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Hello, welcome to the institution and thanks for stepping up
So I was getting interested in running some PFS scenarios and just needed some things cleared up.
So I get that organised play means conventions and game shops, in such cases do you have to run the most recent seasons?
Nope. As long as its not one of the 7? retired scenarios you can run whatever you want. Season just tells you when it's released and gives you a hint what the theme might be (Season 8, elementals. Season 6, tech and robots, season 5 demons and stuff)
And what sort of rules are the GMs held to, its RAW obviously but is that it really? We run the session as written and then thats it, report it in for the character growth and everything is done after that?
RAW in PFS means run as written. Don't add monsters, don't add hit points to make it "more fun" don't give the monsters weird attack bonuses or extra damage.
As far as rules interpretations DMs decide rule pretty much the same way any other dm does, but you can't houserule stuff. You can't say "two handing power attack is too powerful i'll drop the bonus"
The FAQ didn't clear this stuff up at all and I just want to be sure I do everything appropriately so I don't mess up anything.
No problem. We have no life.
I plan on first running a few scenarios in a private discord with basically this dnd subreddit that I moderate and some have shown interest in pathfinder which is what I know better but I've never run PFS stuff before so I am not certain of what rules the GMs follow.
Since you have discord pop over to pfschat.com for PFS. It doesn't matter how well someone knows the rules for pathfinder , i cannot stress enough that pfs is like driving, you really need to see done to get a handle on it.
baring that, This is the best intro i can come up with for pfs new guys
I figured PFS would be better than an adventure path because its designed around a rotating cast and I think thats what I would have, then I thought well theres a game shop nearby I would also like to see if they would be interested in letting me do this sort of thing assuming it goes well with the discord stuff.
The episodic nature really helps groups that don't have fixed schedules.
these are a list of coordinators that can help you get started if any are near by
Map of places pathfinder society is played might have some local help and talent.. they could already be in the game store.
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So I get that organised play means conventions and game shops
One other clarification that BNW missed, about the above phrase. That's actually not true. PFS doesn't have to be done in public, or open to everyone. If you want to start a game in your house for just your friends, you can still do it as official PFS.
That's actually how I started. A couple (since married) wanted to start a Pathfinder group in their home, and decided that doing organized play would be easier than a campaign. That way, we could just play with whoever showed up any given week, rotate GMs, etc. And by following PFS rules, we could also take our PCs to conventions occasionally, which we did.
Other than maybe three or four conventions (that I had to drive 2-3 hours to go to), that was all the PFS I did for my first year or so. It wasn't until I left that group when I moved half way across the country that I started playing in gaming stores.
Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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Games stores and conventions are important to PFS because they catch people's eyes. They also make it easier to play with much more different people, which I find a lot of fun.
But it's totally fine to run it at home with a group of people you invite. Sometimes we do those because we want to take on a specific scenario with a group of specific people - especially Modules, which take more sessions to complete than a scenario.