Tiered Loot - Am I missing something in the guide or did this change?

[Tim Schneider 908]

So... I started wondering how loot per tier on the chronicle sheet works in 2E and I found myself reaching a strange conclusion... there doesn't seem to be anything?

I had assumed you'd cross off the tier you didn't play, but the advice in the guide seems to only say:

Quote:

GM Instructions: Cross off any items that the players did not earn during the scenario. Unless the GM Resources section says otherwise, players only lose access to an item if they did not earn the treasure bundle that corresponds to that item.

Which suggests if they get the treasure bundle you leave it... possibly irrespective of tier. Which given the new logic around tiers & just doing gold by level may be intentional. The new restriction that you can only buy them at level+2 reduces the impact as they can't buy it anyway...

So... should you cross out the tier that wasn't played on a chronicle in 2E? Is there something in the guide to say this, or was it omitted by mistake, or is this just me coming in with a 1E mindset and thinking it should be a rule?

[albadeon]

I tend to think of these adventures as two seperate scenatios, one for the low tier and one for the high tier. They come with different DCs, different enemy numbers and sometimes types, etc. They share most or even all story elements, but are two distinct things, just printed together to save space.

Similarly, the chronicles are actually two different chronicles put together onto one sheet.

If the players completed the low-tier adventure, they get the low-tier chronicle (with the high-tier parts crossd out as they haven't played the high-tier adventure, obviously). Similarly, if they completed the high-tier adventure they receive the high-tier chronicle (with the low-tier parts crossed out, as they haven't actually finished the low-tier one). I've seen a number of GMs who do not cross out the low-tier parts on completion of the high-tier adventure, and in many cases that doesn't make a whole lot of difference. But I've never seen anyone award the high-tier rewards after finishing the low-tier version of the scenario.

[Tim Schneider 908]

I am experienced with how it works in 1E, and I'm 100% sure it's what most would assume in 2E, but in 1E the guide actually said to do it & in 2E it doesn't appear to (unless I missed it?).

It's probably still be right even if the guide doesn't say it, and it's what I'm doing currently, but it can be easy to assume an old rule still exists when it was intentionally left out since the rules can't explicitly list all the things that aren't true.

PS: Separate scenario very much has problems if it was a literal statement of rules. I'm quite sure that's not a valid guiding principle for interpreting the guide (e.g replays, multiple chronicles)

[Mercurywolf]

Well, along those lines, a lot of the scenarios in 2E do call out when an item in the Treasure Bundles are only in the higher Subtier.

As such, per the Guide, as the treasure doesn't exist in Low Tier, you would cross off the item on the Chronicle Sheet because the players did not earn the Treasure Bundle Corresponding to that item i.e. the high tier version of the Treasure Bundle.

That's how I interpreted it.

[Blake's Tiger]

I can confirm that scenarios with different rewards for the different tiers state in the text which items are present as treasure.

So, for example, if the cold iron buckler is what is present for the tier you're running and the sturdy buckler is not, you cross off the sturdy buckler and vice versa.

[Tim Schneider 908]

Yep - but guide also says only remove if they don't get the associated treasure bundle (quoted at top - only text I could find in guide about it), not just for not getting the item. So you got the treasure bundle associated to the shields even if you didn't get the shield...

I suspect you're still right. This language is probably trying to say don't punish creative solutions more so than get high tier options, but given they changed gold to not care about tier and they added the level restriction to buy off chronicles it may be intentional that loot by tier isn't restricted?

Interesting interpretation to say its only associated to the bundle in high tier - that I could see as a reasonable way to interpret to get the logical outcome. I think it could probably use clearer language if that's the intent, as I think the only way you get there is already knowing what you think should happen... but I guess that's way down the list. Guess I'll just keep doing it that way and hope not to discover later that it's a 1E-ism.

[Smoog of Sarenrae]

In Scenario 1-05 "Trailblazer's Bounty" in the "GM Resources: Chronicle Sheet" section at the end of the scenario is the following text:

"PCs who do not [REDACTED] do not gain the [REDACTED ITEM] ([OTHER REDACTED ITEM] in Subtier 3-4) for completing this scenario."

The 2 Redacted Items in that text are the respective items printed in the low and high sub-tiers of the actual chronicle.

This is a specific case, where the items are gained based on certain actions and not based on Treasure Bundles, but the intent to me is clear that PC's who played the lower sub-tier do not get access to both items on their chronicle. It also appears fairly clear here that PC's who played the higher sub-tier do not get access to the item in the lower sub-tier.