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Theese weeks have come and gone several times over now. Does anyone have any further insights into this matter?When can we expect to have "Pathfinder Lost Omens World Guide" appear on the "Character Options" page - http://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/encyclopedia/pathfinder-2-0-characte r-options/ ?It's still undergoing review. Expect it to take at the very least a couple more weeks. Things are unfortunately a bit hectic.
In January's Blog they announced it will likely still be another several weeks.
They obviously want this finished as well. Things just keep getting in the way.
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Theese weeks have come and gone several times over now. Does anyone have any further insights into this matter?When can we expect to have "Pathfinder Lost Omens World Guide" appear on the "Character Options" page - http://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/encyclopedia/pathfinder-2-0-characte r-options/ ?It's still undergoing review. Expect it to take at the very least a couple more weeks. Things are unfortunately a bit hectic.In January's Blog they announced it will likely still be another several weeks.
They obviously want this finished as well. Things just keep getting in the way.
The blog mentioned 'by the end of the month.'
While I understand thing happen, stuff gets delayed, etc, all I (and many others, I presume) would like is an update on if they think they are going to make that deadline, or if it'll be after that.
It's not like all of us do not understand there are issues. But a once-a-week declaration of 'on schedule' or 'not sure' or 'not going to make it' would help with a lot of the people wondering about these things.
Will there always be people who complain about delays? Yes. But there are far more of us who understand that delays happen, and just would like updates.
Venture-Captain, Missouri—Cape Girardeau
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The blog mentioned 'by the end of the month.'
While I understand thing happen, stuff gets delayed, etc, all I (and many others, I presume) would like is an update on if they think they are going to make that deadline, or if it'll be after that.
It's not like all of us do not understand there are issues. But a once-a-week declaration of 'on schedule' or 'not sure' or 'not going to make it' would help with a lot of the people wondering about these things.
Will there always be people who complain about delays? Yes. But there are far more of us who understand that delays happen, and just would like updates.
Agreed. Radio silence does more harm than good.
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Once a month isn't "radio silence".
Once a week will delay things further, since there's more that goes into planning a blog than just the text on the page.
Not going to argue with you about what constitutes 'radio silence' but also, my post wasn't meant to be asking for a blog. Just a dev that already knows the approx answer to drop in once a week on these forums, and put a reply somewhere. This topic, a new topic, another topic. We'll find it.
Just an honest answer along the likes of:
"We still hope to make it by the end of the month for LOWG (or LOCC, or AoA, or Cheeve points, or whatever) sanctioning being posted for use!"
or:
"We don't think we will make it, but we are currently pushing hard for first week of Feb."
or even:
"Delays have piled up more than we wished for, it is unfortunately looking like end of Feb now, for sanctioning."
Will there be people who scream at any of those answers? Of course. /sigh.
Is it still the better way? Probably.
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It is on the bottom of the page.
0.08 – Large errata and clarification update
— GM Basics – Clarified a number of rules. Added Edicts and Anathema to the Table Variation section.
— Glossary – Added “Assign a Chronicle” and “Apply a chronicle”
— Player Basics – Added RIP, clarified “Purchasing Guidelines”
— Organized Play Basics – updated Purchasing Guidelines, Chronicle sheet rules, and clarified who can make rulings for the campaign.
— Character Options – Added link to additional option
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Doing a quick look over of the changes:
Unrelated, but on Org Play Basics, under the list of tags, 'Metaplot' should be added as its being used on some scenarios.
GM Basics section on Challenge Points -- I think the second paragraph under point 4 of calculating the Challenge Points, should be bolded and/or given special emphasis in some other way.
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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It is on the bottom of the page.
0.08 – Large errata and clarification update
— GM Basics – Clarified a number of rules. Added Edicts and Anathema to the Table Variation section.
— Glossary – Added “Assign a Chronicle” and “Apply a chronicle”
— Player Basics – Added RIP, clarified “Purchasing Guidelines”
— Organized Play Basics – updated Purchasing Guidelines, Chronicle sheet rules, and clarified who can make rulings for the campaign.
— Character Options – Added link to additional option
Does this mean the file on PFSPrep file will be/has been updated? Sorry if this question should not be directed at you.
