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I've been playing PFS for a couple of months and want to start DMing. Any suggestions on dry/wet erase maps and minis/tokens to get to reasonably run a game for not shitloads of money?
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Sep 16, 2014 23:38
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Would you suggest the 26x23 or the 34x48 Chessex map? I'm sorta wondering if the 26x23 would be too small for running some scenarios, but I haven't exactly played for a long time. Also, tokens as in something like http://paizo.com/products/btpy8tj5/discuss&page=4?Pathfinder-Pawns-Bestiary-Box ? sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 00:03 on Sep 17, 2014 |
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Sep 16, 2014 23:58
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Cool man, thanks a bunch I appreciate the suggestions.
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Sep 17, 2014 00:12
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So doing my first GMing PFS session, I'm looking at the scenario (Citadel of Flame) and there is a part of the map that's somewhat detailed, pretty big, and not a whole lot happens there. It's the first part with the fire elementals. I really don't feel like giving a gently caress about drawing the map super accurate. Is that a problem or no? Depends on group? FWIW no one's ever even asked if I own the books, and a good half of the characters aren't spellcasters, so they seem pretty relaxed.
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Sep 24, 2014 02:04
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Caros posted:I'd suggest still drawing some form of map solely because a combat encounter in PFS without a map can lead to some problems if you have tactical or fussy players. That said I doubt anyone will really care if you slightly modify the existing map so long as it follows the general feel of it. I tend to square out circular rooms because I find them to be a pain to draw on the fly as an example. Cool thanks. Yeah I was planning on drawing it out roughly, but not exactly to perfect scale as in the scenario. Except when it's easy like a 3x6 rectangular room. Just wasn't sure if there was some weird PFS-it-must-be-drawn-EXACTLY rule or something.
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Sep 25, 2014 03:36
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Well, got my Pathfinder Pawns Bestiary Box 1 in. The sorta stickied on artwork on the box was kinda coming off on the inside, so I had to tape it down. Then the first cardboard cutout (Earth Elemental) that I grabbed had the lamination rip off as I popped it out, so I had to tape that too. That's pretty lovely Paizo step up your game.
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Oct 1, 2014 01:52
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Does anyone have words on Inquisitors? I'm thinking of rolling a Greatsword Anger Inquisitor of Gorum in an AP, starting at level 2. Looks like a ton of fun to play, but I don't know much about Inquisitors.
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Oct 18, 2014 21:34
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GMing question: when should I tell a player to do a skill roll and when shouldn't i? Kinda ran into this when I did Citadel of Flame. Like, there's an unknown language on the wall, and the text that I'm supposed to read to the players specifically mentions it, so the PCs know it's there. If someone has Linguistics, in my head at least, it's sorta an automatic thing that they see the language and Linguistics it. I'm running Sewer Dragons of Absalom tomorrow, and there's traps and alarms and poo poo. When do I roll perception and when don't I for them to notice things? Do they specifically have to say they're looking? Is it up to my whims and whether or not I'm really trying to kill them? Also in the like six months I've been playing not a single PC has died, or really gotten close. If anyone has suggestions for Actually Risky things to run I'd appreciate it Edit2: Low tier Sewer Dragons seems ridiculous. sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Nov 30, 2014 |
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Nov 30, 2014 21:59
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Ran levels 3-4 Sewer Dragons of Absalom last night, second time GMing, was waaay easier than the first time. The Alchemist boss fuckin ran out of bombs then managed to get away, and we ran out of time so I didn't get the chance to try and 1 shot kill people with Lightning Bolt which made me sad. (6d6)+6 damage lightning bolts against level 3s and 4s, got drat.
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Dec 2, 2014 23:16
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I tried to find it, but how does multiclassing work with BAB? I'm going Ninja with 1 level in Monk, what would my BAB be at level 2? Would it still be 0? Goal is a fun Ninja/Wayang who does non-lethal fwiw.
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Jan 7, 2015 17:42
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Thanks yall. It's really silly that BAB progression isn't just additive rounding down but if I gave a poo poo I'd be Human and not Wayang so whateva.
