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The only real solution is for Paizo to actually support their products and FAQ these issues.
With no new content being published, this is a golden opportunity to resolve all these old issues with a comprehensive series of FAQ, including the RAI behind each decision.
Paizo won't do it, simply because they see no reason to support their own products. Some of these questions have been frequently asked for over a decade without being addressed. This is how much Paizo cares about their games.
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The only real solution is for Paizo to actually support their products and FAQ these issues.
With no new content being published, this is a golden opportunity to resolve all these old issues with a comprehensive series of FAQ, including the RAI behind each decision.
Paizo won't do it, simply because they see no reason to support their own products. Some of these questions have been frequently asked for over a decade without being addressed. This is how much Paizo cares about their games.
James Jacobs addressed this recently. He said the reason that many things aren't FAQ'ed or clarified is because the rules/abilities/spells are meant to be guidelines, not hard rules. They knew that House Rules are a thing, and wanted each table to have their own variation of the game, because the story is what's important, not following the rules to the letter.
Personally, I disagree with this. I'd rather have the hard rules clearly defined and RAI clarified, then I can make my own house rules easier and understand "why" I'm deviating from the hard rules.
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Personally, I disagree with this. I'd rather have the hard rules clearly defined and RAI clarified, then I can make my own house rules easier and understand "why" I'm deviating from the hard rules.
I completely agree. I would much rather know what the rule is and then decide if its a rule that I want to use or not. Then if a disagreement comes up it's very straight forward to say "I don't like that rule and therefore don't use it"
It's much more frustrating when two people interpret the same vague rule to mean wildly different things since it makes both the player and DM wonder what else is being interpreted differently.
I'm all for having cool things happen in a game. But I can't remember the last time I ever used "the rule of cool" as a DM. You can do cool things and follow the rules. If a player wants to use a spell in a non-traditional way that is only vaguely covered in the rules, I have them make a spellcraft check with a DC in my head. You passed the check? cool you're able to make it work this time. I didn't ignore the rules, I just added additional rules that allow the player to do the thing they wanted to do.
Alternatively, as a DM I try to plan out encouters to have some idea of what is "supposed" to happen and will even modify monsters by giving them non-standard abilities that allow them to do the thing I want them to be able to do. A knowledge check will give you the default monster and a higher one would let you realize these are non-standard. I've not really had complaints that my monsters don't follow the rules as a result. And if the PCs figure out some way to break the encounter I let them. I think it's cool when players twart the enemies this way. If it's not something I want the players to continue to exploit I plan future encounters in such a way as to dampen the effect of whatever they're doing instead of just outright blocking it.
That being said, certainly my groups have run across certain combinations that are wildly unbalanced and so those combinations just get banned as a house rule so that neither the players nor the DM are allowed to use them.
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Leaving it up to the table to decide is just lazy.
From the beginning, there should have been a set dogma regarding the way feats, traits, spells, and abilities are to be worded.
They should have figured out what information they would provide, what order the information would be delivered, and which verbiage would be used consistently throughout.
If anyone wanted to get published, they would have to provide their content in a manner consistent with the established dogma...
But they didn't. And they aren't going to go back and do it now. Or ever.
So, as a GM, I basically allow anything martial to work without question. And stick to the rules when it comes to magic... because I let martials have nice things and I kind of secretly resent spellcasters. Lol.
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If you are just going to play a game where rules don't matter, why do you use a game based on rules? Just sit at a table and act out the game...who needs hindrances like rules, character sheets, and dice?
Rules exist to stop things like what Mark mentioned above...GM plays it loose with the rules, and ends up snubbing certain players because of it. Maybe it was intentional on the GMs part, maybe it was accidental...hardly matters. If you follow the rules, that does not happen.
As much as I love Pathfinder, Paizo has a horrendous track record when it comes to consistency, quality control, blatant rules conflicts, and doing absolutely nothing to address the problems it causes 99% of the time. There are major rules conflicts that have been ongoing on these forums for 8+ years with no official rulings...now that they have moved on from P1, I don't expect Paizo will ever go back and clear up anything related to it.
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Oh look, a "bad wrong fun" post.