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I know there is a list of changes which is why I asked for a more detailed list of changes. I'm hoping for an errata style list. For example, "Clarified a number of rules." could be expanded to specify which rules changed and how they changed.
I know nothing is going to change but man do I absolutely loathe this new process.
For example, the changelog says that they have added RIP.
I have not the tiniest clue what RIP is. Searching the players basic page, the only reference to RIP is in the changelog.
So glad that they've added it :-) :-)
Premier Event Coordinator
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Sometimes we create and use nomenclature that is not necessarily common knowledge and forget others don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. Honestly, I had to look what RIP was myself. Checked the glossary first, no luck. So I scanned down the player basics page until I hit Retail Incentive Program And realized, yeah, I know that one. :-D
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Premier Event Coordinator
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once-a-week
Given how far behind they are on so many projects, taking time to update us on everything they are doing on a weekly basis would be a significant undertaking and probably push them even more behind. Monthly might be a more reasonable time frame, but most of the time the delays lay with another department outside of the control of the OP team so they rarely know anything other than "soon." If we were to get a weekly update I doubt it would say any more than a quick, blanket, "nope, not ready, we'll let you know."
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Doing a quick look over of the changes:
Unrelated, but on Org Play Basics, under the list of tags, 'Metaplot' should be added as its being used on some scenarios.
GM Basics section on Challenge Points -- I think the second paragraph under point 4 of calculating the Challenge Points, should be bolded and/or given special emphasis in some other way.
Thank you. Both of those things are useful feedback, I will make a note of them.
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Sometimes we create and use nomenclature that is not necessarily common knowledge and forget others don’t know what the hell we’re talking about. Honestly, I had to look what RIP was myself. Checked the glossary first, no luck. So I scanned down the player basics page until I hit Retail Incentive Program And realized, yeah, I know that one. :-D
Thanks for the catch. That should be added to the Glossary.
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The reason I had not yet come in here to announce the update was that I was hoping to give a couple people a chance to look it over for errors and omissions before I started a bulk rush to download / pdf it.
I had considered making the changed text a different color, like the old Additional resources guide did. But I was worried that green or red text might be seen as placing a rules influence on it. Whether or not to do this is a discussion I would need to make in consultation with the team and the campaign leadership. But *if* we decide to do this, what color would you prefer?
I will discuss our options for releasing a more detailed changelong with the team.
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I think some method of easily spotting the changes is important. Exactly what the method should be depends a bit on the technical options. It also depends on how frequent updates are happening.
Placing a border around changed paragraphs/sections would be one option to show areas that people should revist, w/o implying any coloring that you were worried about, and w/o interfering with existing use of b/strong for emphasis. This assumes your authoring tools allow you to add/remove classes to the paragraph tags wrapping the content easily. The basically <p class="updated-0.08">...</p>. First step of prepping a new version would strip all the classes from the previous version number.
Italics and strikethrough would be another non-color based approach for added/removed text.
Or, if not showing in-line, offering a link to see a text diff of the page from the previous version. This is the only version that tends to scale well for allowing a user to see the deltas between arbitrary version (ie someone who wants to compare 0.08 to 0.04 if that was the last version they reviewed/printed,etc
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Venture-Lieutenant, Maryland—Hagerstown
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I am still not quite understanding one of the new rulings.
If the scenario you are running references challenge points directly in the encounter scaling, those override and replace the instructions here. Determine if your table is playing high tier or low tier and reference the appropriate scaling instructions in the scenario. You can then skip to step 5.
So do we still use the table in the guide to determine what is low vs high tier or do we strictly look for the CP total in the encounter section and play the tier the CP matches?
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I am still not quite understanding one of the new rulings.
If the scenario you are running references challenge points directly in the encounter scaling, those override and replace the instructions here. Determine if your table is playing high tier or low tier and reference the appropriate scaling instructions in the scenario. You can then skip to step 5.So do we still use the table in the guide to determine what is low vs high tier or do we strictly look for the CP total in the encounter section and play the tier the CP matches?
The exact cutoff for when a 16-18 party plays up or down is currently an unanswered question. I am hoping to have an answer shortly. In the mean time, I would suggest people use their best judgement.
