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I'll offer more specific feedback: the problem is that you've not only tabbed out the information into sections, but also the navigation. The very first thing I'd *like* to see when I land on this page is a table of contents that minimally has the combined headers on each of the individual tabs, and ideally at least has the side navigation you've got on the individual tabs (e.g. the Player Basics contents on the right on this page is the minimum navigation I'd hope for on the front page of the guide).
Click "No tabs" and you will get the version that looks more like a table of contents.
In addition, I'd probably suggest creating a bunch of "quick reference" links to go side by side with the master table of contents that direct people to commonly accessed pages which might otherwise be buried under sub-headings. (e.g. a quick reference to faction consumables). You can probably guess what'd be useful better than we could based on any saved searches or web traffic logging you've got on your end).
That is actually a very constructive suggestion. I will think about it.
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Jared, I think we all appreciate the hard work that you have put in to keeping the Guide available for all of us, just as we appreciate Dough Hahn's fan-made version. I think that many people (including myself) are hoping to someday have an official PDF version that has been put out by Paizo, but for now... I want to thank you for everything you have done to help us have a guide in the first place.
I would not mind having a section named 'boons' instead of one called Player Rewards, but I eventually found the boons under Player Rewards.
We are working on having an auto updating PDF.
We *had hoped* to put out a manual version. But even though I had people working *just* on that, every time they got close, the guide got an update. They have been trying to get current for 6 months. It hasn't happened, and having them working on that has made them unavailable to do other work.
Anyone who would like to is, of course, welcome to compile their own PDF of the information in the guide. Several have been produced.
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You are asking for it all in a single document, correct?Same basic answer as my last post.
Also what would meet your definition for "functional search engine?"Anything better than THIS (which is the same problem I brought up a while back).
A functional search engine should show you relevant results. None of those three results have anything to do with Vigilant Seal. What search engine returns results with names like that? People who are going to be searching this document are comparing it to the search function of Paizo.com or Archivesofnethys.
It's in people's nature to compare what's available and comment on what's best, worst and needs improvement. Of those three search engines, this one needs the most improvement.
You forgot to make the image public.
"None of those three results have anything to do with Vigilant Seal."
Assuming the search is what I think it is:
pfs2guide._.Retired Rewards (Relevance: 0.007)
Lists the old faction boons, including the ones from Vigilant Seal
pfs2guide._.Factions and Reputation (Relevance: 0.003)
Lists the current Faction Boons, including the ones from Vigilant Seal.
pfs2guide._.The World of Golarion (Relevance: 0.002)
Contains a capsule description of the factions, with a link to their full description, which can be found on Paizo.com (Vigilant Seal's page is here)
If you are asking why the search engine for the Organized Play Foundation web site does not show you the Vigilant Seal page on Paizo's web site, the answer is that I have no where even remotely close to the amount of time required to build a multi site search engine, let alone curate its contents...
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Some Notes on Terminology:
Old Site: The word press implementation of the guide which had serious limitations, including the lack of any ability to have a unified search solution. It also could only be edited by a certain very small number of people, such that every time the Guide team wanted to work collaboratively on any document it first had to be copied to a shared editing solution, then get copied back, and hope that nothing broke in the process. (Which it always, always did. Also, all section links had to be manually added *and* maintained.)
Current Site: The current wiki style implementation that allows us to have a unified search, and allows the team to work collaboratively on the guide with everyone able to suggest changes which can then be rolled out with the push of a button. It also allows us to have page histories and changelogs auto generated, instead of having to constantly compile the changelog by hand.
New Site: This is not a thing that exists or is planned to exist.
Table of Contents: The list of chapters in the document. For example, this is the table of contents for the PFS1 Season 9 guide:
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: Overview of Organized Play . . . . .3
Chapter 2: Player Basics . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Chapter 3: GM Basics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Chapter 4: Roleplaying Guild Basics . . . . . .19
Appendix 1: Character creation . . . . . . . . 25
Appendix 2: Factions . . . . . . . . . 28
Appendix 3: The World of the Pathfinder
Society . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34
Appendix 4: After the Adventure . . . . . . . .36
Appendix 5: Character Revision . . . . . . . . 38
Appendix 6: Player Rewards . . . . . . . . . . 40
Appendix 7: Volunteer coordinators . . . . . . 41
Appendix 8: Roleplaying Guild Glossary . . . 42
Reference Sheets . . . . . . . . . . 46
Bookmarks Bar: The expandable / collapsible / clickable navigation index that runs down the left side of a PDF product, which contains a list of headers. This is a feature that has only ever appeared in the Paizo PDF versions of documents, never in any print document or (to my knowledge) web document produced by Paizo.
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I shared the link no differently than I usually do, and it still says "Anyone on the internet with this link can view" when I go into it.
HERE is the same image re-uploaded.
But long story short, when I performed that search, ideally at the top of the list would be "Vigilant Seal", and maybe a sentence preview of what that is.
That seems like a basic feature of any search engine, to me.
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Worked that time.
That would be ideal, but that also requires a *very* advanced search engine, which usually costs money.
