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Not every encounter yields exactly 'X' amount of anything because some critters don't have items or treasure. You want to shoot more for averages over the course of the level in which you are playing. But, aside from that... No. Everything strictly by RAW, down to the letter, is much too rigid for anything outside of a computer to handle properly.
I have played 15 point buy in just about every adventure path. We do keep track of our carry capacity, track our arrows, rations, roll randomly for available magic items in towns, etc. Consumable items are especially useful but many people simply ignore them, instead converting them to gold to buy what they think they need/want. The most recent game I have played like this is the current Giantslayer campaign I am participating in as a White-Haired Witch/Brawler/UnchainedRogue.
Outpacing the CR system has EVERYTHING to do with how far you deviate from the 15 point buy assumption, wealth per level, allowing players free access to any magic item from any book they want, and ESPECIALLY allowing for cheap crafting of magic items without the relevant down time and skills checks involved. Also, selecting combat [relevant] feats at every opportunity also skews this. I don't really mind pushing well past that baseline, as a player or GM, so long as I (we) don't forget that it is indeed, the baseline.
Personally, I enjoy just about any kind of gameplay, when I know what I am getting myself into at the start.
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I never have so I'm wondering what people's experiences were. I've played 20 pt buy and some GM handwaving back before even the hybrid classes were created, that's the closest I ever came.
When I say strict RAW, I mean every rule as written in the Core book. Like, you have to watch your carrying capacity and count your ammo; when you arrive in a village, the GM randomly rolls what magic items are for sale and those are it; a CR 8 encounter yields exactly 2,200 GP worth of treasure if you're playing Slow progression, 3,350 on Medium, or 5000 GP on Fast.
I see all the time comments to the effect of the PCs outpacing monsters/foes by like, L5 or whatever, but I wonder if part of that gap has to do with point buys and other rules, or if it's really as baked into the math as everyone says. I'm also just curious if anyone enjoyed/enjoys this style of play.
1. yes I have, I've even played super rigid roll 3d6 in order (no drops, rerolls, or modifications)
2. it sucks, everyone hated it3. Point buy does have something to do with outpacing the monsters, So does what magic items are available so those are worth paying attention to. things like encumbrance has little to do with it.
3A. I'll point out that most AP's give treasure below what encounters typically give and tend to fall behind WBL
4. What most puts PCs above CR; is experienced players, with optimal builds, and optimal parties.
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When I say strict RAW, I mean every rule as written in the Core book. Like, you have to watch your carrying capacity and count your ammo
It wasn't until a few years ago that I learned that some people actually track their coin weight.
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When I say strict RAW, I mean every rule as written in the Core book. Like, you have to watch your carrying capacity and count your ammoIt wasn't until a few years ago that I learned that some people actually track their coin weight.
coins can and should have denominations on them, so a single "coin" can be multiple coins worth of value. If you look at the Campaign coins for sale on the Paizo website, and the Coins of Absalom Kickstarter just started by them, you will see they have a 10 piece gold coin... etc.
doing this greatly reduces the "weight" of coinage
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... but between a 15 and 20 point buy, is there THAT much of a swing?
Speaking from what I have seen, yes and no.
If you are playing with a group that leans heavily into the min-maxing, that 5 point gap is the difference between another +1 modifier in their highest ability score. The odds of you having a character with a 20 in an ability score at level 1 increases dramatically. With spellcasters, the means higher DC's and more chances your encounters are getting ended before they get a chance to start. With melee oriented characters, that means they hit for 2 or 3 more points of damage per strike, and end your encounters sooner. In short, they can dish out more punishment but are about as frail (or more so).If you are playing with a less min-maxing group, it leads to more well rounded characters, with generally better saving throws, hit points, and/or skill breadth. You generally see more 16's or 15's in ability scores at this point. This is where I generally gravitate when point buy goes from 15 to 20, or even 25. I rarely, if ever, start with an 18 in anything, even after racial modifiers. In short, you get characters that are a bit more robust and tougher, rather than purely powerful.