People are allowed to play the game in whichever way is most fun to them. The fun of the people who like a more structured system with clear and rigid rules is no less valid than the fun of people who prefer loose interpretation, "rule of cool", "theatre of the mind", etc.
I'm not entirely sure why other people feel the need to enforce that things should be enjoyed the way they personally enjoy them or else not at all.
So Paizo jumped on the opportunity to completely bungle PF2 in the exact same ways they messed up PF1?
Well, at least they're consistent in their bunglings.
Seriously, how hard is it to set a specific standard for the way things will be worded and structured moving forward?
It's a publishing company!
How do you survive two decades without understanding how to establish Standard Operating Procedures?!?!?!
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How do you survive two decades without understanding how to establish Standard Operating Procedures?!?!?!
The only answer is that people who care about Standard Operating Procedures as understood by you to the point of quitting buying Paizo products are a tiny minority of the customer base. And apparently neither you nor anybody in this thread has quit buying Paizo because you didn't get an answer to some rules question over the course of 6 years. You lot make a lot of noise, but then you always came back to discuss That Newest Archetype + Spell Combo, so apparently the lack of FAQ didn't dissuade you from buying new books or playing Pathfinder.
6 years of not answering your burning rules questions didn't budge Pathfinder's market share. It was 5e, which doesn't even have a forum for people to kvetch about rules and demand timely engagement from designers, that knocked PF off the pedestal. There's a lesson there.
For the record, I really quite enjoy PF1. Their lack of consistency in the way things are worded is annoying, but not crippling.
"...foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds..."
-R.W.Emerson
Oh look, a "bad wrong fun" post.
People are allowed to play the game in whichever way is most fun to them. The fun of the people who like a more structured system with clear and rigid rules is no less valid than the fun of people who prefer loose interpretation, "rule of cool", "theatre of the mind", etc.
I'm not entirely sure why other people feel the need to enforce that things should be enjoyed the way they personally enjoy them or else not at all.
There's two different worlds to PF1 though, PFS legal and Every other Private Table. PFS legal play is meant to be pretty strict to the rules, and by that I mean no house rules whatsoever. So how does PFS legal play benefit from having loose interpretations when each PFS legal GM interprets 20% of the spells/abilities/rules inconsistently with the other PFS legal GM's?
I enjoy playing PFS legal, but my favorite style to play is privately. I like house rules, and I have a metric crapton of them, like no confirming nat 20's, skill checks can critical on a nat 20 roll but don't fumble on a 1 roll, +2 abil scores at every 4th level instead of +1, all 3pp content is available and you can even create your own feats/archetypes/PrC's, no ACP, no encumbrance rules unless you're trying to load a flying saucer on a gout-stricken 3-legged donkey and travel over 3.7 miles, 10th level pick any Mythic Feat if you satisfy the prereqs, sleeping in armor doesn't cause fatigue, initiative ties are resolved by straight d20 w/ no modifiers, etc. But y'know what I can't stand? Having a debate about how a loosely defined spell/ability/feat/rule is supposed to work in the middle of my session because it's something so critical that the game can't proceed without hammering it out.
I'd like the rules to be clearly defined and any ambiguities cleared up via Errata or FAQ, because if there's a spell/ability/feat/rule that one of the PC's or myself doesn't like, then that in-game debate gets solved within 60 seconds with "I don't like this clearly defined rule because of x and y and it's also stupid mcstupid, I want to do this instead. Yes/no? All in agreement? K proceeding on. [Achievement Unlocked! New House Rule established]"
It's easy-peasy, done and done.
So Paizo jumped on the opportunity to completely bungle PF2 in the exact same ways they messed up PF1?
Well, at least they're consistent in their bunglings.
Seriously, how hard is it to set a specific standard for the way things will be worded and structured moving forward?
It's a publishing company!
How do you survive two decades without understanding how to establish Standard Operating Procedures?!?!?!
Editing technical writing is a huge pain in the butt. The only sure way to get it right every time is by following a formula, and that makes the rules hell to read through. It's hard work, maybe not sweat, grime, break your back hard, but I'd rather sling tires or hay than edit technical copy.
