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The local VO team that organizes our conventions in the Twin Cities has started only offering the GM boons if you GM at least 2 slots at our conventions. The reason for this I think has more to do with making sure we have enough GMs as our conventions are growing to over the 100 table threshold, but it does have the effect of increasing the requirement to gain a convention GM boon.That is the case for large conventions where we have a lot of tables to fill. For smaller conventions where we may only have three to four tables at a time, one table will do it.
We can also use more volunteers at the conventions. It would allow us to spread the duties around more. It tends to be many of the same people who volunteer at them, although Starfinder has brought in more.
That makes sense.
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Now, I'm actually quite insulted that you call my take, "garbage". I sacrificed time, money I didn't have, and a certain level of enjoyment (because I couldn't afford to do anything other than GM while there.) How is my prioritizing my life around getting to a convention despite not initially having the resources to do so, a garbage take?
The concept of "if I can do it with such little you can do it" is garbage and privileged. Not everyone has the same circumstances as you. It's not all about priorities. There are a whole host of other reasons why people can't/don't go to conventions, so to take my argument and just say "Well I went to conventions on so little so your argument is invalid" is, to be blunt, trash. Regardless of what you were able to accomplish, your circumstances are your own. And that's the end of what I'm going to say about that.
Why is being rewarded as a player even being compared to being rewarded for volunteering as a GM?
While GMs are needed for tables to happen, do you think players or GMs bring in more new players? How many new players have you met at a convention that continue to go to PFS at local game stores versus how many new players have come into PFS because their friend plays at a local game store? Those numbers are not that far apart.
To GM: I need to buy the scenario, prepare the scenario, buy the maps, markers, minis/stand-ins, among other things, not to mention the ephemeral costs like running it before getting to play it, running a table instead of playing at a table. (Yes, I like to GM, but I also like to play and to be surprised when playing.)
First off, you shouldn't be buying scenarios. Your local VO should be providing them to you. Secondly, maps, markers, stand-ins/minis are a one-time investment and are usable outside of Pathfinder Society GMing. Most of the GM materials I use I already owned, though if PFS is what got you into GMing, that's great and I hope you keep with it. Chances are, you're also buying minis to play as well, so it's not like you didn't already have some miniatures to use for GMing. And while those costs are nothing to balk at, they are still one-time costs so you get more and more out of them the more you GM.
Why would I GM at a con if I can just stay local and get the same reward?
ONCE AGAIN, I'm not arguing for the "same" rewards. I'm arguing that the disparity is too great.
Let me try to illustrate some sort of suggestion.
As I stated earlier, right now there's 4 race boons/year on the con schedule. One more race boon through RSP. That's potentially 5 race boons per year for GMs. Outside of VOs handing out extra boons as they see fit at conventions or a GM with enough credit via RSP this year to hand a copy of their boon to a player, there's nothing for players to earn anything like that. Not to mention, the RSP rewards GMs, but if the players don't show up to play, a GM isn't going to earn enough tables to get that RSP race boon. So in one aspect, GMs do rely on players to some extent to get these rewards.
So, how do you get more race boons into players' hands?
---Modify the RSP so that players can trade in a certain number of RSP boons they've won for a race boon (if you play more, you have a greater chance of winning RSP boons; as such you'd have a better chance to get a race boon).
---Reward stores/VOs that hit a threshold of a certain number of tables reported within the RSP timeframe with a select number of race boons that VOs are asked to hand out to players as they see fit.
---Develop a consistent tiered system for convention support events where GMs gain boons based on the number of tables (or % of tables) they run. Just pretty much make the GenCon system a PFS-wide system (though it would probably need some tweaking for smaller conventions).
And honestly, if fewer rewards from conventions mean that you won't GM conventions anymore, then good riddance. A culture that fosters GMs that only go to conventions to GM to earn boons doesn't do any good for the system or the players. I rather go to a convention and sit at a table with a GM who genuinely enjoys GMing and wants to give a good experience to players than a GM who just shows up to get a boon. If enjoying PFS and enjoying meeting others who play PFS isn't enough for you, then maybe reconsider your priorities, as Tallow would say.
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Now, I'm actually quite insulted that you call my take, "garbage". I sacrificed time, money I didn't have, and a certain level of enjoyment (because I couldn't afford to do anything other than GM while there.) How is my prioritizing my life around getting to a convention despite not initially having the resources to do so, a garbage take?The concept of "if I can do it with such little you can do it" is garbage and privileged. Not everyone has the same circumstances as you. It's not all about priorities. There are a whole host of other reasons why people can't/don't go to conventions, so to take my argument and just say "Well I went to conventions on so little so your argument is invalid" is, to be blunt, trash. Regardless of what you were able to accomplish, your circumstances are your own. And that's the end of what I'm going to say about that.
I am privileged, but for other reasons not related to be able to go to a convention. Are all reasons created equal? No. Are there reasons I did not list that I would find valid for not be able to go to a convention? Probably. Social Anxiety disorders is one I left out. But then its unlikely they will be able to handle crazy game days either.
But you are completely missing the point. For every person who complains about not being able to get a boon because they can't get to a convention for valid reasons, there are 10 people who complain about not being able to go to a convention simply because they haven't prioritized being able to do so. And when these conventions are local (within 2 to 3 hours drive is local for a convention), a lot of the excuses that maybe were valid for not being able to go to Gen Con, simply are no longer valid.
