How do folks feel about everyone being able to roll Lore untrained for anything? I just discovered that was a thing. I'm not thrilled about it at first glance, as it seems to cheapen a player's lore skill which already has such fringe benefits. That being said, if we can already roll Religion, Arcana, Society, etc untrained, maybe this isn't that big of a deal. It just means we have catch all for the few checks that don't fall into those buckets. You may not be able to actually get the information even with a nat 20 though; the GM has leeway to say no in regards to this.
What say the rest of you?
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Oh yeah, its a thing. It makes lore skills (which already had little value) even less good.
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From what devs have said, the GM should be saying "no" to untrained users for anything remotely complex. Assuming that's the case, it's no worse than being able to roll Knowledge untrained for DC <= 10 in PF1. The problem is that the actual rules don't appear to contain any such guidelines, and dev comments aren't RAW....
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From what devs have said, the GM should be saying "no" to untrained users for anything remotely complex. Assuming that's the case, it's no worse than being able to roll Knowledge untrained for DC <= 10 in PF1. The problem is that the actual rules don't appear to contain any such guidelines, and dev comments aren't RAW....
Since recall knowledge is explicitly in the untrained use of various skills either the devs do not understand their own rules or they are talking about an errata as substantial as the dying changes.
From what devs have said, the GM should be saying "no" to untrained users for anything remotely complex. Assuming that's the case, it's no worse than being able to roll Knowledge untrained for DC <= 10 in PF1. The problem is that the actual rules don't appear to contain any such guidelines, and dev comments aren't RAW....Since recall knowledge is explicitly in the untrained use of various skills either the devs do not understand their own rules or they are talking about an errata as substantial as the dying changes.
No, it's not that untrained users can't Recall anything, just that they can only Recall simple things. Oh hey, I actually found some guidelines in the rules after all!
Anyone can use a skill’s untrained uses unless some circumstance, condition, or effect bars them from doing so. You can use trained uses only if you’re at least trained in that skill and no circumstance, condition, or effect bars you from that use. Sometimes using a skill in a specific situation might require you to have a higher proficiency rank than what is listed on the table. For instance, even though a high-level barbarian untrained in Arcana could reliably use Arcana to Recall Knowledge regarding the breath weapons of the various colors of dragons, the GM might decide that Recalling Knowledge about the deeper theories behind magical energy of a dragon’s breath weapon might be something beyond the scope of the barbarian’s largely utilitarian and anecdotal knowledge about how to fight dragons. The GM decides whether a task requires a particular proficiency rank, from trained all the way up to legendary.
While that particular example is for Recall Knowledge with Arcana, the rule certainly holds for Recall Knowledge with Lore as well.
There should probably be some more guidance for each Knowledge skill as to what consistutes a "simple" check for that skill. As well as to just what kinds of information you get about a monster when you identify it, even when trained.
There should be basic guidelines and DCs listed for all skills or common occurrences.
I actually feel the reverse and think that Lore skills are nearly worthless. Without a list or a concept of what Lore skills are they don't do much. The fact that Gnoll Lore is a thing means that there is lore for every race and every creature. Probably every skill, every nation, every nationality, and likely subsets of those.
So there are 1000s to 100,000s of Lore skills. So ya, its totally fine that they can be used untrained.
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The fact that Gnoll Lore is a thing means that there is lore for every race and every creature. Probably every skill, every nation, every nationality, and likely subsets of those.
That's the one you decided to call out? :P
Circus Lore is a Thing.ACROBAT BACKGROUND
In a circus or on the streets, you earned your pay by performing
as an acrobat. You might have turned to adventuring when the
money dried up, or when you learned to put skills to better use.
Choose two ability boosts. One must be to Strength or
Dexterity, and one is a free ability boost.
You gain the Steady Balance skill feat, and you’re trained in
the Circus Lore skill.
Note that that is different from:
You gain the Fascinating Performance skill feat, and you’re
trained in the Entertainment Lore skill.
As well as the Gladiatorial Lore skill.
By this logic there's a skill for Maid Duties and Etiquette Lore, which is entirely separate and unique from the Servant of a Noble House Lore skill and the Nobility Lore skill.
WHERE DOES IT END
Ha! Fair enough, but I ran Pale Mountain last night so it was on my mind.
But it still makes my point valid that either lore skills are worthless. And/or you can definitely use them untrained.
I'm honestly fine with Lore skills being super niche, and mostly like it quite a bit. They are usually just a thing you get for free to add a little flavor. I think it is the sort of thing that will feel awesome or hilarious when it does come up. For example, the Pathfinder Hopeful in my group took "Lore: Barbecue" for his Additional Lore for a laugh. And when he came upon a goblin campfire that was cooking meat, I let him roll to determine what the goblins were eating.
