Venture-Captain, California—Sacramento
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One thing I have not been able to find a reference for, is how large a donation would you need to make to a church for a cleric to be willing to channel for you?
I am not really looking for a number from the rule books (though if there is one, that would be great.)
I am more looking for what various GMs and players would think is reasonable. I am hoping to figure out a range of reasonable options. (Since as far as I know this is an area not covered by the rules.)
I know this thread is likely to get a lot of people saying "The rules don't say you can do it, so you can't do this in PFS." I would like to point out that that rule is not anywhere in the rules. And therefore it cannot be invoked, by it's own logic, it is illegal to make that arguement in PFS. :) So please take it somewhere else.
Likewise I recognize that there is substantial table variation here. Since it is basically a GM judgement call whether to allow this or not. As I said, I am trying to figure out a baseline of what range people would feel is reasonable and unreasonable.
For anyone still saying "GMs aren't allowed to do this" I would like to point you to John Compton's post stating that GMs have broad latitude to rule on things not covered by the rules, and may choose to permit them if they feel that they are appropriate.
Context.
My Sacred Huntmaster Inquisitor of Erastil carries a consecrated weapon darkwood composite longbow dedicated to Erastil.
Typically before missions, or when he encounters a Cleric of Erastil, he asks them to "bless his hunt" (aka, channel energy into my bow.)
Honestly, I got the consecrated weapon to have a holy symbol that I can hold in the same hand as my bow. So I don't care if the GM says yes or no.
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The nature of PFS is such that a GM isn't allowed to just decree one's own price for things that don't have a listed price in the rules or scenario in question, and since chanelling isn't technically a spellcasting service it can fall into such a crack where a home GM could just house rule a standard pricing scheme but a PFS GM cannot do the same thing.
However, I feel that you and I may be kindred spirits about how free a GM's hands really should be, even in PFS. So here's an alternate way of looking at it that is ALSO completely compliant with PFS rules:
Treat buying a channel as a bribe for bookkeeping purposes. You can freely dock gold on a chronicle to account for bribes given to NPCs and such that were struck during the course of roleplay. Just wring giving a price for a channel under this authority. I'd consider a ballpark price of pricing it as a spell (3d6 channel as a 5th level spell by a 5th/6th level cleric, so 250-300g)
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(3d6 channel as a 5th level spell by a 5th/6th level cleric, so 250-300g)
I'm with this, though (and perhaps it was a typo), I'd say 3rd level spell, so 150'ish for 3d6.
Or perhaps half that per person receiving the channel. The effect varies so much it's hard to price. Plus buying "L.1 channels" repeatedly would of course be the most efficient...
I guess maybe... 10 gp per person per d6? But again buying cure lights would be cheaper. Bribery rules works best since "purchases" are never technically limited, while the GM can easily rule there is a scarcity to the channeling.
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Edit:
Plus, as an added bonus by technically ruling it a "bribe", you have leeway with your price depending on how the roleplay went. Were the PCs devout members of the congragation? Maybe just good at faking it? Maybe they got caught faking it and the price went up!
Plus you can use "discounts" on the bribe as a condition of doing a service for the church.... which is a tool you can use to point players back on track if they've bungled their "find the clue" stage of the scenario....