All that said, it probably wouldn't hurt to have a resource somewhere that described spell effects without references to the game world, and presented them primarily as a series of flags. (aoe=yes, friendly fire=yes, perceived target=no and so on) The problem there is that you'd notice too many spells with very similar flag patterns and you'd need to condense them. The upside being you could save space on spells that are more or less the same spell with one or two tweaks.
As long as the rules aren't explicit, and player in game experience isn't uniform, people will try to interpret rules in a way that fits into their games and but heads with those with different experiences. It's honestly not that big a deal.
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I think we're all missing the real, core questions here:
Do hotdogs exist in Golarion, and if they do, are they sandwiches?
Well, there's two main types of house rules, as some here have already talked about.
The first type is just modifying the existing rules.
The second type is something that is a lot more delicate and can only be done smoothly if a group of players are familiar with each other. This is when you stick to your rules, but agree to have some things decided by DM discretion and conversation with the players. This isn't a player asking for something for free: It's just a house rule that allows them to occasionally substitute RNG for descriptive narrative as the deciding factor for things. Obviously, this makes the game less stable, because you're replacing perfect uncaring dice with flawed human judgement, but the results are worth it:
My favorite part of playing RPGs is when the table temporarily transcends RAW for something cool, and you end up feeling like you improved the system/universe rather than cheated it.
It's also worth noting that Pathfinder is a harder game to house-rule than other systems. Not impossible, mind you, just a bit harder.
In systems that are less comprehensive, it's easier to house rule because there aren't as many things to grapple with: If someone does something awesome in 5e, the DM can just go "That was cool. You get a +5 on that" because literally everything else is advantage/disadvantage.
It does take a bit of trust though.
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I think we're all missing the real, core questions here:
Do hotdogs exist in Golarion, and if they do, are they sandwiches?
They do.
But they are not sandwiches... they mushed into a paste and consumed like a milkshake.
If you take a look at the PF2 forums there are some threads arguing about rules minutiae, a lot talking about optimisation, a couple talking about how wonderful the latest book is, a couple more about making interesting combat encounters...and that's it. Compare to a look over the PF1 forums any time. The game is nailed down much harder in terms of what you can do than PF1, and the result is that it's a pure combat simulator and treated as such by its fans. I think James Jacobs had it closer to right the first time when he preferred not to nail down what each spell could do, not so much with the new game.
I'm not sure what part PFS had in that change. Blaming it for everything may be too much; while it was probably some, there were calls for clarification from elsewhere.
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It's whole arguments came from 3 simple letters: P F and SL O L
The arguments on this forum are the same than in other fandom...
You mean the ones that don't have PFS? That kinda kills your assumption right there.
Or were you trying to say they weren't the same? In which case that's just flat out false, these arguments have existed in these type of games and elsewhere long before organized play.
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I think we're all missing the real, core questions here:
Do hotdogs exist in Golarion, and if they do, are they sandwiches?
They do.
But they are not sandwiches... they mushed into a paste and consumed like a milkshake.
I think I finally understand necromancy...
Hotdogs are clearly soft shell tacos.I think we're all missing the real, core questions here:
Do hotdogs exist in Golarion, and if they do, are they sandwiches?
Hotdogs are the actual taco shell, but only for fish tacos, with primitive Golarion mayonnaise and raisins as the only culturally accepted condiments. You can have this with a hotdog milkshake or a shot of blessed/holy hotdog water...
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Imagine you are watching SW8. Each time something happens that is out of preestablished canon, the film stop for 10-20 min,
Whose games are like this?
Any arguments and debates I get into on these forums are pretty much irrelevant to my actual games, and arguments over mechanics in my games don’t last long, we either abide by the GMs interpretation or a consensus among the group.
PFS introduced two things:
It did nothing of the sort, it’s neither the first nor only organized play campaign.
PF forum remind me of Star Wars fandom sometimes, the worst part... The part that tear down any work sentence per sentence and reject anything that didn't fit their vision of the canon.
You’re assuming these qualities are unique to Pathfinder and Star Wars.
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I think I know why this kind of "discussion" came to be.
Like the whole "infernal healing don't make me bad because I don't care about coherence of the universe, just about rules (except that one book because I find it stupid)", or the bladed dash thread just below...It's whole arguments came from 3 simple letters: P F and S
Having been playing since before organized play was a thing I can tell you that rules disagreements are a problem that crops up in any game.