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I am still not quite understanding one of the new rulings.
If the scenario you are running references challenge points directly in the encounter scaling, those override and replace the instructions here. Determine if your table is playing high tier or low tier and reference the appropriate scaling instructions in the scenario. You can then skip to step 5.So do we still use the table in the guide to determine what is low vs high tier or do we strictly look for the CP total in the encounter section and play the tier the CP matches?
The exact cutoff for when a 16-18 party plays up or down is currently an unanswered question. I am hoping to have an answer shortly. In the mean time, I would suggest people use their best judgement.
might be me but as it written skip to You can then skip to step 5 but then at 6 you apply the calculation of 4.
not sure how to make it more clear tough
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Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver
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As a heads up the pdf of the guide on pfsprep.com needs reuploading.
I had to rollback the server a few hours last night and while the database which holds the forums posts was unaffected, the uploaded files were not so lucky.
Sorry about that.
I'll let him know. Our VL, Zach, here in Denver made that pdf.
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I am still not quite understanding one of the new rulings.
If the scenario you are running references challenge points directly in the encounter scaling, those override and replace the instructions here. Determine if your table is playing high tier or low tier and reference the appropriate scaling instructions in the scenario. You can then skip to step 5.So do we still use the table in the guide to determine what is low vs high tier or do we strictly look for the CP total in the encounter section and play the tier the CP matches?
The exact cutoff for when a 16-18 party plays up or down is currently an unanswered question. I am hoping to have an answer shortly. In the mean time, I would suggest people use their best judgement.
I now have an answer, from Linda Zayas-Palmer:
"In Scenarios where there is a 16-18 scaling in the low tier, a group of 5+ PCs plays in the low tier. A group of 4 PCs is in the high tier."
For a glimpse of what this will look like, the following 16-18 tables will play high tier. All others will play low.
4, 3, 2, 2
4, 4, 1, 1
3, 3, 3, 3
4, 3, 3, 1
4, 4, 2, 1
4, 3, 3, 2
4, 4, 2, 2
4, 3, 3, 3
4, 4, 3, 1
This will be reflected in the next guide update.
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As a note there are now a few weird situations (although surprisingly few)...
3,3,3,3 plays high 16
while
3,3,3,3,1 plays low 18
Although assuming 18 low vs high is theoretically the same difficulty just a different in its distribution it shouldn't be a problem, but does provide a potentially small incentive against adding a new lvl 1 character/player to such a table if the players particularly want the high tier rewards.
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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I am still not quite understanding one of the new rulings.
If the scenario you are running references challenge points directly in the encounter scaling, those override and replace the instructions here. Determine if your table is playing high tier or low tier and reference the appropriate scaling instructions in the scenario. You can then skip to step 5.So do we still use the table in the guide to determine what is low vs high tier or do we strictly look for the CP total in the encounter section and play the tier the CP matches?
The exact cutoff for when a 16-18 party plays up or down is currently an unanswered question. I am hoping to have an answer shortly. In the mean time, I would suggest people use their best judgement.
I now have an answer, from Linda Zayas-Palmer:
"In Scenarios where there is a 16-18 scaling in the low tier, a group of 5+ PCs plays in the low tier. A group of 4 PCs is in the high tier."
For a glimpse of what this will look like, the following 16-18 tables will play high tier. All others will play low.
<< snip >>This will be reflected in the next guide update.
This is great but will Linda be posting as well?
Sorry, I really need it in the guide or as a post from the campaign leadership.
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Premier Event Coordinator
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I really need it in the guide or as a post from the campaign leadership.
Online Guild Team Lead is an official position. He is in charge of updating the OPF website. If he says, "This will be reflected in the next guide update," that is about as official as it gets. I would assume that the leader of that team would know not to announce something until it had been discussed and approved by the OP leadership, otherwise we would likely see a new team leader is short order.
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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I really need it in the guide or as a post from the campaign leadership.Online Guild Team Lead is an official position. He is in charge of updating the OPF website. If he says, "This will be reflected in the next guide update," that is about as official as it gets. I would assume that the leader of that team would know not to announce something until it had been discussed and approved by the OP leadership, otherwise we would likely see a new team leader is short order.
