Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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safeguards are simple imo..monster must appear in a bestiary you own(as per normal). as per the creature being intier with the scenario leave that up to each gm with the policy that a gm has that right to not allow it.
id rather find ways to make stuff work than flat ban everything
The problem with your proposal is that it undermines one of the things that (IMO) makes PFS so much fun: the guarantee that if your PC is legal, you can play him. You can sit down at a table anywhere in the world and be sure you can play.
If you leave it up to the GM, several unpleasant things will happen;
- Some GMs will just ban it, leading to disappointed players.
- Some GMs will feel like they're being pressured to allow something they don't like, because players will whine if they decide to not allow it.
- Two groups playing the same scenario; one GM allows the option, the other doesn't. Now the players in the not-allowed table feel like they lost out.
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I can understand how people feel. As was stated creatures do not get to keep templates or lvls. So for most part that will balance the strength. As for gms havin xtra work we are supposed to note chronicles for other stuff, how hard is it to note animated creature and then innitial it. The player is responsible for owning material if they want to carry over. I know I ask players bout their characters and unique abilities before I start, it doesnt take long to verify a stat block.
As per animal companions being balanced, im sorry but they are not. However thats not the topic of this thread.
Permanent spells already exist, adding 1 more wont be that much of an issue, and if it was added id expect all gms to respect it. If they decline the animated cause stats are wrong or legitamacy is in question thats fine but you cant say no just cause you dislike an idea.
I feel personally that it is no more unbalanced than most character concepts already out there.
Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento
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For soemthing you describe as "easily obtainable" I've yet to see ONE PFS player make use of it. High level scrolls coast a lot of gold and have a signficant fame level requirement to meet.One thing to note, following this process
The position that "you only get standard unless AR says otherwise" sounds like an unwritten rule, that may sound reasonable to some people, but ultimately, not actually written anywhere.means that it is impossible to summon anything using planar ally or planar binding, both easily obtained in PFS, as the entry for the Bestiaries make no mention of creatures being legal for summoning.
Doesn't the AR for Summoners Handbook explicitly call out two of the creatures in it as callable?
Which does rather beg the question.
Venture-Agent, Florida–Altamonte Springs
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Animate Dead should not carry over between scenarios, there is too much potential for imbalance, other pets are balanced by level and character investment, these would be based on encountered creatures which puts the monster and character outside expected norms.
The cost of Animate Dead can be mitigated. The False Focus feat can be used for up to 4 HD of undead at a time while the Blood Money spell can turn they entire cost into a couple of points of Str damage. This can change the balancing factor if you note cost as a balance to character investment.
I once saw a guy make a skeletal sphinx using blood money didn't cost him a thing (ok a point of str) and it was an unholy terror
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It's not in the Allowed Resources as far as I've looked, so your wish is granted I think.In fairness, it is blood money that is broken. If I could make one spell PFS illegal that would be the one.
I once saw a guy make a skeletal sphinx using blood money didn't cost him a thing (ok a point of str) and it was an unholy terror
It's legal. It's in Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition.
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Just remember the player who wants to use it is required at your request to present his owned copy of the materials for your inspection. If he does not have the book or the watermarked PDF, AT THE TABLE, he is not allowed to use it.It's legal. It's in Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition.It's not in the Allowed Resources as far as I've looked, so your wish is granted I think.In fairness, it is blood money that is broken. If I could make one spell PFS illegal that would be the one.
I once saw a guy make a skeletal sphinx using blood money didn't cost him a thing (ok a point of str) and it was an unholy terror
That's a bit hostile.
Correct, but that's also correct for any non-assumed to own option. Unless you're checking for everything, you shouldn't be checking for abilities you don't like.
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Just remember the player who wants to use it is required at your request to present his owned copy of the materials for your inspection. If he does not have the book or the watermarked PDF, AT THE TABLE, he is not allowed to use it.It's legal. It's in Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition.It's not in the Allowed Resources as far as I've looked, so your wish is granted I think.In fairness, it is blood money that is broken. If I could make one spell PFS illegal that would be the one.
I once saw a guy make a skeletal sphinx using blood money didn't cost him a thing (ok a point of str) and it was an unholy terror
That's a bit hostile.
Correct, but that's also correct for any non-assumed to own option. Unless you're checking for everything, you shouldn't be checking for abilities you don't like.
"shouldn't" does not equal "can't".
There are GMs in my area who bookcheck for obscure overpowered options, like Snowball and Admonishing Ray.
They're completely within their rights to do so.