As to infernal healing, that is an admitted house rule because infernal healing SHOULD slowly corrupt you, but it would be a PITA to track that accoss PFS bag of mixed nuts of dms.
Because of PFS, RAW become LAW.
Absolutely not.
With PFS RAW is Run. As Written. As a PFS DM I cannot add monsters to the scenario, I cannot fudge dice rolls, I cannot decide to make it more interesting by replacing the kobold with a medusa.
I am also bound by the rules of the game. I can't decide that power attack should be something anyone can do and give it out for free nor can I decide that the dragon kills you with one hit because thats what physics says would happen.
However how you determine what the rules are is left up to each individual DM. Whatever mix or RAW, RAI, sense, reason, evidence, and game balance you use to figure out the rules is on you.
Some PFS players are not here to play a social game to write an interactive story with the GM. They are here to play a game with a precise set of rules, coherence be damned! Worst: FUN and Rule of Cool be damned.
The Stormwind is strong with this one
Having a social game, writing an interactive story with the DM, and having a precise set of rules are more or less orthogonal to each other. Some do both, some do one, some do the other, some do neither.
Does allowing the Magus to strike in the air a bad thing? I think not, because it's a creative and COOL way of doing it a few times per day.
Creative and cool are very subjective.
Now, I have NO problem if you want to bladed dash up in the air. (My argument is that any direction doesn't really have any other meaning in a game with no facing otherwise) -especially since you're going to take falling damage AND an AOO if you don't kill them. But the disagreement doesn't break down to "pfs and not pfs" or "people who like fun and people want to kill fun" and its completely disingenuous to frame the question that way.
And the day the party will face an other magus that can do the same kind of tricks, they will be quite surprised!
It's also why PFS create that kind of arguments. What do you do...
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Seriously, how hard is it to set a specific standard for the way things will be worded and structured moving forward?
Honestly, it’s pretty hard. Rules are written and checked by groups of humans over long periods of time. Inconsistencies are inevitable. What actually bothers me is how reluctant Paizo is to correct these issues when they are discovered. I know it may not be “fun” for them to go back over old works. But they should stand behind their products and improve the quality as best they can. The attitude that it doesn’t matter because the GM can just make something up is lazy and bad.
I try to keep an environment of quickly make a ruling in game, but agree to hash out how it will work in the future. An ability working once and then never again in a story is already a pretty common occurrence.
It's hard to go back and reformat written texts into a new mold. Tedious and ultimately not worth the man-hours it will surely require.
That's why it should have been established in the beginning. A publishing company should have known this.
They did it with the spells, why not carry a similar formula into the way feats are written? They already agreed on a template for the way spells are written, and anyone who wants to publish a new spell has to abide by the way they present the language/description of the spell, its requirements, and its effects. How hard would it have been to do that with feats from the beginning?
Now, back to the real matter, I surely hope that the hotdogs on Golarion are closer to high quality bratwurst sausages than the mystery meat crap we call hotdogs here today. The mechanisms required to grind meat and form the links is certainly available in Golarion, and bread exists, so it's perfectly reasonable to expect hotdogs to be possible in similar form to what we know.
It is almost comical to imagine a knight in shining armor on his/her majestic steed, casually snacking on a hotdog they purchased from a vendor cart.
Now, back to the real matter, I surely hope that the hotdogs on Golarion are closer to high quality bratwurst sausages than the mystery meat crap we call hotdogs here today. The mechanisms required to grind meat and form the links is certainly available in Golarion, and bread exists, so it's perfectly reasonable to expect hotdogs to be possible in similar form to what we know.
It is almost comical to imagine a knight in shining armor on his/her majestic steed, casually snacking on a hotdog they purchased from a vendor cart.
Given that sausage casing were traditionally made from animal parts, I'm sure both kinds exist. You can probably get both the all auroch meat variety for 5cp from the local halfling butcher and you can pick up the mystery mean version for 3cp from that shady gnome alchemist. You're afraid to ask exactly what he puts in it but you're pretty sure its mostly meat.
As for if it counts as a sandwich or not the collage of the arcane art's official stance is that it only counts as a sandwich on Thursdays with no further clarification given.