Thank Bob, I was not aware of that!
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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For a glimpse of what this will look like, the following 16-18 tables will play high tier. All others will play low.
4, 3, 2, 2
4, 4, 1, 1
3, 3, 3, 3
4, 3, 3, 1
4, 4, 2, 1
4, 3, 3, 2
4, 4, 2, 2
4, 3, 3, 3
4, 4, 3, 1This will be reflected in the next guide update.
As a note there are now a few weird situations (although surprisingly few)...
3,3,3,3 plays high 16
while
3,3,3,3,1 plays low 18
I think in circumstances where the level distribution is especially skewed we should recommend the low level player to use a pregen and use the "apply to level 1" credit rule. It'll generally make for a more fun experience.
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But overall, great progress on introducing better 5+ player scaling!
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Any equipment listed on your character’s Chronicle sheets with an item level equal to or less than your character’s level + 2. Some items found on Chronicle sheets are available for purchase only a limited number of times. Weapon and Armor found on chronicle sheets can be upgraded following the normal rules for upgrading.I don't understand how upgrading would work through PFS as the traditional rules require the formula in addition to higher crafting skills. Does this imply that we'll find formulas in the future? Or will it be a variant of rune transfer such that as long as we have access to a +2 weapon or armor we're assumed to have the formula and can pay the cost for upgrading and let the specialist perform the upgrade?
As per the rules in the "Runes" section of the rule book, most (if not all) runes can be upgrade to any improved version of the Rune by paying the difference in the cost.
All this is saying is that if you find, for example, an Aldori Dueling Sword (an uncommon weapon) on a chronicle, you could have a +1 potency rune engraved on it without needing to have access to a +1 Aldori dueling sword on a chronicle. You could later upgrade that rune to a +2 potency rune, without needing a specific chronicle for a +2 Aldori Dueling Sword.
Forgive me if it's already been pointed out, but there's a dead link in the Quick Start Guide: "Chronicle Sheets and Recordkeeping" currently 404s.
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As I skim over the Character Creation section it occurs to me that maybe 60% of this can be cut. It's already detailed in the Core Rulebook (which this section even points out), and if you've ever had the experience of reading lengthy redundant material before, you know that feeling you're going to get where your eyes gloss over and you miss small discrepancies.
Now imagine doing that when you're new.
I think the purpose of the Guide should be to point out what's different, not repeat how everything is the same.
Steps such as "Select your character’s ancestry" and "Once you’ve chosen your character’s ancestry, it’s time to select their background" can be eliminated because it's already detailed in the CRB. I think it's easy to hack this section down to a one page addendum.
Character Creation
This page details the The steps for creating a character for the Pathfinder Society. These steps mirror those in the Pathfinder Core Rulebook with a few additional Roleplaying Guild Organized Play-specific rules and benefits.
Ability Scores
Generate your Pathfinder Society character’s ability scores using the method detailed on page 20 of the Core Rulebook. Your character You may also take two additional ability flaws to gain one additional ability boost as described in the Voluntary Flaws sidebar on page 26 of the Core Rulebook.
Ancestry
Select your character’s ancestry. The Core Rulebook ancestries are always available. Other ancestries may become available as Achievement Point boons or via Character Options.
Languages
Your character gains some languages based on their ancestry, but might speak additional languages depending on their Intelligence or class. All Pathfinder Society characters are literate and speak Common.
Etc.
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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The reason why it is in the guide is to make it easier for new players. They don't have to reference different documents.
I don't see a problem with having redundant material because it can be skipped. Adding a sentence at the beginning stating the the rules are same as found in the CRB but reprinted here for easy reference would be sufficient in my opinion.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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I think I'm with Nefreet on this one. Cut the duplicate material, only mention the differences.
Not only is it easy for a reader to drown in a see of duplicate text and lose the plot, it's also a maintenance hazard. We already had trouble with purchasing rules because they'd been spread over so many sections and pages that an inconsistency had slipped in. That sort of thing just happens more and more if you repeat text. Every repetition is another obligation to do more maintenance.
