamfisted to derail a character with a simple veto.
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In my own personal world, I'm with you Jiggy. I would even furthermore want to remove worship of at least the daemon horseman (SKR does an amazing job with the deity articles, and it's easy to make a N worshiper of either Norgorber or Urgathoa who believably follows the religion as presented without being evil. The same is not true for a cleric of one of the horsemen. Holy crap the Szuriel article!). This somewhat stems from my characters tending more in personality towards Thomas the Tiefling Hero than they do towards the imp-on-the-shoulder soul-sucking "totally not evil guys" characters.But on the other hand, I know a lot of great players who love these concepts and would be sad to see them go. It can also be ridiculous fun to play with nefarious or blatantly evil characters in a campaign with greater players where everyone knows how to handle it (see if you can get anyone in John Compton's super-evil Kingmaker campaign to...
I won't try to persuade your mind on this issue, in fact as a GM, I agree since at least to me, it's easier to judge on the table and I expect from people to be hero's also. But neutral worshipers contribute alot to the Pathfinder Society also. It's even the main reason why PFS is neutral ground and it welcome's anyone (non-evil of course) with open arms to work for them. Having many of those occult or evil-based deities removed might be unrealistic for the society itself.
I'v had my share of fun with playing an neutral cleric of Zyphus also. Several times, player's character's managed to see through my motives and react appropriately, but sometimes they didn't and he managed to reap death among his fallen enemies.
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Tell that to a certain Season 4 chronicle sheet.If they get an atonement and keep said evil item, then they haven't really atoned.• Whenever you gain a familiar/companion that is inherently evil (like an imp familiar), as well as whenever you gain a level while you have such a companion, your alignment shifts one step toward evil unless you subject yourself to an atonement spell.
But that's just me and my pipe dreams. :)
Myself, and others, have made this comment before. The official response is that "evil season 4 boons are an exception to that rule."
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RPG Superstar 2013 Top 8
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Tell that to a certain Season 4 chronicle sheet.If they get an atonement and keep said evil item, then they haven't really atoned.• Whenever you gain a familiar/companion that is inherently evil (like an imp familiar), as well as whenever you gain a level while you have such a companion, your alignment shifts one step toward evil unless you subject yourself to an atonement spell.
But that's just me and my pipe dreams. :)
Don't get me started on that.
Common, let's be honest here. If you can do it in public, someone will. And as soon as they do, there will be consequences. That's why this will never be allowed.To derail the thread even further, that's where peer pressure and encouraging adult behaviour come into play. If you're being a Richard, you stop when called out on it.
...
Basically, there's a difference between, "Cackling wildly, I pull out my sippy straw" and "I cast blood transcription, what can I get." ;b'When a player crosses that line, you call him out, plain and simple. Don't make Paizo police your table, Mayim may not be welcome at a table of 10 year olds, she is welcome at a table of adults. [/b]
(emphasis is mine)
GHreat points, sir. I play at just such a table of adults. There's no need to be wildly graphic with blood spells, anyway, as vampires and necromancers often survive by discretion, as I have when using this spell pre-PFS:"This specimen will be vital for my research- now WE shall use his power against his accomplices!"
If and when my 11-year old nephew joins our game, we'll curb our language, but the kid's seen his fair share of blood from Call of Duty and hunting trips- squeamish he ain't!
Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as), I'd be happy to play at a table with Jiggy's tiefling, Mr. Saxon's heirophant, and anyone else looking for a good RP game- just unlikely unless you're in Missoula, lol.
Just to add my observations that I would think could have led to something like this rule.
It was not at my local shop in Southern Ohio, but on a business trip. I had a couple hours to kill so I stopped by a game shop. Watched the last 45 minutes or so of a PFS session.
GM looked to be early 20's.
3 kids in the 10-12 range.
2 adults in 30+ range that I'm pretty sure were the parents (or aunt/uncle) of the kids.
1 supposed adult late 30's early 40's.
This last guys was obviously enjoying the heck out of trying to shock everyone while seeing how close he could skate to the line before the GM said you can't do that. "No I'm not evil. Just a normal chaotic neutral necromancer!" He said that several times.
He was animating corpses to threaten and intimidate the foes that had surrendered (trying to get info). He was getting pretty graphic with the threatened tortures. I'm not 100% sure he used blood transcription, but if he had, he would have described it in detail. Etc...
To get out of the situation, the GM just said "they give you all the info" so there was no reason to do anything more. This guy still tried to prolong it with, "Just to see if they have anything they were holding back..." The GM stopped him and said "No you've got it all." { I understand why the GM did this, but I don't think it was the best way to handle it. I think the guy feels he won. Since the tactic worked he will probably do it again in the future. }
The parent/aunts/uncles as well as the GM were obviously uncomfortable with what was being said in front of the kids. I tried to say something to the guy about it after the game, and he just brushed me off with "Whatever, there's worse on TV every day." and walked out of the store. It would not surprise me at all to learn the 3 kids were not allowed to come back. I think that's a shame.
