That's indeed one silly motive... next time they'll tell us that the Assassin PrC is off limit too? the antipaladin?
...Yes. Those make sense because PFS bans the Evil alignments, and they require an Evil alignment to take.
Vivisectionist is a stupid ban because it doesn't.
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It has "creepy evil flavor".
Has creepy, evil flavor? More like is steeped in it. That may be suitable for a home game but they want PFS to be a bit more family-friendly.
damn, and I wanted to make a Lamashtu worshipper, no soup and no PFS for me...
How is asking for 1 example of something that might be in the book the same as knowing what was in the book in detail?The issue is so far to me what he's saying is super vague. "I want a book to help groups of different players." Okay, that sounds good to everyone. But without having an idea of what he thinks could actually accomplish that it's an idea without any meaning.
If you have an example of 1 thing that could be in the book that works too. Doesn't even have to be completely true or accurate, just an...
I'm not 100% sure what might be in the book. At a guess it would be something like this.
TACTICIAN
Some players may be classed as tacticians. Tacticians are defined as players who devote a considerable amount of time to the character building process and conduct extensive in game planning and enjoy finding novel ways to approach problems. Tacticians often enjoy in game riddles or logic puzzles and role playing is often a secondary consideration to solving puzzles. They have some similarities to power gamers, but where they differ is that they don't have the same desire to be in the spotlight and don't have to have a powerful character to enjoy the game. Typical character classes that appeal to tacticians are prepared spellcasters like wizards. Tacticians can be frustrating to GMs because they are often looking for ways to short circuit encounters. GMs need to keep in mind that a short circuited encounter will not be an anticlimax for a tactician, this is fun for them. If all your players are tacticians then don't get too attached to encounters playing out a certain way, because they rarely will. If you have a mix of tacticians and other player types make your encounters modular so that a short circuit to one part doesn't undermine the rest. That way the other characters will have something to enjoy. If you have a tactician player in your group don't try to prevent their clever ideas from working, let them have their victories (where they deserve it) and move on to the next part of the story.
Has creepy, evil flavor? More like is steeped in it. That may be suitable for a home game but they want PFS to be a bit more family-friendly.
It has "creepy evil flavor".
You can do gruesome things with any character, and likewise can make the Vivisectionist a lot more "family friendly".
Play it as basically a doctor who knows how to fight (very, very common in fiction, the doctor that attacks pressure points and weak spots on the body) with a side order of the Frankenstein-esque flavor the whole class is steeped in and you're gold.
It's barely creepier than the stuff the base Alchemist can do, if at all. Planting bombs inside people's body and making them suicide bomb, anyone?
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Has creepy, evil flavor? More like is steeped in it. That may be suitable for a home game but they want PFS to be a bit more family-friendly.
It has "creepy evil flavor".You can do gruesome things with any character, and likewise can make the Vivisectionist a lot more "family friendly".
Play it as basically a doctor who knows how to fight (very, very common in fiction, the doctor that attacks pressure points and weak spots on the body) with a side order of the Frankenstein-esque flavor the whole class is steeped in and you're gold.
It's barely creepier than the stuff the base Alchemist can do, if at all. Planting bombs inside people's body and making them suicide bomb, anyone?
Eh, between the heavy torture theme and the banned spells, I can understand why Vivisectionist was banned. Yes, it could be done well. But, chances are it would not be. I could see it offered as a charity boon or something, though.
banned spells? the vivisect has spells that are banned ? (and that other alchies don't?)
Wise Old Man,
If you feel strongly then do not wait for Paizo to contact you, you contact them and keep at it until you get a response.
MDC
I want to know what he wants a contract for.
If it is to be a 3pp book author there is no contract needed for that, just like Paizo didn't need to sign a contract with WotC to create a game based on 3.5.He can even do a kickstarter if he needs money for it, and if he can make valid arguments of why it is needed and how it will work people will help him write it so despite his full time job he won't have to do it alone.
If he thinks the members of this forum are the only ones who are against his idea, and that others will buy it he can go to Enworld and Gitp, along with other forums.
Step aside, wraithstrike, I got this!...
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-He doesn't have any reasonable content to support his ideas.
-He just keeps repeating semantics.
-We really really don't need a book for this.
