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The title says it all to be honest. When I first got involved in Pathfinder organized play I loved the vanity system. The titles, the job roles, the properties owned, and assorted little kitschy bits that made a character feel more "alive".
I miss that I used to eventually earn my way up to being a Knight-Captain. The AcP system feels like it would actually be *very* productive for this kind of flair and bauble option as well.
So....maaaaaybe? :D
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There are Vanity Boons in Starfinder Society.
My Mechanic has a Motorcycle Garage, my Xenodruid has an Herb Shop, and my Wayfinders PC has a pet sharktopus.
I've been expecting them for this Campaign, too. Maybe they just haven't gotten around to developing any, yet.
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Is there anything stopping you from claiming those benefits now? I have a paladin with a knightly title because I wrote it in his background. I've never had a GM deny him the "Sir" moniker. Sometimes, having formal rules for something can be restrictive. If we started to see official AcP/boon vanities, GMs might be inclined to dismiss my narrative background if I didn't buy the right boon. And those boons usually have specific aspects. If it said you have to be an Eagle Knight in order to officially gain the title, it would not fit my narrative (hes a knight of Lastwall). The vanities were nice to give ideas for role-play outside of the scenarios, but many of them were a bit too restrictive. YMMV
Venture-Lieutenant, Finland—Turku
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Is there anything stopping you from claiming those benefits now? I have a paladin with a knightly title because I wrote it in his background. I've never had a GM deny him the "Sir" moniker. Sometimes, having formal rules for something can be restrictive. If we started to see official AcP/boon vanities, GMs might be inclined to dismiss my narrative background if I didn't buy the right boon. And those boons usually have specific aspects. If it said you have to be an Eagle Knight in order to officially gain the title, it would not fit my narrative (hes a knight of Lastwall). The vanities were nice to give ideas for role-play outside of the scenarios, but many of them were a bit too restrictive. YMMV
Depends on the situation and the title being claimed. Your character is a knight and others address him as a "Sir"? Sure, there's unlikely very little mechanical benefit to this, go ahead.
Your character is in a scenario where the group needs to have a noble/knight to back them up so that they can get an audience with the king? Nope, your title won't give you the audience. If you roleplay it well? Sure, I might throw you a +1 or +2 circumstance bonus for the good RP, but that's the same one might get from convincingly lying that they are a knight even if the character isn't, so no (special) mechanical benefit for you.You claim to be a king instead? Yeah, most of the characters will be assuming that you're lying or just out of your mind, and either ignore your claim or ridicule you for your claim.
It's kinda the same as if you claim to be a powerful mage who can decimate whole armies on a whim. Sure, that may be your back story, but when the initiative gets rolled, your mechanics better back up that claim.
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Is there anything stopping you from claiming those benefits now? I have a paladin with a knightly title because I wrote it in his background. I've never had a GM deny him the "Sir" moniker. Sometimes, having formal rules for something can be restrictive. If we started to see official AcP/boon vanities, GMs might be inclined to dismiss my narrative background if I didn't buy the right boon. And those boons usually have specific aspects. If it said you have to be an Eagle Knight in order to officially gain the title, it would not fit my narrative (hes a knight of Lastwall). The vanities were nice to give ideas for role-play outside of the scenarios, but many of them were a bit too restrictive. YMMV
Isn't this more or less what secondary initiation is for? Possibly with a side order of a archetype?
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The dividing line between official boon and creative writing has always been predictable mechanical benefit, in my mind.
If someone wants their character to have purple skin, that's creative writing. If, sometime in the future, there's a scenario set on the Plane of Purple and that characters gets a few lulz and circumstance bonuses to Stealth, that's all fun and games.
If the character is trying to argue in every scenario that purple is dark and they should get a permanent Stealth bonus wherever it's slightly dark, that's where the predictability of the bonus comes in and should require a boon so it doesn't unbalance the party/game.
Contributor
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I don't know if we need the Vanities that allowed you to use another skill other than lore, as everyone gets a lore. We all can claim now to have businesses back home to go back to if we want. But I loved the sailing ship option because sometimes you could take the entire group on your sailing ship.
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If something has a mechanical benefit, isn't it a boon rather than a vanity?
I mean, yeah, boons have their place and all, but I assumed we were talking about pieces of paper we could wave in the GM's face to prove they had to address us as Archduke Humuhumu Nukunuku, Lord Regent of Apua'a and Protector of the Seven Seas.
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Aqueous Stock has a point. Spending prestige for mechanical benefits like owning a clinic giving you +1 to heal and access to modified day job checks was fine because prestige was a character resource. (Also an errant +1 was less of a big deal)
Now it's a meta resource and spending it for direct mechanical benefits is problematic. (Access is less of a problem because you still need to spend the appropriate character resources on the whatever)
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So vanities did several things in the past: let people engage in the day job system without investing skill points in craft/profession/perform.
Less of an issue in pf2 since everybody has lore. Happy to not see these come back as vanities but they do make some sense as potential skill feats.
Note that T least 1 AP gives internal access to different day job options as rewards for social advancement. It feels really good in context.
The faction specific ones are already covered by the 0AcP boons that require levels with the factions. Because of the new factions not being grounded in Inner Sea nations they feel a little more ephemeral but do cover some alternate downtime tasks.
On a hilarious note the pf1 faction vanaties all had mechanical bonuses, except the Taldan Nobility ones, they just gave more impressive titles.