It's hard to go back and reformat written texts into a new mold. Tedious and ultimately not worth the man-hours it will surely require.
Then don't do that. We have FAQs and Errata documents for a reason. Just be more responsive to them.
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My only problem with Bladed Dash is that it's better than Spring Attack, which requires a lot more resources in character creation to bring online.
I also have a problem with Greater Bladed Dash being something no martial can do ever no matter how many feats or class features they invest.
Oh look, a "bad wrong fun" post.
People are allowed to play the game in whichever way is most fun to them. The fun of the people who like a more structured system with clear and rigid rules is no less valid than the fun of people who prefer loose interpretation, "rule of cool", "theatre of the mind", etc.
I'm not entirely sure why other people feel the need to enforce that things should be enjoyed the way they personally enjoy them or else not at all.
And when you put both people at the same table, there is no fun at all.
A GM can always choose to relax the rules if that is the preferred game style. Disagreements over what the rules actually mean, however, is only fun in forum discussions.
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The implication felt there, especially with the rest of your post, such as:Also, you make me say things that I didn't.
I never said that SW and PF are unique in this regard. I just compared the two.
Nor did I said that PFS was unique/first, just that it's the medium that introduced lots of the issues.Introduced them to you specifically, maybe. But PFS was not the birth of this.
Anyway, thanks for you to prove my point on how a sentence can be totally missinterpreted to the point it got no longer the same "spirit".
It’s not misinterpretations when you’re running with assumptions, most of which aren’t true.
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How is the College of Arcane Arts the supreme authority on whether or not hotdogs are considered sandwiches?
I 100% agree with their assessment that hotdogs ARE sandwiches on Thursdays, but why is it up to them to decide?
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What actually bothers me is how reluctant Paizo is to correct these issues when they are discovered. I know it may not be “fun” for them to go back over old works.
It's not about "fun". But what is a better use for a Paizo employee's time (which is finite)- going back and "fixing" old things, or making new things?
I mean, economically Paizo doesn't make any more money if they spend weeks doing errata and FAQs, but more to the point where it doesn't really make the game better to "fix" things that a GM could easily just make it work like it's supposed to (and many are doing without knowing there even is an issue.)
A question that is only interesting to people on the forums is not really a "Frequently Asked" one.
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1) there’s no analyzing or metaphor, you brought up Pathfinder and Star Wars like they’re the only ones with negative arguing fandoms. They’re not.
2) this isn’t an answer, you’re claiming PFS is the cause of this mindset, when people have been arguing like this long before Organized Play in any system was a thing. You don’t think people had rules arguments in 1st edition DnD?
3) you’ve outright stated PFS is the cause of rules arguments (and not, ya’know, having a rules system in the first place) and something unique to Pathfinder (the arguments). That’s an assumption. You don’t have facts to back up your claims.
For the record, literally nobody wins when arguing on the internet... and more importantly, nobody cares.
We shouldn't be arguing about anything, actually.
It IS possible to debate different opinions without any arguing.
Interesting concept, I know.
I'm just as guilty as the next person... the joys of being human (a stubborn one, at that).
But it's not worth arguing about, I promise... even Paizo doesn't care that much about it.
Tacos and Fajitas are certainly NOT sandwiches!!! Just to argue...
It IS possible to debate different opinions without any arguing.
Interesting concept, I know.
Lies and Slander.
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PF forum remind me of Star Wars fandom sometimes, the worst part... The part that tear down any work sentence per sentence and reject anything that didn't fit their vision of the canon.
I pointed out that these elements are not unique to these fandoms. By itself this wouldn’t read like it’s unique to those two franchises, but the rest of your statements (as shown below) lead credence to the implication that you think Pathfinder is unique in its arguments.
“ Rules arguments in an organised play are more important than in homegames.”
If you say so.
“Never said that was unique to pathfinder”
Nor did I said that PFS was unique/first, just that it's the medium that introduced lots of the issues.
PFS introduced two things:
for the former the first part and the bolder contradict each other, and for the latter PFS did not introduce those things as you claim.
“ Look at this forum. How many times the fact that the ruling will vary from a PFS GM to an other is introduced in the arguing?”
And the ruling will vary with home GMs as well. In all games, not just Pathfinder and PFS.