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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I would rather not have to read about the differences than go to another document when I read about rules and then try and workout what they mean. It is confusing.
I am not trying to discount the suggestion, I am giving my thoughts on the topic.
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We plan to address dead and broken links as next weeks project.
Ws would like people's feedback on the challenge point rewrite of the guide. Does it make things clearer? Are there ways it can be improved?
We are aware of the rules ambiguity that arises when a scenario uses CP scaling, but then mentions number of players. (Such as "they need successes equaling half the number of players" or "they start with a number of points equal to the number of players."
This has not been addressed in the latest revision because we have not yet gotten clarification from leadership on what the correct answer is.
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Venture-Lieutenant, Netherlands—Leiden
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We plan to address dead and broken links as next weeks project.
Ws would like people's feedback on the challenge point rewrite of the guide. Does it make things clearer? Are there ways it can be improved?
We are aware of the rules ambiguity that arises when a scenario uses CP scaling, but then mentions number of players. (Such as "they need successes equaling half the number of players" or "they start with a number of points equal to the number of players."
This has not been addressed in the latest revision because we have not yet gotten clarification from leadership on what the correct answer is.
I think the challenge point rewrite is a good step. As in, this will prevent a lot of unpleasant situations where a large low tier party is thrown into the mouth of high tier monsters :P
That's a majorly important improvement. It had gotten to the point where we were tailoring character selection and even "should we also invite Bob" to "how do we stay in subtier?" - which is of course completely backwards. The subtier should provide the right challenge for a given group, you shouldn't be trying to optimize the group to stay in the survivable subtier.
But the current change does have a side effect: skill challenges can become a bit easy for large low-tier groups.
For example, I'm currently signed up for a table with levels 1,1,1,1,2,3, which gives us 15 CP. The scenario has CP-based scaling for the encounters. So going by section 3, "Determine the Scaling Adjustment", we ignore the table because the scenario doesn't have number of players based scaling. So the adventure doesn't gain a level bump, but the encounters will have extra enemies. But the skill challenges remain as they are, and therefore will be a bit on the easy side.
This won't be a problem if skill challenges are relative to the number of players ("successes equal to half the number of players, rounded up/down"), but it would matter if it's just a case of "for every success, get something nice", because this 1,1,1,1,2,3 party would effectively be doing the same challenge as a 1,1,1,1 party, but with an additional level 2 and 3 character.
Overall I still think the current shift is an improvement, because having better balanced combats is more important than whether skill challenges are hard enough. But it's something to watch.
(Unless I made an error in my reading of the new text?)
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The guidance on treasure bundles is starting to lead to a bit of table variance, specifically the word "acquired".
For instance, in a scenario where you might encounter a treasure bundle on a corpse, but you don't loot the corpse, because A) you're in a tavern, and B) the corpse is of a local sheriff type. The players saw the valuable treasure, there wasn't a check to know they're valuable, and they honored the dead and don't take them. Later when the corpse and the boots were ruled "destroyed" by events in the scenario leading the GM to say it's destroyed, while two other regular GMs playing vehemently disagreed on the ruling to no avail.
Should players simply assume they must take anything of value not nailed down, or is the guide meant to state that if you encounter the treasure, make whatever skillcheck to find it and it should appear on the chronicle sheet?
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Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha
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The guidance on treasure bundles is starting to lead to a bit of table variance, specifically the word "acquired".
For instance, in a scenario where you might encounter a treasure bundle on a corpse, but you don't loot the corpse, because A) you're in a tavern, and B) the corpse is of a local sheriff type. The players saw the valuable treasure, there wasn't a check to know they're valuable, and they honored the dead and don't take them. Later when the corpse and the boots were ruled "destroyed" by events in the scenario leading the GM to say it's destroyed, while two other regular GMs playing vehemently disagreed on the ruling to no avail.
Should players simply assume they must take anything of value not nailed down, or is the guide meant to state that if you encounter the treasure, make whatever skill check to find it and it should appear on the chronicle sheet?
In 1e, GMs were encouraged to give rewards if the party was creative. I don't see why that principle can't be applied here. However, it is still the GM's call at the end so, in your exampl,e, I can't fault the GM's decision.