Was the guy a jack hole? Obviously yes. But no one at the table was willing to call him on it. (I can't say why for sure, but I would have if it had been me and my kids. Many people are taught to avoid confrontation. Maybe that's why.)
You can say that the VC, VL, GM, or other players should have stopped it. But the fact is they didn't. I can easily see an event like that being the incident that sparked the rules you guys are complaining about.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as)
If players like Jiggy...
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Your ...cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer...
So, you acknowledge that we've never seen each other's characters, but you feel sufficiently qualified to label my cleric as killing everything he dislikes, and then you "hope it wasn't taken as rude"?
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@Kydeem de'Morcaine
I wonder if those people in the end ask themselves what's so great in doing that kind of thing. I tend to keep saying to my cousin that not everyone falls for the same joke or humor. That guy should have known better then to share "his humor" with others who obviously don't get it.
@Kydeem de'Morcaine
I wonder if those people in the end ask themselves what's so great in doing that kind of thing. I tend to keep saying to my cousin that not everyone falls for the same joke or humor. That guy should have known better then to share "his humor" with others who obviously don't get it.
I think for people like that, the best part is that everyone else was not having fun. I would get up and leave if this guys joined a table while I where I was a player and I would not let him sit at a table where I was GM. It was very unpleasant to watch.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as)So, you acknowledge that we've never seen each other's characters, but you feel sufficiently qualified to label my cleric as killing everything he dislikes, and then you "hope it wasn't taken as rude"?If players like Jiggy...
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Your ...cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer...
Jiggy,
Emotions are running kind of high, and some of the quasi-IC posts enflame it. I'd accept that on reflection, he didn't mean to be as rude as it sounded.
Like with Eric's 'cleric of blast any undead' arguing that blood transcription is tampering with the soul when mechanically it's not (Divination, not necromancy. No mention of soul in the text.
I know I've been an aft in the past, so I try to hope for the best.
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Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as)So, you acknowledge that we've never seen each other's characters, but you feel sufficiently qualified to label my cleric as killing everything he dislikes, and then you "hope it wasn't taken as rude"?If players like Jiggy...
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Your ...cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer...
Unless I am mistaken Jiggy (which I may well be), I think he was referencing Eric's cleric from up thread with the "kill all" comment, not yours.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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If that's the case, then all the more reason to point it out. I know if I slipped into name-calling without catching myself, I'd like to be informed rather than to go on thinking that my moral barometer was well-calibrated when it really wasn't.
*laugh* And see, I read your post as being very angry when I replied. Again, reading things that aren't there. :-)
@ Kydeem de'Morcaine: That should have been a GM jurisdiction, and should've been quelled. In fairness, a paladin of holier-than-thou or bloodthirsty barbarian could (and often are) just as graphic. Common sense, maturity, and respect- if we had these, we'd need a LOT less rules! (most at my table have it, those that don't will be "talked to", mwahahaha...)
@ Jiggy: I never meant to make that personally offensive- that character description is supposed to be an extremist generalization, and one that better fits Mr. Saxon's above proclamations than anything you've said, in fairness. Personal, yes- offensive no. You have expressed strong opinion contrary to my own, yes? As is your right. It is personally aggravating, however, when the opinions of some affect the gameplay options of all, when individual GMs should be handling problem players regardless of alignment/class/etc.
Bring your tiefling to Missoula and Pogrist buys him a round at the pub.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Unless I am mistaken Jiggy (which I may well be), I think he was referencing Eric's cleric from up thread with the "kill all" comment, not yours.Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as)So, you acknowledge that we've never seen each other's characters, but you feel sufficiently qualified to label my cleric as killing everything he dislikes, and then you "hope it wasn't taken as rude"?If players like Jiggy...
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Your ...cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer...
Wait, I thought Eric was the referenced hierophant...? Did I get some things mixed up?
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@ Kydeem de'Morcaine: That should have been a GM jurisdiction, and should've been quelled. ...
Agreed. And if it had been me, it would have been. But many people do not like and go to rather extreme lengths to avoid personal confrontation. Since that is the case, I can understand why the organization would chose to ban it since they can be sure many players/GM's will not handle it on their own.
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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You have expressed strong opinion contrary to my own, yes?
Did I? *scratches head and thinks* I remember listing some "pipe dreams" of how things would be in my perfect little always-Jiggy's-preference world, but I'm pretty sure that doesn't count as "strong opinion". Could you link me to a post you're thinking of? I may have forgotten some of my own earlier posts by now, this being such a long-running thread and all.