The home ownership ones were pretty cool. You had a house in a fancy city, or maybe even a private island. While they had almost no direct mechanical benefit they occasionally came up in a way that made sense.
(In one PF1 special set in Absalom you are asked not to stay at the Grand Lodge. If somebody happens to own property, problem solved)
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Blazej made an interesting argument against vanities stating that he doesn't want PCs to have their backstory options gated behind ACP. He likes to just be able to declare that his characters had either a title or a shop somewhere for no mechanical advantage rather than have story options gated behind Prestige Points (PF1) or ACP (PF2). If title vanities exist, calling yourself Baroness Bobbi becomes problematic if you haven't actually bought the vanity.
If vanities cost ACP, players are probably going to want some sort of mechanical benefit from it because they spent a resource that could have netted them a race boon. So if we allow vanities, we probably would want to add some sort of mechanical benefit. The question is... what should it be?
Titles
Right now, if you want the mechanical benefit of being a noble, you have an obvious choice: play someone with Noble background. (Or perhaps play someone with the Charlatan background and try to fake it.) To get that title with mechanical benefits, you have expended an important character resource -- your choice of background. If allow titles to come from ACP, we are diluting the impact of the background choice for those people who took the Noble background.
The same goes for other Organizations. I'd like mechanical benefits of membership in the Hellknights or the Firebrands to come from your Dedication feats. A character choice that you made at the expense of other character choices.
So... I think I am kind of against the concept of titles being purchased with ACP for now. On the other hand, titles that come as rewards from adventures where you earned them? Oh, sign me up.
Celebrity Status
It would be kind of fun to have a vanity option that would let you become an Icon -- like in Starfinder -- where you are famous for something, and that something can be ANYTHING. I would pay ACP for example to be the most famous plumber in Absalom. You could gate this vanity behind a character's overall reputation tier.
Property -- A Place to Stay
I wouldn't mind minor property vanities that could give you and your party a place to stay in a certain area. As far as I am concerned, this would be best if the players could flavor it as anything they want. (Twilight Knight made a great point when he stated that if a boon gets too specific then it doesn't allow for a broad range of character concepts. For example, I wanted to get a Tea Shop for Cup my PF1 tea-selling bard, but the closest option in the Vanities was a tavern, and it didn't have the right feel.)
I would rather that players have more flexibility with their property. You buy the boon, pick a city, and your place to stay for you and your party could be the upper floor of your business, your own temple's hostel, a dilapidated run-down castle, your family's farm house. My Starstone Hopeful, Teki Stronggut, would love to have this boon and be able to flavor it as her own cheap-ass, half-under-construction, grungy little goblin temple in Ascendant Court. I would love it if the property could never provide any monetary value to you other than free rent and food, because the money you earn from it gets immediately ploughed right back into repairs and upkeep. I would be willing to spend 40 ACP on something like this.
You could even have two tiers to this boon: the common room in a somewhat dilapidated, needing repairs or under construction property or the full out castle / clubhouse / whatever option that is somewhat more upscale, comes with better food, and lets everyone have their own room.
Needless to say, none of these properties can ever be sold for cash. We do not want ACP to become a way to enhance character wealth in any meaningful fashion.
Property -- Sailing Boat
I do love the idea of the Ship, too. Once again, the money from the boat goes back to repairs and upkeep, but you can ride to missions with your own boat... I'd be willing to pay quite a bit for something like this. Because boats are cool.
Property -- Hats and other Vanity Options
I did love Kate's concept for a Hat from Hats's collection. I don't know if that could be a realistic option, since Hats would be loathe to give up any hat in their collection, but... having some fun and wacky vanities would be awesome.
Hmm
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Celebrity Status
It would be kind of fun to have a vanity option that would...
Not sure it is quite what you are looking for, but there *is* a celebrity dedication
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Contributor
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Yeah, but that assumes that you are some sort of Diva. It really doesn't fit those who might be famous for monster-killing, or plumbing, or stuff outside the entertainment sphere. I really want something that would let you be famous for just about anything. Did you win an eating contest? Yep, you're famous.
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Yeah, but that assumes that you are some sort of Diva. It really doesn't fit those who might be famous for monster-killing, or plumbing, or stuff outside the entertainment sphere. I really want something that would let you be famous for just about anything. Did you win an eating contest? Yep, you're famous.
One of my pet peeves is that this is precisely (and only) what a legendary skill feat for perform gives you.
You're famous.
That is one of the skill feats that just make the game worse. If it wasn't there, any GM would be free to decide whether or not you're famous because it fits your character. But with that feat, the rules as written clearly think that only very high level characters who are literally legendary in a skill AND have gone above and beyond "just" being legendary actually get to be famous.
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Yeah, but that assumes that you are some sort of Diva. It really doesn't fit those who might be famous for monster-killing, or plumbing, or stuff outside the entertainment sphere. I really want something that would let you be famous for just about anything. Did you win an eating contest? Yep, you're famous.
Technically you could be a plumbing diva. (I have a cooking diva...) But point taken.
Actually, that is kind of what "Storied Talent (Horizon Hunters)" does:
Word of your skill and expertise is spreading, and you find that increasingly prestigious clients are prepared to pay for your services. When using Downtime to Earn Income, you can choose to attempt a task of your level.
So any "celebrity" boon would need to not compete with that.
