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So, first and foremost, I want to say that this is not a slam or rant against the GM I played under last night.
Last night, I played Blakros Matrimony. It was my first season 4 scenario since coming back from an extended hiatus (virtually all of S4 and all of S5, basically). The party was ill-equipped to handle the objectives as my character had the only positive CHA mod out of 6 characters. As we finish the briefing, the GM hands out the faction slips and I ask the table whether these matter, as I can't remember if it was S4 or S5 that moved to the secondary objective system. Another player, who claims to GM for Society on occasion, says that S4 faction missions still matter.
Whether this was not heard by the GM or whatever, this isn't corrected, so I'm completely unaware that the S4 scenarios have been moved to having a group secondary objective. I base my RP decisions on trying to complete the faction mission, which means that the only person with decent Diplomacy spent extra actions specifically on a single faction mission. More than a few other characters at the table go after faction missions, as well, and the GM references faction mission completions for factions that aren't even represented at the table during play.
At the end of the night (6 RL hours later), I find out that we all only get 1 PP. I'm obviously a little upset because every indication I had up until that point is that I completed the faction mission and that would be my second PP. The GM and some of the other GMs at the store explain that all of the scenarios have moved to this secondary objective system.
Long story short: if all scenarios are on the secondary objective system (which I think is great in general), why should GMs hand out something that can confuse players as to the actual objectives of the mission? My feeling as I walked away from the table was that I had been duped into wasting fairly precious RP time trying to achieve something that had absolutely no bearing.
Again, this isn't a slam against the GM. She was great and tried to make the scenario even remotely possible for a group with only 1 positive Diplomacy mod among 6 players. It just seems that providing these old faction missions is a way to leave a very sour taste in a player's mouth when they find out that it's completely meaningless.
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For Blakros Matrimony in particular, the secondary success condition is an extension of the primary. There's no meaningful way to communicate it during the scenario, though, nor particularly effective ways to communicate that you have succeeded fully once you pass a certain point.
Regarding the equating of "no prestige" and "meaningless," when it comes to some of the objectives, yes. One objective was completely counter to the rest of the scenario. If the Society doesn't value a particular action anymore, doesn't that definitionally make it meaningless? Prestige reflects the value that the Society places on your actions, after all.
Lastly, if the faction handouts cause action choices that result in a 6+ hour scenario that has to end prematurely due to the store closing at 1am (this, at least, is what happened due to the way the RP stuff worked for us), is that leading to a positive experience for the players? If the purpose of eliminating the faction missions as prestige was a design choice to push towards more cooperative play, why would you continue to present players with the more fractious, competitive pieces?
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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Sometimes the faction missions actually contain clues to the main mission, or goad you in a direction that's good for the main mission. Sometimes they provide context for the story that you wouldn't discover otherwise.
These faction missions I'll keep. I remind players that there are no consequences for failing them. However, I also assure them that I'm only handing them out of they're somehow relevant.
That said, how do you set up games? If you know in advance that you're going to play a social scenario, why didn't you bring a socially capable character?
The eldest daughter of the prominent Blakros family is set to wed an influential Hellknight, and the Pathfinder Society is invited to the festivities. Dressed for a wedding befitting royalty, a team of Pathfinders attend the ceremony on behalf of the Decemvirate, but will their presence ultimately strengthen the Society's relationship with the influential Blakroses, or will events at the wedding bring the already tenuous alliance to a breaking point?
If you saw that, isn't it fairly obvious that social skills will be needed to participate fully?
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We use Meetup and the descriptions are posted. I was the one player at the table with positive Charisma. :-(
I think what you do is fine, Ascalaphus, if you tell players exactly that each time you run one of these scenarios. That would have been very welcome. Weeding out the "go find me a shrubbery" faction mission would be highly appropriate, which is essentially why I asked the question.
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My group started in Season 5 but we have ran a few scenarios from the older season now and I can say that the answer is, it depends on the scenario and the group. I ran a heavy social scenario from Season 4, and decided ahead of time the missions would give the players something to talk about with the npcs they were trying to influence so I gave out the old faction missions and they rather enjoyed it.