And devaluing all the sacrifice I made because I prioritized conventions over other things in my life, is telling me that my sacrifice was somehow unwanted, unneeded, wrong, bad, unappreciated, etc. Is that really what you want to be telling GMs who make sacrifices in their own private lives to volunteer at a convention? Just so that GMs at game days or players can get the exact same rewards without that sacrifice?
No, my explanation is not a story of privilege. You are reading the wrong message. The message is merely an example of what some GMs go through to volunteer their time at conventions. And since I know my own sacrifices better than anyone else's that's the examples I used.
And the point is, if GMs are sacrificing like that to volunteer, it means they are prioritizing differently than those who do not.
Any reward you give a GM for sacrificing and prioritizing as such, is going to create a similar paradigm. Anything good enough to entice a GM to do such a thing is going to make those who feel they can't get to conventions, for whatever reasons, feel like they are on the outside looking in on this reward.
So why are the race rewards deemed the only thing that is such a huge issue? If you are going to call out have/have-nots, then don't just talk about changing how race rewards are granted, just simply take all convention GM rewards away all together. See how successful a convention you can run that way.
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This conversation has been going on since I can remember in early 2012 when the first Tengu boons were handed out.
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.Now you can ignore all that because you want what you want, I suppose, but that doesn't make your case any stronger for it.
It's not clear to me that any or all of the previous experience is relevant to the position I've advanced. I've never said that GMs at cons should not receive boons as incentives. I've argued that non-GMs should receive similar boons and incentives. As far as I'm aware, this is a state of affairs that has never existed, though the Regional Support Program is a step in this direction.
A statement that GMs will not be available for cons if they are able to earn con-style boons for non-con GMing is at best a hypothesis at this point in time.
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This conversation has been going on since I can remember in early 2012 when the first Tengu boons were handed out.
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.Now you can ignore all that because you want what you want, I suppose, but that doesn't make your case any stronger for it.
It's not clear to me that any or all of the previous experience is relevant to the position I've advanced. I've never said that GMs at cons should not receive boons as incentives. I've argued that non-GMs should receive similar boons and incentives. As far as I'm aware, this is a state of affairs that has never existed, though the Regional Support Program is a step in this direction.
A statement that GMs will not be available for cons if they are able to earn con-style boons for non-con GMing is at best a hypothesis at this point in time.
I'm pretty sure each organizer that organizers the conventions in their area will be able to determine if its more than a hypothesis for their region quite easily just based on how many GMs they've gotten because of the boons. Why would a GM go through all the trouble, time, expenses, and angst of GMing at a convention to get a boon they can get by going to a local game day?
If you are going to go this route, they should be different boons. And crossover should never happen.
I feel pretty confident in saying that in the 5 years I organized conventions in the Twin Cities, that we would have had trouble filling GM tables if we didn't have boons for just conventions as I know many GMs who don't like conventions and only go to help out if I had something for them. You can write these guys off as selfish, but they GMd a ton locally at game days, and chose not to do conventions, not because of GMing, but because they didn't like conventions for a variety of reasons. But they did it anyways because they got a boon.
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The local VO team that organizes our conventions in the Twin Cities has started only offering the GM boons if you GM at least 2 slots at our conventions. The reason for this I think has more to do with making sure we have enough GMs as our conventions are growing to over the 100 table threshold, but it does have the effect of increasing the requirement to gain a convention GM boon.
But every VO that organizes a convention has the option to determine what requirements there will be to earn the boon. You don't have to give it to every GM that GM's one slot. That isn't a requirement from the OPC as far as I'm aware.
Actually it is. Tonya has confirmed on more than one occasion that convention GMs are to receive their GM boon even if they only run one slot. I cannot find a post I can quote in the public forum and my NDA prevents me from linking or copy/paste anything from the private VO forum.
Now it is possible that an individual VO or an organizing team either mistakenly required more slots and were thereafter corrected, or received a special exception to deviate from the standard rules. I am not party to organizing in Minnesota so I cannot speculate what happened. However, I can say that the standard rule is run one slot, earn the GM boon. So, no organizers, even Venture-Officers do not have the authority to increase the requirement to more than one table.
My intent here is not to argue about what may have happened or is happening in the Twin Cities, only to point out to any VOs, organizers, or GMs reading your comment what the rules are. If anyone intends to deviate from the intent, you need to consult your RVC and probably Tonya as well before making that decision.
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Venture-Captain, Minnesota
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I wrote a thing about what GMing at Conventions that Im quoting here:
What irks me most about selling boons is that it puts a paltry physical price (in the case of the Aasimar boon - 15 dollars) on all the effort that I have put into GMing at a con. GMing at cons, especially physical cons, is hard work.
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- Spend hours drawing or grit my teeth and purchase flipmats. In either case, carry those mats.
- Get there. If my boyfriend isn't going, this means either begging for rides or paying through the nose for Uber. There is a family car in my household, but I cannot tie it up for hours on end at a convention.
- Often pay full price for the convention itself and/or hotel. Badge costs range from twenty-five dollars to one hundred and fifty locally. Some local cons will let you in on a free GM badge if you do nothing else. Most do not. Hotel costs... Meh. You all know what hotels cost.
- Haul a ton of stuff from a distant parking lot and then through multiple floors of a hotel with wonky elevators.