Alternately, in order to implement what you are describing, there would need to be a separate page for *every* *single* section, subsection, and topic.
That would be a lot of work to maintain, and would almost certainly cause a *huge* amount of drift.
Compare to what the Archive of Nethys turns up for "Desna"
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I mean, the current Guide already has a huge amount of drift, IMO.
Is it possible to collaborate with Archives to maintain the Guide?
I just tried searching for "School" this time, and nothing relevant comes up, either. It also returns only 4 results, despite telling me it's found 7:
Found "school" in 7 "pages"
Volunteer Coordinator (Relevance: 0.843)
Volunteers, collectively known as Venture-Officers, receive ranks based on their duties and geographical areas of responsibility. The top level of volunteers, Regional Venture-Coordinators, looks after geographical areas. Under them are Venpfs2guide._.Table Variation and Creative Solutions (Relevance: 0.843)
TABLE VARIATION AND CREATIVE SOLUTIONS While the goal of the Pathfinder Society is to provide an even, balanced experience that is fair to all players, every table is different, every character is different, and each GM has their ownpfs2guide._.Retired Rewards (Relevance: 0.843)
The following rewards are no longer available, but are preserved here for characters who earned them prior to their expiration. Playtest Points Playtest Points (playtest adventures): During the playtest period for the Pathfinder Second Edpfs2guide._.Glossary (Relevance: 0.843)
Pathfinder Society (Second Edition) Glossary In addition to the terms and abbreviations used in Pathfinder, Pathfinder Society uses the following. Access: Achievement Points (ACP): adventure: The term “adventure” collectiv
(I could understand if the search engine couldn't handle advanced, multi-term queries, but things like Factions and Schools I feel are basic items that new players would be searching for)
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The School issue is a bit of a spoiler, and has to do with the fact that the Season 3 guide is already in place on the site, even though the public version is still showing the Season 2 guide.
The extra pages are ones that you can't see because they haven't been "published" to the public site yet. (The top page in that search however *is* (or rather will be) the correct page once it is published.)
Archives is already at full capacity keeping Archives maintained. Possibly past capacity if you have tried looking up starfinder content lately.
Venture-Agent, Colorado—Denver
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I am _still_ directed to the "Page Not Found" page everytime I click on my shortcut.
When I do get to the Guide, every time I click on a page I now get an "error detecting JavaScript on this page. Would you like to continue?" notification.
Really, really frustrating.
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I have updated my Read The Docs version of the guide to try and capture the 3.0 version of the official document.
I made notes as to anything that I intentionally left out (for example, not putting all tables through level 20 as I see little point in doing that right now, and not putting convenience calculations for day jobs as AoN has a calculator).
Let me know if anything is missing or wrong... or feel free to make a pull request!
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I personally prefer the table in a reference document, even if I would use the calculator.
1. It gives a "lay of the land" to those who are planning things like "what should my alchemist craft next level" as well as "when would master in Earn Income matter".
2. The AoN calculator doesn't include PFS-specific information such as Task Level being set to Character Level minus two for most characters, and all the options to alter that. So PFS players will end up going back and forth between the calculator and the document anyway.
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Sure, I'll add it this week.
An issue I have (and this is feedback on the actual guide) is that the table itself seems confusing. It has task level and PC level in the same column when in reality they are not the same thing at all.
There are several variances that affect earn income task levels and such as one-time boons, faction boons, crafting prep time, field commission (roll twice and talk half the second), etc.
I do wonder what the best way is to present the data, but that's above my pay grade.
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Sorry. That was a result of converting a former table. The word "Task" was supposed to be removed entirely from it.
The table represents a simplified set of downtime rules, as requested by players who felt using the full downtime rules were too complicated and took away from their fun.
Players using the simplified "default" rules do not benefit form *any* bonuses, boons, or feats.
Players wishing to use the full rules, and benefit from bonuses, boons, and feats can still do so, using the rules under "Additional Options."
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Totally! But that doesn't mean it cannot be a consideration for the community and for the Guide. Especially if there is an objective need from a significant portion of the player base that says "this isn't fun."
For example, consider adding more language in the Guide to clarify that this complexity is an option and is not needed in order to have an optimized character.
Further, language that recommends players actually learn and understand these optional and complex systems would be helpful. I have seen many situations where the player rolls a d20 and expects the GM to do all the calculations for them. Instead, perhaps those players who want to leverage these optional systems should put effort into understanding them.
I would LOVE to see something to that effect in the guide.
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I think complexity is great when it's layered in so that new players get something very basic and experienced players can tinker to their heart's content.
Gating boons behind AcP, for instance is a good example. Nobody gets the "Task Level = Character Level" HH boon unless they've played multiple times. No new player can get that layer of complexity.
The rule that Task Level = Character Level minus two, floored at Task Level 0 is the opposite. Level 1 characters essentially have a different rule than everyone else. And it works in favor of the Level 1 character but it's not immediately obvious.
It's easier for new players if the rule just excluded Level 1 characters from Downtime. Brand it as "Level 1 characters can have total rebuilds in return for giving up their downtime". I realize that's a policy decision and not a Guide decision but the principle for is the same: start easy, add optional complexity.