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25-point buys with 15RP races or don't invite me.
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25-point buys with 15RP races or don't invite me.
you'll be missed.....
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25-point buys with 15RP races or don't invite me.
Harsh, but your terms are acceptable.
Ok, but to offset that, can I also automatically apply both the Advanced template as well as one of the Alignment templates like Fiendish or Axiomatic to every monster and NPC? Maybe only give 1 day of Downtime to every 10 days of adventuring? :)
You'd be perfectly well within your rights as a GM to slap a flat +1 to +2 CR to just about every fight to compensate for the higher point buy (and only award them experience/loot based on the non-templated encounter). Characters will get a lot more use out of a +4 to every stat than any temporarily seen monster would, so it is more than fair. Having a point buy of 25 pretty much means you can expect that all the DCs you have to roll against as a monster vs the PCs are going to be at least +2 harder.
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I've played 15- and 20- pt buy games before, and frankly I'd rather have a root canal. I like playing MAD characters.
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25-point buys with 15RP races or don't invite me.Ok, but to offset that, can I also automatically apply both the Advanced template as well as one of the Alignment templates like Fiendish or Axiomatic to every monster and NPC? Maybe only give 1 day of Downtime to every 10 days of adventuring? :)
I'm your huckleberry :)
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Yes. It "works"* OK.
On the player side, you have to be a bit more careful and actually coordinate with the rest of the party on tactics, teamwork, and covering all the bases. Rather than just leaning on the "build" to overwhelm the expected challenges and expecting to solo encounters.
On the GM side, you need to watch the CRs and DCs to make sure they remain in the baseline range. Note that the CR/DC baselines assume a 15-point buy and only modest min-maxing. Also, you should also probably allow more down-time as the PCs will need to take more breaks to rest and recover resources (hp, spells, consumables, etc.).
However, not everyone is comfortable with this play-style. 20-point buy gives a bit of a cushion (which can be a benefit at 1st level), but doesn't drastically increase the PCs' chances of success in and of itself over the course of the entire campaign. Higher point buys mean the GM needs to start upping the CRs/DCs to provide a challenge, which kind of starts the whole "arms race"/"rocket tag" cycle in many cases (or the PCs just waste everything easily, which may be what the group wants).
The biggest issue with upping the point-buy past 20 is that NPCs either need to be improved as well or they become such pushovers that the PCs can start "breaking" the setting.
*- as in, the game runs fine and you can be successful
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Back to the thread tho, this is kind of what I'm looking for, whether folks had fun with 15 point buy/strict RAW games, and if those had much impact on the disparity between APL and CR.
I've got a couple of RAW-loving players in my megadungeon game, finally fed up with the, umm... how do I put this professionally... challenging other 2 players of the group. They asked for a separate game so I was toying with a 15 point buy homebrew with stricter adherence to RAW.
My reasoning is b/c these 2 are very good, tactically. I've seen them in 25 point games and rolling their stats (they rolled well), and in both instances I've had to craft high-CR fights as their "average" nearly from level 1.
I am not super creative these days in making dynamic, set piece encounters and they're both really adept murder-hobos. I thought a 15 pt buy and strict RAW would level the playing field, maybe even lead to their PCs occasionally having to run away, or bribe/talk their way out of trouble.
yeah, it would most certainly be more of a challenge. But it wouldn't be fun. Players want to be the hero of the story and overcome the evil badguy. things should be a challenge, but not soo much that they don't see a way to win.
with 15 point buy there class that flat out can't be played. even PFS is 20 point...| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Eh, I take that as a challenge. What class(es), specifically, cannot be played with 15 point buy? And what is your standard for "acceptable playability"?
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
Only issue with this for me is you need to put the stat in a racial + if you want 10 human average. Personally I'd prefer to drop one of the 14's to 12 and raise the 8 to another 10. Still to each their own.
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
This is the way!