- Spend the weeks ahead prepping for multiple tables of random strangers.
- Been a personable, cheerful, friendly face for PFS on low sleep and poor food. As a vegetarian, it can be tough to get good quality fuel at certain locations.
- Increase my stress level. Dealing with convention unknowns and uncertainties makes GMing harder. Will my table fire? What do I do when there is an online signin for the convention that we cannot see, so we have no idea who is signed up for our tables? At one con, 14 people showed up for my Overflow Archives table who all believed that they had signed up. Keith and I had to figure out on the spot what to do. Fortunately, we got a kind soul to volunteer to run Quests, did a lottery, and went forward.
- Deal with crises that never happen when I'm GMing at my own venue. I offered to take over running the second part of an adventure for another GM, only to find out that the entire party had TPKed in part one. I had to talk them all back to my table on charisma alone. They didn't know my reputation as a GM. I said, "Oh, I know what a bummer this was, but hey... Let me make it up to you and show you a good time. You were signed up for this slot, and all the other slots are full. I have a bunch of pregens, and we all have nothing to lose. Come on, what do you say?" They had a good time, and everyone shook my hand afterwards.
- Lose the time for other Opportunities at that Convention. For gaming conventions, this may not be a big deal. I have fun GMing as well as playing. For non-gaming conventions, I lose out on parties, movie opportunities, interesting panels etc. Last year at Convergence, I barely had any time to quickly visit the rest of the con, because I spent so much time volunteering on the 22nd floor devoted to gaming.
Do the PFS Salespitch at the beginning and the end. Make sure they know where to find local play. It helps that the Minnesota Lodge is ultra organized with tons of New Player folders that we've put together ourselves.
I love GMing. I love going to Conventions and meeting people. But man, if I compare GMing at my favorite local store with my regulars to GMing at a Convention, it does not match up.
When I went to GenCon, it was incredibly fun but it was also one of the most stressful experiences I ever did as a GM. Eight slots as a Tier One GM means that you are short on sleep, that you have to pack your own lunches and bags of cough drops to make it through the convention. I had to prep PSA Advanced, which is the work of a special, a brand new campaign (Starfinder), another special, and five other scenarios split between Starfinder and Pathfinder. I had to be incredibly organized, moving from one game to the next, and keep cheery for all the wonderful folks who came to play at my table. Still, it’s the big show - where Paizo and other companies show off all their new stuff. So having the games go is important.
In return, GenCon gave me some nice perks. They paid for my hotel, and PFS gave me a catfolk. I also got to meet my fellow VOs in person. But would I have done that insane schedule without the rewards? Probably not. Which would have been a shame, because the players at my tables were 80% new to Organized Play. Many of them got excited when I pointed out Organized Play opportunities that were near them in their home states.
I am not saying that the current system is equitable. But if Paizo is going to get its games demoed at conventions, they need to entice the GMs to do it.
Hmm
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The local VO team that organizes our conventions in the Twin Cities has started only offering the GM boons if you GM at least 2 slots at our conventions. The reason for this I think has more to do with making sure we have enough GMs as our conventions are growing to over the 100 table threshold, but it does have the effect of increasing the requirement to gain a convention GM boon.
But every VO that organizes a convention has the option to determine what requirements there will be to earn the boon. You don't have to give it to every GM that GM's one slot. That isn't a requirement from the OPC as far as I'm aware.
Actually it is. Tonya has confirmed on more than one occasion that convention GMs are to receive their GM boon even if they only run one slot. I cannot find a post I can quote in the public forum and my NDA prevents me from linking or copy/paste anything from the private VO forum.
Now it is possible that an individual VO or an organizing team either mistakenly required more slots and were thereafter corrected, or received a special exception to deviate from the standard rules. I am not party to organizing in Minnesota so I cannot speculate what happened. However, I can say that the standard rule is run one slot, earn the GM boon. So, no organizers, even Venture-Officers do not have the authority to increase the requirement to more than one table.
My intent here is not to argue about what may have happened or is happening in the Twin Cities, only to point out to any VOs, organizers, or GMs reading your comment what the rules are. If anyone intends to deviate from the intent, you need to consult your RVC and probably Tonya as well before making that decision.
No worries. I trust the team I helped put together has got their ducks in a row. I am not privy to any of the inner workings since I retired, but o trust they are doing the right thing.
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I am privileged, but for other reasons not related to be able to go to a convention. Are all reasons created equal? No. Are there reasons I did not list that I would find valid for not be able to go to a convention? Probably. Social Anxiety disorders is one I left out. But then its unlikely they will be able to handle crazy game days either.
But you are completely missing the point. For every person who complains about not being able to get a boon because they can't get to a convention for valid reasons, there are 10 people who complain about not being able to go to a convention simply because they haven't prioritized being able to do so. And when these conventions are local (within 2 to 3 hours drive is local for a convention), a lot of the excuses that maybe were valid for not being able to go to Gen Con, simply are no longer valid.
This is literally what you said, as a summation:
But if you really want to go to a convention, there is very little that actually stops you other than your own priorities.
You don't want people devaluing your sacrifice, but you want to tell people it's their own fault if they don't go to conventions? Sorry, you can't have that both ways. That's the last sentence in your original post and that's what irritates me about everything you're saying. And then "well, if it's within 2-3 hour drive it's a local convention so your excuses are invalid" is EXACTLY the kind of privilege you're touting. Not everybody has access to a car, public transportation, or any of these other things to even get to a convention 2-3 hours away.