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Jan 7, 2015 22:29
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GMing question, in the context of PFS. FWIW I'm fairly new to GMing and am open to any/all advice. This has happened with two of four scenarios I've GMed, but I've run significantly over time and we've needed to wrap up either during the final boss or right before the final boss. Just ran The Stranger Within, and 45 minutes over time was just getting near the end of the boss fight. We took one break that was like five minutes long. There was probably a 25% chance of the boss killing everyone, but had to end and just gave everyone 1 prestige as a compromise. Thing is, everything feels like it's going smoothly. Nothing seems like it's taking longer than it should. No one's wasting time and the party's playing the scenario roughly as it should be. All of the RPing elements happen as they should and seem to be taking a reasonable amount of time. The fights maybe took a little long, but nothing like adding an hour on. I even skipped the end of another combat with a "Well they were gonna die in a couple rounds so lets just say you smack them around and tie them up" and boom out of initiative. So when a scenario is taking too long, what sorts of things should I do to hurry things along? Just take parts out? Shove the party on the train and then railroad them? I realize it could be a problem with the scenario too.
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Jan 13, 2015 21:22
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Ok so I'm running a PFS scenario on Monday, called Haunting of Hinojai. The combat is hard, and it uses haunts that range from minorly annoying to save or die, in both 5-6 and 8-9 tiers. Levels 5-6 has DC16 Phantasmal Killer, levels 8-9 has CL9, DC20 Finger of Death. Save or die trap is lame in general. Levels 8-9 can deal with it, but in levels 5-6 it's super lame. No one can raise dead and buying a resurrection is really expensive for that level. Not to mention that they'd have to grab the body if someone dies, then take them to a temple or whatever, resurrect them, then everyone goes back to the spooky mansion. I want to replace Phantasmal Killer with something else, and was thinking of something like DC16 fort, or be knocked unconscious to -8HP for some sense of urgency, and hit with a DC17 to remove Bestow Curse as if it were cast by the boss. I want the trap to hurt, but just loving someone in a way that they can't deal with is stupid and a waste of everybody's time. But just removing the trap is also sorta boring, just wanted to make sure the sub wasn't too harsh. If there's no one who can raise dead in high tier, I'd do something similar. I don't think I'm allowed to do this by PFS rules but I sorta don't care. edits sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 23:31 on Jan 24, 2015 |
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Jan 24, 2015 23:23
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Well, it's 5,450gp or 16 prestige for raise dead, which is a lot for 5-6, and the spooky mansion this is happening in is in a rural area with the nearest town having a population of 350, and spellcasting of 4th level, so no raise dead. I could cough and say there's a traveling cleric or whatever going through town or something, but that's still a whole assload of resources for a 5-6, and by the time they got back all of the haunts would have reset. Everyone could pitch in and soften the blow a bit, but I can't count on that happening. It's actual PFS, I just personally am willing to bend the rules when the rules are stupid, like someone wasting their whole night or spending half their cash because whoops you rolled a 10 and have a fort save of 5, sorry! FWIW a lot of the comments about the scenario mention that it's hard, and I let everyone know it's hard before hand. The idea of Scooby Doo But You might Die is hilarious to me though, which is why I picked it. If I'm off base about stuff let me know, I've only GMed 5 scenarios.
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Jan 25, 2015 00:14
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That's a pretty terrible idea, whatevs.
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Jan 26, 2015 23:44
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Personally, if I've bought 30 of a type of arrow I'm too lazy to keep track and I treat it as unlimited because whatever. On a different note, I've noticed that seasons 0-3 have terrible combat.
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Jan 29, 2015 19:29
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Looking for opinions on Core campaign for PFS, specifically on combat. There's some scenarios where I can imagine a core party having a really tough time, because they don't have access to spells like Snowball, or classes like Summoner. PCs seem to gain so much strength and utility from non core stuff, that it seems like fights such as in Haunting of Hinojai could just boringly TPK. Maybe I'm wrong? Not really sure how to run core stuff. New things are scary.
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Feb 16, 2015 20:39
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Ok so I'm dicking around with a goofy melee damage dealer in PFS play. How many claw attacks can I get? As an example, bloodrager - draconic gives me two claw attacks, Feral Mutagen gives two claws and a bite. Presumably one attack per limb, so can I get two on hands and two on feet, for 5 total attacks while under Mutagen?
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Feb 23, 2015 04:41
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CaptainPsyko posted:No, claws are explicitly hands only. Unless you can get four arms by some means other than the Alchemist discovery, which explicitly says no extra attack, you can't stack claw attacks. I can't find where that is, so I'm probably just missing it. Can you point me towards where it says claws are hands only?