I don't use those exact numbers, but I like to give a stat array so players can play a MAD class without feeling gimped.
I also add a caveat of no stat above 18 (including racial adjustments) and find what happens is I end up with well rounded, higher floor but lower ceiling characters. And I like how that plays out.
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
This is the way!
I don't use those exact numbers, but I like to give a stat array so players can play a MAD class without feeling gimped.
I also add a caveat of no stat above 18 (including racial adjustments) and find what happens is I end up with well rounded, higher floor but lower ceiling characters. And I like how that plays out.
Tbh, I think this is one of the strengths of PF2, the maximum stat you can possibly have at lvl 20 even with Apex items is 24, and the rest of your stats are a smattering of 14-20-ish. My lowest stat on my lvl 20 Champion is 10 Dex, but I purposefully left it at 10 because I wear plate, but the rest of my scores are 16, 18, 20, and my highest is Strength at 22. And this feels a lot more natural than the point spreads I've had with pf1 characters, where I have 7's, 8's, 10's, 12's, and then a 36 in my primary ability score.
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I'm your huckleberry :)25-point buys with 15RP races or don't invite me.Ok, but to offset that, can I also automatically apply both the Advanced template as well as one of the Alignment templates like Fiendish or Axiomatic to every monster and NPC? Maybe only give 1 day of Downtime to every 10 days of adventuring? :)All kidding aside I think that'd be an awesome game and it'd be a privilege to run something for you.
That does sound fun ;) When do we start!
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
we use point buy with nothing above 18 or below 10 before racial mods.
We also vary how many points we use depending on if we want low, mid, or high fantasy. it's worked well for us, but I can see the appeal of an array.
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I always give stat spreads. Rolled dice are too random and I got sick of players min-maxing point buys.
Everyone gets 16, 14, 14, 13, 10, 8 and can assign them wherever. Sure, its like a 21 point buy or w/e but it also gives people clear strengths and weaknesses. I like player characters to have at least one stat with a 10 or lower, makes for more interesting RP. Players can get to 18 in a stat if its really necessary, or have three different 16s if they wanna go MAD.
we use point buy with nothing above 18 or below 10 before racial mods.
We also vary how many points we use depending on if we want low, mid, or high fantasy. it's worked well for us, but I can see the appeal of an array.
But nothing above 18 is the normal rule. So basically you can't sell down stats. This basically just works out to the normal game if people aren't min maxing their scores.
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But as far as RAW goes, does anyone have a strong opinion for or against things like Carrying Capacity, tracking ammo, monitoring every crafting check, or other things of that nature?
I feel like those things have a bigger impact at low levels, but not so much at higher levels. If a guy wants to haul a statue out of a dungeon, or cross a weight-sensitive bridge, I might see having them quickly add up encumbrance (and not worry about accuracy too much), but it doesn't seem like the sort of thing that's worthwhile to track all the time. And at higher levels, magic usually makes the worry mute.
I'd only worry about tracking ammo in a wilderness survival or extended dungeoneering situation. Or if there's particularly potent magical ammunition.
One way to handle these things is to have the players track it for the initial character creation (so that the halfling bard isn't claiming that they're carrying around a battering ram), but then not worry about it unless something blatant happens.
Like, one thing I'm bad at is watching the one guy that always plays an arcane caster make crafting checks for scrolls or wands or wondrous items and stuff.
Like, the baseline he's trying to hit might be like a DC 8, but he's missing the right spell so it jumps to a 13, but then he's got Spellcraft +10; +12 if he's in his base, so I just handwave it. Could he roll a 1 and end up with a cursed item or something? Sure, but the chance is so slim I don't pay any attention.
I tend to see crafting as a PC spending a feat to save money, which seems like a weak feat to me. I personally don't worry about it (again, unless they try to do something blatantly above their skill).
Should I if I start this new game? Does strict adherence to RAW add anything or does it just make it a slog since you've got such low starting stats?