If you want to talk about "personal sacrifice", I go to conventions to GM and I GM more than one slot. I GM'd 3 of 7 slots at a local convention in February, and then 3 weeks later as a last-minute volunteer, I GM'd 4 slots out of 10. What aggravates me about the current convention set-up is that I got the same exact boons as any other GM at either convention. There was a GM that ran 10/10 slots at the second convention and a GM that ran 1/10 slots, but we all got the same convention-support rewards (whether the organizing VO gave more boons out of their stash to the 10/10 GM, I don't know). That's what I don't like about the system as it exists today. It shouldn't take a VO's judgment call to reward GMs that put in the extra time and effort as others, nor should it be ok to just hand out race boons to GMs that only show up to conventions to GM one table for them. I can easily identify GMs in my area that do exactly that. You're going to tell me that the GMs who goes to every convention within 50 miles for a single day just to GM one table and get a race boon deserve the same rewards as a GM who commits themselves to 2-3 conventions a year, but GMs over 75% of the time slots? I can't agree with that at all.
And that's *MY* personal sacrifice. And I'm not going to come in here and say it's better or worse than anybody else's. My position in life grants me the ability to do these things within my means, and I gladly and openly accept that it is not equal to anybody else, and that it doesn't make me a better or worse person than anybody else.
just simply take all convention GM rewards away all together. See how successful a convention you can run that way.
Once again for the people in the back, I'm not suggesting getting rid of them, I'm suggesting bridging the gap between GMs and players getting highly-sought-after boons, and creating some sort of tiered system for GMs to deter boon collection by barely participating in as many conventions as possible (as I feel that takes away from the spirit of GMing for PFS).
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This is only for qualifying conventions. Local events like GameDays are not provided scenarios, so its not a universal approach.
I was under the impression, as a V-A, that I'm allowed to provide local GMs at my store with the scenarios they need to GM if they are asking to GM. If this is not the case, I'm going to have to contact my RVC to confirm, because I'm going to lose about half my GMs if I'm not allowed to do this.
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In return, GenCon gave me some nice perks. They paid for my hotel, and PFS gave me a catfolk. I also got to meet my fellow VOs in person. But would I have done that insane schedule without the rewards? Probably not. Which would have been a shame, because the players at my tables were 80% new to Organized Play. Many of them got excited when I pointed out Organized Play opportunities that were near them in their home states.
First off, thank you HMM for your contributions, and I really hope to get in on a PbP scenario with you as GM one day.
I think GenCon is probably the most extreme of examples, but, if you don't mind, I'd like to use this as an example for what I'm making an argument for:PFS Rewards - I think, personally, you should have gotten more than one boon if you GM'd 8(!) slots.
Convention Rewards - I would be surprised if a convention themselves didn't cover a GMs pass depending on the number of hours they worked at a convention. I guess maybe I have yet to run into a convention that doesn't at least cover the convention pass for GMs that are there a certain number of hours? As for the hotel, I'm not sure who covers that (Paizo or GenCon), but that's definitely a very nice perk that I wouldn't have expected.
I'm hoping to make it to GenCon this year as a GM, but I don't know what I can afford personally (Indianapolis is far from Southcoast Massachusetts) let alone the fact that just this week I got my personal summer schedule finalized and realized that GenCon is an option for me.
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This is only for qualifying conventions. Local events like GameDays are not provided scenarios, so its not a universal approach.I was under the impression, as a V-A, that I'm allowed to provide local GMs at my store with the scenarios they need to GM if they are asking to GM. If this is not the case, I'm going to have to contact my RVC to confirm, because I'm going to lose about half my GMs if I'm not allowed to do this.
Loaning print copies is fine. Gifting them PDFs through the Paizo store is fine. Sharing your own pdf is not.
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Joe, you really are coming to the wrong conclusions what bout Tallow is trying to say and interjecting your own ideas into his words.
Trying to steer this back to a line more conducive to discussion:
Here are the competing forces.
1. Conventions need to bring in GM volunteers.
2. GMing a convention is measurably more difficult than home GMing.
3. Some non-convention goers feel deprived of the opportunity to earn convention level GM volunteer rewards.
4. Some non-GMs feel deprived of the opportunity to earn convention level GM volunteer rewards.
How do we narrow this perceived gap without breaking a different part of the system?
Wei Ji proposed limited rare ancestry slots for all that could be spent on any approved not-always-available ancestry as they were authorized. Convention GMs could be rewarded with extra rare ancestry slots. The tracking to avoid fraud here seems worse than the current system, but I may not be seeing a simple solution (e.g. your ancestry slots are registered on the website and get coded onto your PFS card like stars; it gets crazy with enough convention boons, but the print could be very small).
One idea I had was to leave the system as is but make a concerted effort to release race boons in Scenarios related to that race like Starfinder did with Morlamaws. You play an adventure that takes you to work with the tengu and the chronicle rewards you with the ability to create one tengu character. You want a second? GM that scenario. You want more? GM conventions.
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This is literally what you said, as a summation:
But if you really want to go to a convention, there is very little that actually stops you other than your own priorities.You don't want people devaluing your sacrifice, but you want to tell people it's their own fault if they don't go to conventions? Sorry, you can't have that both ways.