Venture-Captain, Netherlands
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I hand them out depending on their relevance and attainability. Some faction missions are plain impossible at lvl 1, or ask for ridiculous things. (DC25 profession stonemason check? Really?)
But I make it an all or nothing deal. I either hand them all out, or none.
Of course I make sure everyone knows they are there for fun and more in depth understanding of the scenario/overall story. Not for prestige.
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I can say that I was the GM for the OP.
The reason I handed out the faction missions for this scenario was to give the players something to try to talk about with the NPCs. As it was, most PCs walked up to the NPCs with nothing really to talk about, unless they tried to work in their faction mission somehow. Unfortunately, there were a lot of PCs without any good social skills, which was why I was being very flexible in allowing "creative solutions" by using other appropriate skill checks based on the conversation they were having with the NPCs.
As far as the player that decided to pursue the Osirion faction mission, he is an experienced player and GM and had already run this scenario in the past. Sometimes you just want your character to feel useful, which is probably why he went off to do that instead, as the three that went to do that hadn't really been successful with the influence checks up to that point. I gave you guys an extra influence point to one of the NPCs for the success on that, but that didn't help bring up the score on that NPC for a successful influence. The Andoren faction mission had nothing to do with the Blakros' daughter, so that entire part of the scenario was more a moral decision to be made by the PCs, which could potentially come up in later scenarios.
There are other scenarios that have followed the same or very similiar format: The Hellnight's Feast, The Merchant's Wake and parts of The Paths We Choose.
All I can say is that players and GMs do the best they can and sometimes the dice just aren't rolling well (on both sides of the screen).
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I agree that you were doing your absolute best to allow creative solutions and I think you handled the table very well, given the make-up we had. The misunderstanding with the faction mission (the Ossirian player was the one who told me they still mattered) caused me to work in directions that were not as group-friendly when it came to the influence gathering. All I'm saying here is that the faction mission handouts were misleading because of a meta-concern that I, as a player, am now aware of, but wasn't for the entire time at the table.
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It should have been more clearly explained how getting the secondary prestige point worked when you asked if the faction missions still matter.
I agree that they sometimes hold clues, so they should still be handed out. Sometimes I'll only hand out the ones that add to the game and won't hand out any that aren't of any real help and/or will only slow down the game.
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I don't hand out faction missions unless the secondary success conditions specifically state that I should do so. I feel that a GM should be able to accurately convey the clues and hints needed throughout the course of the scenario either via RP or use of creative solutions.
To be fair, I didn't start being actively involved until midway through season 5. As a result, I've only experienced a few tables that GMs still handed them out. (not counting the required scenarios which must be done) Honestly I just find them too distracting.
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When we first went to the new model, I continued to print out the faction missions and asked, at the start of every session, if the players wanted to use them. I never once had a player say they wanted to do the missions, but most wanted the sheets for the additional information they could get on the challenges to come. Now some of those missions provided indirect information that the society couldn't possibly know or that it sounded more like a shot in the dark..."if you happened to run across ABC, or PDQ event happened to occur, make sure you do XYZ." Ridiculous. Some just came right out and told you who/what you were going to encounter. Sounds great, except that your only got said "juicy" info if you were lucky enough to have the "right" faction player at the table. Certainly did not support the idea of consistent play from table to table.
Anyway, after a short time, I stopped giving them out, even stopped bothering to print them. If there is actually important information on the mission sheet/s that the players need, but is otherwise not available, I will provide it during the course of the scenario. Otherwise, its at least a waste of paper and ink, or at worst a distraction from the main goals of the scenario which is exactly the reason we moved away from that model in the first place.
Personally, I think factions have evolved to the point of not even being necessary. I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was. It is unfortunate since the faction aspect is one of the things I liked best about PFS. IMO, they are having little to no impact on PFS and we could save some developer time and effort, not to mention valuable print-space, if we eliminated them and just focused on the Society's primary goals.
...and I am saddened to say it
Venture-Captain, North Carolina—Asheville
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I personally like getting the faction mission handouts. As a player who didn't start playing PFS until the beginning of this year, it gives me a chance to get some insight on how the various faction heads think and act. Without them, I don't have as much of a chance to understand why veteran players in my area say things like 'Colston Maldris is kind of a jerk.'