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Feb 23, 2015 06:02
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That's fairly lame, thanks yo. Edit: Another question. Are there rules in PFS for the number of non-combat hirelings you can have? I got an Investigator who's a noble and is really spoiled + worthless, so I have a porter, valet, herald, and an entertainer. Porter carries around all my poo poo, sets up my pavilion when we camp, etc. Valet takes care of provisions and fancy poo poo for me, blah blah. Couldn't find any rules about how many I'm allowed to have. sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 21:02 on Feb 23, 2015 |
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Feb 23, 2015 06:41
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I play PFS, which caps out at 11, and don't really run into too many issues of casters totally dominating. They're really useful don't get me wrong, but martials still deal most of the damage and skill monkeys do the non combat stuff. Casters seem to do mostly buffs like haste and control like black tentacles, grease or obscuring mist. Except summoners, they're fuckin assholes.
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Feb 28, 2015 22:33
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Zurai posted:With enough work, you can make yourself unhittable at any given level (lower levels are actually the hardest). It's very expensive and requires some trade-offs with offense, though. Also most of the AC optimization doesn't do much for touch AC and nothing at all for spells which don't make attack rolls, so you're still weak to magic. Would you mind an overview of an unhittable build? I've been considering one to go with my "gently caress it" 6 AC Barbarian. I was planning on going 1 level Lunar Oracle with Charisma to AC and Reflex, rest Sacred Shield Paladin focusing on high Charisma. Really nice defensive options for protecting others, real difficult to land hits on and crazy saving throws. Hilariously bad at skills though. Fwiw I play PFS.
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Mar 10, 2015 22:17
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Every time I look at the paizo forums to check a rules thing I'm real happy I don't play with those people holy poo poo nerds are terrible. Was looking up spring loaded wrist sheaths, accelerated drinker and potions, and half the posts are garbage like well potions aren't EXACTLY forearm length so they can't be used. The worst dumb poo poo rules lawyering oh my god gently caress you i'm loading a potion in that sucker and firing it straight into my face and drinking it because that's hilairous. Just aiming the potion at my mouth and firing.
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Mar 13, 2015 19:57
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Um excuse me this feat doesn't explicitly say that, so according to RAW what it actually does is
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Mar 13, 2015 23:43
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Personally, I think ridiculous stupid characters is 90% of what makes PFS fun. Got a Sorcerer who's a huge coward, an extremely nice gullible Ninja, a Frenchman Paladin and a super spoiled, rich, rear end in a top hat Alchemist. They're pretty well optimized as far as feats etc, but their personalities make them uniquely lovely in their different ways. Hate pregens because that's sorta missing, and the character development part is sorta missing.
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Mar 15, 2015 22:29
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Ran into my first Arcane shenanigans turning everyone else useless stuff today. Ran a 5-9 high tier with me as a level 9 Arcane/Sylvan Sorcerer, and another guy as a level 9 Arcanist. My animal companion Roc had 38 AC, Haste, Blink and permanent Blur, along with her 6 attack offensive poo poo. Arcanist melted the boss Magus with two Greater Flaming Spheres. The Barbarian and Paladin may as well not have even been there. My actual Sorcerer didn't even participate in the last fight because poo poo why bother, gonna just sit here invisible while the Roc and Arcanist do all the work. We also did all the utility stuff like open locked doors, sunder chains, break holes in floors, and turn everyone invisible so we can run away because story. Also, the three CR7 Advanced Kyton enemies with the boss couldn't even get close to hitting my bird while flanking, it was silly. They could only hit on a natural 20, then had 70% miss chance to deal with. sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 05:08 on Mar 24, 2015 |
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Mar 24, 2015 05:02
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Things I learned recently: Tobacco is 1g for 2 pounds. There are 453.592 grams in a pound. There are .7 grams of tobacco in a cigarette, but let's round up to 1 because laziness. Each piece of rice paper is 5cp. Each piece of paper should, what, conservatively roll 10 cigarettes? That's 200 cigarettes for 1 gold. It is very cheap to make your character a smoker.
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Mar 31, 2015 21:40
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Remember even if your skill checks are bad, you can always (always) bribe the poo poo out of everyone in sight. Guard givin ya guff? Here's a 100g. Informant not cooperating? 100g. Boom best friends, cuz you just bought them a Slave (hard labor) or two Slave (housework).
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Apr 2, 2015 23:02
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Pathfinder Ultimate Tax Code! New rules for independent contractors and filing jointly as a married couple! New prestige classes such as non-profit CEO and CPA! Spells such as Litigate and Incorporate! Next month, the long awaited Pathfinder Cutlery and Table Manners Unchained! All the boring tedious rules you never gave a poo poo about but the dude you're playing with who has really greasy hair cares a whole lot about for some reason and he'll argue about them endlessly!