I'm unclear how that's privileged or insulting or whatever you want to call it.
If you prioritize family, work, finances, relationships, other life things over going to a convention, that's perfectly fine. That's your choice.
But lets not be coy about this or beat around the bush about it. If you make a choice to prioritize differently than me, and you know what the reward is for prioritizing the same as me, then the differences are our priorities.
There literally is nothing stopping you from going to a convention if you change your priorities. In some cases, its extremely better to prioritize your children, having a house to live in, having a running vehicle, having cash inflow, maintaining your marriage, etc. And in many of those cases, it may be seen as a choice without a real choice. A distinction of, "well you have a choice to lose your job if you want to go to Gen Con." I get that. And certainly those are factors that go into how you create your own priorities.
And Paizo cannot be responsible for trying to fit every possible priority situation into what's best for the campaign. And finding a way to entice GM's to GM at conventions is seen as a huge priority for PFS.
So if you can find a way to create a convention boon for GMs that simultaneously isn't devalued by also being offered to players and game day GMs and isn't creating a different (perhaps worse) have/have-not situation, then I'm all ears. Seriously. Tell me what the idea is.
Because so far, all the ideas are either A) devaluing the GM Convention Boon to basically be meaningless if it can just be earned by playing or GMing game days or B) creating a different type of boon that makes a Convention GMs character more powerful than other characters. Because trivial but cool bonuses don't cut it. Its already been shown over several Gen Cons, that all those boons you can get as a player that give trivial but cool bonuses are often placed in the round file and never really used. There are a few that are interesting enough to use, but most are like, "What is this?!" The bonus needs to be strong, and when its strong, it creates a game imbalance in favor of the Convention GM.
So yes, personal priority flow charts are the only thing keeping most people from going to a convention. What you seem to be doing is assigning a derogatory or derisive tone to that comment. Which is an unfortunate assumption on your part. If you have a personal priority that disallows you from going to a convention, great. That's your choice. And its a fine choice. But you have to know that its your choice. Nobody owes you anything because you are making a personal priority choice that doesn't reward you.
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One idea I had was to leave the system as is but make a concerted effort to release race boons in Scenarios related to that race like Starfinder did with Morlamaws. You play an adventure that takes you to work with the tengu and the chronicle rewards you with the ability to create one tengu character. You want a second? GM that scenario. You want more? GM conventions.
This is an idea I can get behind. Especially if GM Convention Boons are different (at least at the outset) than the scenario granted ancestries. I've been wanting this ever since Quest for Perfection Part III and Rats of Round Mountain Part II in Season 3. Scions of the Sky Key Part 2 from Season 6 would have also been awesome. All three of those scenarios would have been perfect for introducing the Tengu and Ratfolk and Grippli respectively. We finally started seeing some of this in Season 7 (may have been one in late Season 6 as well).
I'd really like to see when some sort of Pathfinder diplomatic contact with a new Ancestry happens, that those ancestries become available to create new PFS characters.
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Look, I'm done arguing with what Tallow is saying/implying. I think he's being callous and disrespectful towards people who don't have the same advantages in going to conventions as he does because he thinks it's mostly about priorities. I'm not going to agree with that, and he's not going to see things the way I do. So let's leave that dead horse in the ground and be done with it. To be clear, I'm not trying to take things personally with Tallow (as we've been mutual parties in other forum conversations), but rather just his take on this topic. I apologize if I came off as personally insulting.
That said....
Here are the competing forces.
1. Conventions need to bring in GM volunteers.
2. GMing a convention is measurably more difficult than home GMing.
3. Some non-convention goers feel deprived of the opportunity to earn convention level GM volunteer rewards.
4. Some non-GMs feel deprived of the opportunity to earn convention level GM volunteer rewards.How do we narrow this perceived gap without breaking a different part of the system?
Wei Ji proposed limited rare ancestry slots for all that could be spent on any approved not-always-available ancestry as they were authorized. Convention GMs could be rewarded with extra rare ancestry slots. The tracking to avoid fraud here seems worse than the current system, but I may not be seeing a simple solution (e.g. your ancestry slots are registered on the website and get coded onto your PFS card like stars; it gets crazy with enough convention boons, but the print could be very small).
One idea I had was to leave the system as is but make a concerted effort to release race boons in Scenarios related to that race like Starfinder did with Morlamaws. You play an adventure that takes you to work with the tengu and the chronicle rewards you with the ability to create one tengu character. You want a second? GM that scenario. You want more? GM conventions.
The rare ancestry slot idea seems ok, but I don't think it'll solve all the problems I perceive. And I definitely agree that the tracking/fraud element would be difficult. As for putting race boons in scenarios, I'm not sure that's the best idea. That's going to create a HUGE demand for those scenarios, and before long everybody is going to be tired of seeing it.
(Edit: Maybe there's some middle ground here. Everybody knows about the fun one-shot boon from True Dragons of Absalom. Maybe race boons can be incorporated into some of the special scenarios, where they stay convention-locked for a year, but afterward can be run by any 4- and/or 5-star GM at local game days?)
My main issue with the ancestry idea is that is still isn't doing something for the players. To reiterate: I'm not necessarily looking to take things away from convention GMs. I just see a huge gap between the opportunities provided to convention GMs and everyday players (with non-convention GMs falling somewhere in between). Only one of my ideas suggests putting some control over GM convention rewards (and that's just to stop the practice of doing as little as possible and getting the same amount of rewards as other GMs that are doing more for Society). There's something to be said about becoming a VO, but again those benefits also come with a fair amount of responsibilities, so I see that as a trade-off.