I like the idea of a 15 point buy, but as a player I'd look at it as a challenge. Plus, the fact that it's "standard" fantasy is appealing if you're using published adventures that are supposedly designed for that. But I also recognize some of your posts from the past, and it seems like your players are playing just for the high damage output? Would they balk at this and become confrontational about this sort of decision? Have you talked to them about it? If you do, explain how you're hoping the low point-buy might even power levels out among the other players at the table.
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For crafting checks (either Craft skill or magic item creation), I don't think I've ever seen someone roll instead of taking 10, outside of some plot-driven circumstance or GM-fiat*.
Seriously, once a PC arcanist/wizard with an item crafting feat hits 9th-10th level or so crafter's fortune and fabricate, plus the normal magic item creation rules, make it relatively straightforward to essentially convert unwanted magic items to money (sell at 1/2 market price), purchase raw materials (1/3 market price for the masterwork base item and 1/2 market price for the magic abilities), and create wanted magic items (1 round per 10 cubic feet for the masterwork base item + 1 day per 1,000 gp of market price for the magic abilities**).
*- either because they wanted to "soft-ban" crafting or didn't understand the RAW on taking 10
**- note with a valet familiar and/or ring of sustenance or +X restful haramaki, the character can even perform crafting when out adventuring (no "down-time" needed)
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I've been playing in 15-point buy games because our players have become very proficient in the rules, and our DMs are newer so in order to adhere a little closer to the baseline and make our GM's lives easier we've elected to go 15 point buy.
We do track encumberance and ammo, but mostly before going into an adventure location or overland trek kind of thing, and don't sweat it when we pick up loot during the adventure unless it's truly ridiculous.
We definitely track ammo because we have players that like using fire-arms and it's not cheap or easy to find sources of blackpowder or ammunition in some adventure paths. Let alone down-time for crafting. The irony that it's faster to craft a 2000 gp magic sword than most mundane items always bugs us though, and we often use the "Making Craft Work" rules that are available from Paizo.
But for the most part we play rules as written, and interpret generously towards "doing cool stuff" where the rules are ambiguous.
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Only issue with this for me is you need to put the stat in a racial + if you want 10 human average. Personally I'd prefer to drop one of the 14's to 12 and raise the 8 to another 10. Still to each their own.
I like my PCs to have at least one low stat both for balance and for roleplaying. My group is excellent in this regard, so its not a party of Charisma dumped goons or min-maxed god wizards. But I totally get what you're saying and you could even the mix out a little bit, this is just the one I've found works for my group. It also encourages people to not be human, there are way too many humans and half-elves in the modules and campaigns I run so I like my party to be looking through all the other fun races with multiple +2s.
As far as tracking ammunition and carry weight: I don't actively but I will audit people as necessary if I think something is up. The only thing you're cheating is yourself after all, again my group is amazing. I can trust them to keep track of their own ammunition and everyone quickly buys haversacks to let them ignore most mundane carrying issues.
As far as making a 15-point buy work, its doable. Casters are stronger, summons are stronger, and for sure pet classes are stronger. You'll have a hard time going for most physical classes unless the class is single attribute dependent.
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But as far as RAW goes, does anyone have a strong opinion for or against things like Carrying Capacity, tracking ammo, monitoring every crafting check, or other things of that nature? Like, one thing I'm bad at is watching the one guy that always plays an arcane caster make crafting checks for scrolls or wands or wondrous items and stuff.
Like, the baseline he's trying to hit might be like a DC 8, but he's missing the right spell so it jumps to a 13, but then he's got Spellcraft +10; +12 if he's in his base, so I just handwave it. Could he roll a 1 and end up with a cursed item or something? Sure, but the chance is so slim I don't pay any attention.
Should I if I start this new game? Does strict adherence to RAW add anything or does it just make it a slog since you've got such low starting stats?
Tbh, I handwaive a lot of these things. It bogs down sesh time with minutia, and I'd rather get into combat or roleplay or progress the story.