-We've tried telling him this has more to do with the GM, but he's not listening to anyone.
-He's talking about contracts like a snake oil salesman. I don't even know what that was about???
-It seems like he doesn't know the first thing about PFS rules.
-He lacks the knowledge and understanding of how he should be treated at a gaming table.
-He's saying the people he's dealt with "mistreat" him, like that has anything to do with the game itself.
-Stop pouring your personal problems onto Paizo's lap, begging them to fix something that can easily be solved just by consulting with your GM.
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Alright, *panting* I tried to cover tidbits of everything, please continue. Oh, and uhh..I still think we need a book based on party rules.
Since I have given you ideas to use that are a lot better than trying to convince us the book is needed and/or convincing Paizo to print a book that they see virtually nobody supporting or asking for, are you going to follow through with any of them?
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Step aside, wraithstrike, I got this!...
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-He doesn't have any reasonable content to support his ideas.
-He just keeps repeating semantics.
-We really really don't need a book for this.
-We've tried telling him this has more to do with the GM, but he's not listening to anyone.
-He's talking about contracts like a snake oil salesman. I don't even know what that was about???
-It seems like he doesn't know the first thing about PFS rules.
-He lacks the knowledge and understanding of how he should be treated at a gaming table.
-He's saying the people he's dealt with "mistreat" him, like that has anything to do with the game itself.
-Stop pouring your personal problems onto Paizo's lap, begging them to fix something that can easily be solved just by consulting with your GM.
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Alright, *panting* I tried to cover tidbits of everything, please continue. Oh, and uhh..I still think we need a book based on party rules.
I'm curious (but that's all, so feel free to ignore this if you like). How many groups have you had this issue with?
As I mentioned earlier - I think you're mixing together two issues. How we talk to each other (on forums like internet messageboards, etcetera) and how we play together.
I think there's a significant problem in the way discussions about gaming are conducted on the internet and I think anything which reduces that would be great. I don't think there's a big problem "at the table" since I think the hobby is big enough for people to find like-minded gamers and play the way they like (with a little bit of communication, empathy and compromise).
It seems to me that there's plenty of evidence for the maltreatment you describe in internet discussions but you're proposing a book about how to solve it at the table.
Is it really that common for groups to fail to resolve these kinds of issues?
Steve is right. I have told many people here "you can't do that" with regard to the actual rules of the game, but at an actual game I am more lax with the rules.
On the forums when I give advice I make the assumption that the GM is not going to hold back. However, as a GM I tend to play to the level of the group if they are not as very skilled players.
The forums do not equate to what you might see at someone's table.
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The D&D 3.5 Players Handbook II features a rather lengthy section on being a good player.
You may be interested to note that the advice given to players on the subject is that it is the *player's responsibility* to not be disruptive and to play at the same speed as the rest of the table; which is not only the advice that many here have been trying to express, but is hilariously the exact opposite of what you seem to want a book like this to say.
I'll repeat that: it's the responsibility of the power gamer to tone it down for the sake of everyone's enjoyment. Why play something "normal" when you could play something "badass" when asked? Because you were asked. It's polite, and it's a cooperative game - and the GM is *not* obligated to invite you or keep you at the table. We have unapologetically kicked people from our table that were disruptive, and it's always done as a last resort after exhausting other means of correcting the problem - such as asking the offending player to change their behavior.
If that "ruins" the offending player's fun, then - as everyone here keeps trying to drive home - perhaps that's not the right table for that player.
Our group has been playing near twenty years now, and many of us have a pretty keen grasp of system mastery. Any of us *could* build disruptively powerful characters with little trouble, but we all reign it in. We even deliberately go back and nerf our own characters if we end up taking an option that ends up being too strong.
The general exception to our self-nerfing rule is when we're trying to optimize something incredibly gimmicky, like a character with an insanely high perform check, for instance.
"Oh, it's inappropriate to play Grac'thuzar, Destroyer of Kings in this game? It's supposed to be low-key, silly fun? Okay, I'm going to play Johann the Baker, who is going to have THE BEST PROFESSION (BAKING) in the world!!!"
It's very, very easy to be a power gamer and to find your fun in a way that doesn't end up being disruptive or hurting the fun of others, so the idea that being asked to tone something down somehow makes the power gamer a "victim" is ludicrous. Optimize something that doesn't matter if you find yourself in that situation.