.....
Just went back and read all my posts. I made some speculations about campaign decisions, asked MrSin about his position, asked you about yours, commented once about individual rights, commented once about how far the thread had drifted, listed the aforementioned pipe dreams... that's about it. I'm not sure where the "strong opinion contrary to your own" is.
EDIT: Also, where's Missoula?
Wait, I thought Eric was the referenced hierophant...? Did I get some things mixed up?
I honestly wasn't trying to reference each poster specifically outside of using our forum handle, but I see how that appears- although grammatically you ("you" and "your" being the "understood 'You'" of the reader, to whom the statement may or may not apply) could be a heirophant, a paladin, or a cleric of the aforementioned "kill-everything-that-you-dislike" (a role often filled by LG deities, or recently Pharasma). I usually try to list two or more options per point for my characteristic run-on sentences, lol.
Your statements prefering/desiring to
Ban spells that inherently involve evil beyond just the descriptor (such as blood transcription or animate dead).
if adhered to/not repealed sets the dangerous precedent for banning characters I and others enjoy playing responsibly within the PFS guidelines (prior to the blood ruling). That puts our opinions/positions on this post at odds.
Also, Missoula is in Montana (aka Big Skyrim Country). Anyone with a pair of eyes would love it here!
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RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
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Wait, I thought Eric was the referenced hierophant...? Did I get some things mixed up?I honestly wasn't trying to reference each poster specifically outside of using our forum handle, but I see how that appears- although grammatically you ("you" and "your" being the "understood 'You'" of the reader, to whom the statement may or may not apply) could be a heirophant, a paladin, or a cleric of the aforementioned "kill-everything-that-you-dislike" (a role often filled by LG deities, or recently Pharasma). I usually try to list two or more options per point for my characteristic run-on sentences, lol.
Ah, okay. So you weren't saying that my cleric of a LG deity is like that, you were just saying that most clerics of LG deities are like that. Glad we got THAT cleared up. ;)
Your statements prefering/desiring toBan spells that inherently involve evil beyond just the descriptor (such as blood transcription or animate dead).if adhered to/not repealed set the dangerous precedent for banning characters I and others enjoy playing responsibly within the PFS guidelines (prior to the blood ruling). That puts our opinions/positions on this post at odds.
Oh, you were talking about that post? That wasn't a serious suggestion for policy change; I thought I made that clear within the post itself, but apparently not.
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Wait, I thought Eric was the referenced hierophant...? Did I get some things mixed up?Unless I am mistaken Jiggy (which I may well be), I think he was referencing Eric's cleric from up thread with the "kill all" comment, not yours.Just to make sure my previous post didn't seem rude (which I hope it wasn't taken as)So, you acknowledge that we've never seen each other's characters, but you feel sufficiently qualified to label my cleric as killing everything he dislikes, and then you "hope it wasn't taken as rude"?If players like Jiggy...
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Your ...cleric of kill-everything-that-you-dislike will never meet my necromancer...
Well, seems like we were both mistaken! Woops!
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Most of the bad things that Pathfinders do, are done discreetly. Devil pacts included, you don't see people doing human sacrifice in public, not even in Cheliax. Pangolais, yeah, there's a bit of that and it freaks the hell out of people there.
What you want to legalize is a very public thing. I don't think any person in Absalom, Quadira, Osirion or even Cheliax, has ever witnessed a blatant drinking of blood by a Pathfinder.
We would get lynched. Heck, if I'm one of the people living in this fantasy world of Golarion, I'm leading the lynch mob and there would be torches and pitchforks involved. And the Grand Lodge would burn, that same day. That level of insanity, I wouldn't stomach, fantasy world or not, and neither would most people playing PFS.
... Yeah, you do actually see human sacrifices, devil pacts, and devil summoning in public. With no consequences.
... Yeah, you do actually see human sacrifices, devil pacts, and devil summoning in public. With no consequences.
Region pending of course, life in Cheliax is at least a little different than life in Galt or Irrisen. To be honest its hard to find someplace normal in Golarion sometime, eh.
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I'm still reading folks, just not joining the conversation because I can do without the malice. I'm only writing this because I won't see your responses for another 16 hours, its game night, tonight.
Personally, if I wanted to play an unrestricted game, I'd play an Aspis Consortium Campaign. And the reality is, that without restrictions (moral, alignment, feat, spell, etc...), Pathfinder Society is the Aspis Consortium.
Once you take out one restriction, you'll find 20 new threads requesting other restrictions to be removed. And if you take one down, another one will come up for debate. And once all the restrictions are gone, I firmly believe each one of your will quit, one by one. You'll find different reasons but eventually, you'll all get sick of it, if everything becomes up for play.