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Just remember the player who wants to use it is required at your request to present his owned copy of the materials for your inspection. If he does not have the book or the watermarked PDF, AT THE TABLE, he is not allowed to use it.It's legal. It's in Rise of the Runelords Anniversary Edition.It's not in the Allowed Resources as far as I've looked, so your wish is granted I think.In fairness, it is blood money that is broken. If I could make one spell PFS illegal that would be the one.
I once saw a guy make a skeletal sphinx using blood money didn't cost him a thing (ok a point of str) and it was an unholy terror
That's a bit hostile.
Correct, but that's also correct for any non-assumed to own option. Unless you're checking for everything, you shouldn't be checking for abilities you don't like."shouldn't" does not equal "can't".
There are GMs in my area who bookcheck for obscure overpowered options, like Snowball and Admonishing Ray.
They're completely within their rights to do so.
Most certainly so, it is within their rights. But how you enforce a rule is just as important as whether or not you have the right to enforce it.
What I'm talking about has more to do with attitude than the act of bookchecking itself.Checking because you don't like an ability will come out at the table unless you're well practiced, which will come off as hostile to the players. Especially so if they have the source book. It can start a bad player vs gm dynamic.
Its better to check because you should, than to check because you dislike a legal option that much. That is all I am trying to say.
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People have been, but the OP has not really accepted any opinions that don't allow his desired option.
Taking undead from scenario to scenario is a bad idea.
Yes, some people want to play necromancers. They can, under the limitations of the campaign. I'd love to play a Master Summonner, but I can't, I understand the reasons why I can't, and I've moved on.
Variant undead makes undead a more viable "pet", and so I am personally not in favor of them. Neither, it seems, ar the previous five campaign coordinators and the majority of the 400 or so VOs, since the rule hasn't changed despite being suggested at least once a year. And I think those folks probably have a decent sense of what works campaign-wide and what doesn't.
Personally I find that some of my the inquisitor builds are more broken than allowing a necromancer to animate dead. People need to quit worrying g about what they don't like and worry about what is fun. JMTC
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Addressing the "time consuming" of either creation or management -
If well prepared, it takes the player away from the table for 5 minutes. I have a chart I reference based on the creature hit die / size to determine if I am making a fast zombie, bloody skeleton, or standard.
Having played a specialist conjurer and a master summoner as well as a necromancer, the necromancer is the least time consuming from a turn perspective and is far easier / faster than my high level sacred huntsmaster archer with a velociraptor.
I am in favor of allowing these templates and hadn't realized or had a GM tell me I wasn't able to use them. Between this and blood money, I am getting concerned that John just doesn't like Necromancy as a school.
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Animate Dead is a classic of fantasy and Golarion lore. A well prepared player can apply a template easily. The cost plus the loss of the creature at the end of the scenario is a reasonable trade off for a temporary additional companion/hit point sponge.
The templates have their own additional costs and drawbacks. It's reasonable to me that the bestiary 1 templates could be free to be allowed when they specify the specific requirements to make them (such as casting Haste/remove paralysis for a fast zombie or double HD limit requirement on creation for bloody skeletons). Additional templates outside of the Bestiary should probably be explicitly spelled out in additional resources and assumed to be not available. Likely this would mean templates that are there for flavor for the GM and have no rules to make them would not be allowed.
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Going meta for a minute here... one of the points of the PFS campaign is for players to play. Part of that is letting players play things they want to play, but a more important part is making sure those "things" don't interfere with the fun of everyone else at the table. From the perspective of running a group that is bigger than just one table, this last part is extremely important.
Now, here's the rub: every NPC controlled by a player takes away table time from the other actual people at the table. This applies to animal companions, pets, summoned/conjured/animated creatures, of course. It's one of the reasons that master summoners and similar multi-pet classes don't work well in organized play. Templates for created undead make them that much more capable/versatile/powerful and therefore that much more commonly used. So that may be a reason not to make NPC-based classes more versatile/powerful/etc. (EDIT: once your created skeletons start buying Pathfinder products, we can revisit this! ;)
I've sat at a table with a summoner, two druids and a ranger with pets, and a necromancer. I don't recall if I ever acted in combat. (And the druids saved their scrolls of summon nature's ally to the final fight, so there were summons as well. Whee.)
You have to look at the effect on the entire campaign, not just what would be cool for your character or what doesn't seem to be broken or "as broken as X".
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I am in favor of allowing these templates and hadn't realized or had a GM tell me I wasn't able to use them. Between this and blood money, I am getting concerned that John just doesn't like Necromancy as a school.
Those two issues are totally unrelated, so I suspect your worry is unfounded...