I can tell you right now that the sales pitch "We're not going to tell you what we're selling you, otherwise you might not want to buy it" is the worst sales pitch ever...
I'm still with no clue as to what would be in the book. Do you have an example of something that would be in it?Flip that argument on its head.
If you knew what was in the book in detail there would be no point in buying it.
What are you hoping to achieve with this comment?
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The D&D 3.5 Players Handbook II features a rather lengthy section on being a good player.
You may be interested to note that the advice given to players on the subject is that it is the *player's responsibility* to not be disruptive and to play at the same speed as the rest of the table; which is not only the advice that many here have been trying to express, but is hilariously the exact opposite of what you seem to want a book like this to say.
I'll repeat that: it's the responsibility of the power gamer to tone it down for the sake of everyone's enjoyment. Why play something "normal" when you could play something "badass" when asked? Because you were asked. It's polite, and it's a cooperative game - and the GM is *not* obligated to invite you or keep you at the table. We have unapologetically kicked people from our table that were disruptive, and it's always done as a last resort after exhausting other means of correcting the problem - such as asking the offending player to change their behavior.
If that "ruins" the offending player's fun, then - as everyone here keeps trying to drive home - perhaps that's not the right table for that player.
Our group has been playing near twenty years now, and many of us have a pretty keen grasp of system mastery. Any of us *could* build disruptively powerful characters with little trouble, but we all reign it in. We even deliberately go back and nerf our own characters if we end up taking an option that ends up being too strong.
The general exception to our self-nerfing rule is when we're trying to optimize something incredibly gimmicky, like a character with an insanely high perform check, for instance.
"Oh, it's inappropriate to play Grac'thuzar, Destroyer of Kings in this game? It's supposed to be low-key, silly fun? Okay, I'm going to play Johann the Baker, who is going to have THE BEST PROFESSION (BAKING) in the world!!!"
It's very, very easy to be a power gamer and to find your fun in a way that doesn't end up being disruptive or hurting the...
I agree with most if not all of what you said.
I would like to add that whilst every player should contribute to making a game a good experience it is usually the GM who is best placed to influence the table in the right way. When I am GM I think it is my responsibility to make a game that is appealing to everyone. I think a book that could provide advice to GMs on this would be handy.
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What are you hoping to achieve with this comment?I can tell you right now that the sales pitch "We're not going to tell you what we're selling you, otherwise you might not want to buy it" is the worst sales pitch ever...
I'm still with no clue as to what would be in the book. Do you have an example of something that would be in it?Flip that argument on its head.
If you knew what was in the book in detail there would be no point in buying it.
He was simply pointing out what he thought was a terrible idea.
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Alright, *panting* I tried to cover tidbits of everything, please continue. Oh, and uhh..I still think we need a book based on party rules.
And that there is your problem. There are a lot of blogs, gaming magazine articles, and other sources for advice on how to game master. Heck, the Ghostbusters RPG devoted a large portion of the GM book to advice for newbie game masters. Above and beyond listing the full rules, the GM book for most rpgs goes into details on how to run a game, how to build a campaign, and how to balance a campaign.
"I think we need a book based on party rules"... Rules for what exactly? Do you think we need a book that has rules that the players must follow beyond how you play the game? You haven't, to my knowledge, given a good reasoning for this. Do you think it needs to be rules for how to GM a party with different types of players? That's not as workable as you may think. Everyone has a different style of game mastering. Just as many people have different ideas of how to balance a campaign.
Me, I write up an initial adventure balanced around APL=1. Then I ask for everyone's character sheets. Based on how the first adventure goes, I ramp up, tone down, or otherwise adjust how I design future adventures for the group. In non D&D/Pathfinder campaigns I like to run a published intro adventure first as I go over the party's characters. If I'm running a superhero campaign, I'm not gonna run the same type of campaign for the JLA style team as I am for a group of low powered street heroes. And if some of the party have much greater capabilities then the others, I need to design adventures where both the powerhouses and street level heroes can shine.
It's just like how you don't toss a bunch of locked doors that can't be broken down and deadly traps at the group who has nobody who can pick locks and disable traps. An AP or published scenario is one thing, but if you're building each adventure yourself, you design it with the capabilities of your players in mind.