Unless you're trying to carry a trebuchet or being placed under forced march conditions, I'm not tracking your carrying capacity. I'm sure you can buy enough donkeys or bags of holding to carry all your crap, and tbh I don't want to waste valuable sesh time figuring this stuff out. If it becomes important, such as hauling a trebuchet 10 miles away, then fine we'll buy the donkeys and track it.
I don't care about your ammo either, valuable sesh time lost, track that crap yourself.
I DO care about crafting checks, leadership, and stuff like that though, this represents a significant gold expenditure and there are penalties for rolling poorly and good rewards for rolling high, but I handle this out of sesh. We'll meet up at Buffalo Wild Wings for whiskey, wings, and dice rolls. We're not doing this during sesh unless absolutely necessary. Storytime: One of my players started his own religion in my Homebrew World with one of his characters, and he was playing a Thrallherd, so he had the psionic version of Leadership, and this dude built his own freaking empire. He had his 100+ Thralls and these were his inner circle people, but he had like 10,000 people convert to worshipping his deity Mland. He built Temples to Mland everywhere, he had his Thralls traveling to towns/cities giving out textiles, first aid, his priests were doing condition removal and healing, and spreading the Word of Mland, and he even built two cities out in the middle of nowhere and built a Gondola between the two cities across this big continental cliff that would take about a week to traverse on foot, and he turned it into a 3 hour ride on his Gondola and started charging people for rides. Towards the end of the campaign, he created his own Demiplane with Gates that connected all of his temples so his Thralls could move around quickly. But we handled probably 90% of his stuff out of sesh. We would do his roleplaying in sesh though; whenever they reached a new place, this guy would get on his soap box and get a crowd going and start proselytizing, "It is our time brothers and sisters to seek Mland, for when the Four Suns Shine as One, blah blah", and then after he was finished with his speech, his Thralls would start handing out aid to people and preaching. It was pretty cool.
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But as far as RAW goes, does anyone have a strong opinion for or against things like Carrying Capacity, tracking ammo, monitoring every crafting check, or other things of that nature? Like, one thing I'm bad at is watching the one guy that always plays an arcane caster make crafting checks for scrolls or wands or wondrous items and stuff.
Like, the baseline he's trying to hit might be like a DC 8, but he's missing the right spell so it jumps to a 13, but then he's got Spellcraft +10; +12 if he's in his base, so I just handwave it. Could he roll a 1 and end up with a cursed item or something? Sure, but the chance is so slim I don't pay any attention.
Should I if I start this new game? Does strict adherence to RAW add anything or does it just make it a slog since you've got such low starting stats?
So, as I've mentioned before, Carrying capacity, ammo, etc, all only matter at low levels. Once a PC has a few level, they will pass almost all crafting checks, and can have ways of carrying/transporting almost everything they need. tracking all this slows down the game and takes time away from the exciting part of the game.
As for being strict 15 PB and RAW, IMO it just slows down everything and makes the game not fun. In combat, players hit way less often, have fewer spells and have lower HP/AC. So Combat is overall deadlier. All this means that a combat that used to take 15-30 minutes, will now take even more game time, because it takes the party longer to kill the bad guy, and they might have to retreat to recover/revive party members and then try the encounter again. While it might be more realistic, and certainly ups the fear of dying, it's way less fun, and will cause player disengagement.
Think about your typical videogame... for me, I have very little time to play them, so if I encounter something that takes me 4 or 5 try to get past, I usually quit playing and move onto another game. Now I know players who have plenty of time would sit and do it over and over until they got it, but I don't have the time. Same with tabletop. if combat takes an hour, or I have to retreat/reengage the same encounter 2 or 3 time. I'll just go do something else during the game.
So, play however you want, but I recommend keeping it fun and exciting for the players. Sometimes this means giving them the advantage and letting them be a little over the top.