I love necromancer characters myself - but *not* for Organized Play. It causes conflicts with several core classes and deities, it depends on evil when most such acts are not allowed in PFS, and it has the aforementioned "too many NPCs" issue. And, from a lore point of view, I'm not sure why the Pathfinder Society would hire folks like this, who basically confirm the stereotype of Pathfinders as disrespectful grave-robbers. It's great for a home game where the party can adapt and build around the concept, and the GM can build it into the game, but it is more problematic when you don't know who else is at the table.
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I am in favor of allowing these templates and hadn't realized or had a GM tell me I wasn't able to use them. Between this and blood money, I am getting concerned that John just doesn't like Necromancy as a school.Those two issues are totally unrelated, so I suspect your worry is unfounded...
I love necromancer characters myself - but *not* for Organized Play. It causes conflicts with several core classes and deities, it depends on evil when most such acts are not allowed in PFS, and it has the aforementioned "too many NPCs" issue. And, from a lore point of view, I'm not sure why the Pathfinder Society would hire folks like this, who basically confirm the stereotype of Pathfinders as disrespectful grave-robbers. It's great for a home game where the party can adapt and build around the concept, and the GM can build it into the game, but it is more problematic when you don't know who else is at the table.
I agree to a point that they are unrelated and I could just be getting paranoid. I feel like if campaign leadership agreed that necromancy didn't belong in PFS for all of the reasons you mention, banning necromancy and eliminating templates becomes the "pocket ban" if you will - eliminating most of the reasons people want to play Necromancers without having to do something so bold as actually banning a core school of magic.
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Going meta for a minute here... one of the points of the PFS campaign is for players to play. Part of that is letting players play things they want to play, but a more important part is making sure those "things" don't interfere with the fun of everyone else at the table. From the perspective of running a group that is bigger than just one table, this last part is extremely important.
Now, here's the rub: every NPC controlled by a player takes away table time from the other actual people at the table. This applies to animal companions, pets, summoned/conjured/animated creatures, of course. It's one of the reasons that master summoners and similar multi-pet classes don't work well in organized play. Templates for created undead make them that much more capable/versatile/powerful and therefore that much more commonly used. So that may be a reason not to make NPC-based classes more versatile/powerful/etc. (EDIT: once your created skeletons start buying Pathfinder products, we can revisit this! ;)
I've sat at a table with a summoner, two druids and a ranger with pets, and a necromancer. I don't recall if I ever acted in combat. (And the druids saved their scrolls of summon nature's ally to the final fight, so there were summons as well. Whee.)
You have to look at the effect on the entire campaign, not just what would be cool for your character or what doesn't seem to be broken or "as broken as X".
Very well put. My only remaining argument is that the way the rules are for Bloody Skeletons means that I have one less skeleton at the table. Generally speaking as a player and a GM I prefer my allies to bring the one animal companion instead of the warren of earth elementals unless they really know what they are doing.
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There was an argument yay and nay for Burning Skeletons.
They could arguably be used to 'grief' a party, with their aura damage AND their final outcome result. It would DEFINITELY make playing melee miserable for a party.
Some of the other special undead also fall into the category of 'These things can make for an unenjoyable experience' and should be kept off the 'player arsenal' table.
The ones that aren't Weapons of Party Disruption? Sure, those might be worth a go...
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Venture-Captain, Germany—Bavaria
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Going meta for a minute here... one of the points of the PFS campaign is for players to play. Part of that is letting players play things they want to play, but a more important part is making sure those "things" don't interfere with the fun of everyone else at the table. From the perspective of running a group that is bigger than just one table, this last part is extremely important.
Now, here's the rub: every NPC controlled by a player takes away table time from the other actual people at the table. This applies to animal companions, pets, summoned/conjured/animated creatures, of course. It's one of the reasons that master summoners and similar multi-pet classes don't work well in organized play. Templates for created undead make them that much more capable/versatile/powerful and therefore that much more commonly used. So that may be a reason not to make NPC-based classes more versatile/powerful/etc. (EDIT: once your created skeletons start buying Pathfinder products, we can revisit this! ;)
I've sat at a table with a summoner, two druids and a ranger with pets, and a necromancer. I don't recall if I ever acted in combat. (And the druids saved their scrolls of summon nature's ally to the final fight, so there were summons as well. Whee.)
You have to look at the effect on the entire campaign, not just what would be cool for your character or what doesn't seem to be broken or "as broken as X".
I agree, but have to mention that NPCs are supposed to be played by the GM, allowing a player to direct their actions is usually only done to save time.
Personally, as GM I have the problem of dealing with some of the problems created by the presence of undead (I.e. how badly will some NPCs react when the party turns up with a bunch of zombies).
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Going meta for a minute here... one of the points of the PFS campaign is for players to play. Part of that is letting players play things they want to play, but a more important part is making sure those "things" don't interfere with the fun of everyone else at the table. From the perspective of running a group that is bigger than just one table, this last part is extremely important.