So please, explain to us what you feel this hypothetical book would contain. And not just "party rules" either. What specific topics would it cover? Also, as others mentioned... You do know that before you got a contract to write a book for a publishing company they likely would want a sample of said book. Right? When I was looking into getting some of my fiction published, I discovered that most unsolicited submissions get tossed in the trash unread.
That means you would first need to write the book you intend to submit. Or at least the first chapter of it. Then convince the publisher that your work is something they can make money with. This is where the sample chapter comes in, as well as actually contacting said publisher. Then there's the rewrites you'd need to do to satisfy the editor, possibly dozens of rewrites. And you'd need to finish each stage of your work by a deadline. There's more involved in publishing a book then just signing a contract and knocking something out.
When you set up such restrictions at the onset, the players know exactly what they're getting into.
okay so this is an old post, but I've seen this posted multiple times now.
If as so many put it, it's hard to find another group to game in, then playing your game because it's the only one around, doesn't make it a good game.
For instance(using the described setting in another post), I can't be a magus teleporting around the battlefield. Can a blink? It's a quick teleport between dimensions over and over again...
can monks teleport via their ability or do they get nothing at that level?
if short range teleport are okay, and teleporting between the material and astral plane are okay, I'd have to ask, how far can I teleport before god intervenes and stops me. why is the astral(or is it ethereal, i always forget) plane okay?
can I teleport to planes? if so can I teleport to a plane and then anywhere I want back to the material plane?
Can I spend player time trying to re-invent the teleport spell? I'm going to do careful research on all the divine intervention castings and try to find someone who is going to try to do it soon and record any magic that happens, then try to replicate it. Can I not do that, if so, why?
If I get the true name of an outsider, can I use it to teleport me around?
Like here's the point, removing teleport or any other specific kind of magic outright isn't easy, as has been said.
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yes, the group playing rugby isn't right to neglect people because of the game. Think about all those people that just wanted to play lacrosse and the group said, "Nope, we don't play that. Play rugby" and the OP is looking at the group like, "Why would I play rugby when I wanted to play lacrosse".
It seems that some feel that the rugby players need to adjust and let the lacrosse player play lacrosse in their rugby game.
Many of us are saying, why are you trying to force rugby players to accept you playing lacrosse? Find some lacrosse players to play lacrosse with or decide you're okay playing rugby with these rugby players.
Edited to be more global friendly
When you set up such restrictions at the onset, the players know exactly what they're getting into.okay so this is an old post, but I've seen this posted multiple times now.
If as so many put it, it's hard to find another group to game in, then playing your game because it's the only one around, doesn't make it a good game.
For instance(using the described setting in another post), I can't be a magus teleporting around the battlefield. Can a blink? It's a quick teleport between dimensions over and over again...
can monks teleport via their ability or do they get nothing at that level?
if short range teleport are okay, and teleporting between the material and astral plane are okay, I'd have to ask, how far can I teleport before god intervenes and stops me. why is the astral(or is it ethereal, i always forget) plane okay?
can I teleport to planes? if so can I teleport to a plane and then anywhere I want back to the material plane?
Can I spend player time trying to re-invent the teleport spell? I'm going to do careful research on all the divine intervention castings and try to find someone who is going to try to do it soon and record any magic that happens, then try to replicate it. Can I not do that, if so, why?
If I get the true name of an outsider, can I use it to teleport me around?
Like here's the point, removing teleport or any other specific kind of magic outright isn't easy, as has been said.
This is the sort of thing the GM should have worked out before removing elements. In the teleport example, if I were doing it, I'd have substitute abilities to replace teleport when it is given, a rational (whether or not the players ever find out In Character) for why teleport doesn't work, how to handle planer travel and more.
It isn't easy, but it isn't that hard either if you want to do it and put some work in.
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When you set up such restrictions at the onset, the players know exactly what they're getting into.okay so this is an old post, but I've seen this posted multiple times now.
If as so many put it, it's hard to find another group to game in, then playing your game because it's the only one around, doesn't make it a good game.
