Pathfinder Newb

[redneckdevil]

also I will second greylord on rise of the runelords. As a beginner beginner player who is also being the dm on top of it, rise of the runelords seems pretty easy and enough room to add and take away from the main campaign. I bought rise of the runelords and carrion crown campaigns. While I am floored and deeply impressed with the first 2 books in carrion crown, even I realize its very rp heavy which is good but also to get the most outta the story the players need to know a good bit of the rules and what exactly their options are. I decided rise of the runelords for our beginnera group for a couple of reasons. One is that it seems very flexible but straightforward to dm and for players to play. Second because me and my group are brand new at pnp rpgs, the beginners dungeon that comes with starter kit can easily be incorporated into a prestart to the campaign.

 

But then again I am brandnew at this and have realized to do a successful campaign is half on the dm and half on having a good group of players that get along and will be their charecters.

 

I made it rule number one of the house rules, is that ur charecter does, acts, and talks like he does, not like u do and act and know. So far it seems we can talk, fuss, debate every other action but as long as that rule is enforced and the players abide by it, it seems no matter what the campaign and process will go along well.

[Mamoulian War]

Maybe have a character that is more like himself?  Or maybe have the others guide him?  Good Luck with him.

 

I once had a friend who came and basically got drunk before we were halfway through, at which point he got very out of character.  So, we let him play an Ogre so when he got drunk, his character was appropriate...

 

He always insist on playing Rogue "jack of all trades" with high INT, but his talk is neither himself, neither his character... It is hard to explain, but it sometimes breaks the immersion :/

 

 

 

And we have one funny story with a guy who after got drunk at one session as well. The session after that, he decided to reroll his character Orc Barbarian with WIS, INT and CHA at 5, he can't read and is almost always drunken. He always brings 20 jugs of beer with himself on an adventure :D He just plays him the same way, when he was drunk last time, even if he did not drank last few sessions any alcohol :D Others just have to hold him at short leash, so he does not anger some NPCs and that already made few nice roleplays :D

Edited February 24, 2013 by Mamoulian War

[ravenshrike]

Rise, Council, and Second Darkness are all balanced runs that are easy to do. Kingmaker REQUIRES at least 2 players who like to play with the pen and paper equivalent of spreadsheets and are very good at doing basic math quickly in their head. Also is RP heavy unless you want to run it as a dungeon crawl especially as you get into the later books. Assuming you can do that it's loads of fun though.

[Mamoulian War]

Hmm Kingmaker might be little bit problematic then with my group yet, fast basic math is easy for my friends, but I am afraid I am only one with PnP spreadsheet enthusiasm We will see, but from what I have talked to them about various APs, they are liking the concept the most...

 

Second Darkness is something that hit my attention as a first, when browsing through Paizo web site, because I love the underground setting and Svirfneblins, were for some reason my all time favourite race in computer games...

 

But I am still little bit insecure about converting all of the DnD rules into Pathfinder... I never played PnP DnD before

[ravenshrike]

Yeah, that could be a problem. Definitely stick with Rise or Council then. As for SD http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2jmsh?Second-Darkness-Conversions-to-Pathfinder

 

That has all the enemies converted. I'm not entirely sure how balanced everything is since I've only played the first 2 books in 3.5.

 

The problem with kingmaker is that there is a LOT of time you're sitting around running the city and kingdom, especially between books 2 and 3. It took us 3 play sessions to go from one to the other and even then we fudged a lot of the process as 2 of our cities are carbon copies of our capital city. Not to mention it's ridiculously broken in terms of wealth by level as per the rules unless your players are mature enough not withdraw 1-4000gp every month(I gamed it in my head for ****s and giggles and once you hit the 4th or 5th kingdom level you can do so without any real penalty by building at least one house in every city every month) and there are at minimum 3 years of kingdom building between books 2 and 3.

[ravenshrike]

Soo, apparently I'm not allowed to edit older posts. Annoying. Anyway, one more thing I'd like to add about Kingmaker is from what I've seen as a player either players will plan properly for their cities/kingdom and have no trouble running it(By the time we hit a dukedom all our rolls were roll 1 or succeed) or they will be perpetually bankrupt.

[Raithe]

The other flip side of Kingmaker is that you'll probably have to make houserules over the population numbers. Otherwise.. after about 3 or 4 years of kingdom building, you will have a ridiculous population compared to the rest of the River Kingdoms.

[Mamoulian War]

Thank you for all the advices...

 

I think, that after we get little bit more comfortable with the games and get at least level 5-7, after playing various PFS scenarios, I will slowly move to Rise of the Runelords...

 

And another advice needed How do you handle the situation, when you have new players, and they do not know some rules, which they have to use for successfully solve the situation at hand or quest? My players are not really good at knowing Combat Maneuver rules for example, and in last scenario we played it was essential to solve the situation by the book with Sunder Combat maneuver, which no one had a clue about And my improvisation skills are still not good when it comes to bending some rules to better fit the situation :/

[Raithe]

I'd say make a short list of a bunch of the special combat maneuvers that are above/beyond the simple hack and slash.

Ie - Trip, Sunder, Disarm, etc..  with a couple of notes jotting down what they do, and the basic rules. 