Also, given how quickly tables these days can mop up the early-season scenarios, faction missions can give a bit of extra role-playing fun when your six Pathfinders and two combat pets have chewed through the primary opposition to your goals.
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It sounds like the OP's big problem was just that he wasn't aware of how secondary mission objectives work now, and thought the faction missions still counted for prestige. Most players already know that these days.
As a GM, I look at the faction missions and decide if I'll give them out for each scenario based on how entertaining and/or informative they are. There are some scenarios I won't run without them (Dalsine Affair - SOMEBODY needs to get that Qadiran mission, even if they're not in the right faction), while other scenarios, I skip them altogether. If they're generic, but not downright dumb, I'll print them and give the players the choice.
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It sounds like the OP's big problem was just that he wasn't aware of how secondary mission objectives work now, and thought the faction missions still counted for prestige. Most players already know that these days.
As a GM, I look at the faction missions and decide if I'll give them out for each scenario based on how entertaining and/or informative they are. There are some scenarios I won't run without them (Dalsine Affair - SOMEBODY needs to get that Qadiran mission, even if they're not in the right faction), while other scenarios, I skip them altogether. If they're generic, but not downright dumb, I'll print them and give the players the choice.
I knew that s5 and s6 moved away from the faction missions, but until the end of the night, I didn't know that the faction missions were replaced on the old scenarios. Most players probably know this, but I would say that it could easily be confusing to new PFS players or to others who left for a while and came back, like me.
I'm willing to acknowledge that I should have erred on the side of "ask the GM directly" instead of asking the table. I'll bear that in mind when it comes to future questions.
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.
Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Liberty's Edge/Andoran's goal is to free the slaves. Always has been, always will be.
Don't ask me for more specifics.
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Or banishing evil.
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Or banishing evil.I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Or redeeming it!
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Or redeeming it!Or banishing evil.I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Or stabbing it, if it won't cooperate.
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
I believe we in the Silver Crusade are trying to help redeem criminals and open up a therapy school this year... In additional to the usual Evil raseling
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Liberty's Edge/Andoran's goal is to free the slaves. Always has been, always will be.
Don't ask me for more specifics.
I can recall getting that mission once from the Paracountess... something like "Free all the Slaves you can!"
it was great racing the Andorans to see who would get credit for freeing them... ;)
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The Guide to Organized Play spells out how to handle older season faction missions. Essentially, you're upset because you didn't know the rules, didn't read the rules, and took someone else's word for the rules. Somehow that leaves me with very little sympathy for you.
Did you have fun playing the scenario, yes or no? Don't give us any of that "I did until I found out I only earned 1 Fame." PFS isn't about the destination, it's about the journey.
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The person who told me the faction mission mattered also identified himself as a GM. I knew that they didn't make them in s5 and s6, but it was my first s4 scenario in 2 years, when I played Rise of the Goblin Guild and had a very memorable faction mission. Yeah, like I said above, I'll be getting my answers from the GM directly from now on.
Had I known, my action choices would have been quite different. Part of my frustration is that I think I could have gotten the secondary for the whole table if I knew because some of my choices were designed to work my faction mission instead of furthering the main goal and I sat out an action at the end to save time since we were approaching closing time for the store.
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I haven't had a single player reference their faction's annual goals. In fact, I would wager that I can count on one hand the number of players with whom I've played in the past year who even know or could tell me what their faction's goal is/was.Silver Crusade's goal is grapple evil.
YOU'VE BEEN WARNED EVIL!
Liberty's Edge/Andoran's goal is to free the slaves. Always has been, always will be.
Don't ask me for more specifics.
I can recall getting that mission once from the Paracountess... something like "Free all the Slaves you can!"
it was great racing the Andorans to see who would get credit for freeing them... ;)
I remmeber that one. I played it with a Shadow Lodger who got the Cheliax faction mission. I thought he was freeing slaves because it was a good character, and didn't find out until afterward that it was the PC's faction mission.