For instance(using the described setting in another post), I can't be a magus teleporting around the battlefield. Can a blink? It's a quick teleport between dimensions over and over again...
can monks teleport via their ability or do they get nothing at that level?
if short range teleport are okay, and teleporting between the material and astral plane are okay, I'd have to ask, how far can I teleport before god intervenes and stops me. why is the astral(or is it ethereal, i always forget) plane okay?
can I teleport to planes? if so can I teleport to a plane and then anywhere I want back to the material plane?
Can I spend player time trying to re-invent the teleport spell? I'm going to do careful research on all the divine intervention castings and try to find someone who is going to try to do it soon and record any magic that happens, then try to replicate it. Can I not do that, if so, why?
If I get the true name of an outsider, can I use it to teleport me around?
Like here's the point, removing teleport or any other specific kind of magic outright isn't easy, as has been said.
This is the sort of thing the GM should have worked out before removing elements. In the teleport example, if I were doing it, I'd have substitute abilities to replace teleport when it is given, a rational (whether or not the players ever find out In Character) for why teleport doesn't work, how to handle planer travel and more.
It isn't easy, but it isn't that hard either if you want to do it and put some work in.
Exactly! For my homebrew setting, it's not that teleportation doesn't exist. Rather the old magics that allowed instantaneous transportation and planer travel have been lost. What's left are lengthy multi-person rituals or innate magic abilities which only function when a group of people with the same ability work together. Give you a hint, the game world is based on a series of stories I wrote set in a super hero world setting that followed a team of fae based magical girls, and the only instantaneous teleportation in the world that's not directly caused by a god level entity or natural phenomena is effectively like the Sailor Teleport in Sailor Moon. Takes a group of people, minimum of 5 to pull off. And only if they have similar power sources.
And yes, I did put into a lot of thought for how it worked. A monk's abundant step in the game world isn't a teleport technique, it's a speed technique for example. Which means you need something to push off of to use it. And even if the players never learn the exact reasons for why teleportation is so difficult, there are reasons that are integral to the setting.
yes, the group playing rugby isn't right to neglect people because of the game. Think about all those people that just wanted to play lacrosse and the group said, "Nope, we don't play that. Play rugby" and the OP is looking at the group like, "Why would I play rugby when I wanted to play lacrosse".
It seems that some feel that the rugby players need to adjust and let the lacrosse player play lacrosse in their rugby game.
Many of us are saying, why are you trying to force rugby players to accept you playing lacrosse? Find some lacrosse players to play lacrosse with or decide you're okay playing rugby with these rugby players.Edited to be more global friendly
Interesting analogy.
There is a sport called International Rules Football that is a hybrid between Gaelic Football and Australian Rules Football. This sport allows elite Australian and Irish sport stars to compete against each other on a level footing. I've seen this sport played live and it is amazing. A far better game than if one team insisted that the other play their code.
RPGs are even more flexible. A good GM can cater for various levels of character optimisation within the same game in a way that is satisfying for everyone. In our table players vary from the casual newbie to the veteran super optimiser rules encyclopedia, yet somehow the game just works. I would love to see a guide on how to make this situation work even better.
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The problem, Boomerang, is that there is no real way to tell people how to do this. You can advise, and many RPGs do have sizable amounts of space in the GM books dedicated to this as part of running a campaign. Which I mentioned before. But no two groups are going to be alike. So really it comes down to experience. Designing your own adventures helps a lot with getting a feel for how to balance things. And the CR system makes it easier to balance an encounter overall.
Back in 2nd edition there was no way other then hard won experience to judge if a group of enemies was going to be too easy or two difficult to defeat. Can the party handle a group of 10 orcs? Maybe, maybe not. How many skeletons makes for a good encounter at level 4? Only experience told you that. While CR isn't perfect, it provides a good base.
As an example, I want the first combat encounter in a level 1 dungeon adventure to be fairly easy but not a cake walk. So I set it up as a CR 1 encounter. This provides a guideline for how many goblins total the encounter has. If I previously ran a similar encounter for a party with those same classes and the encounter was trivialized but the CR 2 encounters where as difficult as I wanted the CR1 encounters to be, I know I should bump it up to APL+1. If the APL+3 BBEG proved to be impossibly difficult, I know to maybe dial the BBEG down to APL+2. Or raise the encounter up to APL+4 or +5 if it was too easy.
