PFS2: High subtier awards only high subtier rewards, or both?


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1 person marked this as FAQ candidate.
Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Does completing the high subtier of a PFS2 adventure award only the high-subtier rewards, or both low and high subtier? Personally, I've been leaning towards rewarding only that individual subtier, but I've been unable to find an official statement regarding that.

I've had GMs handle it both ways, some strike out the low subtier rewards, others don't. In the cases so far it doesn't make a significant difference since many of the early chronicles just had common low-level rewards from the CRB. Worst case, access would be delayed a level or two.

But recently, that changed: e.g., a recent quest gave access to a limited quantity of a completely new, uncommon alchemical item. Low tier awarded the lesser version (limit 5) while high tier award the moderate version (limit 5). So, if both subtier rewards were granted, I could potentially buy 5 each.

A few somewhat related questions:

- The items are listed on the chronicle with a purchase price significantly lower that the value of the item listed on the same sheet (even though they are not marked "reduced price" as in previous chronicles). So much lower, in fact, that purchsing the moderate version at the listed purchasing price, and re-selling them for half their listed value would still net a (small) profit. Not that the amount is all that relevant, but is this intentional?

- Does obtaining access to purchasing a limited amount of such an item also enable you to attempt to reverse engineer it to attempt to learn its formula? I.e. does this also grant you access to have the formula in your book (even if you cannot purchase the formula itself)? I'd assume so, and also assume that the limit should obviously not apply to items you then crafted yourself.

- I addition, is said access required to have the formula in your book? Or can I copy the formula from another player that is willing to share his formula book, when I myself do not have access to the item via a chronicle. I'd say no, the formula of an uncommon item would/should(?) generally be uncommon as well, and as such, you'd need access to it to use ("access" in this case meaning permission to use rules-wise, not physical access). N.b., technically, the CRB does not seem to allow actually sharing formulas with fellow crafters/alchemists, the only two ways of obtaining a formula are purchase or pay an NPC to share it. However, I'd be surprised if that difference to wizard spell books was intentional.

Liberty's Edge 3/5 5/5 **** Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha

So you asked this question again? Should this be merged with your other thread?

In any case, I am playing this post as duplicative.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Gary Bush wrote:

When you gain a chronicle you gain all tiers that you earned. So if you earned the high tier rewards, you also gain the low tier rewards as well unless it is for the SAME EXACT item.

As a FYI, this has been asked recently.

I'm quoting you from the other thread, because I think this is the relevant answer to one of the questions in this thread, while on the other thread is was trying to raise a somewhat different issue. I apparently didn't make that clear enough so have tried to clarify the distinction there.

Still, if you could point me to the correct thread where that has been discussed recently, I'd appreciate that.

Sczarni 5/5 5/55/5 ***

I am also flagging this post as a duplicate.

THIS post from Michael Sayre implies you only earn the rewards for your Subtier.

The creator of that thread also asked the questions being posed in this thread.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

THAT post's implication is quite tenuous at best, imho. I'd much prefer a straight answer. Also, judging from Gary's answer in the other thread, he somehow came to the opposite conclusion.

However, that was only one of several questions I posted, the others aren't even touched upon anywhere in that thread, so I see no reason to consider this thread duplicate.

Liberty's Edge 3/5 5/5 **** Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha

I agree, the answer provided by Mark in the the thread linked by Nefreet does not really cover the question being asked by albadeon.

Sczarni 5/5 5/55/5 ***

The link I posted wrote:
The main reason both versions would be on a Chronicle sheet is to signpost what you actually received from the adventure.

The items listed in the Lower Subtier aren't found in the Higher Subtier, and vice versa.


Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber; Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

Except that is not always the case.

1-04 has one uncommon item listed as a low-tier reward, but not as a high-tier reward even though said item is present and possibly obtained in both subtiers.

1-07 also has the heroes find a high-tier reward item in addition to a low-tier reward item.

Quest 5 specifically mentions that the vendor where the high-tier heroes can purchase the high-tier reward item also has the low-tier reward item available for purchase.

1-06 has chronivle rewards that do not align with the ones actually received in the adventure at all (and that was likely the chronicle Michael was referring to in his post).

Liberty's Edge 3/5 5/5 **** Venture-Captain, Nebraska—Omaha

Nefreet wrote:
The link I posted wrote:
The main reason both versions would be on a Chronicle sheet is to signpost what you actually received from the adventure.
The items listed in the Lower Subtier aren't found in the Higher Subtier, and vice versa.

But it makes very little sense to say that my character now has access to a +1 striking [[REDACTED]] but I don't have access to a +1 [[REDACTED]] or even a normal [[REDACTED]].

A lot of people, me included, are using the assumption that low tier is available to high tier, just like in 1e. If that is not the case with 2e, leadership needs to say something definitive.

Which it has not. Mark? Tonya?

edit: Some additional information.

PFS2e Guide, Filling out a Chronicle Sheet, section J: Items wrote:
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.

Treasure bundles say what items are found in them. And sometimes a different item (or additional item) is listed. I read the above to say that the treasure bundle was found so both the low tier and high tier items are considered found for characters playing in high tier.

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