Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Disclaimer: Thus far I have successfully avoided getting a player boon by virtue of not going to many conventions.
That said, after playing for a couple of months, I noticed that the nature of chronicles leads to some ... unpleasant results. Since researching chronicle rewards before you play a scenario is regarded badly (personally I expect it to lead to some unfortunate group compositions, when suddenly everybody is an archer trying to get the keen longbow).
And while GMing the scenarios is a solution for a small number of players, obviously many of us can't actually offer a scenario in some areas.
The following player boon ideas could benefit players who have been unlucky enough to have their group slip into a lower tier (despite their own character fitting into a higher tier), and in those cases where a very attractive item is on a chronicle owned by a character, that will never buy it.
A great number of stories change in the retelling, the monsters become fiercer and the traps more deadly.
Chose a previously earned chronicle, if you didn't get access to all the items on the chronicle sheet, you can expend this boon to gain access to all purchase able items on the sheet.
This doesn't allow you to reset the purchase limit on limited items, but it will allow you to buy the items your party missed in the scenario and those locked to a higher tier of play.This boon does not improve other rewards on the chronicle (like the limited use of an item for a scenario etc.)
Requiring GM changes/documentation on this boon and the original chronicle.
You can use this chronicle when you finish a scenario, or use it later with an additional 5 point PP cost.
If you successfully finish the scenario, but boons aren't unlocked on the chronicle sheet (due to your tier), you can expend this boon to modify that chronicle sheet, to give you the rewards of finishing the scenario in the highest tier.
Choose a chronicle owned by another (living) character under the same PFS number (add a field for the GM to add the character number and chronicle number), you may buy items from that chronicle sheet as if your character had earned the chronicles herself.
It is quite early in the morning so the grammar could use a lot of work, but I really didn't want to further procrastinate this post. And obviously I didn't include all the necessary caveats to properly protect those boons against abuse just yet, in any case I doubt, that I have the necessary experience with the available chronicle sheets.
In any case, I am sure that you have other awesome ideas for boons, and I would be delighted to hear them.
|
|
I agree that the first one is pretty cool. I'm okay with the ones that just unlock item access, but the second one that allows for the alteration of a chronicle seems pretty murky to me. It could work, but I think the ability to pay PP to use it after the scenario has to go. I think the third one is probably too good, I know of some chronicles that have items (wands, mostly) that I would like to give to all of my characters.
|
Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
|
I'm not sold on the last two, but I'd be pretty happy with the first one. It's the flavor text. It's awesome. Maybe call it "Favorable Recollection".
Love the name^^ obviously all boons deserve some flavor (and I have some ideas in mind) but I wanted to wait until the the mechanical effects are assessed/changed.
Some examples have some pretty awesome boons (Night Marsh of Kalkamedes, Fortress of the Nail etc..) some have pretty nice loot, like the otherwise not PFS legal keen longbow or the celestial shield.
I hope that the existence of boons like this could reduce the amount of meta gaming involved.
I agree that the first one is pretty cool. I'm okay with the ones that just unlock item access, but the second one that allows for the alteration of a chronicle seems pretty murky to me. It could work, but I think the ability to pay PP to use it after the scenario has to go. I think the third one is probably too good, I know of some chronicles that have items (wands, mostly) that I would like to give to all of my characters.
Well there are certainly situations where your character is ready and willing to play in the higher tier, but the APL is dragged down by missing players and lower level characters. It happens.
Obviously those boons need some caveats, like "you can use this to buy a limited item twice, so no dual wielding Gamin the missforged", and some other ways to limit the power "like you can only buy a single item from another chronicle, and if the item is limited, this purchase reduces that limit", or something like that.
And I really cant gauge the availability of player boons, but would a once per character limit be appropriate ?
|
|
Player boons are by nature one per PC, but if a boon is good enough people tend to want extra copies for more of their PC's. Player boons come on their own separate chronicle sheets, which you then apply to a specific one of your characters.