Designing adventures that allow the power gamer and non-power gamers alike to shine is again something that comes down to experience. Advice is fine, but there's a lot of sources for said advice already. Do we need a new book that contains rules which, to be honest, are more focused on telling the players how they are allowed to play rather then rules on how to adjudicate if something in-game works or not?
I'm not looking for yet another Rulebook or player code of conduct. What I want is a book that gives advice on running games, that is written for GMs.
The advice I have found online in this area is terrible. There are snippets in other books and magazines that help, but there is no comprehensive in depth analysis. There is a gap in the market for a professionally written, well researched how to guide on running an RPG.
If Paizo were to write such a book they might actually appeal to non-Pathfinder customers. Publishing yet another "ultimate" book will likely only appeal to the Pathfinder faithful.
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Ah, but that's what WOM wants. He wants a book with rules for 'the party'. He doesn't want a book of advise, although I can agree such a thing would be useful. The tips on how to GM in the old Ghostbusters game were invaluable to me as a newbie. And the sections in the 2nd edition DM guide on how to balance a campaign again were invaluable.
What he wants is rules that the players need to follow. Rules not to govern if an action works or not, but to govern how the players actually are allowed to play the game. Or at least that's how it comes across from his "party rules" comments. And he said he was willing to write the book if Paizo gives him a contract.
Wait, are you talking about pretty much the entirety of chapter 2 in paizo's Game Master's Guide? It includes advise on things ranging from how to keep the narrative going, how to deal with game changing abilities such as flight and teleportation, and even advise on dealing with problematic players or over powered characters.
Chapter 2 is certainly a good start. And other games have similar content. I would like to see a more in depth approach along similar lines. I think you could easily fill a book with really good advice, tips and examples.
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I think thats an excuse. They just don't want to say "99% of the stuff we receive is garbage and reading it would be a waste of time".Paizo has a policy to avoid even reading unsolicited content, for legal reasons.Wise Old Man,
If you feel strongly then do not wait for Paizo to contact you, you contact them and keep at it until you get a response.
MDC
From my research, this is actually a pretty common policy. Which is one reason why it can be difficult to break into the business as an author. It's a common mistake to send your completed manuscript in unsolicited, not realizing it probably got thrown in the trash without being read. Unless you're already an established name, your manuscript isn't likely to be read unless you can pitch it well enough to make the exec want to read it.
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I think thats an excuse. They just don't want to say "99% of the stuff we receive is garbage and reading it would be a waste of time".Paizo has a policy to avoid even reading unsolicited content, for legal reasons.Wise Old Man,
If you feel strongly then do not wait for Paizo to contact you, you contact them and keep at it until you get a response.
MDC
Actually, most places the publish things have a "no unsolicited material" policy. It saves them from being sued in the case of them coming up with something similar to something someone wanted to submit to them. Of course, that doesn't stop people from trying to do it.
Again, you mean like Paizo's game master guide? Other then a few charts, most notably for random treasure generation, and a handful of rules such as for haunts that's what this book primarily is. Advice, tips, and tricks for how to game master.
Good question!
I think the style of book should be similar at the very least. In my opinion (and I noticed some reviews echoed my opinion) most of the advice seems to be rehashed content that is already known by most experienced GMs. What I am looking for is more in depth and would include new insights that would benefit both newbies and more experienced GMs. Perhaps an Advanced GM Guide is what is required?
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Wait... people ban Infernal Healing because of WHERE the campaign happens???
Why not? Maybe I don't want Inner Sea spells in my Greyhawk, or Dragonlance campaign, because of the world flavor. Not having setting specific spells be available generically helps make worlds distinctive from each other. It's not like the game goes south without them. On the other hand, if I do a Greyhawk campaign I use the original names of the spells that WOTC denatured and try to include some greyhawk spells updated to Pathfinder rules if possible.
And it's not what I ban... it's what I allow.
Actually, most places the publish things have a "no unsolicited material" policy. It saves them from being sued in the case of them coming up with something similar to something someone wanted to submit to them. Of course, that doesn't stop people from trying to do it.I think thats an excuse. They just don't want to say "99% of the stuff we receive is garbage and reading it would be a waste of time".Paizo has a policy to avoid even reading unsolicited content, for legal reasons.Wise Old Man,
If you feel strongly then do not wait for Paizo to contact you, you contact them and keep at it until you get a response.