Now, here's the rub: every NPC controlled by a player takes away table time from the other actual people at the table. This applies to animal companions, pets, summoned/conjured/animated creatures, of course. It's one of the reasons that master summoners and similar multi-pet classes don't work well in organized play. Templates for created undead make them that much more capable/versatile/powerful and therefore that much more commonly used. So that may be a reason not to make NPC-based classes more versatile/powerful/etc. (EDIT: once your created skeletons start buying Pathfinder products, we can revisit this! ;)
I've sat at a table with a summoner, two druids and a ranger with pets, and a necromancer. I don't recall if I ever acted in combat. (And the druids saved their scrolls of summon nature's ally to the final fight, so there were summons as well. Whee.)
You have to look at the effect on the entire campaign, not just what would be cool for your character or what doesn't seem to be broken or "as broken as X".
6 player table, so problems right there. 4 or more NPCs per fight on the PC side, even worse. I don't think adding a level-appropriate undead to the stew in that case really made much difference. Seriously 10-11 figures on the table for the PCs, even if it was Hard Mode Waking Rune, will make it run towards cake-walk, and that is before any regular SMs or SNAs get added to the table.
I have seen, in a low level game, a summoned Celestial Eagle (singular) totally nerf an encounter.
I am assuming the petS means a pet per Druid, and one for the Ranger, not multiple pets for the ranger somehow.
I am still waiting, with dread, for the 7 player table, all with some sort of companion, whether it is an animal companion, eidolon, mount, improved familiar, or what-have-you. Even the Hard Mode scenarios probably won't do well against that table with "14 plus summons". If, indeed, there is even room for everyone/everything to fit into any particular room...
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I am still waiting, with dread, for the 7 player table, all with some sort of companion, whether it is an animal companion, eidolon, mount, improved familiar, or what-have-you. Even the Hard Mode scenarios probably won't do well against that table with "14 plus summons". If, indeed, there is even room for everyone/everything to fit into any particular room...
I once agreed to take a 7th player so that the odd man out wouldn't be turned away (and have to wait 5 hours for his ride, doing nothing). It was a 5-9, playing up. Then I found out that 5 of the players had pets.
Head.
Desk.
We had to split the scenario over 2 nights: it took almost 10 hours, start to finish.
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Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento
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I took 7 players + 3 pets through part 2 of the Devil you know series.
It got to the point where the first 4 people in the initiative order would go into combat, and the rest of the PCs would declare actions like:
"So Jim, hows the wife and kids"
"Gee that looks crowded, I pull out a deck of cards. Anyone up for poker?"
"Yeah, yell if you need help guys, We'll be out here."
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Going meta for a minute here... one of the points of the PFS campaign is for players to play. Part of that is letting players play things they want to play, but a more important part is making sure those "things" don't interfere with the fun of everyone else at the table. From the perspective of running a group that is bigger than just one table, this last part is extremely important.
Now, here's the rub: every NPC controlled by a player takes away table time from the other actual people at the table. This applies to animal companions, pets, summoned/conjured/animated creatures, of course. It's one of the reasons that master summoners and similar multi-pet classes don't work well in organized play. Templates for created undead make them that much more capable/versatile/powerful and therefore that much more commonly used. So that may be a reason not to make NPC-based classes more versatile/powerful/etc. (EDIT: once your created skeletons start buying Pathfinder products, we can revisit this! ;)
I've sat at a table with a summoner, two druids and a ranger with pets, and a necromancer. I don't recall if I ever acted in combat. (And the druids saved their scrolls of summon nature's ally to the final fight, so there were summons as well. Whee.)
You have to look at the effect on the entire campaign, not just what would be cool for your character or what doesn't seem to be broken or "as broken as X".
As a player who has a wizard who main summons... I understand the idea behind this. One game I rolled high and got max summons for a load of Catrina Psychopomps. The fight bogged bad and now it is a 'nuclear option' for my character.
But, necromancers are already a thing. Animating dead is already a thing. What we are talking about is a bit of a boost to their usability, at a further cost, but not their quantity. In fact, their quantity goes down due to the increase in effective HD during raising for some of them. Honestly, instead of being a necromancer they could be a summoner and bog the game down ever more. Should we strip away the ability to summon to? Or perhaps ban all pet classes?It is up to each player to not bog down the game or hog the spot light.
What you are talking about is taking away the toys because some don't know how to play together well.
And, over an issue that makes being a necromancer worthwhile instead of being something you can do, will take time, will cost the player, and will not be very effective yet players will still want to do. Undead are iconic after all.