I presented my 3 suggestions a few posts back, but nobody is responding to them so I'm guessing nobody likes the ideas.
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Look, I'm done arguing with what Tallow is saying/implying. I think he's being callous and disrespectful towards people who don't have the same advantages in going to conventions as he does because he thinks it's mostly about priorities. I'm not going to agree with that, and he's not going to see things the way I do. So let's leave that dead horse in the ground and be done with it. To be clear, I'm not trying to take things personally with Tallow (as we've been mutual parties in other forum conversations), but rather just his take on this topic. I apologize if I came off as personally insulting.
Fair enough.
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and that's just to stop the practice of doing as little as possible and getting the same amount of rewards as other GMs that are doing more for Society
Now you can't have it both ways. One man's "little as possible" is another man's "the most I have to offer with my limited resources (vacation days, spousal good will, money, concentration, etc)."
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Stepping back from the specific discussion of convention boons, I'd like to chime in on the original question about boon carryover into PFS2. First: Wow! Some folks really are really invested in their boons (or lack thereof). Me, not so much. I'll be able to use anything I'm really excited about between now and the time PFS1 winds down; and anything else, well, I wasn't that excited about it to begin with. So, really, any of the proposed solutions would work for me. Of course, not everyone feels the same way. Which is why it is important to get to a solution as close to right as possible. But it's also important to get clear about our goals.
If there's anything that (I hope) we all want, it's this: a happy, fun community going forward. The old guard needs to feel valued, and the new kids need to feel welcome. We're going to have to compromise on this one, folks, and we can't be bitter about it. The question we need to ask ourselves isn't so much "What's fair to me?" as "What's best for the game?" We're going to have to give up some of our old toys, even the ones we GM'd our butts off for/traded for/cut a check to a charity for, or risk making the new folks feel left out.
This isn't because the leadership stoppped valuing us, or doesn't want us to have nice things. It's because we can't walk into a fresh campaign with a giant pile of nice things that aren't available to all the new players that we (I hope) want very much to attract and retain. Plus, obviously, there are lots of boons that will simply be mechanically obsolesced by changes in the rules.
That isn't to say that there shouldn't be some value carried over from our legacy boons. I fully support some sort of trade-in option. But it will have to be at a reduced rate, and probably amortized over the first year or two of the campaign, to ensure that we are all, new players and old alike, given the chance to progress at a similar pace.
I hope this made some sort of sense, and that I haven't made too many fresh enemies.
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I don't, personally, seen chronicle fishing as as bad a thing as other people. Wanting to play or run a scenario for access to a race is no different, to me, than wanting to play or run a scenario because it matches my character's theme or applies to my character's faction or any other reason one might want to play a scenario they missed out on.
There is always the SFS alien archive player boon method: Play X-number of unique scenarios and gain access to one of N races. Ironically, I have seen GMs put off by that system, even though they have a separate RSP GM boon to work on.
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I don't, personally, seen chronicle fishing as as bad a thing as other people. Wanting to play or run a scenario for access to a race is no different, to me, than wanting to play or run a scenario because it matches my character's theme or applies to my character's faction or any other reason one might want to play a scenario they missed out on.
There is always the SFS alien archive player boon method: Play X-number of unique scenarios and gain access to one of N races. Ironically, I have seen GMs put off by that system, even though they have a separate RSP GM boon to work on.
Chronicle fishing for one chronicle, is not so bad, really. Getting the perfect weapon/shield/mount for a particular character makes sense. And its unfortunate the way early PFS was done, was that you could play a scenario and get a really cool boon for a character that had no use for it, and then never get to replay for that boon. Sure, you could GM for it if you wanted and assign it to the perfect character, but still, unsatisfying. I like the idea of opening up an option for any of your characters Once.
But the idea of chronicle fishing is people who play characters only in scenarios that get all the best gold, loot (partially charged wands and special poisons are big ones), and boons that are particular to that character only. And this is a dangerous precedent to set.
But if you start opening up special loot, boons, etc. to any character you have, and open up that special weapon/armor enhancement to any weapon/armor that character has, instead of the ubiquitous long sword, would go a long way to making chronicle fishing pointless. And knowing X race is available in Y scenario really doesn't matter for chronicle fishing, because all it does is open up X race to any of your characters and doesn't particularly make your character more powerful by having only the best Chronicles for that character.
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Now you can't have it both ways. One man's "little as possible" is another man's "the most I have to offer with my limited resources (vacation days, spousal good will, money, concentration, etc)."
Fallacious comparison. In the context of my argument with Tallow, it was the justification of being able to attend conventions versus not. This argument is in regards to rewards commensurate with the work put in.
I never suggested that GMs should be given greater rewards based on how much effort they put into getting to the convention in the first place.
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Chronicle fishing bugs me because it's people reading/researching scenarios before playing them, which contributes to metagaming. But, that can't be helped since the scenarios are available to you if you play them.
Regardless, I'm leery of putting a race boon on a non-special scenario for the reasons I listed. GMs will get sick of it, and players who want to play something else will get sick of it. Even True Dragons lost its luster after a couple of tables in my area once a few GMs hit 5-star status.