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Apr 23, 2015 21:11
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mother fucker
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Apr 23, 2015 21:20
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I'm such a munchkin piece of poo poo. Level 9 Sorcerer and my animal companion is running around with 37 AC (could get it higher if I wanted) and just my bird severely out damaged the Barbarian and their animal companion. Also out damaged the Paladin on evil targets and the Fighter, and wasn't even fully buffed up. My animal companion also lived and didn't go unconscious while the Barbarian's companion died (actually dead) because the Barbarian's animal companion didn't have False Life on it. I've basically turned a Sorcerer into a Summoner. Casters are so op it's hilarious, there's like a few levels of being mediocre but still winning encounters because Grease owns and then kaboom as soon as level 3 spells are available ya'll aren't needed anymore go away. sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 03:44 on Apr 28, 2015 |
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Apr 28, 2015 03:42
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Yeah it's a Roc. At level 9 they have +14 natural armor and +5 dex, so straight out of the gate they're at 29. I have no idea why. This was just a test to see how well it would work after really remaking the character. Part of the plan is to now whack it with Beast Shape 1 or 2 and turn it into something loving stupid like a dodo. I can cast Fly on it so it doesn't even need a fly speed. I'm looking through the bestiary and haven't found something with the right natural attacks. Just need claw/claw/bite and for it to have wings for wing attacks. edit: skunk and badger are in fact very good options. No wings, but have claw and bite sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 05:24 on Apr 28, 2015 |
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Apr 28, 2015 05:20
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Here's the result of my stupid little Sylvan Sorcerer experiment, all PFS legal as far as I can tell. Level 10, Human. Feats are Racial Heritage - Aasimar, Celestial Servant, Spirit's Gift (Blur), Boon Companion, Evolved Companion x2 (Improved damage on Claw and Bite). Start with a base Roc, her name is Sarah, she understands Ancient Osirian, and has the feats Power Attack, Combat Reflexes, Improved Claw, Improved Bite, and Eldritch Claws. Has an Amulet of Mighty Fists - Holy. Sarah is perma buffed with False Life and Mage Armor, and as soon as things looking suspicious Bull's Strength, Shield, and Heroism go up, Extend Spell metamagic rod if I need to. In combat, Haste, Fly, Tactical Acumen and Strong Jaw (Wand) get popped. That's the boring part. The fun part is I can hit em with Beast Shape 2 or 3. If I think combat is right in the next room I slap on that poo poo, plus buffs measured in rounds, then go in swingin. Searched through the bestiaries, picked out the forms I like, and ended up with the following options with the buffs they'll inevitably get because that's my entire dumb stupid gimmick. Skunk: 2 Bites +14 (2d6+12), 2 Claws +14 (1d8+12), flying, 41 AC. Rat King: 6 Bites +16 (2d8+13), flying, 42 AC.A Rat King is apparently a collective consciousness group of a dozen or more rats tied together by the tail, and is a Small sized Magical Animal so fair game for Beast Shape 3! Allosaur: 2 Bites +16 (8d6+16), 2 Claws +16 (4d8+16), flying, 42 AC, 15 foot reach. Also have an Aurumvorax template all done (1 bite and 4 claw attacks) for if things actually get serious but that's not as funny as a flying dinosaur or ball of rats. edit gently caress you martials, boring pieces of poo poo
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May 7, 2015 19:41
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Zurai posted:How are you getting two bite attacks out of beast shape on shapes which only have one bite attack? You don't get to stack the attacks from your base form and the attacks from your polymorphed form: Haste, because they'll always be hasted every single fight. It's basically part of their stat block because they've never once attacked without it. Found out that there's a FAQ that doesn't let Strong Jaw, Improved (Attack) and Evolved Companion - Damage stack, so that was sad. edit: I figure that things I do to the bird that are basically always on are fair game for the stat block. Things like False Life and Mage Armor at the start of every day, from the AC's perspective almost at will dimension door as a free action because of share spells, and other poo poo. Thing I'm most curious about right now is how a GM is going to deal with an animal companion being turned into a Human or Dwarf or whatever with 3 intelligence from Alter Self. sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 05:32 on May 11, 2015 |
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May 11, 2015 05:09
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Personally, I think the Sylvan bloodline Sorcerer has the best comedy options and fairly good effectiveness for polymorphing. You cast polymorph spells on your animal companion, so you have way more options than a Druid. If you want you can build for polymorphing yourself too so double trouble raptors or gargoyles or whatever. You sorta have to pick up the Boon Companion and Spirit's Gift feats for your AC. Spirit's Gift is probably one of the strongest feats I've seen so that's not a huge problem though. You can also do goofy stuff like turn a badger into a Bugbear and give them a spear or some poo poo, or a Skunk into an allosaurus, or even better an allosaurus into a skunk sugar free jazz fucked around with this message at 20:53 on Jun 14, 2015 |
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Jun 14, 2015 20:49
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Anyone have suggestions for ridiculous and silly but weirdly effective builds for PFS? I'm working on an Aid Another/Trip build right now, but suggestions on other goofy poo poo that works would be appreciated. Starting at level 3 (GM baby).