My concern with the third boon was that it was something I would give to as many of my PC's as I could get copies of the boon. Which isn't really a bad thing, just that the third idea is really powerful. Any limits on the chronicle you're opening access up to should naturally remain. I know of a couple of 7-11 scenarios I would give to my Ratfolk Counterfeit Mage rogue due to the extremely useful wands.
Another potential issue with the second issue is that the boon could be potentially be giving a lot of extra gold, as it stands I could use the boon on a level seven playing in the 7-8 subtier of a 7-11 to get the 10-11 subtier. I think if we were to make such a boon work it should only be able to give you subtier rewards for which you could qualify. I would try something like: "At the end of a scenario you can use this boon to have your rewards for the scenario be calculated based off of your level instead. Record the scenario name and chronicle number on the line below and have the GM sign it."
As an aside, you mention the Celestial Shield as not being legal, which is somewhat incorrect. While the Celestial Shield out of UE is not allowed, the version in the ARG is legal to purchase.
|
Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
|
Well some boons like the custom order boon already seem very attractive to a wide range of characters, so I get what you are trying to say.
Obviously the "let me grab something from my hunter's chronicle sheet" boons should require the buyer to have a high enough level to have earned the chronicle.
Your suggested wording is a great idea (and frankly, increasing the GM rewards never really crossed my mind), that way high level characters don't get "dragged down" by lower level players.
I had not considered, that the shield could be available from another source, what a weird situation.
|
I had not considered, that the shield could be available from another source, what a weird situation.
Just as a side note:
The Celestial Shield is not the only thing that shares a name between sources in Pathfinder.Examples:
Dueling as a weapon enhancement.
Dueling 1 is from the APG, reprinted in UE
Dueling 2 is from the Pathfinder Society Field Guide.
Timewise, APG came first, then the PFSFG, then UE, so it is not a case of one replacing the other, they are separate enhancements with the same name, leading to a +1 Dueling, Dueling whip....
|
Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
|
I had not considered, that the shield could be available from another source, what a weird situation.Just as a side note:
The Celestial Shield is not the only thing that shares a name between sources in Pathfinder.Examples:
Dueling as a weapon enhancement.
Dueling 1 is from the APG, reprinted in UE
Dueling 2 is from the Pathfinder Society Field Guide.
Timewise, APG came first, then the PFSFG, then UE, so it is not a case of one replacing the other, they are separate enhancements with the same name, leading to a +1 Dueling, Dueling whip....
I was aware of those, in the case of the celestial shield it is not legal from UE (see the chronicle sheet) but is legal from the ARG... which is a bit confusing. All your examples are PFS legal - to the best of my knowledge ^^.
We even have a case where he have 2 spells called carry companion one is a first level spell one requires a second level spell slot and is available for far fewer classes... and one of those can pretty much kill the pet owner.
Not ideal, and confusing but at least both are legal.
|
|
This list is reposted from another thread at the suggestion of the OP here. I'd like to see more boons like the following:
1. Races- Race boons would be more common, but each race boon would allow a wide number of race choices, and PFS would stop allowing non-core races altogether, except via boons. Thus the approximate number of weird races could be controlled, and you wouldn't get the phenomenon of an inexplicable influx of X race each season.
2. Companions and Familiars- More boons allowing the selection of cool familiars and animal companions, like the faerie dragon, owlbear, hippogriff etc.
3. "Cameo Characters"- These boons would allow the creation of a level (randomly generated from 4-11) character that would not earn XP or level up, but which could be played (randomly generated from 1-6) times before being permanently retired. This would let players play around with interesting character and build concepts that they like, but which they might not be interested in committing a lot of time to.
4. NPC Codex Pregens- These boons would allow the player to use a specific character from the NPC codex in place of the usual pregens of a specific level. For instance, you might receive a boon that allowed you to play Meliski Traundor the Gambler (pg. 30) anytime you would normally have the option of using a level 7 pregen.