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Chronicle fishing bugs me because it's people reading/researching scenarios before playing them, which contributes to metagaming. But, that can't be helped since the scenarios are available to you if you play them.
Regardless, I'm leery of putting a race boon on a non-special scenario for the reasons I listed. GMs will get sick of it, and players who want to play something else will get sick of it. Even True Dragons lost its luster after a couple of tables in my area once a few GMs hit 5-star status.
If the scenario isn't replayable, then eventually there won't be players to play it. And I don't know why as an organizer you wouldn't try to ensure every player could play every scenario if they wanted anyways.
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Chronicle fishing bugs me because it's people reading/researching scenarios before playing them, which contributes to metagaming. But, that can't be helped since the scenarios are available to you if you play them.
Regardless, I'm leery of putting a race boon on a non-special scenario for the reasons I listed. GMs will get sick of it, and players who want to play something else will get sick of it. Even True Dragons lost its luster after a couple of tables in my area once a few GMs hit 5-star status.
Hey, I still want to run the damn thing!
:)
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Now you can't have it both ways. One man's "little as possible" is another man's "the most I have to offer with my limited resources (vacation days, spousal good will, money, concentration, etc)."Fallacious comparison. In the context of my argument with Tallow, it was the justification of being able to attend conventions versus not. This argument is in regards to rewards commensurate with the work put in.
I never suggested that GMs should be given greater rewards based on how much effort they put into getting to the convention in the first place.
Tallow argues that prioritizing convention attendance lower than, say, going to my sister's wedding is a choice and you bite his head off. However, you argue that GMs who prioritize sharing the job of entertaining the kids at a convention so they only have time to GM one slot and maybe play one slot are doing "as little as possible" and shouldn't be rewarded and fail to see the irony.
Venture-Captain, Ohio—Columbus
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Loaning print copies is fine. Gifting them PDFs through the Paizo store is fine. Sharing your own pdf is not.Good to know. In the future, I'll start printing them out. Thanks.
I know I’m off on a tangent, but you also need to *get your printed copies back* from GMs you loan them to.
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I believe that registered retailers are still eligible to receive free scenarios. If so, they can print a copy and keep a file of scenarios that can be run at the store/venue. Once you identify the GM, the copy can be loaned out to the GM for prep and then returned when they are done using it. I think there are still a lot of stores following this process to save their GMs some cash.
Just remember that pdfs and printed material that comes from them is the intellectual property of Paizo. We cannot share pdf files and we cannot sell/trade/give away printed copies of our pdfs.
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Tallow argues that prioritizing convention attendance lower than, say, going to my sister's wedding is a choice and you bite his head off. However, you argue that GMs who prioritize sharing the job of entertaining the kids at a convention so they only have time to GM one slot and maybe play one slot are doing "as little as possible" and shouldn't be rewarded and fail to see the irony.
Now who's coming to the wrong conclusions about what someone is trying to say and interjecting their own ideas into their words?
I didn't bite Tallow's head off over the concept of convention prioritization, but over the fact that his argument was that this is the SOLE contribution to why people don't go to conventions, and he boiled down any other factor (cost, family, accessibility) to prioritization. I find this to be simplistic and somewhat insulting to people who don't have the ability to overcome circumstances besides "I rather do something else".
I feel that people should be rewarded by the time, effort, and quality they put into something. That's how my "default world" job works. I work 40 hours, I get paid for 40 hours. I complete my tasks consistently, my boss gives me a raise. But that's not the reward system for PFS GMs at most conventions today.
I also understand that some people don't have the ability to work 40 hours per week or have the ability to work at a job that's moderately rewarding. But I wouldn't tell them that it's their fault because their priorities are out of whack. There's plenty of situational and environmental factors besides "priority" that prevent people from doing the things they want to do.
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...but over the fact that his argument was that this is the SOLE contribution to why people don't go to conventions, and he boiled down any other factor (cost, family, accessibility) to prioritization. I find this to be simplistic and somewhat insulting to people who don't have the ability to overcome circumstances besides "I rather do something else".
This is exactly where you are putting words into my mouth. Perhaps the word "prioritize" is charged for you? Or has some sort of negative connotation? I know that there is a running joke amongst my geek friends of "Come on! Why are you going to see your baby be born, come game with us, get your priorities straight!" Perhaps that is similar in your community and thus the word priority has taken on a negative meaning?
Regardless of whether the option of doing something is an illusion of choice or not, the fact is, its all about what your personal priority tree is. For most people, family, health, work, etc. all have a higher priority than gaming. And it should in most circumstances. But I've found, over, and over, and over, that if someone really, really wants to do something, they find a way to make it a priority and find a way to do it. Sure, there are always those people who feel hopeless or helpless in trying to make something happen.
I'm not going to get into the psychology of societal expectations and requirements that beat people into that feeling. That's a major digression we don't need to get into. But suffice to say, that its all about priorities. That's how everyone lives every moment of their life. What is your priority right now?
The point being, no organization can thrive on trying to accommodate every single stricture of every single persons priority tree. As an organizer of your store as a Venture Agent, you have a game day on a particular night I assume? It starts at a particular time I assume? What about all the people who can't show up to your game because they work second shift? Or the people who can't show up to your game because they work retail and work on Saturdays (assuming a game day on a Saturday)? No, you create a game that is convenient for you and the store that you organize through/for and possibly (hopefully?) you make sure your convenience matches the majority of people who show up to that game.