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I personally level my players up at narratively important points rather than track XP. Right now I’m running a Rise of the Runelords game and I have the points where people will level up pre-planned. Doesn’t matter what extra fights they pick or avoid: levels happen when they happen. This both encourages them to follow the story and prevents the weird mid-dungeon level up that might force extra rests.
That does force me to occasionally shuffle loot around to keep them on track for wealth by level, which can lead to enemies having more or less loot than “they should” per CR. Most enemies can be brought in line with a few minor stat changes, +2 strength is a fine alternative to a +1 weapon and etc.
Of course, my game group has largely done away with the filler fights. So I have fewer things to adjust numerically. No sense going to initiative and dragging the game to a halt because some bandits showed up alongside the road. Just narrate how you handle them and track the resources spent in narrative time.
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I'd suggest ditching XP in favor of a game play progression, say (4) 4-5 hour sessions earns players a level with CR set to a maximum at APL+3 for lvl 1-5 then APL+4 at level 6+ and every adventure takes a minimum of 1 month of game time (really just mostly downtime in between adventures). That makes it super simple and paces everyone together. When on away missions weekly upkeep(housing, meals) is 4*(APL^1.3)GP for basic accommodations suitable for the...
yeah, we gave up on XP years ago and went to milestone leveling, this keeps everyone equal, and correctly on pace for the AP.
As for gold for basic accommodations, again we gave up on that, once a party find it's first major treasure stash, they are effectively rich and tracking the minutiae of daily costs is just a pain in the butt. We just assume that mundane items they don't track as part of the treasure horde, get collected anyway and sold to cover those.
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Once.
We were restricted to certain classes, most of us were restricted to running these classes un-archetyped. Traits were assigned by the GM. We rolled for starting wealth.
When my low-level vanilla Bard died a pretty freaking horrible death, I was given an NPC character that was already in this dungeon... as in I could not make a new character for myself, I was given some random Rogue NPC that happened to be written into whatever module the GM was basing this adventure off of.
That cRogue NPC ended up being an extremely fun character for me, though. Izzek was a Tengu, and I was allowed to rewrite him within our starting character guidelines for the next session. I eventually "earned" the Scout archetype due to how I played him... constantly charging into battle with my Greatsword. I was always right up there, front and center, with the Fighter. Often out front before the Fighter due to my higher Initiative and faster movement speed/lighter armor.
In the process of saving our Cleric from being sacrificed, I charged in and took a wicked AoO from a glass syringe spear that dropped my to 1hp... and surviving the following battle is apparently what earned me the ability to apply an archetype to my character.
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Strictly RAW you have a few random magic items plus a 75% chance of having any other magic or special item at or under a specific value. For a large town that limit is 2,000 gp, for a small city 4,000 gp.
A large town has 2,001-5,000 inhabitants and you generally have one in the starting region of most AP, a Large city has 5,001-10,000 inhabitants, and generally, you have one within your traveling range for level 7 onward.
The items should be occasionally replenished and re-rolled.
While that means that the PCs will not get the "+3, Demon Bane, cold iron greatsword" or the "staff with spell A that uses 2 charges, spell B that uses 1, and cantrip C that uses one and allow me to recharge it even if I don't know spell A and B", most of what the PCs will want at low to middle levels falls well within that price range.
Wands of CLW, Amulet of mighty fist +1, cloak of resistance +2, fist level pearl of power, stat-boosting item +2, etc. are all in that price range, so most of the base necessities can be covered by the normal market while following the RAw of magic items accessibility.
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When I say strict RAW, I mean every rule as written in the Core book. Like, you have to watch your carrying capacity and count your ammoIt wasn't until a few years ago that I learned that some people actually track their coin weight.
In my game I get around this my having magically protected banks in in major cities. Gold is “insured” OOC I tell my players logically coins do need weight so this is just way to not travel with everything and its protected. No player at my table has tried to take advantage of it and oddly enough no one has played a rogue to attempt a theft.