Lore is basically a way for players to have some skills rounding out their character without costing adventuring relevant resources. To that end, I suppose they could remove some of the Lore based feats like Obsessive and Additional Lore, and/or make it so that your Lore automatically graduates in proficiency all the way to Legendary. Putting feats or skill increases into those right now kind of feels like a trap option, which I would imagine most people are savvy enough to avoid but might as well be removed.
To my mind any encounter/exploration mode uses of Lore are basically a side effect; its main purpose is to earn money in downtime as Profession. Though I do enjoy the thought of Legendary Lore: Barbecue letting you successfully cook rocks into being both tasty and nutritious. Anyway, investing in a useful money-earning profession isn't a trap in any campaign with significant stretches of downtime.
To my mind any encounter/exploration mode uses of Lore are basically a side effect; its main purpose is to earn money in downtime as Profession. Though I do enjoy the thought of Legendary Lore: Barbecue letting you successfully cook rocks into being both tasty and nutritious. Anyway, investing in a useful money-earning profession isn't a trap in any campaign with significant stretches of downtime.
True that!
To my mind any encounter/exploration mode uses of Lore are basically a side effect; its main purpose is to earn money in downtime as Profession.
I can't remember which one it was now, but my group found that one of the ways of making money managed to barely let a PC live hand-to-mouth (i.e. just food for the day).
Also.
How often is a PC going to do Profession: Circus?
To my mind any encounter/exploration mode uses of Lore are basically a side effect; its main purpose is to earn money in downtime as Profession.I can't remember which one it was now, but my group found that one of the ways of making money managed to barely let a PC live hand-to-mouth (i.e. just food for the day).
Also.
How often is a PC going to do Profession: Circus?
That's actually one of the easier ones to justify; circuses actually go on the road and visit small towns and such. The big practical issue is just finding people to round out your acts. But if you make that a big hurdle, then you also have similar issues with finding a smithy who will let you use his shop to practice your own trade, or people to buy your expensive magical items. Or animals to train or hunt. Or a ship to go sailing on. Or land to farm....
All sorts of stuff seems left up to your GM, really.
"Land to farm" is easy. When you're performing your profession, you're being employed to do that task. You find a farmer and say "I'll work your fields for a few silver." Finding a farm shouldn't be hard in the vast majority of places you'll be spending downtime.
Its that doing the same thing as a Circus performer...requires a circus to be there already (or that you have a trained monkey).
But it gets super weird when your Lore skill is That Random Secret Society No One's Heard Of Because It's a Secret Society.
"Land to farm" is easy. When you're performing your profession, you're being employed to do that task. You find a farmer and say "I'll work your fields for a few silver." Finding a farm shouldn't be hard in the vast majority of places you'll be spending downtime.
Its that doing the same thing as a Circus performer...requires a circus to be there already (or that you have a trained monkey).
But it gets super weird when your Lore skill is That Random Secret Society No One's Heard Of Because It's a Secret Society.
One, nobody said all Lores or all Professions are equally useful for money-making. Try to pick a Lore that is.
Two, if you're competent in a range of circus acts there are some you can do by yourself on the street for tips, like juggling or whatever it is clowns do at birthday parties. Yes, that stuff also falls under Entertainer Lore, but nothing says Lores can't overlap any more than Professions couldn't.
I'm cool with players making up new Lore skills in home games, but I think the PFS needs to have some guidelines on what kind of Lores can be used.
But it gets super weird when your Lore skill is That Random Secret Society No One's Heard Of Because It's a Secret Society.
Someone has to tell people they just saw swamp gas reflecting light from Venus, and that person needs to get paid. ;)
Why use Circus Lore when you have Performance ?
How often will you go to a city with an arena to use your Gladiatorial Lore ?
To go back on topic : I don't feel anything about Recall Knowledge for Lore being untrained. This just means you do an Int roll -2 (which I allowed from time to time for easy topics, although I used an Int roll with no penalty). Anyway, I don't see how my players will be able to use Recall Knowledge for Lore more than once in an AP without it being fetched.
I don't think the Doomsday Dawn backgrounds are really meant to be professions as they do just more directly tie into the story. Which makes sense because the modules give no downtime and deal with a lot of obscure topics.
I think folks would be inclined to use Circus Lore over Performance if their intelligence is better than their charisma. Actually, unless you're a bard or a preacher Performance remains one of the least useful skills and I can't imagine many folks will want to waste being trained in it. At least circus lore comes for free. Keep in mind there is pretty much one person in the typical circus act who is especially charismatic: the ringmaster. Juggling, knife throwing, and various trapeze and balance acts are all Dex based. Strong men are obviously strength. Lion taking is now wisdom based. And then there is whatever is supposed to make clowns entertaining, which I guess you could argue is charisma but it sure doesn't feel that way in practice.
As for Gladiatoral Lore, in my RotRL game a player actually used this in PF1 Sandpoint. Got a bunch of burly dudes together for a thing that was one part fight club, one part LARP, and one part betting ring. Das Korvut was a big hit there.