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The rule that Task Level = Character Level minus two, floored at Task Level 0 is the opposite. Level 1 characters essentially have a different rule than everyone else. And it works in favor of the Level 1 character but it's not immediately obvious.
It's easier for new players if the rule just excluded Level 1 characters from Downtime. Brand it as "Level 1 characters can have total rebuilds in return for giving up their downtime". I realize that's a policy decision and not a Guide decision but the principle for is the same: start easy, add optional complexity.
Watery Soup. Please look at the new player basics down time section. All mention of task levels is removed. See if you think it solves the problem for new players.
Removing dayjobs for first levels would involve a game rules change. Which PFS avoids wherever possible.
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Just to let you all know: we are currently experiencing an unplanned, extended outage of organizedplayfoundation.org, which is the website for the Organized Play Foundation. It also hosts the Pathfinder Society Second Edition and Starfinder Society guides. We are actively communicating with the hosting service, who are working on restoring access. Unfortunately, we do not have an ETA on when the website will be available again. As part of restoring access, we have taken steps that may cause the guides to remain unavailable until Monday morning. We will provide more information as we receive it. We apologize for the disruption, and thank you for your patience!
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My mirror of the 2e guide is still up if anyone needs it In the meantime or it's further delayed. Good luck!
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The lists of preadventure society consumables have been moved to the "Additional Character Options" does this mean that:
If a player has not declared their character to be a member of a school, or a Field Commissioned agent, at the beginning of the adventure do they still receive consumables? Specifically do they receive consumables as if they had declared themself to be a "Generalist"? Are the iconic pregenerated characters considered to be "Generalists", or do they not receive any consumables?
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If you don't opt in to the additional character options, you use the table in the
Player Basic's page.
Heads up - the link on the first post here leads to a broken site. Since this is the pinned post in this forum and the first post says “here’s the link to organized play”, you should consider editing the post and updating the link for noobs like me.
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The Sticky first post is by Alex Spiedel. That was intended to allow him to update it as needed. But I probably need to remind him to update those links. (ETAS: It looks like one of those is being proxied, but the proxy itself is not *quite* right. I should be able to put a fix in on the OPF site to make those links take you to the correct pages, at least as a temp patch until I can get Alex's post fixed.)
In the mean time the correct links are:
Season 4 Guide is now up on the site.
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Could not find it in the thread. Magical crafting as a feat is allowed, per Archives of Nethys, and you get four magical crafting formulas free. How does this work for Society? Are they only items you can use? Can you sell the items? I don’t see any rules about that in the Guide. Unless I’m missing it, I used the search feature and all it references is the base crafting rules.
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Could not find it in the thread. Magical crafting as a feat is allowed, per Archives of Nethys, and you get four magical crafting formulas free. How does this work for Society? Are they only items you can use? Can you sell the items? I don’t see any rules about that in the Guide. Unless I’m missing it, I used the search feature and all it references is the base crafting rules.
You could sell them... but there's no money to be made that way.
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Could not find it in the thread. Magical crafting as a feat is allowed, per Archives of Nethys, and you get four magical crafting formulas free. How does this work for Society? Are they only items you can use? Can you sell the items? I don’t see any rules about that in the Guide. Unless I’m missing it, I used the search feature and all it references is the base crafting rules.
For PFS specific rules for crafting, you want to check the "additional options" section of the guide. (Will post links when I am not on my phone. )
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Can we possibly unsticky this thread and sticky the new top level forum post for the newest version in its place?
Season 4 Pathfinder Society (Second Edition) Guide to Organized Play is currently live.
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Having trouble with access to: https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/Lorespire/pfs2guide-en/pfs2guide
Must I have a password and register with PFS first?
The link on the first post is wrong.
It should be https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/Lorespire/pfs2guide
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Greetings.
Reading through the guide I have found out that nowhere in the guide it says you can't pass/trade wealth in form of items or gold permanently between players. SFS have this line:
Group Purchases
In Starfinder Society play, you can never buy, sell, or trade items with another player, but you may allow another player to borrow an item for the duration of an adventure.
But for Pathfinder Society there is nothing in the guide says you can't do that.
This is already causes a divide between new and old players in our local community.
Can this issue be addressed, please?
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Greetings.
Reading through the guide I have found out that nowhere in the guide it says you can't pass/trade wealth in form of items or gold permanently between players. SFS have this line:
Group Purchases
In Starfinder Society play, you can never buy, sell, or trade items with another player, but you may allow another player to borrow an item for the duration of an adventure.
But for Pathfinder Society there is nothing in the guide says you can't do that.
This is already causes a divide between new and old players in our local community.
Can this issue be addressed, please?
We are currently looking at how and where to add this language. In the mean time, the same rule does apply. You can never buy, sell, or trade items with another player, but you may allow another player to borrow an item for the duration of an adventure.
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When I click on the link https://www.organizedplayfoundation.org/Lorespire/pfs2guide to access the Pathfinder Society information I get an error that "This Account has been suspended."
Is there another way to access the information? Will this error be fixed? Is it me? Am I somehow suspended from accessing the pdf?
