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For those of you bemoaning the loss of the “good old days” when players ruled the roost and GMs had no room for trust to be placed in them, I present the following evidence:
I completely agree with the main thrust of your argument but feel compelled to point out that at the moment its WAY too early to know the long term effects of the new paradigm.
Right now PF2 is "the new shiney" and people are interested in it for that reason. That will fade.
While I hope that the net effect of the new paradigm will be positive I can't help but think that it as at least plausible that it will be negative.
Its certainly all but guaranteed that table variation will increase. Take this thread as an example. There is a considerable divergence of opinion on what should be given out on a success. It is even up to the GM whether rolls will be secret or not which will have a very significant effect on how much critical fumbles affect things (I'm firmly of the belief that human beings can NOT ignore knowledge they have regardless of how much they try).
That increased table variation has risks. Bad GMs being even worse, groups splitting into subsets of like minded individuals, etc.
I'm NOT prophesying Doom and Gloom. I'm saying we have to wait awhile to see how it all shakes out. Like just about every major change, there will be both good and bad long term effects.
Point being in my interpretation you get all the info on a ghoul on one and maybe at most two checks. If they are a common monster I would probably give out one of those pieces of information for free.
Your storytelling style I definitely agree with though, I just don’t see any justification in the rules to give out the DCs etc. in anything other than vague terms.
So the party is not interested that ghouls have darkvision and the stealth of a professional sneak thief, so they could easily ambush the party in a darkened tomb? Or that they can heal by consuming flesh? Or their Swift Leap? Or that those paralyzing bite and claw attacks have have a professional fighter's chance of hitting? Or that hiding in the abandoned house might not work because they can burrow into the basement?
Almost all monsters are common, so how much information should the GM be giving out for free? I would introduce the ghoul as, "The creature eating the dead body looks like an emanciated undead human with big sharp teeth. You remember undead traits, right? Negative healing, immune to death effects, disease, paralysis, poison, and unconsciousness, tend toward glowing eyes, discolored skin, clawed hands, and sharp teeth. Ghouls have a reputation for digging up corpses to eat them, so it appears to be a ghoul." That basic information does not include the paralysis nor ghoul fever, though it hints at the bite and claw attacks.
A GM not making it clear that the troll is regenerating, or that certain attacks are ineffective is doing the same thing as describing a monster as a green something unless the party makes a check. A fighter might be better off making a slashing attack to test whether a monster is affected by that weapon because their bonus to attack is better than their knowledge check. While a wizard is probably better off making the check than the attack. That feels like the system working as intended.If that devil we are facing is shrugging off our sorcerers fireballs like nothing happened or our fighters slashing weapons do not deal any damage to the monster we need to know this as the characters and players.
When the mummy guardian with weakness fire 5 is hit by the savvy PC's torch, I want to describe its bandages burning like toilet paper on fire. That is part of the fun of being a GM. Likewise, I want someone--either me or the player--describing a critical hit in gory detail. If the fighter makes a slashing attack against a skeleton with resistance slashing 5, I want to describe how the 5 damage from the blade did not cut bone but did create a tiny crack.
But that is part of the problem with Recall Knowledge. Telling the player, "Mummies burn," is not useful just after one was hit with Burning Hands and already visibly burned. It is not especially useful if the wizard always starts combat with Burning Hands, either. Nevertheless, the "best-known" wording on Creature Identification implies that "Mummies are wrapped in flammable bandages," is among the first things I should tell the player on an identification roll. Sometimes an attribute is best known because it is obvious.
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For those of you bemoaning the loss of the “good old days” when players ruled the roost and GMs had no room for trust to be placed in them, I present the following evidence:
In my area, and in most other areas I have heard of through other VOs, we were facing a downward spiral in the number of people willing to step forward to GM. One of the main reasons sited was the complexity of the rules and the antagonistic relationship put forth by optimizer players that seemed to be demanded of the GM.
I was willing to GM because I have been doing it for 35 years and I had a decent amount of rules mastery. Our tables were frequently full of players, none of whom was willing to GM even if it meant the table was cancelled. A few burnt out GMs would throw themselves on the grenade and run more tables than they preferred to do, but it was clearly breaking apart at the seams.
With 2nd edition I have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to new people being willing to take up the challenge of GMing.
I have ZERO problem with a tiny modicum of trust being placed back in the hands of the GM.
Hyperbole much ?
There is already a lot of basic trust in the GM's hands in PF1. As well as a nice amount of power, even in PFS.
PF2 puts quite a bit more power in the hands of the GM. For those who appreciated that in 3.X/PF1 players were less at a GM's mercy and had more agency on what happened to their PC, it looks a little like a few steps backward and being cautious rather than enthusiastic feels reasonable to me.
Interpreting this as entitled player vs poor burnt-out GM is not conducive to a serene and balanced debate on the subject IMO.
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When you have had the job of convincing people to GM across a big region for many years you can come back and say it was hyperbole. I read it again and I stand by it as an accurate account of things in my area.
I can see why what I said would be viewed as an us vs them statement. I don’t personally feel that way and have enjoyed running for all my players but newer GMs don’t feel the same way.
The short version is it is a small adjustment in my opinion but any adjustment that encourages people to step up and GM is more important for the game than a small sacrifice of perceived agency on the part of the players.
I would be opposed to it if they had gone too far. I am also a player that likes to know the common rules. Doesn’t feel to me like they have done that.
"You see a medium sized mammalian quadruped."
In PF1, I would, before the players act, first give them the information from the Bestiary about the creature's appearance. E.g.:
Spittle drips from this feral bear’s roaring maw, and its matted fur is broken in places by wicked, bony growths.I might alternatively show them the illustration. Or give them both.
It would be nice if the rules told GMs to do this, but it shouldn't be necessary...
Who are these monumentally moronic GMs that don't give info to their players after a successful roll? What is the point? Just tell them what they want to know. That's what I get from the CRB, "useful" information for the player of course. And who decides what is useful for a player, well that same player xD
Who are these monumentally moronic GMs that don't give info to their players after a successful roll? What is the point? Just tell them what they want to know. That's what I get from the CRB, "useful" information for the player of course. And who decides what is useful for a player, well that same player xD
The Skills chapter in the PF2 Core Rulebook says on page 239 to give useful information, "Success You recall the knowledge accurately or gain a useful clue about your current situation." On the other hand, the Game Mastering chapter says on page 506 to give best-known information, "A character who successfully identifies a creature learns one of its best-known attributes—such as a troll’s regeneration (and the fact that it can be stopped by acid or fire) or a manticore’s tail spikes." Best-known is not the same as useful.
For example, imagine the party is attacked by an ankhrav, a giant insect. Its best-known trait is that it hides underground and uses tremorsense to pop out and ambush travelers. That is useful information if they spot an ankhrav burrow from a distance. However, if the party is already in combat with the ankhrave, that information is not particularly useful. More useful would be its acid spray, a 30-foot cone dealing 3d6 acid damage and 1d6 persistent acid damage.
Furthermore, each answer counts as one full piece of information. To learn about the ankhrav's burrowing, its acid spray, its armor-rending bite, and its ranged acid spit (the melee mandible attack is obvious due to its visible mandibles) would require four successful Recall Knowledge Nature checks. If a lone Nature-trained character, such as a Druid, performs Recall Knowledge and two spellcasting actions each turn, the ankhrav will be dead before the druid learns all its attacks and defenses. And if the GM choses a bad order to reveal the information, then the party might get the less useful information first.