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Strictly RAW you have a few random magic items plus a 75% chance of having any other magic or special item at or under a specific value. For a large town that limit is 2,000 gp, for a small city 4,000 gp.
This is core RAW and it's a bit silly. A 75% chance of having any other magic or special item under than figure means that in a small city there will be 75% of a huge number of items. For example, there's a 75% chance of a small +1 cold iron bardiche and a 75% chance of Angelskin Parade Armour and 75% chance of a masterwork astrolabe or scroll of Miracle.
Even a typical thorp (population 15, limit 50gp) in the middle of nowhere will have a stock of some dozens of assorted potions, 75% chance for one for each 1st level spell or cantrip. And even more scrolls, piles of weapons probably including Spiresteel arrows and a Drow Razor, 75% chance of a pressurised air tank, maybe an aquatic harness, a cannonball, collapsible bathtub or pantograph.
These things are not technically for sale as such, but they're there. Probably hanging on the wall at the back of the tavern, per cliche.
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This is core RAW and it's a bit silly.
I agree, the economy of the game is silly in a lot of ways.
A party loots 20 masterwork greatswords and sells them to a merchant in a little town with 500 inhabitants. Next week they do the same with 20 long spears.So, they looted 20 specialized pieces of equipment worth between 3,000 to 15,000 $ or € and sold it in a town that probably as something like 5 persons interested in it (in Medieval times the professional soldiers were between 1 and 3% of the actual population, I doubt adventurers are more common, and not all of them use greatswords or long spears). To who will the merchant sell that stuff?
In my games, I try to make the economy a bit more realistic. One of the things I do is increasing cities population. Years ago I tried to calculate the Inner Sea population. The results I reached are that: the Inner sea area is something like two times that of Europe and North Africa (Russia included) and the population is half that of the same area after the Black Death. I.e. the Inner Sea population density is 1/4 of that of the end of XIV century Europe. And at that time there was a good number of cities with well above 100,000 inhabitants in Europe.
The description of Golarion is based too much on Middle Ages England and too little on the rest of the world at the same level of development.
Constantinople was a very big city during the Middle Ages, and it wasn't the only one.
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I've played 15- and 20- pt buy games before, and frankly I'd rather have a root canal.
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This.
I remember many years ago on one of these Threads arguing that I play this game to be a Hero, a Champion. And I DM it to challenge epic Heroes and mythic Champions.
I do not play this game to be a peasant farmer with no shoes and dung inbetween his toes. I do not play this game to play a broken, rusty pitchfork-wielding soldier who has to leave treasure behind because he doesn't have the physical strength to pick it all up and still carry his broken, rusty pitchfork.
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I like playing games on easier difficulty modes too. Unless I actually want the challenge.
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I like playing games on easier difficulty modes too. Unless I actually want the challenge.
I don't even know what those words mean. Lol.
Ima beat the same game 4 times in a row just to beat it again on Master Ninja sort of guy... Legendary or nothin'... all in, all the time... turn that $#!+ up to 11... the only way to get better is to fight a better opponent...
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I've played 15- and 20- pt buy games before, and frankly I'd rather have a root canal..
This.
I remember many years ago on one of these Threads arguing that I play this game to be a Hero, a Champion. And I DM it to challenge epic Heroes and mythic Champions.
I do not play this game to be a peasant farmer with no shoes and dung inbetween his toes. I do not play this game to play a broken, rusty pitchfork-wielding soldier who has to leave treasure behind because he doesn't have the physical strength to pick it all up and still carry his broken, rusty pitchfork.
My group played for a time while generating stat by rolling 4d6 and keeping 3, ordering them as they wished, and then re-rolling one stat and keeping the better one. We still had a guy roll a character with a total stat cost of -5 and another, in the same party, with a total of +38.
The -5 character is a farmer with a rusting pitchfork, not someone with 15 or 20 points.The average NPC has a 3 points build, and the one with 15 points is an elite.
The PC with a 20 points build is above that.