 

Make sure your players have a copy and award a little exra xp if they use them with appropriately fluffy roleplaying descriptions for the combat.... Or for using them in appropriate ways. It's a way to encourage them to think beyond just "roll to hit and damage" , especially if it turns combat into something a bit more tactical.

[ravenshrike]

Be glad you're running PF. The special attack rules, ESPECIALLY grappling, were horrendously complicated in 3.5. They managed to simplify them quite a bit. Also, these condition cards are VERY useful if you have players/enemies that constantly cause debuffs and or grappling. Also the flowchart here is useful in case of a player who grapples constantly. Hell, that whole website's useful.

[Fionavar]

Heya all,


How great to see a rich PFRPG conversatin unfolding! Thought I would let you know we are now finishing the triliogy that started with Crypt of the Everflame. Next stop for our merry band, The Slumbering Tsar Trilogy!

[redneckdevil]

thanks fionavar for that link.

I do have a question about recommendations though, what premade adventures do yal recommend for people who like to rp and battle, but not so much managing businesses/towns/kingdoms/etc etc.

So far I have rise of the runelords and carrion crown, hut ive looked over the other pathfinder adventures and see,alot of,people saying quite a bit of them lose steam etc. anyone recommend any good pathfinder or even dnd premade adventures?

[Raithe]

Curse of the Crimson Throne doesn't have much in the way of resource management, during the last stage the GM has to keep track of a running tally of points depending on what the pc's do.

 

Although a lot of the Adventure Paths have that feature in the final stages. Various encounters award/take away tally points depending on their actions, and then an overall "feel/result" depends on what the score is. ie: 1-3 the pc's won, but the town was pretty wrecked, 4-5, they won, there was moderate disruption, people aren't that happy with the pcs, 6-8, x section was destroyed but the rest was saved... (you get the idea, but that's not resource management)

 

The Serpents Skull has a lot of plunder and combat. It's very much pulp serial, archaeologist adventure, lost city, ancient evil, etc etc.

 

Jade Regent has an extended journey, leading to a mix  of combat and roleplaying to build allies before grand finale sequence, but has some minor "management" of a trade caravan during the early parts of it.

 

Kingmaker is pretty much the one thats seriously management of assorted things, so that would be one to skip if you don't like that.

 

Legacy of Fire has the interesting arabian nights feel to it. Lots of genies based elements and plots, mysterious magics, strange locales and the like.

I think the end of part 1 and some of part 2 has a few elements of resource managent (pc's helping recover a trading outpost as part of the plot), but thats more background then major and the story soon sweeps you out beyond that.

[redneckdevil]

Ty ill have to check these out then.

[Fionavar]

For Resource management the new Lone Wolf software - Realm - is looking most shiny! For now, I use Hero Lab and an excel db ...

[Mamoulian War]

Be glad you're running PF. The special attack rules, ESPECIALLY grappling, were horrendously complicated in 3.5. They managed to simplify them quite a bit. Also, these condition cards are VERY useful if you have players/enemies that constantly cause debuffs and or grappling. Also the flowchart here is useful in case of a player who grapples constantly. Hell, that whole website's useful.

 

 

I am frequent visitor of d20pfsrd website, and I have it opened on my notebook during our sessions as well, fastest method to search for some rules, when none of us is realy sure about some rules we need to incorporate into the game

 

What kind of gamemastery cards are most helpful or you are people using for easier flow of the adventures?

[Fionavar]

I would completely echo Mamoulian War's experience. That site is awesome. With our group of 6-8 gaming here each week, the bandwidth is goo to have

[Fionavar]

In respect to cards, here's what we're using fwiiw:

 

• Buff Deck: http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9z?Pathfinder-Roleplaying-Game-Buff-Deck
• Conditions Deck: http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9f?GameMastery-Condition-Cards
• Critical Fumble Deck: http://paizo.com/products/btpy8x9g?GameMastery-Critical-Fumble-Deck
• Critical Hit Deck: http://paizo.com/products/btpy872f?GameMastery-Critical-Hit-Deck

[rjshae]

I've got a ton of old D&D material (magic, creatures, lore) and I'm contemplating starting up again with Pathfinder. Can somebody relate how hard it is to port between the two? I'd like to find out if the task is hopeless before investing heavily. Thanks.

[Fionavar]

What edition of D&D stuff rjshae?

[rjshae]

What edition of D&D stuff rjshae?

 

3.5e

[Fionavar]

This is a free OGL resource form Paizo that should help: http://paizo.com/products/btpy89m6?Pathfinder-Roleplaying-Game-Conversion-Guide

[rjshae]

This is a free OGL resource form Paizo that should help: http://paizo.com/products/btpy89m6?Pathfinder-Roleplaying-Game-Conversion-Guide

 

Aye? Okay, thanks, I'll give it a perusal.

[Mamoulian War]

I never played DnD before, but I tried to convert few free adventures to PF rules...

 

For almost monsters from DnD Monster Manual, you almost easily find same monster or equivalent, in PF Bestiaries... So this is very fast procedure...

 

But first two unique monsters were for me about 2 hours each converting the stat blocks... Last time, when I was doublechecking if I did not any mistakes after playing few sessions and becoming more fond of the rules, it is about 10-20 mins for full conversion of unique monster, depending on Template used etc etc...

[Fionavar]

As well, somet of the classic D&D modules have been convertedby others if you look around