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Jun 30, 2015 07:01
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I think the other thing about multiclassing is that it opens up a lot of fun weird options. You can go Empiricist/Mindchemist for huge Knowledge checks and fairly dang good SAD skill checks. You can go Unarmed Fighter/Master of Many Styles to get Pummeling Style/Charge and Janni Style/Rush at level 4, which is hilarious. Or you can get Kirin Style/Path and just do goofy poo poo and skitter all around fights, and maybe I dunno Dragon Style/Roar. Maybe you wanna get cheesy and go for an Oracle/Paladin and heal the gently caress out of everything, or go Bloodrager/Unchained Barbarian for double rage shenanigans. How does double rage work with rage powers? gently caress if I know!
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Jul 9, 2015 16:40
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I'm looking for PFS GMing advice: So in I dunno 30% of scenarios I GM in PFS at least one person dies. I'm not trying to kill anyone, but players keep doing really dumb poo poo after they've been fairly explicitly warned not to, or get really unlucky with crits and damage rolls, or it's a combo of both. In the PFS groups in the area, people don't die very often, but for some reason people just die at my table and it's confusing. So the times I've killed PCs are: A full health Wizard gets hit by the bad guy's above average damage lightning bolt and dies. Wizard goes off alone to explore a crypt without the rest of the party, is told that's a bad idea, gets hit by a trap, goes unconscious, makes no fort save and dies. A full health Investigator walks up to the bad guy to flank, next round gets crit and dies. Earlier he got himself flanked by rogues and only didn't die because I didn't mention they had Bleeding Attack 5. That fight should have been a TPK but we ran out of time so I handwaved it and the party survived. They were barely into the high tier of the scenario. A bow Ranger takes a shot at construct bad guy who has a Longspear, which provokes an AOO. The Ranger gets crit, gets down to 2 HP, and then sticks around. Wizard bad guy wants to Fireball, but waits a few rounds because I'm trying to avoid killing people, so he misses a couple of Scorching Rays on a different PC instead. After he's out of other damaging spells, he doesn't have much else to do, so Fireball, hits 3/4 of the party, and the Ranger dies. Party is in a temple, they're told the priest wont see them, and that he has guards outside of his room 24/7. Two PCs sneak up onto a balcony and into the priest's room. Priest says leave or he calls the guards, PCs say they're not leaving, priest says no seriously I'm calling the guards, PCs say they just need to talk and aren't leaving. Priest calls guards, two encounters happen at once. The two PCs jump off the balcony while another guy runs through a hallway, straight into the middle of 4 enemies and gets surrounded. He gets crit and dies. Later, a Sorcerer chases after the priest guy, who runs to fight in a better spot and to heal himself. Sorcerer runs straight into melee, and tries to hit the priest with their staff. Sorcerer goes unconscious and later dies. Turns into basically a TPK, but I tell them to run and they hit a tanglefoot bag, then I have the priest try and break it with a staff instead of channeling negative and killing everyone. Level five Witch with 37 HP is standing next to an Iron Golem, which is CR13, deals 2d10+16, and is sort of a police enforcer. Another PC is there with him, but listens to the cops and doesn't run. Combat happens with the Iron Golems only if you make incredibly terrible decisions. The golem will attack if they try to run or do anything hostile, and the Witch is explicitly told that, and it's heavily hinted at that he WILL die if the golem attacks. The rest of the party is being chased by a different Iron Golem and are running away. After five or six rounds, the Witch tries to run, and the Iron Golem takes an AOO, crits, deals 4d10+32. The Witch dies, but I handwave it and say he's one away of whatever his negative con is. Did I do anything wrong? Should I just fudge more dice rolls? Halve the crit range of NPCs? I can't see anywhere I hosed up, but drat, I've killed more people than the rest of the GMs combined since I started GMing.
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Jul 11, 2015 17:21
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Word, I appreciate the feedback. I don't think they generally go for defensive items, and they do make some really bad decisions.
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Jul 12, 2015 01:19
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Afaik the Ninja archetype works with Unchained Rogue so that gets you the Wakizashi and other toys like a Ki pool.
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Jul 16, 2015 01:16
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