MDC
Unsolicited material is generally thrown into the trashbin/incinerator unread, unless it came with an SASE, in which case it may be returned... unread.
Out of curiosity: wouldn't all Paizo created PF spells be foreign to Greyhawk or Dragonlance?
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Again, you mean like Paizo's game master guide? Other then a few charts, most notably for random treasure generation, and a handful of rules such as for haunts that's what this book primarily is. Advice, tips, and tricks for how to game master.Good question!
I think the style of book should be similar at the very least. In my opinion (and I noticed some reviews echoed my opinion) most of the advice seems to be rehashed content that is already known by most experienced GMs. What I am looking for is more in depth and would include new insights that would benefit both newbies and more experienced GMs. Perhaps an Advanced GM Guide is what is required?
Well, that's the thing. It feels like old rehashed advice because it IS old advice. Yet it's advice that's still just as useful today as it was decades ago. Some gets updated for the specific system, but it's still essentially the same advice. Books like paizo's game master guide are mainly written with new GMs in mind. Experienced game masters have been around the block, and probably know this stuff already. The section on balancing what treasures you give out is useful since Pathfinder has a different game balance then many other systems.
Beyond that though, there's only so many ways you can describe how to deal with disruptive players. And there's only so much insight into how to deal with a given issue that can be imparted. Most of it is gained via experience, so the tips and tricks are more guidelines to get you started.
I've been game mastering since the early 90's, I'm very familiar with how to handle problem players and game balance issues. I'm also an old hat when it comes to world building and designing adventures. Groups that ignore the plot hooks and/or add 2+2 and come up with kumquat? Again, been there done that. I don't need advice, tips, and tricks to deal with such things. New game masters need it though, and that's what the game master guide provides.
Not at all. For example, the Vivisectionist is banned for no good reason at all. I've heard the reasons and they're stupid.I'm especially eager to play in games where the GM has a laundry list of banned items and house rules. Usually these masses of house rules are carefully curated, with things like "CORE ONLY" and "Greater Trip is OP."PFS makes a decent reference if people want to see what feats and builds should be banned imo.
Flavor, the classes flavor is pure evil.
Every person I saw wanting to play one wants to use vestigial limb and get 4 sneak attacks.
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In no way am I a disruptive player. IRL, I'm a super polite, cooperative, and overall friendly person.
I'm not talking about being disruptive, I think if you have a personality problem, it should be dealt outside of game.
I've seen people play evil characters for the sake of wanting to steal from other players and kill them, or just cause shenanigans and they give me an excuses like "That's my alignment. I'm trying to play in character!"
I've also seen players trying to act the scientist for the campaign rules, like when a GM says "There is no astral plane." and players would say "Well, how does teleportation work then? And it wouldn't make sense because of this, this, and this."
And it's like...why are you trying to start this debacle, when it's very unnecessary. The GM puts in rules at the start, that's that. People don't need to justify in their own minds why it wouldn't work.
Those are disruptive players.
I hold back all the time to give my respected players a chance to have the spot light, so everyone can shine equally. Because it feels good to shine.
But I don't like how people are judged based on what kind of character builds they want to make.
I'm very honest about what kind of character I want in the beginning of the game, and I tell my GM's,
"I want to play an admixture wizard"
"No. Pick something else."
"I want to play a summoner synthesist"
"No. Pick something else."
Even when I'm researching a build and show them the link for my resources and FAQ's. They say "I don't know...Would it be okay with you if you just play a fighter?"
And then other player's jump in "You can't make these characters man! You're being disruptive!"
"How am I being disruptive??"
And the crazy thing is that if one of the guys is a closer friend to the GM, he let's him play like a slumber hexcrafter build. And they're always laughing and giggling about it.
It's frustrating. I'm all honest and nice about it and I get burned for it. It's not cool. And I see that it happens all the time. Favoritism.
I don't want to subjected to polite politics on a gaming table. And it's not easy finding a gaming table near me.
So it's "Too bad so sad for me"?
That's not fair.
Get a party rule set book out there, so people can play their favorite builds on an equal level and have fun.