Honestly, I'm rather enjoying coming up scenarios to use Lore when challenged on it. Which actually strikes me as a nice little benefit to the system. It gets those creative juices flowing.
That being said, I do think it is important that your background fit the the campaign you are playing in, just as it was when background was just a short story you gave to your DM with no mechanical impact. If you want to be a Gladiator in a game that takes place in a town too small for an arena, why were you in that town in the first place? How were you keeping yourself fed? Same question applies for a farmer or hunter in an urban campaign. You could be a recent transplant but then you will have to hope there's an opening for your services I guess.
Note that the GM can alter the stat used for a check as appropriate.
For example, I wrote an NPC Infantryman as an Unskilled Hireling using the Warrior background as his basis. He uses his Constitution when Practicing a Trade using his Warfare Lore Check because I ruled most of his tasks are endurance based, like digging trenches, setting up and breaking down camps and siege equipment, or standing guard for hours on end. Using that clause was the only way that some of my NPCs are able to perform as described despite their sometimes mediocore Intelligence (the Infantry needed Str and Con more)
Otherwise I agree that the officially published Lore skills should be consistent. For example, why does Goblin Renegade grant "Criminal Lore", when the actual Criminal background grants "Underworld Lore" instead? What is the difference (if any)?
I hate reinventing the wheel. So a list of common Lore categories (and subcategories) would be a valuable addition to the final rulebook. If for no other reason than to reduce table/product variation by providing examples for GMs and adventure authors to use; instead of having to guess, or do a lot of unnecessary research to find out if there is already an appropriate Lore published in some source or another which they can reuse.
But it gets super weird when your Lore skill is That Random Secret Society No One's Heard Of Because It's a Secret Society.One, nobody said all Lores or all Professions are equally useful for money-making. Try to pick a Lore that is.
Sure, its just that the book implies that you CAN make money with any lore skill (just that the DC for doing so "might higher" based on GM discretion).
In either case:
a level 1 task completed competently earns the player 1 silver, or 7 sp a week. Subsistence level living costs 4sp a week (the next cheapest is 14sp/wk!). Keep in mind that DCs are intended to be a 50% shot at success (failure for a level 1 job is 2cp, or 1/5th the pay) and that there are no guidelines for the GM. Based on the example, the DC is the "low" collumn of Table 10-2 where the level of the job is the level used on 10-2, so a Level 1 job will have a DC of 12.
If we look at your average first level adventurer practicing their Lore skills as a trade, 1(Level)+0(Trained)+2(Int) = 3, requiring a 9+ on the d20; thankfully can only crit-fail 5% of the time, but only a 60% chance of success (only a 60% chance of managing to feed yourself!).
Another thread brought this up with regards to NPCs and James Jacobs (the Creative Director) replied saying it needed an adjustment to keep Golarion's economy from collapsing (basically, these are rules for adventurers, who are known to be in town for only a short while).
I think folks would be inclined to use Circus Lore over Performance if their intelligence is better than their charisma.
Oh, so it's more like using Unchained rules in PF1 to use Lore (Army) instead of Profession (Soldier) to command an army because you learned to do so in an academic manner ? That makes sense. Okay, I'm sold.
I think folks would be inclined to use Circus Lore over Performance if their intelligence is better than their charisma.Oh, so it's more like using Unchained rules in PF1 to use Lore (Army) instead of Profession (Soldier) to command an army because you learned to do so in an academic manner ? That makes sense. Okay, I'm sold.
Yeah, that's a good example. Another way to think about it: Being a really good performer and being really good at marketing yourself are very different things. A Circus Lore check could represent being in charge of a circus (expenses, promotions, selecting new acts, etc) but not actually performing in it.
Otherwise I agree that the officially published Lore skills should be consistent. For example, why does Goblin Renegade grant "Criminal Lore", when the actual Criminal background grants "Underworld Lore" instead? What is the difference (if any)?
Does it actually matter what the difference is? Do you imagine yourself ever having both of those in the same party and needing to treat them differently for some reason? I like that Lores are open ended. So much of the rules are hard coded, it is nice to have something with some flexibility.
Man, we have drifted way off topic.
Does it actually matter what the difference is?
It does if the adventure calls for one Lore skill, but you have the other. Will the GM allow the one to substitute for the other, does he assign a modifier for differing specificity? Where possible a player and/or GM should be able to trust that any given adventure will use a given Lore skill for a given profession.
There are at least twenty different background Lores in the Playtest rulebook. I think that if (3) background Lores were relevant in a single level, that would be on the threshold of believability.
I think the idea of certain Adventure Paths getting Lore very specific to its adventures (like in Doomsday Dawn) is a good way to make several of them applicable at the same time. From what I've seen of the PFS modules for 2ed, each one has tried to use a different background Lore in it.