You prioritize your time to organize for that store on that given day during those given timeframes. The store prioritizes that time window for you to have one or more tables to organize a game at their store. The GMs prioritize their time throughout the week to prepare a scenario, possibly finances to purchase said scenario (or time to pick it up from you), and then prioritize that evening to run a game at the store you (and the store) has prioritized for the community. The players all prioritize their time to show up to the store at that given day and time to play.
Why is the priority tree any different for conventions? Why is it so negative to say that someone not attending (being able to attend) a convention is about how they prioritize their life?
Because that's exactly what is happening.
It may be an illusion of choice where they really don't (or don't feel they) have a choice. But it doesn't change the fact that this is how they've prioritized things.
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I didn't bite Tallow's head off over the concept of convention prioritization, but over the fact that his argument was that this is the SOLE contribution to why people don't go to conventions, and he boiled down any other factor (cost, family, accessibility) to prioritization. I find this to be simplistic and somewhat insulting to people who don't have the ability to overcome circumstances besides "I rather do something else".
This is exactly where you are putting words into my mouth...
Oh am I?
Regardless of whether the option of doing something is an illusion of choice or not, the fact is, its all about what your personal priority tree is.
if someone really, really wants to do something, they find a way to make it a priority and find a way to do it.
But suffice to say, that its all about priorities
Why is it so negative to say that someone not attending (being able to attend) a convention is about how they prioritize their life.
I guess I lodged them in there so well that you just kept rolling with it then.
I'm not going to agree with that, and he's not going to see things the way I do. So let's leave that dead horse in the ground and be done with it.
Now if we're done casting Reincarnate on this poor dead horse, constantly bringing it back as some unspeakable horror with a babble aura, let's stop hijacking this damn thread.
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This was apparent when they went back into retirement and there was a concerted effort by a particularly large amount of the community to make special schedules and "speed runs" in order to lock in more assimar. No other race that has been introduced has seen this type of activity.
Disingenuous at best:
A) Paizo staff supported trying to lock a few races that were about to be forcibly retired due to closet whining on a VO-only board whose toxicity is legendary even if the details discussed there are protected by NDA.B) "Speed runs" were about as widespread as that pandemic of edited photocopies and people being mugged for their chronicle sheets in parking lots. In a campaign of tens of thousands, it's unlike the number of people who managed to organize "speed runs" numbered in the dozens.
C) Of course no other race has seen that type of activity - no other race has been legalized and then removed.
The echoes of that decision and the even more poorly implemented decision to penalize GMs with APG Summoners will probably haunt this campaign for years to come as trust was damaged in both directions by both decisions, so I applaud Paizo staff for their transparency on this rather than leaving it to the Bog of Etern- VO Opinions to determine.
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Venture-Captain, Minnesota
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Let’s avoid terms like ‘disingenuous’ — they imply hurtful judgments about the motivations of other posters. Let’s acknowledge that aasimars & tieflings are races that inspire a diversity of opinion. I was not part of the campaign when they decided to ban aasimars and tieflings. I literally joined one week after they retired, and boy did I feel left out! However, from my poking around in old discussions in these forums, I believe that the banning of Aasimars and Tieflings happened because of GM whining everywhere. The complaints weren’t limited to the Aquatic VO Forums, but also happened right here in PFS General Discussion. I love this community, but we can’t deny that complaints and dismay form a large part of our discourse here!
Otherwise, I think your analysis is spot on, Tim. As a campaign, we over-reacted and our solution to ban aasimars and tieflings caused more problems than it solved.
The echoes of that decision and the even more poorly implemented decision to penalize GMs with APG Summoners will probably haunt this campaign for years to come as trust was damaged in both directions by both decisions, so I applaud Paizo staff for their transparency on this rather than leaving it to the Bog ofEtern-VO Opinions to determine.
I also applaud Paizo Staff’s current transparency.
Hmm
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Venture-Captain, Minnesota
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Back to boons... I’ve basically started giving them away left and right. I want them to see use, and they’re doing no good to anyone stuck in my folder.
Of all the solutions proposed, I like the idea of boon trade-in best where you can trade in 1E GM Race boons to get whatever the current race boon is in 2E, because that will keep GMs motivated in the transition.
I also hope that most boons going forward have a 2E option on them, once Organized Play Leadership has a better idea of what races will be coming out in the bestiaries of the Second Edition.
Hmm
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One boon I would like to see make an appearance is a complete rebuild boon. I have at least one (possibly two) characters that I started before realizing that they are not only mechanically bad, but are also offensive in some manner. And retraining will only get me a new class; I will be stuck with the statistics I have.
With dwindling play opportunities, being allowed to go "You know what? That was a terrible idea. Let me not waste those chronicle sheets" would be super awesome.
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Throwing my two cents in, but I think it'd be great to have something like the Xenophile that I can "Mulch" what are to me worthless boons that I'm never going to use, especially with now limited (still big, but limited) amount of plays to play around with character concepts. Now, I'd like to be able to mulch a bunch of worthless boons into something interesting for 2e, like say 5 or so whatever boons for a race boon in 2e, but even if it was just mulching 2 or 3 for a regular boon in 2e I'd bee fine.
Organized Play Manager
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Locking this thread.
Commentary is moved to the blog discussing Boon Converstion Update