RPG Superstar 2009 Top 4
|
| 17 people marked this as a favorite. |
I’ve just wrapped up running my second PF2 mini-campaign, and I wanted to offer some praise to the authors and developers of this game. My players have been having a blast with it, and I’ve greatly enjoyed running it. We play weekly on Roll20, and the group is distributed across a couple of time zones. If there’s any silver lining to gaming during this pandemic, it’s been getting to play with folks that I’d never have gamed with otherwise. Members of the group had not played PF2 prior to this, but the specific edition changes and new material proved consistently easy to learn.
Some specific notes:
- The three action round is a HUGE win. It’s elegant, it simplifies rulings, and it speeds up gameplay. Once we were up and running, this system got out of the way and allowed the narrative ebb and flow of combat to come to the fore. Really nicely done.
- Heightened spell effects feel regularly useful, and were often game-changers in clutch moments.
- The social/influence rules really helped me, as GM, operate a huge cast of characters and keep their attitudes toward party members consistent. Having this framework in place allowed me to more effectively manage how much on-screen time an NPC should have.
- Some stand-out modules: we ran the entire Souls for Smuggler’s Shiv (absolutely excellent springboard for all kinds of different games) as our first campaign, taking about 34 2.5-hour sessions to complete. There’s so much good material crammed into this adventure, I really can’t gush enough about it.
- Second adventure was more experimental, taking the opening chapter from Crownfall, launching the characters into The Harrowing, seeding Curse of the Crimson Throne Easter eggs throughout, all in my campaign world’s pastiche of Skyrim. High-risk-of-trainwreck, but high-reward. It worked splendidly and was some of the most fun I’ve had as a GM. This took about 31 2.5-hour sessions to complete. It became an example to me of just how easy it is to scale this edition’s math up or down, pull and convert content from earlier sources, and make use of this edition’s sub-systems (exploration, downtime, influence) to enhance the game.
So, on to mini-campaign #3. Thanks for making a well-crafted game system and for some fantastic adventures (both past and present).
|
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 4
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
That's awesome to hear - we're having a lot of fun with Age of Ashes.
When you said heightened spell effects were useful and game changers - can you clarify what you meant? Was this a spontaneous caster's signature spells?
Sure, for two specific examples:
- The party's bard used signature spell with Dispel Magic to evaluate a proper slot to burn for disabling some magical wards, and with Illusory Object to create effects with only those characteristics required to meet the situation.
- With a single spell in their spellbook, the party's wizard could prepare the effect that would be most beneficial, like fear, enlarge, or invisibility -- all used for a satisfying effect. Since there wasn't a whole lot of regular shopping in either game, that single spell went a long way.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I am also enjoying gming pf2e, I think at the table I am the one that notices most the change of system. Players might notice more or less (different, really) choices and flow, but on the gm's side of things it has become such a difference. PF1 was a tremendous burden, and PF2e has done a good job of lessening it.